by Robinne Lee
When I didn’t say anything, he kissed me again and repeated it: “Ever.”
“Okay,” I said. And at that point I could not be certain as to who was more intoxicated.
* * *
Late in the night I slipped away to the restroom, and on exiting I encountered Oliver in the adjacent vestibule. We had until that point exchanged very few words.
“Well, you seem to be hanging in there.” He smiled, coy.
“Excuse me?”
“I just assumed you’d leave our boy after those photos.”
I paused. It was the way he’d phrased it. “Well, you assumed incorrectly.”
“Clearly.”
The vestibule was narrow, dimly lit. I could smell the gin on him.
“Where’s Charlotte?”
“It’s over. We’re through.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Yes, well … She ended it.”
“Can you blame her?”
He laughed. “Oh, Solène…” He was drunk. “Did Hayes ever tell you what he said when he first saw you in Las Vegas? Did he?”
I didn’t respond. Somehow I knew where this was going.
“‘I just want to fuck her mouth.’” He said it slow, soft. “Did he tell you that? ‘Did you see that mum? I just want to fuck her mouth.’”
I stood there, not moving. Feeling his closeness in the tight space.
“What’s wrong, Oliver? Do you just not want him to be happy?”
He shook his head then, and there was something in his eyes that seemed to me sad. “You have no fucking idea, do you?”
“No,” I said. “I don’t.”
But I’d begun to wonder.
* * *
On Friday morning Hayes and I flew to Aspen for four days to celebrate his birthday. I’d booked us a luxury suite at the Little Nell, a swank resort at the bottom of Ajax Mountain. The property was elegant, serene. Our suite decorated in soothing grays with multiple fireplaces and cozy throws and pristine views. The perfect winter hideaway.
In the late afternoon, after massages and lovemaking and a walk around town, Hayes decided that he wanted a “proper tea.” He rang up room service, and I listened as he requested a “spot of Earl Grey and something sweet like scones or digestive biscuits, if you have any,” and my heart ached. My sweet, sweet boy, so far from home.
“Well, that was a first,” he said, hanging up the phone. We were in the living room, peeling off our layers. Snow falling outside on the terrace.
“What was a first?”
“He just called me Mr. Marchand.”
I started to laugh. “You didn’t correct him? You didn’t say, ‘It’s Mr. Doo to you’?”
He smiled, pulling me into him, his hands and nose still icy. His cheeks, red. “No, I quite liked it. ‘Mr. Marchand.’ It’s rather sophisticated.” The last bit he stressed with an upper-crust accent, mocking his own people, as it were.
“Think I’ll try it out for a few days, see if I like it enough to make it a permanent thing. You know, in case we get married.” He kissed me. “I’m going to go warm up in the shower. Don’t hesitate to join me.”
I watched him make his way back into the bedroom. His broad shoulders in flannel, his jeans clinging to his ass. How the fuck had I gotten so lucky? How, in this great world, had we found each other? And how, I wondered, when the time came, was I going to let him go?
I made my way eventually to the master bath. Hayes was in the steam shower. I could smell his soap, his grapefruit body wash. He traveled with his own toiletries because he said he spent so much time in hotels, it was his way of holding on to his identity. Of remembering who he was.
He turned when I opened the glass door, his eyes brightening. I’d removed everything. “Hiiii.”
“Hi yourself.” I stood there, drinking him in. All of him.
And feeling everything.
And then I said it. “I love you.”
Hayes froze, a confused look on his face, water streaming down his long torso. “Are you saying that because I’m naked?”
“No.”
“Are you saying that because it’s my birthday?”
“I’m saying it because I love you.”
He was quiet, weighing the moment. And then he smiled, wide. “What took you so long?”
I laughed. “I was just making sure it was you, and not the idea of you.”
“Come here,” he said, pulling me under the stream of water. His hands pushing my hair from my face, his mouth on mine, his penis stirring against my groin. “Would you mind saying that again so I know I didn’t imagine it?”
