Three Stages of Love: Attraction

by T. Anthony

  And I you, Alexander! But now was not the time.

  “I’m leaving,” I said, heading for the door while Alexander watched me walk away. “This is what I have feared all along. Giving in to love and having it tear me apart only to leave me alone, picking up the pieces of my shambled life! I’m temporarily in your home, so I will ask that you not return to the house tonight or that you return when I’m asleep or gone.” Rapidly unlocking the door, I flew out of his office and bolted for the exit to the elevator.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  “Ms. Eva, oh thank goodness you’re back. Mr. Mason has been calling every fifteen minutes to check if you had returned. We have been so worried. Are you all right? Are you ill or hurt?”

  Ms. Gina might as well have taken my mother’s place at that moment because all I needed was to cry in my mommy’s embrace.

  I fell literally into her arms, tightening my hold around her neck, hoping to find consolation. “I think he cheated on me,” I mumbled between hiccupping sobs.

  She gasped, holding me up to look at me. “You saw him with another woman? But with who?”

  I shook my head no. “His ex-girlfriend is his personal assistant, and she told me he has sex with her often.”

  Ms. Gina forcefully positioned me erect. “Now you listen here. That little bitch”—she whispered the word bitch—“is no one. I have worked for Mr. Mason for ten years now, and I can assure you that he has spent most of his life alone. She would call, and he wouldn’t answer. She would show up, and he would hide and tell me to say that he was out. He doesn’t love her; he barely cares for her. He loves you, Evangeline.”

  I was utterly speechless. Had I talked to Ms. Gina that morning, I might never have gone to Alexander’s office to begin with.

  “Let’s go sit and get you dried up from all these tears,” she said, escorting me from the foyer to the kitchen.

  The fireplace was lit, and while I sat, Ms. Gina slipped the torturous but gorgeous shoes off of my feet and then placed a blanket over my shoulders.

  I was trembling from head to toe from sheer fright and hysteria.

  “Let me tell you a story, Eva. When I first married my husband, God rest his soul, he owned his own business in construction. He did well for himself. He had a very outgoing personality and a very friendly demeanor. I didn’t know a single person who didn’t immediately love him or call him their friend. Well, one day, because curiosity gets to us, I was visiting his office and saw the light on the answering machine was blinking. At that time the machines were very new, so I played with the machine and pressed play to hear what the messages sounded like. But remember this always: when you seek, you may not like what you find!” Ms. Gina raised my chin with her fingertips and pushed my disheveled hair to the side. “What I found was a message from a young woman with a very seductive voice. Her message to him—as I can never forget it—was: I’m so glad you liked it, and I can’t wait to see you again. I was destroyed. My thoughts immediately decided that he was cheating on me. So…I did what any normal woman would do—I started throwing and breaking things in his office.”

  That finally forced a giggle out of me. I couldn’t even try to picture Ms. Gina in a furniture brawl.

  “Good. I like to see you smile. As I’m smashing things up real good, my husband walks in and says, Gina, have you lost your mind? But seeing him—having his heart beat that near to my own—I could do nothing but cry. My heart was rupturing. So, I spent the night on the floor of his office crying, and he spent the night on the floor right beside me, swearing to me that nothing had happened—except that she had kissed him unexpectedly one day. But before and after that, there was nothing else. And he swore and swore that even that insignificant kiss never should have been given the room to happen, but he did and was gravely sorry for it.”

  “Did you leave him?” I asked, crying again for Ms. Gina as well as myself.

  “Oh—absolutely not! Are you crazy? Look, men are silly, bendable, and foolish beings. They could be made to crash a plane if women in short skirts and big boobs could walk the clouds. I chose with my heart to believe that there was nothing more than that one-time mistake of a kiss. And I chose to not give up on the love of my life just because he was a naive fool! See, women are the masterminds behind the workings of everything and anything in the world. Go back to Adam and Eve, and I can assure you that on Eve’s bad days, Adam walked with two feet in one shoe!”

