Beautiful Confusion (New Adult Romance) Room 105

by Whitefeather, Sheri

  “That’s super. I try to be as green as I can.” She shrugged, then laughed. “Well, mostly I just throw stuff in the recycle bin. But at least I do that, I guess.”

  “Every little bit helps.” I felt so grown up, being at my new friend’s house, talking about the environment. It was certainly better than staying home and panicking about being crazy.

  After the food was ready, Lori made a pitcher of strawberry margaritas, combining tequila, triple sec, simple syrup, frozen strawberries, and limeade concentrate in a blender. She rimmed our glasses in sugar and poured the icy mixture.

  I sipped mine and gushed. “Oh, my God.” It tasted like a smoothie. I couldn’t even tell there was alcohol in it.

  “Good, eh?” She sipped hers, too.

  We ate at the table, and when I was halfway through my margarita, I said, “I think I’m getting tipsy.” I couldn’t taste the liquor, but I could feel it.

  Lori laughed. “You’re a lightweight.”

  “Yes, I suppose I am.” I raised the glass to my lips. “But I like it.”

  She leaned forward. “Can I tell you a secret?”

  I leaned forward, as well. Her abrupt change of topic intrigued me. “Yes, of course.”

  “It’s not really a secret because other people know about it,” she amended. “But I want you to know, too.”

  “All right.”

  She guzzled her drink, nearly finishing it. “I used to have a really close friend named Carla. We grew up together, but she hates me now.”

  “Why? What happened?”

  “She thinks I hit on her boyfriend. But I swear I didn’t.”

  “Then why does she think you did?”

  “Because he said that I tried to fuck him. He doesn’t like me, and he wanted me out of her life. What really hurts, though, is that she believed him over me. I guess she thinks I’m a big enough whore to do something like that. Our other friends believed it, too. Now none of them will talk to me. I have new friends from college, people I party with, but it’s been lonely without my old crowd.”

  I realized why Lori had taken to me so quickly. She needed to fill the ache of losing Carla. But I figured it was okay because I was trying to ease the pain associated with Abby. “I’m sorry she hurt you.”

  “The only guy I sleep with who has a girlfriend is Martin. But that doesn’t count because he was mine before he was hers.”

  I still thought it counted, but I knew how badly she was struggling to get over Martin.

  “Do you want to see a picture of him?” she asked.

  I assumed she was talking about Martin. “Sure.” I was curious about the boy she couldn’t shake.

  “Hold on. I’ll go get my iPad.” She went into the living room.

  She came back and stood beside my chair. “I’ll show you his Facebook page. There are lots of pictures. You can see his stupid bitch girlfriend, too. Her name is Colette.”

  “Do you know her? Personally?”

  “We’ve never met. But she looks like a bitch.” She logged onto Facebook and brought up Martin’s homepage.

  I leaned over to look. He was using an image of a malamute as his profile picture.

  “That’s his dog,” Lori said. “He’s a big old baby. I miss him.”

  Not only did she miss her ex, she missed his pet. She had it bad.

  She went into Martin’s photo albums and pulled up a picture of a wildly handsome guy straddling a motorcycle and giving the camera a thumbs-up. He had short brown hair, a set of straight white teeth, a killer body, and an armload of tattoos.

  “Dang,” I said.

  “I know, right?” She blew out her breath and got into another of his albums. “This is Colette.”

  Martin’s girlfriend was a sultry brunette with a voluptuous figure, almond-shaped eyes, and a sexy navel piercing.

  “I have a belly button ring, too,” Lori said and lifted her tank top to show me.

  “Your stomach is flatter than hers,” I said. “And you’re prettier than she is.” Actually, they were equally pretty in different ways, but it seemed like the right thing to say.

  “Thanks.” She made a nasty face at Colette’s picture and moved on to another image of the couple together, with Martin’s hand on Colette’s butt. “She has a gigantic ass.”

