The Overlap (24 page)

But then what? An angry scene over why he never contacted me all weekend? An anguished confession on my part that I had never broken up with Dustin and had been regularly sleeping with him for more than a week now? Some bullshit “let’s agree to be friends” agreement to let him off the hook for suddenly throwing me aside after just a couple of dates, and to let
me
off the hook for having sex with Dustin?

Or... as farfetched as it seemed and despite all that had happened in little more than a week, was there a remote possibility that Zack and I could actually pick things up where we had left off before he left for San Francisco? And if so, would I be falling into some casual hookup relationship with him using me for occasional dinner dates and hot sex when he felt like it, and then ignoring me the rest of the time?

The third thing I anguished over was what to do about Dustin. Yeah, again. I kept coming back to one simple fact: how the only way I could get myself to respond to him sexually was by fantasizing that I was with Zack instead. I mean, what sort of foundation for a relationship is that?

We had spent an entire week and a half together and I was now 100% certain that things needed to be over between us. I liked Dustin and he would always be special to me; but after what happened with Zack, I couldn’t stay with Dustin. I had been miserable all week and sure, I know a large part of me was feeling that way was because of the long, horrible work days. But even spending this past Saturday and Sunday totally with Dustin at the aquarium, museum, on boat rides, and all of that: well, it all felt like I was hanging out with a good friend, not a guy with whom I had been in a relationship for almost one year, and definitely not a guy with whom I wanted to stay in that relationship.

It
really
was over now, and not just because I had cheated on Dustin with Zack.

Surprisingly, because things with Zack were apparently over as quickly as they had begun, to me it seemed that breaking up with Dustin would now be easier than it would have been the weekend before last, when I had my whole breakup speech ready to go. Now, I could honestly tell Dustin that things weren’t good between us, and because of
that reason
we needed to break up. He would no doubt say that he thought they were, and I would counter his point by saying “See? That’s why we’re finished. You think things are good but I
know
they aren’t. We’re not on the same page, get it?” I would soften the wording a bit – probably – but that was my message now. I didn’t need to go down the “I’ve met somebody else” because that would have been in the past.

The long flight droned on and I found my thoughts shifting to yet another troubling subject: how much I’ve hated my job the past couple of weeks. Still, there was a silver lining that gave me hope that things might get better. I had been pulled from the Chicago project as quickly as I had been sent there. I had only been there for four days and true, they had been four pretty shitty days but chances were I wouldn’t be going back. (Of course I realized that there was always the possibility that I
would
be sent back there – more accidents of geography, anybody? – but something told me the odds were in my favor that I wouldn’t).

And even though I was going right back to MetroGen, the chief problem I had been dealing with on that assignment – Dave Evers – was suddenly gone. Hopefully the new senior manager, whoever he was, would be better than Dave had been. And if that was the case, then I was back to working reasonable hours only a short distance from my apartment and doing sort-of-fun work.

At least I hoped things with my job would get better than they had been the past couple of weeks! With my personal life in such turmoil, I needed at least some stability in other parts of my life!

And speaking of turmoil in my personal life... the fifth and final thing that I gave a great deal of thought to was that after I officially broke up with Dustin, I would be alone again – single, unattached – just like the summer after I broke up with Andrew. That period of not being with a guy hadn’t lasted too long because I hooked up with Josh Chamberlain so soon after I went to Miami for training, and then Dustin came along right after Josh and I were through.

But very soon Dustin and I would be broken up, and apparently things with Zack were also finished so I wouldn’t be instantaneously easing into yet another relationship with a different guy. I couldn’t swear I wouldn’t meet some other guy within a couple of weeks and wind up with him, but I was pretty sure that the best thing for me right now was to not be in any sort of relationship. I’d probably have some casual hookups now and then, of course, but given the mental torment I had been going through for the past couple of weeks I felt like my emotions could really use a break. Even all of the exhilaration of meeting Zack, that first wonderful date, the anticipation of knowing that soon we’d be having sex for the first time... all of that had happened under the twin dark clouds of me cheating on my boyfriend as well as my work life going to shit. So the more I thought about it, the more I needed to give my head and my heart a rest before I jumped back into anything, right?

*     *     *

All of these contemplations served to fill up four hours of flying time, so paradoxically the flight from Chicago to L.A. passed both excruciatingly slowly yet at the same time, sort of quickly since my brain and emotions were on overdrive. We landed at LAX around 3:30 our time, but we didn’t need to show up at MetroGen until tomorrow morning. I would have liked to have had drinks or dinner with Kensie and Courtney to share all of the things I had been thinking about during the flight and get their opinions, but Kensie and Rick had dinner plans and Courtney was going to meet her stockbroker guy again. Apparently after their date and after sleeping together that one night before we all got sent to Chicago, Courtney and Derek – that was his name, Derek Elliot – had wordlessly agreed that they would be friends with benefits; you know, available to each other on a semi-regular basis for dates and casual sex, but not actually in a relationship.

When Courtney told me this when we were back in Chicago I told her I didn’t think this was a good idea, especially with that particular guy given how he had gone dark on her all summer and apparently called her only after breaking up with some other girl he had been dating. She had just shrugged, made some comment about all the drama I was going through and how she didn’t really want to go through all that herself right now in her life, and I decided to keep any further opinions about Derek to myself. Thinking about that conversation during the flight, maybe Courtney was right. If I were older and in a different place in my life – you know, thinking about meeting a really great guy with marriage and children on my mind – I couldn’t see myself falling into that sort of situation. But now? Maybe Courtney had the right idea...

