Love Not at First Sight

by Sarah Ready

  Surprise hits me and I trip over a stalagmite and catch myself on the wall.

  “Are you okay?” she asks. She’s concerned for me. Dang it, of course she’s concerned. She thinks I broke her theory of players and wanna-be players. Me. The King of Players.

  “I’m…yeah. I’m good.” I right myself and keep moving forward. “So, you, ah, changed your mind?”

  “I did. Well, sort of. I mean, players and wanna-be players still exist. But, I mean, you’re not…look at you, well don’t look because it’s pitch dark, you know what I mean, but look at you. You had only one girlfriend, your wife, and she cheated on you, and then you…you’re decent and smart and…I was wrong. I admit it. It just took getting trapped down here with a good man to realize it. So, I’m probably going to have to amend my theory to make room for good men.”

  My watch light fades and the darkness pressing down on me feels strangely similar to guilt. There are no secrets here, that was our deal. She doesn’t know who I am. I have to tell her.

  “My theory started with my dad,” she says. “He used to take me with him when I was little to help him pick up women. You know, the cute little girl, sad single dad routine. Except he and my mom were still married. But he didn’t care. For years I watched him pick up women. I saw all his moves, learned it like a playbook. After he died, my mom and I found his little black book, it had almost a thousand names in it. I was there for nearly half of them.”

  My throat burns. I feel hurt for the child she was, that a father would do that. “I’m sorry,” I say thickly. “That was…”

  “Horrible of him. Super crappy. I know.”

  “It was wrong. I’m sorry.” We’re quiet for a moment, then, “Not all men are like that.”

  “Unfortunately, the men I dated were. I saw them use all the pick-up moves I knew so well. I saw it when they dated my friends, I saw it at bars, in movies. It seemed like they were everywhere. I never met a guy that could prove my theory wrong. Until you.” She seems happy, almost pleased with her discovery. “I guess, if I get out of here, I should rethink my stance.”

  “Or stick with me,” I say. Then I hear her stop walking and I realize that she’s surprised. So am I. I didn’t think before saying it, the words just came out.

  “That’s a thought,” she says.

  We start walking again. There’s a short climb, a few natural stairs. I reach down to help but Veronica has already boosted herself up. A heavy weight is settling over me. I have to tell her.

  “I didn’t…” I stop.

  “What?”

  I clear my throat. “After I got divorced, I dated a lot of women.”

  “Okay?”

  “I was trying to prove my ex-wife wrong. Or right. When she’d said no one would want me. I wanted to wipe away what she’d said, I…”

  “You don’t have to explain yourself. My best friend was cheated on, it took her a long time to feel that she was worthy again. If you had to go on a few dates to get there, that’s your business.”

  “I mean it was a little more than a few.”

  She laughs. “Alright, fine. You can call yourself a player or a wanna-be player. But I don’t think you really are.”

  “Thank you,” I say. “You’re right. I’m not.”

  “Good.”

  She reaches toward me and grabs my hand.

  Another six hours pass. We come to forks and turns, and leave cairns and arrows every time we take a new route. It’s lucky we do, because I’ve lost count of the number of dead ends. We turn around and try another route and another. The pressure of the darkness increases and every so often we hear noises. Scratching, thumping, rustling. But we never see any life. No sign of it. Just noises in the dark.

  At eight o’clock we stop and drink as much water as we can stomach from a dripping stalactite. We’re in a small room, about eight feet in circumference. It leads into a small passage. It looks like it’ll be another crawl.

  “Can we stop and rest?” Veronica asks.

  “Good idea.”

  I find a clear dry area and brush away the bits of gravel and broken rock. I sit down and Veronica sits and leans into me. Over the past hours we’ve talked about everything and nothing. Her business, her friends, her soon-to-be born goddaughter, her fears and her ambitions, how much she loves small towns and the outdoors. I’ve told her about my childhood in the city, my family, where I’ve traveled, my worries and my goals. The more we talk, the faster time moves. I feel like I know her better than I’ve ever known anyone. I think if we do die, she has her wish. She won’t die with a stranger, she’ll have a friend.

