The Kissing Coach

by Mimi Strong

  He licked his lips and shifted around in his seat.

  “Take your time,” I said. “Remember, you're just getting close. You don't have to kiss me. Not unless you … well, just try getting close.”

  He leaned in, drawing closer and closer. I became aware of my own body sensations, from the nervous dryness in my mouth to the rushing of my pulse, the arteries of my neck throbbing. I'd kissed a lot of boys since my first smooch at fourteen, but I'd never been this nervous.

  He drew closer, until his lips were two inches away from mine. I didn't close my eyes completely, but observed him through my eyelashes. He leaned in more, until I could feel the heat of his skin radiating onto mine. My body was crying out for him to close the distance. My hands fidgeted on my lap, wanting to grab his cheeks and pull him to me, to show him there was nothing to be afraid of. If I could kiss him, I'd make him feel so good. All over.

  Something grazed my lips, and I reflexively responded, mashing my lips into his.

  His eyes flew open, and he pulled back.

  “I'm sorry,” I said. “I pushed you. I felt your lips touch mine, and I … I got confused.”

  He was hunched back in his chair, rubbing his mouth with one hand. “You kissed me,” he said.

  “No. You kissed me first. I was holding still and your lips touched mine first.”

  “You started leaning in.”

  “I don't think so, but if I did, I apologize.”

  His tan cheeks were flushed, and he grabbed an unopened bottle of fizzy water and opened it, even though his other unfinished bottle sat there. His anxiety levels had definitely shot up, thanks to my mistake.

  Trying to sound cheery, I said, “Good work today! I think we've made some real progress.”

  He stood and crossed back over to the couch, further away from me. “That wasn't what I expected.”

  “How so?”

  “I wanted to kiss you.” He fidgeted on the sofa. “I wonder if maybe the problem is I've never wanted to kiss someone before.”

  “Do you think it's because I bear a resemblance to that first girl you tried to kiss?”

  “Maybe.”

  “It's not uncommon for people to develop a … bond with their coach. It's a special dynamic, completely unlike other relationships, which are about mutual needs. With the coach and client, the coach is focused entirely on the needs of the client. This can be confusing for some clients.”

  He stood and went to the large window overlooking the street and park. “Confusing,” he said. “Hey, is that an off-leash park?”

  “Officially, no. But people break the rules all the time.”

  “They sure do.”

  I folded my hands in my lap and used my core muscles to sit absolutely upright, like a yoga pose. I breathed deeply, imagining my energy residing within a wall that surrounded my body. I would not allow my energy float around like so much smoke, but stay close, inside my boundaries.

  Though I was terrified of what he might say, I asked, “How are you feeling now? What's your anxiety level?”

  He stayed at the window, his back to me. “Around four. But I swear, when you kissed me, it was only around a three.”

  “Good.”

  He wandered around the room, making his way over to my DVD collection. “Do most guys rate you a three out of ten?”

  “Ah. Cracking jokes. You must be feeling better.”

  He smiled as a response. Even in profile, I could tell his grin was huge, and he really had the most attractive profile I'd ever seen. I thought I'd get used to his good looks, stop noticing so much, but he kept getting cuter, every time I looked his way. And now I really wanted to kiss him.

  He picked up my Firefly boxed set and started reading the back.

  “You never told me you were a geek,” he said.

  “Does one sci-fi series make me a geek?”

  He glanced over my collection. “Girl, you have Farscape. You're a geek.”

  I giggled, squirming in my chair.

  No, this wasn't appropriate behavior. I had to get this session back on track.

  “Devin, I know I already asked you once before, but I feel like I need to ask again. Most people can trace their phobias back to an incident. If someone harmed you as a child, or did something inappropriate, it's probably best for you to talk to someone about it now. I can always refer you to someone with more training than what I have.”

  He opened the Firefly box to look at the cover art. “I love this series. You know that Inara character, the Companion? I bet she'd make a good kissing coach.”

