Yes, delivery van. In our haste to make real estate history with the fastest decision ever, we both forgot about my commute into the city. Sure, I could take the ferry, but I hadn’t had a chance to figure out the ferry schedule. And I no longer had access to Jillian’s very sporty Mercedes. So I’d purloined the Jillian Designs delivery van, and was using that to drive over the bridge to my new address. As I pulled up in front of the old Victorian that I now called home, my lipsticks rolled around on the floor. I sighed heavily as I turned the ignition off, looking through the windshield at the house.
From the street, it still looked melancholy and a bit run down. I knew that was temporary. Perhaps I was feeling a bit run down? This day had taken it out of me, and I wanted nothing more than to explore my new home, take a hot shower, and crawl into bed.
A bed on the floor.
Shit, I didn’t care anymore. I just wanted a bed. As I shut the door to the van, it squeaked in a way reminiscent of Cory Weinstein’s bed as he jackrabbited his teeny peeny in a mind-numbingly (and hoohah-numbingly) way, and I flinched once more.
I slammed the door shut and walked up the steps. I could see Simon through the front picture window, moving boxes.
I felt my load begin to lighten. And something else begin to tighten. This was my new home, and I was sharing it with Simon.
Suddenly the crappy day disappeared. I couldn’t wait to get inside and make the sweet sweet love. And the nasty dirty love. And everything in between.
I opened the front door, looking past the mauve wallpaper and the Pepto pink carpet and the dingy baseboards and the fingerprinted doorjambs and all of our boxes, and saw my boyfriend. Tall and handsome, strong and lean. He turned when I came in, and shot me a devilish grin.
“Hey, babe.”
“Hey, yourself,” I answered back. I dropped my bags and started to walk across all that pink toward him.
“I waited to order some dinner till you got here. How does Thai sound to you?”
“Sounds great, you big, hot homeowner, you,” I purred, and he looked up from his take-out menus. He grinned as he watched me walk toward him, so I threw an extra bounce into my step.
“What’s got into you?”
“Nothing. Not yet, at least.” I winked. “Now, where’s that blow-up bed? Let’s christen this pile of bricks.”
I pulled him into me and kissed him deeply, winding my hands into his hair. He responded immediately, kissing me back urgently. I kissed along his jaw, along his cheekbones, drawing my tongue along his skin right where his neck met his shoulder. He always tasted amazing there.
He groaned into my ear. “Shit. I forgot to get the blow-up bed.”
“Whuh?” I said, my mouth full of neck and shoulder.
“Yeah, sorry. I was so busy with everything this afternoon, it totally slipped my mind.”
I pulled back and pulled my tongue back into my mouth. “So where are we going to sleep—aghh!” I danced away; something furry had brushed up against my legs. “What the hell was that?”
My mind instantly conjured a task force of mice determined to take the house back from the invading humans.
But it wasn’t mice. It was Clive. Wide eyed and bushy tailed. Now weaving himself in and out of my legs, saying hello to Mommy. I looked at him, then back up to Simon. Who had the decency to look the tiniest bit guilty.
“I couldn’t leave him there; they called him Clyde!”
It took me 120 seconds to fly around the house, closing each and every door to each and every room that had not been kitty proofed. And then another sixty seconds to unclench my fingernails from the inside of my palms.
I returned to the living room. Simon was showing Clive the coat closet.
“I can’t believe you, Simon,” I huffed, pushing past him to grab my bag from where I’d dropped it by the front door.
“Oh, come on, it’s not that big a deal.”
I whirled on him. “It is a big deal when this is something we’d already agreed on. I don’t have time tonight to run around this huge fucking house and make sure there’s nothing he can get into.”
“I think you might be overreacting here a little. He’s probably going to stick pretty close to us tonight. He’ll snuggle up just like he always does and—”
“Snuggle up with us where, Simon? In the blow-up bed we don’t have? Where the hell are we supposed to sleep tonight?”
Clive wisely retreated to the dining room, where he pretended to explore the window seat. He was totally listening to us.
“I forgot! It’s not the end of the world; I’ll run out and get one. No big deal,” he snapped, grabbing his jacket and starting for the door. I stepped into his way to stop him when I heard a rattling of glass. I turned around and saw Clive, halfway out the big window over the window seat.
“Clive!” I shouted, and he froze, half in and half out. I snatched him up and held him close, Simon right behind me. The original casement windows were rusty, covered in years of old putty, and had no screens. Simon jiggled the window, finally got it shut, and turned back to face me.
Tears were running down my face. Clive was like my child. And like any mother who just saw her child go halfway through a window, I was half scared, half furious, and totally relieved. Clive was an indoor cat through and through; he’d never been outside a day in his life. He’d only seen streets from the comfort and safety of a window ledge. With a real window between him and the streets—not this rickety death trap.