by Golden, Kim
What she hadn’t counted on was Chris turning up at the pub and witnessing the kiss.
“What the fuck is going on here?” His voice was ragged, almost ferocious. His body had gone taut. She could see it in his stance and the stiffness of his movements. Andrew inched away, embarrassed and maybe a little scared. But Chris didn’t let him get far. He grabbed Andrew by the collar. “Where the fuck do you think you’re goin’?”
“Chris, stop—it’s not what you think at all.”
“Yeah, I was just being silly, mate. No harm intended,” Andrew grinned at Chris. Did he really think his charm would get him out of this one? She wanted to shush him, but he stupidly blathered on. “She’s a lovely girl, an’ I couldn’t help myself.”
“Let’s just go, please?” Jessica loosened Chris’s fingers and pulled him away. She cast a glance over her shoulder at Andrew. He was still standing where they’d left him, straightening the collar on his rugby shirt and laughing at something someone had said. Even over the music she heard him say in a scathing voice, “Feckin’ eejit.”
Chris heard it too. He stopped suddenly.
“Please, let’s just go home,” she murmured urgently. “He’s just being stupid.”
They left the pub, stumbling out into the black winter night and snow-covered streets. The space between them was colder than the very air around them.
Why had she let him kiss her? She wasn’t even attracted to Andrew. When they’d first met during the Postgraduate Student Orientation, she’d found him feckless and a braggart and altogether unappealing, despite the sexy voice and his wild black curls. He was a wonder to look at: a perfect creamy complexion that suggested good, clean living; the sort of body that was firm and muscular with minimal effort, and a mischievous twinkle in his eye that promised more than it would ever deliver.
She’d met his type before in Philadelphia and steered well clear of them. She hadn’t expected to share her student flat with him, but she was the odd man out—he, Gillian and Peter were all firm friends from upper secondary school, and had been living together for the last four years.
When Jessica was assigned to their flat it was sheer coincidence. Initially, she’d been offered a place in Pollock Hall, a grim multipurpose building near Holyrood. The rooms were nondescript and the building itself a monument to drabness. Then the extra room in Gillian’s flat became available, thanks to Andrew sleeping with then ditching Ruth, who’d been one of the original Gang of Four. From Gillian, Jessica learned how Andrew had smothered Ruth with lothario-like attention, throwing her heated looks that made any girl weak in the knees. And Ruth, though she’d sworn she’d no time for any man until she finished her thesis, fell hard for Andrew.
“They were like feckin’ rabbits, I tell you,” Gillian sneered. “In the middle of the night, Pete and I could hear them through the walls, him tellin’ her how special she was and how she was so very beautiful and keeping us up all night with that racket when the next morning he’d be traipsing off to meet this girl or that one he’d met at the pub.”
“Where’s Ruth now?” Jessica had asked. “Did she move to another residence hall?”
“She left Edinburgh. She’s taking a year off, traveling in Asia with some other girlfriends.”
“All because of Andrew?”
“Not just him, but he broke her confidence…and see Ruth’s the sort of girl who doesn’t open up to just anyone. And then Andrew took advantage of knowing that she liked him…well, he’s a right bastard, isn’t he?”
Jessica knew what he was after. He’d been hitting on her since the beginning of the term and she’d ignored him. But just before they left for London he’d come up behind her in the kitchen one evening when she was making dinner, grazed against her as he was reaching for a mug and she’d felt the heat rising from his body and smelled the citrusy cologne he was wearing. He’d murmured, “Sorry, luv” in her ear but lingered nonetheless.
When Andrew finally moved away she missed the weight of his body against hers. She and Chris hadn’t been together for several days. Fergus had kept him busy photographing those models for his new project, and she was more than a little jealous. She’d walked in on one of the sessions and seen how one of the models, a statuesque redhead with the body of an Amazon, cooed at Chris whenever he was near her. Or how, when Fergus barked out orders for Chris to readjust the lighting or reflectors, or test the ---, the redhead thrust her ample bosom out at Chris, stroking herself and fixing him with a challenging stare. None of it would have bothered her if he’d only just ignored the redhead. But he blushed and even returned her flirtatious banter. And a few times his gaze seemed to be appraising the redhead, lingering over the curve of her ample ass, drinking in the firmness of her gravity-defying breasts so perky despite their size.
If only Chris had not been so embarrassed when she teased him about the models all wanting to sleep with him. And then there was Fergus’s wife. Jessica had only met her once but she’d understood immediately why none of Fergus’s other assistants stuck around long. There was something predatory in the Juliette’s eyes. When she wasn’t piercing you with a chill stare, she was drinking you in and pulling you to her with her smile and the weight of her slender hand on your arm or leg. Twice Juliette had stroked Chris’s neck in a completely inappropriate manner, and when their eyes met, he turned away so quickly that Jessica understood something had passed between them, something she wasn’t a part of and that he’d never tell her about.
And then she’d made the mistake of telling Aisha, who’d filled her ear with venom against Chris.
