by Edie Danford
God, and there it is. Mar’s khaki-covered dick. The perfect thing to thrust against.
The car beeps, a huge thunder blast of sound directly behind my back. I drop the keys, gasping into Marek’s mouth, my brain beeping like the car horn, loud as fuck, over and over.
I nearly jump out of my skin, but Mar doesn’t seem similarly affected. He brushes my lips with his in a last, quick kiss and bends to pick up the keys. He presses a button and the beeping stops.
The beeping in my head doesn’t, though.
Oh fuck. I stare at him. What are we doing?
Either I’ve asked the question out loud, or Mar is a mind reader. He brushes my cheek with slightly shaky fingers and leans in for another quick kiss. “It’s okay. You. Me. We. We’re okay. I’ve got a plan.”
I’m not sure exactly what he means, but my body responds to his touch and his tone. The noise in my head lessens as he keeps murmuring softly, touching gently. I take a deep breath. And another one. Slowly my heart makes its way back to its spot in my chest.
“You good to drive, or shall I find us a ride?”
“I’m, um, good.”
His eyes smile down at me. “I promise not to kiss you again until we get home.”
“Oh God.”
He laughs and finally walks around to the passenger side.
I manage to jerk open my door and slide into the seat just in time. My knees have figured out Mar isn’t supporting my body anymore and have decided to give out.
Marek
Pete keeps trying to talk on the drive home. It’s very fucking cute.
“I think we should talk about—”
I interrupt by picking up his hand and twining our fingers together and he goes quiet. After a couple minutes, he draws his hand away, his brow furrowing as he stares out the windshield.
Couple minutes later he tries again. “Mar, what happened just now…we really need to figure—”
Again, I pick up his hand. It’s an amazing thing to get to do. His skin feels great—silky in some spots, rough in others. I’ve never really thought of hands as sensual organs before—stupid of me—because, glag, they so totally are. So many bones, so many muscles, so many textures and contours. Just running my fingertip over the bumps of Pete’s knuckles can make his whole arm tense and his eyes go wide.
I soon discover that anything at all I do to his hand makes him bite his lip. I really, really, really want to lean over and stop his teeth from mistreating his lower lip—I’m fond of it and want to protect it—but I promised not to kiss him.
Pete needs to have promises kept. I’ve long had the feeling—and this evening’s conversation with Ro had validated a few of my suspicions—that Pete doesn’t trust he’s a good friend, a good person. I’m pretty sure he has problems with the whole idea of trust—giving it and receiving it. I recognize this because I’d once felt the same way. I know trust has to be built between people, and I’m not going to let him down.
I hadn’t done enough preparation or planning or theorizing about moving our relationship into a new phase. I’d rushed the experiment and had received shitty results. So now I have to start over and be careful with my process—go slow and show him how things might look between us. Sometimes talk is not effective.
When we pull off Lake Shore and head into Hyde Park, he tries one more time, “I don’t want to have a big conversation right now because I’m driving and that stuff you do to my hand makes me crazy. But I’m telling you that we will talk about this.”
“I know we’ll talk about it. I’m fine with talking about it. But we’re also going to do other things besides talk.”
“What? We are? What things?”
“Look at the road, pusinko.”
“What’s a pusinko?”
“It is…a word of affection. The literal translation is, uh, ‘little kiss.’”
This shuts him up until he pulls into the small garage behind the townhouse.
He turns off the car and looks over at me. His gaze gets caught on my hair.
I smile. My new haircut is freaking him out. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing in the long term. Short term it’s working quite well. I can tell by the wrinkles on his forehead and the furrows by his mouth that he doesn’t like the cut. This is reassuring.
I don’t like it—it makes me feel not like myself. But I also know from Ro’s reaction—and from looking in the mirror—that it’s a good haircut. It makes me look like I have…hotness potential. And this hotness-potential concept could be a catalyst for getting Pete to think of me in some different ways.
