by Carr, Suzie
Her breaths quickened. “He’s a player. He’s come on to me right in their house with my sister in the next room. I’ve seen him here taking ladies out. He’s wealthy and owns the whole chain of Gateway Suites on the East Coast.”
“Does she know?”
“It’s hard to miss.”
“I’m surprised she wants you working with him.”
“I’m gay.”
“Well,” I said, turning her back around to face me, bubbling with adrenaline. “That makes two of us.” I played with a strand of her hair again. She leaned into my touch. So, I twirled the piece around my finger, holding a piece of her captive. Her chest rose and fell in stronger waves, her nipples toying with my eager eyes.
“You’re beautiful. Do you know that?” she asked.
My skin tingled. My face flushed. I could easily lean in and kiss her, and I doubted she’d fight me on it. “You’re my boss now. And I really like my new job.”
Nadia traced her finger against the blue suede of the couch, trailing the curve of my leg. Slowly, seductively, she teased with the suede. “You’re right. This is so unprofessional of me to be flirting with you like this.”
I expanded my twirl zone so much so that my finger flirted with her cheek. “I am so attracted to you.”
“I should look away from you right now.” Her seductive clutch tightened. “I’m finding it so hard. Nothing else in this room is as interesting.”
I released her soft hair and sat back against the arm of the couch now, crossing my leg over my knee. “I should go, huh?”
“Please don’t.” She crossed her leg over her knee just like me. Only her foot fidgeted whereas mine lounged midair, relaxed. “You still owe me a massage.”
“I do.” How I’d get through it, God only knew. I was a horny mess. I needed to refocus. “I need to use your bathroom first.”
Nadia blinked then laughed. “Right down the hall on the right.”
I rushed towards it. Once inside, I stood staring at myself. I didn’t even have to pee.
I scanned her sink which was cluttered with Crest toothpaste, dental floss, Shaper Plus hairspray, Paul Mitchell Sculpting Foam, and a variety of lotions and facial creams. She probably stood at the sink naked, her skin dripping in moisture from a fresh shower, applying her facial cream to her soft skin. This just turned me on more. I can do this. I’ve massaged plenty of beautiful women. Just do your job and walk away.
I walked out of the bathroom. Nadia stood baring the backside of her voluptuous body. She dropped one cloth after the other, and I just stood there watching it all unfold. Slowly, provocatively, she undressed her upper half, and then sank into my chair. I stood in the hallway, drooling, staring, and craving to run my hands all across her sweet, buttery skin.
There Nadia sat, uncovered and unexplored on my chair, the chair I’d carried under my arm. Never did I see this coming, a beautiful half-naked lady waiting on it in her hotel room for me. I stood, ambivalent. I wanted to run to her and take her in my arms. Yet the other side of me argued that I should just stay put right there in front of the bathroom door and avoid the eventual disaster of charging into this innocent massage moment as a hormone-induced junkie wanting to get high.
Her chest pressed against the chair. She relaxed wearing just her silk bottoms. Her golden spine, straight and perfect, waited to be healed. I’d never massaged a half-naked client without a protective blanket before.
I steadied myself and walked in like a professional masseuse should.
“Let me get a blanket for you.”
“Don’t bother,” she said, squirming against the plastic seat. “I figured it would just get in the way, right?”
I lost my breath. “Yes, ma’am.”
She snapped up, her breasts danced forward along with her flowing hair. “Ma’am? Really?”
I clicked my tongue. “No?”
“No.” She wrapped her hair around her neck and rested back down against the head stirrup.
“Deal.” I went into this massage like I did any other. I cradled my hands around her shoulders and worked my touch into her tired, knotted muscles. “You really need this.”
Nadia moaned.
My tummy rolled.
I closed my eyes and pretended I was massaging a three-hundred pound bald man. I ripped into her muscles, angling my palms deep into her tissue.
She moaned again.
I opened my eyes and took in the full beauty of her spine, so perfectly arched in all the right places. I breathed in deeply, imagining my lips on her skin, blanketing her in soft kisses along her shoulder blades and down her lovely spine.
I eased Nadia’s tension for ten short minutes before surrendering my access to her beautiful skin.
I leaned in and whispered, “How was that?”
“Heavenly.”
I slipped my hands off of her. “Be careful in rising. Sometimes people feel dizzy.”
I guided her as she rose. She turned to me all sleepy eyed. “Thank you.” She reached for her pink t-shirt and pulled it back over her head. “I needed that.”
We sat on the couch again, folding in on ourselves.
“What other stories do you have bottled up in that pretty little head of yours?”
She eyed me with great care. “I’ve told you too much.”
“Oh come on, darling. Don’t raise your guard now.”
She leaned in, so close I could smell the sweet mint on her breath. “Sometimes words get in the way.”
Nadia’s lips called out to me. On reflex, I placed my finger on them and circled. If I kissed her, I wouldn’t be able to stop there. This pulse radiated between us. I needed this job. She just trusted me with all of this personal stuff. If I kissed her it would ruin everything we just shared. I couldn’t pull away from her lips, though. They called out to me like a magnetic force, luring me to them. “I should go.”