Anyway, neither Kensie nor Courtney was available for dinner so I decided I would just go home, grab a quick dinner in my apartment, and download a movie to watch. By the time I made it from LAX to Beverly Hills the time was 5:15. As soon as I got home, though, I was overcome by a powerful urge to go outside for a long run. I had gotten so sluggish in the past week and a half, even before going to Chicago, that I needed to feel good about my energy levels and my body and all of that. True, this past weekend Dustin and I had walked for miles and miles all over downtown Chicago but all of that walking had been more of a casual stroll, not really exercise. And during the week I didn’t have any time to go to the hotel’s exercise room or to do anything that even resembled working out. So now that I was unexpectedly back home, I decided I would take advantage of this unexpected pleasure and get outside to run.

I kept expecting to turn a corner and run (literally) right into Zack. But I didn’t. I honestly didn’t know if I was glad or not. I would see him sooner or later; of that I was certain. And maybe tonight, outside on the street, with me all sweaty and disheveled, would be the best way to encounter him. You know: not dressed up and looking all hot, like pretty much every other time he’s seen me.

Anyway, it didn’t matter because I didn’t encounter Zack anywhere on my run or while walking back to cool down. I got back to my apartment building, went upstairs, made myself my standard at-home light meal - whole wheat tortilla with some low-fat cheese, avocado, and salsa – and then showered and jumped right into bed to watch a movie.

As I fell asleep around 9:30 with the movie still running, a curious sense of serenity came over me. Despite all the turmoil in my life that had hallmarked the past couple of weeks, I suddenly was sure that things would all work out for the best.

Well that didn’t take long; there he was.

I was walking towards the conference room where the calendar on my cell phone showed our morning standup meeting would be, and I turned the corner and directly ahead of me, ten or fifteen feet away, was Zack Buchanan. My mind instantly overlaid this scene on top of a different one from a Thursday less than two weeks ago, that in many ways seemed a long, long time earlier: that morning when Zack broke the news to me about his trip to San Francisco. I was in almost exactly the same spot as I had been in that morning when I had spotted him, as was Zack. I shook away any thoughts that this was anything other than pure coincidence.

“I heard you were coming back,” he said with a half smile as he approached me.

I felt my eyebrows raise.

“Really? And that’s why you texted me to let me know you had heard the wonderful news and were so glad I was coming back from Chicago so soon?”

Wow! The bitchy sarcasm in my voice surprised even me, and I’m the one who actually said that!

His half-smile vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

“We should talk,” he said in quieter tones as he stopped right when we came within a foot of each other. To his surprise – you could tell by the look on his face – I just kept walking.

“Maybe,” I responded, gazing back over my shoulder at him for a quick second before looking back straight ahead.

And that was my first encounter with Zack Buchanan this time around.

*     *     *

I did want to talk to Zack, of course. I wanted –
needed
– to know why he hadn’t contacted me at all during that fateful weekend. Nothing would change after that discussion, of course; at least that’s what I assumed. Whether he had hooked up with some new girl up in San Francisco that weekend, or had decided he didn’t want any part of the drama involving my breakup with Dustin; whatever the reason, he had obviously decided that...

Well, I didn’t know exactly what he had decided, or for that matter if he had decided anything. That’s why I was determined to have “the talk” with him. But I would talk to him on my terms, not his. And even his benign “we should talk” a few minutes earlier was too much on his terms for my liking.

I was thinking all of this during the morning standup when Alan Robbins, the senior manager from our firm who would be taking Dave Evers’ place as our day-to-day supervisor, gave us the rundown on what we would be doing this week to get the MetroGen project going again. So I was only half-listening to Robbins while my mind churned and I fumed about what had just transpired with Zack. Just before I sat down as the meeting was getting started I caught Kensie’s eye and mouthed “I just saw him.” Since she was now joined at the hip with Rick Worthington, talking to her about Zack was going to be more difficult than before we had been sent to Chicago. So maybe Courtney was the one I would have lunch with today and talk this all out. You know: when and where I should talk to Zack, how I should approach setting up that conversation; all of that. But when I asked Courtney she said that she had plans for lunch, and didn’t offer anything further. I presumed that Derek must be in the neighborhood and they were going to meet for lunch... or maybe go back to Courtney’s apartment, which like mine wasn’t far from here, for a lunchtime quickie.

At 11:03, just as my last meeting before lunch was finishing, I felt my cell phone vibrate. I looked at the text I had just received:

I really want to have lunch with you and talk. Today? Please?

Two and a half weeks ago, the thought of hot L.A. guy Zack Buchanan all but begging me to have lunch with him would have been as far-fetched as anything else I could have imagined. Yet here he was, doing exactly that. I still didn’t have any lunch plans but that didn’t stop me from sending this reply:

Already have lunch plans sorry

Even as I was typing and sending that text, I wondered what would happen if Zack happened to stumble upon me across the street, having a baguette by myself... which was what I guessed I would wind up doing for lunch today. So what? If that happened, and I almost wished that it would, I would just defiantly look at him and dare him to call me a liar. He would know that I would rather have lunch by myself than with him. Game on, right?

A few seconds later he texted back:

Ok Cerise after work? Drinks and appetizers? Our special place? <3

That one got me. It made me furious and sad at the same time. But – and maybe Zack knew this – I couldn’t say no to this particular request, especially how he worded it and with his little emoticon heart attached at the end. I sent back a simple, short “Ok” and until I walked into
Cerise
at 5:30 after leaving work, there were no further exchanges between us and I didn’t see him at all that afternoon at MetroGen.

When I saw Kensie shortly after lunch I let her know what I had agreed to with Zack so she didn’t go there with Rick. The last thing I wanted Rick to do was see me with Zack and have word get back to Dustin that he had seen me in a bar having drinks with some other guy after work. Even though I had decided with all the certainty in my heart and soul that Dustin and I really were finished now, I wanted to do the breakup my way; not have him hear via the rumor mill that the day after I got back to L.A. I was with some other guy.