Despite the worries of my uncle and Pete and a few other friends, I am a well-grounded person. I know who I am—a haircut doesn’t change me. The haircut simply provides new angles for seeing me from the outside.
The car is making soft, clicking noises, recovering from the cold drive. Pete is trying to recover too. He takes a breath, obviously gearing up for delivering the speech he’s been wanting to give. “Last week. When we had pancakes and you told me—”
“I don’t remember having pancakes last week. We had them on Sunday. That would be the first day of this week, right?”
“Damn it, Marek. You know what I’m talking about—”
“Pancakes. Let’s go inside. I’m cold and hungry.”
I want to smile when I see concern cool his anger a few degrees. Pete thinks he’s a hard-ass, but he isn’t. Not with me. The only threat that has any power over me is the threat of him leaving.
At this moment, with him opening the car door and muttering, “Of course you’re hungry, you hardly ate any dinner…” I know there’s no danger in him disappearing. The mutters continue as we leave the garage and take the short, narrow walkway to the backdoor. “…and I shudder to think about what you had for lunch at that department meeting today. Zoe’s dad brought home leftovers from a meeting that was catered by the same food service. I made her throw them away. Mac-and-cheese should not be reheated. It makes the cheese do nasty things. Especially if it was poorly prepared in the first place.”
We take off our boots, hang up our jackets. I step into Pete’s space and look down at him. God, he’s beautiful. Not like Ro is beautiful. Not like all the pictures of pretty people in Ro’s salon. Pete’s beauty is all wrapped up in his energy.
I study energy and its sources as a profession and a hobby, so I knew a lot about it. Despite the efforts of myself and my colleagues, and all the scientists’ efforts before us, much about energy remains a mystery. So, although it is frustrating to try—and fail—to analyze Pete’s energy, I understand my own limitations.
Maybe Pete’s mystery is in the shades of blue in his irises, the tender quality of the lines around his mouth, the particular curve of his cheek? Or the way his body moves. Or the timbre of his voice. The specific answers don’t really matter, because all of these things are derived from one source of light—Pete. His soul. His essence. His Pete-ness. I’m not sure what to call it.
What I do know is that he wants me to touch him, but he’s afraid. He’s telling me this as clearly as if he’s spoken the words out loud.
I raise my hand, run my finger along his cheek. Amazing. I’ve dreamed of how his skin might feel, but the reality is so much better, so much more complex. Soft, but also complicated, with textures in some spots. Like here. Over his top lip. And here. Along the edge of his jaw.
“We’ll have a snack,” I say. “And then there will be kissing. For dessert.”
“Oh, there will, huh?”
“Yes,” I say. Firmly.
I picture my lab. Disparate data zig-zagging, threads of numbers snarling, lines of information screaming to be interpreted, to be read, to have someone care about them, put them in meaningful order. I don’t pause to think or consider or worry when I take charge of those numbers on a screen. It’s time to take the same approach with the biggest puzzle in my life.
In the kitchen, I get the crackers and Pete gets the cheese. I pour him some seltzer
and get myself a beer. Preparing the snack will help Pete’s nerves, and eating it will help mine. I’ve only been buzzing a little from the wine I’d shared with Ro at the salon—it took away some of my fear at being someplace totally new, with people I’ve never met.
But the buzz I generated in that parking lot with Pete had been much more powerful. If the cell in the electric car had malfunctioned, I’m sure our kisses could have fueled the trip home. I’d been so happy to see him. Relieved. He’d made everything seem right. Touching him had seemed as though it would make more things right.
I sit on one of the barstools and watch Pete work his magic with a few selections of cheese. He swiftly cuts some in thin, square slices, others into chunks. All are arranged attractively on an oblong wooden plate.
I really am hungry, so I snatch a slice while he’s opening another package, pair it with a cracker, and crunch it down. I do it again. And then again. Then I drink half my beer in a few quick gulps. When I look at Pete, he’s smiling. Enthusiastic eating always pleases him.
“Good,” I tell him, gesturing at the cheese. “The Vermont cheddar is excellent.”
