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I thought I’d be nervous at this kind of thing. All full of experienced people in various lifestyles like rope and floggers and leather and fire and oh my... This girl I was dating told me about this one. How all the people are so warm and open and don’t even think twice about your particular “kink.” You like to date lots of people? Sleep with lots of people? Love lots of people? There’s nothing these people haven’t seen already.
After chatting with a few people around the room, I walk over to the bar and plant myself in one of the well-worn barstools. The bar tender slides over –like he’s auditioning for a role on “Cocktail” – trying way too hard –and I order a Cosmo.So Sex in the City of me.The woman next to me is drinking one too, and she turns to face me. She is a bit older, taller than me, with auburn hair, classic features and rimmed glasses that make her look a bit intimidating. But very well put together – I admire her face and her body and since I don’t have a poker face, she notices and blushes. And admires me back.Maybe most women are as awkward as I am at flirting with each other.
My Cosmo arrives and we clink our glasses in a toast. We start talking and I find out that Dee is an attorney.Yes, so David’s ex is a lawyer. Whatever. They’re not all psycho bitches. Plus, this is just a friend. I’m not going to marry her, and I’ll never have to worry about her ability to endlessly drag me to court. I do not have the financial stability to want that as a possibility. I’m sure she can find another lawyer to marry so they’re on equal footing. Or a rich doctor who can afford it. I am neither of these things.Then I find out that she’s not interested in marriage either. Been there, done that. Got her punch card stamped and everything.
Of course, the first person I meet has less familiarity with this kind of thing than I do. Oh, well. She’s lovely, albeit inexperienced. But noteveryonehere has experience. Age brings wisdom, true. But there’s so much about which to be wise! And this appears to be my comfort zone.Hmmm. Perhaps I have value here, too.
She and I connect over cheese fries and Cosmopolitans. And make plans to do our nails together at a future date. A friend? I could use one of those. We are kindred spirits, I can tell.
* * *
March 3, Noon-ish
Fast forward toa few dates later. Dee and I have something like a relationship. I don’t know what to call it. We are friends, but maybe more, intimate friends? In the purest sense of the word, but also, we sometimes make out. And fool around. And go to events together.I guess we’re dating.Just as a taste of what our relationship is like, let me describe to you one of our “dates.” I don’t know what to call it. We are friends, but maybe more, intimate friends? In the purest sense of the word, but also, we sometimes make out. And fool around. But not this time.
It’s a nice day in Vegas, so we make a picnic. I bring my favorite cheeses and I ask her to choose a wine. She owns a winery, back in California somewhere. Napa? Sonoma? I don’t really know wine or California geography that well. I’m pretty sure they have vineyards there, though. We drink the wine in plastic Vegas branded wine glasses built inside of a tumbler (classy!), and she pretends to film a commercial, throwing her hair over her shoulder and attempting to seduce me with a smoldering look. Except halfway through she just bursts into fit of giggling.
We fall, laughing, onto the grass. Lying on our backs, staring up at the big puffy clouds and bright blue sky. I cannot imagine being any happier than in that moment.
* * *
March 9, 1:00am
I don’t thinkI’d say I have “vacation days.” Instead, I have days where there isn’t much work. Usually, a few days here and there between sprints that last anywhere from a day to three weeks— and occasionally longer. This is one of those lulls. David suggests I come along with him on a short business trip. Just a couple of days. I can lounge in the hotel room, or I can sightsee nearby. He’ll be busy with day long meetings, but he can join me for dinner. I leave the hotel room twice in three days. I think the hotel staff think I’m a very well-spoken escort.I can’t tell if I mind or not. I don’t look down on sex workers. And maybe that’s what I am? Who knows?The point is there’s a lovely cafe with artistically painted matcha lattes and the best brownies I’ve ever had the pleasure of putting in my mouth. And this small, quiet cemetery that I can walk about in the late afternoon and ponder the mysteries of life. Once, I even take a brief cat nap. Such a perfect napping spot.
