Emily's Reasons Why Not Page 16

  “We just love you and want you to be happy,” Grace says.

  “And if he breaks your heart, AAAGAAIINN, we’re here for you.” Reilly holds up her beer. “To baseball, Em’s favorite new pastime.” We all tap plastic Dodger cups together.

  The girls dropped me at Reese’s hotel, where I had conveniently left my truck. I wait outside near the valet stand, watching the team bus pull up to the Ritz-Carlton. Reese walks off and heads into the hotel without seeing me. I give him a slight whistle and he turns, grins, and heads my way. “You wanna get a beer?” he says.

  “No. I just wanted to say thanks for the tickets.” I nod at the valet, who runs to get my truck.

  “You’re going? Why? C’mon, have a beer with me.”

  I shake my head with an “I don’t think so” look as the Rover rounds the driveway.

  “I just really wanted to say thanks and well, it was great seeing you.” The valet holds open the driver’s-side door as Reese walks around to tip him for me, but then he gets in. I stand dumbfounded for a minute. The valet rushes around the front of the truck and opens the passenger-side door, but not before giving me a wink. I sigh and climb into the truck.

  “Let’s go home,” he says.

  That night in my bed Reese and I make sweet, sweet love. He treats me like I am a Dairy Queen soft-serve on a hot summer day. “You know,” he says after leaving me trembling, “I’m not going anywhere, promise.” With the candlelight dancing off my red velvet drapes and Sam asleep on his cozy blanket on the floor, life seems perfect lying in Reese’s arms.

  We kiss and kiss and kiss, and you know what? I believe in him, in me, and in us. Everything just falls into place like they say it does when you meet the right guy. And for the first time I’m not scared of him hurting me.

  He leaves on that Thursday morning for Chicago and then it was the All-Star break and he was going home to Arizona. We’re going home to Arizona.

  The Western stars are aligned and we can actually spend some quality down time watching the purple, yellow, and pink sunsets over the blooming floor of the desert. I couldn’t wait to be in his house. I couldn’t wait for him to meet my family. I feel like I am bursting from every corner.

  We rent a car at the airport and arrive around 6:00 P.M. at his house, which is sweet and not too big, yet big enough. It’s decorated nicely, yet could use a woman’s touch. That night we head to Albertson’s and push a grocery cart together. I know it sounds small, but it is the small things that I have been longing for in my life. Each aisle is a new discovery about one another.

  He likes Frosted Mini-Wheats, I like Frosted Mini-Wheats. He likes Almond Joys, I like Almond Joys. I like skim milk, he likes 2 percent. Okay, you can’t win them all. But actually doing something this ritualistic, coming home, putting the food away, is a dream come true. Reese is BBQing his “famous” pork chops and I am actually making my scrumptious apple pie. I feel, well, I don’t know. Domestic.

  After dinner we lay in his oversized king bed watching Forrest Gump. He looks at me and does his best Gump impression.

  “Emily and I are like peeeas and carrooots. She’s my best friend. She’s my only friend.” My heart officially opened.

  We made love that night with his French doors open and a warm summer breeze blowing in after a thunderous monsoon. It smelled like him and me and the desert after the rain, which is beautiful and completely reminiscent of home for me.

  7:45 A.M. and Reese heads to the batting cages before it gets too hot to hit a few. He kisses me as I roll over in a sleepy haze and says he’ll be back at 9:00 A.M. with breakfast and coffee.

  I hear the door slam, jump up, and look at my tired face in the mirror. MUST FIX. I jump in the shower, shave, loofah, and slather. Blow-dry, light makeup, new jammies, and back into bed. Ah, must appear to be perfect woman for perfect man. I look at the phone, wanting to call Dr. D. to prove my point, that Reese isn’t a complete dick, that maybe it can work. But will it? Okay, I also want to get a little perspective and may have been a little harsh on him in my last session. Why am I compelled to call Dr. D.?