“I love you.”
“Yeah.” He smiled, all dimples. “That’s what I thought you said.”
* * *
On Saturday morning, Hayes awoke early to go to the gym before we hit the slopes, his body still on Greenwich Mean Time. I watched him dress from the comfort of the bed: his shorts, his girlish headband holding his hair off his pretty face, his #BlackLivesMatter T-shirt.
“Hayes Campbell, political activist?”
He smiled, grabbing his headphones from the dresser. It was still dark out. “Hayes Campbell, concerned citizen of the world. Your country, as much as I adore it, can be a bit fucked up when it comes to race…”
“You don’t say?”
“I do. That’s one of the things I love about you: that you’re giving these artists a voice.
“I read an interesting piece in The New York Times this week on Kehinde Wiley—is that how you pronounce it? And he’s kind of fascinating. But it just made me proud of you. And I know I gave you a hard time about the Invisible installation, but I’ve been thinking about it a lot since our conversation in New York—about how we value some art more than others—and really, I think what you do is amazing.”
I lay there staring at him. Every time he opened his mouth, I liked him more. It had taken Daniel much longer to not view my work as some kind of self-indulgent charity project. In many ways, I’m sure he still did.
Hayes made his way over to me then, leaned in, kissed me. “I love this mouth. I’ll be back in a bit.”
“Oliver said something interesting the other night…”
“Did he?” He tensed.
“He said the first time you saw me, that night in Vegas, you said to him: ‘Did you see that mum? I just want to fuck her mouth.’” I allowed it to sit there. “Is that true? Did you say that?”
He was quiet for a moment, contemplating. “Mm, that sounds like something I might have said … But in my defense, I was a twenty-year-old lad. We can be crass.”
“Hayes…”
“Fucking Oliver … Oh, come on. What did you say when you first saw me? To yourself, what did you say?”
“Probably something like, ‘Oh, he’s cute.’”
“Really? Hmm … Because I clearly remember a conversation with someone saying, and I quote, ‘God, I just want to sit on this kid’s face and pull his hair.’”
I smiled at that.
“I don’t know,” he continued, “but that sounds an awful lot like fucking my mouth.”
“It sounds more delicate my way.”
“Delicate? Delicate mouth fucking?” He smiled. “Right. You’re insane, Solène, and that is why I love you.” He kissed me again before heading toward the door. “Let me know when you’re up for some delicate mouth fucking. I’ll be back.”
* * *
I awoke in the middle of that night to Hayes’s mouth traveling the length of my spine. His lips, tongue, soft, descending. To my ass and between my legs before I could properly recall where we were. My screams, stifled in the pillow. And when he was done, he flipped me over and did it again.
And I wasn’t certain if it was the thinness of the mountain air, but everything felt so heightened and intensified that I could not be sure whose birthday we were celebrating. Hayes’s tongue unfolding me. His fingers, long and thick, and so very familiar. The way he explored me so completely, as if each tim
e was the first. As if he were enjoying it. I could not get enough. My ass lifting off the bed to meet him. My hands in his hair, gripping his skull. My nails in his scalp. Jesus fuck.
I came so hard it seemed to me the entire room was spinning.
“Shit,” he said, smiling up at me. “That wasn’t very delicate, was it? My apologies.”
Hayes wiped his face with the back of one hand and grabbed both my wrists with the other, pinning them above my head.
And before I could recover, his dick was pushing up inside of me. And as always, that first thrust was everything. I marveled at it: the way he fit me. Thick. Perfect. Like no one who had come before him. As if all my life I’d been walking around with a Hayes-shaped vagina and never knew. The idea made me smile. But then, completely unexpected, I started to cry.
He stopped moving, his free hand brushing my hair from my face. “Are you all right?”
I nodded.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Why are you crying? It’s a little disconcerting when we’re having sex and you’re crying.” The heel of his palm slid over my cheek.
“I’m sorry.”
“Why are you crying, Solène?”
