Nerd Girl (33 page)

We were at Ryan’s house tonight. We had just finished our meal of salmon accompanied by a delicious lemon arugula pasta salad, thanks to the Barefoot Contessa, when Ryan’s mom called.

I proceeded to clear the table, trying to keep myself busy and out of the way. I wasn’t eavesdropping, but I looked up when I heard the tension in his voice.

“This really isn’t a good time, Mom,” Ryan said somewhat tersely. He glanced quickly over at me to see if I was listening, catching my eye but then looking away.

Were they talking about me?

“I’m heading to the San Juans tomorrow.” He paused as his mother spoke. “Yes, on the boat.”

I couldn’t help noticing that he made it sound like only he was going to the San Juans alone.

“I’m meeting my real estate agent on Friday to look at a couple of new properties.” There was another pause on his end. “No, I’m not going alone.”

I tried to focus on rinsing and loading the dishes into the dishwasher, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out that Ryan and his mom were having a delicate discussion about the recent personal changes in his life. I looked up when I heard the sliding door to the deck open and then close. I suspected he went out there to get some privacy. His back was facing the window, so I was unable to see his facial expressions. However, I could tell from the stiffness of his back and the way he was gripping the phone that the discussion was getting contentious.

Of course, after seven years of being a couple, not to mention having grown up together before that, his family obviously knew Catherine well. It had never occurred to me, how tough their breakup might be for the shared people in their lives. I had so many questions about Ryan and Catherine’s past. How many of their close family and friends knew about their breakup? Who were their shared friends? Would I meet some of them soon? How awkward would it be to have Ryan introduce me to them, especially if they were also good friends with Catherine? Would they talk about me and then report back to Catherine? They were engaged, for Christ’s sake. My presence in Ryan’s life would surely be a shock to some, if not all.

After Andrew and I broke up, I had very little contact with his friends. This went both ways. Ethan and Andrew had gotten close, but after our relationship ended, they hadn’t seen each other since, or at least that I was aware of. Andrew certainly hadn’t come to Ethan’s wedding. As for those couples that we had both been friends with, I hadn’t made much of an effort to keep in touch. That was more my fault than theirs, though. Some of my girlfriends had reached out to me to see how I was doing, but I rarely returned their requests to get together.

I did have lunch last month with my friend Christine. Her boyfriend, Daren, was one of Andrew’s college buddies. Andrew and I had introduced the two of them. Christine had met Andrew’s now fiancé, but she was cautious about giving me too much information, in case it might hurt me. I doubted I would be seeing much more of Daren, but I did hope Christine and I could keep in touch. I knew it would be less frequent, though, because that’s just the way things worked. When you weren’t part of a couple anymore, your whole social network shifted to accommodate. Friends were usually lost in the process. In all likelihood, Ryan would lose some friendships as a result of our relationship, too.

Friends were one thing, but I couldn’t help wondering if Ryan’s family would resent me. My mom had been upset when Andrew and I had broken up. My parents liked him, and they were saddened by the loss of him as a potential son-in-law. Three years of knowing someone because he dated your daughter didn’t compare to someone who dated your son for two-thirds of a decade and grew up with your children.

I bet that Catherine and Ryan’s sister, Lauren, were close. They were probably best friends. No wonder Ryan had to be so sure that breaking up with Catherine was really what he wanted. If I felt that Ryan had turned my life upside down, I could only imagine what I’d done to his.

These last few days with Ryan had been wonderful. With the exception of last night and time spent at work, Ryan and I spent every moment together and I was looking forward to spending the next four glorious days with him. However, I recognized that there was little outside influence in any of the time we had spent together; we had created our own little happy corner of the universe. If life could continue like this, I wouldn’t complain, but I knew the reality of life would face us next week. This conversation with his mom was just a small flavor of what we were in for.

Until now, I hadn’t thought about how our relationship was going to be perceived by his family and friends. I realized now that Catherine may always be in the picture, but had very little knowledge or understanding of
how much
. I was hesitant to ask Ryan, since I didn’t want to come off as an annoying, jealous girlfriend. It killed me, though, to know that people would always be comparing me to Catherine and that Ryan would have to defend and explain his new relationship with me. People were going to assume the worst. Would they think badly of me? Or Ryan? Or both of us? From the tone of his phone conversation with his mother, I could only conclude that she disapproved of his actions.

Ryan came back inside, looking distracted. “Sorry about that,” he said.

“Is everything okay?” I asked with concern.

Ryan took a deep breath and ran his fingers through his hair. “My mom just spoke to Catherine.”

“Oh,” I tried to sound surprised. “So she knows then about you guys breaking up?”

“She does now, yes.” He looked up at me guiltily. “I hadn’t told her, but she called Catherine about something and Catherine gave her the CliffsNotes version.”

My fears were warranted. Ryan’s family and Catherine were very close, close enough that they called one another regularly. His mom had no reason to think anything was wrong or anything had changed between Ryan and Catherine. Until now.

“Does she know about me?” I asked cautiously.

“Yes, I just told her.” Ryan looked irritated. He saw my hesitation and his face softened from frustration to gentle concern. He walked up to me, placing his hands around my waist. “Jules, this isn’t something I want you to worry about, okay? My mom will get over it. I won’t lie to you and say that she isn’t upset about Catherine and me, but that doesn’t mean she won’t come to love you like I do.” He crinkled his eyebrows like he was debating whether or not to say something more. He then blew out a long breath as if the topic was exhausting for him. “At the end of the day, I’m her son and she ultimately wants me to make the choices that will make
me
happy, not her or anyone else.”

