“What?” All the jagged energy rushing through Theo’s body slammed to a halt at the sound of her name. “Jenna has nothing to do with Lucy.”

Tyson looked up and smiled. “C’mon, man. I was with you through the Jenna shit, remember? She betrayed your ass, and I saw how you took it.” Tyson got up from the chair and moved closer to Theo, then sat on the edge of the table. “You swore you’d never let a woman in as far as you’d let Jenna, remember? You told me you’d never let a female become that important to you again.”

Theo let out a startled laugh.

“And listen, Theo, I think losing your parents and Jenna like that made you kind of crawl up inside yourself and hide behind all your surface business. I remember you said-”

“What are you, my therapist?” Theo laughed in earnest now.

“I’m your friend, Theo. I’m making sure you’re not walking around thinking that Lucy is another Jenna.”

Theo stopped laughing. “Lucy isn’t Jenna.”

“See? I’m damn good at this.” Tyson smiled.

“I just don’t want to hurt her.”

“And you don’t want to leave yourself open to being hurt.” Tyson shrugged. “It makes perfect sense. All I’m saying is you can’t blame this mess you’re making with Lucy on your med school shit alone.”

Theo collapsed into a chair and rubbed his forehead, because Tyson’s words were making more sense than he cared to admit.

“Have you talked with her about this? Have you really told her about how Jenna fucked you up? How it felt to lose your parents? How scared you are about going back to school?”

Theo raised his head and blinked at Tyson. “Maybe not everything.”

“Then do it, Redmond. I think Lucy is the kind of woman who can handle most anything if it’s given to her straight.”

Theo walked over to the large tinted window of the trainer room and watched Lucy bounce up and down on the elliptical trainer in her pink sweatpants, ponytail swirling.

Lucy is not Jenna. Theo smiled to himself, sensing Tyson coming up behind him.

“Lucy’s cool.”

“She is.”

“If you really love her-even if you’re in med school or law school or in training to be the king of the fucking world-you gotta be straight with her and give her whatever you can.”

“Even if it’s an hour a day?”

“Hey, if you know and she knows that you got one hour a day for her, then that’s what you give her. But you give her your full attention for that one hour. You see what I’m saying, Theo? You make the most of that hour. Then you give her another hour the next day.”

Theo turned his head and smiled at Tyson. “You’re on a roll, aren’t you?”

“And if you ever find yourself with a whole day, you give her that whole day. And you tell her that you can’t wait for the next whole day you get to spend with her.”

That’s when Theo began to laugh. He laughed loud, and Tyson joined in. Then Tyson said, “What’s so damn funny?”

“You. You’re funny. Since when did you get to be an expert on how the female species thinks?”

Tyson smiled so big he obviously enjoyed having the opportunity to answer that question. “We all have our fields of expertise, Theo. Your life’s work is going to be medicine. My life’s work is women.”

Theo studied Lucy again, now trudging along in earnest, the pink sweatpants a blur. “I think I’ll just concentrate on this one woman.”

“She’s a good one.”

“But those sweatpants have got to go.”

“No shit.”

The two of them watched Lucy without comment for a moment, and then Tyson asked, “So what’s your plan?”

Theo smiled at him. “I’m going to get her back.”

Tyson nodded, then raised his eyebrows hopefully. “If you fuck up, feel free to delegate my way again.”

Theo laughed and smacked Tyson on the shoulder. “Not going to happen.”

Office of Doris Lehman, MSW, PhD

“It concerns me that you missed several appointments and didn’t return my calls. What’s going on, Lucy?”

“Well, let’s see.” Lucy got comfortable in the peach damask and refused-absolutely refused-to look at the annoying geisha girls. They’d have to wait for the next patient to harass, because she wasn’t giving them the satisfaction today.

“I’ve been following a very hectic schedule, Dr. Lehman, doing things like telling Theo I love him and getting rejected, eating, working, worrying, crying, eating, obsessing about Theo rejecting me, eating, trying to figure out my whacked-out boss, eating, thinking about Theo, lounging around, taking phone calls from crazed family members, eating. Other than that, not much.”

Doris finished taking notes, and Lucy would have given anything to see what she’d just written. She guessed it would be along the lines of, Patient sarcastic; in relapse with food; rejection issues have surfaced.

“What happened with Theo?”

“Banner City, I’m afraid.”

Doris cleared her throat. “I have a very hard time believing he unrolled a bedsheet painted with derogatory statements about you. Where did you choose to tell him how you felt? What were the circumstances?”

“The party three weeks ago.”

“Ah, yes. I saw photos in the Herald.”

“I made an error in judgment-I really expected him to tell me he loved me, too. Isn’t that rich? Instead, he said something about his life not being what I needed or deserved-some crap like that.”

Doris recrossed her legs and blinked at Lucy a few times. “That might have been a sincere response. Maybe he fears he’s not good enough for you.”

Lucy’s mouth hung open.

“I’m merely suggesting that Theo might believe you’d find something about him or his lifestyle unacceptable.”

Lucy shut her mouth and took a deep breath. “Uh-huh. Like the fact that he’s smart, witty, gorgeous, and fun to be with? You mean those annoying traits?”

“Perhaps he’s concerned about how you would handle him being in medical school. Did that cross your mind?”

Lucy frowned. “You mean he’s worried he won’t have enough time for me?”

“Exactly, Lucy. Maybe it wasn’t a rejection at all but his attempt, albeit an awkward one, to tell you he wasn’t sure he could give you everything you need.”

“But all I need is him.”

Doris smiled. She put her clipboard down on the floor near her feet and leaned in, lacing her fingers together as she, Lucy hoped, came up with a plan to fix everything. It was times like these that Lucy didn’t mind the copays.

Doris shook her head and laughed. “I’d love to lock the two of you in a room for a few days without diets or scales and certainly with no family or TV cameras. Just the two of you, free to be yourselves. I wonder what would come to the surface?”

Then Doris made a preposterous suggestion.

“Have you considered inviting Theo to go with you to Jamaica when this is all over?”

Lucy swallowed hard. Alone with Theo? In paradise? With nothing to do but enjoy each other’s company?

“I’ve already asked Fran. She can’t wait to go.”

Doris nodded. “I think she’d understand if you made other arrangements.”

“What really happened between the two of you?” Carolina Buendia flapped her eyelashes and glanced at the camera, as if to warn viewers that now was not the time to go for a coffee refill.

“Oh, crap,” Theo said. He leaned back in his kitchen chair and clasped his hands behind his head, sprawling his legs out in front of him.

“We’ve all seen the newspaper and the Web site- everyone is talking about it,” Carolina continued. “Was there a relationship between the two of you outside the gym that went sour?”

The look on Lucy’s face made Theo queasy. He wasn’t sure if she was going to break into tears, laugh, or rip poor Carolina to shreds with her sharp tongue. As Theo watched Lucy’s eyes go wider and wider still, he contemplated rushing downtown and busting through the studio doors to save her.