Just Friends
Even though I hadn’t wanted to do it, I had given in to Zac’s demands to see Layla more often. The most practical way to manage that was for me to come volunteer at their new/old office. Zac had offered to officially put me on the payroll; I refused but was outvoted by him and Taylor. Even the lunches and dinners he bought me seemed more like charity than I wanted. I had a job, though. I didn’t need another one, especially not one working for the married father of my child.
I tried not to think about that last bit, though. True to his word, I didn’t have to see Kate at all while Zac and I worked together. Whatever she did all day with their children, I didn’t know, but it kept her busy enough that she wasn’t involved in Zac’s work at all. I tried not to think too much about the fact that I was more involved in it, at least right then. It didn’t mean anything. Nothing meant anything. I just assigned too much meaning to things to convince myself that there really was something between the two of us.
But there wasn’t. Maybe there never had been. Maybe it had been so fleeting that it didn’t matter anymore. Whatever might or might not have been between us, it was clear that it was gone; working with him again had proven that much, at least.
“Do you guys want these old Billboards in here, too?”
“Sure,” I said, brushing my hair back as I glanced up at Taylor in the doorway, a big cardboard box of what I assumed were indeed issues of Billboard magazine in his arms. “If you can find an empty space for them, we’ll take them. And Layla’s playpen does not count as an empty space.”
Taylor chuckled, but it wasn’t that much of an exaggeration. The part of her playpen, which I had brought with me for the day so that she would be occupied while I worked, where she wasn’t currently sitting was just about the only empty spot in the entire room. Taylor finally heaved the box on top of a few more that we hadn’t looked at yet, then bent down and plucked Layla up into his arms.
“Are you helping Mommy and Daddy?” He cooed, bouncing her on his hip.
I tried not to bristle at the way the words came so easily to him. Zac’s head was down as he flipped through an old Rolling Stone, so I couldn’t tell what he thought of the title. It was true, though, and he had fought to have it legally recognized. If he didn’t want it now, then he was even worse of a human being than I’d given him credit for.
“She’s tons of help,” he finally said, his expression going from blank to a wide smile as he looked up at his daughter.
“Keeps us from going crazy in here. I hope she’s not choking on the dust, though.”
“You think it’s dusty now, you just wait until we start on the studio,” Taylor said, and even though Zac groaned, I could tell he was excited about putting in a real studio.
Although it had been the headquarters for 3CG for a while, they had never had a real studio here. Incorporating the company in New York was a strategic business move, for reasons a little too complicated for me to understand, and once that had served its purpose, they moved back to Tulsa and barely looked back. Because of that, their office-slash-storage space was a giant mess of magazines, paperwork and broken instruments. We had already been working on it for a week and had barely made any progress at all.
“We can’t start on that until Ike gets out here, though,” Zac commented.
“That reminds me,” Taylor replied, giving Layla a kiss and placing her back in the playpen. “I need to give him a call. I should call Nat, too, and see if she wants me to bring anything home for dinner.”
Taylor wandered out of the room then, mumbling to himself about all the things he needed to do before we all left for the day. At least it didn’t seem like Natalie was bringing the kids by that day. The last few times she had, I’d all but hid in a closet. It was stupid, but I knew anything she saw or heard would get back to Kate and we’d be forced to explain that we really weren’t having an affair again. I knew that hiding only made us look guilty, but if it meant we could avoid that conversation, I would gladly do it. I wasn’t even sure how much Kate knew about my new work situation.
“You know, I’m getting hungry, too,” Zac remarked.
“I wouldn’t eat anything in the fridge here, if the state of this room is anything to judge by.”
“Let me take you girls out to dinner,” he replied.
Before I could stop myself, I said, “That almost sounds like a date.”
“It’s not like that,” Zac said. “If it is, it’s because you’re making it like that. I just want to take you girls to get something to eat. A friendly meal before we go home, separately.”
“You always do this. You make it something, and then you say it’s not. If I ever think that there’s more between us than you say there is, it’s because of this shit you pull.”
Although the conversation wasn’t friendly at all, neither of us had raised our voices. I couldn’t speak for Zac, but for me it was a combination of not wanting to distress Layla and just being so tired of this happening with him. I couldn’t argue the same shit over and over again. I just wanted him to finally understand how I felt. I just wanted this to stop hurting. I wanted off the roller coaster.
“But,” I said, my tone measured, “if you really do just want to buy us dinner, I guess that’s okay. But it can’t take too long. I have to work at the shop tonight to fill in for Tobias; his band has a show tonight.”
“Lombardi’s is halfway between here and there,” Zac said. “What’s more casual and non-date-like than pizza? Will that convince you that I really don’t mean for this to be anything more?”
“I don’t know,” I replied honestly. “But I do love their pizza. So let’s pack this up and head over there.”
In just a matter of minutes, we had all of Layla’s belongings packed up and had cleared ourselves a path out of the room we were working in. As I surveyed the room, I couldn’t tell that we had really made any progress at all, even though we had been working practically all day. Maybe someday this office would be in decent shape. And maybe someday Zac would actually be mine. Neither of those things seemed very likely.
