The Mending of Broken Hearts

"I know, Janny," he said, using his little nickname for her, "and I'm sorry about that. I've just been . . . wrapped up in some things lately."

"No sweat," Janice told him. "You're here now, aren't you?"

"I am," he agreed, and then he turned to Andrea, whose lovely sea-green eyes were wide and curious, and clear even from across the room. The two had been such good friends and Mike would be damned if the idiocy of Peter and Hayden screwed that up. Andrea was too good, too nice and too beautiful a woman and person for that to happen.

"Hi, Andrea," he said with a nod.

"Hi, Mike," she replied softly.

"I was thinking about making a run to Coffee Bean. Care to join me?"

Andrea thought for a long moment, then smiled. "Of course, I would," she said, and rose to her feet. She approached him then and he turned to go, but was surprised when she wrapped her arms around him and squeezed him tightly. "I've missed you," she added in a whisper.

He hugged her back, happy they were friends once again. "I've missed you, too, Andi."

Janice snorted with amusement. "Get a room, you two," she chided playfully.

And so Mike and Andrea left the athletic department office and made their way across campus in the direction of the southern gate, which lay just one hundred short yards from a shopping center with a Coffee Bean, among other things. Both were quiet as they walked, each trying to find the right words, and in the end, it was Mike who found them first.

"I'm sorry, Andi," he said after long minutes. He spoke from the heart and meant every word. "I'm sorry for everything that happened, yes, but that's not what I'm talking about. Mostly, I'm sorry for not being a good enough friend to you. You were in pain, you needed friends around you to love you and support you and I wasn't there. I should've been. I'm sorry."

Andrea had been shaking her head almost from his first word and by the end, the shaking was vigorous. "No, Mike," she told him, "please don't be sorry. You and I are very good friends, very close friends, and we've been friends for a long time, but there is little we could have done to help each other after what happened. It was not the right time for us to be around each other."

Mike stopped walking and turned to her. "And now?"

Andrea smiled soothingly and Mike remembered then just how gorgeous his friend truly was: long strawberry blonde with layered bangs, lovely light sea-green eyes and an absolutely smoking hot body toned by years of soccer workouts.

She took his hand in hers and squeezed it tenderly. "Now is the perfect time," she decided, and off again they went.

"So what have you been up to lately?" he asked her. "Anything exciting happen?"

A curious kind of smile flittered over her face then. "Nothing much," she said, "although I did go to a really fun Halloween party last weekend and had wwwaaaaaaayyy too much to drink."

Mike laughed. "You and me both," he admitted. He was absolutely not ready to tell her about the sex, although they had talked about such things before. "Halloween is crazy."

Andi giggled. "Yes, it is," she agreed, and then she sighed.

They reached the Coffee Bean and Andi squeezed his hand again. "I'm gonna visit the ladies room," she told him. "Mind ordering my drink for me?"

"Sure thing," he replied. "What would you like?"

"Grande Vanilla Latte with one pump vanilla, if you please." Her smile widened. "Think you can handle that?"

He grinned back. "Not much I can't handle," he said, and went to get in line.

* * *

It was six o'clock that night when Andrea heard her phone beep, signifying a text message. She rose from the couch and went to her purse, and pulled her BlackBerry out from within.

"Was that mine?" her sister called from the other room.

"No!" Andrea called back.

She had been staying with her sister a great deal since her relationship ended, preferring a warm and comforting body beside her to the cold and empty bed at her own place, and the memories it conjured, and she was leaning more and more towards just moving in with Audrey completely. Her sister had already expressed great excitement at the idea.

She clicked open the message and smiled when she saw it was from Mike: whatcha doing?

Andrea texted back: watching a movie at my sisters place.

Dinner tomorrow? came the response.

Love to, she wrote back.

Pick you up at your place at 7, he sent.

Think you can handle that? she texted with a smiley face, only to have not much I can't handle shot back faster than any text thus far.

Cant wait, was her response, with an xoxoxo thrown in for good measure.

Minutes later her sister entered the room dressed in a loose white cotton shirt and sweat pants, toweling off her damp hair, and plopped down next to her on the couch.

"Who was it?" Audrey asked, ever inquisitive (to and past the point of nosiness).

