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“Yeah,” I said. “Everything works out in the end, anyway. It’ll all be fine.”
Fine, fine, fine, Andrew mocked in my head. Everything’s fine. Isn’t it, Ace?
* * *
I knew that sex wasn’t going to fix anything, but I wanted to feel in control of something. At the very least, I wanted to feel in control of my own body.
I turned over in bed, slowly trailing my fingertips along Michael’s arm. They glided over his chest, giving his side a gentle squeeze. I brought my hand down, traced the outline of the waistline of his briefs. I could feel him coming alive bit by bit under my hand. Though it was fairly dark, I could see the tenting effect that my hands had on his briefs. He growled deep in his chest. “Babe. Are you sure?”
“We don’t have to wait anymore,” I whispered. I grinned, trying to feel the happiness about this that I once did. “We’re married.”
As if fully awakened by those words, Michael flipped me to my back lightning-quick and hovered over me, his weight distributed onto his forearms. He trailed kisses down my neck, kissed my collarbone ever so gently, ran his tongue over the ridges. When he ran his blunted fingertips up my spine, I imagined a pair of long, gentle ones in their place. Instead of Michael’s murmured tenor, I heard a just-as-familiar baritone. With every stroke, every touch, my skin came alive, but not because I was in bed with Michael. No, all I could see in my mind as my husband thrusted and grunted was a pair of cherry-wood-colored eyes and an awkward-kid smile.
“So you’re saving it for marriage, then?”
I looked down at my sandwich, avoiding a pair of bright, astute brown eyes. The band had made a pit stop in a small town that was slightly off our route. Jean Lee had been complaining about feeling trapped on the bus, so it was either stop somewhere or see Danny lose his shit. Even as Andrew and I made our way to Joe’s Sandwiches ‘N More, I could hear Danny muttering, “If I hear one more complaint outta you, Jean Lee, I’mma strap you to the roof.” The deviation from his normal reticence had me suppressing a giggle.
The sandwich shop, while big, couldn’t contain the enormity of the tension that sprung up between Andrew and me. I couldn’t understand how the other customers, the shop owners, even the people in the back, couldn’t feel it. But talking about intimacy with Andrew felt more intimate than sex itself. For the life of me, I couldn’t understand why.
“I wouldn’t say I’m saving it for marriage, exactly,” I said finally. “It’s complicated.”
“Dumb it down for me, then. Help me to understand.”
I cut my eyes at him, understanding exactly what he was doing and what he wasn’t saying. I looked out the window for a brief moment, watching a meter maid slip a parking ticket under someone’s windshield wipers. Finally, my eyes met his again. “It’s not a purity thing, Andrew. Obviously, since I’ve already had sex.” I shrugged and blushed under Andrew’s watchful gaze. “Michael wants to wait, and I respect that. Besides, with Nicholas, I did it because I thought that it was what I had to do. What I should do. I don’t want to just do it to do it. I wanna do it because it feels right. Because I’m in love. Because I’ve finally found my soul mate.”
“How ironically romantic of you.”
“It’s not all romance,” I insisted. “It’s insurance that my heart won’t get broken.”
“Sure, okay. Because people in love don’t break each other’s hearts all the time.” Andrew sat back in his chair. Though his tone was casual, conversational, his eyes blazed. “Let me tell you how I think it’s gonna go. You’re gonna marry Michael. He’s gonna do something to make you feel like he isn’t the one who will keep your heart safe for all eternity, as he will inevitably do because that type of One doesn’t exist.”
“Talk about irony. Aren’t you always chasing the all-elusive One yourself?”
“It’s different.”
“Right.”
“Anyway, Michael’s gonna fuck it up, as predicted, and you’re gonna have sex with him.”
“What! Why the fuck would I do that?”
“Because deep down inside, you know he’s not the One. You know he’s not your soul mate. I do agree, though, that he’s insurance.”
“What do you mean by insurance?” I crossed my arms over my chest in a futile attempt to protect myself. I hoped Andrew didn’t notice.
“Insurance that you never have to admit to yourself, or anyone else, that you know you’re not meant to spend the rest of your life with him. Insurance that you never have to feel the hurt of someone knowing you, truly knowing Alicia Danielle Jones and the girl deep inside who just wants to be vulnerable, who wants to be loved for the person she is.” Andrew popped a fry in his mouth. “Michael will never know the real you, and you don’t want him to. And sex is the best way to avoid that. A man who’s getting good sex on the regular won’t ask questions.”
We sat in silence, staring each other down, before I cleared my throat. “What a hurtful thing to say,” I said finally. “And not true.”
Andrew shrugged. “For your sake, I hope I’m wrong.” His mouth pulled to the side, a small frown playing on his face. “But unfortunately, I don’t think I will be.”
Fuck Andrew and his accurate predictions. And my stupid heart.