  I smiled, melting under his undeniable charm. “You know, you're right. Oh well, too bad you have to settle for me, and not sexy Inara.”

  He flashed me another grin. “Yeah.”

  “Do you want to talk about Firefly, or do you want to try another desensitization exercise?”

  “You mean kissing?”

  “Yes, an exercise.”

  “You want me to kiss you, again?” He put the box back on the bookshelf and put his hands on his hips. “Woman, I just kissed you! You can't get enough.”

  “You pay the same amount, whether we do the exercise or not.”

  “Can we watch some TV together? Can you come sit on the couch next to me and hold my hand?”

  “I don't think that would be appropriate, as you don't have a hand-holding issue.”

  “Okay, no hand-holding. But how about we watch TV together for twenty minutes, and then I'll try to kiss you again. We can simulate a real casual date situation.”

  “That's a good idea,” I said. “It would be mimicking a real-life scenario.”

  “Yeah, plus you'll stop trying to get me to cry and say Santa Claus molested me as a child.”

  “Devin, asking you doesn't mean I want it to be true. Just that these things don't usually come out of nowhere.”

  “Don't shrink my head. Just kiss me.”

  I got up, grabbed the remote control, and clicked the TV on. We found an interesting cooking show, and sat together on the couch.

  I asked him, “Do you like cooking?”

  “I like to watch and learn. I hang out in the kitchen where I work.”

  “Where's that again?”

  He waved his hand. “Just a hotel.”

  I sensed he was holding something back. “What's in the kitchen that's so interesting?”

  He turned and raised his eyebrows, giving me an innocent look. “Food?”

  “Oh. I thought maybe there was a girl you wanted to kiss.”

  He laughed, but didn't deny it.

  My head filled with a mental static, because we were so close to each other now, physically, but he was still keeping me away emotionally. Plus I wanted to kiss him so bad.

  We were next to each other, with just a few inches between our legs. My shoulder was so close to his, I could feel his heat, but we were weren't touching. At any moment, he could easily lean over and kiss me.

  I noted the time on the little clock above the TV. We were only twenty minutes from the end of our session, which meant that if he did kiss me, we wouldn't have much time to discuss it afterward. I had to run out and meet another client at eight-thirty, but I hadn't mentioned this to Devin. Selfish as it was, I wanted him to kiss me, even if it made me late for the next appointment.

  As we watched the cooking show, I kept glancing over at Devin to see how he was doing. His posture was rigid, and I could see his breathing was shallow. His body language matched how he'd been at a level three for anxiety. At ten minutes to the hour, sweat beaded on his forehead, and his breathing was so shallow, I started to worry about him passing out from lack of oxygen.

  I grabbed the remote control and turned off the TV, planning to guide him through some relaxation exercises.

  His eyes widened in fright and he jumped up and ran for the door. He must have thought I was going to kiss him. He grabbed his shoes and was out the door before I could even say a word.

  We still had seven minutes, and he was gone.<
br />
  “Nice one, Feather,” I said to my empty apartment.

  After allowing myself five full minutes to scream into my pillow, I splashed some cold water on my face and ran out to make my next appointment.

  It was after eight o'clock, but the sky was still bright outside, the days getting longer now that summer was on its way. I drove my car, a little red Toyota Tercel that had seen better days, but had a great stereo. All the irritating ads on the radio got on my nerves, so I played one of my relaxation playlists. After the clusterfuck that was my session with Devin, I needed whalesongs, waves, and even a few Gregorian Monk chants for good measure.

  I parked in front of my client's house and walked up the front path, admiring the new landscaping.

  Justine opened the door, looking impeccable as always. Her long, brown hair framed her round face, and she wore a silk brocade tunic over wide-legged trousers. I mentally changed her into black leggings, but bit my tongue, because I wasn't there for a style consultation that day.

  “Don't be mad,” she said. “I've already opened a bottle of wine, and I hate to drink alone.”

