The Bucket List

by Georgia Clark

  We glance at each other and simultaneously launch ourselves at the chair. I manage to get half my butt in, but so does he. Scrabbling for control, I find the lever and shoot us backward as the footrest jerks up. I end up half on his lap, half on the armrest, one hand around his neck. Which is probably where we both wanted to end up. Steph’s not here: she would’ve come out of her room by now. We’re alone in the loft, which makes it feel unfamiliar in an interesting sort of way. I can feel Cooper’s chest rising and falling through my thigh. Even when relaxed, neutral, the corners of his mouth lift slightly upward. His glasses are askew. Gold flecks in each iris: I’ve never been close enough to tell before now. His lashes are surprisingly long, his jaw surprisingly strong—adding to the delicate/manly dichotomy of his face. I realize I’m staring, and he grins, as if to say, Like what you see, huh? I make a Don’t flatter yourself face in return. He says, “I can stay here all night.”

  “Me too,” I counter.

  “Great.” He shifts. I wobble and have to grab his arm. Muscle beneath my fingers. His hand presses into my back. We’re basically holding each other. We’re certainly touching each other. He cocks an eyebrow, voice a teasing murmur. “Tell me more about your list.”

  He says it as if he expects me to leap off him, girlishly offended. What happens if I don’t? Watch out, Sheryl Sandberg, your girl’s about to lean in.

  “Tonight,” I say, “I’m going on a threesome. Having a threesome?” I straighten his glasses. “I’m having sex with two people from the internet.”

  His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows. No doubt he’s wondering where that boner cushion’s at. We are inches from each other’s mouths. I could kiss him right now and he’d kiss me back. But then I think about Elan. His apartment and his confidence and the fact he is Elan Behzadi. His six-thousand-dollar commission floating above me like a specter. The way his dark eyes bring me into being, casting me older, mysterious. Even sexy. Suddenly scruffy-haired Cooper in his secondhand chair and shared messy loft doesn’t seem as attractive. My body loses interest, wanting instead to replay the way Elan’s warm hand felt on mine, the way his closeness picked up my heart rate.

  Cooper murmurs, “You are something else.”

  But really, I am somewhere else.

  Cooper is a boy. Elan is a man.

  Footsteps coming up the stairs. Steph. I slip out of the La-Z-Boy, and am well on the other side of the room when she comes in.

  “Greetings and salutations,” I say. “Look what we found.”

  * * * *

  I regale the tale of my six-thousand-dollar commission to Steph with the theatrics of an alien abductee. I’m expecting salacious excitement. But her brow is furrowed, expression doubtful. “He paid you,” she clarifies. “Like a prozzie?”

  I bristle. “Putting aside that sex work is a legitimate form of employment: he didn’t buy me; he bought the books.”

  “That he won’t use.”

  “I thought you’d be excited,” I exclaim. “We were flirting. He was into me. It must be all the bucket-list stuff. It’s really upping my game.” As I say it, it rings true. I bet my skin is rolling with pheromones. “I’m like catnip right now.”

  “Sure.” Steph is wincing. “It’s just . . .”

  “What?”

  “Isn’t he one of those different-girl-for-every-day-of-the-week guys?”

  There is some truth to this: Elan’s no Leonardo DiCaprio, but he’s not a monk. “I didn’t realize you were such an expert on him.”

  “Lace,” she sighs. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “God, I’m not that naive, Steph! I know we’re not going to get married and have a bunch of little Persian babies. But don’t you think two grown-ass people can enter into something mutually beneficial as long as there’s reasonable expectations and clear communication?”

  “Did you have that? Clear communication?”

  I exhale harshly. “Don’t you think I’m hot enough for him?”

  “What?”

  “You don’t think he’d be into me because I’m not, what, worldly enough? Sophisticated enough?”

  “Lace, no! No! You’re a hottie with the lottie. He’d be lucky to have you, any guy would. I just think you should be careful. Particularly if he’s the type to throw around commissions for six bloody grand. That’s confusing, especially if you need it. Which you do, right?” Her voice softens a little. “Did you find out how much your copay on the surgery might be?”

