I say, "Women are like fine steaks.”
Mac groans and Ryan smiles because they both know how intuitive my analogies are.
“How so?” Ryan asks.
“Don’t encourage him,” Mac says.
“The outcome is about heat and time,” I go on,
ignoring Mac. “Without heat, you get nowhere.
Things stay cold and raw. Not
good. Too much heat and things just end up burnt and ruined. But with the right
amount of heat, for the right amount of time, you get pink, moist and warm in
the middle.”
Ryan looks from me to Mac. Mac is staring at me. Then he wrinkles his nose. “Seriously?”
“What’s pink, moist and warm in the middle?” Conner asks from just behind Ryan.
Ryan jumps (because we're actually talking about Ryan and Amanda-- one of Conner's sisters)
Ryan says, “Steak,” as I say,
“Women.”
Conner looks at me with the same wonder I always get when I'm imparting deep insights.
“That’s…interesting,” Conner says. “Why are you talking
about women and steak and holding up practice?”
I don't really give a crap about the Hawks practice schedule. I'm trying to help a friend out here. “I was explaining about the proper application of heat and time to women.”
“And steaks,” Mac adds.
Conner grins at Mac. “Well, you do know something about
the prime cuts.”
Oh, God. This kid needs to learnt to shut the hell up.
Ryan covers his laugh with a fake cough.
Conner is getting
more brazen in his comments about Sara Gordon. It comes from the fact that
Conner has firmly established himself as one of the best paramedics in Omaha
and the fact that Mac has never acted on any of the threats he's ever made when Conner
spouted off.
Yet.
Of course, everyone, including Conner, knows that Mac has absolutely no
reason to worry about his wife running off with another man.
I know Conner really does have a thing for Sara but he
also has a thing for giving Mac a hard time. Not sure what's fueling this exchange this time, but it's entertaining either way.
“Don’t,” Mac says simply to Conner.
“And I think I get what you mean,” Conner says to me. “Like,
if you apply too little heat, even over a long period, it just never gets quite
done, you know?” Conner grins at
Mac. “Like if your heating element is too old to do the job or something.”
Mac points a finger at Conner’s nose. “If I’m the old heating unit in this analogy, I’m gonna put
you on your ass.”
Conner laughs. “Now why would you just assume I was
talking about you when I mention something being old. You worried about
something?”
The fact that Mac is twelve years older than his wife—and
that Conner is only three years older than Sara—is a common jab. But Mac reacts every time. I keep telling him that if he'd just let Conner's comments roll off, the kid would get tired of poking at him, but Mac can't let that stuff go.
Besides, I think he kind of likes the kid and their sparing anyway.
Mac sighs, then shoves Conner. It wasn't quite hard enough
to put him
on his ass,
but it wasn’t a friendly nudge either.
Conner laughs and rubbed his shoulder. “Okay, let’s go,
Kaye, we’ve got practice.”
So, they leave and I turn to Mac. "It's a good analogy though, right?"
"I'm going to run it past Morgan and see what she thinks." He starts to walk off.
Dammit. My wife has told me numerous times that I can compare her to anything sweet, anything
hot and anything intoxicating, but no meat, no sporting events and no disastrous historical events.
Not that I would do that anyway. At least not where she can hear it. Or hear of it.
It costs me a pizza to shut Mac up.