  It was true, she did. But between Kim Kardashian, Nicki Minaj, and J. Lo, I didn’t think big booties were a bad thing to have. I didn’t say so, though. “Does she know that you still sleep with him?”

  “No. He only comes to me when they’re fighting and then he goes back to her when it blows over. I’ve thought about contacting her and telling her what he does, but if I do, he’ll get mad at me and then I might not ever see him again.”

  “You deserve better.” So did Colette, but I kept that tidbit to myself. Martin was handsome, but in my opinion, he had no heart. “You need to find a decent guy, Lori.”

  “Are you sure there is such a thing?”

  “Duncan seems decent.”

  “Yeah, but he’s still a predator. They all are.”

  “He doesn’t act like a predator around me. But he does seem fierce sometimes. I’m confused about the way I feel about him.”

  “Men are always confusing.”

  “So I’m learning.”

  “Aren’t we all? So, what happened to your Facebook page? I thought you were going to open an account.”

  “I did. But I haven’t friended anyone yet.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I haven’t uploaded a profile picture yet. I’ll have to take some of myself, I guess, and try to get a good one.” I wanted to look as pretty as possible, especially if I was going to friend Duncan. “I tried to check out Duncan’s wall after I opened my account, but I guess it’s private because I couldn’t get on it.” All I was able to see was his profile picture, which was an image of a blank canvas with his name spray-painted on it.

  “Here, I’ll show you.” Lori got off Martin’s page and went to Duncan’s.

  I scanned his wall. He’d created a recent photo album with pictures from the gallery opening. There were lots of posts about that night, too. None of them mentioned me. But why would they? None of his friends, except for Lori, knew me.

  Curious, I poked through Duncan’s friends list and noticed how many gorgeous girls were on it. I scowled at the screen, wondering how many of them he’d slept with. I could see how Lori had become obsessed with stalking Martin’s page.

  “I made Duncan promise to be my first,” I said.

  “Really? So it’s official? You’re going to sleep with him?”

  “Yes, but I don’t know when.”

  “You were going to take it slow, anyway.” She resumed her seat and went back to her food, leaving her iPad next to me.

  “I don’t think I want to go slow anymore. I want to be with him.”

  “Then you should show up at his loft in your best lingerie and blow his socks off.”

  Intrigued by what she said, I asked, “Do you think I could seduce him like that?”

  “Of course you could. He wouldn’t be able to resist you.”

  I wasn’t so sure about that, given what he knew about me. But I couldn’t tell Lori that. “I think he’s going to want to wait.”

  “For what? The next century? If you’re ready, then he should go for it.”

  “I can’t just show up in lingerie. I’d have to be wearing clothes, too.”

  “Maybe you could go over there in a trench coat, like a flasher.” She refilled her margarita and laughed.

  I laughed, too. But then I got a brainstorm. “I have this really cute coat dress that I could wear. It would be easy to remove.”

  “Oh, I like that. You should do it.” She held out the pitcher, offering to refill my glass.

  One drink was supposed to be my limit, but now I wanted more. All that was left in my glass was some slush at the bottom. “Sure, I’ll take another one.” A second margarita wasn’t going to kill me. The alcohol wasn’t
affecting me badly. If anything, it was making me feel good.

  We finished eating and put the leftover food away. But we didn’t do the dishes. We went into the living room with our cocktails. I sat on the sofa, and she plopped down on the floor, amid a grouping of pillows.

  “Are you going to do it?” she asked, about me getting Duncan into bed.

  “I’m certainly going to try.” Now that it was in my head, now that it was being discussed, I couldn’t let it go.

  “When is this rendezvous going to happen?”

  “I should probably shoot for next weekend.” That was the soonest I could do it, and if I waited until the week after that, it would be too late and I would be on my period.

  “Are you going to come up with an excuse to visit him or are you just going to show up out of the blue with the element of surprise?”

  “I think the element of surprise would be more effective. But if I go there and he isn’t home, then nothing will happen, except me having to start over again.”