  I reach out and take her hand. She leans her head against my shoulder.

  “We could try to sleep,” I say.

  “I don’t know if I could.”

  I lean back to the ground. The cold of the rock seeps through my clothes. I take Veronica and pull her on top of me. “Here. I’m warmer.”

  She relaxes against me, puts her hands on my chest and rests her head on my shoulder. Warmth spreads between us and I start to think about the kiss we shared before the bridge. I wrap my arms around her back and pull her closer. I rest my head against hers and close my eyes.

  After a few minutes of silence, when I think she’s almost fallen asleep she shifts and lifts her head.

  “It’s funny,” she says.

  “What’s that?”

  “I was thinking about pick-up lines. The ones where the guy says, ‘I feel like I’ve known you forever,’ or ‘no one understands me but you,’ or ‘I wanted you from the first day I knew you.’ You know those lines?”

  “Yeah. I do.” I’d just been thinking them.

  “I never thought I’d ever feel that way. That I’d know exactly what they’re saying.” She drops her head back to my shoulder. “Do you know what I mean?” she asks.

  I feel her heart beat softly against my chest and the length of her along my body. She feels as if she belongs there, like we’ve lain like this a thousand nights before and we’ll keep doing it far into the future. She fits me.

  “I know exactly what you mean,” I say.

  If I didn’t know better, I’d think we’ve known each other years instead of a day.

  She nods and her fingers splay over my chest. “Funny thing, I was in the woods this morning because my best friend’s aunt, she’s psychic, predicted my soul mate. She’s never wrong and she predicted the man I’m supposed to spend the rest of my life with.”

  A sharp pain hits me in the chest. I shift Veronica in my arms. “You were going to meet him?”

  “Heck no. I was running. The guy’s a sleaze. The worst sort of creep. You have no idea.”

  “I hate him,” I say jokingly. But I do. I’m insanely jealous of a guy I’ve never met. Her supposed soul mate.

  “You’re nothing like him. He uses women like they’re disposable. He’s conceited. Arrogant. I’d rather sit in this cave for a decade than be with him.”

  “That bad?”

  “Trust me. This guy is the epitome of a player. There’s no way I’d ever be with him.”

  I smile. I’m starting to feel better. Clearly, there’s no need to be jealous. Besides… “You realize psychics are scientifically improbable? So, you really don’t need to worry.”

  She laughs into my chest. “Bless your heart. Miss Erma, the soul mate seer, has a record of success thicker than the Bible. She’s been at this for decades and she’s never been wrong.”

  Dang it. I’m back to being jealous of the player.

  “Except, the joke’s on Erma because it’s likely we won’t get out of here. So, no soul mate for me.”

  I don’t like that. “Hey. You’re the one who said survival is eighty percent mental. No more of that talk. I’ll get you out of here.” Even if it means delivering her to the conceited, egotistical player.

  “I’ll get you out of here,” she says. I smile, because her confidence is back.

  “Don’t worry,” she says. “I won’t be with him
. Not ever. I promise.”

  “Yeah?” I ask. I’m not sure why the answer means so much. Except, when she braces her hands on the ground and moves her mouth over mine I realize I actually do know why.

  “Promise,” she says. “I’d rather be right here with you than with him.”

  I don’t like her mentioning him, because her breath hitches and her voice catches. So I lean up and kiss the sound of him from her lips and replace him with me.

  7

  Veronica

  Sam kisses me. His mouth is warm and gentle. He brushes his lips over mine, and when I kiss him back he makes a low growl in his throat. The noise sends a vibration through me and my body lights up. He starts to pull away, so I send my hands into his hair and pull his mouth back to mine.

  “I wish we’d met out there,” I say.

  He takes my mouth again and sends his tongue over my lips. I shiver when he pulls back.

  “Where? Tell me how you’d want us to meet,” he says.

