The Sexpert

by JA Huss

Oh, right. Still here on the wall.

  I nod. Swallow hard. And then whisper, “OK. I’m ready.”

  “This wall has a forty-five-degree angle at the top, so we’re gonna just scoot over a little to that wall.”

  I feel him nod his head to the right. I glance over and see a different colored wall—steel-gray instead of black, like this one is—and say, “I see it.”

  “OK, good. Now put your foot where I told you.” I have to stretch. Like really stretch my leg to reach that foothold. But I get the tip of my toe on it and he says, “Good. Now put your right hand on the pink hold right up there.”

  I have to stretch my arm too. It’s all the way straight, like no bend at all. “Andrew,” I say, my breath betraying how scared I actually am now that I fully comprehend what I’ll have to do to get to the top. “I won’t be able to pull myself up.”

  “You don’t need to pull yourself up. You’re going to use your legs for lift, not your arms. Just grip it with the tips of your fingers and then lift your left foot off and swing your body to the right a little.”

  “I don’t think I can,” I say. And I’m serious. Totally serious.

  “Listen to me. I know what I’m doing. When you lift that foot and swing your body, you’re gonna change your center of balance immediately. And it’s going to feel right. Trust me.”

  Center of balance makes sense to me. I know how that works from all those years in gymnastics. So I do as I’m told and… and he’s right. He’s actually right! The second I lift my left foot and swing my body over—his body pressing hard against me still—I am centered again and don’t feel like I’m gonna fall backwards anymore.

  He’s quick to tell me what to do after that. Like he knows I’ve given in to him. That I trust him. And I follow every direction. I put my hands and my feet exactly where he tells me to. We angle over onto the steel-gray wall and then the climb gets easier. I actually start picking my own path and Andrew backs off a little, concentrating on his own climb.

  It’s like… we’re climbing together now. As partners or something.

  And then—too soon almost—we’re there at the top.

  I swing my leg up and pull myself over the edge and the whole fucking gym erupts with clapping and whistling. And people are shouting, “Go, Eden!” and “He saved her!” Which... I mean... Dramatic.

  I roll onto my back, my button-down shirt almost wet with sweat, and smile at Andrew as he comes over the edge to join me.

  “You did it,” he says, grinning wide.

  “Thank you,” I say. “I don’t know what I was thinking, but…Jesus. I’m so hot.” He raises his eyebrows at me. Like he’s about to make a comment about me being hot. Or maybe I’m just delusional with rock-climbing endorphins and I just made that up. Probably that last one. But my fingers are busy unbuttoning my shirt, and then I sit up and take it off, throwing it off to the side.

  When I glance over at him again he’s staring right at my tits.

  His eyes lift up, big question marks in them. Question marks that make me remember why I tried to climb that stupid wall in the first place.

  “Soooo...” he says, slowly. “Where you been?”

  “What?” I say, fake-laughing the word. “What do you mean?”

  “I haven’t seen you since... And when I called you you hung up on me. What’s up?”

  “Nothing. Why? Why is something up? Why would you think something is up? What’s up with you? You ever think about that?”

  He closes his eyes and smiles. “Why’d you run?”

  “What?” I say, fake-laughing harder and longer. “What are you talking about?”

  “You saw Pierce and me and ran. Why?”

  “I didn’t run! You ran!” I’m not sure I’m making sense. But sometimes if you commit to something hard enough you can convince people they’re wrong.

  “I ran after you. After you got yourself stuck on a wall.”

  I laugh again. Louder this time. Trying to buy myself some time. “Well... I mean, we were here to climb the walls, right?”

  “Sort of,” he says. “I mean, this was constructed as a team-building exercise. Because... Oh, right. You missed Pierce’s opening statement because you came in late—”

  “I… I…” I stutter. Because I was gonna say I got caught in traffic. But this is the TDH where everyone walks. So that excuse doesn’t work anymore. “I couldn’t decide what to wear,” I say.

  “I don’t care that you were late. You don’t work for me. That’s not my point. I’m trying to make a point.”

  “OK. So. Fine. Make your point. What’s your point?”

  And then I see he’s looking at my tits again.

