The Bubble Match

by Merav Tuson Vardy

  “Would you speak up, please,” I growl.

  She places her hands on the table and looks up, blushing deeply.

  “Waiting to be my… first.”

  It’s my turn to take a deep breath.

  I shut my eyes and try to process what she said. It’s a painful reminder of Lee Sung’s duplicity – telling me that I’d be her first, making a fool out of me – and still, my heart rate rises at the words.

  “He panicked when he saw the dresses. He lost it.”

  I admit – it’s possible that under those circumstances, I also might’ve momentarily lost it. It’s primitive, I know – primal, deeply sexist – but the thought of being the first man to discover her makes me want her even more, so much that it has become painful. I’ve been inside her head; I’ve heard the tune of her heartstrings. I know she wants me, too. The only difference between us is that I see this as a thrilling but ultimately one-time thing; she does not.

  I try to imagine the moment which immediately follows the fucking.

  It’ll be a disaster.

  She will be heartbroken. Tears will be involved almost definitely. I will feel like the biggest asshole in the universe. This noble thought troubles me, because I don’t remember ever experiencing anything like it. I don’t normally take interest in what the woman feels after.

  I wonder why I suddenly give a fuck, and fear I already know.

  Chapter Thirteen

  I am stuck in limbo between total exhaustion and insomnia. It is sheer torture. My sleep is agitated, alternating between wanting to speed over to her place in the middle of the night just to mark her like some lion in heat on National Geographic, and images of her lying on the hotel bed, broken and torn up after that piece of garbage nearly raped her, and then I just want to protect her – from the entire world, but mostly from me.

  I haven’t spoken to her in a week. The radio silence is intentional – a self-induced restraining order. She’s been trying to call, and I’ve been ghosting her. She’s calling now, and I just let it ring itself out.

  The universe obviously hates me, because at the red light she grins at me from the side of the bus beside me. This is becoming cruel. Frustrated, I exhale sharply and keep my eyes on the road, convincing myself that this self-punishment is necessary to wean me off this obsession with her.

  At the office I manage somehow to regain my focus. It helps that I am ridiculously busy – work is the best distraction.

  The production manager informs me that they’ve found a contamination in the clean room in the India factory. This means that the chips will not get here in time, delaying production. The ad campaign is currently at its peak and we’re in the middle of the first month after launch, so this is understandably worrying. The entire launch might suffer if we need to halt production while they re-sterilize the clean room. I think it might prove necessary to fly to northern India to see for myself how bad it is.

  My head of cyber security has finally submitted the report I requested. Large, bold letters on the front page read ‘CLASSIFIED.’ He notes and reiterates the extreme sensitivity of the information contained in the report – of course, I’m already aware of this – and hands me a file that is not quite thin, but hardly as thick as I expected.

  “This is all of it?” Honestly, I was expecting his to come in with a wheelbarrow’s worth of binders.

  “These are the anomalous cases. I prepared the report myself, checking each individual incident. Of course, there were plenty of other malfunctions – I could add them in if you like.” He sounds worried and disappointed by my reaction, but this is actually just what I’d hoped for – a brief, succinct report including only the oddities, rather than a thousand-page tome that it would take years to go over. I’m curious to read what he’s found that actually made the cut – one of them might be another case of a shared Bubble user, like Mi-Ok and I have.

  “No, this looks like more than enough for now – I’ll let you know if I need another report.” He exhales, relieved, and I realize how taxing preparing this report must’ve been for him, amid constantly increasing hacking attempts.

  I dedicate the remainder of the morning to thoroughly going over the report. Some of the cases are quite interesting – it turns out that four years ago, around the time I’d left Korea, there was an unsuccessful hacking attempt initiated by an organized crime group. The attacks were aimed at the core systems, but those involved were never caught, so their precise goals remain unknown. The report also referred to several records that were deleted from the cloud for no apparent reason. Possibly the most curious thing about this case was a brief reference to several security breaches created deliberately by my father – they were spotted by security, but my father said he’d handle them himself. I suspect this has something to do with File 142, which my father insisted that I delete completely from existence. I note to myself that I should look into that matter again.

  I finish the report, disappointed. Nothing in it was even in the general vicinity of what I was looking for.

  “Are you trying to avoid paying me?”

  I look up and try to figure out why she’s in my office and whether she’s joking or actually pissed.

  “I asked payroll to handle it, but they claim not to have received an account number from you.” I try to react with some poise and formality but her very presence in my office has my entire body on edge. She is standing just where she was when we kissed; where this insane rollercoaster ride started.

  “Are you still mad that I’m not going to the police?” she’s fishing to see where I vanished to over the past week.

  “That’s none of my business. Do what you want,” I shrug indifferently. “As for your paycheck – I’m afraid I’m the wrong address. Try payroll, down on the sixteenth floor.” I flip through the pages on my desk, expressly ignoring her.

  “I don’t know what more you want from me.”

  “Don’t you?” I get up and walk around the desk I stand in front of her and face her. “Are you really that clueless?” I stare at her with enough intensity that she backs away from me, stopping only when she nudges against my desk. I place my arms on either side of her body. The distance between us is nearly gone – I can feel the heat of her body radiate into mine.