There was a chill in the air as we finally made our way outside, and I pulled my scarf tight around my neck. Zac insisted on pushing Layla’s stroller, and I didn’t object. I knew we were pushing it being out in public together like that, but I tried to keep an eye on the gossip. As far as I could tell, most of Zac’s fans didn’t realize that he was living in New York yet.
Yet.
I was sure it was only a matter of time before the shit hit the fan in one way or another. I just wished I could predict how. It might save me a lot of trouble and heartbreak.
“So, how are things going?” Zac asked as we walked briskly down the street, which was every bit as crowded as I expected it to be. At least no one paid much attention to the couple pushing their baby along—as that was what we looked like, I supposed.
“What kind of question is that?” I shot back. “You’ve seen me practically every day for the past week. You know how things are going.”
“Not really,” he replied. “I know when you work. I know how Layla is doing. I know the newest words she’s learned, and where she spit up on your favorite shirt. But I don’t… I don’t know you, Colby. I guess I never really did. And I want to.”
“See?” I said. “It’s that shit. That’s what makes me think this is something more than it is. Don’t you see how you sound? Do you do this on purpose to fuck with me or do you really not hear yourself?”
Zac paused, stopping so suddenly that some guy in a suit shoved past him and cursed. He stared at me for a moment, before shaking his head. “I guess I don’t hear myself. I never really thought about it. Why can’t I get to know you and be your friend without it meaning something more, though?”
“Because before you tried the friends thing, you tried the mistress thing. There’s always going to be a history here that colors everything you try to do, innocent or not. And it’s hard for me to believe it’s innocent.”
He tilted his head to the side. “Would you believe it if I looked you in the eye and told you it was?”
“I don’t know,” I answered softly but honestly. Wrapping my arms tightly around myself, both for protection against the cold and protection from Zac, I asked, “Can we just go on? I told you; I have to work. We need to hurry.”
“Alright, alright,” Zac agreed, sighing heavily before he finally began to push the stroller again. “But you know we’re going to have this conversation again.”
I heaved a sigh of my own. “I know. We go around and around in circles about everything.”
A few minutes later, we finally arrived at the restaurant. It was packed, of course, but we had a simple enough order—one meat lovers and one pineapple and banana pepper. Sometimes I thought I still ate like a pregnant woman, even seven months postpartum. At least Zac only raised an eyebrow at my order, but didn’t say anything.
Since it was so crowded in Lombardi’s and we had a stroller to deal with, we decided to take our order to go. I carried the boxes outside and we walked on toward Sit and Spin until we found an empty bench to sit and eat our dinner. It wasn’t ideal, but nothing with the two of us ever was. Even in the most mundane situations, I don’t know why I ever bothered to expect anything normal.
“So you didn’t answer my question,” Zac said in between bites.
“What question?”
“About how you were doing,” he replied.
I took my time finishing my slice before I answered him. I was trying to buy myself time to think of an answer, but I still didn’t have one. He was staring at me, though, so I had to say something. “I’m tired, Zac. That’s how I am. Because I am, for all intents and purposes, a single mother. You might be here, but it’s not the same, and well… sometimes when I slow down for a moment, like right now, I realize just how very fucking tired I am.”
“You curse a lot in front of the baby,” he said softly.
“Yeah, I guess do,” I replied. “Oops?”
“There are worse things you could do than give her a potty mouth,” Zac said. “I don’t know what to say about the whole… single mother thing. You know where things stand. You know I’m doing the best I can.”
“I know,” I replied. “I didn’t mean to complain about what you’re doing or not doing. You just asked how I was, and the answer is totally exhausted. Even if things between us… well, I think I could sleep for a year and I would still be this tired.”
Zac nodded. “So, other than really needing a nap, how are you?”
“I don’t know,” I replied, shrugging. “I don’t have time for anything else. I go to work. I come home. I take care of Layla. That’s my life now.”
“What can I do? To help, I mean.”
“Nothing,” I replied, closing my pizza box. “You can’t turn back time, and I feel awful even suggesting it, because then Layla wouldn’t be here. So, no. You can’t do anything.”
Zac sighed, but nodded. “I don’t like that answer, but I get it. And for what it’s worth… I really am sorry.”
“Yeah,” I said, standing up. “If you’re not going to finish that pizza, do you mind if I take it work? The guys might be hungry. These late shifts suck like that.”
“Sure,” Zac said. He stood up next to me and touched my shoulder. “And if there’s anything else I can do…”
I nodded, effectively cutting him off. We said an awkward goodbye, and then parted ways. I resisted the urge to watch him walk away.
As I carefully balanced the pizza on top of Layla’s stroller, I thought back on the conversation I’d just had with Zac. As tired as I was, as bitter as I was about how things had turned out… would I really go back and change it if I could? I didn’t have an answer for that. All I knew was that I wasn’t sure how long Zac and I could go on like this, pretending to be nothing but old friends.