  Between five and eight thousand dollars. Plus the cost of not working while I recover, and all the stuff I’d have to buy for that. I’m living on my credit card right now, and, oh, did I mention student debt? So, yes. I need the money. But there is a distinct and slightly annoying irony in she-who-falls-for-unavailable-women giving me advice on sexual boundaries. “Fine. I won’t cash the check when I get it.”

  “Don’t you get paid automatically?”

  I huff out some air. “He made the initial check out to me, not Hoffman House. It’s an accounting thing; I’ll get a check now. Which I won’t cash. Besides he’s away for a month. He’ll probably screw a million French groupies and forget all about me.”

  My gaze falls to her nightstand. On top of dog-eared copies of Tipping the Velvet and a few awful true-crime things is a brand-new book. Coping with Cancer: Getting Through Life’s Biggest Challenge. The author, fiftysomething, never met a tea cozy she didn’t like, stares from the front cover with a How are you really? look of compassion. I click my eyes away. I know it’s a just-trying-to-help purchase, but I feel weirdly embarrassed for my ex-roommate, like I’d just caught her doing something odd and private.

  Then a flicker of anger. I don’t have cancer, Steph. I might never get it.

  She hasn’t noticed. “How’s everything else going?” she asks. “Did you make an appointment with the plastic surgeon Vivian suggested?”

  “I left a message,” I lie. How did Steph know about that?

  She regards me with the disappointment of a favored student caught cheating on a test. “You’re still doing self checks, right?” She mimes rubbing her breasts in small circles.

  “I just got a clear scan. It’d take ages for something to develop to the point that I could feel it.” I unearth her only pair of heels: black stiletto Manolos, bought online while very inebriated. “Can I borrow these? For my ménage à trois?”

  Steph stares at me, chewing lipstick off her bottom lip in concern. “Lace.”

  “Steph.”

  Her tone is as gentle as baby shampoo. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  My chest tightens. For a terrifying moment, I think I might cry. I press my lips together until it passes. “What I really need are these shoes.” I smile, too big, too breezy. “So can I borrow them or what?”

  15.

  * * *

  In the cab to Camila 4 Cam’s, Vivian calls. I almost send it to voice mail. “Hey.”

  “Bow-chica-bow-bow.”

  I roll my eyes, smiling. “Mature.”

  “I’m excited for you.” She makes a panting noise.

  “Shut up.” I’m laughing. “Wait, how did you know? Don’t tell me I put it into our shared cal.”

  The pop of a can of something carbonated. Seltzer, for sure. “Steph told me.”

  I was right. A horrifying vision of the two of them at lunch, exchanging a detailed analysis of everything I say and do. I want to tell Vivian that if she wants to know about my life, ask me, not my best friend. “How’s everything going with Clean Clothes?”

  Viv starts in on user registration and conversions without drawing a breath.

  I’d prefer Vivian didn’t know that Elan wants to take me out when he’s back in New York. She’d probably give me a series of talking points about the app, or worse still, come along. I need to make sure Steph doesn’t say anything to Vivian about Elan and his massive, throbbing commission.

  “I wanted to mention,” Viv says, “our user ratings for last month’s outfits we
re down. Usually we’re averaging 4.3. We’re at 3.9.”

  She says it without accusation. She doesn’t need to; it’s implicit. “That’s less than half a point.”

  “I know,” she says. “Could be seasonal depression, post-Christmas slump. We just can’t have it settling below a four. Investors can ask about that sort of stuff.”

  I have been phoning the outfits in: spending less time per customer, doubling up ideas. I’ve been distracted. “I’m on it.” The cab swings onto Bowery. My stomach swings into my mouth. We’re a minute away. “I gotta jump off.”

  “One more thing.” She pauses, which makes me pause.

  “Yeah?”

  “H&M are developing an ethical line of womens wear starting this spring.”

  “So? We agreed we wouldn’t support any business using slavery in any part of their supply chain.”

  “I know. But using an H&M line in our outfits might get our sales figures up.” She lets out a slightly tense breath. “Girls are using the app, they’re just not buying any of the pieces. Let alone an entire outfit. It’s getting harder to dance around that. H&M is a brand that our customers can actually afford.”