So when Andrew suggested the research trip to London, she jumped at the chance to be away from Chris if only to get her head together. And then he kissed her, and she hadn’t been able to stop herself from wanting him to take her one step farther into something she knew would only hurt her in the end.
They argued, from Nicholson Road all the way to his apartment. Each time she tried to walk away from him he grabbed her and the intensity in his eyes frightened her but she was drawn to it all the same. This was what she wanted—someone who’d react, who’d force her to feel something and not let her get away with just gliding on the surface. And she deserved his anger.
“What game are you playing at with me?” he demanded. They were nearly at his building. His voice filled the empty street, bouncing off the bricks and asphalt. “I can’t fucking take this, Jess—what the hell is going on?”
“I didn’t mean for him to kiss me.”
“You didn’t… what are you saying? Did you ask him to do it?”
“No, no… look, please, just forget about it—”
“How am I supposed to forget that your roommate was all over you in that pub? How many other times has he done that?”
“Never…”
“Tell me the truth!”
“I am telling you the truth. Stop shouting, the entire city doesn’t need to be party to our fight!”
“Fuck you, Jess—you’re just dicking me around right now. Why am I letting myself get so into this?”
“Chris… Stop, look at me.”
“I can’t.”
“Please…I’m sorry…we had too much to drink. That’s all.”
“Are you sleeping with him?”
“No! I don’t want him.”
“Just be honest with me, Jess. I can’t take it if you’re going to jerk me around.”
“I’m telling you the truth.”
For a long while, they stood there, their ragged breath steaming between them. She was shaking, partly from the cold but also because she knew she was hurting him just to protect herself. He rubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand. All of the steely tension evaporated. His shoulders slumped; his limbs lost their rigidity.
She took his hand and stroked his cheek. They kissed in the orangish glow of the streetlamp. He was trembling, shaking so hard when she embraced him that she was afraid they’d lose their balance and tumble to the ground. They parted long enough to
go inside.
They made love for the first time in weeks. She wanted to be on top of him, to straddle him and make him forget what had happened. But once they were in his bed, he wouldn’t let go of her. He stretched her arms over her head, tightening his grip on her wrists as he nuzzled her neck and breasts, slid his tongue along the curve of her lower lip.
“Don’t close your eyes…look at me…just let me do this…”
chapter eight
What's Going On
“My period is late,” she said with no preamble. They were sitting at his drafting board in Fergus’s studio. Chris was supposed to be taking care of the final prints of what constituted Fergus’s next big project, a portfolio of nudes retouched in such lush colors they reminded Chris of Fifties pin-ups. Even the models’ bodies were voluptuous and alluring, like the Marilyn Monroe centerfold from Playboy or the soft focus shots of Jayne Mansfield and Betty Paige that gave their naked bodies a luminosity so golden they were more like paintings than photographs.
Chris froze. Had he heard her correctly? He turned a little to face her. Maybe if he took in the expression on her face he’d know how he should respond. But pregnant… Hadn’t they used condoms every time they were together? “Have you been to a doctor?”
Her eyebrows scrunched together and a deep crease formed between them. “No. I bought a home pregnancy test so…” but she didn’t finish her sentence.
She shrugged and picked up one of the rejected prints. The model depicted was Fergus’s wife. She’d insisted on being part of the portfolio despite how anachronistic she seemed compared to the other models. But Chris couldn’t look at her without remembering Thanksgiving and how she’d cornered him at the cigar club to which Fergus had dragged them. In the dimly-lit hall between the men’s and women’s lounges, she’d pulled Chris aside and, before he could respond properly, grabbed his hand and slid it inside the gaping opening of her dress. She pressed his hand against her small breasts and murmured, “I could make it so good for you. So much better than that little girl you’re so torn up over.”
He’d pulled away, but not before she untied the small bow that held her dress closed and displayed her long white body to him. Her breasts, which FHM had once described as being like perfect dollops of cream were small and firm, her nipples deep pink and hard as beads. There were no traces of fat on her slender frame; she was as lean as a whippet. But what he remembered most was the perfect V of her crotch, and its startling absence of pubic hair. Then, she bit his lower lip, closed her dress shut and sauntered off, rolling her hips in such a calculated manner that he almost hated her. But for all that, he’d wanted her. His cock had gone hard at the sight of her and when she dragged his hand over her erect nipples, he’d wanted to lower his head to them and suck on them, savoring them as if they were rare wild strawberries.
A flush of color rose in his face and neck. He took the rejected print from Jessica and tossed it in the pile with the rest of the rejects.
“Maybe you should do it now,” he said. They were watching each other, both assessing the situation and trying to decide what move ought to be next. “Then we’ll know what to do.”
“What if I am pregnant?” She pushed her chair back. She stretched her denim-clad legs before her and tapped his foot with hers. “What would you want me to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“I couldn’t keep it.”
“Then I guess we’d have to get an abortion.”
“I’d have to get an abortion, you mean.”
“You’re not the only one affected by this.”
“No. I’m just the only one who’d be a statistic: single black female with fucked up life.”
