by Annie Jocoby
“Sure.”
At that, I ran into the bedroom and shut the door behind me. Shit, shit, shit. I took the entire pile of clothes off the bed, and threw them into the closet on the floor. That takes care of that. I realized that I hadn’t vacuumed in there for awhile. Oh, Iris, what’s your problem? You aren’t usually this messy. Then I remembered my profound depression that week. No excuse. You have to do better than this. Still, without the pile of clothes on the bed, the room was passable. You will just have to figure out later what is clean and what is dirty.
Oh, who am I kidding. It’s all dirty by now.
The clothes crisis resolved, I returned to my earlier obsession – my weight. Looking in my full-view mirror, I noticed that I had lost some weight this past week, but not nearly enough. Now I was only 25 lbs overweight, not 30 lbs, but on somebody 5’2”, that is a lot. Stop. There is nothing that can be done about it. Ryan is out there waiting.
I came back out, and Ryan stood up, expectantly. I smiled nervously. My nerves were back. “Uh, come on back.”
“Thanks for accommodating me on such short notice.”
“Don’t be silly. I’m thrilled to have you.”
We lay down on the bed, fully clothed, on top of the covers. Ryan lay behind me, one arm wrapped tightly around my waist, his free hand gently stroking my hair. “Mmmm, this feels nice,” he said. “Really nice.” He reached his face around and kissed me gently on the mouth with little feathery kisses. I immediately felt his erection after the kiss, through his pants, even though his pants were somewhat loose, as they were suit trousers. He self-consciously turned his body slightly so that his lower half was no longer pressed up against me. “Sorry about that,” he said.
I lay there quietly, afraid to speak. I hoped that he thought that I had just magically fallen asleep. I didn’t want him to feel embarrassed.
He just lay there next to me, his lower half facing the ceiling, his torso still pressed up against me, his fingers still stroking my hair, his other arm still wrapped tightly around me. “Beautiful hair,” he purred. “I’ve always loved redheads.” His lower half remained facing the ceiling. I could feel his breathing, could feel his heart pounding. When he kissed me, his breath tasted of Dewar’s. He smelled of a very faint cologne. My breath was catching, and I was trembling. His hands never explored my body. I could tell that he was trying very hard to be a gentleman, but I really wanted his hands to explore my breasts and my private parts. I wanted his kisses on my thighs, back, neck. But we both were trying to behave. With any luck, there’ll be plenty of time for that in the future.
Still, it was nice to know that I turn him on. The evidence was certainly there. I fell asleep with Ryan wrapped around me, except his lower body.
I had never felt so safe.
Chapter Eight
The next morning, I woke up fairly early. Ryan’s entire body was now wrapped around me. He was still sleeping soundly. I attempted to extricate myself, as I had to use the bathroom, but, when I tried, Ryan held on tighter. He was mumbling. “Stop, stop, daddy. Daddy, please.” I didn’t quite know what to do. What was he dreaming?
This guy was becoming ever more complicated. But I knew that I was at least starting to fall for him, and not because of his beauty and apparent wealth. I was falling for him more for his kindness.
He woke with a start, looking at me, not quite seeing me. Then he plopped back down on the bed, pulling the covers around him, facing the wall. I seized the opportunity to use the bathroom at that point. I then tiptoed into the kitchen. Might as well tidy up while he sleeps.
As it turned out, I only had about a half hour to get my dishes in the dishwasher, the kitty litter changed, and my bag of wine bottles, with the old kitty litter mixed in, hauled out to the dumpster. So much for the recycling dream. I’ll start again with the next batch of wine bottles.
Ryan appeared, still fully clothed.
“Hey,” I greeted him, Ajax coating the kitchen sink, and me scrubbing it diligently. My dishes were now in the dishwasher, which was humming quietly.
“Hey.” He looked beautiful, more than ever, because he now had a look of vulnerability. “I’m sorry about last night.”
I looked at him. Sorry about what? I hope he wasn’t apologizing for his erection. Probably not, he is probably apologizing for coming over so late. “Um, don’t worry about it.” That covered anything that he would be apologizing for.
