Acute Reactions

by Ruby Lang

  When it came down to it, Petra had screwed up. Again.

  If she were standing strong on her principles, she should never have gone out with Ian, kissed him, invited him back to her apartment, and straddled him shirtless. If, however, she were intent on seducing him, she should never have leapt off of him and practically accused him of cheating on her with another allergist. That was just confusing.

  She felt bad for him. He had been trying: the man had gotten shots for her even though he didn’t necessarily need them. But for some reason, feeling those bumps on his arms had made her angry and scared, even while her lust raged on. She felt out of control and she hated it. She remembered how hurt and frustrated he looked as he pulled his shirt back over his beautiful chest. He had done something for her that he thought would please her, or at least make her more at peace with herself. She had no such serenity. So many ambivalent and oddly defined responses coursed through her. Her mind was going in circles.

  Regret. That was the only coherent feeling, punching through all others. She wanted a second chance. Things would have turned out different. But now, there was nothing she could do about it.

  She decided to go for a run to clear her mind. It was late, but she wouldn’t go for long.

  The course took her through the streets of her neighborhood, past the small park she loved, past people strolling and laughing in the cold, clear night.

  He had done something for her because he respected her feelings. But did he want too much in return? He was getting shots so that she’d feel okay about their relationship. Was it too much too soon?

  It didn’t feel like too much too soon.

  Either way, he probably didn’t care now.

  She jogged slowly and carefully and tried to clear her mind. On the sidewalk, a group of people stood outside a restaurant after dinner saying their goodbyes. She avoided Ian’s businesses. She cruised past the weathered brick warehouse buildings, past the new towers, and past glass and steel apartments, jerking her head enviously at the lighted windows, imagining people inside, laughing, talking side by side. And of course, while she was sightseeing through her own neighborhood, she nearly ran into him.

  • • •

  He watched her warily as she slowed down. Not that she had been running all that quickly. If he were a sensible person, he should have stepped back and let her keep going. As usual, whenever he came within three feet of her, he wanted to close the space between them until their bodies were merged.

  He stayed where he was and jammed his hands in his pockets.

  “Nice night,” she said, after a pause.

  “Yes. Not a cloud in the sky.”

  Another pause. “You’re not at work.”

  “No, I just came back.”

  He reminded himself that she was the one who was supposed to explain things to him. But she looked messy and lustrous-eyed and all he could think about was the fact that he’d seen her half-naked. The streetlights picked up the sheen of her running tights and he tried not to look at her legs, the crescent of her bottom.

  He had cupped that gorgeous ass last night.

  “It’s getting cold out here, for me, at least. Would you like to come up?”

  She nodded. “I’ve always wanted to see the inside of one of these fancy buildings,” she said, as he pushed the elevator button.

  “I like it,” he lied.

  He opened the door to his apartment and they both blinked in the flare of light.

  “It’s…clean,” Petra said.

  “I hired someone recently to take care of the…”

  “Dust.”

  “Yes, dust.”

  “It’s okay to say dust in front of me,” Petra said.

  “I was just afraid I’d trigger some sort of outsize reaction if I referred to my…”

  “Allergies. You can say that in front of me, too.”

  “Okay,” said Ian. He still looked a little tense. “Would you like some water? Or something else? Wine?”

  “Water would be great. Tap is fine.”

  • • •

  She winced at herself. Under the wind jacket, she wore a quick-dry T-shirt, which was shiny in all the wrong places. And there were her running tights, striped with reflectors that could probably be seen from space. At least, if he tried something with her, he wouldn’t miss this time. Not that she thought he would try anything with her. Then again, she was in his apartment, so maybe she was forgiven.

  She shouldn’t count on it.

  He handed her a glass. They sat down on his black leather couch. It was an awful couch. It squeaked when she settled on it.

  “I should apologize,” she said.

  He appeared to think about this.

  She started again. “You should know something about me,” she said. “I can’t stand being the bad guy. Everywhere you look here, from every angle, I’ve done something terrible to you. I’ve been a bad doctor. I may have made a pass at you. I certainly had many thoughts and dreams about you while you were my patient. And then you got shots because of me and I didn’t appreciate the gesture.”

  “I shouldn’t have expected it,” he said quietly. “I didn’t ask you. I made assumptions and I’m sorry.”

  “I wish we could begin again,” she said helplessly. “I wish I could get a clean start on everything.”

  “We can’t change the circumstances under which we met,” he said.

  They had both apologized, but it wasn’t exactly encouraging. Not that she blamed him. He put down his own glass of water and turned his gaze on her. His chest was lean and strong under the crisp shirt. She wanted to run her hands from his cuffs, up his biceps. She wanted to sit in his lap and bite his chin. She was drawn to him, and he to her. It would always be like this between them, she realized. It frightened her that it would work—the attraction could work—between them, even when the rest of it seemed to be a disaster.

  She took the easy way out. She closed her eyes and leaned over and gave him a small, soft kiss. She put her forehead against his.

  She heard him say, “I’ve decided that the best thing about having you in my apartment is that you can’t kick me out.”

