Page 66 of Life’s Too Short

He was leaning with his forearm on my door frame, still in his tux.

I crossed my arms. “What? If you’re here to laugh at my boob, you can just go back to your thing.”

He gave me one of his dazzling grins. “I’m not going back. I brought you something. Let me in and close your eyes.”

I wrinkled my forehead. “What? You’re not going back?”

“Close. Your. Eyes.”

I gave him a look, but I pulled the door open and closed my eyes. I heard him come in, then the sound of my sliding glass door opening. “What are you doing?” I asked, feeling a blast of cold air.

“Don’t peek,” he said from what sounded like outside.

I heard the door close, and the sound of my curtains yanking shut. When he spoke again, he was standing in front of me. “Okay. You can look.”

I opened my eyes to find him smiling down at me like he found me amusing. The whole front of his tuxedo was wet.

“Why are you wet?”

“Go sit on the couch.”

“For what?”

He shook his head with a smile. “Go on.”

I eyed him, but I went to the sofa and flopped down onto a cushion.

He went into the hallway and brought in a large plastic takeout bag. He took off his tuxedo jacket and draped it over the back of one of my kitchen table chairs. Then he undid his bow tie and unbuttoned his wet shirt and peeled that off too. When he sat down next to me on the sofa, he was in nothing but a white T-shirt and trousers. He leaned over the coffee table, pulling out containers. Then he opened one and held up a humongous orange lobster and waggled it. “Lobster?”

I snorted. “You brought me a lobster?”

“And caviar, prawns, baklava, petit fours—I even brought the garnish for you. Look.” He plunged his arms into the bag and pulled out a halved watermelon with the name of the fund-raiser carved into it and held it proudly.

I laughed. “Oh my God, they’re never going to let you back into the Depot.”

He set it in the middle of my coffee table like an out-of-place centerpiece.

He was still smiling.

“You better stop,” I said, giving him side-eye.

“What? I’m just thinking of something funny Lenny said.”

“You are such a liar.”

Maybe I should start doing a Kegel every time I embarrass myself in front of him, get something out of all this humiliation. Two weeks and I’ll be able to snap a man in half with my pelvic floor.

“You know, I’ve seen you topless before. In the painting.” He nodded to the wall.

“Okay, that is not the same thing. That’s a drawing and he took liberties—”

“No, he didn’t. Frankly, he didn’t do you justice.” He glanced at me. “At least not on the side I saw.” He grinned and finished emptying the bag.

I had to hide my smile in my hand.

“So what do you feel like eating?” he asked.

“Uh, all of it? But you’re sure you don’t need to go back?”