  “Oh, what the heck,” I said. “Sure, but just this time.”

  Inside, she showed me the new painting in the living room, then led me to the back of the house. We sat in her sunroom, with the glass doors open so we could enjoy the spring evening breezes.

  At first glance, Justine seemed to have everything a woman could want. She was as smart as anyone I'd ever met, owned a big-time advertising agency, and had bought her house for cash a few years earlier. It was not an extravagant home, but she'd done a full renovation, and every surface was now magazine-shoot perfect.

  During the renovation, she'd gotten herself into trouble by having too much fun with one of the sexy tradesmen. He and his rippling abs were a decade her junior. Age difference wasn't the deal breaker, but he was a total player, leaving a trail of broken hearts in his wake. Worse, he ruined the burgeoning relationship she'd had with the general contractor. The contractor, by comparison, had been age-appropriate, as career-oriented as Justine, and an all-around great catch. They'd been flirting for weeks at their meetings, and she was sure he was bound to make a move soon.

  Unfortunately, Justine was not a patient woman, and she had needs. While she had been testing out the new sparkling-white counter tops, on her back, with the young tradesman's face in her skirt, the contractor had walked in, seen everything, and that was the end of that.

  I'd met with Justine for our first session in the week following. We bonded over her tragedy, and I even held her as she sobbed, her makeup smearing down her lovely face.

  We worked on her style first, as she'd gone for the trophy-wife, Real Housewives aesthetic, which was sending the wrong message. She was too beautiful for all that makeup, and when we removed half, she looked ten years younger and felt better.

  We'd been working together for five months, and she was one of my favorite clients. (Not that I could let any of my others know, because they all thought they were my favorite clients—exactly as it should be.)

  That Tuesday night in her sunroom, Justine's lips seemed plumper than the previous time we'd met. I couldn't be sure if she'd been getting more injections—back to her bad habits—or if I was just newly obsessed with kissing and lips.

  Kissing, kissing, kissing. I stared at her lips and wondered if the tradesman had been a good kisser. Had the trouble and heartbreak been worth those moments of bliss?

  Justine brought out her laptop, since it was bigger than mine and had all her passwords set up, and we moved our chairs in around the glass table. My job for that evening was to help her look over online dating profiles and pick appropriate men. She was forty-one, and she thought all the men over forty looked “so old and grody,” so my job was to point out the ones who seemed appealing. We'd been doing this for a few sessions, and the hardest part had been calming her down when she came across the skeezy ones her age who wanted to date twenty-year-olds.

  Against my advice, she'd actually lied about her age and gone on dates with a few of those guys who wanted women half their age. That hadn't worked out. (Surprise, surprise.)

  The funny thing is, Justine knew exactly where she was going wrong, and all I had to do was raise my eyebrows at her and she'd talk herself into a better candidate. If her girlfriends had done the same thing to her, she probably would have defied them and sent emails to the wrong guys, just to spite them. With me, however, she was paying for the advice, and, as I've mentioned before, paying makes all the difference.

  After a glass of wine, my lips were loose, and I asked Justine if she'd ever heard of someone being afraid of kissing.

  She gasped. “Is this a client?”

  “No, no, no, no, no,” I said.

  “Too emphatic. You're lying,” Justine said.

  “Damn it, I've taught you too well.”

  She splashed some more wine into my glass.

  “Hypothetically,” she said, “that seems like an easy one to treat. Please tell me it's an attractive man in his early forties who's looking to settle down.” She did a double eyebrow-raise. “I'll be patient. Even if he's a virgin. That might be nice, actually.”

  “Huh. A virgin. I never considered that.”

  “No kissing means no nothing-else. So, is it a guy?”

  “Can't say.”

  “I kissed a girl once. Too soft. Like kissing an uncooked loaf of bread.”

  I laughed. “That little gem might be a good first-date ice-breaker. It's on the border, though.”

