His smile held and his brown eyes hovered on mine with questions written in them.
We were both free-wheeling down a hill, I could tell he felt like I did. Neither of us knew what we were doing or where we were going. We were probably the most unlikely couple; if I could call us that. Our meeting had been accidental, and we were poles apart. But I wanted to try and see if it could work, if I could succeed in life with a nice guy.
I leaned forward and kissed his cheek, and his hand came up and brushed over my hair.
My legs were stretched out about Rachel and hers lay over mine at my sides, as we sat facing each other in the bath.
She had such a beautiful body, everything was so evenly proportioned. I was tempted to touch her again, to start up where we left off last night. I didn’t, I wasn’t even sure my stomach was up to it yet. Instead I carefully washed her long legs.
I ran the soap through her toes making her giggle as she lay back against the taps, with her eyes shut.
When I’d woken this morning, I’d remembered last night, but it had been more like a dream. Images had kept throwing themselves at me all day since, and they’d poured questions and doubts into my head as I’d lain in bed.
I didn’t doubt my motives. I just wondered about hers.
“Rach,” I let her foot slip back into the water, and gripped her knee gently rubbing it as her eyes opened, “you know you went to that club alone before, have you ever done what you did with me with anyone else after going there?”
There was an instant frown on her brow. She sat up, the water swilling about her.
I remembered watching her at the restaurant too, flashing a glimpse of her bra and her cleavage for tips.
“I… Yes…”
I was glad she didn’t lie. It meant I was right, and Mom and Lindy were wrong, I could trust her.
“With guys you’d just met in the club, one-night stands?”
Her eyes were wide, a pale green, bright, and her hair clung to her face and her forehead, damp from the steaming water. “Yeah.”
I wanted to hold her, but it was too awkward to move in the bath.
“Did you see any of them again?”
“Some.”
It was the most open she’d been with me. I reached for her hand and then held it on top of her knee, weaving my fingers in between hers and brushing her healing palm with my thumb.
“Why would you do that, Rach?”
Her body stiffened. “For fun, for excitement, for things you can’t understand, Jason Macinlay.”
I lifted my eyebrows at her. I was getting too close to who she really was, and she was going all defensive again.
“Well.” I clung onto her hand, knowing she’d want to pull away when she heard what I had to say. “I’m just throwing this out there, Rach, I really think you should have more respect for yourself. You’re worth far more than some sordid quickie in an alley with a stranger. You shouldn’t do that.”
Her face had turned crimson, as it had done when I’d caught her eavesdropping on my call, only now I could see the blush run down her neck and into her breasts.
She moved to get up out the bath, but I held onto her hand, and kept her down.
“Don’t run. I’m not saying it was wrong for us. I just want you to know that what we’re doing isn’t just about sex, Rach, as I think it has been for you in the past. You’ve let people get away with using you. I’m not going to use you, and I don’t want you to let anyone else do so again.”
“You can’t ask me that. You don’t know me.”
“Rach, I think you should ask it of yourself. The night you came here, you showed me your body like it was a worthless possession. You do it all the time at the restaurant, flashing yourself to get tips. I’ve watched you, even if you’ve not watched yourself. You did it last night, too, threw yourself away on me when you thought I wouldn’t have left Lindy. Don’t do it again. For yourself. Not for me. You’re worth a lot. Your body is precious. Cherish it for me.”
I hung on to her hand as she sat still in the water, staring at me like I was a fool.
Perhaps I was a fool, or a little mad today, but if I was mad today, I was mad for her.
“Now give me your other precious leg, so I can wash that too.”
Staring at Jason, I lay back against the taps again. I didn’t know what to say.
Friends had told me over the years,
someone will hurt you, if you don’t watch out
;
you’ll end up in a situation you don’t want to be in
. Those friends had been left behind and lost ages ago, while I had gone too far and gotten into situations it was hard to justify, or get out of. Their words had never sunk in. His did.
Was that really what I was doing? Not valuing myself. Not respecting myself.
