by ML Michaels
Well, she was satisfied in one way at least. In the other? Not so much.
When she got home, she fished her cell phone out of her bag and checked the messages that had accumulated during the day. She nearly dropped the phone.
There was a voicemail from Dane.
What the hell was he doing calling her? Why couldn't he leave her alone? Hadn't he done enough?
She vacillated between wanting to listen to the voicemail and wanting to throw her phone into the deepest ravine she could find.
She settled on a middle ground. She put her phone back in her purse and decided to ignore it.
After that, she made herself some tea and though about what to do for dinner. She was so drained from her long first day that she didn't want to prepare a meal.
She ordered out instead. It was all she could not to drag the delivery guy inside her house when he got there, like a scene out of a cheesy seventies porn.
God. Jamie Woods really knew how to get her on edge.
Jamie
Jamie showed up early for his next session, hoping to have a little more time to work his magic.
He was also incredibly bored.
Clara was at her desk when Jamie came in. She looked up at him with the practiced face of someone who had resigned themselves against all temptation and instructed him to take a seat.
"What shall we do today, Clara?" Jamie asked.
She ignored his sexual undertones. "More like what we won't do," she said in a sing song voice. "Now, what have you been up to for the past few days?"
"Thinking about you."
His words hung in the air, and Clara took a moment to compose herself before answering.
"Right. Well that sounds productive."
She was wearing a demure black dress that hung off her horribly. It was like she was trying to hide all the delightful curves she had. Then Jamie realized she probably was. It made him smile.
"What have you been up to, Doctor?" he asked.
She shrugged. "This and that. Mostly just getting to know the routine of my new job."
"Did you always want to be a psychiatrist?"
She looked at him suspiciously. "Do you actually care?" The way her mouth pouted a little bit with the expression caused a flicker of lust inside of Jamie. He wondered how her mouth would look other places.
"Maybe I do," he said. "You don't know me all that well. Until our first session—therapy wise—you didn't even know my name."
She frowned. "Embarrassing me isn't going to make me sign off on your paperwork any faster."
Jamie chuckled, leaning back in his seat. "You have nothing to be embarrassed about, Clara," he said, eyeing her. "You were an absolute delight."
Jamie could tell that she was a little bit proud of herself for gaining his approval. He decided to try again. "I still think about the way you practically screamed as you came. It keeps me up at night." He winked at her.
She huffed a sigh. "This is going to be such fun," she said flatly, all traces of girlish pride gone. "I cannot wait to spend a few more weeks doing this."
Jamie laughed then. He didn't know why, but something about the way she looked when she was frustrated rubbed him exactly the right way. He loved watching the little expressions that crossed her face. Everything was laid out like paint on a canvas. He wondered how she thought being a psychiatrist and listening to people's secrets and fears was a good idea when her reactions showed plain as day on her face.
Clara was unruffled by his laugh. She leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes.
"What are you doing?" Jamie asked.
"I'm going to hopefully sleep for the next hour," she replied nonchalantly. "So I don't have to put up with you."
Jamie chuckled again.
If you're having trouble, I can think of a couple ways to tire you out."
Clara didn't even open an eye. Instead, she began to make low snoring noises. At first Jamie thought she was just messing with him, but after awhile, he began to wonder if she really had fallen asleep.
"Clara," he said.
No response.
"Clara, I want to talk about something."
A dull snore was all Clara had to say on the matter.
He reached for one of the candies in the jar on the table and tossed it at her. It hit her right in the forehead, but she didn't even flinch. She just kept on snoring.
Irritated that his plaything had fallen asleep, Jamie got up and walked over to her. He leaned close to her face, planning on giving her the scare of a lifetime.
Too bad she beat him to the punch.
Clara abruptly opened her eyes and screamed in his face. Jamie reeled backward, stunned. He had only just managed to contain a shout.
Clara descended into giggles. "I so had you," she cried. "Your face!"
Jamie scowled at her, resuming his spot on the couch. "You're good at pretend sleeping," he conceded. "I wasn't aware that psychiatrists often moonlighted as comedians."
Clara's face was pure glee. "I'm good at pretending a lot of things," she replied, giving him a pointed look.
When he understood her meaning, Jamie wrinkled his nose. "That's a dirty tease," he said. "And maybe I would doubt myself, if I hadn't felt you squeeze around me that night in pure ecstasy."
She had walked right into it, but Clara still looked stunned. Good. He had knocked her off her high horse again.
Attempting to get a handle back on the situation, Clara asked, "You really pride yourself on your sexual prowess, don't you?"
He let out a bark of laughter. "Not something I pride myself on, darling," he replied. "Just a fact of life."
She looked disappointed. Ah, he realized. She thought she had found a way to get him to talk. Too bad.
Clara
Clara went home that night in the same kind of frustrated state that she had after her last session with Jamie. When she got into her door, she let out a loud cry of angst.
When she had been pretend sleeping, a part of her had thought, as he leaned over her, that he had been about to kiss her. What would she have done?