“No, no. I was pretty shitty, coming over here in the middle of the night.”
I smiled. “Better late than never.”
“I, I should have called you.”
“Please, don’t mention it.” I looked in my fridge and found some turkey bacon. I also had some eggs and a tube of biscuits. That should do it. It’s not a cheese strata and berries with cream, but it will do in a pinch.
I cut the turkey bacon in half, then started to fry it. “I hope you like turkey bacon.”
He smiled. “Actually, I love it. I like it better than regular bacon.”
“Me too.” I was half expecting him to make some excuse to dash out the door, realizing that he made a huge mistake in coming here, so I was relieved that he wanted to stay for breakfast.
“Can I help?”
“No, I got it.” After the bacon was done, I poured the eggs into the same pan, adding a little bit of olive oil and minced garlic to the pan. I had already put my Pillsbury biscuits in the oven, and they were almost done. I dug into my freezer and opened up a can of orange juice concentrate, and squeezed it into a container, adding water to mix it up.
Everything finished, I produced two plates - I had to interrupt the dishwasher cycle to get them- and piled some bacon, eggs, and biscuits on each plate. I set the plates down on the counter, and then got two TV trays out for us to eat on.
“Sorry,” I said, feeling embarrassed again, “I don’t have room for a dining room table, so I have to eat on these TV trays.”
He smiled, sincerely - the first sincere smile I have seen in awhile, to be honest. “Not a problem.”
As we ate, I was dying to ask him a million questions. About his ex-wife, about his therapist, about Sheldon (the non humper and pumper). About Nick. Most of all, about his dream. What did his father do to him?
“So, what are you up to today?” Ryan asked.
Besides laundry? “No real plans.”
He seemed suddenly shy. “Would you, uh, like to hang out?” he asked, not looking me in the eye. He seems afraid of rejection.
“Sure, what did you have in mind?”
“Well, I chose the last activity. Your turn.” His face was instantly brightened.
“Um, well, let’s see….How about we pack up a picnic basket with some roasted chicken, some bread and some wine and take it out to the park by the art gallery? I think that there is a Shakespeare play there tonight. Let me look in the paper….” I brought out the paper, turning to the art section. “Yes, see, Twelfth Night is playing.”
“I love that play!”
And we were off. I drove him to his car, just up the street, and he followed me back to my apartment complex so that I could drive with him in his car to the park. We stopped by the Hen House to pick up a roasted chicken, and I packed the chicken into a picnic basket that I had picked up at a thrift store a few years back. We also picked up some roasted new potatoes and roasted green beans. A bottle of Two Buck Chuck completed the meal, along with a small loaf of bread. I had also packed an Indian blanket, but we had to stop by his house to pick up two small lawn chairs for the evening performance. Also, Ryan wanted to check on Maximus and Brutus, and change his clothes, of course. He was still wearing his dress pants, silk shirt and Ferragamo shoes from the night before.
“Daniel checks on them when I am away, but I want to see them for at least a little bit before we go,” Ryan said, referring to the dogs.
“Why don’t we bring them along?” I remembered that dogs were welcome in that park.
“Sounds great.” So, when we stoppe
d by his house, Maximus and Brutus were harnessed. They leaped about, excited to be going. He also got two lawn chairs. “Um, we better take the Escalade.” Another Escalade? I thought, remembering his driver also drove an Escalade. We went into the garage, and Ryan packed the dogs, in their carriers, into the Escalade, along with the two chairs, and the picnic basket filled with goodies.
Driving to the park, Ryan held my hand the whole way. Every other stoplight, he kissed me softly. I watched his groin, remembering last night’s erection. I hope that isn’t a problem now. However, it became evident that it was. There wasn’t much hiding it, the guy seemed enormous. I privately worried about that, but felt excited at the same time.
He blushed. “I better stop that for awhile.”