Andrea harrumphed. "You do realize your nipples are showing," she stated.

Audrey looked down to find her shirt a little wet from her hair and her breasts and nipples clearly visible beneath. She laughed and tugged at her shirt to air it out. "Whatever," she said dismissively. "Who was it?"

"It was Mike," she said simply.

"He's such a hottie," Audrey said with a sigh, her hands lingering teasingly over her breasts. The girl was perpetually horny, it seemed. "I'm glad you guys are talking again. I've always had a crush on him. I wonder what he's like in bed. I bet he's pretty good. I bet he's got a huge cock. You know, maybe you should bring him over here. I'd be gentle. He's single now, after all . . ."

The girl was rambling and Andrea stopped listening, content to watch the television and relax and not think about anything too hard . . . that is, until Audrey said something that caught her attention once more.

"What was that?" Andrea asked suddenly, turning to her sister.

"Saturday night," the beautiful part-time stripper replied. "I saw a couple of his friends at the party we were at."

"Who?" Andrea asked as the hair on the back of her neck stood up.

Something tickled the back of her brain, like a secret she knew the answer to but could not remember, something she felt she could figure out if she tried, something strange she could not put her finger on but that she knew was going to be important, and when she had these kinds of moments and feelings there usually wound up being something significant behind them.

"Mike," Audrey replied, a little confused.

Andrea grunted exasperatedly. "No, no, no, his friends."

"Oh! That black guy he brings to your games sometimes," the oft-ditzy blonde replied. "You know, the cocky, good-looking one."

"Dwayne?" Andrea suggested.

Audrey clapped her hands together. "That's it, Dwayne! It's been bothering me for two days. Dwayne. He's hot, too, and black guys usually have huge cocks. I'd fuck him in a heartbeat!"

The twisted feeling in Andrea's stomach would not go away.

"Wait, was Mike there, too?" she asked abruptly in a hard voice. She would have been mortified if Mike had seen her in her slutty football outfit, although she had no idea why the thought of it suddenly bothered her so much.

Audrey thought for a moment, then shrugged. "I don't think so," she said. "I never saw him. Just Dwayne in those ridiculous tights." She giggled. "It was actually pretty funny."

"Tights?" Andrea could not see the super-macho Dwayne Wimbley, who never met a girl he wouldn't hit on and who never wanted to look anything less than cool, wearing tights.

Audrey giggled again. "Yeah, and really tight, too. I'll be honest, though; he's got a good body for Superman."

Andrea froze. "Dwayne wore a Superman costume," she said in very measured words.

Her sister frowned and fixed her with a pointed stare. "Yea, why? What's with you?"

Andrea did not hear her sister. In fact, she heard nothing at all past the ringing that suddenly had enveloped her ears. Her mind was whirling and spinning, and the twisted feeling now threatened to overwhelm her completely.

And in that moment her mind flashed back to the darkness of the laundry room when she was lewdly bent over a washing machine with a tongue buried deep in her ass, her hips wiggling and egging its owner on, before the man behind her spanked her and asked her a question in a gruff voice, to which she replied, "Fuck me, if you think you can handle it."

And she remembered the tenderness in his fingers then as they traced the line of her back and stroked at the strands of her hair, and she remembered also the roughness that followed as he shoved her down against the cool surface of the machine and wedged the head of his cock between the lips of her pussy, and said, "Not much I can't handle," and then the fucking began.

And in that moment Andrea Tinsley came to the most awesome and amazing realization in the whole of her life, pieces falling into place like so many dominoes knocked down in a line, and she turned to her sister with eyes wider than they had likely ever been, and said in a voice soft and low until the last, which was hard and high and loud, "Oh . . . my . . . GOD!"

* * *

Mike Gregory lay awake in bed a long time that Monday night, thinking in turn about the craziness of the last few weeks of his life.

He wondered fleetingly where Hayden was and what she might be doing at that moment, but the thought was no longer accompanied by a tightness in his chest nor a stirring of his loins, but rather just a ticklish kind of curiosity. It said more to him about the depths of his supposed feelings for the woman that he was good and truly over her after only a relatively short span of time; it was clear now that he was not in love with her, so much as he was in lust. She was gorgeous, after all, and a dynamo in bed, and that was enough to keep him happy in the short term, but it was clear Mike and Hayden could not have survived in the long run.

