Backyard Offer

Happy birthday to me? No, happy birthday to Jacob, that's what tonight is about. Let me back up.

My name is Roberta Browning, I'm thirty-four, and I've been married to Jacob Martino for eight years. We met at a community college auto shop class when I was twenty-three and he was twenty-five, and yes, he was the guy who corrected my torque wrench technique, and yes, that was somehow the most attractive thing anyone had ever said to me. We both work at Riggs Auto now. Have for years. It's a whole thing.

Anyway. Today Jacob turned thirty-six. And I had a plan.

He was out in the garage fixing Mrs. Pell's lawnmower, because that's what he does on his birthday apparently, fixes things for half the cul-de-sac because nobody else on Cedar Lane can tell a spark plug from a hole in the ground. I walked out there with two glasses of lemonade and my heart going about a hundred and ten.

"Happy birthday," I said, setting the glasses down on the workbench. "I want to give you something in the bedroom tonight. Anal."

He looked up from the mower. He had a rag in one hand and the most amazing expression on his face, like I'd just told him the car had a fifth pedal.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"You heard me."

"Roberta. It's six o'clock on a Tuesday and Mrs. Pell's mower is in forty pieces on my bench."

"The mower will wait. Mrs. Pell will wait. I will not!"

He wiped his hands off slow, like he was buying himself time to think. "Okay. Hold on. Are you sure? Because we've talked about it, sure, but we've never..."

"I've been reading," I said. "A lot of reading. Like, embarrassingly much reading. There are whole forums about this, Jacob!"

"There are?"

"Whole forums! And I bought supplies. And I've been, you know, prepping. For a week. Which is why I've been weird about the bathroom door lately, don't think I didn't notice you noticing."

He laughed at that. He's got a great laugh, my husband, even when he's baffled. "A week? You've been planning this for a week and you didn't say anything?"

"It's a surprise. A birthday surprise. You always say you want to know what I'm getting you and I always say nothing, and this year I finally get to say nothing and mean it in a completely different way."

He came around the workbench and stood close, and I could smell the grease on him, motor oil and cut grass from the yard. "Babe. I'm not saying no. I'm saying are you sure you want this to be the gift? Because it's supposed to be your gift to give me, not the other way around, and..."

"That's exactly the point," I told him. "I want it to be for both of us. I want to do this. I've wanted to for a while and I kept chickening out, and then your birthday came along and I thought, well, there's my excuse. Happy birthday, here's my ass."

"Best card I've ever gotten," he said, and I swatted him, and he caught my hand and held it. "Okay. If you're sure."

"I'm sure."

"Then go get ready. I'll finish this tomorrow."

"You're going to leave Mrs. Pell's mower in pieces?"

"For this? Roberta, I'd leave a transmission in midair."

* * *

So then it was on me to actually deliver, which, no pressure! I went upstairs and ran the shower hotter than I usually do and just stood under it for a while, getting my head on straight. Let me tell you about me and nerves. I talk a big game. I've talked a big game my whole life. But when it comes time to actually do the thing, my hands shake a little, and tonight was no exception. I shaved everything, took my time with it, and kept checking my own work like a mechanic torquing bolts twice. Old habits.

The bedroom got the full treatment. Fresh towels down on the bed, the good ones, because if we were doing this we were doing it right. The lube came out of the nightstand drawer where it had been hiding all week behind the aspirin like it was contraband. I got the soft lamp going and turned off the overhead, because overhead lights are for finding dropped sockets, not for this. And then I stood there in my robe in the middle of my own bedroom thinking, okay, Browning, you talked the talk, now what?

The water in the hall bathroom shut off. That was fast! I heard him stomping around in there, scrubbing the mower off his hands, and then the stairs, and then he was in the doorway with damp hair and a clean t-shirt, looking at me like I'd hung the moon.

"You set the whole room up," he said.

"I told you. Forums."

"Towels on the bed and everything."

"Towels on the bed and everything. Sit down before you drip on the carpet."

He came over and sat next to me on the edge of the bed, and the mattress did its familiar dip, and suddenly eight years of marriage felt like the best safety net in the world. He turned toward me and kissed me, slow, the way he does when neither of us is going anywhere. His hand came up to my jaw and I made a little noise into his mouth and he smiled against my lips, the jerk.

"I love you," he said, pulling back an inch. "And happy birthday to me, seriously."

"Happy birthday to you, you're welcome."

"So," he said, and his thumb was doing this slow thing along my cheekbone that was not helping my nerves any. "What do you need? Tell me what you need and I'll do it."

What did I need. I'd rehearsed this, actually, in the shower, a whole speech, and it evaporated the second his thumb moved. "I need you to go slow. Slower than you think. Like, when you think you're going slow, go slower."

"Slower than slow. Got it."

"And talk to me the whole time. If I say stop, we stop, no questions, no sulking."

"Never sulked a day in my life," he said, and I raised an eyebrow at him because we both remembered the great thermostat war of two years ago. "Okay, once. About the thermostat. Not about this. I promise, the second you say stop, we're done."

"Good. That's good." I took a breath. "And I need you to not make it weird if I make weird noises."

"Roberta. We've been married eight years. I've heard every noise you make. I have favorites."

"You have favorites?"

"There's one you do when you stretch in the morning that I'd listen to on repeat if you'd let me record it."

"Absolutely not. No recordings. You're not putting my morning noises on your phone, Jacob, I mean it."

He held up both hands, laughing. "No recordings. Fine. Just my memory, then."

"Just your memory."

I reached over and clicked the lamp down one more notch, and the room went gold and shadowy, and my nerves were still there but they'd moved over to make room for something else. Something warmer. Eight years and he still kissed me like that. Eight years and I still got butterflies when he looked at me in low light.

"Okay," I said, and untied the belt of my robe. "Come here."

He came here.

He kissed me once more and then pulled back, and I did the thing I'd been circling for a week. I opened the nightstand drawer and pulled out the bag. Not the aspirin. The other thing.

"Okay, so, full disclosure," I said, holding it up. "This is not the only thing I bought."

Jacob looked at the small plug in the package and then at me, and his eyebrows went up in a way that would've been funny if my face wasn't already on fire.

"You've been planning this for a while," he said.

"A week. I read a lot. There are so many forums, Jacob. So many."

"What's the plan here, exactly?"

"The plan is, you don't just get to skip to the end. There are steps. Like a brake job. You don't start with the calipers."

"See, now you're speaking my language," he said, and he took the bag from me and actually read the lube bottle like it came with a torque spec. That's my husband. I married a man who reads instructions, and tonight I was grateful for it.

"Okay, so you lie back," I said, and my voice came out steadier than I felt. "And I do the prep myself. You watch. That's part of it, for me. I want you to see I'm okay."

"You sure? I want to help."

"You are helping. You're being the calm one while I'm over here with my hands shaking."

"They're shaking?"

"A little. Don't make it a thing."

So I got out of the robe and lay back on the towels, and he settled next to me on his side, one elbow propped, close enough that I could feel the warmth off him. I warmed the lube in my palms first, because the forums were very loud about cold lube being a crime, and they were right. I took my time. More time than I needed, honestly, and Jacob just waited, quiet, one hand resting light on my knee like an anchor.

"Still okay?" he asked.

"Still okay. Just, my brain is doing a checklist. Lube, check, relaxation, working on it."

"Want me to talk? About anything?"

"Tell me about the mower."

"Mrs. Pell's mower?" He laughed under his breath. "Seriously?"

"It's a normal thing. Normal is good right now."