  “My point is that Pierce’s big speech was about everyone at Le Man working together to find the Sexpert.”

  “Oh,” I say. “Was it? Wow, that’s weird. He’s really upset about that, isn’t he?”

  “Super upset.” Andrew nods. “He thinks he knows who it is.”

  “Oh, does he?” I say, gulping out the words.

  “He does. You know who he thinks it is?” He’s really close now, looking at me with a knowing stare. Oh fuck.

  I shake my head slowly.

  “He thinks,” Andrew says, his voice a low whisper, “it’s Myrtle.”

  “He what? Myrtle? That’s... No way.”

  He presses his lips together and nods. “Yeah. I hear you. I think he may be wrong too.”

  “Oh. You do?” I swallow.

  “Yeaahhhh, just too obvious. I think.” He nods, like he’s waiting on me to say something. Which is weird. And I’m not gonna. So...

  I stand up and brush off my ass out of habit, not because I actually have anything to brush off. “OK. Well, good talk, Andrew. Good talk. And thank you for saving my ass.” Nope. Stop talking, Presley. Don’t wanna talk about your ass or boobs or any of your other naughty bits right now. I laugh, uncomfortable. “But I gotta go and I see there’s a handy-dandy ladder to get down once you’re at the top, so—“

  He grabs my hand. Gently. Not squeezing tight, but he does pull. He sighs and says, “Dammit, Eden.” He looks down and shakes his head.

  “What? What?” I say, growing ever more emphatic. “What is it?”

  “Do you know what Myrtle said to me the first time she and I met?”

  Wow. Non-sequitur much?

  I shake my head slowly. I can feel my eyes getting bigger.

  “She said, ‘You are not what I expected.’”

  He stares right through me. I try to stare back right through him to show him that I’m not going to break first, but my eyes are kind of sweaty and it’s fogging up my glasses and I can’t really see him that clearly all of a sudden. Crap.

  “You know what I told her?” he asks.

  I don’t say anything. Not because I’m being badass, just because I’m trying not to rub my eyes, because he might mistake that for crying and I don’t want him to think that. But then again, he might be the kind of guy who gets all protector-ish when a girl cries and that could be to my advantage and—

  “I told her, ‘Nobody ever is.’”

  Fuck it. I pull my glasses off, rub my eyes so I can see, and I look dead into his face. He’s looking back at me with a mix of accusation and maybe disappointment.

  “So... the next time I talk to Pierce...”

  A long, thick moment. I double down and keep staring. But damned if, despite my best efforts, I don’t wind up blinking first when he says...

  “Who do I tell him you are?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY - ANDREW

  She turns away from me, says, “OK! Well... Thanks for the lift,” kind of snorts because I think she thinks she was making a joke, and then makes for the edge of the wall. Her feet close to the lip, she stares at the handholds to get down. Down below, the Le Maniacs, as I have just decided to call them, are milling around again. Over by the entrance, Pierce and Myrtle appear to have missed the whole thing. Pierce has his arm against the wall in very much a, “Hey, babe, let
me tell you about my Porsche” kind of a way, and Myrtle is sweeping her hands across her clavicle, swiping away imaginary strands of hair. My guess is that she thinks she’s flirting with the boss and he thinks he’s interrogating her.

  Maybe he’s right. Maybe it is Myrtle. Maybe I’m way off about what I’m thinking. Except he isn’t. She isn’t. And I’m not.

  “Hey,” I say, going to stop her. “Hey.” I reach her and grab her arm. She spins on me, her hair smacking me in the face.

  “What?”

  “I need you to talk to me.”

  “And I need you to let go of my arm.”

  I put both hands up in a gesture of surrender and take a step back.

  “Listen,” I start to say, but at that moment am interrupted by a new body cresting the wall’s top. It’s the dude in the Cannibal Corpse t-shirt.

  “’Sup?” He nods.

  “Uhhhh. ’Sup?” I nod back.

  “Yo, Eden, nice climb,” he says, lifting his chin toward her in affirmation.

  “Aw, thanks, Leo,” says Eden.

  He pulls out a vape pen and takes a hit. The smell of cannabidiol oil fills the air.

