by CD Reiss
“Open the pants.”
I unbuttoned and unzipped, keeping the sweater down over my bellybutton.
“Put your hand between your legs,” he whispered.
“I can’t.” Somehow, feeling his touch on me would be all right. Touching myself would seem too self-indulgent.
“Yes, you can. And you will. For me.”
I slipped my hand into my panties then stopped.
“Please,” he said, not like a plea, but a mandate.
My middle finger found my wetness first, gathering over my engorged clit like dew. Jonathan sighed when my expression changed. I put my hand down to my opening, dragging the tingle and heat with it, and circled, gathering the juices between the two fingers, like a metal ball around a roulette wheel.
Jonathan kissed my cheek and stroked my breast, keeping the nipple stiff as I pulled my hand back up to my clit, which was as hard as a marble and soaking wet. I was so close already. My body remembered I’d been lying under the covers with Jonathan, even if my mind had moved on to other things.
“May I come?” I whispered. Things may have changed between us, but one thing did not remain undefined. He owned my orgasms, and I wanted him to have them.
“You are such a good girl.”
“May I?”
He waited before answering, kissing my nose, my cheek, caressing my breast. I kept stroking while he surrounded me. My orgasm pushed against me, a pressure inside, asking to get out, begging, needing. I kept telling it, not yet, not yet until, all at once, he grabbed my nipple hard enough to hurt and said, “Come.”
The tension released like broken strings, everywhere. My body straightened under my own touch, pulsing and clenching from pussy to ass. I opened my mouth, and though I screamed inside, only air came out.
“Don’t stop,” he said.
I kept my hand moving, and the orgasm continued. My knees bent, and my body crouched and again, like a shot, I went rigid, breathing ah, ah, ah. It hurt, and just as I thought I couldn’t take it anymore he said, “Stop.”
I fell into his arms like a shuddering mound of jelly.
He laughed. “I think you needed that.”
I just leaned my head on his chest, gasping for air.
“You didn’t use your voice,” he said, stroking my hair. “I thought for sure that would do it.”
I shrugged.
“We need to get back inside,” he said, “before all your ex-boyfriends come out here, and I have to kill them.” He drew his hand over my belly and stopped. He picked up my sweater so he could see my naked navel. “Did you lose it?”
I put purest innocence on my face with a hint of lack of surprise. “Inside.” I indicated the direction of the house, but downtown was in the same general direction, and unless it was in transport or being stolen, there was a good chance it was indoors.
He nodded and pulled my sweater down, then watched as I buttoned up. He seemed pensive, and I wondered if he’d become sensitive to contextual lies.
seventeen
When we got inside, much of the wake had broken up. The wait staff cleaned and put away, making beelines for the catering truck. Only a few people remained. Darren, in particular, looked lost, milling around the leftovers. Adam wasn’t anywhere to be seen. Jonathan and Debbie spoke quietly at the door.
A man of about fifty, with round plastic glasses and long straight hair, approached me. “Are you Monica Faulkner?”
When I nodded, he held out his hand. “Jerry Evanston. I saw Gabby that afternoon.”
I tilted my head. No memory had been jogged.
“Eugene at WDE asked me to go to DownDawg in Burbank to keep an artist company. It was crazy, but he got me my next gig, and I kind of owed him. I didn’t question it. I wanted to say I’m sorry. I didn’t know this would happen. Eugene’s an asshole, but I knew him in college, and he’s always got a favor lined up when I need it.”
I nodded and pointed to let him know I knew he was the one who had kept Gabby company while I fucked up the scratch cut by myself. She’d been right. It had been a setup.
“I’d understand if you’re pissed.”
“It’s okay,” I whispered. “You didn’t know.”
“Your partner played for me, and she was brilliant. Eugene said you were really good.”
I shrugged. It seemed the simplest way to communicate paragraphs worth of feeling. I was good. I was worthless. I was mute. I was music.
“Your voice okay?”
“Laryngitis.”
“I have a proposition for you, because I feel guilty about what happened.”
I nodded. The room suddenly seemed stifling with too many people around, and Yvonne giving me the old eyebrow as if I were her source for interesting news.
“Tell me,” I said.
“I got this job. It’s through Eugene, but that’s not going to matter. Carnival Records. I’m working with the EVP to develop new talent.”
“Herman Neville?” I asked, feeling like Gabby with her magic hat of names.
Jonathan came up behind me, and I took his hand. I wanted to lean on him more than anything. He and Jerry nodded to each other.
Jerry continued, “Yes. And I have this studio time I booked for Thursday. In Burbank. The talent cancelled this morning, and I thought, if you wanted to do something low production value, all you, we could put something decent together, and I could bring it to him. No promises. But I’d feel better.”
“Could it be my song?”
“Well, it would have to be. If you have the voice to sing it, of course.”
“Yes.” My agreement came out in a breath, and I wondered what the hell I was doing. I had no song. Shit, I had no voice. What the fuck was I thinking?
“Great, here’s my card.”
“Thank you.” I stared at it. It just had his name and number. Could have been anyone. And as he left, I thought, he was probably the last person to hear Gabby play.
Jonathan came up behind me as Jerry left, stroking my back, his touch electric even through my sweater. I glanced at Yvonne, who seemed to find our intimacy fascinating in a very “you go, girl” sort of way.
“Are you going to be all right?” he asked softly.
“Tired.”
“Do you want to stay with me for a few days?”
