by Amy Briggs
I stripped off my running clothes and stepped into the shower, letting the warm water rain over me. I had the perfect waterfall shower, and generally spent way more time in there than I needed to because it was so relaxing. Running my hands over my body, sudsing myself gently, it occurred to me that it had been a very long time since anyone else had their hands on me. As I trailed my fingers along my sides, I daydreamed of a lover that would get in that shower with me. A man who would let his hands follow my curves, who would press himself against me, coaxing pleasure from me. My hand dropped lower, and I began to touch myself gently between my legs, leaning against the shower wall. As I raised my foot slightly, giving myself more access, I started to rub my clit smoothly with my fingertips. My other hand raised to my now pert nipple, I gave it a slight pinch, my breath hitching at the sensation I was giving myself. As I grew more turned on, I envisioned a man, a beautiful man, was doing this to me. Becoming incredibly aroused, I massaged myself more fervently until I became weak in the knees with my own climax. Crying out, just barely audible, I rode out my orgasm, fantasizing about the man who could give me that kind of pleasure.
As I came down from my euphoric high, I almost chuckled to myself about the absurdity of my shower fantasy. I finished washing and stepped out of the shower, taking stock of myself in the floor to ceiling mirror that my master bathroom offered. Wrapped in a towel, I ran my hand over the fog that had formed in the mirror and leaned in. At the age of forty, I looked good, but I had lines forming around my eyes. Many of the women I knew were getting botox, or even plastic surgery at my age, but I just couldn’t do it. I wanted to age gracefully. For my brand, but also for myself. As the rest of the fog began to clear, I dropped my towel and surveyed my body.
I was fit. I worked out every single day, and on most days, ate the things that were good for you. I was the President and CEO of a fitness clothing company, after all, and it was important to project an image appropriate to that. But also, I loved the feeling of getting winded. The feeling of challenging my body to keep up with what I wanted it to do. While my face may be showing the signs of aging, my body still had the tightness of a twenty-five-year old. Thank God for small favors, I thought to myself.
It was a Friday, and I had a few meetings that morning, with a social event that evening. I decided to take my conference calls from home; I just wasn’t feeling a trip to the office for half a day of phone calls. I put on some fresh workout clothes, my “at home” attire of preference, and after making a cup of coffee, grabbed a banana and took it with me to my office.
Jase and I went over the day, and confirmed I was having dinner with a few potential investors that evening. In his usual spunky and almost snarky way, he reminded me to remember who was taking pictures, and if I was going to “get some,” as he so eloquently put it, that I should get it from someone who wasn’t my age. He was convinced that I needed to be frolicking around the city with a younger man, to match my personality and lifestyle.
“No, I’m serious. I’ve been giving this a lot of thought, Elise,” he explained.
“Oh, have you?” I snickered audibly at the suggestion.
“Laugh all you want. I think you need a younger man. You know, go ‘be the cougar you are’ kind of thing.”
“So, you think I’m a cougar, do you?”
“Listen, I don’t make the terminology up. I’m just saying, these pricks that are your age, are just that. Pricks. They want your money, your stability. Fuck that.”
“They don’t want anything from me, Jase. They want thirty-year-olds.” I crinkled my nose, still annoyed by the whole concept that it was fine for men to just leave their wives for younger women as often as they did.
“Eh, I don’t know about that. Yeah, we know a lot of them that have done that, but I’m telling you, I think I’m on to something. I mean, at the end of the day, do you really want to wake up next to a wrinkly old fart anyway?”
Speculating what it would be like to wake up next to a man who had the graying hair of my grandfather did not exactly get my juices flowing. “No, I don’t. But that doesn’t magically make age-appropriate men appear before me, does it?” I was being sarcastic, mostly because he was right.
“Age appropriate is just an excuse to not do what you want. Or who you want. You’re hot. Forty, or whatever. Seriously. You should be getting bent over your desk by some gorgeous thirty-year-old. I’m serious.”