She didn't need to ponder that much. She would have submitted. There was no doubt in her mind that one touch of those lips to hers would have been enough for her to throw all of her hesitation and morals straight out the window.
She sighed and went about the rest of her evening, trying to figure out what she was going to do with Jamie Woods.
***
A couple of weeks passed, but Clara hadn't gotten anywhere with Jamie. Sure, sometimes they would have small talk, but most of the time they just sat and stared at their phones or the wall.
The phone-staring was all Jamie. Clara had been avoiding her phone ever since her ex had called and left her another voicemail, which she still hadn't listened to. Now she kept it in her purse, tucked away, unless she knew there was some pressing reason to pull it out.
One night, after another sexual-tension laden session with sex-on-a-stick-Jamie Woods, Clara decided it was time to let loose a little. It was a Friday evening, and she knew just who to call.
Adrianne answered the phone on the first ring. "Girl, I hope you're thinking what I'm thinking."
Clara chuckled. "If you're thinking shots, we may be on the same page."
Adrianne came and picked Clara up, even though Clara insisted she could drive down. Adrianne said she had missed her best friend and wanted to spend some quality car time with her, singing along to stupid songs and checking out guys at traffic lights.
The two caught up, exchanging stories about how the past couple of weeks had treated them. Clara, for whatever reason, couldn't bring herself to tell her best friend about the fact that the hot guy she had slept with last time they went out was now her patient. Instead, she regaled Adrianne with tales of the "city life," and Adrianne told her about how her farm's harvest was going.
They decided on a bar that was in between where both of them lived. It was one they used to go to in the old days, when they would meet on weekend
s when Clara was in medical school. It was also where Clara had met Dane, but she tried not to dwell on that.
The music was much better at the bar than it had been in Woodberry, and both girls immediately fell into a jovial mood.
This mood was cut short, however, when a man from Clara's past approached their table.
"Clara, hey," Aaron said.
Clara scowled. While Aaron wasn't the worst person in the world, he was still best friends with her ex. That was unforgivable.
"Hey Aaron." She was still polite, though.
"How have you been?" he asked.
Adrianne, ever the savior, stopped the conversation from continuing. "Get out of here Aaron," she spat. "We're having a girls’ night out."
Meek as ever, Aaron backed away from the girls and melted back into the crowd. Clara found it troubling, however, that she saw him furiously texting before he disappeared.
Adrianne saw the look on Clara's face. "Do you want to go?" she asked.
Clara smiled brightly. "No!" she said. "Of course not!"
The waitress brought over another round of drinks for them, and Clara nearly choked as soon as she took her first drink.
Jamie Woods walked in the bar.
"Dammit," she said under her breath.
He saw her right away, but didn't approach. She was thankful for that.
Adrianne noticed the look exchanged between the two of them. "Oh my god!" she announced. "That's the guy from Woodberry!"
Clara hissed at her, "I don't want to talk about it. Let's pretend he's not here."
Adrianne looked perplexed. "After that night you couldn't stop talking about how good the sex was. Why not go have another alleyway encounter?"
Clara grimaced. "He may or may not be one of my patients now, Adi."
Adrianne's jaw dropped. "No."
"Yes."
"How can that be?" she asked. "Wouldn't you have to like...not see him on ethical grounds?"
"That’s kind of a grey area because he wasn’t my patient when we…well anyway, we...kind of have an arrangement."
Adrianne gaped at Clara. "Please don't tell me that he's paying you to have sex with him in your office."
Clara reeled back. "No!" she cried. "Oh god no!" She shook her head vigorously. "We just kind of...hang out."
Adrianne looked perplexed, so Clara elaborated. "He doesn't want to be there. He's being forced to be there. There's nothing I can really do to make him talk, so we just sit in silence, mostly. In return, he doesn't tell anyone about our past."
Adrianne chuckled. "You make it sound like you'd have some sort of past that didn't just involve screwing one time."
Clara smacked her. "Stop that."
They resumed drinking. For the moment, all the men that they'd encountered during the evening were no longer on their minds.
If only that could have lasted.
Clara and Adrianne were just getting ready to head out, when a tall head bobbed through the crowd. Clara felt suddenly sick.
There wasn't enough time to avoid him, so instead Clara gave her friend a beseeching look. "Dane is coming," she said. "Please don't attack him while we're still in the bar."
Adrianne spun her head around, glaring at the man now within punching distance. "What the hell are you doing here?" she fumed.
Dane didn't address Adrianne. He pretended she wasn't there. "You haven't been answering my calls," he said angrily to Clara.
Clara paled. She hadn't realized she was going to have to have this kind of confrontation with him. At least, not so soon.
Though it wasn't soon, was it? She had been ignoring him for the past couple of months. Though, honestly, he deserved to be ignored.
She tried to speak, but her words were a garbled, unintelligible mess. "You—I...No. I'm—we're—"
"Spit it out!" he yelled.