  I draw my hands through his hair, over his forehead and down his nose. It’s narrow and there’s a bump at the end. I feel his lips with my fingertips. They’re firm, but his bottom lip has the slightest pout. His jaw is hard and the stubble growing in tickles my fingers. I move my hands down his neck, I feel his pounding pulse and move to his shoulders. The muscles in them tense and I move my hands down his biceps.

  “You’re muscular for a computer geek,” I say. “I wonder what you look like.”

  He grunts and pulls me down to his mouth again. I play with his bottom lip and enjoy the comfort of being in his arms.

  When he pulls back from my mouth I draw my hands down his face and cup his jaw.

  “I look like me,” he says. “Tallish, short hair, hazel eyes.”

  I laugh and I realize it doesn’t actually matter what he looks like. His appearance doesn’t matter at all.

  “Alright. Let me think,” I say. I relax against him as his hands wander over my back, my arms, and draw a slow circle over my lower back. It’s getting late and I’m tired, my head still hurts, I’m hungry, thirsty, and we might not make it out of here alive. But Sam’s hands, circling slowly across my back, my ribs, my sides are making me feel safe and…loved.

  Everywhere he touches fills with a sparkling liquid warmth that spreads until I feel like he and I are floating and there is nothing except us. I can’t think of anything except the next place he’s going to touch and the way my breasts have gone heavy against his chest and the place between my thighs is starting to ache. I can feel him growing hard beneath me. I shift until I’m centered over him and then I move my hips, just barely, so that I rub along his length.

  He lets out a harsh breath and his hands still.

  My word, I want him. I want him so much.

  “We would meet one weekend on the White Pine Trail,” I say. My voice sounds languid and huskier than usual.

  “We would?”

  I rock my hips against him and he hisses. A warm spark lights inside me and starts to burn.

  “We wouldn’t like each other at first,” I say.

  His fingers press into my hips and he pulls me closer. I rock against him.

  “We wouldn’t?”

  “No. I’d still think all men are players. And you, being a man—”

  He sends his hands up under my shirt and spreads his fingers around my ribs, then his thumbs rub along the underside of my breasts.

  “Yes?” he asks.

  I take his mouth and his hands rise up and he circles my nipples.

  “A tallish, short-haired, hazel-eyed man,” I say.

  “And you being a medium-height…”

  “Long-haired, blue-eyed woman.”

  “Exactly.” He presses his mouth to my neck and kisses the underside of my jaw.

  “I wouldn’t like you. And you would…”

  “Ask you to dinner,” he says. He lifts his hips and his length hits me right…there. “Because, the minute I saw you, I’d realize that you were special and that I’d never felt this way about anyone before and—”

  “I’d say no. Because I’d think you were a player and just using pick-up lines.”

  He cocks his hips again and I gasp. My clit throbs and each time he hits it a pulse of warmth rushes through me. I grab his shoulders and move against him.

  “Then, when you said no, I’d try again,” he says in a low, urgent voice. “I’d bring you flowers and ask you to come to New York City. I’d take you on my favorite walks in Central Park, you’d climb the boulders, then, we’d get coffee and cookies at this old Hungarian bakery I grew up by, and that night I’d take you home and make you pasta. We’d go to the roof deck, eat spaghetti, drink wine, and watch the sun set over the river.”

  I reach down and feel the thick ridge of him. His length jerks up when I touch him. I carefully undo his button and then unzip his fly. I take him in my hand. He’s hot and smooth and I run my hand over him. He lets out a harsh exhale.

  “I’d say no,” I tell him. “I’d think you were pulling out all the player stops, tempting me with sunsets and wine and homemade dinners. I’d tell you to get lost.”

  He arches under me when I stroke my hand down his length. I revel at the feel of him in my hand. The softness, the heat. There’s the smallest bit of moisture at the tip of him. I lean down and kiss him there, taste the salt of him.

  His hands stop stroking me and then he carefully moves them down. He traces my stomach, the flare of my hips, and then he circles round and pushes my pants and panties down until he finds my clit.