  “Maybe I can help you make sure that he’s home. I can arrange to stop by his place for some reason, but you’ll be the one going there instead.”

  “You wouldn’t mind doing that?”

  “Of course not. It’ll be fun to conspire with you.”

  “Thanks, Lori.” My skin zinged with excitement, as if Duncan was touching me already. “Was your first time with Martin good?”

  She shrugged. “It was okay.”

  “Just okay?” I expected her to sing his praises.

  “It was kind of quick and sloppy, but Martin had never done it before, either.”

  “Oh, wow. You were each other’s firsts?”

  She nodded. “I think that has a lot to do with why he keeps coming back to me. By now, we know what turns each other on and how to make it hot. So believe me, it got better.” She sighed, her voice dreamy. “But you know what the best part of being with Martin is? It’s when he holds me afterward. If Duncan wants to hold you afterward, you should let him.”

  “Did Duncan hold you after you did it with him? I know you felt awful after you were with him, but did he try to make it better?”

  She shook her head. “It wasn’t like that with us. It was just raw, dirty sex. And then afterward, I was too upset for him to make it better.”

  “You regretted it immediately?”

  “Yeah, like instantaneously. I pushed him away and told him to fuck off, and he was like, ‘What did I do?’ Men can be so clueless.”

  I didn’t think he was going to be clueless with me. If anything he would probably be too aware, thinking about what was wrong with me. “I want it to be raw and dirty,” I decided. “But I want him to hold me afterward. I want that part to be romantic.”

  She grinned. “You want the best of both worlds, and on your very first time. You shameless hussy.”

  “A girl can hope.” I drew my knees up, feeling young and wild and free. It was probably the liquor. Or maybe it was the talk of sex. Or the combination. Whatever it was, I was enjoying it.

  “What about oral?” I asked.

  “What about it?” she parroted.

  “Do you like it?”

  “Do I like what? Giving or receiving?”

  “Both.”

  Truthfully? Back then, I didn’t like either. I was shy about receiving and I wasn’t very good at giving.”

  “I can’t imagine you being shy about anything.” I hoped that I wasn’t going to be shy if Duncan did it to me. I wanted everything to be just right.

  “It was embarrassing, being sprawled out like that with my legs open.” She grabbed a decorative pillow and tugged on the tassels. “I felt like a moron when Martin went down on me for the first time.”

  “You could never be a moron.” She was so honest, so real, so unlike me. I was keeping a horrible secret from her. I hoped someday that I could tell her the truth about myself. But more importantly, I hoped that she didn’t treat me like a leper because of it. I knew how creepy she thought mental illness was, but would she be more forgiving if she knew that a seemingly normal girl like me was struggling with it?

  “I finally got good at giving,” she said.

  I zapped back to the conversation. Oral sex. “Do you think I should do it to Duncan when we’re first together?”

  “Have you ever done it before?”

  I shook my head.

  “Boy, you really are inexperienced. Even I’d given head before Martin. Shitty head, but still.”

  “What makes it good?”

  “Going deep. But using your hands with it, too. And making eye contact. Most guys love it when you look up at them, all starry-eyed, with their dick in your mouth.”

  She showed me her blowjob expression and I pealed into a fit of laughter. It wasn’t the least bit sexy.

  She laughed, too, and nearly spilled her drink. “I exaggerated that.”

  “You think?”

  “Well, at least you got the idea.”

  “Right. So I can think of you making that face when I’m trying to do it?”

  “Skip it the first time. It’s always better to leave a bit of mystery.”

  I touched a finger to my lips. “How old were you the first time you gave head?”

  “Fourteen. I was at a local party and there was this guy who crashed it that I thought was cute. He was a little older than I was, maybe fifteen or so. He didn’t live in my neighborhood. He was more of wrong-side-of-the-tracks type, and the rebel in him appealed to me. I don’t even remember his name. Kirk or Dirk or something.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “A bit like Martin, I suppose. I’ve always had a type, I guess, even before I met Martin.” She paused and pushed a hank of hair off her shoulder. “Anyway, lots of girls were flirting with Kirk or Dirk or whatever, so it was tough to get his attention.”