  He reached and pulled her toward him, putting his hands under her shirt.

  He kissed her until she felt sparks snapping under her eyelids and a rush of warmth between her thighs. She squirmed. And then she started to think, again.

  “I want to do this,” she gasped, as he pulled her shirt up and off. “I really, really do. But maybe not just right now.”

  “Why not?”

  He kissed her again. Then he kissed her chin.

  “Sports bras are not sexy,” she whispered.

  “I find them quite compelling,” he whispered back.

  His eyes wandered over her chest.

  “They smoosh everything together,” she said.

  “Lucky bra,” he said. He ran his hand against the smooth fabric.

  “And then there’s the name. Bra. It’s such a weird sound.”

  He pulled back a little, but his fingers remained occupied. “Are you trying to talk me out of this?” he asked, sliding his thumbs under her tights. He drew the waistband down under her and pulled them off with a snap, casting them to a remote corner of the room.

  She winced in arousal and embarrassment. She smelled like sweat. She was damp and her legs were probably stuck to his leather couch. She’d make an awful sound when she tried to rise. Maybe if she moaned loudly enough, he wouldn’t hear it. He ran his hands over her calves and knees and thighs. She sucked in a breath. Yep, making a lot of noise wouldn’t be a problem if he kept this up.

  “I don’t think you’re going to be able to talk your way out of this one,” he murmured.

  She groaned again as she felt his fingers tunnel under her buttocks. He hauled himself up and her with him, her skin stinging, almost ripping from the couch, making her eyes smart. She grabbed his shoulders and bit his neck against the pain. Her legs wound around his waist and he stumbled up and
toward his room.

  “God,” he said, throwing her on the bed. “You’re going to kill me. We’re going to kill each other. It’s going to be great.”

  He pulled off his shirt and Petra bounded up to her knees. She was tingling and frantic. She ran her fingers roughly over the planes and angles of his chest, down his ribs, and pushed around to his firm ass. She drew him down so that he too was kneeling on the bed. They sucked on each other’s lips and slid their tongues together. She rubbed herself against him urgently, but there were still too many layers between them. He slid his big palms into her underwear and shoved it down to her knees, then he started to pull up the tight bra. He got it up over her breasts and to her upper arms, where it stayed stuck.

  She wriggled, her movements on top and below bound by her stupid underclothes.

  He laughed softly.

  “Oh, come on,” she panted.

  She was still trying to move her arms, but instead of helping her, he stood up and began to unzip his jeans. She watched for a moment, her achiness and frustration mounting almost to a point that was unbearable, then she began to struggle even more with her Lycra bindings. She had almost gotten the bra past her face, when she felt him grab her waist and wrap his lips over a nipple. All muscle control fled, and she lurched and would have fallen, if he hadn’t been there to spread her on the mattress, his hot mouth never leaving her.

  She was blindfolded by the sports bra and almost sobbing with frustration. Between her legs, she felt a throbbing fist of want. Her thighs struggled now, rubbing along his coarse dark hair, along his cock, as she tried to make any movement that would bring him closer to her. Finally, he raised his head and helped her pull off the bra. She kicked off her underwear. And as he looked in her wild eyes, he flicked her clit back and forth with his thumb and pushed his fingers into her slickness and she came almost at once, her legs spreading, her heels digging into the bed.

  He groaned, and kissed her and reached over to his nightstand.

  “It’s a good thing that happened, because I warn you, it’s been a while, so this probably won’t last very long,” he said. “I’ll do better next time.”

  “Famous last words,” Petra said giddily. “Wait, you’re leaving your glasses on?”

  “I want to see everything,” he said.

  “Oh. That’s…that’s kind of hot.”

  He gave a mysterious half smile and it made her shiver. She watched avidly as he pulled a condom on. Then he kissed her and pushed in, and the feeling was almost too much for her overloaded senses. Her pussy was still pulsing from her orgasm, so she concentrated on breathing. His eyes narrowed and his hair flopped. She reached up to push it back and she could hear his groans. She loved his groans. Her body was becoming taut again, just listening and watching as he panted and slid, so she dragged his head down for a kiss. “I’m going to make you come,” she whispered fiercely.

  That did it for him.

  He crashed into her wildly until her teeth started to click and then he fell on top of her and she felt his pleasing weight pressed into her chest and stomach, on her pelvis, and along her legs. He breathed her name.

  After a while, he shifted himself onto his elbows and mouthed her neck, her chin. “Are you good?”

  His glasses were smudged and slightly askew.

  “I’m good. Are you good?”

  “I’m good. I’m very good.”

  It was true.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  She was swearing, wearing only a pair of underpants, and searching for something in his room. He put on his glasses and checked his clock. Six eighteen. He groaned.

  But then she turned and he saw her dainty breasts, which he suddenly got the urge to prod with his index finger, her belly button, the quivering curve of her stomach.

  “Good morning,” he said.

  “Damn,” she muttered, not meeting his eyes. “Where is that stupid bra?”

