by JD Hawkins
It’s no mystery to me. I’ve been so wrapped up in one thing that the rest of my life has faded a little into the background—become less important, less interesting. My work, my shop, my lifestyle, it’s all become the distraction rather than the purpose. My purpose now, the thing I wasted an entire Saturday thinking about, is to finish what I started with Maeve.
It’s not like I don’t know what obsession is. I’m no stranger to getting fixated on a woman. But this is different. Maeve is different. She’s no simple hottie with a nice personality. No quirky girl with a few nice attributes. She’s the ice queen herself. Feminine strength incarnate. The femme fatale that was supposed to exist only in movies. Maybe that’s why the thrill of taking her is ten times that of any other woman I’ve had.
Mia says I always want what I can’t have, and though I keep telling her she’s wrong, I keep proving her right. Well, it doesn’t get more forbidden than Maeve. Even without the messiness of ruining my sister’s best-friend relationship with her, Maeve is an Everest kind of challenge.
For six years I kept a lid on it, suppressed my lust for her, forced to look but not touch. Only letting out my sexual frustration in our tense, mocking, flirtatious exchanges, the prospect of anything more seeming ridiculous. It took one little accident—brushed hands under a tap—to break us, and it turned out that six years of holding back makes for a hell of a climax.
The genie has to go back in the bottle at some point, though. This can only end one way—with us going back to the “agreement.” With us as friendly, competitive acquaintances. The only question is if we can risk a little more.
Truthfully, I’ve always been a gambler.
I’ve been so horny for her since that night at her place that I’m even starting to think the unthinkable. So what if people find out? So what if we keep on doing it until it blows up between us? Sure, it would be hard for Mia if her brother and her best friend weren’t on speaking terms. Uncle Toby and Auntie Maeve having to alternate between dinner parties, and a little care taken so they don’t end up visiting at the same time. It sucks, but it’s hardly the end of the world. I guess the problem is that there’s no way we could end this prettily—which is why we never really ended it six years ago anyway.
It would end badly, we both know that. The first one to get bored would have to drop the bomb on the other, who would take a bruise to the ego which could be permanent. A game of Russian roulette where the stakes are our own identities. Maybe we’d end up getting under each other’s skin so much that we wouldn’t be able to stand the sight of one another. Maybe it would be so good that we’d spoil each other for future lovers…
But it’s hard to think of the cons when the pros are so compelling…
The way her thighs quiver and her tongue twirls… The way she claws like she wants to tear you to pieces and the way those eyes harden when she comes… The way she walks, and talks, and stares, and moves like everything is foreplay… She’s worth the risk.
And after all, it’s not like we’re going to catch legitimate feelings for each other. I’m just about smart enough to keep my heart out of things, and she’s barely even capable of that to begin with. It’s impossible to even imagine a connection anything deeper than sexual with Maeve. Impossible to envisage affectionate words coming from lips designed for put-downs, tenderness from a body that’s dressed and sculpted to elicit lust and awe, sex that’s more emotional than it is a selfish physical contest… I can’t even imagine it…
But for some reason I’m trying…
I skim through the rest of the messages on my phone as I stretch out in bed, and make mental excuses for why and how I can delay responses a little longer. Then I see the one about the soccer match.
“Shit,” I say, instantly awake.
It takes me half an hour to shower, get dressed, pack a sports bag with my shorts and shirts, and then another half hour to search for my old soccer cleats until I remember I gave them to Goodwill. I grab my things and get to my car, only then realizing that my phone is half dead and I left the charger upstairs. Regardless, I drive straight to the nearest strip mall, once again wishing I hadn’t sold the Ferrari, and try to remember if I’ve forgotten anything else.
Once there, I park and probably look like a manic father-of-four on the last minute of opening hours on Christmas Eve as I race inside. I pick a pair of shoes based on color and buy them without trying them on, make a quick stop to get a charger, then another (slower) stop for some coffee and a donut, which I eat like a starving kid on the way to the location Colin had sent me earlier.