“Oh my God, Jase. No one is bending anyone over any desks in my office. You got that?” I started to laugh.
“Yeah yeah, it’s a metaphor. Although, it’s your desk. Hell, they’re all your desks. So, if it is what you want, you should. Just sayin’...” He returned the chuckle and waited for my reply.
“Well, when this unicorn shows himself, feel free to send him my way. In the meantime, I’m all set for the day, and you should go enjoy happy hour with your friends.” Whenever I could give Jase a little time to himself, I tried to. His loyalty to me couldn’t be matched financially, although I certainly tried. I couldn’t have been luckier to have him as my assistant, but also, as my friend.
“Well, thank you very much, Ms. Regan. There’s a new gay bar that opened up just a few blocks from the office, and I think I will do just that. I’ll have a martini just for you, and be on the lookout for our unicorn.”
Laughing out loud, I replied, “Well, I hope you don’t find him at the gay bar, Jase. That won’t do me one bit of good, now will it?”
“I need a unicorn too, milady. I’m looking out for both of us.”
With that, we said our goodbyes, and I went back to work for a bit before getting ready for my dinner. I had a bunch of emails, and other boring things to get to that day, but nothing was particularly pressing, other than a couple conference calls. It would still be a bit before the new line launched, and we were more or less all set, outside of needing to come up with some innovative marketing, which we were planning to work on over the next few weeks. It didn’t need to be done that day, so I wrapped it up early myself.
The dinner was uneventful, and fairly typical. Five of us sat around a very expensive table at a fabulous new restaurant, pretending to enjoy the food, but mostly just pretending to be friends. We shared light personal anecdotes, everyone but myself talked about what their children were up to, and we had cocktails. Lots of cocktails. I never understood why drinking was so important at business dinners. It was as if the possibility of closing a deal was better if we all lost our inhibitions together.
I’d never been much of a drinker, and was regularly asked if the drink in my hand was the same one I’d had all night. It was, usually. But I always lied and said that it wasn’t, because God Forbid, unless you’d had to go to Betty Ford, you better be getting schnockered on fancy overpriced booze like the rest of them. As I glanced around the table at my societal peers, I suppose you could call them, I tried to figure out if they were happy. Truly happy. Sure, everyone was smiling, but could they see the emptiness that I was beginning to recognize? Could they tell that I was silently judging our lifestyle, our choice to spend time together? I was judging myself just as much as I was judging them, but I felt almost like I had a secret. The secret, of course, was that most of this life was all bullshit.
Feeling rather void, I settled my check and said my goodbyes. I had managed to get some meetings scheduled for the upcoming week in our idle chatter, which was, more or less, the point of going to dinner with people I only sort of cared for. At least there weren’t any photographers snapping pictures that could be misconstrued as anything other than a few people out to dinner on a Friday evening. Not that I especially cared about the rumor mill; I was more concerned with making sure my reputation remained in tact. I’d become known as the ‘independent woman’, the one who didn’t need a man and wasn’t going to be bothered with such things, and I’d grown to be comfortable with that.
As I waited for James, my driver, outside of the restaurant, I attempted to shake off the over-analytical thoughts t
hat crept in my mind. I couldn’t wait to get home and put some comfy clothes on. Pulling my jacket around me tightly, I mused to myself that I was standing in thirty-degree weather, outside of a restaurant in New York City, wearing a slip of a dress like some kind of twenty-year-old. It was an expensive dress too. One of the big designers had a show and I’d picked it up for a pile of money, knowing it would show off my curves, and grab attention. But again, my thoughts turned to asking myself, why did I want the attention anyway?
As I was getting into the car, suddenly I was thrown back out onto the sidewalk. I never saw the taxi that hit the town car; all I remembered was looking at the pavement as a sharp pain in my back pierced through me. Then, I woke up in the hospital.