  “What did you do to get him to notice you?”

  “When he went outside to have a cigarette, I followed him. I pretended to be drunker than I was. I kept leaning on him like I was going to topple over. That seemed to do the trick because he ditched his cigarette and kissed me. Then he led me away from the patio and searched for a place on the property where there was no one around.”

  I got a visual in my mind of what she was describing. A big fancy house. A vast yard. A needy girl and a take-advantage boy.

  “We ended up on the ground, in the middle of these big, leafy bushes, kissing and rubbing against each other. Then he unzipped his pants and nudged me down. I think that’s how it happens for lots of girls. You just sort of get sucked into it.”

  I bit my lip to keep from laughing. Getting “sucked” into it was funny. After she realized what she’d said, she laughed, too.

  Then I seriously asked, “How many of the girls on Duncan’s Facebook page has he slept with?”

  “I have no idea. I don’t keep track of who he messes around with. I’ve never even met most of the girls on his page. The friends we have in common aren’t his fuck buddies. He keeps his hookups to himself.”

  I prodded her for an estimate. “If you had to guess.”

  “A lot, probably. But he’ll remember you the most. You’re going to be his first virgin.”

  And his first schizophrenic. That didn’t bode well for me. “I’m getting nervous.”

  “Why? Because of the girls on his page? Don’t let that intimidate you. You’re going to seduce Duncan like he’s never been seduced before.”

  “I don’t even have any sexy lingerie.” I wasn’t equipped for the job.

  “Then you’re going to have to get something. Are you free tomorrow? We can shop together, if you are.”

  “I’d love that.” I needed all the help I could get. “I’m definitely free.”

  “Cool. I know just the place for us to go.”

  I figured that she would know where to shop. I suspected that she went through panties like popcorn.

  “Do you want another one?” she asked.

  I blinked, then re
alized she was talking about another margarita. “No, thanks. I’m good.”

  “I’m having one more, but it will be my last. Otherwise, I’ll have to make another pitcher and get rip-roaring drunk all by myself.”

  Rather than remain in the living room alone, I followed her into the kitchen so she could refill her glass. The mixture had gone watery, so she added more of the frozen elements and blended it again, making it icy.

  “Are you sure you don’t want more?” she asked. “The last of it won’t be very strong, not with the way I just diluted it.”

  She extended it to me, and I decided that another helping would be okay, especially if it was a weak solution.

  Thank goodness she stuck to her guns and didn’t make another pitcher. I didn’t trust myself to not keep drinking, even if I knew better. I’d already exceeded my limit, and I needed to stay focused.

  I had a big shopping day ahead of me tomorrow.

  ***

  I woke up feeling anxious. I was in a strange house, in an unfamiliar bed and planning on buying underwear to seduce a guy who loved sex so much, he’d incorporated a sexuality symbol into his tattoos.

  Lori pushed open my door and came into my room, wearing an oversized nightshirt and looking like Medusa. Her sleep-tousled hair was tangled around her shoulders like a swarm of snakes—like one big sexuality symbol.

  Who was I kidding? I could never be as seductive as someone like her.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “I’m worried about pulling it off.”

  She plopped onto my bed. “I thought we solved that last night.”

  “We did.” I grabbed a pillow and hugged it to my chest. “But now I’m getting insecure again.”

  “He’s just a guy.”

  “Says the queen of Martin Madness.”

  “Ha-ha!” She tugged the pillow away. “No more stalling. Come on, get your ass up.” She pulled me forward.

  We went into the kitchen together, where last night’s dishes abided. She ignored them and brewed a pot of gourmet coffee. Since she wasn’t a breakfast eater, and I needed to coat my stomach, I drank a glass of milk and made a slice of toast. Afterward, I dashed into my bathroom to pop my pills, trying to keep myself sane.