He considered his soccer team and its significant talent, and the fact that without his guys to take his mind off things, the last few weeks would have been twice as difficult as they actually had been, and he would be ever-grateful for the fortunate timing of this particular soccer season.

He remembered with some relish the party from the weekend before, from its humble beginnings to its dazzling end, and he could feel stirrings creeping up on him again as he recalled just how eager the woman had seemed to be, and how luscious her body had been.

But more than anything else, which was surprising in some ways and not so much in others, he thought about Andi. He had not realized until he saw her in the office earlier that day just how much he had missed talking with her and being around her on a regular basis, and how much she meant to him. She was beautiful, inside and out.

Mike had often wondered what the two of them might have been like together romantically, but never more than in passing as the timing had never been right: they had never known each other when both were single and often were in relationships with mutual friends. Of course, he had considered also in the past what it would be like to have sex with her, but never too seriously despite her obvious beauty; mostly he fantasized about her as any man would fantasize about a gorgeous young woman, with just the little added bonus of that he had seen her body in a spandex sports get-up, a short-shorts soccer uniform and a bikini, which added a little weight to his imaginings as her body was truly fantastic.

When he had texted her earlier about dinner the following night, his fingers had actually trembled and he was amazed to find himself nervous. When she said yes, he felt a thrilling rush of adrenaline course through him.

And because she said yes, when he finally did drift off to sleep close to two o'clock in the morning, there was a pleasant smile etched across his face.

* * *

Mike knocked on the door to Andrea's apartment at seven o'clock on the button and heard then some significant rustling behind it. He shifted the bouquet of flowers he was holding from one hand to the other, cleared his throat quietly, and waited for the woman to appear.

The door opened.

"Hi, Mike," said Audrey Tinsley, Andrea's sister. "Long time, no see, huh?"

Audrey was a fire-cracker of a girl, beautiful and uninhibited, intelligent in many ways and a complete ditz in others: a paradox, in other words, but adventurous and fun to be around.

"Hi there, Audrey," he said with a smile.

"Come on in, stud," the woman said as she eyed him up and down, her gaze lingering over his waist, and Mike felt very much as if he were standing on a set of scales. "She's almost ready."

It was then that he noticed the delicious smells wafting out of the kitchen. "Something smells good," he commented as he moved through the door and into the comfortable two-bedroom apartment that had been Andrea's for several years.

"She's put a lot of work into it," Audrey said, her blue eyes still staring intently at him. For a moment, he wondered if he'd done something wrong or if there was something amiss with his clothes, so pointed was the girl's stare. "She really wanted to cook for you tonight."

"You don't mind do you," a soft voice said from the other side of the room.

Mike turned and was met with one of the loveliest sights he had seen in a long time: Andrea Tinsley looked absolutely gorgeous in a yellow sundress. The dress was spaghetti-strap with a cami neckline that produced a good degree of cleavage, a brilliant shade of yellow for most of its length before tapering ombré-style into white and brown at the pleated hem, touched up with modest flower embroidery and a brown waist tie. Her lovely strawberry blonde hair was full and down, draped ever-so-gently over her bare shoulders, and her eyes, sea-green and expressive, sparkled as the warmth of her smile enveloped them.

Mike only rarely got to see Andrea dressed up in such a way. Since she had gotten together with Peter, Mike had only seen her dressed up the few times the four of them had gotten together. He was used to seeing her garbed in sporty soccer gear, sweats or jeans or shorts and a tee-shirt, and rarely had he seen her in a dress like the one she was wearing. It was casual, but elegant, and absolutely stunning.

He realized he was staring when Audrey giggled next to him.

"Sorry," he stammered. "Andi, you look great."

He was surprised to see her lower her eyes and blush as she came closer to him. "Thanks," she said softly, and then she had wrapped her arms around him again to hug him tightly.

Mike was overwhelmed by the smell of her, sweet and womanly. "Here," he said lamely, handing her the flowers as she pulled back from the embrace. "I brought these for you."

Andrea beamed. "They're beautiful!" she breathed. "Thank you."

