by Shen, LJ
Judith tucked her yellow hair behind her ears and ran her pearly whites over her lower lip. She seemed to consider it.
It was a relief not to get shut down immediately, since the suggestion in itself was ludicrous.
“That’s not a good idea.” She paused, flipping on her cellphone and checking the time. It was well after eleven. “I will take that ride back home, though, if it’s still on the table.”
“It is.”
“Let me get my dress and wash my face.” She hopped out of the bed, all business, like we were back at work. I watched her perky white ass jiggling in my hallway.
I closed my eyes. A gust of air with the scent of her shampoo and body lotion caressed my nose, and I took a deep, greedy breath.
Not good. Not good. Not good.
Her phone was between the sheets, beeping with new text messages.
Brianna: Thanks for helping me with the filing today! xoxo
Grayson: If I were a Victoria’s Secret model, which one would I be?
Ava: Going to get my nipple pierced this weekend. Wish me luck. Did that cute guy call you yet?
I grabbed it, took out the SIM and split it in half before inserting it back into her phone and smashing the whole thing against the floor.
If that guy wanted Judith, he’d have to look for her the old-fashioned way, among the eight million residents of New York.
Break a leg, buddy.
One day I noticed Dad’s face was no longer the same pale shade as the bathroom wall.
He was going through something called adoptive cell transfer therapy. The treatments were invasive and uncomfortable, but every time he came back home, he smiled bigger than the last time. He was still weak. He was still gray. But he no longer spoke like he was ready to die but too ashamed to let go of life because he knew how much I needed him, and that made my heart soar.
We spent more and more time out of the house—short trips around the block, arm in arm, admiring the festival of colors as New York burst into full-blown summer. Green leaves rustled above our heads and barefoot children ran around the neighborhood pointing hoses at each other and spreading wild laughter like confetti. Flowers unfurled in their sleepy beds on the edges of our neighborhood’s sidewalks.
I still hadn’t told Dad I knew about Célian, and I intended to keep it that way. Even though we were cautiously optimistic, there was a good chance the treatment wouldn’t work. In which case, I would forever blame myself for confronting him about lying to me and trying to save both of us when really, I should’ve been cherishing every moment with him. So I chose to do that instead of picking a fight.
“Are you going to the library today?” Dad asked.
“Yeah, I need to catch up on some reading material for work. Why?”
“Oh, we got an invitation from Mrs. Hawthorne to come watch that new Jack Nicholson movie. She’s making Irish stew. But of course, you don’t have to come.”
“I’ll take a pass. I think you’ll have a good time by yourselves, anyway.” I knocked my shoulder against his, smiling brightly.
“It’s not what you think.”
“You don’t know what I think.”
Dad had never dated after Mom died, and not for my lack of trying to fix him up with people. I’d spent the majority of my college years trying to get him to sign up on dating sites—before he got sick. I was desperate for him to be happy, and never wanted him to think he shouldn’t be on my account.
“It’s really just a movie and dinner.”
“Dinner? I thought it was a lunch thing.”
We stopped by the grocery store on the corner of our street, and he blushed. Actually blushed. I was almost giddy with excitement. Such a natural human reaction, but on his pale, ill skin, it looked like a glorious sunrise.
“Don’t worry, I have other plans for the afternoon. How’s Milton?” He scratched his head.
Right. Milton. It’d been several weeks since I’d mentioned him to Dad. Then again, he’d very rarely dragged his butt to Brooklyn even when we were dating. Dad wasn’t too suspicious, because I worked insane hours—it still felt like I was barely at home to spend time with him. I didn’t want to explicitly lie to him, but this lie had gotten so big, it felt almost criminal to come clean at this point. Especially on this beautiful, sunny day, when we were both happy and smiling.