  The cab pulls up in front of a sleek apartment complex, all brushed metal and tinted glass. “Sounds like a slippery slope. Our whole sales pitch is ethics. H&M isn’t clean fashion, it’s fast fashion. Not into it, sorry.”

  Another pause. “Fine. Let’s get those user ratings up this weekend, okay?”

  I’m visiting my sister this weekend, but I’m not in the mood to disappoint Vivian further. “Like I said, I’m on it.”

  Maybe I’ve been spending too much time with Vivian, but I find it distinctly sharky that she mentioned my user ratings before sending up a let’s-sell-out-our-idea test balloon. As if I’d be shamed into submission.

  I met Vivian at a women’s networking event a few months after I moved to New York. I was the slack-jawed yokel who couldn’t contain her excitement at being able to see the Empire State Building. She was charming everyone in the room by being flawlessly relevant: yes, she had read that New Yorker profile on the city’s new poet laureate; yes, she did have opinions on the future of gerrymandering. I took her out for lunch. She took me on as a pet project.

  I already had an entry-level position at Hoffman House, but I didn’t know how to behave around rich people, famous people, people with clout. Vivian taught me how to operate in New York, and not just by breaking my tragic vodka-cranberry habit.

  Never say you’re a fan. Connect over something equalizing. Be genuine. Stay in touch—never ask for favors out of the blue. In fact, never ask for favors. Present opportunities. Think about it from their perspective. Know that everyone in their orbit thinks they’re owed something. And never, under any circumstances, post a selfie without explicit permission. Deeply uncool.

  The chance to work on Clean Clothes came up late last spring: stars aligning, skill sets locking together like LEGOs. (Also, we’d drunk two bottles of rosé and I’d taken it upon myself to reorganize her wardrobe.) It seemed like I was never going to graduate out of junior sales at Hoffman House: I needed to create my own job. A job in a company that Vivian now seems interested in selling out.

  Whatever. I’m off the clock. I straighten the seams of my little black dress (when in doubt, go for classic) and check my reflection in a hand mirror. The photoshopped version of myself bares her teeth at me: all imperfections airbrushed with carefully applied makeup. I don’t look like me, and that is good.

  Scrawling threesome onto Steph’s whiteboard was almost in jest, but now that I’m here, I’m 80 percent ready to step over my normcore threshold and into sexual experimentation oblivion. I’ve spent the past few days googling How to start a threesome. I don’t have a definitive answer. Half the time it happens in a sexy, spontaneous (re: drunken) way, and the other half, everyone involved practically had lawyers drawing up contracts. I don’t want to feel left out. Or for anyone else to feel left out. Am I supposed to stay over? What if I catch chlamydia or, worse still, feelings?

  I hope Camila and Cam look as good IRL. But more so, I just hope I can keep up and not freak out like the newb that I am.

  I hope I can enjoy sex with two total strangers.

  I hope I can enjoy sex, period. Honestly, that’s pretty much it.

  I’m here. I’m doing this. As if in slow motion, my finger lifts through the crisp winter air and firmly presses the buzzer.

  Lights? Camera?

  Action.

  16.

  * * *

  Camila Hernandez air-kisses both my cheeks in a cloud of jasmine perfume. “Hiiiiiiiiiii!”

  “Hiiiiiiiiiii!” Anxiety pitches my voice an octave above hers. I’m smiling so hard my cheeks hurt. “Shoes off?”

  “If you don’t mind.” She squeezes my forearm, coquettish but friendly. Camila is shorter than she looks on camera, and she’s wearing a bit too much makeup, but everything else checks out. And then some. Maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s Maybelline, either way the girl is a New York nine, and that’s no small feat. (I am a New York six point five, Ohio eight, and Buntley fifty-eight thousand.) She’s in a tight black dress too. I congratulate myself on sensing the right thing to wear to a group sex date.

  “Great place.” Floor-to-ceiling windows, all-new amenities, enough polished concrete to park an SUV. “Holy smokes, did you know you have a view?”

  Her perfectly painted brows pincer without creasing her forehead (what’s up, Botox?) before it lands that I’m kidding. She laughs, tells me I’m funny. Okay, Camila isn’t Amy Schumer. That’s cool. I’m not here for a comedy show.

  “I didn’t know what kind of wine you liked, so I brought both.” I hand her the bag of red and white.