“Oh for Christ’s sake are you going to pull the god damn race card again?”
“Fuck you, Chris! It’s so easy for you—you could just walk away if I’m pregnant…”
“Is that what you want? For me to prove you right so you can confirm for your friends what jerks we white boys are?” His voice escalated a notch higher than he’d expected. Why did she always have to turn everything back to the color of their skin? It wasn’t like either of them could do anything about it other than accept that they were different and move on.
She flung herself out of the chair, grabbed her backpack and stormed towards the door. He didn’t move. He just sat there, trying to contain his anger as if it were nothing more than a morsel of food. For a moment he thought she was going to leave, and he didn’t want her to go. They hadn’t seen each other in two weeks and the more time they spent apart the less he felt he knew her. He called out to her. When she didn’t answer, he tossed the prints aside and stood. At the end of the hall he could see a light shining from beneath the bathroom door. He went towards it, rehashing in his mind how he would apologize to her. He didn’t want her harboring any resentment toward him. It was bad enough that each time her friends from Philadelphia called her she was sullen for days afterwards. Though she attributed her mood swings to being homesick, he’d overheard enough of these phone calls to know that her best friend didn’t approve of their being together. And the closer they came to when they’d go home, the more frequent Aisha’s calls grew.
“Jess? You in there?” He called out, leaning against the bathroom door.
“Give me some space, please.”
“Fine, have it your way.”
He went back to his desk and finished cropping and mounting the prints to Fergus’s specifications. When Jessica finally emerged from the bathroom she looked relieved. She smiled nervously at him, but he didn’t return it. He couldn’t switch off his emotions as quickly as she did.
“False alarm,” she said. She stood behind him, rubbing her face in his hair. The warmth of her breath brushed his skin and left him full of want for her. Her breasts grazed his neck and he turned nuzzling into her and folding his arms around her. “Sorry…”
Why couldn’t she love him a little more? Why was she so afraid to let him in?
But the false alarm didn’t lessen the tension between them, especially not after the Scotsman and the Times published articles about the rise of racism in the Lothians. Three days after their pregnancy scare, a young black man on his way home from work was attacked by a group of skinheads just down the road from his flat. Chris had hoped Jessica wouldn’t see the article, but of course she had. She pored through the newspaper everyday and wanted to discuss just about everything she read. After the first article, more and more articles about the rise in race-related violence and discrimination in Scotland popped up in the daily papers. And Chris, anxious to keep Jessica from leaving him, became clingy and desperate, inventing excuses to see her if she decided not meet him for dinner one night or cancelled plans at the last minute.
They didn’t talk about the young man, who’d survived the attack thanks to pepper spray and using his keys as weapons. They hardly seemed to talk at all. When they did, it was always about her classes or his project. Some nights he’d walk to her rooms at Mylne’s Court, wondering if this would be the night she’d call it off with him. When he arrived, she still kissed him, still pressed her body against his as though she craved him like a much-needed glass of water. But a chill had settled over them that refused to dissipate. And the more he held her, the more he later claimed each part of her body with his mouth and hands, the farther away she seemed to be.
“Tell me what’s wrong…”
“Nothing’s wrong.”
“We never talk. I feel like you’re keeping me at a safe distance.”
“You’re exaggerating things now.”
“Am I?”
“You are.”
“Then why do we spend so little time together?”
“We’re both busy. I’ve got two hundred pages of research to hand in soon, and you’ve got Fergus breathing down your neck.”
“Christ, we’ve only got another month.”
“I know.”
“Are we going to make it?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.
I hope so.”
“You do?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“Do you love me enough to stay together when we’re back home?”
“Of course, I love you… how does this feel?”
“Stop…don’t distract me, just…just tell me we’ll be okay.”
“We’ll be fine. You’ll see.”
chapter nine
Burnt-down Days Like Cigarettes...
Spring came earlier than expected, bringing daily reminders that soon Jessica would be going home again. The Accommodations Office had already sent her a memo requesting that she compile a list of any repairs needed to her room so they could sort it out before its next occupant arrived. Her thesis advisor scheduled weekly meetings with her. And though she’d already finished writing her thesis, she had nightmares about forgetting to submit it or worse, not being able to hold her own during her thesis defense. It didn’t help that, since the debacle at the pub with Andrew, she felt guilty even talking to him about her thesis. He still sent smoldering looks her way, still pretended not to have been accosted by Chris, still flirted like mad with her—but the difference was that he did so these days from a safe distance. He didn’t want to risk being surprised by Chris again. And she didn’t want to upset Chris, especially since his own project was not going well. Sometimes he complained about it to her. He’d try to explain what he intended with his photography and why some of his prints lived up to his expectations while others came far short of the mark. He wanted at least 50 good entries in his portfolio before he returned to Philadelphia.
“Why fifty?” she’d asked. It seemed such a large number, especially considering that he often found it hard to judge his own work. “Is it significant or did you just pull it from air?”
He shrugged. “I want something sizeable, I don’t want them to be able to ignore my work.”
“But can’t it stand on its own without so many?”