Miss Matched [COMPLETED]

8. Simon

It doesn't take long for me to figure out why there was such a twinkle in her eyes when she picked a plate and selected her paints. While we've been talking about our jobs—a safe subject—she's been constructing what, I'm pretty sure, is a replica of me on the plate. He's dressed like me right down to my vans, and she keeps examining me as though I'm her model. Obviously, I can't be sure since his head doesn't quite match mine.

Starting at his shoulders, a shrunken, flaccid penis takes the place of a normal head. Every time I look at it, I have to smother a laugh. The woman in charge came over early on and was impressed with Tayla's artistic skills. Just now she came around and stared at the plate for a moment, her head cocked. Then she examined me, took in the masterpiece immortalized on the ceramic, and turned bright red.

Tayla glanced over her shoulder and gave her an impish smile. "He's a dick, so..."

"Right, yes, I can...see that." She wandered away without another word and hasn't come back again.

At the top of the plate, she's written Soulmate Simon in a swirling, beautiful cursive that belies the eyesore below. "You know," I say, tipping the end of my brush toward the dick head. "Someday our children might wonder why you've got a picture of my most prized possession on a plate. Also, they may question where you put my actual head."

"It's up your ass. Makes it hard to see." A hint of a smile tugs at the edges of her mouth. "You think this is your penis?" She purses her lips and pretends to assess it. "I can't really remember. Is that what yours looks like?" She bats her eyes.

Our gazes lock, and her smile slips a fraction. "If you need a reminder, I'm happy to oblige." Is it too soon for those comments? Probably. But when an opening presents itself, it's hard to ignore. I reach for the top button of my pants.

Her eyes widen a fraction. "Oh, no!" She crosses her arms over her face.

"No? You sure?" I try and fail to suppress my amusement.

"Quite sure," she says, straightening her back and dipping her brush into the pale pink. "How's your sister?"

"Married to a decent guy. Two kids." I pick up my brush and examine the colors. In contrast to hers, mine has Soulmate Tayla scrawled across the top. When she started her plate with the swirly Soulmate Simon in such careful neat letters, I got sucked in and thought we were making progress. Turns out, not so much. Although I suppose she didn't label it Fucking Simon, so that's something. I'll count it as a win.

Since I can't draw, my creation is a colorful list of all the things I loved about her when we dated. Some of them, like her sense of humor, clearly still apply, but others are a leap of faith. Whether they're true now or not, they were once, and maybe the plate can celebrate the good parts of our past together. "Your brother?"

She sighs. "A manager at McDonald's. No house. Not married. No kids. Not even a serious girlfriend."

"He's happy?" Her brother Damon is a free spirit, and his motto is work to live and not live to work. Over the years I wondered whether he outgrew his stance. I guess not. "Still traveling the world?"

"Yeah," she nods and rinses her brush in the bowl of water. "He's saving up for an Eastern European trip next. To me, his lifestyle seems ridiculous, but Mom and I have given up trying to talk him into something else."

"What about your dad?" One of the things I loved about her had been her close connection to her family.

She bites her lip and paints for a few minutes in silence. When it seems like she's not going to answer, I set down my brush and swivel on my chair to face her. Maybe Damon's lack of career aspirations has driven a wedge into the family? When we were dating, they tried to talk him into becoming a flight attendant like her mother.