“He’s good, Dad.” I pulled him into a hug. “Taking names and kicking ass at The Thinking Man.” Not technically a lie. Our mutual so-called friends had been happy to break the news that Milton had recently been promoted to junior editor. For them, it was more reason for me to get down from the ego tree I’d climbed up and take him back. For me, it was yet more proof of the fact that he was still sleeping with his boss.
Of course, I wasn’t a big enough a hypocrite to point that out.
“My cell is broken at the moment, so I’m going to call you when I get to the library from the public phone. I’ll try you here, and at Mrs. Hawthorne’s, so please be available.”
Two hours later, I was walking to the subway on my way to the library. I’d dressed down, embracing the fact that it wasn’t a workday. I felt juvenile and reckless in skull-themed Chucks. The world felt lighter when you wore flannel shirts, ripped jeans, and a messenger bag. I adjusted the strap over my shoulder, about to enter the station when someone honked their horn behind me.
Rolling my eyes, I proceeded.
“Judith.” The commanding tone found its way straight to my core, making my stomach swirl with delicious heat. Jesus Christ, what was he doing here?
Jesus: “Didn’t you say something a while back about hitting Sunday Mass sometime in the next decade? Maybe you could take your foul-mouthed, engaged boss with you.”
I turned around slowly, feigning annoyance, because the alternative was showing him how much I cared, how much it affected me to see him here. In Brooklyn. On a Sunday. Take that, Milton.
Célian sat in his silver Mercedes-Benz in a navy, short-sleeved sport shirt, his Ray-Bans tipped down to examine me.
“What are you doing here?” I narrowed my eyes. I hadn’t spoken to him since the phone incident. We’d talked business in the office, but every time he’d tried to pretend like that night hadn’t happened—like he hadn’t broken my phone just because I’d exchanged numbers with some random guy at a diner—I turned around and walked away.
“You can’t keep ignoring me.”
“Pretty sure I can. Exhibit A: this conversation.”
“I’m your boss.”
“Precisely, and you crossed a lot of lines.”
“You could have made a great lawyer.”
“Not satisfied with my performance as a reporter?”
“Quite the contrary. As a booty call, however, you do a lousy job.”
“Good. Consider this my official resignation.”
He lifted his hand, waving a brand new cellphone. It was the new model that had just come out a hot minute ago and was already out of stock.
“With twelve cases in different colors to suit your mood.” He shot me his devastatingly charming smirk. “Truce?”
“Never. But I do need a phone.”
This was a gift I was willing to accept solely because he was responsible for the untimely death of my previous phone. It’d been a rough few days without one, but I wasn’t exactly swimming in money to buy a replacement. I’d had to arrive at work even earlier and leave slightly later to make sure I wasn’t needed or MIA, and at home, I checked my email every half hour.
He clutched the new device to his chest, and mine tightened in response.
“Come get it, Chucks.”
He was blocking the traffic, and someone honked behind him. Three, long beeps.
“You want to get her number, park like a goddamn man and let us through!” someone yelled behind him.
Célian ignored the guy completely, ruthlessly entitled to the bone.
“No, thanks,” I resumed my walk to the subway.
He began to drive sl
owly beside me. Not unlike a creeper. I rolled my eyes, but couldn’t help but feel a little satisfaction at the way he’d been chasing me the last few days. He’d even come down to the fifth floor to fetch me from lunch with Ava and Grayson, muttering an excuse about an urgent meeting, when really, all he’d wanted was to ask if we could see each other that night.
The answer, by the way, had been a big, fat no.
“I want to show you something.” His car was blocking a long line of vehicles now.
“You already showed me plenty,” I muttered, secretly liking that people were still honking at him, and that for the first time in our relationship, he was the one out of sorts.
“Get your mind out of the gutter. I mean geographically.”
“Would you like to dazzle me with your rich-boy Hamptons house? Show me another glitzy hotel you own?” I made grand, hoity-toity gestures with my hands as I walked.
Four. You’re acting like a four year old. That wasn’t Jesus speaking. Just me.
