Mark:You want to grab a drink?
Brea:Have to finish this gown.
Mark:Or I could come over and help you with your sewing.
Brea:You didn’t help the last time!
Mark:Of course I did. You have to be relaxed with a steady hand to sew. You were too tense before. You could have developed carpal tunnel.
Brea:Ah, yes, he was concerned with my well-being.
Mark:Hey, I didn’t take off all my clothes.
Brea:And that’s the real tragedy.
I smiled at the phone.
Finn poked his head into my office. “Ooh, did you meet someone?”
“No,” I scoffed.
“Lemme see!” Finn wrestled me for my phone. “She cracks jokes and doesn’t put up with your shit!” Finn said, laughing as I tried to grab the phone back from him. “I like her already.”
“I’m not sure she likes me that much,” I admitted.
“What’s not to like?” Finn protested, draping an arm around my shoulders. “You’ve got the money and the looks and the tragic backstory. That shit is catnip for women.”
“Not this one,” I said.
“You have to speak her love language. And no, I don’t just mean sex. What does she like to do?”
“She likes to sew.”
“Then sew her something,” Finn said grandly.
“I can’t sew.”
“I know,” Finn said impatiently. “That’s the point. You just do your best, give it to her, say you tried, and then she’ll think it’s adorable.”
“That is such a terrible idea. I have no idea how you made it this far in life.”
* * *
But when Igot home that evening, after playing with Beowulf, instead of rerunning my algorithms for my stock purchases, I looked up sewing videos online.
“It can’t be that hard,” I decided. There was one video where the lady was making a small stuffed dinosaur. There were only five pieces, and it was small. I could do it, I decided. I had been in the military, after all, and we were required to know how to patch our uniforms. I could handle a little dinosaur.
I placed an order for the material then playfully boxed with Beowulf. He had already doubled in size and had huge front paws.
“You’re going to be a giant,” I told him. The dog barked and sprang at me. “And,” I reminded him, “Brea is coming by tomorrow. She’s going to be so impressed with how much you’ve grown!”
* * *
I was waitingdownstairs the next day when Brea arrived ten minutes before the meeting. Liz’s doctor had told her she should avoid sitting for long periods of time anymore because she was swelling and needed to keep moving. So long car rides to the Weddings in the City office were out.
When the Uber pulled up, Brea huffed out of the car, dragging a crate filled with a variety of gift bags.
“This seems excessive,” I said.
