"No, I'll be fine, really."
When we got to the parking lot, I offered once again to take him home, but he firmly refused.
"Can you give me a ring when you get home…just so I know you're home safe?"
Tristan gave me a very strange look when I asked him that. "Raina, I said I'll be fine. Can we just leave it at that?"
"Uh…sure. Well, good night then." I turned to go to my car, but he stopped me.
"Thank you for tonight. It was wonderful." He kissed me gently on the forehead like a child, which seemed yet another odd thing considering what we had just been up to in the wings. Still, it was far better than the last parting and I decided to accept it for what it was--a spent man with nothing on his mind but a good night's rest.
Five
Sleep didn't come easily for me that night. It took a while for the glow of what our bodies had done to one another to wear off. When it did, I was left with quite a bit of confusion.
I kept running the week through my head and not much of it made sense. Okay, I could accept that a crisis of epic proportions halfway around the world could cause a temporary lapse in manners--what Tristan called "not being good at some things". And I could chalk up the gruffness on stage to an ego that hated to be corrected.
And, I suppose there could be legitimate reasons for a man with a great deal of money to have a personal bodyguard to travel with.
There were still two things I couldn't reconcile. First, why did that Roger character have such a chilling effect on not just Tristan, but the entire cast? Second, what the hell did Tristan King see in me?
Only Tristan could answer the last question, but I was sure that any one of the other cast members could shed some light on the first.
When I woke up Saturday morning, I was surprised to see that it was nearly ten a.m. I had slept poorly, waking several times from various disturbing dreams featuring painted stage beds, Chinese bodyguards and pretty men with sad faces.
The apartment was empty because Jenn had to man the virtual Tanglewood box office and the phones on Saturdays. Sunday was the only off day we shared and as the summer drew closer to its conclusion, she and I tried to make the most of each day we had left together.
She'd left a note on the kitchen table:
Hey sleepyhead, how about a drive and a picnic tomorrow? Jenn.
That sounded like a plan to me and it gave me something to focus on other than the strange and overwhelming way Tristan had insinuated himself into my thoughts. He wasn't doing it on purpose. That much I freely admitted to myself.
Even as a child, I had a tendency to over involve myself in people and situations. My sisters used to tease me about being 'sensitive' and taking things too seriously. Those qualities had also given more than one guy all the reason needed to walk away from a relationship with me.
I've never been very good at casual. Even my friendships tended to be deeply intimate. What excuse could I come up with for allowing myself to get even mildly involved with Tristan? He wasn't just out of my league; we weren't even playing the same game.
One spring break, my second year at Bennington, Jenn and I and two other girlfriends went to Panama City beach for spring break. Jenn and the two others threw themselves into the 'scene' with abandon. Even Jenn, normally not a girl you would describe as 'wild' by any stretch, had sex with at least three different guys that I know of in the course of our ten day stay. All I managed to do was piss off a couple of dudes, one of whom called me a prick teaser in front of a bar full of drunken strangers.
So, what was it about Tristan that would make me want to do something I'd never wanted to do before? Casual liaisons had never appealed to me. Why now? Why involve myself with a man with whom there could never really be any involvement? What was there about him?
Maybe I was growing up. Maybe I had matured sufficiently to do what the rest of the world seemed so fond of doing--see someone attractive and go for it if you can. God knows I found Tristan attractive. At first, it was simply an animal reaction to a man who seemed to have been constructed to my personal standard of perfection. But, even in the short time I had known him, I had found other things about him compelling, appealing and so fascinating.
His talent as an actor was superb. From the first moment I watched him on stage, I was amazed at his ability to transform himself into another character. Every single thing he did on that set reflected the coach--his voice, his posture, even the movement of his hands. The fact that this was only a hobby for him impressed me even more.
I liked the fact that he didn't seem to take himself too seriously, at least not all the time. And while he seemed to appreciate the fine things he surrounded himself with, they apparently didn't define him.
About the time I started to hope that I'd get a call from him over the weekend, I realized that he had never gotten my phone number. I had his, of course, on the cast roster. I was tempted to call him, maybe just to 'check' that he made it home okay. That was a temptation best resisted, I told myself.
Sunday's picnic helped me stop over thinking the whole 'non-relationship' with Tristan. Jenn had taken care of last Sunday's Mexican day and it was my turn to treat. A cold platter and a nice bottle of wine would be great for our picnic. I thought of the cheese, olives and great bread that I had eaten at Tristan's and wondered where he got those treasures. I could casually call him and ask. I mentally slapped myself across the face for that thought.
Our local gourmet grocer had quite a selection to choose from. I didn't see the particular cheese that Tristan had served--the one wrapped in brandy soaked leaves--but I found several I liked. The cheese monger gave me samples and guided me in selecting three types that would complement each other. I also bought dry Italian salami, some mixed olives and a loaf of artisanal bread with herbs baked in. It would be a scrumptious picnic.
I stopped at the wine shop and bought a cheap, but respectable bottle for us to share and went home to put it all away.
I was at loose ends after that. Jenn is a neat and clean freak and I'm not far behind. There's rarely anything to be done to the duplex on Saturday except a little laundry and she had taken care of that before she went to work. I folded the few towels in the dryer and decided I'd take a ride over to the theater and see how the set was progressing. We had the basic walls up which made a big difference in rehearsal. It's so much easier to have an actual wall than a piece of tape on the floor. Even the appearance of a sofa on Thursday had change the dynamic of the 'room'. Each little detail added a new element that made each performance become successively more nuanced; progressively more real.