  “I don’t know how to handle this. I feel like I’ve been bludgeoned,” I cried.

  “You don’t have to handle anything. That bludgeoning feeling you have inside—that’s love! Let it fade away your pain, and let it fix that which ails you. Love may be blind when it comes to the external, but when it comes to the connection it makes with another’s heart, love has hawk eyes. You can’t control it, stop it, or let it go,” she ended.

  2:00 a.m. the clock read.

  I found myself crouched on the floor and holding myself up against the corner of the bed Alexander and I had blissfully shared. Only now I was alone staring at my suitcases lined on the plush carpeting in front of me.

  Of all the things I could have rummaged through in my mind, I grabbed and held onto Ms. Gina’s story. Had she chosen a different path, would she have been happily married for over forty years? Would she have still found the love and comfort and life in another man, or would she have succumbed to a lifetime of regret?

  I believe in soul mates. And I believe that there is one perfect person for everyone. But the choices we make either lead us to that person in life or away from them. Crystal balls to see into the future don’t exist, but I would give up my shoe collection for a moment’s glance. I was soothed by Ms. Gina’s happy ending, but what about Evangeline’s happy ending? She had chosen to search the earth to find her love—her soul mate—and when she did, he died in her arms. What kind of a life is that to live?

  One thing was for sure: I had a 50 percent chance of living happily ever after and a 50 percent chance of totally fucking up the rest of my life!

  Whispering through a song, I consoled my sorrows like a mother singing a lullaby. “I don’t wanna close my eyes. I don’t wanna fall asleep ‘cause I’d miss you, babe, and I don’t wanna miss a thing.” Aerosmith had for the moment written that song for me, as I lived in what seemed like my love’s Armageddon.

  “Hi,” came from the small, dark opening between the bedroom doors. “I know you asked me not to return, but I couldn’t stay away—not from you.” I sat silent as Alexander took a few careful steps forward. “You packed your things? Evangeline—”

  Lifting my head off the bed, I silenced him. “Please stop. I have made my decision.” I crawled to my knees and heaved my throbbing body off of the floor and slid onto the edge of the bed. I pressed my palms into my knees to hold myself up. “I continue to ask myself what it is that I am barely holding on to. I ran and hid from you for fear of love. I faced darkness and pain for fear I would never have your love again. And now…Well, now I’m torn. I trusted you to show me and take a fearful girl into the light of love and make me a believer. I trusted that once I had this figured out that I would be able to regain myself and my life as a whole.” I breathed the once passionate and now dry air into my lungs and braced myself. “I left everything to take this trip with you. I left my independence to be guided and lead by you. So…Do you know what it’s like to lose trust in the person who holds your life and love in their hands? To be made to feel like a joke in the eyes of the most traitorous of people? To have to fend for your hopes and your heart?”

  “I do!” he exclaimed. “Not too long ago I laid my life and my heart in your hands for safekeeping. And you did nothing but throw them away without thinking of how you hurt me. And I still came back. And when you openly admitted to me that you had not slept with Michael or anyone else while we separated, I chose to believe you. All I am here to do is to ask you to find even the smallest shred of love for me inside you and take a chance on my honor as a man who loves
you endlessly and eternally. But, here I find you with your bags packed, ready to leave without a pause of reflection.”

  I shook my head no. “There is nothing more for you to say, Alexander. All I ask is that you help me with the luggage.”

  Defeated, Alexander drudgingly walked toward the luggage on the floor and, with the mightiest of force and unbearable anger, hauled the luggage up—and it almost flew across the room.

  “It’s empty…?” he said in a questioning tone.

  “Yes, it is. I need help putting them back into the storage closet,” I explained.

  “But you said you made up your mind and that there was nothing else I could say.” Again confused, he remained standing with the feather-light luggage in his grip.