Audrey had been watching them with a wide grin on her face. She took the flowers from her sister then and said, "I'll put these in some water. You kids have a good time. I've got to get to work."

"You don't mind eating in, do you?" Andrea asked, her voice was softer and more reserved than Mike could ever remember it being. She was usually so giggly and girly and extroverted, and here she was acting almost shy.

"Not at all," Mike replied quickly. "If it tastes as good as it smells, I'm hooked."

"Would you like something to drink?" she asked, and that was how it went for the next fifteen minutes or so.

It was a very strange and almost surreal experience, his conversation with Andi as she finished puttering around in the kitchen; the kitchen opened into a counter with pull-up bar stools and Mike situated himself at one to chat with her while she did so. There was a definite sort of distance between them, their voices soft and hesitant and overly polite, as if neither wanted to say the wrong thing, which was just silly because the two of them had talked and joked and laughed about so many things serious, sexual, funny and otherwise over the years that, in theory, nothing should have been left to make either of them nervous in discussion with the other.

When they sat down to dinner and began nibbling at their plates (delectable chicken roll-ups with goat cheese and arugula, roasted potatoes and a spinach leaf and avocado side-salad, an admittedly awesome meal) there were several periods of long and uncomfortable silence.

Finally, mildly exasperated with himself and the situation, Mike blurted the question that changed completely the course of the night, which was, "This is ridiculous. Why are we acting like this?"

Andrea did not look at him. Her eyes were rooted to her plate. "What do you mean?" she asked in a strained voice.

Mike set down his fork. "What's with us? Why are we being so weird? We've hung out hundreds of times before by ourselves and it's never been like this." He sighed. "Are you still upset with me? I wouldn't blame you. It's my fault you're going through all this."

Andrea lifted her face to him then, her eyes wide and questioning. "What are you talking about?" she asked timorously. "What do you mean it's your fault?"

"Peter," he replied quietly as he lowered his eyes. "I'm the one who introduced you to him and it was my girlfriend he cheated on you with. It's my fault you're in so much pain right now."

Andrea's eyes hardened and for the first time that night, Mike saw in them great passion and life, and the fire of hers he was so familiar with. "It was absolutely not your fault, Michael," she told him in a hard voice, using his full name for maybe the first time ever. "If I ever hear you say that again, I will punch you in the nose."

Mike could not help but grin. "Oh, there you are," he said smugly. "I knew the Andi I know and love was in there somewhere."

She stared at him for a long moment . . . and then burst out laughing. "You're a prick," she chirped haughtily, before her eyes softened again. "But you're not just making fun. You believe it, don't you?"

She knew him better than he thought. "It was one of the hardest parts of the whole thing for me," he admitted. "I felt so guilty, knowing how much pain I caused you."

"Forget it," she said emphatically. "We're better off without them. I realize that now."

"Single again," Mike said with a sigh.

"Yes," she said in a funny kind of voice, "and for once, we're single at the same time."

Mike felt his chest tighten. Was she inferring something or just saying they could have a good time being single together? He did not want to get his hopes up just yet and changed the subject.

"So anything interesting happen now that you're single, Miss Tinsley?" he asked, and again she looked at him strangely, and so he added, "Why do you keep looking at me like that?"

Her words were slow and careful when she answered, "What did you do last weekend, Mike?"

He was getting confused now. "Why?" he asked suspiciously.

Andi shrugged. "Just curious."

Mike was not about to tell her sex story, but the party itself he could certainly talk about. "I went to a party with some friends," he told her, then clarified, "for Halloween."

"Me, too," she said simply. "What'd you wear?"

Mike really did not see where this was going and it did not seem like casual chit-chat. It seemed more like an interrogation. "Uh, well," he stammered, not wanting to tell her as it was rather embarrassing, but this was Andrea and so he finally just said, "Alright, fine. I went as Spiderman and I looked totally ridiculous, but it wasn't my idea."

And the expression on Andrea's face then as she rose to her feet and walked away from the table was one Mike was not likely to forget as long as he lived: amazement and excitement and anxiety and fear and, finally, resignation. Honestly, it shocked him; he had no idea a person could show all those things on their face at one time.