  “Best of both worlds.” She winks. Excitement zips up my back.

  My experience of flirting with women is (you’ll be shocked to hear) limited. My female friendships are defined by intimacy, but there are clear lines between the affectionate and the erotic. In college, sexuality as a spectrum was a buzz conversation. Discovering yourself wasn’t an option: it was mandatory. My friends spent more time discussing their sexuality than enacting it. I kissed a few girls, but it was awkward and tenuous, like trying to find your footing on a slick and unstable bridge. “I’m straight,” I concluded sadly at the end of freshman year, adding that I wished so badly that I wasn’t but secretly relieved that I was. It was just easier. But now things aren’t easy or defined or, as Elan claims, 100 percent vanilla.

  Sultry R & B murmurs from unseen speakers. Matching throw pillows line up like Russian nesting dolls. The idea that Camila and Cam have had to do domestic chores like choosing a playlist and tidying up for their threesome is oddly charming.

  “Hey there.” YouTube’s own Cam Velez is coming for me, and, hello, the guy is oven-roasted perfection. He looks like a personal trainer in his tight white tee and artisanal stubble. We hug as if I have zero knowledge of this custom.

  “Great place,” I tell him, evidently the only thing I’ve been programmed to say. “How, um, long have you been here?”

  “Few years.” Cam says. “We both work from home, when we’re not traveling.” He’s got the same vibe as his girlfriend: open and warm with zero sleaze. These guys are clearly pros, which makes me feel even more like a big bumbling baby.

  Camila snaps a photo on her phone of her perfectly manicured hand holding a wineglass, before handing it to me. I’ve given myself a pass to drink tonight, but I’m feeling slightly nauseous with nerves and don’t really feel like it: another first.

  We settle in the living room, me facing them. “Cheers,” Camila says. We clink our glasses. We’re all excited, smiling, but I have no idea how to transition from the meeting-new-neighbors vibe to a putting-my-boob-in-your-mouth vibe. When I fantasized about this, there was very little chitchat.

  “Steph said you’re in trend forecasting?” Cam says, one arm around Camila, the other snaking down the empty couch.

 
; “Three years.” I point to Camila’s phone. “Apple is coming out with these gorgeous metallic cork cases this summer. Sounds whack, but they’re super pretty.”

  “I love metallics. Oh, you reminded me.” She angles the phone at herself. “Hey guys, Camila here. This is my final look for this evening, what do you think? I love it, and I have a feeling our lady friend does too.” She shoots me a grin. “She just arrived, and she looks smoking.” Cam sticks his head into the camera and gives a thumbs-up. Camila giggles. “Who do you think should make out with her first, me or Cam? Let us know in the comments! Peace!”

  My wine clatters onto a coaster. “Are you filming me?” I glance around the room in alarm—there’s a camera there, there, and there!

  “No, no.” Camila waves her hands.

  “Not if you don’t want to,” Cam adds.

  “I don’t,” I say.

  “Sorry. I should’ve said something,” Camila says. “We share everything with our fans, including our sex life.”

  Good Lord. Really should’ve done a deeper dive into their channel.

  “But privacy is important,” Cam says, “and so are boundaries. Speaking of . . .” He leans forward, hands clasped between his legs. “What do you like in bed?”

  Thai food. “Everything, really.” Such a lie. “Except, maybe, butt stuff. I’m kind of anal about my, ah, anal.”

  “Do you prefer vaginal or clitoral orgasms?” Camila asks.

  I am trying to be hip and modern, but I’m sorry, this is just so awkward. I can feel myself blushing. “Oh, I don’t have one of . . . those.”

  Cam looks confused. “A . . . vagina?”

  “A G-spot,” I say. “Vaginal orgasms are just a myth, right? Like honest politicians or sober Australians.”

  Camila 4 Cam exchange a glance. Camila says, “Every woman has a G-spot. Maybe she doesn’t use it, but it’s there.”

  “The clitoris is easier to stimulate, and is quicker to climax,” Cam says. “But if you spend a good, say, fifteen minutes working up to it, you can definitely come vaginally.” He pauses. “I’m just going to add that.” He takes out his phone, hits record, and repeats the same line, all with a customer service smile on his handsome face.