He patted the pockets of his huge rubber coat, then wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. “This uniform traps heat,” he said. “I’m burning up in here.” Then he walked away.
THAT NIGHT on the way to Weber’s apartment, I tried to trace the possible path of the news Weber had told Joel. The task was dizzying and crazy-making. I knew that for the sake of my sanity I should stop, but I couldn’t. I hadn’t done anything gossip-worthy in my entire life; I had managed very well to keep myself to myself. Now I could see all my control, all my highly prized privacy, spinning away from me like a ball of yarn.
Joel would tell Margaret. Margaret was the assistant to Mayor Carrelli and the best friend of the Bergen Record’s gossip columnist. My mother apparently had her hair cut by the mayor. The mayor could tell my mother and/or my father. Joel or Weber might tell one of the bar-tenders at the Green Trolley, which meant the entire town would know the news of my one stupid, thoughtless misstep.
I told myself that it was no big deal and that I was overreacting. For God’s sakes, Gracie’s entire life was made up of one-night stands that many people knew about and few people even thought less of her for. She had screwed up her entire life, which was not what I had done. But—I couldn’t help but think—I am not Gracie. I am stronger.
So in the end my common sense was unable to stop the train barreling along: This person will know, this person will know, this person will, too. In every possible direction I could see the small bomb-shaped truth headed right for the heart of my life. There seemed to be no point in stepping out of the way.
“Welcome back, Doc,” Weber said when I showed up. He didn’t seem surprised to see me. His bed was made and his apartment was a little neater than it had been the night before.
“We need a new deal,” I said.
“I think you should just loosen up and go with the flow, Doc. It’s a lot more fun.”
I was worn out, shivering, hung over from my hangover. “I’m not interested in having fun. I’m not here to have fun.”
“You seemed to have fun last night, Doc. Take off your coat, why don’t you. There you go. Sit down. Relax.”
I sat on the very edge of the bed.
“I had a really weird day,” I said. “It’s just twenty-four hours of insanity. I can accept that, but after tonight, the craziness will be over. Understood? I will go back to my normal life, and my normal self. We won’t see each other again.”
“I understand that you have control issues. I can help you with that. Loosening people up is one of my specialties.” Weber was grinning at me again. A big stupid, happy grin.
“Look,” I said, “I’m not here to argue with you. I’m not here to talk about my issues—”
He reached out and caught my right arm midair. I had been waving it to make my point. He held on to my wrist, and tiny shivers began to spread out from where his fingers pressed into my skin. “Of course you’re not here to talk,” he said. “You’ve got me for that.”
And he did talk, and I didn’t try to make him stop. His voice revved up as smoothly as a brand-new car and he was off and running. There was no chance for me to say a word. He talked about his job, about fighting fires, about the blazes he’d seen. I just stared at him while he talked about the heat on his skin, the way it felt running up stairs toward a force that wants to kill you. Weber talked all the way through our getting naked, all the way through our skin becoming slowly reacquainted—intertwined hands, then arms, then torsos pressed against each other, my breasts flattened, our legs spread, my cheek pressed against his. Still he kept talking. I stopped following what he was saying. I stopped listening and working and wondering. I just stopped, and it was a great relief. Only at the moment of orgasm, while Weber was deep inside of me, did the monologue cease for one long, shaking moment.
Then he pulled away and said, “Waka waka.” The phrase sounded vaguely familiar, and when I asked what it was, he told me it was the catchphrase of Fozzy Bear on The