I think back to meeting Maggie for the first time, and like a scrapbook flipping forward in time, all the years of ourfriendship after that. It abruptly stops when our communication became little more than occasional calls and regular texts.
How’d I let that happen?
My heart thuds hard and then, like I’ve been hit with a defibrillator’s paddles, it jump-starts.
Thump, thump.
My hand involuntarily presses against my chest.
Maggie’s voice is husky when she speaks. “We have to role-play as if we’re meeting for dinner. In this scenario, you arrive first, then I come in. Please demonstrate how you’d greet a dining companion.”
If it were an option, I’d rather throw the rule book out the window and show Maggie a lovely evening for real. As friends, of course. Instead, I say, “So I can’t use water guns this time?” I flash a winning smile.
“Definitely not.” Her tone is firm, absolute.
My phone vibrates again. I ignore it.
She points to the table. “Ready for a do-over?”
“Definitely.”
I sit down and wait for her to come in as if she’s arriving to meet me at a restaurant. The way her hips sway, her hair swooshes, and how her eyes hold mine as though I’m in a crowded room and am the exact person she’s been looking for transfixes me.
Those hazel eyes make me want to rethink my life. Run for president. Be a better man. Win every football game—even the ones I don’t play. There’s depth and possible secrets, but nothing that could dampen the strange crackling inside.
When we’d re-met earlier, I noticed that even though My Oh Mags was flustered, she’d hardly looked at me. Maybe she’s embarrassed about the Cinderella Spill as if I’d ever, or could ever, criticize her for that. Perhaps she’s feeling awkward since we haven’t seen each other in so long.
Neither possibility lands quite right. Could it be something else?
However, now her eyes don’t leave me. The intensity buffeting between us glues me to the spot. What’s happening?
When she arrives at the table, she dips her head slightly toward the chair opposite mine.
I fumble, confused for a moment, and then realize that we’re role-playing. It’s not just a casual get-together with My Magpie and me as mere friends. I’m supposed to get to my feet when a lady enters the room, pull out the chair, and act like a gentleman—instead of a beast who had a temporary break from reality and was practically drooling over Maggie Byrne.
While I ensure she’s settled into the spot, my phone, now on silent mode, vibrates again. It intermittently continues while she guides me through the dinner lesson. When the server fills our glasses, brings the first course, salads, and the entire time Maggie prompts polite conversation, it vies for my attention.
Ignoring it and trying to ease the strange tension between us, I reply to Maggers with my typical bravado, earning an ever-darkening expression of disapproval.
When she excuses herself to the ladies’ room, I glance at my phone to see who has been trying to get ahold of me. A vaguely familiar number blinks, sending an uncomfortable feeling slithering under my skin. When Maggie returns, I set my phone on the table.
She sits and when I look up, her eyes are damp and her cheeks are slightly pink. She remains quiet after the server checks on us.
My phone jitters on the table along with my leg beneath it. I wonder about the call from back home. More importantly, why does My Maggie-rific seem upset and suddenly quiet? My manners are fair to middling, minus the cell phone etiquette, so it can’t be caused by our lesson.
I take a sip of cold water as silence laces between us. Did I do something wrong? Is she homesick, missing dinner with her boyfriend, or some other important event?
“Before, you called Florida home,” I say.
“Home?” she repeats like I’m speaking a foreign language.
Did the call earlier, a reminder of the place I grew up, cause my accent to come back? “Yeah. Do you consider that home? Where you grew up? Somewhere else?”
Maggie lifts and lowers her shoulder slightly as though she doesn’t want to talk about herself—quite a contrast to the Maggie I remember and the women I usually spend time with. Then again, in this setting, the roles are different. She’s the coach. I’m the student.
“I’m making conversation. Hoping to score good marks on your evaluation later. As for me, I’m not sure if my home is Ireland, Boston, or someplace I haven’t been to yet. I don’t mean where my house is. I have several of those. I mean, where I feel like I can—” My phone buzzes again as though warning me not to say more. A place where I could leave the persona at the door and be myself with people, or a person who won’t judge me for my past or my mistakes. Where I can be myself and not play a role other than husband—though that’s probably a long way off despite Coach Hammer’s suggestion.
Maggie lifts one sharp eyebrow and then jots something down on a piece of paper in her file. “You’re quite attached to that thing, huh.” She angles her pen in the direction of my phone.