  I dial. Big mistake. I begin to explain my revelation of the smell of the desert and shopping for Frosted Mini-Wheats, but I am subtly reminded by Dr. D. of Reese’s failures in the past. Failure to commit. Failure to open his heart, other than to baseball. Failure to love me more than himself. He tells me to go back to easy-breezy girl. Throw on the brakes. Keep my heart in check. And right when I want to hang up on him, Dr. D.’s tone changes to almost, well, warm …and he finishes with, “Just give it just a little more time to let him prove that he is worthy of someone as special as you, Emily.”

  I hang up thoroughly confused. Luckily, I am saved. Reese is back with Starbucks and Krispy Kremes in hand …

  Damn Dr. D. What does he know, other than the fact that I am special? Hmmm. But the damage of Dr. D.’s words is done. That night after going to dinner at Jillys and shooting pool, Reese and I lay in bed watching the All-Star game. He’s still slightly annoyed that he wasn’t picked, but he hasn’t had the best season due to a shoulder injury in spring training. As I lay there listening to the perils of baseball, I get to thinking, Maybe Dr. D. was right. I’m not listening to my own reasons. Maybe I need to slow down. Maybe for once in my life I need to breathe. To be just slightly more objective, protective, and just a little less willing.

  So I did. And like a wash of bravery, I remember how I felt when I left Reese’s apartment in San Diego a year and half ago. It didn’t make me mad at him. It didn’t make me bitter. It just gave me the slightest inner edge. A freakin’ miracle. For the first time in my life I put it all in perspective and pulled the emergency brake. I was learning.

  But Reese knew. He sensed the smallest glimmer of protection. Just the slightest hint of guardedness, as if somehow I had moved the outfield wall just out of home run reach … he was going to have NO part of this. We lay there kissing.

  “What’s wrong with you?” he says as he delicately brushes the hair off my face.

  I roll off of him and lay to the side.

  “Nothing, everything is good, really good.”

  “I know you and something’s up.”

  Reason #4: Never listen to a man who says he “knows you” when he doesn’t. He knows what he wants to know.

  I want to believe he can see into my soul, but you know what, he can’t. He has no idea of the tears I have shed. The days spent wanting to call. The hours spent in therapy trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with me.

  “I think we should talk,” Reese says with all seriousness in his eyes.

  See, I knew it was coming the … “talk,” which is never a good talk …particularly when the man initiates the talk.

  “What is it that you want from this?” Reese says, not giving away any idea of what my answer should be.

  “I don’t know. I am just taking it one day at a time. Easy-breezy.”

  “That’s not going to work for us,” he says, propping up on his elbows and flipping off the game.

  NOTE: He turned OFF the game.

  “If there is anything I learned in the last year, it is that we need to give it our all. I mean, I am not quite sure where it will take us and I’m not making any promises, but I know I don’t want to be with anyone but you and I don’t want to worry that you are back in L.A. with anyone else. I just think we need to be committed to trying this.”

  Did he just say “committed”?

  The man whom I longed to commit to. The man who juggles the hearts of five women in five different states. Can he change? Has he changed? All questions to save for therapy.

  “What’s changed, Reese? I mean, I am okay with this now, but how do I know that in a couple of months when the honeymoon period is over you won’t be gone?”

  It’s an honest question.

  “I’ve changed. I wasn’t ready. I am now. I know what I want, and it’s you.” He kisses me gently.

  “There are no other women right now that I
need to know about? No one you’ve been dating, chitchatting with, e-mailing? ‘Cause let’s just talk about it now,” I say as if opening Pandora’s box.

  “No one. There’s no one but you.”

  I am not sure at what point I believed him. But I did. He had so much honesty, sincerity, goodness.

  “Trickery,” Grace says, packing boxes in my kitchen. “It’s Trickery 101.” Grace, Reilly, and I wrap my dishes in newspaper as Josh comes through the door with two bottles of champagne. “Where’s the new homeowner? Congrats on the new beach casa, Kitten.” He hugs me.

  “Thanks. Remind me of that when I am taking two Xanax a night to stop the anxiety of being a small-business owner with a mortgage. Jesus, renting and working for ‘the man’ was so much less worry.”

  “But so much less money and fun,” he says, popping the cork. “So what were you dollies chatting about?”

  “Can a leopard change his spots?” Reilly says, taking a glass of champagne and lighting a cigarette.

  “Whose kitty are we talking about?”

