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I grit my teeth, desperately wanting to be away from him, but not wanting to upset him even more. “Ok,” I whisper, pulling the door open and turning uncomfortably to look at him.
His eyes meet mine. They’re remorseful and disappointed, and all I can do is look away again and hold the door until he follows me into the hallway.
We walk in silence to the elevator and then ride it all the way to the lobby without a single word. He shifts in place a few times like he’s about to say something, but he never does. It’s an excruciating span of minutes, and I really hate him for insisting on following me out, because it’s only making the whole ordeal even worse. Does he think I can’t hail a cab on my own? Why is he dragging this on?
We step out the front doors into the open night air, where there are already two available cabs at the curb. I sigh and drop my shoulders. This is so pointless. I don’t even know what I’m supposed to say to him. How do you say goodbye to someone who just had their hand up your skirt, only to be pushed away?
I’m mortified and frustrated with myself, and I’m disgraced by the lies I’ve told myself all evening. I turn to him one last time as I pull open the door to one of the cabs. “I’m really sorry I ruined your night.”
His face is softer now, as if he’s beginning to feel sympathy for me. I squeeze my eyes shut, not wanting to see it. I don’t need his pity. I know I’m just a little innocent nobody to him now. The girl who couldn’t go through with it, who pushed him away. I feel small, naïve, and lame.
“You didn’t ruin my night, Sophie,” he says when I open my eyes again. “I’m still glad I met you.”
It’s a line. Still just a line. All he’s given me tonight were lines. And now that he hasn’t gotten what he wanted, he’s trying the lines again.
I stare at him for a moment, imagining an evening where I would have actually meant something to him, where I might have been able to believe his words. But tonight is not that night.
I respond with only a stiff nod, and then I drop my eyes from his disheartened ones, climb into the cab, and close the door behind me.
I give the driver the name of my hotel and he pulls away from the curb. After Kai is out of view, I stare out the window, looking past the bright lights of the bustling seaside city, and out at the dark, churning ocean instead.
I feel guilty.
Guilty that I let things go as far as they did.
Guilty that I denied myself something I wanted so badly.
Guilty that I led Kai on.
Because, in reality, he was actually really kind to me the entire night. He’s good at this. He’s used to these types of interactions with women. He’s used to taking them home, bedding them, and then never seeing them again. It’s selfish of me to test my own comfort and then reject him at the last minute.
None of tonight is his fault. When I pushed him away, it was only because I really wanted to pull him closer. And that terrifies me because I know that closeness—real closeness—is not what he craved at all.
Judging from the way he made me feel in just the course of a few hours, I’m finding out just how easily he could have broken my heart if I’d let him. And I know myself well enough to stop that train before it goes off the tracks. My heart hurts even now, after just a short evening with him.
When I arrive at my hotel, I pay the cab driver and take the elevator up to my own room. I run my hand up and down my face in exhaustion, but when my fingers touch my lips, I pause, remembering the way Kai’s mouth felt against mine. Fiery and tender all at once.
I sigh and walk into my empty room. Leah hasn’t returned, and I’m not sure she’ll even be back until the morning. I slip out of my dress and into a t-shirt, and then climb into bed and under the covers immediately. When I close my eyes, I see Kai staring back at me. I feel his firm hands on my bare waist, and his breath on my neck. I can still smell his cologne and still sense the heat of his body against mine. My heart beats faster when I remember the way his fingers slid across the thin material of my underwear.
I turn over and bury my head in my pillow with a groan, trying to dissolve the images from my mind. I hate that I still want him so badly. But my heart is too meddlesome. If I had stayed, it would have figured out how to sneak its way into my feelings for him somehow.
I hear the door unlatch and shift to see Leah walk in looking a bit disheveled. Her hair is now flat and tangled, and there isn’t a trace of lipstick left on her lips.
When she sees me, she stops in place and sets her purse down slowly. “Oh, you’re back?”
I sigh and push myself up to sit, leaning against the headboard. “Yeah. I’m surprised to see you back so soon. What happened with Drew?”
She kicks off her shoes and turns from me to reach into her bag. “We had a good time.”
I furrow my brow. “If you had such a good time, then why are you here?”
She stands up with a shirt in her hands, keeping her back to me. “He said he had to get up early to catch a flight. So…I left…” She pauses. “You know…afterwards…”
I still watch her skeptically. “Did he ask you to leave?”
“Not in so many words…” she mumbles as she disappears into the bathroom to change.
I cross my legs in front of me and sit forward, waiting patiently for her to return. This isn’t the first time I’ve seen her come home in the middle of the night, but she’s usually in better spirits.