The tables around them went silent. The music was still loud though, so the rest of the bar seemed not to notice. Adrianne stood and squared up with Dane.
"You have no right to be here!" she cried. "You have no right to accost her after what you did!"
He scowled. "I'm trying to make it right," he said, again directed at Clara.
Clara, suddenly feeling a panic attack coming on, rose and ran from her seat. She hated herself for it. She should have been able to face him. She should have been able to put their relationship to bed finally, but she couldn't.
Clara was afraid of confrontation.
When she had walked in on Dane and another girl, she had run just the same as she was doing now. He tried to call her, and she texted him saying they were over. Then she moved.
Truthfully, she was scared of him. He'd always been so demanding, so controlling. It was almost a relief that their relationship had ended.
If only she hadn't have really loved the bastard.
Clara intended to get outside and get some air, but she ran directly into Jamie on his way out of the bathroom.
"Whoa," he said, placing her back on her feet when she nearly fell over from the force of her impact. "Where are you going?"
Clara looked up at him, eyes wide and beginning to fill with tears. Jamie took one look at the guy following close behind her and punched him in the face.
Jamie
He wasn't sure why he did it. He shouldn't have held any sort of feeling for this girl, besides lust, but the look on her face when she ran into him made him furious. Not at her, but at whoever had done whatever it was to her that was making her look like that.
Jamie assumed it was the beefy idiot chasing after her and punched him straight in his pretty boy face. Apparently, he hadn't been wrong.
The bouncers came over and kicked him out, and he left without causing a fuss. Clara trailed along after him, probably confused, and he rounded on her as soon as they reached the outdoors.
"What's going on?" he asked.
The guy he hit wasn't far behind, though he was holding his bloody nose. It made Jamie smile.
"I will end you!" the stranger cried. "Who the hell are you?"
Jamie smirked. "The guy who just broke your nose."
The stranger launched himself at Jamie, but Jamie avoided it easily. He'd always been a great fighter.
"Stop!" Clara cried.
Jamie stopped and looked over at her. She was trembling.
"What did you do to her?" Jamie asked, looking at the bloody stranger.
"None of your business! This is between me and her."
Clara took a steeling breath, then got between the two of them. "Dane, go home!" she yelled. "I'm finished with you. You broke my heart in the worst possible way, and I absolutely hate you for it."
Jamie tried to piece together the facts in his head. This was an ex of some sort, and he had done something wrong. He felt a lot better about hitting him.
"I won't go until you've heard me out,” Dane said.
His tone was just a little too rough for Jamie to stand. He went to move past Clara to hit him again, but she stopped him with a hand on his chest.
"I should have said this a long time ago, Dane," she said. "You disgust me. I will never hear you out, so you're better off talking to a wall."
Dane was clearly fuming, but he was also sizing Jamie up. Her words seemed to have some sort of effect on him, as well, because he took a cautious step back.
"You're making a huge mistake," he growled at Clara.
She glared at him. "No," she said. "You were a mistake. Now get out of my face."
He seemed to battle with his masculinity, but eventually Dane figured it was best to turn back.
When he was gone, Clara turned to Jamie. "You didn't have to do that," she said.
Jamie shrugged. "Whatever. He was a dick."
Clara sighed and walked past him to lean against the cement wall. "He cheated on me months ago," she said. "When it happened, I just left.” She hefted a sigh. “I should have dealt with it sooner.”
Jamie walked over to her. “Let me drive you home,” he said.
&nbs
p; At that moment, Adrianne came outside. “What did I miss?” she said.
“Not much,” replied Clara. “I just told Dane to beat it.”
Adrianne whooped with joy. “Better late than never!”
“Jamie’s going to give me a ride home,” Clara said. “I think I just need to get into bed.”
A look passed between the two girls, but Jamie wasn’t able to decipher it. Adrianne pulled Clara into a hug, whispered something in her ear, and went off back inside.
“Everything okay?” Jamie asked.
Clara nodded. “I just want to get home.”
He led her over to his back and passed her his helmet. He would ride without one. When she climbed on behind him, he felt every curve of her pressed hard against him. It was a struggle for him to concentrate on the road, but he managed. He thought about how pissed he had been to see that douchebag following her, and how he couldn’t believe that she had ever dated a jackass like that.
Clara didn’t seem like that girl. But then again, who hasn’t fallen in love with the wrong person?
She yelled directions in his ear as they closed in on town, and not long after, they were at her house.
Clara dismounted and handed the helmet back to him with a small smile. “Thanks.”
Suddenly, the hypocrisy of the evening’s events hit Jamie. He opened the kickstand and followed her up to the porch. “You know, you’ve got some nerve trying to tell me how I should live my life, when you’ve been dating douchebags like that.”
Clara stilled but didn’t turn around. “I know,” she said quietly. “But you were never meant to see that.”
“Well I saw it. I saw how you failed to take your own advice and just deal with your problems.”
Clara rounded on him. “Is that why you offered me a ride, Jamie?” she asked. “So you could berate me about my life choices.”