Dark hair, dark eyes, athletic build. The man had a killer smile that made me weak in the knees every time he walked in the door, and a sweet and almost painfully shy demeanor. Bryan was everything that I could have ever wanted or wished for in a man.
Even before I'd had weight loss surgery he'd been nice to me but since I'd lost 133 pounds he was even nicer and my little ego was definitely eating it up. Every day that I went to work I'd hope and pray that he would drop by. Just seeing him walk in the door of the Batting Cage business that I helped manage was enough to make me start acting like some giddy little schoolgirl. Here I was, a 39-year old woman going gaga over a man 10 years younger. What did I care? It wasn't like he was ever going to be interested in me.
My brother was always picking on me whenever he showed up and accusing me of flirting with him. Bryan certainly didn't seem to mind and my brother couldn't believe it when I actually asked him if it bothered him. I'd gotten much more confident and a lot of people didn't like how I acted around him.
I was definitely attracted to him but he was such a sweetheart that I would never even think about actually making a play for him. Once I had touched him on the arm and he had jumped back like he'd been burned. I made sure that from then on that the counter and cash register stayed between us.
That's why what happened next totally took me by surprise.
I was having a rare day off because of the weather and since my brother was out of town on a business trip I had the house all to myself. It wasn't every day that I actually got to sleep late and laze away the day and I was taking advantage of every minute of it. I had just started to fill the bathtub and had stripped down when I heard the doorbell ring. Cursing under my breath, I turned off the water, pulled on my robe and trudged down the stairs to have a peek out the window. My heart skipped a beat when I looked out and saw Bryan standing on the porch. Quickly I dropped the shade but not quickly enough. He saw the movement and knocked on the door again.
Pulling the ties on my robe tighter I plastered a big smile on my face and opened the door.
"I'm sorry!" He blurted out when he saw what I was wearing. He turned around and started back down the steps. "I didn't mean to bother you."
"Bryan, wait a minute! I'll be right back." I could feel my face getting as red as my robe and I rushed back upstairs to dress. I should have known better. Maybe my attitude was changing but Bryan was the sensitive type and I didn't want to do anything to embarrass him or myself. I knew how it felt to feel like a total fool. Lord knows I'd done enough of it in my life.
He was still standing on the porch when I came back downstairs. I thought for sure that he would have run like a scared rabbit while I was gone.
"Yeah, Mike wanted me to come by and check on you while he was gone." His arm brushed against my breast as he stepped past me into the house and he scooted past me as fast as he could go.
"I'm a big girl, Bryan. I can take care of myself." I said a little angrily.
"Hey, don't get mad at me." He held up his hands. "I'm just doing what he asked me to do. I don't want to make you mad or anything."
"Why would he want you to check on me anyway?"
"Since you had the surgery and everything-" He hesitated for a second and then he shrugged. "He just didn't want to leave you alone for too long."
He gave me that sheepish little grin that I'd always found so darn sexy. I smiled a little at that. "That was sweet of you, Bryan. You didn't have to do this you know."
"Well, I know I didn't but I wanted to." He stammered a little and looked away from me. "I did have another reason for coming over here." His face was getting redder by the minute. "I hope that you're not mad at me or anything."
"Bryan..." I was really at a loss for words and I was starting to feel badly about snapping at him. I put my hand on his arm and he jumped slightly. "Why would I be mad at you? You've always been nice to me even when I was still carrying around all the weight. Don't you know that I really appreciate that?"
If his face could have gotten any redder I think that he would have burst into flames right in front of me. "Listen, why don't I make us some coffee or something? We can talk and you can tell me why you really came over here."
We spent the next couple of hours talking and Bryan started to relax a little. He'd always seemed so supportive of my surgery and the efforts that I'd been making to really loose the weight. I felt really comfortable around him and I had no problem in telling him about the tummy tuck I'd probably end up having after I'd lost another 80 or so pounds.
"I think you're really doing great, Suzie." He finally told me. "I'm proud of you. I want you to know that."
"Thanks, Bryan." I blushed a little myself then. "You're one of the few people that actually seem to be happy for me."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It's just-" I sighed. "A lot of people don't like the changes since I've lost all the weight. It just seems that when I was fat and miserable it made them happy."
"Then you shouldn't worry about what they think." Bryan reached across the table and took my hand in his. "You need to take care of yourself first. That's all that really matters."
"Now that one's easier said than done." I toyed with my coffee cup. I felt nearly as black as the liquid inside it. "Everybody thinks that I took the easy way out with this surgery. If they only knew just how hard all this really is then they would really be a lot nicer about it."
"I know that you didn't take the easy way out. I actually read up on the type of surgery that you had and I think that you were really brave to even take that chance."
I tried to smile but I just couldn't seem to do it. Even with him sitting right next to me telling me that he was actually interested in what I had done. It was no wonder that I was so attracted to him. He was one of the few people that actually seemed to care about me.
The urge to tell him how I really felt was killing me. I wanted to tell him so much but I was too ashamed to do it. How could I explain to him all the fears and the tears that I fought with nearly every single day and night? It would kill me if I told him how I truly felt and he ended up rejecting me. I knew deep in my heart that I wouldn't be able to deal with that. I'd even warned my best friend on the point of death not to say anything to him.
"Enough about me and my little pity party." I tried to smile. "You never did tell me the real reason that you came over here."
"I did drop by just to check up on you. That's no lie." He looked directly at me and I could tell from the look on is face that it was a big effort on his part.
"But? I hear something else behind that."
"I dropped by the business and Rhonda told me that you were off today-"
Warning bells started to go off in my head and I tensed up. "I thought you said that Mike asked you to drop by."
His face turned beet red because he knew that I'd just caught him in a lie. I was going to have to kill Rhonda the next time I saw her.
"In a way he did. He told Rhonda to ask me." He looked at me and I saw the concern in his dark eyes. "She told me a few other things too."
"I'm really going to have to kill her." I muttered under my breath.