  “Yes, I did. I made up my mind to stay. And there is nothing more you can say or anything more you need to explain for me to make that decision. You chose to interpret my statement another way,” I clarified and stood to walk closer to him. “I choose to discover whether or not this is the biggest mistake of my life or my life’s happily-ever-after. I choose to believe every single explanation you have given me about Chloe because I am choosing to be lead by this unexplainable and torturously joyful chemical imbalance that has occupied my mind and body.”

  The handle on the luggage slipped from Alexander’s hold and thumped onto the floor near the other empty luggage.

  “I have been far from perfect. And now I know that you can make the same stupid mistakes.”

  I reached him slowly and gazed into his—

  “Alexander! What happened to your face?” I screeched, running my hands over several cuts and bruises. “And your knuckles are bleeding. Are you terribly hurt? What the fuck happened?”

  Alexander chuckled. “You should have seen the other guy! I look good compared to him. I’m fine.”

  “The other guy—wait; what other guy? Where did you go and get into a fight?” I persuaded him to tell me more as I took his hand and led him to the chaise in the corner.

  “Steve” was all he muttered.

  “Steve, as in Cat’s Steve?” I questioned, making sure there were no other Steves I had to be weary of.

  “Steve, as in currently fucking Leila, Cat’s soon-to-be ex-husband Steve!” He continued shaking his head, carrying a victorious smirk.

  I held up one finger, signaling him to wait before continuing. I ran to the master bath, where I grabbed a basin and filled it with ice water, a clean a towel, some Band Aids, and peroxide. “OK, proceed. What happened?”

  “They are not bullet wounds; they are just scratches.” He fought me like a child.

  “Scratches or not, they need to be cleaned. Now, you speak and I’ll mend,” I demanded.

  “Long story short,” he started, “after you left my office, I went to go find Cat and Steve. I told Cat everything, and Steve proceeded to fight me. Trying to not return home”—he glared at me as I looked up subtly—“I then went to find Tom and Leila. Tom almost killed Leila and told her she’d better ask Steve for money for a divorce attorney. As we finished screaming and Leila was about to storm out, Steve showed up at Tom’s door. Not letting him get a word in edgewise, Tom sprang for Steve’s jugular, and Steve just tried to keep getting at me. Again, long story short—Leila drove Steve to the ER, and Tom and I polished off a half bottle of scotch. The end.”

  My mouth open and my eyes glued, I couldn’t fathom what he was saying.

  “Oh, and Tom and Cat—separately—send their sincerest and most heart-broken apologies for the position that Steve and Leila put you in,” he added.

  “But they weren’t at fault. They were the victims,” I defended.

  “They were deeply wounded but never victims. They are stronger and more willing than that. All you need in life is a little strength and a lot of will,” he preached to me.

  “You are all bandaged. I feel terrible. Two families are destroyed tonight because of me.” My heart sank.

  Alexander raised my chin to hold my head higher. “You saved two amazing souls from living a life of misery with two very evil and deceitful scavengers. They can still find love and happiness, but now they have their eyes wide open.”

  “Are our eyes wide open? Or will we be searching elsewhere for love?” I asked, trembling with fear and love all at once.

  “We have battled so many beasts in such a short time that in a year from now we will have nothing to do but love each other and make love to each other. I am sure of it.” Alexander was undoubtedly confident.

  “The only thing that is absolutely certain in life is death, Alexander. No one knows what is in their cards or what the future holds. It’s playing your whole hand on one number at the roulette table and praying that the odds or gods are in your favor,” I rebuked.

  Alexander took my hands and raised me off of the floor. With no sound escaping either of us, he scooped me into his arms and took me to the master bath.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  Alexander continued into the suite, and he placed me on the ground. Leaving me, he went to turn the water on in the Jacuzzi tub.

  “Alexander, my eyes hurt from crying. My feet hurt from stomping around in my barely worn Manolos all day, and you are beaten from head to toe.” I stated what was obvious.