  I lean toward her slightly, and the remaining distance quickly melts away – I stop again only when my lips are placed just above her ear. Every time she breathes I feel her rising chest press against me, her racing pulse.

  God. I want her so much.

  “I suggest you get out of here while you can, because I can’t seem to control myself when you’re around. Run away, now. As quickly and as far away from me as you can.” I’m hoarse with desire. She isn’t moving.

  She’s being an idiot. The odds of her getting out of here if we move forward are as slim as the odds of a lion willingly releasing a captured antelope. Twice.

  Run.

  Stay.

  What the fuck do I even want from her, anymore? From myself?

  I can control myself, to a point, but now it seems that all the blood in my body has rushed into my cock. I grab her hair and pull her head back, kissing her urgently; she kisses back, and I lift her up onto the desk and spread her legs, leaving only fabric between my pelvis and hers. She suppresses a small moan when my erection presses against her. I grind and growl like an animal. I want to be inside her.

  I need

  I have to

  Then she speaks, and the words fall over me like a bucket of ice water.

  “I trust you.”

  She trusts me? She doesn’t even know me. And she doesn’t seem to understand the basic rules of this game. She needs a nice boy to marry and make babies with, and I need to step the hell down. For her sake. Plenty of other women out there who play by my rules. This, her – it’s too complicated.

  I can’t believe this. I can’t beli
eve I’m actually stopping at a green light. But I tear myself away from her with the agony of a thousand martyrs.

  “It is taking every ounce of my self-control to stop me from taking what you’re offering. But this can’t happen, not with you.”

  “Why not me?” She swallows, her indignation evident.

  “You need to get this through your head. I’m not secretly a romantic, I won’t bring you flowers –”

  “Do I look like the kind of girl who even owns a vase?”

  God damn her. She’s dancing on very thin ice. Does she think I’m kidding?

  “The only relationships I have with women are very brief and very, very intense.”

  “It’s not like I expected you to propose,” she mumbles, her hand rising to fix her hair.

  She didn’t expect me to propose? It takes the last of my courtesy to keep from laughing aloud at her cluelessness. She has no idea what I’m even talking about – the concept is entirely foreign to her. God, she’d never consider I’m talking about flings. About never eating in the same restaurant twice, so to speak. About hard, sweaty fucking that her virginal little body cannot even fathom. So to speak.

  Christ. These thoughts are counterproductive. I remind myself that I’m trying to stop this from happening.

  Her eyes are shining. She’s blinking rapidly, trying very hard not to cry in front of me.

  “Look. I can’t love you,” I say. “I can’t love anyone. I don’t even have a heart.”

  This girl, she like a damn defibrillator. Every time we touch my heart gets shocked into beating again, entirely against my will. I don’t want this CPR, nor have I asked for it. I will do anything to remain heartless. Having a heart means being afraid for it, having it break again, and god fucking damn her, I will not have that.

  “It takes courage, deciding never to love when you know it means ending up alone.”

  The words torture me, though not as much as her gaze. I’ve taken away every last trace of her smile. It’s gone from her eyes.

  “God. You just have no idea…”

  I almost say she has no idea how much I want her. I end up saying, “You have no idea what I look for in a woman.”

  The pain in her eyes makes my stomach turn. I care about her – there’s no way around it. And it terrifies me.

  I’m sorry, Mi-Ok, but I won’t go there. I intend to fight for my right to have no heart.

  “Look, I see how someone as inexperienced as you might read too much into this erection – sorry, but it’s how any man would respond to a woman interrupting his workday with the offer of quick release. Honestly, though, I’m just not interested. Try to see this from my perspective. I’m a busy guy, and frankly, I don’t have the time to play amateur hour. Teaching you how to please a man would take ages. By the time you’re anything near adequate, I’ll have grown bored with you.”

  I’m being a monster. But I need to scare her away; turning into a horrible asshole is foolproof.

  “You’re the worst person I’ve ever met.” She flees my office, her eyes glistening. I’m forced to agree.

  “That fucking bug,” I snarl before I pick up my Bubble headset and toss it at the wall. If someone took a slow-motion shot of the impact, like they do at crash tests, it would show exactly how durable the damn thing actually is. As durable as my obsession with this fucking girl.

  I’m nursing my nth bottle, having genuinely lost count by now, and spill my guts in front of Jeremy. I tell him the whole thing – except for the bit about the shared user, which I can’t tell anyone.

  “Should’ve listened to me about the ten-minute rule. No more than ten minutes between kissing and sex. I told you.” He pours me another small glass of soju.

  “What can I say, man?” I sigh. “You were right. I was wrong, wrong, wrong.”

  “But you could’ve been less of a shit to her. She didn’t do anything to you.” Seriously. Of all people, I now get a lesson in good manners from fucking Jeremy.

  “You… You,” I slur, waving a finger at him, “you treat women – all women, everywhere – like disposable sheaths for your insatiable cock. You’re telling me to be more of a gentleman?”

