Page 11 of Every Time We Touch

“Marcy?” That rings a bell.

“Yeah. Stella hired her to get back into camera shape after she had Silas.” Skye looks up. “Six feet tall and shoulders like this.” Greatly exaggerating, she holds her hands two feet apart. But the description is more than plenty for me to match her to ‘MB’ from my dating app.

“Well, fuck me,” I mutter.

“Excuse me?” Skye says. “First you want me to get with Eric’s only single daughter and now this? I thought I was here to discuss locker room renovations?” She shoots me a wink.

I tell her the story about matching with Marcy on the app and it being the real reason Jennifer showed up at my studio.

“That’s sneaky as fuck,” Skye says.

“It wasn’t malicious.” I will happily defend Jennifer because I only had to spend a few hours with her to know she doesn’t have a bad bone in her body—much like her father. “I went through the same thing with my dad and I can be all kumbaya about it now, but it’s not an easy process to accept a parent in a relationship with someone much younger.” I haven’t talked to my father in a while and I have no idea if Blair’s pregnant yet—I figure I will hear if and when she is—but to have him tell me that he wants to be a dad again was disconcerting to say the least. Just because he’s my father and I want him to be happy, doesn’t make the circumstances any less complicated.

“How kumbaya are you about it?” Skye asks.

“A bit more now that I’m dating Eric.” I chuckle.

“I bet.” Skye grins at me. “How’s that going?”

“It’s… nice,” I say.

“Just nice?” She narrows her eyes.

“He’s such a lovely, decent, good man.” I mean every single word. “A rare find in this city of posers and wannabes.”

“Not to mention a handsome silver fox,” Skye says with a straight face.

“Very easy on the eye, indeed.” And in excellent shape, making me wonder if he has secret personal training sessions with his daughter’s ex—or he just hasn’t told me yet.

“You got yourself a catch, girl,” Skye says. “How about the age difference?”

“That’s probably the trickiest,” I admit. “He’s seventy now, but we all get older at the same speed.” I bite my lip, because this is difficult to say out loud. “It’s not easy to think of… a future.”

“Is that what you’re doing with this guy? Thinking of the future?”

“Not really, but you know how it is when you meet someone great… even though it’s still super early, your mind can’t help but go there sometimes.”

“Are you serious about him?” Skye whispers, as though it can’t be said in a normal tone of voice.

“He introduced me to his family, so I think it’s more that he’s serious about me and it’s starting to rub off on me.”

“Okay.” Skye nods conspiratorially, as though I just revealed a secret I didn’t even know I kept. “Not that serious yet, but there’s potential.”

“When Jennifer confronted me with still being on the dating app, it made me wonder about our status. We haven’t really talked about it.” When I see Eric tonight, the subject will need to be broached—although I kind of already know what he’s going to say. Maybe that’s why I haven’t asked him yet. I already know the answer and it’s not one I’m necessarily ready for. “You know me? I like to go with the flow, just see where things lead…”

“But this dude’s running out of time,” Skye says, then holds a hand in front of her mouth. “Sorry. Am I allowed to joke about that?”

I laugh along, because it’s funny—although, at the same time, it’s also something that can’t be ignored. Age hasn’t stopped Blair from wanting a child with my father and once you go down that route, there’s no choice but to think of the future. Maybe I should talk to her sometime—kind of like how Jen talked to me, but the other way around.

My mind keeps drifting to her, to our chat, and how it didn’t even come close to hostile—quite the opposite, in fact.

“You can joke about anything you like.” I point in the direction of the changing rooms. “How about we get to work now?”

“You bet.” Skye pushes herself to her feet.

I do the same and just as I stand up, my phone buzzes in my pocket. It’s probably Eric, who is becoming a more enthusiastic text-message sender by the day, but for a split second, part of me wishes for it to be his daughter instead. I shake off the thought swiftly. The message is from neither of them. It’s from Juan.

As much as I liked him, I’m still a touch disappointed.