  Petra Lale was not a morning person, he thought, adding to his store of knowledge about her. He pictured the way she had leaned over his counter while she ate cereal in the middle of the night and how her legs had stuck out from the covers when she finally fell asleep. She would not escape so easily.

  “I thought you hated the jog bra.”

  “I do,” she said, getting on her hands and knees. She looked under the bed and then under the night table. He edged over to her side and stroked her waggling rump.

  “What?” he said, when her head popped up. “I’m encouraging you.”

  She made a noise and kept looking.

  “Do you regret last night?” he asked.

  “No,” she said.

  She did not, he noticed, ask him.

  Finally she gave up and stood, her gaze still roving the room.

  He threw aside the covers and rolled over onto his back. She went quiet and very still. Her eyes crept to his groin. “You should put that away,” she muttered.

  “I was planning on it,” he said, grinning.

  She tried to hide a smile and bent over to shake the sheets that he had vacated.

  “C’mon, your turn. Drop those panties.”

  “I hate the word panties,” she groused, putting one hand on a hip.

  The grumbling should have been a turnoff, but even though she stood there, frowning about his word choice, she was naked, except for the aforementioned underpants, and her legs were apart, and she was so unself-conscious, so supremely herself, that it made his dick hard. Harder.

  “What do I have to do to get them off?” he asked, watching her.

  That half smile again. She turned and he couldn’t see her breasts. Too bad. On the other hand, he now had a better view of her ass. “Think of a new word for ladies’ undergarments,” she said. “A good one, a fierce one. Then popularize it.”

  “What counts as popular?”

  “An entry in the Oxford English Dictionary?”

  “Wow, you really kick it old school. Would you settle for an Urban Dictionary entry?”

  She frowned at him, or at least she tried. Her eyes glinted and she gave him another saucy look. He hooked his leg under her and tumbled her to the bed.

  “Oh, well,” he said, pushing the scrap of underwear aside, “I can fuck you without taking them off.”

  • • •

  He didn’t let her go until he had fed her a piece of toast and coffee. He was annoyingly cheerful. She had to admit that she felt the laughter bubbling its way madly in her chest, too. It was a little bit like hysteria, but with less potential for tears and screaming involved. Maybe it was happiness. Whatever it was, she was fighting it with all she had.

  She had to give up on finding her bra. Ian watched as she pulled her tee back on. The slippery, quick-dry material rubbed and molded against her nipples immediately, causing him to smirk. She pulled on the tights, self-conscious and turned-on again, and found her socks and shoes and jacket.

  “I’ll walk you home,” he said, standing beside her in his hallway. He was still naked, and drinking coffee. It was a good look for him.

  “It’s early. I’ll be okay. This is a safe neighborhood. Plus, most criminals ply their trade late at night rather than early in the morning.”

  “You’re quite the little Miss Sunshine, aren’t you?” he murmured, kissing her hair.

  She barely escaped.

  She only had two appointments that morning, but the drug rep came in and tried to entertain her with stories. She couldn’t pay attention. He gave her a pen and piles of samples, and instead of wondering idly how much she’d get if she sold it all on eBay, she considered sending Joanie home early. Not that Ian would be free tonight. Maybe he would. Petra didn’t really care.

  There was that effervescence in her chest again. Maybe it was gastroesophageal reflux.

  In the afternoon, one of her patients went to the hospital for asthma. It was across town and she didn’t have privileges there yet, but she went in to see Rose Marie and sat down with her mother to reassure her. She called the girl�
�s pediatrician. Rose Marie was fine, though. She was discharged soon afterward, and they made an appointment for follow-up the next day. Petra made a note to check how often the girl was using her inhaler.

  Then, it was five already.

  She shucked off the white coat and called a goodbye to the receptionist. She checked her phone, determined to ignore all calls from Ian for the rest of the evening. Not that he had telephoned.

  She wondered what he was doing.

  She would not swing by Stream like a crush-struck teen.

  Instead, she went to the grocery store and bought a package of frozen lima beans and some lemons and oranges and box of butter, and she sat down and tried to read JAMA while eating a bowlful of lima beans.

  Her phone rang.

  “You didn’t support me,” Helen said. “You didn’t help me out. You think I’m a horrible person. Like Sarah.”

  “That’s not true. I was just so confused at the time. And you know Sarah. She can be challenging. She takes arguments too far. Actually, you both do.”

  “I just started talking, and it was like I couldn’t stop.”

  “Neither could she.”

  A pause.

  “Not so awesome now, am I?” Helen asked.

  “It was a stupid thing to say. Affirmation should never be filler. You know I really love you, don’t you?”

  “I know. I hate the false enthusiasm, though. I hate faking it to make it.”

  “I hate when people say, A pretty girl like you should smile.”

  “People who tell me to smile need to fuck off. Especially men. What is that?”

  Petra put her empty bowl in the sink and rinsed it.

  “What did you have for dinner?” Helen asked.

  “Lima beans.”

  “The single vegetable dinner. I remember it well.”

  Petra put the bowl in the dish rack. Behind it were three identical bowls. This was her life.