“In the fucking car, Chucks.”
“Say the magic word.”
“My cock.”
I made a gagging sound.
“I agree. It is abnormally big, but I haven’t heard any complaints.”
“The magic word,” I repeated.
“Please.” The word rolled off his tongue like it was in a foreign language.
“Whoops. Still a no.”
My determined stroll slowed when his catcalling stopped. Had he given up on me? I took a few more steps before a hand grabbed my wrist. I looked up. He was smirking darkly, his thick eyebrows drawn together.
“Grayson was right. This is kidnapping…” I said as Célian yanked me toward his car.
He’d parked in the middle of the street, blocking approximately thirteen cars now, all of them honking. Some had tried to reverse and slip out of the road. To say Célian didn’t give a crap wouldn’t be a stretch. I got into his car and buckled up, mainly because I didn’t want anyone to put a bullet in his head for his behavior. He started driving and strapped in as he did, not wasting any time.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“You’ll see.”
“You never apologized for the phone.”
“I do. I am. It wasn’t my finest moment. I would say I didn’t mean it, but lying on top of breaking your shit would really be rude. You shouldn’t have exchanged numbers with another man. I’ve been dutifully faithful to you from the moment my tongue touched your crack.”
I threw my hands in the air. “You’re engaged, psycho!”
“It’s not real.”
“It is to me.”
“Bullshit. You wouldn’t touch a taken man, and we both know it. We aren’t cheaters.”
“Does that mean we’re in some sort of a relationship in your weird mind?”
“Not a relationship, but an arrangement. Yes. Do you think you can handle that?”
I laughed bitterly. “I can’t fall in love, Célian. I’m broken.”
“Good. Let’s be broken together, then.”
He threw the phone into my hands. It was fully charged and ready to be used. It should have made me happy, but it didn’t. I enjoyed having sex with him, and butting heads with him in the newsroom, but what was the point of all this? Love might not be in the cards for me, but I was getting more attached, setting myself up to get hurt more than I already was.
“Open the glove compartment,” he said, still staring at the busy road ahead.
And yet again, I had the feeling he knew exactly what I was thinking. I opened the glove compartment. “What am I looking for?”
“Morrissey.”
I patted the mostly empty space, my hand coming to rest on the familiar shape of my iPod. I yanked it out and squeaked. My precious iPod, with the thousands of songs I’d collected over the years, was back in my hand, and it felt glorious.
“Did someone find it at the hotel?” I turned to him.
“Yes. I did. The night you bailed on me.”
I frowned. “Why did you never give it back?”
He shot me a look I couldn’t decode—maybe bewildered verging on annoyed. “You stole something from me, so I stole something from you.”
Huh. I sat back, considering this. He rubbed his jaw.
“Who’s Kipling?”
Kipling was my notebook. But of course, I didn’t miss an opportunity to mess with him.
“A friend.”
“A good friend?”
I nodded. “Very.”
“How long have you known him?”
I grinned at this. I didn’t know if Célian was aware he was jealous, but I saw it from the outside. “Long enough.”
We drove into Manhattan and parked at his building. He rounded the car, took a duffel bag from the trunk, and we went up to the ground floor and out to the street.
“Where are we going?” I asked as he flung the duffel bag over his shoulder, looking royally pissed and completely disturbed by what we were doing.
“On a date.” He sighed, like I was forcing him to hang out with me at gunpoint.
“Huh?” I laughed. I’d ignored him for just over four days, and he was taking me on a date now? Imagine what would happen if I actually went through with what my brain told me I should do on a daily basis and cut things off with him completely.
“I’m taking you on a date. What’s not to understand?”
“What’s with the duffel bag? Is that in case you’re bad at romancing and have to kill me before I tell anyone?”
We rounded the corner to Central Park West and headed straight to the meadow. He scoffed. “I can charm the panties off of a nun.”
“Charming your way into underwear and into hearts are two different skills.”