  “Well, I wouldn't lead with it,” she said, winking at me.

  The next day, I was surprised to get a message from Devin saying: Same time next week?

  I confirmed that we'd meet at seven o'clock on Tuesday, at my place again.

  When by best friend Steph found out I was seeing him again, she offered to come, but I declined, saying she'd only complicate matters.

  We were out for dinner on Friday night, sharing some tapas and enjoying a few adult beverages, and Steph wouldn't let up on the teasing.

  Being no slouch, she had correctly assumed I had a wee crush on Mr. Devin Nelson.

  “How long before you get some tongue?” she asked, giggling.

  I gave her a stern look across the table. “I can't discuss the specifics of client sessions with you.”

  She munched on the celery from her drink. “All this talk about kissing has been giving me the most intense cravings.”

  “I know, right! Like, I'm not even thinking about sex—though it would be nice—but all I want is some dreamy guy to hold me in his arms and take his time kissing me.”

  Her eyes widened. “Where? Show me where this dreamy guy kisses you.”

  “Here.” I touched my finger to my lips. “Here.” My cheek. My ear. My neck on the side. My neck on the front. Back to the side. Lips again. Lips some more. Throat again.

  “Here's me,” Steph said, pointing to her lips, then her forehead, the tip of her nose, then lips multiple times, then straight down her chin, down her throat down her chest. She closed her eyes and moaned, “Oh, baby, don't stop,” and kept pointing at herself, moving slowly down her stomach and then to her jeans, and then to where I couldn't see because the booth's table was in the way. I had a pretty good idea what she meant, though.

  Giggling, I said, “Stop it you weirdo, those guys over there are looking our way.”

  Her eyes flicked open. Steph has pretty, blue eyes, and they get even brighter when she's been crying, or after a few drinks. “Good,” she said. “If I take one of them home with me, I won't have as much explaining to do.”

  “You're a bad influence on me.” I glanced over at the three guys sitting at a nearby table. They were all cute, and since there were three of them and two of us, there was even a guy to spare. “We should send them over a round of drinks,” I said.

  “How forward.”

  “Someone has to make the first move.”

  She smirked. “You're so good at
this. You should coach people to date for a living or something.”

  “Ha ha,” I said.

  As if by magic, our waiter came by with two more drinks, courtesy of the guys at the other table. This really surprised me, because I was familiar with the practice, but I'd never actually had a stranger send a drink over to my table. It was both creepy and romantic at the same time, and I was conflicted in feeling flattered, but Steph wasn't. She waved to the guys and blew them a kiss.

  After the waiter left, Steph said to me, “I haven't shaved my legs in weeks.”

  I looked at her sideways. “Steph. Are you considering your first-ever, one-night hookup?”

  “I've only been with Richard. It's been nearly a year now, and it's time to move on.” She rubbed her eye. “Stupid contact lenses. Hey, that reminds me of something. Did I ever tell you what the big fight was about, the one that led to the breakup?”

  “I thought it was just general nastiness. Wasn't he always taking money from your purse?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Among other things. Anyway, we were up at his parents' cabin, just the two of us. I thought I'd been meeting all his needs, but ...”

  I made an ick face. “This is going to be gross, isn't it?”

  “Be a professional,” she said. “Pretend I'm a client.”

  I sat up straight and got a serious look, which made her laugh.

  She continued, “I woke up in the middle of the night and noticed he wasn't in bed with me. I had my contacts out, couldn't find my glasses, but I wandered out of the bedroom, following the sound of the TV. I was groggy, but I found him in the living room and just started talking to him. He wasn't in a very talkative mood, and he had something pinkish on his lap. I couldn't make it out without my glasses, so I leaned down to see what he had in his hands. Just then, I realized it was a porno movie playing on the TV.”

  I gasped. “Nooooo.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you stuck your face right on it?”

  “About two feet away, I realized what I was looking at. Mr. Pinkie.”

  I giggled into my hand. “Awkward.”