  “Um, dude, can you—?” I start to say.

  “Oh, my bad,” he says, and then extends the vape pen in our direction.

  “No, no, I’m good. Thanks. I just... Never mind.” I decide it’s not worth the conversation.

  “Eden?” He extends it in her direction.

  “Oh, no, thanks Leo. I’m good too,” she says. “I’m already higher than I’d like to be.” She snorts again, slightly.

  Leo laughs a bit and then excuses himself past us, giving Eden a fist bump on his way down.

  “Friend of yours?” I ask.

  “Leo’s in tech support. He’s fixed my computer a bunch of times. I made him brownies and now we’re friends. What do you care?”

  I take a second to eye her. “You’re pretty popular at Le Man, aren’t you?” I ask.

  She points at me in an accusing way. Which is ironic. “Why are you asking so many questions? Who are you supposed to be? Nancy Drew?”

  And for whatever reason I feel myself getting hot. “Yeah. That’s it. That’s it, Eden. You nailed it. I’m Nancy friggin’ Drew.” I say it with a fair amount of snark. Having the girl I’m into both blow me off and be responsible for making my friend lose his mind is starting to catch up to me a little bit and my naturally relaxed Southern charm is eluding me just at present. “And I’m on the case of the Girl with the Concealed Identity. But you know what, cupcake?” She stiffens at the word. Good. “I feel like I’m pretty damn close to cracking it wide open.”

  “Well,” she says, now turning and eyeing the handholds that lead back down, “good luck with that. Hope you don’t get a magnifying glass stuck up your ass looking for clues.”

  “Why would I get a—?”

  “Whatever!”

  She steps toward the hand grips, but then stops. She sort of stutteringly edges forward, then steps back.

  “You’re afraid of heights, aren’t you?” I ask.

  “Wow! You are really are fuckin’ Nancy Drew! Figure that one out all by yourself?”

  “Then why would you try to run away by scaling a climbing wall?”

  “I make bad choices!”

  Two more people land where we’re standing, and walk past.

  “Nice climb, Eden.”

  “Thanks, Lucy. Thanks, Peter.”

  They high-five her and begin their descent. Jesus. Everybody really does like her.

  She storms past me.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” I say.

  “I dunno! To see if there’s another way down!”

  She marches to the back corner of the top of the wall where there’s a small, enclosed space that has a sign reading, “Yoga Studio.” I follow her. Obviously.

  “Hey, I’m not kidding. I need you to talk to me,” I say as I follow her in.

  And she—turns isn’t the right word. Whirls? Whips? Pounces?—around. Whatever it is, it gives off the distinct impression of a cornered animal ready to fight for survival.

  “What?” she groans out. “What do you want?”

  A couple thoughts run through my mind in response to that question, but I decide that right now’s probably not the time to say them. Shit. I’m so fuckin’ bummed. I was really into this girl. I think. No, I know I was. More than I’ve been into a girl in a long time. She seemed like somebody who would be...well...fun to be around. But when I considered that she might be into adventure, this wasn’t what I was thinking of.

  I decide to just ask the question.

  “Are you the Sexpert? And don’t say no because I know you are.”

  She gets a half-caught, half-righteously indignant look on her face and says, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “No? Really? No idea?”

  “No. I don’t. And honestly, I’m offended by the accusation.”

  “Well, I’m sorry if you’re offended, but my best and oldest friend is being fucked over by someone, and even if he’s putting an insanely disproportionate amount of import on the thing... he’s still my best and oldest friend. And y’know what? I like you. Like, I really like you. But even so, I can’t let you fuck my friend over. So, please, just tell me. Just come clean and tell me... Is it you? Why’d you do it?”

  She huffs and when she does, her chest lifts up and down. If she wants to convince me it’s not her, a heaving bosom, thinly veiled by a sexy tank top, is not getting the job done.

  “I had you all wrong,” she says.

  “What? Sorry? Come again?”

  “Yeah. I bet you’d like that.”

  “What?” And then I realize... Ooooh. ‘Come again.’ Got it.

  She goes on. “I thought you were a good guy. But you’re not. You’re just like every other rich, privileged asshole in the world who’s out only for themselves and to get what they want.”