He nods and pops a piece into his mouth. He makes an analytical face as he chews.
“Right?” I prompt.
He nods again. He has more on his mind than cheese. He walks over to his tablet, taps at it, and starts up a jazzy-sounding playlist.
When he comes back toward the island, he pauses behind my stool. I hold still, my heart beating fast as he gently touches the back of my neck. “You’ll have to start wearing a thicker scarf than the cashmere,” he says. “Maybe the wide-cabled one your mom knit you for Christmas.”
I swivel the stool swiftly, turning to face him. I grasp his hips before he can step away.
“Mar—”
“Touch me,” I command.
He stares at me, his forehead wrinkling. Not quite a frown, but close. He’s feeling unsure. I need to show him a possible path to take.
“My hair,” I say. “You know you want to. I cut it for you.”
“Oh God. Marek, that is fucking ridiculous. I loved your hair the way it was—”
“Yes, and so this experiment worked. The results were not what you expected and now you must cope.”
“I don’t entirely get what you’re saying, but it sounds evil.”
I smile. “This is not such a big deal, really.” I point at my head. “You and I both know it’s what’s under the hair that counts. But now you need to check the hair and tell me if it feels okay. If it is any good.”
He makes a snorting noise. “I don’t think ‘feel’ is a sense I’d use to tell if a haircut is any good.”
I raise my brows. “If it’s not, then it should be. The air is hitting the skin on my neck and around my ears—I feel it. Feeling, of course, does not simply have to refer to temperature or—”
“Hush,” he says, placing his hands gently on my ears. “I know it must feel different for you. I meant, asking someone else to feel it.”
I hold very still as he begins to stroke the hair over my ears. Light, short strokes. I close my eyes. His touch becomes bolder. I feel the impact of his fingertips on my skin, warm, firm. At first this touch seems…analytical. But soon it becomes appreciative, possessive.
More touches, moving to the back of my head now, tracing the line where Ro had shaved. “It’s going to be a lot harder to maintain than your old cut,” Pete says. “You’ll have to get familiar with the products Ro sent home. Wax for when you want it spikier, oil for when you want control. Maybe we should invest in a blow dryer for when you want the top to have more volume.”
I open my eyes. The comments are very Pete-the-housekeeper. Full of detailed advice, a plan for making things work.
His expression, though—not Pete-the-housekeeper. His eyelids seem a little heavy, but his irises are bright, his enlarged pupils reflecting the ceiling’s lights. His lips are very pink, and they’re parted. I hear the soft sounds of his breath.
This is Pete-the-man, and I want to know him better. I have my own detailed plan for making things work.
Chapter 6
Marek
“Do you need to eat more?” I ask.
He blinks and drops his hands. “What?”
I tip my head toward the cheese plate. “Are you still hungry?”
He shakes his head. “You were the one who was hungry.”
“I’m still hungry,” I say. “But now I want dessert.”
“Marek—”
I hold back a smile. I love it when he says my name like that. Scolding, but full of care. And maybe a fraction of fondness. Lucky me, he says it this way often.
“Dessert in your room. Then statistics.”
“Oh shit! My exam. I forgot all about it.” He makes a grab for the textbook at the end of the counter.
“Nope.” I hold his hips tightly so he can’t reach. “First we need to stimulate your neurons, get blood flowing in all the right places.” I mold my fingers around him, following the curve of his ass.
He makes a snorting noise. “Just shows how much you know about me and sex. ’Cause if you’re talking about giving me orgasms, your plan is fucked. Within three seconds of coming, I go brain dead.”
I nod, pretending to consider this new data.
Pete coming. I want to experience that so badly. I want—need—to know much, much more about Pete and sex. And…I need to treat this as I’d treat any other research objective.
I say, “You will nap after coming, then. At the lab the other day we were discussing the concept of the power nap. Twenty minutes apparently does miraculous things to your brain.”
A smile tries to break free from his stern mouth. “Why do I get the feeling that for everything I say you’ll have an answer. Some scientific, data-driven, computer-proven, evident-in-the-stars reason for why we should fuck.”