Eventually I reach the soccer fields, and park in a line of luxury and sports cars. Sugar sprinkled and high on the strongest coffee I could buy, I dash for the building. After checking in on the wrong locker room (probably the opposing team’s) I find the right one and enter as everyone’s just finished getting themselves ready and are in the middle of a team talk.
“There he is,” Colin calls from the far side of the lockers, and I make a beeline for a free one. “Everyone, this is my brother-in-law, Toby.”
“Hey…how you doing? What’s up?” I say, returning everyone’s confused but welcoming greetings. “Yes… Hello… Sorry I’m late, guys… Jake, is it? Hey there…”
“Thank God for that…” I hear a guy who looks red-faced from putting on his shoes say behind me.
I dump my sports bag and quickly start getting ready.
“Lucky you,” I hear someone tell him.
“Lucky us,” I hear someone else respond. “We get to play someone who does a little more than a lamp post.”
“I told you,” the red-faced guy says, “I got an injury.”
The others laugh dismissively.
“Remind us of that when you get drunk afterwards and start dancing like you’re at a wedding.”
I’m down to my boxers, pulling my shirt over my head, when I hear a familiar voice right beside me.
“Hey, Toby. Glad you could make it.”
I pull off my shirt and look toward the voice to see Asher there. Somehow I manage to hide the conflicting things that seeing him brings up, and force a smile. We clasp hands.
“Hey, man. Wouldn’t miss it for anything.”
“Okay everyone,” Colin calls out across the locker room, commanding attention. I suddenly realize he’s the captain. “We haven’t played these guys before, but you’ll know their best players from other teams. Best plan Jake and I have come up with is to stick to our strengths, that means the same back four as last time—Roddy on the left. The dual pivot…”
I concentrate on getting ready while Colin gives the team talk, pulling on my new cleats just in time for him to finish up and get around to me.
“Toby, you’re on the wing so you won’t have too many duties, other than making an attack happen whenever you can. That okay?”
I give him the a-ok sign and then finish off tying my laces.
“Perfect,” Colin says, then claps his hands and shouts out some last-minute words of encouragement. The other guys join in, hollering and shouting, their energy levels up, before they follow Colin out onto the field.
For the first ten minutes of the match I realize just how much of a bad idea this was. The match moves at a pace far quicker than I can follow, and I find myself ball-watching, ball-chasing, and barely getting a touch. That donut and coffee combination in the morning not doing me any favors—I feel just as bad at the game as the red-faced guy in the locker room looked, and I’m probably playing worse.
But I’ve never been one to get embarrassed, or derive my pride from others. And I certainly don’t like giving up on anything. After we go a goal down, the ball comes to me out wide and I trap it well. I look up and see that I can pass it safely inside to Asher, who’s in space, but decide to try to make something happen. Old muscle memories kick in, my body settling into a physical, swaggering cockiness. Now a little attuned to the pace of the game, I turn to an oncoming defender, send him the wrong way with a feint, and neatl
y skip past him with the ball.
I’m not the fastest on the field, but I weave between the last defenders like the cleverest, soon through on goal but too wide to shoot myself. I loft in a hard and fast cross that our striker sprints through to head past the goalie and the celebrations even take me by surprise.
“That’s it,” someone says, smacking the back of my head.
“More of that, Toby. More,” Colin encourages as we move back to kick-off again.
For the rest of the first half, I only get better. The other team puts a man on me to stop me from getting the ball, and I enjoy myself spinning and feinting away from him. When I do have the ball, their defense holds back a little now—a little afraid of getting turned—and I make full use of the space. Still, they put up a hell of a fight, battles all over, and when we head in for halftime the score is still even.
In the locker room we catch our breath as everyone talks over what we should be doing. Asher hands me an energy drink and sits beside me as I tell myself that I should really ease up on the booze.
“Great little get-together last Friday, huh?” he says in a friendly tone.