“I’m a good multitasker.”
“Not to mention I haven’t agreed to date you. You never even asked,” I pointed out.
“I thought it was a given.”
“Why?”
“You gave me backdoor access—a woman’s version of expensive jewelry.”
“Anyone ever told you you’re a delusional piece of work?”
He smirked. “Is that an actual question? I can count on one hand the number of people I know who haven’t called me that.”
“Just because I like it when you boss me in bed doesn’t mean I want to be with you.” I blushed, fighting the urge to look down and break eye contact. He stopped at the John Lennon memorial, where the word Imagine looked back up at us.
Imagine that Mom is wrong. That I am capable of falling in love. That I am heading into a collision of feelings. That lust and heartache are going to crash together soon, and tragedy will explode.
He laced his fingers in mine, turned me around to face him, and tapped my nose, his lips tilted up arrogantly. “You have skulls on your shoes.”
“You have skulls in your eyes.”
“Are we feeling morbid today, Chucks?”
“No. Just deadly.”
The park was swarming with people. Clusters of tourists, couples, cyclists, parents, and children. Even though Célian wasn’t clad in his usual expensive suit, we still looked so different. For one thing, he was ten inches taller, ten years older, and reeked of a privileged air I lacked in every way. I had dressed like a teenager. He’d dressed like a millionaire. And the way he stood, tall and proud, made people stop and stare.
He put his mouth on mine and kissed me in front of everyone—soft and slow and seductive. Kissed me like no one was around, like we were alone in this city, this park, this planet. He pressed a possessive hand over the small of my back and jerked me to his body.
Then he caressed my cheek. His lips dragged from my lips to my ear and he whispered, “This is where I went every time my parents fought—every time Mathias blamed me for being the little snitch who’d killed his marriage. This is where I went when we started fighting physically. And this is where I went when I knew he would have his staff driving around looking for me. They never came into Central Park. Th
is was my place.”
My heart fluttered inside my ribcage and I saw Célian not only as the man he wanted people to see, but also as the person he really was. Not completely broken, but definitely cracked enough for pain to spill through the fissures.
We unpacked the duffel bag under a huge tree. Célian was surprisingly organized for our picnic. We spread a blanket, and he took out grapes, cheese, crackers, wine, and fancy chocolate. I told him there was no way he’d done this himself, and he admitted he’d given his housekeeper pot in exchange for these goodies. I laughed, and he threw a grape at my face. It made me laugh harder.
The sun was glorious, and I laid on the blanket and stared back at the sky, munching on almond chocolate that melted between my fingers. He sat next to me, staring at me intently, like he expected me to get up and run away any second, like I could evaporate into thin air, like sharing this place with me meant something to him.
“How was your relationship with Camille?” I asked.
I’d always wanted a sibling. Unfortunately, my mom got sick shortly after I was born. She won the first round of breast cancer. The second one, too. By the third, her body was too exhausted to fight, but I knew my parents had always wanted more kids.
He smirked at the blue sky like the clouds had cleared up especially for us.
“We were a team. Maybe because Maman was busy running around with her lovers and Mathias made a point of sticking his dick into everything with a pulse, we figured out early on that we had to have each other’s backs to survive.”
I nodded. “You must miss her very much.”
“Losing someone close defines you. I trust you know that by now. I’m sorry about your mother,” he said. And he meant it. I appreciated him not extending his condolences to my dad. Some people did when they heard about the cancer.
I looked down and stared at a chocolate cube slowly melting in my hand, gluing my forefinger and thumb together. “I think I wanted to marry Milton just so I’d have someone to catch me in case I fall. You know?”
He stuck his hand in my hair and leaned down to kiss my forehead. “I do. But falling into the wrong hands is just as bad as crashing into nothing.”
His phone, sitting between us, buzzed, and I looked down at it. The name Lily Davis flashed, making my heart sink. He hit ignore and tossed the phone to the other side of the blanket.