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Except there’s also a vintage hair comb I’m dying to check out, made up of swirling cascades of rhinestones—at least I hope they’re rhinestones—in the most dramatic display I have ever seen. It’s as beautiful as the sea glass, and as thoughtful. I have a small grouping of antique hair combs that I’ve been collecting since I was eleven. This is by far the nicest one I own—it’s one of the nicest I’ve ever seen—and I can’t resist taking it out of the tissue paper and holding it up so that the light can make the rhinestones dance and dazzle. Then I’m loosely twisting my hair behind my head and securing it with the comb. A quick glance in the mirror tells me it looks as good as I imagined it would.
And finally, as if those gifts aren’t more than enough, there’s a copy of Pablo Neruda’s One Hundred Love Sonnets. It’s a garish pink book, not exactly what you would expect for sonnets filled with such warmth and emotion, but I love it anyway. I clasp it to my chest for long seconds before turning to the page marked by an exquisite bookmark in the shape of a mermaid, another gift in and of itself. The sonnet marked is seventeen and though I’ve never read it before my heart starts beating faster at just the sight of it. Ever since I sent Ethan that Neruda poem when we first got together, he’s kind of been our thing. Back and forth we trade lines and stanzas and whole poems, images that touch us, words that Neruda wrote for his love that echo so beautifully the raw emotions we feel for each other.
Some of the sonnet’s lines are highlighted, and as I read them I feel the last of the ice inside me start to melt. I’ve felt frozen, not quite here—not quite right—ever since the night Ethan got back from his last business trip to the East Coast. First he tried to break up with me, then Brandon showed up and I broke up with him instead, then we pretended the other didn’t exist for two excruciating weeks and now we’re back together, but it doesn’t feel real. It doesn’t feel whole.
And that’s my fault, I think. My rules and my damage have made Ethan reticent, have made him as cautious as I am afraid. And I hate that I’ve done that to him, hate that I’ve turned this beautiful, powerful, passionate man into someone who watches and waits, who thinks before he kisses me and who makes love to me like I’m the most fragile thing in the world.
That’s the last thing I want.
I love you as one loves certain obscure things, / Secretly, between the shadow and the soul. This p
oem, these words, give me hope that it won’t always be like this between us. I run my fingers over the words, trace the shape of the letters, imprint the meaning of them on my soul as Ethan is imprinted there. As he always will be.
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. / I love you directly without problems or pride. The words echo in my head, in my heart. It’s how I love Ethan. How I’ve always loved him even when I so desperately didn’t want to. How I will always love him no matter what happens. No matter how things end up. Together, apart, no one will ever reach inside me like he does.
I think of Brandon in these moments—which feels like a sacrilege, but it’s one I can’t help. I think of the emptiness, of the pain and the loneliness, the terror and the rage. And I imagine what it would feel like to live without it, to live without any of it. To just be happy and in love and loved like Neruda describes.
I reach for my phone and switch it back on, pull up Ethan’s last text. And send him only the last two lines of the poem. So close that your hand upon my chest is mine, / So close that your eyes close with my dreams.
Fifteen minutes later, there’s an urgent pounding on the door, one that has my heart climbing up my throat even as I walk to the door. I know who it is—of course I know—but I check the peephole anyway, do all the responsible things a single woman living in a big city should do.
It’s Ethan—of course it is—so I fling the door open. And stare. I just stare.
I can’t help myself. He looks hot. I mean, he looks really, really, really hot. He’s wearing a pair of massively ripped jeans and a tight black T-shirt that shows off the curves of his biceps and the powerful muscles of his chest. And he’s got a look on his face that I’ve never seen before, like a starving man … or a dying one. Desperate, depraved, maybe even a little delusional. And I swear, my mouth actually waters.
And then, it’s on.
He grabs my upper arms.
Yanks me to him.
Shoves the door shut behind him.
Slams his mouth down on mine.
Pushes me against the door.
And then, he takes. He just takes and takes and takes.
He’s ravenous, his mouth skimming from my lips to my jaw to the long column of my throat. He latches on just where my neck meets my shoulder and sucks so hard that I know there will be a bruise there tomorrow.
He moves to the other side, does the same thing, before grabbing my shirt and yanking. It rips straight down the center, buttons flying in all directions.
Then he’s on his knees in front of me, biting and nibbling and sucking a path straight down the center of my body. He pauses at my breasts for a few breathless seconds, shoving my bra down and sucking love bites into the soft undersides of my breasts.
“Ethan,” I half-sigh, half-moan. My head is rocking back and forth against the wall, my fingers tangled in his hair and my body—God, my body feels like it’s about to go supernova. Like it’s going to spontaneously combust in a pillar of flames that burn so hot it just might incinerate my whole world.
“Chloe,” he growls back as he undoes the button on my jeans and yanks them down and off.
His mouth is on my hip, and this time he sinks his teeth in. Hard. I yelp even as I burn hotter and then he’s burying his face in the juncture of my thighs, eyes closed and hands cupping my ass.
“Ethan,” I gasp again, rocking my hips against him. I’m desperate for his mouth, for his hands, for something—anything—for whatever he wants to give me.
He doesn’t answer. For long seconds, he doesn’t do anything—doesn’t speak, doesn’t bite, doesn’t move. Instead, he just breathes me in, short, shallow, shuddering breaths that somehow only ratchet up my desire.
And then he’s shredding the delicate lace of my underwear, ripping them off my body with a curse that sounds an awful lot like a prayer. He rests one hand against my stomach, pressing my ass into the wall, then grabs my right thigh and lifts my leg up until it’s draped over his shoulder.
“Ethan!” This time it’s a high, keening cry as my consciousness—my whole world—is reduced to those two syllables.
