The Woman in 3B - Eliza Lentzski Page 0,77

crayons from her mom-sized purse and dropped it onto the table. June and Peter reflexively reached for a handful each and began to solemnly draw on the back of their paper placemats.

My eyes darted between my niece and nephew and then back to my sister. “Don’t kids always have their faces pressed against some electronic screen?”

“Never at the table,” Dawn clipped. “They get an hour of screen time a day.”

“Wow. You really are Super Mom, aren’t you?” I couldn’t help remark.

Dawn’s mouth flattened. I felt fingernails bite into the top of my thigh, a silent under-the-table-warning from Anissa to behave.

The restaurant wasn’t busy so we didn’t have to wait long for our food to be delivered. Our waitress returned with two extra-large pizzas and a bowl of salad. Dawn took charge and began filling plates with slices of cheesy pizza and Italian salad. Cherry tomatoes rolled around on the plates.

“Is this okay?” I asked quietly while Dawn continued to serve the table. “Pizza two nights in a row?”

Anissa leaned her head closer to mine. “I hope you’re not preoccupied by the calories,” she replied. She spoke more quietly in a low voice meant only for my ears. “But if you are, I can give you a workout later.”

Her suggestive words had my cheeks burning. “I’m not worried about that,” I corrected. “I just don’t want you to be bored with the food.”

Or me and my vanilla family, I silently added.

“Alice, I eat most of my meals at airport food courts. This is practically gourmet.” She popped a crouton from her plated salad into her mouth for affect.

“So Anissa, are you a flight attendant, too?” my sister asked.

Oh, Lord, I thought. Here it comes.

Despite my cajoling, Anissa didn’t spend the night that evening. She didn’t have a business trip in the morning, but she was on call. Her work situation was very similar to mine. We had days off that were untouchable by our employer, but other days when we weren’t scheduled to travel we still needed to be able to get to the airport in case our services were needed.

She insisted on calling a Lyft, but I insisted more strongly on driving her back to Dearborn. When we arrived, I parked in front of her house and walked her to her front door. The safety precaution was unwarranted; it was a safe neighborhood—much more so than where I lived—but I wanted to delay our saying goodbye for as long as possible.

We stood on the front stoop together, holding hands. We’d spent a lot of time together recently. We’d even had sex. But the moment felt more important and significant than me simply dropping her off after a routine day.

She’d had the foresight to keep on the porch light or maybe it was on a timer. A moth fluttered stubbornly against the glass-enclosed lantern. I could hear its delicate wings tap against the glass. It would never reach the illusive heat source, and even if it did, it would be its own demise. Despite these obstacles, it tried again and again.

Anissa didn’t seem to notice the winged insect and I didn’t bother pointing it out to her, sure that she would scamper inside before I got a proper goodbye.

The question nearly got caught in my throat, but I needed to ask. “Can I see you again?”

A small smile played at the corner of her mouth. “On Wednesday?”

I couldn’t tell if she was teasing me, but my heart dropped nonetheless.

My face must have revealed my disappointment, because before I could mutter another convincing syllable, she was grabbing the sides of my face and kissing me deeply. A surprised noise tumbled up my throat, but she swallowed it down before it could escape.

There was no controlling her pace or pressure. It didn’t feel like she was kissing me; it felt like she was kissing through me. I held on to the front of her t-shirt—a shirt she’d borrowed from my closet—to keep from tipping over.

She pulled back from the kiss, leaving me panting. She continued to hold onto my face. Her caramel eyes stared hard into mine. “I would love to go out with you again.”

She said the words with conviction, like it was essential that I heard and believed her.

“Okay,” I happily sighed.

She released her grip on the sides of my face, but I could still feel her fingers like branding irons on my cheeks. “Call me when you’re done flying tomorrow.”

“I might not be able to wait that long,” I blurted