No Ordinary Bloke (17 page)

She walked inside the large room, looked around, and announced, “I don’t know what you mean. It looks fine to me.”

I noticed yesterday’s suit slumped over the desk chair and my undershirt crumpled on the floor by my suitcase. At least I didn’t have any dirty socks or boxers lying around. “Not too bad, I suppose.”

I opened the door to the bathroom. “Here you go. Take your time.”

“Thanks,” she said.

As I moved out of the way, she walked in and shut the door. Not wanting to be caught with my trousers down, especially after telling her she’d have peace and quiet, I quickly tore through my suitcase for a pair of shorts. In only a few minutes, I sat on one of the chairs in the sitting area by the window, wearing shorts and trainers and thumbing through that day’s
Wall Street Journal
.

When she came out of the bathroom, she smiled and placed her backpack on the credenza. I glanced only long enough to see she was wearing cut-offs that were just long enough to still be respectable. I began to have farm girl fantasies when I saw her freckled thighs so I went back to my paper and heard her say, “You read the
Journal
?”

“I read whatever newspaper is around.” I peered back up from the paper. “The
Journal
is fine, though the editorial section is a bit rightwing for me.”

“Me too.” She rolled her eyes. “As you can imagine, Trey thinks it’s gospel.”

“I’d think he is a rather conservative Republican.”

“We don’t talk politics that much because it makes me upset.”

“Probably best to leave it alone then.” I knew I wouldn’t want to discuss politics with old Trey. I grabbed a bottle of water by the bed. “Let’s raid the mini-bar, shall we?”

After loading up on snacks and drinks from the bar, we went downstairs where the doorman hailed us a taxi. The taxi driver drove like a mad man through the streets of San Francisco, which was frightening even to me because of the steep hills. Poor Allison looked terrified the whole time. The driver zoomed down one particularly giant hill at such a speed that the taxi actually bounced as we hit the bottom of the hill. “Dear God, we caught air on that one,” I said, as the driver drove on, paying no heed.

Because my head hit the ceiling of the taxi’s roof, it took me a minute to notice where Allison had placed her hand. She was gripping my thigh.

“Ahem,” I said, pretending to clear my throat. I nodded to her hand, which she recognized as her own and then withdrew, obviously embarrassed.

“It’s okay, love. You needed to hold on,” I said with a chuckle. And then for only a second, I poked her ivory thigh. “You have freckles.”

“I do.” She smiled, and after looking down, she poked my thigh in return. “It looks like you do, too.”

“I do. Everywhere.” I winked just in case she didn’t get it.

“Well now…” She placed her hand to her chest and looked away.

“Do you have freckles…everywhere?”

Her head snapped back toward me, her eyes on red alert. “Excuse me?”

“Based on what I’ve seen, I’m guessing you also have freckles everywhere.”

“I’m neither confirming nor denying that.”

“Oh, get off your high horse. You can just tell me.”

She pouted her lips in defeat. “Yes. I have them everywhere.”

“Thank you. You’ve given me enough material for a month of fantasies.”

“Happy to have helped,” she grumbled, though she was smiling.

“I’d like it better if you leant a hand, but this will do for now.”

“For now?” She eyed me.

“For now.”

After the death defying cab ride, we ended up in Haight-Ashbury, which was still true to its 1960s Summer of Love hippy roots in the number of bong shops along Haight Street. Like most great neighborhoods of the world, though, that character was now diminished by yuppie cafes and bars. Before we went to get the bikes, we stopped at a deli to pick up some sandwiches for a picnic. I nabbed a bottle of wine and corkscrew as well. Then we hit the bike hire place, and soon we were both outfitted with bikes and helmets for our trip.

“Let’s go to the beach,” she said excitedly as she put on her helmet.

“The beach? Here?”

“Yes, silly. The park ends near the beach, right? I’ve only been in the Pacific in Hawaii.”

“This beach is not like Hawaii,” I warned, snapping the chinstrap of my helmet together. “It’s as cold as a witch’s teat.”

“Having never touched a witch’s breast, I don’t know how cold that is.” She smirked.

“I’ve known a few witches.” I smirked right back. “And it’s really fucking cold. I’d rather go swimming in the bloody North Sea than swim off the coast of California.”

“Okay. The North Sea sounds cold to me.”

“It’s fucking frigid.”

“Okay. So we won’t go into the ocean. Can we go see it?”

“Absolutely, love.”

W
e didn’t bike long before we were deep in Golden Gate Park. Stopping at a little lake, we found a decent picnic spot. The place seemed perfect, but I touched the ground, which was still wet from the morning’s fog. I wiped my hands on my shorts. “Pity. It’s wet.”

“That’s okay,” Allison said, as she took off her backpack. “I have something.”

As she pulled out a couple of cellophane wrapped blankets, I laughed. “Are those airline blankets?”

“Yup.”

“You stole airline blankets?”

“I don’t know if I’ve actually stolen them just yet. I saw them, and I wasn’t sure what we would be doing today. It seemed like a handy thing to have, and if we didn’t use them, I’d just leave them on the plane tonight.”

“Brilliant thinking.” I helped her spread the blankets on the ground. “I do like that you thought of blankets when you thought about our day together.”

“Well, you seem to take me to the oddest places. I never know what we’re going to end up doing.”