Chapter Four
Carter
Over the next week, I found myself becoming irritated with practically everything. Work was annoying, the subway was frustrating. I watched people a lot that week. Observed the misery and pretense around me; it was everywhere. It probably wasn’t really everywhere, but it’s all I could see. Every conversation seemed mundane, and I continued finding less and less pleasure with each passing day. On Thursday, I was set to meet a friend of mine for drinks after work and couldn’t come up with any reasonable excuse not to go; it had been planned for weeks.
When I walked into the bar, I took note of the old feel of it. More of a whiskey bar, it was warm and cozy, with couches and overstuffed old-fashioned chairs placed about the room. The bar itself was quite small, but its carved wooden front was ornate and striking. The entire room smelled of polish, but not in a way that was off-putting at all; in fact, it was rather pleasant, mixed with the slight scent of high-end alcohol. Whether anyone agreed with me or not, there was a distinct difference between whiskey you could purchase at Duane Reade on any street corner in the city and the type they served you at a place like this. It had an almost floral aroma that gave me the first smile I’d felt all week.
As I glanced around the room looking for Brian, I spotted him on his cell phone in the back corner, already enjoying what looked like two fingers, neat. He must have sensed me, because he looked up and raised his glass in my direction.
“How are you, buddy?” He stood and gave me a bro hug.
“Doing well. Things are great. You?” I lied.
“That’s clearly a lie.” His expression turned somber. “Have a seat, my friend. Let’s get drunk over whatever it is.” He used his glass to point to the chair across from him, and then flagged down a server.
“Ah, you do know me, Brian,” I sighed.
“We’ve been friends since elementary school. Of course I fucking know you. So, what’s got you down? Lady troubles?” he teased.
“Nah, that’s kind of a non-existent thing at this point. Honestly, these city girls are so superficial, man. Like, they have zero substance. I’m so sick of all the ostentatious attitude, with no character to back it up.”
“Well, I feel you there. You’ve always been more a philosopher when it came to that.” He took a sip of his drink thoughtfully, as if he had a secret to tell and he was waiting for the right moment.
“I suppose that may be true, but there’s got to be more to life than making money and buying shit, to show people we don’t care about. Please tell me there is.” The server brought me whatever Brian was drinking, and I took a rather large gulp immediately. As the liquor warmed my throat, I began to relax. I'd started to feel what was the beginning of a panic attack.
“First of all, you need to calm the fuck down. You look like you’re about to have a stroke.” He set his glass down. “Maybe you need to come take a weekend off at our house in the Hamptons or something. A vacation would probably do you some good.”
While that may be true, spending a long weekend at a beach house in what was becoming winter sounded like a recipe for a nervous breakdown more than anything. “I appreciate that, and maybe I’ll take you up on it at some point. I guess I just need to get over the idea that there’s more.”
“More what, exactly?” He continued to almost smirk.
“I don’t know. Just more. More happiness. More passion in the day to day. More something other than stuff.” I paused to collect my thoughts. “You’re right. I have always been sort of a philosopher, but let’s be real here. Is being married better? Are you truly happy every day? I wonder if it’s that I don’t have someone sometimes. But then, other times, all I can think is that I’d be settling if I chose one of these twenty-somethings and started making a bunch of babies with them.
“It’s not that I don’t want to be with someone; I think I do. But right now, I just can’t see it. And truthfully, I’m not even sure that’s what would fix my shit attitude. All I see lately is how miserable people are, living their mundane lives of buying shit to show other people that they don’t even like.”
“You need a new circle,” he said matter-of-factly.
“A new circle. You mean new friends?” I teased.
“Funny. But sort of. You need a new group to associate with. People that are already successful. People who have found the things you’re looking for. So you can model them. You’re almost always the smartest guy in a room. You know what that means?”
“That I’m bored constantly?”
“Well, maybe, but it means you’re in the wrong fucking room.”
“Interesting. Go on.” He had my attention.