I look at him and nod.
“Yeah.”
He laughs gently to himself for a second and then says, “I didn’t even know Colin was setting me up. He told me he just wanted to show off how good his wife was at cooking Thai food.”
Suddenly I’m interested.
“Really?”
“Yeah,” Asher says, chuckling again. “I’m not complaining though. Maeve is…something special.”
I cough, the drink sticking in my throat a little, then manage to clear my throat.
“You’re into her then?” I ask him, trying not to sound too curious.
Asher shrugs and smiles.
“Who wouldn’t be? She’s crazy hot.”
“Did you and her…?”
“Fuck?” Asher says, and I wince at the word like it’s a hammer blow to the temple. Not the word itself, but the fact that someone’s using it in regard to Maeve. Someone other than me. “No. I get the impression she’s the type to play hard to get.”
“Ha!” I blurt out, then straighten my face up a little and shrug as if that wasn’t a personal reaction. “Yeah… Really? I mean… I get that impression too.”
“Right?” Asher agrees. “Anyway, we’re seeing each other again this week—”
“You are?” I interrupt, then pretend to be more interested in sipping my drink to hide how surprised I am.
“Some art exhibition. We were both going anyway, so she agreed to let me pick her up.” Asher winks at me and smiles. “Second time lucky, right? I’ll bet you didn’t have that problem with Hazel, huh? She seemed pretty hot for you all evening.”
I choke on the drink again and even splutter a bit of it over my dirtied sports gear. I thump my chest to clear my throat.
“Shit…” I say. “Never liked the taste of this stuff.”
“Me neither. I always stick to water when I—”
“So you think you and her might get something going?” I ask, too interested to hide it anymore. “Do you think she’s really into you?”
Asher seems to think about it for a moment, then says, “Who knows? All I can tell you is that I’m gonna have as much fun with her, and take it as far with her, as I can. She’s a prize, even in L.A.”
“Yeah, but I mean, are you like into her or do you just wanna—”
My words are drowned out by the sudden surge of hollering and noise in the locker room as the guys get up, start jumping and stretching as they begin making their way out, Asher included.
“Shit,” I say, but nobody hears me over the sound of studs on hard floor and the cries of “come on!”
Now I’m back out on the field again, but the last thing on my mind is how to turn my defender or when to make my run. Now all I’m doing is repeating Asher’s tone and words back in my mind and wondering what he means by it. Have as much fun… And take it as far as I can with her… What exactly does that even mean? Is he into her or what?
Obviously, he wants to fuck her—I didn’t need to ask to find that out, any straight guy with blood above freezing would—but does he actually want something deeper with her? Is he trying to date her? Maybe women are right when they say men are just as confusing as they are…
Twenty minutes into the second half and I’m playing worse than I did at the start. Defenders taking the ball from me like I’m moving in slow motion, and the few times I try to pass forward, I end up misjudging. My head’s somewhere else now, trying to figure out what Asher’s all about—and realizing that I’m maybe not as casual about the whole thing as I thought I was.
And what the hell was Maeve doing arranging a date with the guy? I mean, sure, I swapped numbers with Hazel, but I didn’t even think about when or how we might meet again. That moment in the bedroom, where we told each other we weren’t going to fuck our respective “dates”—it wasn’t a promise, of course. We never said it out loud. We couldn’t. We didn’t need to. It was understood. And now it turns out Maeve simply found a “loophole.” A way of getting around it. Is she planning to fuck him after that art thing? Did Asher have to try hard to persuade her? Is she even planning to go?
I find myself glaring at Asher—who’s playing as the number ten, so we’re not too far apart—and I’m glaring at him so intently, trying to figure out if Maeve would be taken by him, that I completely miss a beautifully placed pass that Colin plays to me. A perfect ball that would have put even the red-faced guy I replaced in a dangerous position.
“Wake up, Toby!” the striker yells at me, and I raise a palm as apology.
