could watch a game and hold me, which was a pretty cool trick indeed.
“I’m getting shoulder pads,” I said on one occasion, when Shayla was sleeping in the armchair next to the window and Scott and I were in our usual places on the couch watching the Bears getting trounced again.
“Yeah?” He was only half with me. I’d discovered that the rise in testosterone caused by football had a direct relation to hearing loss. Go figure.
So I tried it again. I nuzzled his neck a little—because I was allowed to do that now that we were pursuing and all—and said in as husky a voice as I could muster, “Scott? I’m getting shoulder pads.”
I had his attention. And his confusion. “Planning on taking up football?”
“No, but look at those guys!” I was back to my own voice as I motioned toward the TV. “Their shoulder pads make their butts look tiny.”
“My girlfriend the athlete.”
“Your girlfriend the bored nonathlete who sits on the couch and watches games with you because she knows it makes you happy. Your girlfriend who has, however, been sitting on this couch too long tonight because her daughter is asleep in your armchair and should really be home in bed. Your girlfriend who still thinks it’s a little bit weird for adults in their midthirties to be using the term girlfriend when really this is just a game of if-you-pursue-me-I’ll-put-up-with-your-blasted-football-game.”
“You through?”
I thought about it. “Yup.”
“Good. For an English teacher, you sure use a lot of run-on sentences.”
“For a phys ed teacher, you sure do a lot of sitting on the couch.”
He raised an eyebrow at me. “Should we break up?”
“Sure—I have to go home anyway. Can we make up in the morning?”
“Sounds like a plan.” He got up and slipped into his coat. “I’ll carry Shay out to the car.”
“Thanks—I’ll wait here for your second run.”
“I’m not carrying you.”
“You couldn’t lift me anyway. I’ve got my first-performance bulge going on.”
“You’re not fat, Shelby.”
“My love handles have grown into a love steering wheel.”
“You’re not fat,” he said again, lifting a limp Shayla into his arms and arranging her against his shoulder. “But your lips should be a lot skinnier for all the flapping they do.”
Any talk about mouths or lips always got my brain thinking about kissing, and thinking about kissing always made my toes curl, so I put the thought out of my mind, what with having to walk out to the car and all. Curled toes made it ungainly.
I followed Scott outside and waited while he installed Shayla in her car seat. It was a lesson I’d learned only recently. It went something like this: wait for the cute guy to open your car door or he’ll get all huffy and make you get back out of the car so he can be a gentleman. Scott was trying to break me of my single-girl habits. When he got around to my door, he reached for the handle but didn’t open it right away.
“So are we going to talk about the kissing thing or just have a moment of panic every time it crosses our minds at the same time?”
I put on my Scarlett accent. “Why, Scott, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Flapping lips.”
My toes did the sighing thing. “Fine. Go ahead and talk about it, then.” I hated that I still went a little junior-high when I was out of my comfort zone.
“You want subtle or nonsubtle?”
“I want quick. Shayla’s freezing in the backseat.”
He glanced into the car where Shayla slept peacefully and warmly under the blanket Scott had wrapped around her. “She’s not complaining.”
“Okay, let’s go for subtle.”
He cleared his throat, and I thought I saw a bit of a blush working its way up his neck. “All right,” he said, “here’s the deal. I’ve known you for, what, six months now, and we’ve spent a lot of them being just-friends—which, by the way, was your idea.”
“Are you blushing?”
“Hush. I’m trying to be subtle.”
“Whatever.”
“But we’re not just just-friends anymore and . . .”
“All right, enough of subtle. I don’t have time for this. How ’bout you go for nonsubtle and get whatever this is over with?” There was an elf tap-dancing on my stomach and he was driving me nuts.
“Nonsubtle?”
“Please.”
“All right, here it is. I really, really want to kiss you, and if you don’t say no in the next three seconds, I’m going to do it.”