  “Reese Callahan. AKA RC Cola … not even Coke or Pepsi, but RC imitation Cola …” Grace says.

  “No fucking way,” he shoots back to her.

  “Why can’t we talk about Reilly’s wedding or something? For fuck’s sake, she’s marrying a Frenchman,” I pipe in, knowing good and well he isn’t French.

  “Belgium,” she snarls. “Look, don’t be bitter at me.”

  “Em, how come you have short-term memory loss when it comes to this guy? He’s just telling you what you want to hear,” Grace continues. “I want to be happy for you. I am. I just feel like I’m watching you make a huge mistake.” She turns to Josh. “Emily and RC had the talk.”

  “Look, I wasn’t the one who asked for ‘the talk.’ I wasn’t the one who wanted to be committed, monogamous. He’s different. He’s more grown up. He’s learned.” I plead with my friends to understand and support my decision.

  “I don’t know. I would just be suspicious with this one. I mean, you already know he is a master manipulator,” Josh adds with a hint of venom. “The guy has two cell phones.”

  He looks at me and then says with his “I love you” voice, “I think what the girls are trying to say is, just be careful.”

  I try to explain how he changed, but they’re not buying it. I am just glad to have them to help me pack up the house.

  There is something safe about these three people in my life that makes me feel lucky, as if they’ve always been a part of me and always will be.

  Careful. Careful. Those words ring in my head as I board Mid-West Express headed to Milwaukee for a Brewers game. Careful is with me when I check my bags on United to see Reese in Colorado, on Delta in Chicago, then St. Louis. Careful never leaves me as my frequent-flyer mileage grows like the Reese batting average. Every week, a new city. Every week Reese sends me a new ticket. Between trips we talk twice a day. Like clockwork, he calls on his way to the field, he calls on his way home to his apartment. We talk before bed. We talk all day. And sometimes we fight. Not bad. Just little disagreements that usually end with Reese saying something perfect like, “Honey, we’re going to disagree. It’s okay. It’s not the end of the world.”

  Heaven. I am in heaven. We are a match and I have found the man I want to marry. His love of kids, family, ethics, Arizona, sports, humor, music. All of it. But it’s only been eight months. Too busy traveling to the games, hanging out in the off-season, and being happy—to see Dr. D. I feel good, finally. Maybe I am cured. Safe. I trust again. Wasn’t that the plan? Nothing that I thought would be possible with a professional athlete has become my reality. It just goes to show you that timing is everything.

  But, I will say, the being-apart thing has gotten harder. The constant ache when he walks away. Even now, I get the slightest empty twinge. It fills me with the torture that maybe, just maybe, he won’t come back. But he always does … and there are kisses. More kisses. Reassurance. Kind words. Hugs. Laughs. More kisses. And desperate gaps of time in between.

  Dr. D. is pissed. Really pissed that I haven’t been to see him in six months and thirteen days. I went to see him this morning as a checkup and do you know what he said? “Emily, you’ve picked a man who by nature pushes every scared little girl button you have. You have picked a man who leaves you every week. He was home for all of four months and now he’s off, leaving you again. He LEAVES you. Leaves you. Leaves you. And you can’t even blame him, it is his job. But, he’s still leaving you.” He shook his head. “Not good. We had just gotten past the whole abandonment issue lying under your murky past. Don’t you see it? Reese feels familiar and familiar is comfortable, but sometimes familiar is bad for us. You have now traded your major league father issues for a major league baseball player.”

  Reason #5: If he’s always leaving, he has to go.

  Dr. D. was right. He was always leaving and it did feel familiar, but can we really pick and choose the people we fall in love with? For me, no. It’s all about the flutter, the feeling, the knowing, the passion, the happily ever after. And Reese fits that bill. Would it be better if he was a lawyer or a sales guy or a fireman, sure, but the fact that he had a dream and he was living it was so awesome. It said something about his character. So I was willing to put my own issues aside to love this man.

  IN A PICKLE …between what is right for me and what feels good for me. Caught like a runner between third and home. Knowing that I need to pick and make a run for it. But which way is really home for me? Because if I am smart enough to know I have issues, I probably shouldn’t be dating someone who pushes those buttons. At some point wouldn’t he leave me for good?