“Because … I love you. Because this is perfect and I don’t want it to end.” It was the most honest I’d been with him. It was the most honest I’d been with myself.
“Are you ending it?”
I shook my head.
“Then there’s no reason to cry. I’m not going anywhere.” He started moving again. So. Fucking. Deep.
“It ends every time you leave. Every time I go back to my life and my fucking computer, it ends.”
“Well, we’ll get you a new computer, then.” He smiled. “Look at me. Look at me. It’s just us. It’s just you and me in this relationship. Fuck everything else.”
The fact that he could say that to me with my arms pinned above my head and his dick gliding in and out—the fact that he held my gaze the entire time, never wavering, never losing his tempo, the fact that I could smell myself on his face—was so unbelievably sexy. I did not want it to end.
I did not want it to end.
When he was close to coming, he leaned in and bit down on my lower lip so hard that I anticipated the taste of blood, but it never came.
“You. Are fucking everything to me,” he said. His breath coming in short spurts. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Afterwards, when I was reveling in the joy of my third orgasm and he’d passed out beside me, his body slick with sweat, I thought long and hard about what he’d said. It was just us. Fuck everything else.
* * *
In all the months of slipping off to various locations, Hayes and I had never flown in and out of the same terminal together. We had never departed and arrived as a couple. It was something I’d not made note of until we touched down at LAX Monday evening.
“It’s going to be crazy out there,” he said as our plane was taxiing. “Just a warning.”
“Like photographers?”
“Photographers, fans, all of it. It’s Grammy week. It’s going to be bad.”
“Okay,” I said.
But “all of it” did not quite capture the madness. We had no fewer than three airport escorts who met us at the gate and accompanied us to baggage claim, and the entire time, walking at a relatively fast clip, we were hounded by a handful of paparazzi. Hayes walked one pace ahead of me, clinging to my hand, protecting me from the brunt of it. And what struck me most was not the intrusiveness of the experience, but the running commentary spewing from the guys with the cameras. “Hey, Hayes. Happy Birthday, Hayes! How does it feel to be twenty-one? How was Aspen? Hi, Solène. Did you get a lot of skiing in? You gonna go out drinking tonight? What bars you gonna hit? You excited about the Grammys? You’re looking good, man. I love your work, dude. I love the new album. Your girlfriend is very beautiful. What do you think of Rory’s new tattoo?” Dear God. Who were these people?
And then, as we exited into the chaos of the baggage claim, the full scale of Hayes’s celebrity hit. There were over a hundred girls squealing with cell phone cameras and throwing themselves in his path attempting to take selfies and yelling his name and falling down and crying, and it was terrifying. The paparazzi’s flashes, blinding. I spotted Desmond with our driver, and even his familiar ginger head did not alleviate my panic. They were touching him and pulling at him, and he was squeezing my hand harder. And they were at turns euphoric, diplomatic, and violent. “Get the fuck out of the way.” “Make a path.” “Hi, Solène.” “You’re so pretty, Solène.” “Guys, let them through, please.” “Happy Birthday, Hayes!” “Can you sign my face?” “There’s a girl on the floor.” “OhmyGod!OhmyGod!OhmyGod!” “Can I get a picture, please?” “Let them through!” “Happy Birthday!” “HayesHayesHayesHayesHayes.” “Let him go!” “He doesn’t want to take your picture. Just let him go!” “Get off of him!” “They’re gonna think we’re animals!” “Move, bitch!” “Hayes, I’m so sorry about this.” “You guys, let him go. Jesus fucking Christ!”
By the time we got into the back of the Escalade, I was hyperventilating. And he was as cool as a fucking cucumber. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
It took me a minute to catch my breath, to gather my wits, to assess that I had not been physically harmed. “Yeah,” I said. “It’s just you and me in this relationship. Fuck everything else.”
beverly hills
The Fifty-Seventh Grammys were scheduled to take place the following Sunday evening at the Staples Center. The guys were performing “Seven Minutes,” their nominated single. Their week filled with press leading up to the awards show and the tour, including a day in Santa Barbara shooting an exclusive interview with Oprah. And by that, I was a little impressed.