I blushed, too. I no longer was obsessed about what he saw in me. He saw something in me, that I didn’t see in myself, and that was that. Stop obsessing. But the memory of the week when I thought that I would never see him again haunted me. This could all go away at any moment. He is apparently dealing with a nasty ex-wife, and possibly other, deeper, issues, and he might be rebounding. And he might even have a girlfriend. Be cautious.
We got to the park, and tossed around a frisbee and a ball for the dogs. “How old are they?” I asked.
“Maximus is 2, and Brutus is around 8 months.”
“No wonder they’re so frisky.”
“Frisky is not the word. Spastic, hyper – those are good words.”
And indeed they were.
We lay the blanket out on the lawn, and then got out the paper plates, and plastic cups. He poured some wine for us both, and I broke apart the chicken. “Is a leg ok?” I asked.
“A leg would be great.”
I piled a chicken leg, about four new potatoes and a spoonful of green beans on the plate.
Ryan produced two pillows after our lunch, and he lay down on one of the pillows. At his urging, I laid my head on his stomach. I felt his eight pack beneath me without an ounce of fat. His body was sinewy, muscular and lean. He stroked my hair contentedly. “I never thought I could feel this way,” he purred.
“What way?”
“Happy, fulfilled.”
I played a little dumb. “But you were married.”
“Yeah,” he said, simply. “But I never felt like this with her.”
“Then why did you get married?” A logical question.
“Shhhh.”
I kept quiet. The mystery will remain for now.
After a few minutes, Ryan admitted “I was so sick last week, when I thought I might never see you again.”
“Why did you think you would never see me again?”
“I thought that you thought that I was lame for seeing a therapist and didn’t want to see me anymore.”
“So, what inspired you to come by?”
He smiled. “Liquid courage.”
I lay there, putting all the pieces together. I was only trying to give him his space when I wanted to leave when he told me about his therapist. I almost destroyed things because of it. Why didn’t I see that before? I evidently hurt his feelings by my indifference. Oh, how we can wound somebody without even knowing it.
I lay on his stomach, drumming my fingers on his rock hard abs. Should I ask about the therapist?
I took a chance. “So, how did the therapy session go?”
“Fine. I’ve been seeing Dr. Halder for awhile.” He felt more comfortable about opening up about it, apparently.
“Was there anything in particular that made you want to schedule an appointment that day?”
“Well I had a conversation with my ex-wife that morning. It….didn’t go well.” An understatement.
“Do you care to elaborate?”
“Well, she just wants stuff, still, even though the divorce is all settled and has been for awhile.” No mention of the blackmail and the threats to go to the press with…something.
In due time.
I lay there, silently. It was so difficult trying to determine how much to pry. I needed to make sure he knows that I care, but I didn’t want to push. I was walking a delicate line, and I knew it.
“What kind of stuff is she still wanting?”
“A new Ferrari, an airplane, that sort of stuff.” It sounds like he’s joking, although I know that he isn’t.
“How long were you married?”
“Two years.”
At this point, I was dying to find out everything. Why did they break up after only two years? Why did he marry her, when he apparently didn’t love her (he said that he never felt about her the way that he felt about me. Considering he had known me for less than two weeks, that wasn’t saying a lot for their marriage)? And, especially, what information was she using to blackmail him?
In due time.
He volunteered some information then. “I married her because she was pregnant.”
I thought about the baby room. Here’s where he will tell me about his child. However, what he said stunned me.
“So, you have a child, right?”
His face darkened. He said, softly, “No. At least not a child who is alive.”
I blinked, feeling the tears coming to my eyes.
“Um, I am so sorry. What happened?” I thought about the baby room some more, and how it was so perfect. There was nothing that was disturbed in that room. I immediately felt so sad, knowing that he must have loved his child very much. The evidence for this love was in the pristine condition of that room. I now figured that he didn’t want to show me, because he wasn’t ready to talk about her.
“Mia was born healthy. She died at the age of 6 months. SIDS.” That was all he said. And, I could tell from his tone and his body language, that this was all that he was going to say.
“Oh, I am so sorry…” What was there to say?
