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Shrugging, he took another drag on his cigarette. “It’s whatever. It’s one more in a long list of things I suck at.”
He was too sad. She wanted to make him feel better, but she didn’t know how. So she did the only thing she could think of, which was to confess something embarrassing about herself: “The reason I’ve never been cheated on is that I’ve never been in a serious relationship.”
He looked over at her, eyebrows raised. “Really?” He sounded as surprised as if she’d told him she’d never tasted ice cream.
“I’ve had sex,” she said, so there wasn’t any misunderstanding. “Plenty of times. I’m not a—”
He put his hands up in a warding gesture. “I wasn’t asking.”
Esther looked down at the sidewalk. If the wind was just right, she could probably spit on her car from here. Or Jonathan’s. “I don’t think I’m built for commitment,” she said. “Some people just aren’t, right?”
“Why do you think that?”
She shrugged. “I’ve never liked anyone long enough to keep them around.”
“You’ve never been in love?” There he went again, sounding shocked.
“Nope.”
It wasn’t a big deal. Plenty of people had never been in love. The world was full of people still waiting to find their soul mate—not that Esther believed in soul mates. She was better off than most of the rest of them, because she didn’t need to be in love. She wasn’t waiting for a man to come along and complete her. She was perfectly happy on her own. Most of the time.
He flicked ash over the railing. “That’s sad.”
She swiveled her head to glare at him. “Thanks.”
He didn’t look as sad anymore—probably because he was too busy thinking about how sad she was. She’d successfully distracted him with her own patheticness.
He shrugged, smiling at her. “Well, it is.”
“It’s not like I haven’t been attracted to people. I’ve had crushes. But after the initial excitement wears off I always end up feeling meh.”
He looked thoughtful. “Maybe you’re gay.”
“I’m not gay.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I want to sleep with guys and I don’t want to sleep with girls. That’s pretty much the textbook definition of not-gay.”
Not that she hadn’t considered it. She’d even tried to date a girl once—in college, which was such a cliché—but that had been a big nope. Girls were definitely not for her. She liked men, and she liked sex with men. She liked it a lot. She just didn’t like the men hanging around afterward. Esther was the opposite of Jinny. Instead of keeping men around past their expiration date, she tossed them out as soon as the freshness had started to wear off.
She looked down at her hands. “I just think all that sappy, hand-holding, love song stuff isn’t for me.”
Jonathan shook his head, gazing across the alley at the building next door. “That stuff’s all performative. That’s not love. Love is madness. It’s a compulsion. It’s passion and torment and exhilaration and fear.”
“You make it sound awful,” Esther said, shuddering. “Like skydiving or something.”
“It is. But it’s also incredible.”
“If you say so. Seems like more trouble than it’s worth.” Look at him—he’d only been in love once and he was still fucked up from it. If that was what was in store for her, she didn’t mind taking a pass.
He took another drag on his cigarette. “You only say that because you’ve never experienced it. Most of art and literature was inspired by love.”
Esther rolled her eyes. “A lot of it was inspired by religion, but I’m not inviting missionaries into my house to proselytize me.”
He looked over at her. “So you’ve just given up on ever falling in love?”
Maybe. It was easier than being disappointed over and over again. Or wondering whether there was something wrong with her. Plenty of men preferred casual sex over relationships, and no one ever blinked an eye at them. Esther was only doing what they did. That didn’t make her broken.