Doubts warred inside me. I had never understood myself, because I was not understandable, and I knew I’d been running from the truth for years. But was this the truth?
His fingers left mine so he could wash my other leg, but I wanted to hang onto him. I was terrified of losing him now, and there were so many things pulling against me, Lindy, his mom,
me
…
“Relax.”
I did, as much as I could.
When we got out the bath, we did it again. Sober. Slowly. Beautifully.
No one had ever done this to me as tenderly as he did.
~
I didn’t have any shifts at the restaurant over the weekend. They’d already scheduled them before I’d started. They had students working there. I needed the money, yes, but another part of me didn’t care; I just wanted to be with Jason. We spent Saturday evening and all day Sunday hanging out like kids, holed up in his apartment, playing on the Xbox, or having sex; okay perhaps not like kids.
We did it on the kitchen counter, on one of the stools before the long window after he’d lost a game to me. In the shower with me up against the wall, as we’d done it in the alley, because I told him I’d been fantasizing over it ever since I’d seen him in the shower, and we did it a couple more times on the mattress in his bedroom.
He might have been a lightweight at drinking. He wasn’t a lightweight in bed.
Poor Lindy, she’d seriously lost out. No wonder she was so cut up over it.
His mom rang Sunday morning, and he rang her in the evening.
From what I gathered, though he didn’t talk to me about it, Lindy had been bad mouthing him all over his small town.
She was probably telling everyone he was fucking me––which he was.
His mom was giving him a hard time, too, for breaking things off. She thought he’d done it lightly. I didn’t think so anymore. I could tell he was going through his own hell over their separation, but he didn’t show it after his release of emotion on the first morning. Except perhaps in the amount of times we were having sex.
He’d said he wouldn’t use me, but I still wasn’t sure if I was simply his rebound girl, his escape, or if this was something just about us, and nothing to do with what he’d just left…
But whatever I was to him, I knew what he was to me;
everything
. I felt like I’d been living in a parallel universe for two whole days. Then Monday came and it was time to face reality again, and work.
We had sex in the morning. He woke me up by kissing me behind my ear as he brushed my hair back, and with our bodies spooning, he pressed into me, while his arm came over mine and held me still, surrounding me, like a harbor protecting me from a storm.
I just knew then that a storm was coming.
He met me from work when I finished my shift, as he’d been doing for a week and a half before we’d gone out, but this time when I came out of work, I threw myself into his arms and kissed him hard.
I heard the chef, who’d come out for a cigarette behind me, laugh. “See, I knew he was your boyfriend. Otherwise why else was he walking down here night after night? Thought you could sneak a kiss in as you’re clocking off on the early shift tonight didn’t ya?”
I looked back and laughed, and Jason raised his eyebrows, but neither of us denied it.
“Come on, let’s get back.” He gripped my hand and held it firmly.
It was really cold again tonight.
“Do you mind if I go for a run, after we get in? I was late out of work so I came straight here.”
“No, of course I don’t.”
He flashed a smile at me. “You could come along if you wished..?”
“And slow you down, yeah, you’d love to have me tag along.”
He stopped dead on the pavement, before a load of people, blocking their path, and then pulled me close as they bypassed us. My face was so near to his.
“Yeah, actually I would, Rach. I’d really like it.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I just whispered, “Maybe.”
He let me go.
“I missed you today,” I said, as he gripped my hand again.
He looked over at me. “And I missed you.”
I smiled at him and he smiled at me, then we faced ahead, and carried on walking.
I’d never done anything this normal before with a guy. My fingers clasped his more tightly.
“Rach, I seriously would love to try running with you…”
I glanced across at him. “I’m not sure, I––”
“I did everything you wanted me to do on Friday…”
Yeah, he had, even though the drinks had made him sick. “Okay, I’ll try it.”
He grinned. “Tonight?”
“I haven’t got anything to run in.” I looked ahead as we turned the corner into the road where he lived. The street was quiet, there were only a few people walking past.
“Dammit, I forgot that. Tomorrow then. I’ll buy you some stuff.”