  He snorts, seeing the irony.

  “Someone’ll have to be her first, eventually. I have no idea why you didn’t step up yourself. She’s hot. And my god, those tits.”

  “Watch it,” I growl.

  “You’d probably have a nice time, do her a solid while you’re at it. A girl like that would be flattered just being pursued by a man as handsome and successful as you, buddy. Would you prefer her first to be that shithead with the goatee? Or someone like me?”

  “Piece of… you need to shut up.” I slam my fist on the table, angry and confused; the green glass bottle tips over and shatters on the floor.

  “Let’s call a… designated driver.” I’m very drunk. “Neither of us are can drive right now.”

  “Let’s walk to my hotel. It’s just around the corner. Cold air’ll do you good.”

  I follow Jeremy’s blurry form, my head swimming with the alcohol in my system. It feels more like I have some blood in my alcohol rather than the other way around.

  “Well, now you’ve gone and given me an appetite with all your talk about fuckin’.” Jeremy winks at me and adds several other sentences which fail to penetrate the soju haze – I manage to make out, “see you in the morning.”

  I stumble and sway around the lobby, trying to figure out the way to Jeremy’s room. Through immense effort I manage to find the elevator, and once I have, I just stare at it, dazed. I have no idea what floor I need to take it too. Also, I suddenly realize that Jeremy, utter jackass that he is, didn’t leave me a room key.

  “I thought that was you. What are you doing here?”

  I turn around in a sort of slow motion and make out the vague shape of Lee Sung, walking toward me in a golden wrap dress. I’m blinded by the combination of the bright lobby lighting and her gleaming dress. I drunkenly shield my eyes.

  “I’ve been – trying t – to find my – room –” I hiccup.

  “You reek of soju. Ugh… can you even stand up straight? Come on. I’ll help you.”

  Beggars can’t be choosers. I stagger after the glittering wake of her gown.

  She presses a keycard against the lock and when the door clicks open, I realize this isn’t Jeremy’s room. She takes off her stilettos when she walks inside and disappears into the other room.

  “I think – you’ve made uhm – mistake,” I manage through the hiccups, and hobble toward the couch, barely making it – it’s the opposite direction from the one in Jeremy’s room. I nearly trip over the coffee table, but she emerges from the other room and helps me to the bed.

  I wake up with a powerful headache. I’m naked under the blanket, and I can hear water running from the direction of the bathroom. Apart from the headache, I have no recollection of last night, or the girl I apparently spent it with – it would be nice to see what she looks like, at least.

  In the bathroom, I can’t see anything through the foggy glass of the shower door. I don’t realize the magnitude of the mistake I’ve made until I open the door.

  “You?! No. God, anyone but you.” I grab a towel and wrap it around my waist, stunned.

  She’s laughing.

  “What the fuck do you find funny about this? You disgust me.” I’m shaking with rage.

  “Ugh. Go to hell,” she replies.

  My inner GPS is informing me that I’ve reached my destination. This is hell. How the fuck did this happen. How did I get tricked into this mess.

  “You’re sick. Do you have any idea how much I hate you?”

  “Well. You know what they say about love and hate.” She flashes a quick half-smile.

  “Unbelievable. This is unbelievable.” I feel like I’m going insane. “Why, why would yo
u pull this kind of bullshit?”

  “Jeremy called me from your phone. He said you’re blackout drunk and that if I don’t mind running the show singlehandedly, you’d appreciate the exercise.”

  “You’re lying. He wouldn’t.” She shoots me a frozen look and shrugs.

  “Go on, see for yourself. I think I heard your phone buzzing in your pocket earlier – you’ll find your pants on the floor, next to my gold dress.”

  I kick away the dress and pick up my pants, find my phone and check the outgoing calls.

  Fuck. She was telling the truth.

  Jeremy crossed a line. I’m going to kill him.

  I get dressed in a hurry and call my driver to come pick me up. When I open the door to leave, she wraps her arms around my waist from behind and begs me to stay, just when a paparazzi bastard flashed his camera in my face and runs away, leaving me shocked and staggered for the second time this morning.

  I try to chase him, unsuccessfully. I can imagine the taglines for this fucking photo, me looking like shit, her still wrapped in a towel. The result should look fairly straightforward.

  My aunt will almost certainly have a stroke.

  Jeremy. I swear I’m going to kill him.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The clean room crisis in Noida, northern India, gives me an excuse to distance myself from Mi-Ok, as well as the media circus that’s congealed around me.

  My phone won’t stop ringing. Everyone wants a statement about the photo with Lee Sung. Everyone wants to know if we’re back together.

  Never. I hope she dies.

  I read Lee Sung’s statement, which doesn’t help. Of course she’d try to spin this to her benefit and imply that we’re a couple again. If she thinks that’ll get her anywhere with me, she is sorely mistaken.

  My thoughts find Mi-Ok. I suppose by now she’s seen it, too.

  I stare miserably at my headset waiting on my desk. For over an hour I’ve been struggling with the desire to look at her records again, and eventually the obsession wins, and I compliantly put them on.