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“Tacos,” he replies. “You didn’t eat. I need to feed you.”
“When did you order that?” I ask.
“While you were changing.”
I sigh, reminded again of why he’s the absolute best. “You know my love language,” I say.
“Well, I love you,” he says, shutting the door behind him.
Then, the tears finally come, and when they do, they’re hot and thick and I wonder if they’ll ever stop. After all of that, this gesture—as small as it might seem—feels so big that it fills my heart and undoes me. Who would have thought that tacos could do that to a person? He holds me tight until they taper off.
“Was your mom pissed?” I ask Jake once he's back inside. I’d been watching his expressions during the phone call out on the balcony, but hadn’t been able to discern the tone. It didn’t seem particularly tense, but maybe they argue differently. Maybe it comes with status. I picture their arguments being less dramatic and more terse.
“No,” he said, “she wasn’t pissed, she was worried. She said she liked you.”
“Pfft, no way. I’m not mom-likable,” I say, wiping taco sauce off my hoodie. Am I, the woman in the freshly tarnished hoodie, the woman that won his mom over? I can’t believe that. I also can't believe he just eats on this couch, and that he encourages me to do the same. Maybe he should walk back that rule if I’m going to be here for a while.
“No seriously, she did. She asked if you are going to Christmas in Aspen with us.” He dropped that in casually and went back to devouring his food. Was that a real invitation? Was I just invited toChristmasin Aspen? As in, I’ve never been on an airplane, but I’ve been invited on a trip with people who Christmas places, like it’s a verb. Should it have a lowercase ‘c’ in this case?
“That’s a real thing?” I ask. I remember he had mentioned it that day at the park, on our first date.
“Yes, it’s a real thing. It’ll be fun. I’ll teach you how to ski. It’s easy, and you’ll be great at it,” he says smiling.
“Shut up,” I say, and hit him playfully on the arm. “You already gave away that joke. You’re going to laugh at me.”
“Yeah. But it’ll still be fun.”
“Whatever.”
“So…will you go?” he asks, a serious invitation this time.
“I’ve never been on a plane,” I remind him, a bit embarrassed.
“It’s easy. You just sit in a chair.” I roll my eyes at him, and he laughs again. “No seriously. That’s it—that’s the whole thing. You just…sit in a chair. You’re doing it right now and you’re really good at it. You’ll be great on a plane, babe.”
“Shut the fuck up,” I say, shaking my head. “I hate you. And technically, this is not a chair, it’s a couch.”
He leans over and kisses me on the mouth. “You don’t hate me. Will you go?”
“Yeah,” I tell him, “I’ll go, with you.”
We stay up late binge-watching true crime on the couch, my head on his chest, and I wonder if I’d been wrong all along about who I am and who I am meant to be—if I am wrong about the kind of life that’s waiting for me. Maybe it’s better than just surviving. Maybe all the shit I’ve taken in over the years isn’t mine to carry and it never was. I’d just absorbed it all: the ill intentions of others that had used me to displace their own darkness over the years. And there were a lot of them—too many to name, but they’d all left their mark on me just the same—some of them literally, like the burns on my stomach. I was a sponge filled to capacity with the putrid gray water of all of those who had hurt me. I wondered if, like a sponge, I could be wrung out and I wouldn’t have to carry it anymore. I wouldn’t have to be so heavy anymore.
I imagine myself as a person who has family waiting for them in Aspen at Christmas. I imagine what it would be like to be a person that had to take holidays into consideration before committing to plans. I tried to picture myself as someone that was invited to family barbecues and had nieces and nephews and birthday parties to attend. It didn’t seem too outrageous. I could just, but only just, touch it.
thirteen
Wakingupnexttohim, I forget for a minute how I’d ended up here and what had happened the night before. I forget about the missing laptop, the busted door, and the little bag in the corner with next to nothing that I needed. Not that I needed much of anything right now. I needed the warmth of his body, his mouth on my neck, his fingers sliding between my legs like they were now.
“Good morning,” he said, his voice raspy, in my ear. I could feel his hard cock thrusting against me from behind, the head brushing up against my entrance, teasing me, taunting me.
“Oh, fuck,” is all that I can reply. “Please…”
When he doesn’t comply and I absolutely can’t take it anymore, I climb on top of him and sit down hard on his cock. I can barely breathe and I’m already shaking with the brink of orgasm as I force my hips to keep moving back and forth, up and down, finally finding my release. I cum hard and loud, and so does he. I tell him something about how I guess my apartment can get broken into any time if this is what I get to wake up to, and he tells me that I don’t have to be robbed to fuck him in the morning, and that I can do that anytime I want.
We take a shower, make coffee, and have breakfast together on the sofa while watching the local news and it all feels so strange, but also—so normal. Not normal like normal for me, but normal like this is the stuff they show people doing on TV shows and movies when they want you to know what you’re witnessing is a loving, established couple, and not something less or something darker. Jake doesn’t seem to notice. He jokes about how maybe my break-in will make the morning news, completely unaware of how unordinary this ordinary moment feels for me. I take a moment—because a moment is all I get—to bask in this normalcy and the sense of balance it offers my restless soul. Then, my phone starts buzzing. Standard operating procedures dictate that I should ignore it under these (and most other) circumstances, but it doesn’t stop. It’s a shame, really, because it was almost perfect, so close, before I picked up my phone.
“Who is blowing you up this early?” Jake asked.