“And what does Trey think of our little adventures?”

“Um.” She wrinkled her nose. “He thinks they’re strange, but harmless.”

What a fool he is
. “What do you think of them?”

She grinned. “I think they’re a blast. Isn’t that obvious?”

“How would I be doing if I kept taking you to lunch and dinner?”

“I don’t know…” She sat down on a blanket. “Let’s eat. I’m hungry.”

After lunch, we began biking the three miles to the ocean. We stopped along the way to explore everything from the Japanese Tea House to the fly-casting pools and the poor bison that looked like they’d much rather be somewhere on the American plains. As we started to near the ocean, I spotted an archery field. “What do you think of that?” I said, pointing to the few archers with their bows and arrows.

“It looks fun.”

“We should stop. I can teach you.” Actually, I’d never held a bow or arrow in my life, but I had a hunch I could do it.

After locking up our bikes, we stopped by the bloke who was renting bows and arrows. We picked up a few, and he gave us some pointers. Soon we were on the range, trying it out. On my first attempt, I hit the bullseye square in the middle.

“How did you do that?” asked Allison, as if I’d turned water into wine.

“It’s nothing, love.” I sidled up to her. “Let me show you.”

Wrapping my arms around here, I said, “We’ll shoot some together.”

“Okay. How are we going to do that?”

“Like this.” Now I had her fully wrapped in my arms, and she felt small, but warm and with enough curves that my body wanted to get close to each and every one. I had to will myself not to get a stiffy. Placing my hands on her, I positioned them so we could draw the bow properly. Then I took extra time to be sure of my aim. “Are you ready?”

“Yes.”

“When I say release, we release, okay?”

“Okay.”

I made sure I still had the target in my eye, and at just the right moment, I said, “Release!”

The arrow flew through the air and onto the target. It was just a hair off from a bullseye, but very close and still within range. “Oh my God,” she exclaimed. “We did it!”

“Yes, we did.”

“I’m impressed. Let’s do it again.”

“That’s what I always say.”

I took another arrow from the quiver and once again wrapped my arms around her. I’d shoot the damn arrows all night long if it would keep me this close to her. The best part was that she didn’t flinch at all. We were comfortably one. As I lined the arrow up to the target, she said, “I’m waiting for a snarky comment about how close we are.”

“There are so many possible comments it’s hard to choose.”

“Good. Then keep the thought to yourself. We might stay this way a little longer.”

“I won’t say another word.” When I had everything aligned again, I said, “Release!”

This time the arrow perfectly hit the bullseye. “Oh my gosh,” she said. “We hit it right in the middle.”

My mouth twitched. “Releasing simultaneously has its advantages. I’m sure we could do it again…elsewhere.”

Waving her finger, she turned to me and laughed. “You said you weren’t going to make any comments.”

“I tried.”

“You failed. I’m going to do it by myself now.”

“Is that my punishment?”

“Maybe…” She gave me a sly look.

After we both shot two arrows, mine hitting the target and hers hitting the grass, she put her hands on her hips. “I don’t think this is fair. You’ve probably been doing this your whole life?”

“Archery? Fuck no. Do you think England is still the land of Robin Hood and his Merry Men?”

“No, but you’ve said you’ve done it before.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Yes, you did.”

“No, I said that I was good at it.”

“Oh, come on. How did you know that you’d be good at it when you’ve never done it before?”

“I’m good at pool,” I said taking another arrow from my quiver. “I can shoot straight.”

“How long have you been playing pool?”

“Let’s see. I’m thirty-seven—”

“Are you? I was wondering how old you were.”

“How old are you?”

“Thirty-five.”

“So Trey is how much older than you?”

“A lot.” She was a little testy after that. “Can you answer my original question? How long have you been playing pool?”

I lined up the arrow and took aim at the target. “Thirty-two years.”

“Thirty-two? You learned young. Who taught you?”

“Me dad,” I said as I released the arrow. Sadly, it wasn’t quite as perfect a bullseye as my others. “Oh, well.”

“I wish I could shoot that well.” She came to my side and said, “I know your dad is an awful human being. Truly awful. But he did teach you a lot of skills and probably you inherited some abilities from him.”

“That’s true. I’ve thought that before. It’s just hard to value those things sometimes.”

“I understand.”

“I know. That’s one of the things I like about you. You know.”

She smiled and went back to her place. She tried again to shoot by herself, but it just landed in the grass.

I walked back over to her and again wrapped my arms around her. “Let me help you.”

“This again?” She laughed.

“If you didn’t like it, wouldn’t you have pushed me away by now?” If I couldn’t yet outright tell her how I felt, maybe I could force her to admit to something. I continued to place the arrow onto the bow just in case she didn’t answer.

“I haven’t pushed you away because you’re only teaching me how to use a bow and arrow.”

“Is that all I’m doing?”

“Well, I’m sure you want to be doing something else. That’s probably the sole reason why you’re with me,” she said a little bitterly.

A thud reverberated off the ground as the bow and arrow landed. I couldn’t have her thinking that about me. I wasn’t just spending time with her to get laid. Hell, if I concentrated I could get it up again and be with any woman I wanted. I didn’t want that, though. I wanted her—all of her, everywhere, and at all times—not just in bed.