I noticed he called me “Jules” for the first time. I liked it because it sounded intimate. Only the people closest to me called me Jules. I snuggled in closer to him, playing with the top buttons of his shirt. I thought about his reply to my question; despite the strength of his argument, something still bothered me. It had been a week since he had broken it off with Catherine. Why hadn’t he told anyone?

Unable to share what was truly bothering me, I looked away and tried to shrug it off. “I get it. There’s a long history with your family and Catherine. I’m okay. I understand that your mom and Catherine were close. I can deal with it.”

Ryan tilted my chin up, forcing me to look him in the eye. He didn’t look convinced and gave me a quizzical gaze.

I sighed heavily and decided to confess to him what was really bothering me. “I guess I’m just wondering why you waited to tell her. I mean, breaking off your engagement is a pretty big deal. Were you afraid of what she or others might think of me? Of us being together? She disapproves, doesn’t she?”

His eyes widened, surprised by my comment. He then gave me a thoughtful, hard look. “No. She has no reason to disapprove of you. Any dishonesty was done on my part, not yours. She won’t judge you like that. It’s me she’s disappointed with.” His mouth creased into a tight line. “She just needs some time to adjust.”

In an attempt to reassure me, he tilted my chin up with his fingers and bent down to kiss me. Kissing him was all-consuming, so it distracted me from thinking about anything other than his lips and his tongue. I kissed him back with fervor. For the time being, I pushed all my questions and insecurities to the back of my mind and focused wholeheartedly on the task at hand.

Our kiss continued and I slipped my hands under his shirt to feel his hard abs, my hands greedily exploring his chest and stomach. He placed his hands on my hips and lifted me up onto the countertop, wrapping my legs around his waist to secure him there. He pulled me into him as close as possible, molding every part of my body into his. My nipples, even under my shirt and bra, went taut and I could feel his excitement press into my stomach. Unexpectedly, though, he pulled away and stopped kissing me, leaning his forehead in so that it was touching mine. We were both breathing heavily and I was unhappy he had pulled his lips away. I pouted, wanting his warm, sensuous mouth back on mine, but he held steady and gazed at me with quiet intensity. He wanted to say something.

“Julia, this is happening between you and me. From the moment I saw you, I wanted you; more than I’ve wanted anyone or anything in my life. You don’t have to worry about what anyone else thinks about us. You only need to know how I feel. I’ve fallen crazily in love with you.
You
are everything I want and I am completely at your mercy. “

My heart pounded in my chest and my breath hitched. He kissed me thoroughly, full of tenderness, passion, love and reverence. Ryan took my breath away. This must be what they meant when they talked about making a woman swoon. If I had been standing, I would’ve been a wobbling mess of Jell-o.

He finally released me and lifted me down onto my feet. I was breathless and my whole body trembled from the intensity of his kiss and his words. He took my hand and led me upstairs to his bedroom, where he proceeded to make love to me with the same tenderness, passion, love and reverence as his all-consuming kiss.

Ryan and Catherine’s history could wait. The rest of the world could wait. Ryan was all mine; at least for the next four days.

It’s been five years since the last time I visited the San Juan Islands. I went with a college girlfriend of mine who wanted to have a girls-only weekend. We thought it would be fun to go bike riding on the island. Why I thought that that would be fun, I had no idea. I suspected it was the naiveté and ambition of youth. The longest distance I had ever biked before was about ten miles on the very flat Burke Gilman trail near the university. I wasn’t prepared for the twenty mile torturefest that had since prevented me from ever riding on another bike.

Besides recuperating from the bike ride from hell, my memories of that trip were mostly of my friend complaining about her significant other. I tried to lend a supportive ear, but by the end of the weekend, I couldn’t blame her boyfriend for wanting to spend more time alone.

We had stayed at a bed and breakfast in Friday Harbor, a quaint little town located on the south end of the island populated with gift shops, seafood restaurants, and plenty of other romantic bed and breakfast establishments, all lined with potted red geraniums on their windowsills. The town was tiny, only about three or four square blocks in each direction. I remembered thinking, back then, how romantic it would be to come here sometime with a boyfriend. I had imagined strolling the few blocks along the waterfront, walking hand in hand, watching the ferries roll in and eating ice cream. If we were lucky, we would sleep on our boat that we had sailed from Seattle. If we didn’t have a boat, we would stay in one of those cute bed and breakfast spots, drinking coffee on the deck overlooking the harbor after having just made love.

So, in a way, my plans for the weekend with Ryan were sort of a little fantasy come true. Sometimes I had to pinch myself. Ryan and I were happening so quickly that I hadn’t really had time to process it all.

As I followed Ryan along one of the docks in the Elliott Bay Marina, we finally stopped at what looked to be to be a huge white boat. Actually, it fit more into the yacht category. Not that I was one to judge or anything, but this clearly was not a run of the mill sort of boat. This was a fancy boat and a big boat; bigger than any personal watercraft I’d ever been on. Ryan told me we would be staying on his boat for the duration of the trip. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I guess I thought we would have a pull out bed of some sort, a toilet and basic shower, and maybe a sink and hot pot; I thought it would be more like camping. This was no little camper on the water—it was a full-fledged, floating luxury home. I noticed the name of the boat was painted on the rear. It made me smile.
Dawg House
.

I was still staring at the yacht, which seemed like a more appropriate description, amazed that this was where I would be living for the next several days, when I heard Ryan ask, “Can you pass me the grocery bags?”

I followed him into the main cabin and then further into the kitchen area, placing one of the bags on top of the counter. I looked around with excitement; I was dying to inspect all the cabin compartments.