She feathered my lips with her finger now, releasing puffs of sweet air into my zone. “Yeah, it would be a good idea.”
I rose, which caused me to move in even closer. “It’s the Sangria.”
Before I knew it, my lips were on hers. My hands cupped her face, and her hands traveled to my shoulders, pulling me towards her. We breathed as one, her lips brushing against mine in small seductive sweeps, her tongue teasing mine in a dance that twirled me, sent me reeling, soaring, flying high. “I shouldn’t be doing this,” she whispered.
“Me either,” I said, drunk on her.
“There’s too much you don’t know.” She pulled away and jumped up. She raked her hand through her hair. “I’m sorry, I can’t.”
I caught my breath, steadied my heart with a hand to my chest. “I understand.” I stood and smoothed my hair. “We’ll just blame it on the wine.”
“Yeah.” She looked confused.
“Oh, come here.” I opened up my arms to her. “We just shared a moment. It’s perfectly fine. I get it. It’s a line we shouldn’t have crossed.” I laughed. “It’s my first week, and I’m already trying to get into your pants.”
Nadia laughed too.
We clung against each other sharing a good laugh. “So, I’m not fired or anything, right?”
She pulled away and held me at arm’s length. “We’re good.” She blinked heavily and nodded. “Tomorrow, when we see each other, we’ll share another good laugh and pretend it never happened.”
“Well, all right then.” I grabbed my pocketbook and chair.
“Okay,” she said all professional, escorting me to the door.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I said.
“Until tomorrow.” She smiled and closed the door.
I wobbled all the way to the elevator, drunk on a lot more than just Sangria.
* *
I bumped into Shawna on my way out of the lobby area. She looked tired. She limped up to me, dragging her feet.
“You need a massage,” I said.
“I’m too tired. I just want to go home and relax in a tub, listen to some
jazz, maybe sip some wine and call it a night.”
I held the door open for her. “Long day for you?”
“The breakfast girl called out, and so when Nadia called me in a panic, I filled in.”
I scanned her heels. “I don’t know how you do it.”
“I do it because I love this job.”
We walked past the valet parkers and out to the far end of the parking lot. “Two shifts, though?”
“You’re so naive.” She scrambled through her pocketbook for her keys. “That’s why I like you so much.”
I blocked her with my portable chair. “Naïve?”
“It’s not a criticism. Your innocence is a gift.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Everyone is not out to get you.”
She rolled her eyes. “You haven’t lived my life. So you can’t toss out bold statements like that.” She patted my arm. “Have a good night.”
She walked towards her car, limping, as if carrying a lifetime of trouble on her shoulders.
Chapter Nine
Nadia
I adored Ruby. When she left my hotel room, I lounged on my bed and attempted to concentrate on an episode of King of Queens where Carrie’s father and Doug become best friends. Lost on the show’s humor for the first time ever, my mind drifted.
I closed my eyes and imagined her hands on my shoulders again, then her soft lips on mine. My body seared.
I shook my head and sat up. I could not fantasize about her.
I walked over to the window and opened the curtain. The city of Providence lit up below me. People walked on the sidewalks some in pairs, some in groups, their laughter echoing off of the brick buildings. Ruby had long disappeared. Did she go home to a wife? A girlfriend? An empty apartment? Did she have a cat or perhaps an adorable dog that we might one day walk together?
I spun away from the window.
I would not obsess over her. Ruby was simply a fun girl with a killer smile and a knack for buckling me at the knees. God she was something else.
I went back to my bed, slid under the covers and caved into thoughts of her long blonde hair tickling my skin as she leaned over me, seducing me with her charm in a passionate moment that could only be described with words like thrilling, intoxicating, and inescapable.
* *
Jessica called me the next morning. “I’ve got some good news.”
I braced for it. “Tell me.”
“The lawyer thinks I’ll be released early.”
My heart sank. I wasn’t ready for her to come home just yet. “How early?”
“Four months.”
I sat on the edge of my bed. “Wow.”
“Yeah. Wow. Crazy, huh? I’ve been a good girl, I guess.”
The tension shot right back between my shoulder blades. I envisioned our new life, sitting across from one another having nothing in common but our history, pretending to be interested in how we spent our days, wishing in silence for our old times. “That’s fantastic.”
“We’ll get a fresh new start. Finally.”
We needed a fresh start. “Yeah, finally.”
“You know what the first thing is that I want to do when I get out?”
I clamped onto the hope. “Tell me.”
“I want to eat lobster at that restaurant in Mystic where we had our first date.”
We had gotten silly drunk on cheap beer that night and ended up pulling off to the side of the road to make out for hours. “Sounds lovely.”
“It’s almost over.”
This wasn’t a victory race. “Yeah. Almost there.”
Silence hung between us. Someone in the neighboring hotel room turned on the television. I could hear Matt Lauer from the Today Show laughing.
“So, have you talked to your sister yet about hiring me?”
“Not yet. I will.” They would never hire a convicted felon. I would never ask them to either.
Long pause.
“Jessica? Are you still there?”
“Why haven’t you asked her yet?”
“Well, we didn’t know how long you’d be incarcerated,” I said this with scorn, my anger renewed for what she’d done to us.
