Yolanda comes to stand beside me, her arms crossed. “He started watching that morning show right after he agreed to the interview. I thought he was taking a few notes and getting a feel for the format, but then I came up after my class this afternoon and found him like this.”
I knew he’d been watching the show and I’d seen the odd bit of paper floating around, but he must have been keeping all this in his office. I had no idea he’d gotten so caught up in his preparations. “I thought the network sent you a list of the questions they plan to ask,” I say to Sam.
“Yes, and I’ve covered those.” One hand drops onto the largest stack of papers. “But then what if they decide to ask me something else? What if I get tripped up? I don’t want to look stupid.”
“That’s not going to happen.” Picking a few pages off the top of the pile he indicated, I read through the start of the first answer before realising it continues on to the second page, and the top of the third.
“You know the slot is only five minutes long, right?” I gesture to the essay he’s so artfully composed. “You won’t have time to go into much detail.”
“I tried to keep it simple, but once I started writing I couldn’t stop and then…” He looks around at the various stacks of paper with dawning horror. “Oh my god, this is ridiculous. I can’t use all this. What am I going to do?”
Putting the pages back on top of the appropriate pile, I take his hands in mine and kneel in the small space between him and the coffee table. “First, you’re going to take a couple of deep breaths,” I tell him.
“All right.” His gaze locks with mine and he takes one long, slow breath. Then another.
“Second,” I continue, “I’m going to order us all pizza so we can stuff ourselves silly.”
A tentative grin breaks out on his face as he sighs. “And third?”
“Third. We’re going to go through the questions you were sent, and Yolanda and I will help you practise some simple, concise answers to each of them. How does that sound?”
“Good.” He nods shakily before looking up at his friend. “You’ll stay?”
“Are you kidding?” she says with a laugh. “He had me at pizza.”
“Excellent.” I smile at Yolanda over my shoulder. It’s crazy that it’s taken so long for me to meet Sam’s best friend. With her running classes while I’m at work, we haven’t managed to cross paths until now. Turning back to Sam, I thread one hand through his hair to cup the side of his head. “You can do this, Sam. One step at a time.”
A half hour later, the food shows up and the three of us move Sam’s piles of paper onto the floor near the wall to make room for the pizza boxes.
Then, we tackle the questions one by one. I don’t contribute much because what the hell do I know about meditation, but I take notes on the answers Sam and Yolanda thrash out between them. Eventually, Sam begins to relax. He figures out what points he actually wants to include and what to leave out. Towards the end, he even manages to throw in some humour and the man I love begins to shine in all his siren sexiness.
Watching Sam and Yolanda bounce ideas off each other is fun. It’s obvious they’ve been friends for a long time as they laugh at jokes that only make sense to them and expand each other’s thoughts like it’s the most natural thing in the world. It makes me wish I had someone like Yolanda in my life. I’ve avoided personal connections for so long, the idea of having an old friend is foreign to me. Maybe George can be an old friend one day. It does take new friends to make old friends and I have to start somewhere.
Eventually, we reach the end of the questions. With a relieved sigh, Sam draws Yolanda into a big thank you hug.
“Will you still love me when you’re a hotshot TV star?” she asks, grinning.
“Of course I’ll still love you,” he croons, “my lowly little nobody.”
She laughs out loud. “You say the sweetest things.”
We start to clean up the mess we’ve made. Sam takes the leftover pizza into the kitchen, leaving me and Yolanda alone in the living room. “You did well with Sam today,” she says, quietly. “I’ve never seen anyone calm him down so quickly before.”
“He does the same for me,” I assure her, “and more often.”
“Is that so?” She gives me a quick once over. “All right, then. I approve.”
The irony of this moment is not lost on me. With all the torture I put myself through over whether my dad would approve of Sam, I forgot I would need to pass muster with the people in Sam’s life. It’s yet another reminder of how self-absorbed I’ve been.
“Thank you,” I tell Yolanda. “That means a lot to me.”
Sam walks his friend to the front door while I gather the last of the glasses and go into the kitchen to load them into the dishwater. It’s a little, domestic task, but I enjoy how natural it feels to move around Sam’s home this way—as if it’s my home, too. We haven’t spent a night apart since my birthday. Although we’re not officially living together, everything I use on a regular basis is here now. My apartment has become little more than a storage facility for my out-of-season clothes and a freezer full of uneaten meals.
Lately, I’m beginning to wonder if maybe this is a life I could lead long-term. I wouldn’t have to let go of my responsibilities to Claire. There are still ways I can pay my penance, as I should. But maybe I can have Sam in my life at the same time. That would be all right, wouldn’t it? Am I asking too much?
When I return to the living room, Sam is sprawled on the couch, his head dropped back against the cushions and the heels of his hands pressed to his forehead as he stares at the ceiling. Whatever possible future is enacting itself behind his eyes, the rigid lines of his body suggest it doesn’t have a happy ending.
“You look so tense, Mr Stephenson,” I drawl, strolling across the room at a leisurely pace.
