Chapter 7: The First Hurdle
The pancakes were a slight disaster. Tommy had gotten distracted, watching Holly dance barefoot to a soul record she’d put on, the silk robe fluttering around her thighs like a flag of surrender. The edges were a bit too dark, but they ate them anyway, drowned in syrup, fingers sticky. They sat at the sunlit kitchen island, knees touching, a shared secret humming in the air between bites.
“You’ve got syrup,” Holly said, her voice low and amused.
“Where?”
She leaned over, her robe gaping open, and licked a slow, deliberate stripe from the corner of his mouth to his cheek. “There.”
He caught her wrist, his heart hammering a guilty, joyous rhythm. “You’re gonna start something we can’t finish.”
“Who says we have to finish?” she murmured, her eyes dancing. “We’ve got all day. The whole weekend. Forever, maybe.”
The knock at the front door was like a gunshot.
It wasn’t the friendly, familiar tap of a neighbor. It was three sharp, confident raps that sliced through the music and the lazy morning haze. Tommy froze, a forkful of pancake halfway to his mouth. Holly went utterly still beside him, the playful light in her eyes snuffing out, replaced by a swift, calculating alertness.
They didn’t speak. The knocking came again, more insistent.
“You expecting anyone?” Tommy whispered, though it was pointless.
Holly shook her head, a barely perceptible movement. She slowly untangled her legs from the stool, the silk of her robe whispering as she pulled it closed. She didn’t tie it. She just walked, moving with a cautious, deliberate grace toward the front hall, Tommy a half-step behind.
The front door was solid wood, but the inner screen door was old, its mesh gauzy. Through it, the morning was a bright, cheerful block of green lawn and blue sky. And standing on the welcome mat, her face a friendly, expectant blur, was Chloe.
Tommy’s girlfriend. Was. The word detonated in his skull. He hadn’t thought of her, hadn’t returned her texts from last night, hadn’t considered her existence at all since Holly’s hand had first slid down his chest. A cold wave of nausea washed over him.
Holly’s hand froze on the door handle. She didn’t look back at him. She just stared through the mesh at the shape of the young woman on her porch.
“Tommy? You in there?” Chloe’s voice, bright and slightly muffled. “I saw your car. I was just driving by after yoga. Brought you a smoothie!”
Holly’s shoulders rose and fell with a deep, silent breath. Then, in a movement so fluid it seemed rehearsed, she pasted on a dazzling, maternal smile and pulled the main door open, leaving only the screen between them.
“Chloe! Hi, sweetheart!” Holly’s voice was all warm honey, just a touch of sleepiness clinging to it for effect. She leaned a shoulder against the doorframe, the posture casual, but the effect was something else entirely. The morning light from behind her streamed through the thin silk of her robe, silhouetting the full, heavy curves of her body. She was naked beneath it. Anyone could see that.
Chloe’s smile faltered for a microsecond, her eyes doing a quick, involuntary sweep from Holly’s disheveled dark hair down the length of the revealing robe to her bare feet. The cheerful plastic smoothie cup in her hand seemed suddenly absurd.
“Oh! Holly, hi. I didn’t mean to disturb you. You’re… not dressed.” Chloe’s laugh was a nervous chirp.
“Just a lazy Saturday,” Holly purred, not moving an inch. “Tommy’s in the kitchen. We’re having a late breakfast. Come in!” The invitation was generous, but her body blocking the doorway was a contradiction.
Tommy found his feet, moving to stand just behind Holly’s shoulder. He felt hyper-aware of everything: the scent of Holly’s skin and syrup on his own, the scorched-pancake smell still hanging in the air, the way Chloe’s eyes darted from him to his mother and back, trying to assemble a story that fit.
“Hey, Chlo,” he said, his voice surprisingly normal. “This is a surprise.”
“Yeah, I… I texted.” Her gaze was searching his face, looking for something. Guilt, maybe. All she’d find was a man standing too close to his nearly-naked mother, in a kitchen that felt like a crime scene.
“Phone’s on the charger,” he lied smoothly. “What’s up?”
An awkward silence stretched. Holly didn’t move to open the screen door. Chloe didn’t move to come in. The three of them were suspended in the awkward geometry of the threshold.
“I just wanted to see if you were free tonight. The gang is getting together at Miller’s.” Chloe’s words were for Tommy, but her eyes kept flicking to Holly, who smiled benignly, a queen tolerating a subject.
“Tonight? Uh, yeah, maybe. I’ll have to check.” Tommy ran a hand through his hair. It was a tell. He knew it as soon as he did it.
Holly saved him. Or damned him further. She reached back, without looking, and let her hand rest on the bare skin of his forearm where it crossed his stomach. It was a casual, intimate gesture. A claiming. “Don’t feel like you have to rush off on my account, baby,” she said to Tommy, her voice a private caress meant for public consumption. “We’ve got no plans.”
Chloe’s face underwent a subtle but profound change. The cheerful confusion cooled into something harder, sharper. Her eyes fixed on the point where Holly’s fingers touched his skin.
“Right,” Chloe said, the word clipped. “Well. I’ll let you two get back to your… breakfast.” She held out the smoothie. “I guess you don’t need this.”
“Thanks anyway, sweetie,” Holly said, still not taking the door.
Chloe’s polite facade finally cracked, just at the edges. A slight flush crept up her neck. She gave Tommy one last, long look—a look that was no longer searching, but concluding. She offered a tight, brittle smile. “Call me later, Tommy. Or don’t.”
She turned and walked quickly down the path, her yoga pants bright and cheerful against the green grass. The sound of her car door shutting was a definitive click.
Holly didn’t move until the engine noise faded. Then she slowly let her hand drop from Tommy’s arm and pushed the main door shut, leaning her forehead against the cool wood. The bright, false smile was gone.
“Well,” she said, her voice flat now. “That happened.”
Tommy stared at the closed door, the ghost of Chloe’s knowing, wounded expression burned into his vision. The cozy forever they’d confessed to just an hour ago suddenly felt fragile, a soap bubble threatening to pop at the slightest touch. The outside world wasn’t a distant concept anymore. It had a face, a name, and a right to be angry. It had just been standing on their porch, holding a smoothie.
He turned and walked back to the kitchen, to the cold pancakes and the half-finished coffee. The record had ended. The only sound was the furious, frantic beating of his own heart.