I looked over at him again. “You shouldn’t spend any more money on me. I got more tips. I’ll get myself something tomorrow before I start work.”
Sensing him staring at me, I glanced at him. His eyebrows lifted.
“I just talked, honest.”
He smiled.
I laughed.
God, I really liked this guy.
He stopped suddenly, then hugged me, pulling me against his chest, and kissing my cheek. Then he whispered in my ear, “I don’t want you to feel guilty, or afraid to tell me the truth, Rach. I just want you to be happy, genuinely happy, and you’ll only achieve that if you like yourself, and if you value yourself.”
When he let me go a little I met his gaze. “And who made you the guru? You need to be happy, too, Jason. You aren’t, yet…” His words had made me want to cry though. I think he was the only guy who’d ever seen through my bravado. I was never really happy. Elated, exuberant, bursting with enthusiasm and bubbling with ideas and a hunger for more, yes––happy, never. Happy was the middle road my brain could never seem to find. How did he know? I didn’t ask, I just hugged him, my arms about his neck, and thought maybe I didn’t just like him, maybe, I loved him.
When he pulled away, and I let him go, he kissed me. It was a firm but gentle kiss, not sexual at all; it expressed kindness and appreciation.
“I knew this was why.” We both turned at the bitter voice.
We were only a little way from the entrance to the apartment and a woman was standing before the door. There was a suitcase on the pavement beside her.
She pulled off her woolen hat and revealed blonde hair.
“Lindy.” Jason let go of me and walked toward her.
Something cut into my heart; a deep sharp pain.
“Lindy, what are you doing here?”
“I came to sort things out, to speak to you in person. Now I see there was no point. I was right in the beginning.”
Jason glanced back at me. “Rach, go inside.”
My feet felt like they were stuck to the sidewalk. I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to leave him.
“Rach! Please, just give us a moment. I’ll come up in a while.”
My heart raced. He was going to get back with Lindy. I was going to lose him. I’d got used to him being mine. I didn’t want to lose him.
“Rachel,
please
.”
The plea in his voice made me move rather than his words. But I felt like I was in a daze as I walked toward the entrance and then buzzed in the code, leaving him behind and leaving a part of me behind with him. I couldn’t bear this. I couldn’t stand to lose him now.
I stood in the elevator and clutched my arms about myself. I felt so alone. I was so used to having him with me now.
My imagination raced, overflowing with possibilities about what they were saying and doing down there while I was up here.
I let myself into his apartment with the key he’d given me, and immediately went to the long window, and looked down, but I couldn’t see the street in front of the door below.
Then I saw them, walking away side by side. He had his arm around her and her head was on his shoulder. They didn’t have her suitcase with them.
My heart pounded, tears left my eyes, and then I was sobbing.
“Lindy.” I reached my arm around her. “I’m truly sorry.” Her head fell onto my shoulder.
I’d just shoved her suitcase in the hall and left it there. I hoped no one would take it. Shit. This was a nightmare.
I was walking her away from the apartments only because I didn’t want to make things worse for Rach. Devil versus deep blue see again.
The memory of Rachel’s expression was scored into my brain as I walked with Lindy. Rachel had been terrified; I knew she was thinking I would let her down. But I couldn’t focus only on Rachel now, I had to think of Lindy, too. I
had
hurt Lindy. She was here in New York, crying.
I walked with her in silence until we reached the Brooklyn Bridge Park, and then, there, by the water, against the railing, I stopped and put my arms around her.
She only accepted my comfort for a moment. Then her head lifted. “Why are you letting her do this to us? Why are you doing it to me?”
Anger and pain burned brightly in Lindy’s eyes, glinting in the electric lights as her breath misted.
“It isn’t Rachel’s fault. It isn’t anyone’s.”
She wiped her nose on her sleeve. “I saw you kissing her, Jason. I know what’s going on. When did it begin? Tell me?”
My arm fell from her shoulder. “Lindy…”
“Tell me!”
I sighed. “Friday.”
The heel of her hand struck my shoulder. “You bastard.”