Things at Marchand Raphel were once again busy after the holiday lull. Hamish Sullivan Jones, the curator from the Whitney Museum, was coming to town and had scheduled a visit at Anya Pashkov’s studio to see more of her Invisible collection. The fact that he was still interested was noteworthy. If we could land Anya an exhibition at the new Whitney with all its expectation and hype, it would be a coup. At the same time, Lulit and I were organizing our pieces to be shipped to New York for the Armory Show the first week of March.
It felt good to be back in the groove of working. To not put too much energy into the offensive voicemails and the occasional fans who showed up at the gallery randomly during the day, hoping to get a glimpse of their idol. Josephine solved our problem by hanging a “By Appointment Only” placard on the door. She fielded questions from the media with her rote response: “I’m sorry. It’s the Marchand Raphel policy to not comment on any of our associates’ private lives.” They seemed to buy that.
On Friday evening, after a day of interviews and a rehearsal at the Staples Center, Hayes dropped by the gallery to see the Finnsdottir exhibit and say hello. Matt and Josephine seemed so charmed with his genuine affability, you would have thought his celebrity hadn’t put us all out. That we hadn’t received death threats.
Lulit was a tougher nut to crack.
“So,” he said, sidling up to her in the kitchen where she was brewing a cappuccino, “I met Oprah.”
“I heard.”
“And I got a tour of her Montecito house…”
I watched him as he crossed his arms and leaned back on the counter, smiling, smug.
“She’s recently redone it and she’s got quite an art collection … but I think it’s missing a few key contemporary pieces.”
“Ha!” Lulit said, the hint of a smile. “Did you tell her that?”
“I did. And I told her I knew just the women to sell it to her. She has a few African pieces and she does all this charity work in South Africa, and so I specifically told her about you…”
“No, you didn’t.”
“I did. And she said, ‘Have her get in touch with my people.’ So…” Hayes dug into the pockets of his jeans and
withdrew his wallet before proffering a folded sticky note. “Oprah’s people. They’re expecting your call.”
Lulit stood there with a goofy look on her face and then turned to me in the doorway. I shrugged.
“You’re pulling my leg,” she said.
“I promise you, I’m not. And you know who Oprah is very, very good friends with?”
Lulit and I looked at each other and smiled. “The Obamas.”
“The Obamas,” Hayes said. “And last I checked, Sasha was still prime August Moon age.”
“Shut up,” Lulit laughed.
“And you thought your best friend dating a guy in a boy band was going to lead to nothing but trouble.”
“I never said that.”
Hayes cocked his head and rolled his eyes before walking out.
“Fuck, he’s good.” She smiled at me.
I nodded. “He’s good.”
* * *
After, we scooped up Isabelle from her fencing class, and the look on her face when Hayes walked into the gym was priceless.
“That’s quite a getup.” He smiled. “You look like a Musketeer.”
She laughed. A big, bright, confident laugh. She’d gotten her braces off two weeks prior and she was sharing it with the world.
“Holy fuck.” Hayes turned to me. “That’s your mouth.”
I gave him a look, and he turned away, and we never spoke about it again.
* * *
We made a quick detour to the Whole Foods in Brentwood, and no one stopped him to request a photo or an autograph or his time. And watching him openly pick out wine while Isabelle sifted through the cheese selection made me content in a way I had not been in a long time. The idea that maybe this could work.
We dined at home: ratatouille and rack of lamb. The three of us seated around the oblong table, the lights of Santa Monica twinkling in the distance. Hayes, at turns amused by Isabelle’s tales of middle school, and seemingly enamored, stealing glances at me, wistful. When Isabelle got up to clear her plate, he leaned forward, his hands flat against the rosewood.
“Do you know what this table makes me think of?” His voice was low, raspy.
“Yes.”
“Good,” he said. “So long as you’re thinking of it, too.”