“Incarcerated? You make me sound like a—”
“—just drop it.”
“I wanted you to be happy with this news. You sound more disappointed than anything.”
Didn’t I have the right? “So much has changed, you know?”
She exhaled, and her pain curled up around me, choking me. “Maybe if you came to visit me more often, we could deal with all these changes better.”
I sat up taller. “We’ve been over this. My schedule is challenging.”
“You choose Rhode Island over me,” she said. “I’m not blaming you. I’m just stating the fact. You didn’t have to switch locations. Keith would’ve kept you on in Connecticut, and we both know it.”
“You’re antagonizing me.” She never argued with me before jail.
“I’m just stating the facts. You have distanced yourself on purpose. Admit it.”
I would not admit that, even though it was true. “Where is this blame coming from suddenly?”
“You’ve changed so much. I don’t know how to speak with this new version of you.”
I liked this new me. I no longer catered to her ideals or sacrificed my happiness for hers. “Yes, of course I’ve changed.” My temples flared. How dare she turn me into the guilty one? “You want to hear exactly how? Do you?”
“Yes. Tell me.” Her voice steamed out all smooth and collected.
“I’ll tell you how.” Fuck her and her new virtuous attitude. “For starters, I fixed the lawnmower last week. Yup, I had to take it apart and put it back together again. I did it by watching a YouTube video. I fixed it all by myself because my wife decided to get drunk and kill someone.”
She gasped.
I carried right on with my argument. “So what fucking choice do I have but to change?”
“You’re being unreasonable,” she whispered like everyone in the state prison could hear us.
“Oh, I’m sorry.” I flew up from the bed and paced the room. “Am I embarrassing you?” I had never yelled at her before. Never. This rage needed releasing.
“What do you want me to do?”
I barged right over her question. “You know another unpleasant task I had to do a month ago? I had to get the ladder off the hangers under the deck, place it up against our home, and climb up the steps all the way to the roof holding a hammer and five roof shingles because our home is falling apart, and because I’m the only one here to fix it.”
She exhaled. “Why didn’t you call Keith?”
“Go crying to him so he and my sister can gloat about how fucked up our lives are?”
“Huh. Nice. Feel better slamming me when I’m already down and out?”
“You put yourself there. Not me.”
“Well, go on then. You’re on a fucking roll.”
“You’re a felon Jessica.” My chest beat wildly. “A fucking felon.”
I flung my phone across the bed and rose, pacing my hotel floor like a tiger pissed to be locked up in this cage.
Slamming her? Huh. Maybe she needed a good slamming. My tongue turned numb. My skin burned. My blood pressure spiked by the second. Tears stung my eyes. The end of what we used to have arrived. It stung, blasting sand and grit in my face and blinding me.
I walked back over to my bed and plucked up the phone. “I’m not going to sugar coat things for you anymore.”
She was sniffling.
“Stop crying,” I said.
She sniffled some more.
My heart slowed. My breaths rolled out smoother. My mind cleared. “I just don’t think it’s a good idea for me to beg Sasha and Keith to give you a job. We can find you work someplace else,” I said softly.
“You’re afraid.”
“I’m not afraid.”
“You are though. You’re worried about what everyone’s going to say behind our ba
cks.”
“Well of course.”
“Why do you care?” she asked.
“Because it matters.” I saw a future with her laboring for eight dollars an hour, or resorting to drug sales, or pimping herself out.
She cleared her throat. Sniffed. Clicked her tongue. “There’s this long line of women staring at me right now. I’m hogging the phone. Can you just come for a visit soon so we can talk this out face-to-face?”
“Of course,” I whispered.
“Until then, Butterfly.” Her voice cracked.
Butterfly.
That word transported me back to my old wife, to our happy days, our free days. Peace and familiarity landed softly on the wings of that word.
“Hey,” I said. “I love you. I hope you know that.”
She breathed out. “I love you too.”
* *
Unsatisfied people took risks. Some jumped from airplanes, some dove hundreds of feet underwater, some trekked up dangerous mountain sides in search of justice, youth, and thrill, anything to purge the unsettling rustle of fear and angst and apathy from their systems.
I chose to make a phone call.
When Ruby answered, I said in as sweet a tone as possible, “It’s me. Nadia.”
“Hello, Nadia.” Her voice was quiet and soft.
“I could already use another massage.”
“Then, I’m your girl.”
“I won’t argue with that.” The flirt tumbled out before I could stop it. “I come to you a humbled girl in need of help.”
She rolled out a sigh that sent my heart into flight. “I hope you do.”
“Shall I come down this afternoon?”
“I’d be disappointed if you didn’t,” she whispered and faded out like a song I didn’t want to end.
I cradled the phone to my ear for several long seconds after she hung up, savoring the residual softness of her voice still dancing on my heart, light and airy, a pleasant escape from my reality.
An hour later, I was eating breakfast in the garden patio restaurant when Ruby strolled by wearing a flowing shirt that mirrored her willowy personality. Her blonde waves bounced along her shoulders, and when she spotted me, her cheeks flushed. I waved her over.
“Have you eaten breakfast?” I asked.