We’re getting close to the end of the match, and it’s still even. Both teams desperate now, throwing more bodies forward, flying into tackles and taking more risks as we both chase a winning goal.
But I don’t care. None of this shit matters anymore. Maeve’s about to go off and fuck some other guy and I’m supposed to just be cool with it when I’m not. When I can’t be.
My surprise and confusion soon turns into a bristling anger, deep inside. A thorn in my side that makes me hyper-aware and itching to do something, to move, to act. The kind of focus you can only get from pain. And it’s in this frame of mind that the ball comes to me once again, hurtling at a speed that I have no right to be able to control, sure to go out.
I kill the ball dead, bringing it down right in front of me with a touch so deft Picasso would admire it. I knock it past a defender while I run the other side, switch feet to dance past two more, then change direction to leave another sliding into nothing. Through once again, but once again too wide, I look inside to see who’s there for the cross.
Asher. He’s making a perfect run, and all I need to do is pass to him to give him a chance he could score with his eyes closed. But it’s Asher—and I’ve already given him too much. I look at the goal, the angle impossibly tight, the keeper covering almost every space to shoot in. There’s maybe seven inches of goal above him that I can score in, but I’d need to hit it razor-accurate, and even then with the force of a freight train to get it past the goalie. And I’ll have to do it now.
I strike the ball guided by nothing but instinct, nothing but passion and reckless abandon behind my foot, not caring if it flies miles wide. A wild, aggressive, outrageous—and almost selfish—attempt.
Maybe it’s the sheer audacity of it, the keeper himself expecting me to pass to Asher, or maybe it’s that I’m so in the moment it’s like time slows as I connect with the ball, but it heads straight for the top corner. The keeper gets fingertips to it but not enough to push it away. It slams against the underside of the crossbar with a satisfying thud and crashes down into the back of the goal.
I hit the ball so hard and at such an angle that it had left me on the ground, and before I can get up there are roaring bodies piling on top of me. Whacks on the head and an ear-busting chorus of joyous, primal victory screams.
“You fucking beautiful son of
a bitch!”
“That’s how you do it! That’s how!”
“That was glorious, you bastard!”
The shouts ease up, but only a little, as the weight of the bodies on me do, and I find myself being pulled up to my feet. A victorious glare in my face as we make our way back for another kick-off, my new teammates continue to come in for fist bumps and shows of appreciation.
“That was some fucking goal!” Asher says, smacking me on the back. I turn to nod at him as he moves ahead, jogging backwards. He wags his finger as a joke. “And a good thing too, or I’d have been on you for not passing it!”
I smile back at him.
“I don’t like giving things away that easily.”
12
Maeve
My Monday at work has been the busiest in a long time. Brent and Harriet are so enthused about the new jewelry line, bombarding me with ideas and proposals for it throughout the day, that you’d think they were the ones putting their names on it. Add to that a weekend spent with the dinner date at Mia’s and roaming about the house taking care of myself, and it’s no wonder I’m falling behind on the social engagements and event-attending that anyone in fashion needs to maintain in order to secure their connections and status. Time to focus. Get myself back on track. Show everyone what I’m made of.
I cram about twenty hours of work into the ten hours I’m on the clock. Half of it outside the offices, visiting a few of our stores to clear up some inventory issues, and meeting with a supplier whom I had to charm out of his disappointment at waiting so long to see me.
By the time I’m gathering my things to leave, the last person in the office, I’m ready for a long bath and a deep sleep, but instead I only touch base at home for a quick shower and change of outfits before heading out again. It’s been too long since normality—and for me normality is other people, dressing up, and enjoying life.
It starts with drinks at a bar where I know the bartender well and the exclusive clientele even better. Before I’m halfway through my cosmopolitan, I’m chatting with a man I know from a fashion chain who is almost as interested in a lucrative deal for both our companies as he is in me. Then I get a call from a friend who writes for a European fashion magazine asking me if I’m free, and I turn down the first man’s invitation to dinner to take up this writer’s instead.