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She was already trying to get off the bed. “Just let me brush my teeth and take a shower and I swear I’ll do whatever you want. I mean, within reason. If I like it.”
I pushed her back down in a tangle of limbs and stripped her dress down over her tits, her waist, her hips. “You’re not listening to me. I don’t care that you ate pepperoni or that it’s been a whole two hours since you showered. I don’t care.”
She stopped wiggling and eyed me. “Really?”
“Really.” I wanted to tell her she had some issues that needed working on, but that was none of my business and I didn’t want to kill the moment anyway. She looked like she might actually believe me. “Now shut up and kiss me.”
To my surprise she did, with an enthusiasm I wasn’t expecting. It made me instantly hard. I yanked down my jeans and kicked them off. I kissed her back, feverishly, stroking my tongue across hers. I wanted her to understand sex could be raw and spontaneous and very fun. I didn’t need her spritzed and brushed and cleansed and posed. I just needed her.
I didn’t even wait to push inside her. I just took her, hard, wanting her to let go and enjoy herself. Wanting to take what I could while we still had time. She moaned in the back of her throat and dug her nails into my back. Then she shocked both of us by having an almost instant orgasm. “That’s it, baby,” I told her, my dick throbbing inside her. I heard the excitement in my own voice. She had no idea what she did to me and how sexy she was.
“Yes,” she said, sounding breathless. “Oh yes, Christian.”
Then I bent down and kissed her, hard, wanting to drive my point home. “You make me need to come, baby.”
“You really should,” she said, like she was encouraging me to try for a new job or take a vacation.
It amused me. I exploded deep inside her, loving the way she held on to me, her eyes rolling back in her head.
And when I slowed down and rested my forehead briefly on hers, kissing her slightly greasy pizza lips that she was so insanely stressed about, I realized that this was trouble on a whole other level.
Fuck my life, I actually liked her.
—
I had thought that for the first time in a week I would be able to sleep. That the relief I felt and all the carbs and a few glasses of wine, the multiple orgasms, would knock me into a sleep so sound and deep I would wake up at 10 A.M. on Sunday morning, groggy and sluggish. I wanted that. I wanted oblivion.
I didn’t get it.
Christian lay next to me in bed sound asleep, and that in itself was unsettling. It had been four years since there had been anyone other than Bradley in my bed. I knew his habits, his breathing, his sleep sounds. Christian was bigger and took up more space. He eschewed the covers and lay sprawled out bare-ass naked on his stomach. It seemed important to him to always be touching me. We had started out spooning, then when I shifted away from him and he rolled onto his stomach, he flopped his arm across my middle.
It was sweet and I appreciated the intention behind it, but I didn’t like it. His arm was heavy, the weight oppressive. Bradley never touched me when we slept and I was disconcerted by Christian’s dominating contact. But then everything about Christian was disconcerting. Especially how easily he brought me to orgasm. It was unreal.
My body warmed at the memory, and even though I was actually a little sore from having sex three times I also wanted more. Real life was going to hit me hard and I wanted to avoid it as long as possible.
But as I lay there in the quiet darkness of the cabin and felt sick to my stomach from both the pizza and thoughts of my wedding, I couldn’t avoid reality. I wondered if the reception had just gone on without me. I wondered if Bradley was still in town or if he had immediately gone back to Boston. I wondered if I could get my job back. Or my apartment. Or if our honeymoon to Bora Bora was refundable. I knew Bradley wouldn’t go on it solo. That wasn’t his style.
I thought about the mothers I had been working with whom I had passed off to my colleague Sandra and I felt terrible. I loved my job. The relief those mothers felt when they were reassured by the adoptive parents they would love the child was amazing. And the joy of the adoptive parents was always beautiful to see. I had walked away from that and now I wasn’t sure if I could go back.
Then I realized the most obvious answer was I could never go back to any part of my old life. That was the life of a woman who got everything she ever wanted. Only none of it was real.
Peeling back Christian’s arm, I climbed out of the brass bed. It was creaky on the floorboards but I tiptoed over to where my dress was lying on the floor and pulled it on over my head. I put on my sandals, pulled my phone out of my bag, and opened the door as quietly as possible. There were four chairs in the yard arranged around an old fire pit and I sat down on one, sinking back so I could look up and see the stars. When was the last time I had looked at the sky?
Maybe summer camp. I went every year in Vermont until I was thirteen. I was always socially adept and I loved camp because it was one big social event. Swimming and horseback riding and laughing in the bunk when I was younger. Gossip and games and checking out boys when I was older. Sophie had despised camp and I had spent a good chunk of time insisting that my friends let her hang around with us because I always felt sorry for her that she couldn’t make friends. She was too smart, too factual, too serious. She made people uncomfortable.
I was always hugely confident then because conversation and making friends came easily for me. Drawing my feet up onto the chair, I pulled my sundress over my knees and hugged them. I stared at the sky, at the brilliance of the stars floating over the canopy of trees, and wondered where was that bold little girl who turned cartwheels and performed camp cheers in front of a hundred people. I spent the summer tanning to a golden bronze while my hair lightened to nearly white and I was happy because I knew who I was.
Now I had no freaking clue.
I lifted my phone and unlocked it with my pass code. My screen said I had forty-seven texts and six voicemails. The social media notifications were in the hundreds. Clearly everyone was tagging me and questioning the wedding that didn’t happen.
I started to scroll through them. They were predictable. Concern. Anger. Fear that I had lost my mind entirely. My mother seemed to think I was kidnapped. I sent her, my father, and Sophie a group text.
I’m fine. Just need some time. I’m sorry.
I wasn’t sure what else to say. How did I apologize to my father for his tremendous waste of money? Or my mother for humiliating her in front of her peers?
It was chilly in the night air so I went back in the cabin and dragged out my wedding gown to use as a blanket. Or maybe just because I wanted to hold it and cry. My heart was more than a little broken, but I also realized it was my ego that was very bruised.