Hearing those words and watching them leave his lips—“we should fuck”—makes my cock throb. “You get this feeling because you know I am right. Of course we should fuck.”
He laughs. “Your IQ might be off the charts, but that doesn’t mean you’re not full of shit.” He says this like I’m a huge pain in the ass, but the stern expression doesn’t come back.
“I am not full of shit. I am good at setting up research models. Think of this as research…or…” I glance at his textbook. “An exercise. Homework. For both of us. You keep saying that I need to be more relaxed about being with guys. You are a guy. My favorite guy.”
He sighs. “I can’t be a part of that research model, Marek. You need to remember that—”
“Research of this nature should involve the largest data set possible, is that what you are saying?” I nod. “Yes. Agreed. You arranged my date this weekend, so you have already involved yourself in this experiment.”
“But that was…that was…” he sputters.
I talk over him, because my point is valid. It would likely demand an extra explanation in a lab write-up, but I don’t think we’ll be writing up the results of this experiment. “Ro invited me to a party where he says there will be lots of thirst-inducing guys. Zoe is arranging a dinner party as well, with—as she says—her father’s hottest friends.” (I neglect to mention the term “stooge” on purpose.) “So you get a say, Ro gets one, Zoe too. But I think I should get a say about the data set. I want it to include you. In fact, I won’t go on any dates at all—with anyone—if you don’t agree to be a part of this experiment.”
His eyes widen then narrow. Then he stares at me like he’s trying to see if my brain is, in fact, full of shit. After a moment he laughs—a hooting sound, or maybe a sound more like what an angry gull would emit as it swoops over Promontory Point park. “Oh my God. Blackmail. You—Marek Andrej Janos, PhD—are using jealousy and deviousness to get me into bed.”
I laugh. And his eyes light up the way they always do when I laugh.
I say, “I am only pointing out—asking you to examine—the factors we already know. If you
didn’t care about me, if you didn’t feel any sort of attraction for me, then you wouldn’t care if I went to a party and flirted with and fucked a hundred boys.”
“A hundred?”
“Coming one hundred times in one night is not outside the realm of possibility.” I shift around on the stool. “I’ve been saving it up. For you.”
“I—” He coughs, a noise that sounds strangled. “God. Marek. Those rules I made—I’m not going to ignore them. Even though I goddamn want to right at this moment.”
The blue of his eyes suddenly goes cloudy. A pale blue, a sad blue. I hate it. But I know I can make him happy, and so I have to do this, have to give him a push.
“Those rules can be rethought,” I say. “Adjusted. We weren’t friends—we didn’t know each other at all—when you made them. But now we have new variables in our equation.”
“Our equation?”
I think about this for a moment. I ask, “What do you see when you consider you plus me? When you consider me plus some other guy? Maybe a guy I met at a party or a club. Or on an app.”
He shakes his head like he doesn’t understand the questions.
I want visual aids, but I don’t have any at hand. My gaze fixes on the phone on the counter. I hold it up and try again to explain. “Picture me on Grindr or some other hookup app. Analyzing guys. And these guys—who don’t know me—analyzing me. Judging my potential for a hookup or, in rare cases, more. Those sites—pictures and phrases on a phone—they don’t give you a chance to know someone. They are good for finding a quick fuck, yes. And I understand that sometimes things do work out between people who meet online. But still. Mostly you are forced to judge based on data that is way too limited and easy to fake for good long-term outcomes.”
I put down the phone and take a deep breath. It’s very hard for me talk about this—even with Pete. “This is how I found my ex-boyfriend in Palo Alto. I was lonely. And he, um…faked me out.” I don’t say any of this in a tone that might tease him. Or provoke him. I speak the same way I might communicate to the members of my lab, discussing potential results in an experiment. “We were a terrible match because he lied and skewed the app’s data. But you and I, we know each other. We see each other as we are. And so, as far as rules go, I think we should make new rules together.”