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Her voice brought me back to reality. “I can tell.”
“Does that turn you off at all?”
I grinned. “Am I acting like it does?”
She snickered. “No, I just--maybe that wasn’t the right term.”
“Take your time. Find the right term.”
I watched her take a long pull from her drink before she set it back down, licking her lips and thinking hard on my question.
Mesmerizing me with the movement of her tongue.
“I just meant, me not knowing much of this kind of lifestyle, it doesn’t bother you at all?”
I shook my head. “Why would it?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess…”
I waited for her to find her words as her eyes stared off over my shoulder.
“My father’s a perfectionist. That’s just how he was raised. He’s Korean, and in his family, failure is anything other than our most perfect. It’s why I’m always striving to get good grades. I mean, I want to get them, yes. But I also don’t want to disappoint my father. Which happens more than I’d like it to.”
I nodded, but I didn’t interject. It looked like she needed to talk.
“And Mom? Well, she’s a business owner. She’s got her own interior design business. She makes just as much as my father, if not more. And she still found time to raise me, and keep our house put together, and get her own degree, and all sorts of other stuff. They’re… two perfect peas in a perfect pod. It’s exhausting to keep up with sometimes.”
I nodded. “I can imagine.”
She snickered. “You must think I’m stupid, complaining about that kind of stuff. I mean, I’ve got two parents who love me pay for my education, and give me everything I need or could ever want. Who want me to have the best start in life.”
“Grass isn’t always greener.”
“And in some ways, I was fine with that. You know? I was fine with the judgment and Dad constantly critiquing my clothes and Mom constantly wanting me to dress up for dinner parties and Dad going over my research papers in school with a fine-toothed comb. I was okay with all of that because it was supposed to make me better. It’s supposed to put me in this world and make me this person they want to be. This person I want to be.”
“Sure you really want to be that person?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know now.”
I squeezed her hand. “Dani, look at me.”
Her eyes slowly came back to mine and I saw tears lining them. The words coming out of her mouth didn’t match the sadness in her eyes. And it killed me inside. Such a beautiful girl, with her entire life ahead of her. Just now finding out she wasn’t really happy with it.
I could sympathize with that.
“What do you want now, Dani? Right now? This very second?”
Her eyes danced between mine. “Something different.”
Something came over me. Whether it was lust, or passion, or a desire to know her more, I ran with it. I tugged her hand toward my body, raising her up from her chair. I captured her in my arms and pressed my lips against hers, tasting the Coke, the rum, and the way she opened up to me. The way her tongue slid against my own set my veins on fire. The way her back bowed to press her body against my own sent my gut churning. I picked her up and walked her out of the kitchen. She wrapped her legs around me and shed her coat, leaving it in a pile on the floor just outside my bedroom. She ripped at her scarf, tossing it to the floor. As I closed the door with my foot, I sucked on her lower lip, causing her to moan down the back of my throat.
As I settled her back against my mattress, I gazed into the depths of her twinkling eyes, needing her to answer me before I went any further.
“Are you sure this is what you want?” I asked.
She answered me by gripping the collar of my jacket to slide
it off my shoulders.
