“They’re just jealous. If the opportunity arises, go for it. That’s all I have to say.” She was totally amazed by everything he’d said, and she said nothing about it to Simon that night. It would have been too embarrassing, and he probably would have thought she was crazy and trying to put a move on him. Besides, she could tell he was still suffering over Megan. For a thousand reasons, Mark’s fantasy was never going to happen, but it was interesting to hear.
In the avalanche of stresses and challenges she dealt with every day, thanks to Zack, Susie, and a host of others, she forgot all about Mark’s comments, until the following weekend, when Simon was helping her clean out a closet to make more room for Salima’s things. Blaise still had all the toys she used to play with, and she wanted to get rid of them now to give her more space. She was on top of a ladder and teetering dangerously when she stretched too far in one direction, and Simon reached out to grab her and steady her, with a firm grasp around her waist. And he kept it there until she stepped down. As she came down the ladder, she stopped when she was eye to eye with him, and the world seemed to stand still around them. Neither of them said a word, but Blaise felt the same electric current run through her that had happened once before at the sink. She tried to tell herself it was her imagination, but this time she knew it wasn’t. And Simon didn’t take his eyes off hers, nor his hands from around her waist. She could feel him there, and for an instant she felt herself moving closer to him, and then he shifted his gaze, and helped her the rest of the way down the ladder. She had no idea what had just happened, and she was afraid to ask him. Maybe nothing had, and as she put all the old toys in boxes, she told herself she had imagined it. It was nothing. But a little voice inside her said something different. And when she looked at Simon, his eyes were guarded and he was busy.
They both pretended not to notice. And everything was back to normal when he cooked dinner that night. Salima had requested homemade pizza, and the ones he made were delicious, with a huge salad. He had baked apple crumble for dessert, made with sugar substitutes for Salima’s diet. He served it with homemade dietetic vanilla ice cream. He was a genius at making the foods she could eat and making them taste great. And as they chatted and joked after dinner, Blaise realized again how close they’d gotten, and how at ease they were with each other, and she remembered the moment in the closet that afternoon, and the question Mark had asked her earlier in the week, about being in love with him. She didn’t think she was, but maybe those two moments that felt like an electric current running through her had been some kind of fantasy of her own. And if that was true, it made her feel like an old fool, and maybe she was. Mark was right, he was very handsome. But she saw much more than that in Simon now. She saw the person he was, the kind heart, the good values, the honesty. It was his qualities she liked so much, not his looks. That was just icing on the cake. And it was a cake she didn’t plan to eat anyway.
As though to remind her of it, Megan called him when he was sitting in the kitchen with her that night, after Salima went to her room to use her computer and write to a friend from school. They communicated through Facebook, and Salima had a lot of fun with it. Thanks to the programs on her computer, she could do Facebook like anyone else, and she loved it.
Blaise could tell instantly from the look on Simon’s face who the call was from. He hadn’t been answering Megan’s e-mails, but he had told Blaise that once in a while he took her calls, usually late at night when he was in bed, and thinking about her anyway. He admitted that he missed her, and what he said about her sometimes reminded Blaise of how she had felt about Andrew Weyland at first, when she missed him so terribly, but knew she had done the right thing to break up with him. She had never doubted it, but she missed him anyway, and her illusions about him.
Simon looked pained the moment he took the call, and disappeared to his room with his cell phone in his hand, while Blaise sat quietly in the kitchen, thinking about that afternoon and what it meant. She was sure it was nothing, just a moment between two people who were alone. But they weren’t going to wind up with each other because of it. And Blaise wondered if he’d go back to Megan when they both went back to school. The pull between them seemed to be strong.
He came back five minutes later with an apologetic look. “Sorry. I told her she has to stop calling me. She calls every time he slaps her around. It drives me nuts. It’s why she wanted to leave him in the first place. I told her to go to Al-Anon and she won’t.”
“It’s okay,” Blaise said reassuringly. “You don’t owe me any explanations.” She could see how upset he was by the call. She wasn’t sure if that meant he still loved her, or was trying to escape and having a hard time. And Megan didn’t make it any easier by calling him all the time, just as Andrew had done. Megan was hanging on to him for dear life. But not dear enough to leave her husband.