  He spoke but continued on with his chores. “Battered, yes—beaten, never!”

  Alexander added a bath salt and bath soap to the steamy water and walked back over to me, making me rise—gently—from the stool I had sat on. He stared at me with the most glorious and all-consuming stares. His magnetic pull left me defenseless.

  Unlike Alexander, I was wearing little. Lifting my arms up over my head, he raised my T-shirt, all the while dragging the tips of his fingers up my abdomen and over my chest and shoulders.

  The steam from the tub and the coldness of being naked ignited an excitement all throughout me. The sensation was familiar and as intense as always.

  Alexander wrapped my hair in a fluffed bun and clipped the top. He began kissing the nape of my neck and my shoulders and my breasts. As he circled around to the front of me, he lowered my panties slowly as his kisses descended my body.

  I let my head fall back as my eyes closed. I could taste the sensation of his kiss on my tongue just because he was kissing me. I felt my fingertips outline the soft Herculean muscles on his back even though I was not touching him. I could explain the curves of his body and every scent he released depending on his mood.

  He carried me across the cold tiles and slid me onto my feet in the perfectly set waters. I felt the salts beneath my feet as they pressed against my pressure points. The bubbles began foaming to my ankles as I remained standing, facing Alexander.

  I took initiative to try to undo his pants, but he took my hands and kissed them before bringing them back to my sides.

  He walked to the entrance and dimmed the lights to a soft moon.

  I slowly made my descent into the warmth while Alexander began undressing himself. He kicked his shoes off to one side and then his socks. After pulling his shirt over his head with a swift tug, he let it fall before him. He moved on to his slacks, and as he snapped off his belt with a snap, the leather cracked the air, delighting my senses. And last—but definitely not the least—he aided his pants to the floor and, wasting no time, his briefs went down with them.

  Though I had at this point seen him in his glory countless times, the first full plain view of him always made me salivate. It never failed. I swallowed hard and noisily.

  Alexander joined me, sliding behind me in the Jacuzzi.

  “Do you want the jets on?” he asked sultrily and hoarse voiced.

  I shook my head no. I wanted to feel him—not the water, not the bubbles, and not the jets—just him.

  He took the sponge from its decorative holder and sunk it into the foam and water. He raised it behind my neck and squeezed all the tenderness he could out of it and onto my skin, letting in drip down my back.

  “Lean back, baby,” he sai
d.

  And wanting to do nothing more than just that, I let my body rest on his. Skin to skin and life to life, if I had to chose a death, it would be this one.

  Feeling him twist slightly, my eyes flickered open, and my head leaned to bring him into view. “What are you trying to do?” I asked, seeing him struggle to reach something.

  “Hush. Close your eyes for me, and stay still but not silent.”

  And as he explained, I knew I would be moaning shortly.

  I complied but then felt a twinge as the cold of metal braised my exposed nipples. When a pulse of water hit me, I was confident in acknowledging the portable showerhead Alexander was burying into the water and across my body.

  With one hand he continued to wash me with the porous and soft cotton sponge— very sensual and personal in nature but amazing with every stroke. With the other hand, Alexander gestured with less innocent maneuvers and traveled to more erotic destinations—my clit!

  I immediately tensed back against him as he began moving the nozzle to and fro in between my legs. And the minute my breath would catch, he held it in place. The intensity of the pulses raged violently against my lips and clit. When I tried to stir, Alexander pinned me into his chest with one arm.

  I bit and pecked and licked his skin, his mountainous arms, and hands—whatever part of him he allowed me to take into my mouth. But Alexander’s strength mixed with the adrenaline rush that had been thriving within him all day—he wasn’t going to allow me to have the last say. I swayed my hips with force hoping to motion closer to his cock to thrust in and out of me as I spread my legs wider and moaned louder and deeper. I opened myself up as far as I could and wiggled onto the bat of his penis that continued to stick me from behind. My arms were pinned as he circulated my body with his massive limbs.