“Yeah, it was a tough break. Alexis was never the same after that, and our marriage, which wasn’t all that strong to begin with, just went downhill. I found her in bed with Paul, my former driver, one day when I came home early from work to surprise her with a trip to Italy. I had it all planned out – the blindfold, the limousine taking us to my private jet, the whole nine. I wanted to cheer her up. It was like a kick in the gut, to say the least.” I like how he slipped in there that he had his own jet. He must be getting more comfortable talking to me about his wealth.
“Geez.” Again, what do you say to that?
“Yeah. I kicked her out. During the divorce, I found out how dirty she can fight.”
“Oh?” Come on, tell me everything that is going on.
But he left it at that.
“Yeah. Hey, listen, it must be getting kinda late. The show starts at 7, and we should head over to get a good seat.”
“Sure.” I felt disappointed, but I also felt that he would slowly reveal what was going on with the blackmail thing. I found myself genuinely caring about what was going on, as opposed to wanting to know for nosiness, which, I admit, motivated me before to want to find out.
We made our way out to the outdoor theater. It was dusk now, and the cicadas were buzzing in the trees. Those bugs were so loud, but I had never actually seen one. There are apparently millions of them, however, judging by how loud the sound is. It’s funny though – although these bugs are annoying because they are so loud, I miss them when I am in a different city that doesn’t have them. I thought about my trip to San Francisco, which, to my knowledge, was the most magnificent city in the world. But it was August, and there were no fireflies and no cicadas, and it made me a little sad.
We ended up not even using the lawn chairs, preferring to simply spread my Indian blanket on the lawn. Thank god this was a park that still allowed alcohol. We poured our wine into some plastic wine cups and drank the wine while the dogs, tired out from chasing around various balls and frisbees earlier, lay beside us. The park was packed, as this was a free show. It was something that I try to make every year.
As the night wore on, I tried hard to keep up with the action. Twelfth Nig
ht was a play that I had learned in college, but Shakespeare had always been exceedingly difficult for me to follow. I really learned Hamlet when I took my Shakespeare course in college. I read the actual play, got the Cliff’s Notes, and watched the surprisingly good Mel Gibson version. I didn’t put that kind of effort into Twelfth Night, so I felt a little lost. However, the experience of being there – under the stars, with thousands of other people, on a warm summer night, with the most beautiful, sweetest man I had ever met, was intoxicating.
Ryan was lying behind me on the blanket, and I was leaning against him. The dogs were beside us, snoozing and snoring. I started to notice that he was not watching the play at all, but, rather, was staring at me. I felt a little strange and thrilled at the same time. What does this guy see in me? I tried to banish the thought and concentrate on what was going on, but it was impossible. My mind was racing.
“You’re not watching the show,” I teased him, when I turned around for the millionth time to see him staring at me, instead of the play.
“You’re right, I need to watch the show. I actually do like this play. I thought it was hilarious when I studied this at my high school.”
I laughed. Who was I to control him and make him watch the show? If he’s that into me that he can’t take his eyes on me, then….Oh, stop it, you’re sounding so full of yourself.
“Would you like some more wine?” I asked.
“Nah, I’m ok.”
“Ok, then.”
The play ended. “We better pack all this stuff up,” I said, already beginning the process of getting everything together.
He looked strange, wide-eyed. “Is there anything wrong?” I asked. His demeanor had changed 180 degrees from just a few minutes before. I felt a bit alarmed.
He wasn’t hearing me, but was staring off into the distance. He shook his head. “She’s following me now?” He looked down, his expression now looking perplexed.
Who was following him? It couldn’t be Alexis, he probably would be upset. He just seems mystified.
But there was unmistakably a woman coming toward us. I started to feel nauseated. The woman was the typical supermodel type that I had been noticing all over town since I started hanging out with Ryan. These are really the only women who had confidence to stare openly at Ryan, while staring at me for a different reason. They never failed to make me feel like a particularly low class of bug. I could just tell that they were thinking he’s with her? I didn’t think that I would ever get used to the glares and stares. It was like high school all over again.