“You’re not an idiot, and frankly I’m surprised you haven’t figured this out yourself. If you’re the smartest person in the room, how are you growing? You’re not. It’s that simple. If you’re not growing, you’re dying. And you, my friend, appear to be wilting away.” He finished his drink in one gulp, and motioned for the young man waiting on us to bring two more.
Stepping up my game, I finished mine, and thought about what he was saying. “So, what would you suggest? I look for a new job?”
Laughing at me, he shook his head. “Thank you,” he said to the server, when he brought our fresh drinks. I had never really been much of a drinker, and was already feeling the effects of whatever expensive libation we were having, but took it anyway. Turning his attention back to me, he scanned my face carefully before continuing, “What if I told you that there was a way for you to get paid to join a new circle?”
“What the hell are you talking about? Is this a business scam you’re running?”
“No! Nothing of the sort. Listen to me, and hear what I’m saying.” He turned serious. “What if I told you that you could sign up for a service, that matches people like you—people that have their shit together, people with beautiful minds—with other like-minded people.”
“Do you mean, like matchmaking?” My skepticism had to be evident. He was off his rocker.
“Well, it’s not exactly matchmaking. It can be, if that’s what you want. It’s a client to employee match though, and it is guaranteed that you will find some companionship with someone that has mutual goals and interests, but also has the ability to raise you up into a new circle of society, in some ways.”
“What is this cult?” I teased, trying to lighten his serious tone.
“It’s not a cult. It’s called Infidelity. And I think it’s exactly what you’re looking for.”
“Infidelity? That doesn’t sound very reputable.”
“Oh it’s reputable. And it’s fucking exclusive. In fact, it’s incredibly elite, and I’m only telling you about it because you need a recommendation to interview, and I’m offering mine.”
“So, you’ve participated in this?”
“I have. Do you remember that year I was with that girl from Brown?”
“Yeah, Stacy? She was nice, and wicked smart.”
“Well, I paid for her to be my companion that year. I was trying to look like less of a college boy who stumbled on a pile of money, and I wanted to have a companion, that was essentially my girlfriend and, for all intents and purposes, was my girlfriend. She was paid handsomely to play the part, and we were matched on compatibility.
We were a fantastic match; in fact, and we were a real couple in every way for that year.”
“So, what really happened when it ended, if you were so ‘compatible’?” I finger-quoted the word compatible.
“My goals changed. What I wanted changed. She was looking for a new circle, much like you are now, and at the time, that worked for me. As time went on, I realized that I wanted to have kids, and I wanted the house in the suburbs and shit. When I signed on, I didn’t, so at the end of our contract, we parted ways. Very amicably. She didn’t want those things, so we didn’t renew our contract, and I left Infidelity. Later that year, I met Melanie.”
Melanie was Brian’s wife. She was from a great family, had her own money, but was more than happy giving up her career to be Brian’s wife, which, ultimately, turned out to be what he wanted. Not that he would have ever held anyone back. I truly think Melanie always wanted to be a mom, and she was already an amazing mom to their three-year-old son, David.
“So, you think that a year of companionship, we’ll call it, would change my perspective?”
“I don’t know if it would change your perspective, but I think it’s the kind of remodeling your temperament could use. You would be the employee, so you would have to agree to the terms of whatever the woman paying the bills would want. That might mean moving in with her. It might mean simply being her companion to events. It might mean fucking her a couple times a week too.”
“Whoa, are you serious?”
“Oh come on, don’t get all high and mighty with me. This is a service that matches you with someone on a level you could never pay for. This is elite. This isn’t some online dating service. I assure you that whomever they match you with, you’re gonna want to fuck.”
I ran my hands through my thick hair, ruminating over everything he’d said. A year of companionship. With a stranger? It seemed preposterous, but I also thought that he and Stacy were a real couple. I mean, it sounded like they were, but didn’t exactly start out that way. I couldn’t wrap my brain around the concept. But, it had to be better than doing absolutely nothing, or more of the same.