Shame on Me

Matt stares at me across the table and I can’t bring myself to move my hands off of his even when the waitress comes over and refills our coffee cups. I think back to his words at the club about this thing between us being weird. It is weird, but in a good way. I feel like I’ve known him forever.

“Where did you even come from? My life was total shit a week ago and then all of a sudden, you show up out of nowhere and make everything better,” he tells me with a smile.

I swallow past the lump in my throat. Now would be the perfect opportunity to tell him that it wasn’t a coincidence, me showing up in his life the way I did.

“You are amazing,” Matt tells me earnestly.

I shake my head at him, wishing the words would come out of my mouth as easily as they pop into my head.

“Yes, you are,” he insists. “I barely know anything about you, but I know that much at least. I’m pretty much a stranger to you and yet you’re willing to do whatever you can to help me out. That’s amazing, if you ask me.”

Oh, but you aren’t a stranger, Matt. I’ve read your file. I’ve MEMORIZED your file.

“So, tell me something about you. I’ve bored you to death and most likely insulted the hell out of you with my problems. What do you do for a living when you aren’t trying to make it in the modeling world?” he asks, moving one of his hands out from under mine to pick up his coffee cup and bring it to his lips.

Of course he couldn’t start with something easy, like my favorite color.

“I’ve actually given up the modeling dream. Um, I mostly just do some office work for my best friend’s company.”

I am going straight to hell.

“Why would you give up on the modeling thing? You’re gorgeous, obviously. I have a hard time believing it wouldn’t be a pretty lucrative career for you once you got your foot in the door.”

If you only knew . . .

“I just realized it wasn’t something I loved doing. It got old really fast,” I explain, giving him as much as I can of myself right now. A part of me wants to tell him everything. About how I was, and still am, kind of a big deal in the modeling world. How I got tired of being paraded around in front of people for my looks, no one even considering that I might have a brain that I’d want to use for something else. And how the person I loved, trusted, and married only cared about my looks and used me for what those looks provided him. It’s so refreshing being anonymous that I’m almost drunk from the joy it brings me.

“You should never do something you’re not passionate about. I’m glad you aren’t doing it anymore if it didn’t make you happy. Although it would have been kind of cool to drive down Route 20 and see your picture splashed across a billboard,” he jokes before taking another sip of his coffee.

Well, it’s a good thing we’re not taking Interstate 69 home, then, since there is currently one of me at mile marker seventy-two modeling a bathing suit for Victoria’s Secret.

I laugh uncomfortably as I watch him drink his coffee. I can’t do this anymore. I want to be honest with him. He’s poured his heart out to me and I sit here and continue to lie to him. He needs to know where I work, and he needs to know that I know everything about Melanie.

“Matt, I need to tell you—”

“Paige, what the hell is going on?”

Jerking my hand away from Matt’s, I stare up in shock at Andy standing next to our table, staring down at us with an annoyed look on his face. He’s wearing his usual work attire: a black suit with an interchangeable shirt and tie in various colors. He’s wearing blue right now, so it must be Friday. Andy is the most anal person I’ve ever met, but something is going on with him. He’s a hot mess right now. Instead of his typical clean-cut, perfectly pressed appearance, he looks like he hasn’t slept in days, or if he has, he’s slept in his clothes. He’s a wrinkled disaster and I have never seen him with so much facial hair. He was always meticulous about shaving every single morning.

“Andy? What are you doing here?” I demand.

“I didn’t like how our last conversation ended. You didn’t answer my calls this afternoon and I got worried,” he explains, with a dirty look at Matt.

“So you followed me? Are you insane? GO HOME, Andy.”

Andy ignores me and continues to stare at Matt. “Who are you?”

Matt looks back and forth between us before sliding out of his seat and standing up in front of Andy.

How did I ever think that the two of them were anything alike? Seeing the two of them side by side, the differences are glaringly obvious. Andy is short, whiny, and annoying. Matt is easily five inches taller than he is, and working in an office all day hasn’t diminished his intimidation skills in the least. I watch in awe as Matt stares Andy down and Andy visibly shrinks into himself and takes a step back.