  He circles his finger over me and I cry out.

  “Then, I’d try again. I’d ask you to go with me to New Zealand, to climb in Fiordland National Park. Or if that was too far, I’d take you to Italy to climb the Dolomites. We’d stay at a villa with a patio and an outdoor oven, and we’d drink Italian wine, and eat olives and fresh bread and—”

  I kiss him and I can taste the Italian sun, olive groves, focaccia bread and red wine. His finger circles over my clit and then he sends a finger inside me. I cry out into his mouth and he pushes in deeper. I clench around him and I want more. I need more of him.

  I grasp his length harder and stroke down, matching his rhythm.

  “I’d say no,” I tell him. Then I cry out as he puts another finger into me. “Tell you to leave me be. But I’d be intrigued, because players usually give up and find easier targets.”

  “But I’m not a player.”

  “No. And I also like tallish, short-haired, hazel-eyed men.”

  I can barely think anymore, I can only feel. His fingers inside me, his hand stroking my clit, his mouth, sucking my neck, kissing my jaw, his body warm and solid beneath me. The hot, hard, softness of him in my hand and the pressure I feel growing at his base. He throbs in my hand and I clench in response. I’m warm, I’m safe, and even though it’s dark I feel like between us we have all the light in the world.

  “I’d try again,” he says, and his voice is rough and strained. “I’d keep trying. Because the more I saw you the more I’d know, you and I…” He stops as I clasp him tighter. Pump him up and down. He growls and I stroke him harder.

  “Veronica,” he says. “I can’t—”

  “We can.” I kiss him.

  He growls and something unleashes in him. He pulls me to him, sends his hands faster, harder. His mouth moves over me. Each sensation becomes a bright, throbbing light. His kiss, a spark. His hands inside me, a fire. And the growing, aching need…I shout out, ride the exquisite brightness…it’s as bright as a star. I feel the heat of his cum. I clench around his hands in response, and I ride the shooting stars of my orgasm. Until finally, finally, I fall back to him and settle into the darkness.

  I feel boneless and liquid. I stay on top of him, happier and more content than I have been in…ever.

  And how strange is that? Considering we’re staring death in the face.

  Sam wraps his arms around me and runs a small circle over my back. I wonder why fat
e didn’t pair me with Sam. If it had, I never would’ve run.

  He feels like he should be mine.

  “What would you do next?” I whisper. “After I said no again. After I told you to get lost and never come back?”

  His hand pauses. “I guess I’d ask you to go on a walk.”

  “A walk?”

  “If I couldn’t entice you with dinners, or city lights, or romantic trips, I’d ask if you’d like to go on a walk. You could be you, and I could be me, and we could walk together.”

  “Just walk?”

  “That’s right. I’d walk next to you and you’d walk next to me.”

  “And we could walk anywhere?”

  “Wherever we liked.”

  “But we’d do it together?”

  “That’s right.”

  I rest my head against his chest and listen to his heart. “That sounds nice,” I say.

  I drift to sleep, lulled by his heartbeat and the soft rocking motion of his breath.

  8

  Sam

  I wake Veronica after a few hours of sleep. We’ve been in the cave for thirty hours. A day and a night have passed since we were trapped. After last night, I want to get out of here more than anything. Before I met Veronica I was drifting. I was finally starting to head in the right direction, coming to Romeo, but I was still drifting. Now, everything is clear. I’m going to start my tech think tank, I’m going to move to Romeo, and I’m going to spend my life being worthy of her. That starts with getting us out of this cave.

  My stomach gives a long growl and I try to push aside the fact that I haven’t eaten since dinner at Evie’s place. Unfortunately, I had coffee for breakfast on my way up from New York City and didn’t eat before my hike.

  “We should have some water,” says Veronica.

  We drink from the stalactite we found last night. Veronica and I take turns catching the slowly falling water droplets. My mouth is dry and the thirst hurts so much that it’s painful to wait. It takes thirty minutes for us to swallow enough to quench our thirst. My stomach rumbles.