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about Leo at first.  And being a man of few words, he didn’t do much to convince her not to be.  The ride from the airport back to my cottage that day was about as odd as odd could be.  Just me…driving along in silence with my dead friend’s three-year-old daughter and the twenty-five-year-old guy I’d barely seen in the last year and eight months and just reunited with. AWKWARD!  Leo wasn’t trying to be rude on that drive home.  In fact, I think it was just as weird for him to be around Kendall as it was for Kendall to be around a big strange guy.  You see, this was the first time Leo ever met anyone associated with my old Freakmont days.  Not that he doubted it for a minute, but Kendall was the proof that I did have a best friend who died, that my best friend does have a husband who is still horribly grieving, and that her husband has a best friend who happens to be my ex-husband.  No shit it was a quiet drive.
    And the quiet continued once we got to the cottage.  Just as I was about to suggest to Leo it might be best for him to stay at a hotel, he tenderly opened up his carry-on bag and started playing with a bunch of shitty airport gift shop toys.  Kid gold!  Kendall’s eyes lit up at the mountain of florescent plastic crap that Leo so obviously bought when he got my call about her being with me -just minutes before boarding his plane.  I watched from the kitchen as Kendall slowly walked over to the pile. When she got there, Leo said, “My favorite color is blue, what’s yours?”  Within an hour, the two of them were on the back deck overlooking the roaring creek with flashlights in hand, hunting for snipes.  By the time I tucked Kendall into bed, she made me promise that “Weo” would hunt for the imaginary creatures again with her tomorrow.
    That weekend, Leo and I agreed it would be in poor taste to sleep together with Kendall under the same roof, and it was torture watching him play with her, knowing the entire time he wouldn’t be able to play with me.  While he slept on my super pretty, but annoyingly uncomfortable wicker couch, I curled up next to Kendall in my bed and forced myself to forget about the man on the other side of the wall. But you know what? Despite being celibate for more days than I care to count, the three of us had a fantastic time that weekend.  We went boating at the Lafayette reservoir, we ate dinner at one of those cook-at-your-table Japanese restaurants that ALL kids love, and, of course, we hunted for snipes.  There’s nothing that could’ve made those forty-eight hours any better.  Well, maybe one thing, and with Kendall sleeping at her own house tonight, I’m ready to collect.
    Knowing tonight was finally going to be the end of my celibacy tour; I wanted everything to be perfect.  I waxed nearly every square inch of my body and spent a hundred and seventy-five bucks on lingerie that barely weighs an ounce.  Seriously, there’s no point to it other than “Hey look at me, going to all these extremes to turn you on.”  I scrubbed every inch of my cottage and my body, set up candles anywhere there was space, and prepared a dinner for us that hopefully wouldn’t come back to haunt me later while trying to bust a compromising move in bed (like in the form of a Chinese-firecracker-type fart).  Before I left for the airport to pick up Leo, I put on my lingerie, my cutest jeans, my sexiest shoes, sprayed on the same Carolina Herrera perfume I had on the night we met at Buckley’s, and then I eagerly hit the road.  And now, here we are!
    Pretending to listen to Leo talk about the new job he’s about to take at Robertson Stephens in San Francisco while he drives my luggage-packed car back to the cottage, I can only hear my own thoughts and they’re saying the same thing over and over again. One year and eight months after the love of my life slammed the door on my face, I’m finally gonna get laid!
     

 
     
    May I kiss you
    May I kiss you