  “What are you...?”

  “You think I’m the Sexpert? Like really?”

  I take a breath and then nod.

  “So why didn’t you say something before? I mean, it couldn’t have been just so you could coerce me up to your stupid penthouse so you could get off before you go running to your friend and try to ruin my life, could it? Oh, nooooo. No waaaayyyyy.”

  “I didn’t—”

  “What? Is that your thing? You come on girls’ backs and then fuck them over? Is that, like, some weird, creepy fetish you have? Because it is. It’s creepy, Andrew. It’s creepy. You’re a creep.”

  “I feel like you’re changing the subject.”

  She starts walking toward me now. Going on the offense. “So, riddle me this, Batman—”

  “I thought I was Nancy Drew.”

  “Shut up! Let me...”

  But that’s all she gets out before she trips over a discarded yoga block thing sitting in the middle of the room and goes collapsing to the floor.

  “Ow!”

  “Jesus,” I say, starting for her. “Are you OK? Did you hurt yourself?”

  “I’m fine!” she says, waving me off. She struggles up to her feet. Her hair is a mess and her glasses are askew. She wipes the hair out of her face and pushes her specs up the bridge of her nose.

  She’s so goddamn cute, I want to fuck her right here. Which is not my usual reaction to things that are adorable, but oh, well. The heart wants what it wants.

  “OK,” she says. “You’re so sure that I’m this awful Sexpert person, but meanwhile your friend is sure it’s Myrtle, yeah?”

  “Yes. That is an accurate summary of the last five minutes.”

  “Fine, Mr. Smart Breeches.” So fuckin’ adorable. She goes on, “So how come you’re right and he’s wrong?”

  “Because I am. Because Myrtle doesn’t have...” I nod at her chest.

  “What? What are you talking about? Myrtle has fabulous boobs.”

  “They’re fine.”

  “Seriously? Men go cr
azy for her.”

  “Sure. She’s OK. And her boobs are too. But they’re not...” Again, I indicate her chestal area.

  She draws her head back, confused. “Wait. You can’t possibly be saying that I’m sexier than Myrtle?”

  “No, I think I can. And I think that’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  She blushes. “Oh my God. That’s... I’ve never... That’s so... Wait! Stop! You’re trying to Jedi mind trick me into admitting something!”

  “I’m honestly not.” I put my hand on my heart to suggest my earnestness, or something. “I just know it’s not Myrtle.”

  “How?”

  I shake my head a little. “Because. It’s not her voice.”

  Eden swallows. She takes a breath. She blinks. “Wh—Why... I mean... How do you know?”

  “Because I know.”

  “How?”

  “Hi, Andrew Hawthorne? CEO of Aureality? Have we met? This is what I do for a living.”

  “But the...person, whoever it is, is using your app, aren’t they? To disguise their voice? I mean, I’ve heard her. It sounds like she is.”

  “Yeah. She is. But we can decrypt it.”

  “You can?”

  I nod. “And once we do—”

  “You mean you haven’t yet?”

  I hate this. I wish she’d just come clean. “No. Not yet. But we will. And when we do, we’ll run it through a new app we have and I’ll be able to make a definitive call.”

  There’s a long pause while I wait for her to say anything. Finally, she does.

  “OK. Super. Good for you. And then what? What will Pierce do when you guys find her?”

  I shrug. “I dunno.”

  “I mean, he can’t really sue somebody just for having a similar idea, can he? I mean what if they had the idea first?”

  I take a deep breath. Blow it out. OK. So. Here we go. “I dunno, Eden. Did they have it first?”

  Her eyes go saucer wide behind her glasses. “Why do you keep asking me? Why do you think this Sexpert person is me? Seriously. Why?”

  I shake my head and say, “Dessert.”

  “Dessert? Hell does that mean? What about dessert?”

  “You shook your cupcakes at me in my place. And apart from the fact that you have, and I mean this sincerely, the most gorgeous cupcakes I have ever seen”—I smile, still trying to be charming even as I’m accusing this girl of being my friend’s nemesis—“all of the videos I’ve watched now in trying to help Pierce... all of them have been heavily confection-oriented.”