David and I fly back the evening before his birthday. I think, as we get into the taxi, I must give him a kiss on his birthday. I want to be the very first person to wish him a happy birthday. I want to do so properly. I’m not worried about if it’ll happen, but rather missing the moment. when I want something, I get it. That isn’t pride or arrogance. It’s self-awareness. When I know what I want, I get what I want. When I don’t know, well, I get whatever I get. And I don’t get upset. Nobody can reliably give me something I haven’t asked for. That is a fact.
I am careful to be on top of things. I’m anxiously checking my phone to make sure I kiss himonhis birthday. As he slips from one year to the next. Not a moment before. He probably thinks this is my neurosis. Which it kind of is. But not all neuroses are damaging.
Sure enough, as timing would have it, it turned midnight as we pulled up onto my street, and I kissed him, without waiting to be asked, before he dropped me off at home. The timing could not have been more perfect. I gave a quick thanks to my guardian angel. I know who’s responsible for this. Always show gratitude to the ones that deserve it. Life will be a lot easier for you if you do.
We kiss. Then the taxi pulls away into the night. I crunch through the snow, obstinately dragging my rolling suitcase behind me. I walk up the short flight of stairs and throw myself under the warm blankets. I fall asleep thinking about the kiss.
That kiss.
It’s the kind of kiss you see in movies. The kind that never happen. I’ve imagined other kisses since; kisses that make you pick up your foot and cross it behind your knee, toes curled. Kisses that manifest in the rain. Or snuck between two cars in a parking lot. Kisses that send shivers down one’s spine.
I’ve never even been much into kissing. I know. All women love to be kissed. But maybe, just maybe, I’m not all women. Oh, I like kisses.WhenI like them. It’s rather an oddity of mine, I suppose. I usually don’t like to kiss, especially not when I’ve only just met someone. I don’t know why. It’s not a physical intimacy issue; I’ll hop in bed with someone before I’ve blinked. But kisses? Just…no.
But I cannot stop thinking about this kiss. And I am not the sort to remember kisses. I barely remember my first. Do I remember my first? I must have had one. One kiss jumps to mind, but I am sure it isn’t my first. It happened in the rain, on the steps in front of my college dorm building. Hmmm, why that kiss? Oh, well, I don’t have time to analyze this now, Kitten! I have more important things to do. Probably.
We’re all looking for something real. I remember this line, from some movie. It rings true to me. This kiss is real.
He drops me off, and the taxi drives off into the night.
March 9, 2:25am
I can’t sleep. Not like that’s unusual. I lie in bed reflect on what I want for the next year, the next few years, even. I am twenty-nine, on my last stretch to my thirtieth birthday. Surely, I should have my life sorted out by thirty! Truth is, I realized with a jolt, I felt pretty settled. Dee had been right. I just hadn’t announced it officially.
I’m not his wife. It’s likely that I never will be. But is that bad?
I’m my own person. I’ve tried the Girlfriend thing all year, and I kept waiting for the right moment to tell his kids, like a normal person and I couldn’t because that isn’t what I want.What do I want? How do I want to make my life? Is this my quarter-life crisis? My biological clock?Or am I just in a haze from insomnia?
I look over at the clock. It’s late, like three in the morning. But I call him, anyway, and even though it’s the middle of the night. As I thought, he’s up too, working. But he takes a break and walks over. In a short second, I am on my stomach with my face pressed into bed and my hips up with him inside me. Filling me completely. I can feel his hand at the top of my hips pressing my torso into the mattress making my hips come up at the proper angle.He’s using me. And I need to be used. I crave to be used by him. He speeds up the thrusts and I feel like I’m going to burst.He must have known too, because just as I get there, he leans over and almost growls in my ear. “Not yet. Wait.”
Like an obedient girl, I wait. But I am right… there… I need to release. And yet I still hear him growl “Wait,” this time with his voice starting to crescendo. And wait, I do.He knows. He knows how close I am. And he’s toying with me. I’m better than this. I am…
“Now.” I don’t know whether he whispered it or yelled it or something in between. But I hear that word and my mind explodes. I let all the emotion and all the feelings out at once. And it feels like a rocket launch.