  Issues are important. Issues are what you’ve learned along the way. For me the whole absent father thing is huge. It’s always there. Wondering why he left. Wondering when he’s coming back. Waiting, forgiving. This is my issue. It’s what makes me comfortable in my own skin. It’s what makes me NOT make the mistakes I have made before. It is experience, knowledge of self, and, if nothing more, it is thousands of dollars of therapy and countless hours of conversations with the friends who helped me figure them out. Why am I ignoring my issues?

  “Hey, I love you,” Reese says. I choke on a piece of ice and practically fall off the hotel bathroom sink. He looks at me with shaving cream all over his face. I sit there, my legs dangling off the counter, my back against the mirror, just staring at him. HE SAID IT!

  I felt the tears filling, something inside of me that moved deep down because I had finally found someone who really loved me. I took his lathered face in my hands and kissed him, through our kisses I whispered that I’d loved him since the first day he smiled at me. And I meant it.

  I wasn’t sure when exactly those three little words changed everything, but they did. Reese left for Atlanta and I went home to L.A. Our relationship had changed into something more, but I didn’t know what.

  In my new house in Manhattan Beach.

  …the house is on a friendly walk street exactly eleven houses up from the sand. The navy trim gives the white wooded house a nautical, old beach house flavor, with a white picket fence that surrounds a little grassy area and patio. It has two bedrooms and a den. Two bathrooms and a sweet family room and dining room. It needs a new kitchen but has great wood floors and a working washer and dryer that just got delivered from Sears. Currently, I am still surrounded by wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling cardboard U-Haul boxes. Between the travel with Reese and trying to keep my little company running, it seems the home life is still in disarray. Sam has managed to maneuver around the new beach casa pretty well. His hips are still sore but I am more concerned with the lump that we had a biopsy on last week. The vet said it didn’t look good, but as long as he is still eating, the meds should keep him comfortable. When I am away he is well loved at Grace’s house. When I am home, he stays pretty much glued to my side. I think the boxes have given him anxiety. Must unpack!

  I hear the phone ring. I see the cord on the floor and
follow it along hoping to find the handset. I kick a box out of the way. It’s on the third ring. At four I know it goes to voice mail, but I reach it. “Hello?” There’s no one there. I missed it. I wait a second for a message to register and call my voice mail. Instead, “You have no messages.” I knew the moment I heard the call that it was my Reese. I knew by the second ring that there was no way I was going to get to that phone on time. By ring three I realized that a call at eight o’clock at night during a game could not be good news.

  Why isn’t the ugly automated message that’s on every personal voice mail telling them they have no messages more friendly and apologetic? And why doesn’t it have some self-affirmation at the end like, “But that doesn’t mean you’re not special”?

  The phone rings again. “Hello? Hello?” I answer and stand motionless, listening to Reese.

  “W … w … wait,” I stop him. “What does that mean? Torn rotator cuff?”

  “It means I jumped in the air for a line drive with a man on third and came down on what’s left of my arm. I made the play, but now I’m fucked! Done. It’s over. My season, maybe my career,” he says in a scary tone that I have never heard before.

  Reason #6: When things go bad you see the real man.

  “I’ll come there,” I say obviously.

  “I am flying to Vail tomorrow to see a specialist and to prep for surgery on Friday,” he kinda barks at me.

  “Okay, well, I’ll fly to Vail.”

  “Emily, no. I’ll call you when I get there.”

  I ease back in my chair, staring at a framed photo of the two of us in Phoenix, on top of an unpacked box, somehow knowing immediately that something has changed. And it is more than a rotator cuff. It has something to do with the fact that I had now been put back on the shelf with the other less important stuff.

  I wonder why it is that if I stub my toe, I want him to put a Band-Aid on it. If I’m feeling sad, he can make me feel better. Why is it when men are at their weakest, they don’t want us to help them? Does an injury or a flaw in the armor somehow make them think that we will love them less? Or is it that, like an injured bear, they just retreat into their cave and lick their wounds? Either way, I’m alone and knowing something’s different. At least his pain was tangible.