My knees almost lost the ability to hold me up. I wanted nothing more than to crawl into the bed of his spare room, where we’d done all our fucking, and let him stroke and spoon me for days. His voice as I drifted off to sleep, the soft touch of his lips on me, and the feeling of being cared for, safe, partnered, were exactly what I wanted with all my heart. I looked into those jade eyes, which expressed none of the smug dominance of the club, only concern, and said, “I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“You’re not a prince, Jonathan. You’re a king. But I’m not ready.” I touched his face and looked right at him, as if that could transmit the depth of my feelings for him, or my doubts about their prudence.
“I’m trying hard not to be a controlling asshole.”
“You’re doing a good job.”
He left me with a tender kiss that Yvonne saw, and then Darren was gone, too. The staff and all their accouterments disappeared with Debbie telling me I didn’t have to come in tomorrow if I didn’t want to. Then it was me in my clean house, alone. The door to Gabby’s room was closed. I opened it.
My best friend’s knowledge of Hollywood’s web of relationships came from hours and hours of hard work. Her dresser was piled with manila envelopes, each with a name. Colored bars in felt tip pen decorated the bottom of each envelope, cross referenced by name, education, job, and personal and family relationships. Stacks of Variety, the Calendar section of the LA Times, the New York Times, and the Hollywood Reporter rose in towers around the perimeter of the room. I’d asked her repeatedly to make use of the recycle bin, but she always thought there might be one connection she missed, so she couldn’t throw away a shred of paper. In the end, she’d just relegated
the mess to her room and closed the door.
Jonathan’s text came in just as I was considering locking Gabby’s door for good.
—You ok?—
—Feet hurt. Fine otherwise. I’m going to bed—
—Good night, goddess—
—We still need to talk—
—When you can talk, we will. Now get to bed. No touching. I’ll know…—
I was sure he would, somehow. The same way I was sure he knew about the diamond sitting in a baggie downtown.
eighteen
I wanted to stay in bed for days after Gabby’s wake, but I couldn’t skip work. I hustled in for the lunch shift dry-eyed and made up. I put on my stage smile for Debbie, who pursed her red lips and seemed generally unimpressed.
“Can you talk?”
I shook my head.
“So what do you think you’re going to do?”
My face must have been a complete blank because I had no answer. Debbie sighed and called Robert over from the other side of the bar where he was flirting with two women who looked like cover models. She took my pad from my hands and said to him, “Monica’s at the service bar tonight.”
“Why? It’s lunch.”
“Question me again.”
Robert was immediately cowed. The tone in Debbie’s voice triggered something in me as well. A recognition. A wakefulness. When she glanced over at me and indicated I should go around to the other side of the bar, I knew what it was because I’d heard it from Jonathan’s lips. Debbie was a dominant.
The fact that I recognized that told me more about myself than I wanted to know. I’d spent the morning and afternoon in busy sequester, puttering around the house, picking up Gabby’s things, and putting them in boxes. The copies of Variety on top of the piano. The shoes by the door. The metronome she left by the TV. Music sheets. I’d separated them into Keep and Toss and then kept everything for Darren anyway. All that time, I heard not her voice in my head, but her music. I sat at the piano and played one of her compositions, the one she played when she was feeling threatened and powerless, the bombastic thing she’d been at just the other night, and I stopped mid-way. I didn’t sound as good as she had. Some keys were off, but she never wrote down her own stuff. She only did notations on pieces she heard and was trying to figure out. I’d snapped up a few sheets of the notepaper abandoned in the Toss bin and played again, writing down the notes as I went. And then, as if the notes could not be contained as simple sounds, words flowed through them. I had run for the legal pad by my bed.
What if he collars me? Slaps me? Spanks me? Bites me? Fucks me in the ass? Whips me? Hurts me? Displays me? Gags me? Blindfolds me? Shares me? Humiliates me? Ties me down? Makes me bleed? Fucks me up?
That fucking list. I could have added another hundred things.
Chocks my mouth open. Pulls my hair. Fucks my face. Calls me whore. Tells me to lick the floor. Destroys me. Makes me hate myself. Turns me into an animal.
And that was it, wasn’t it? I was afraid of turning into something subhuman, not just to him or to the people around me, but to myself.
I’d remembered the tone in Jonathan’s voice when he demanded something of me. The calmness, the surety, the note itself. A chord. I played it, toying with the sounds until I came up with something in D, and I checked the notations I’d made of Gabby’s piece. I could do it. I could keep her alive. I could figure out how to continue with him, if at all.
Hearing that tone in Debbie’s voice threw me for a second, and I stood silent. She raised her eyebrow and made a motion with her hand, indicating that it was time for me to go under the service bar and do my new job. As I passed her she said, “You need to get to the doctor.”
I smiled, not because I agreed, but because I knew it wasn’t something a doctor could fix. I didn’t know if I’d be able to sing in time to record with Jerry on Thursday, but at least I had the beginnings of a song.
I poured for the girls, dancing around Robert to get to the bottles, refilling the ice when necessary, and replenishing the beer. I was definitely stepping on his territory and his tip total for the shift, so I tried to be nice to him.
I was having a fun time just smiling and nodding as forms of communication, until I saw Darren at the bar, looking sullen.
“Hey,” he said. “You’re back there?”
I indicated the service part of the bar just as Tanya came up with a ticket. I filled glasses with ice, then the liquor, and stuck her ticket at six o’clock. It was still slow, so I leaned over the bar, wiping the space in front of Darren.
“Can you get me a beer?” he asked.
I shook my head. Robert was already giving me the devil eye. I pointed at the beers. Robert slipped it out of the case, poured it, and opened the ticket.
“I got your thing,” Darren said. “Pretty big fucking rock.”
I held out my hand.
“I left it on the piano.”
I nodded and glanced at Debbie, who was on the phone and watching me.
“I’m not sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have called you a whore, but that doesn’t change anything.”
I had so much to say, starting with the fact that I had no use for his non-apology and ending with the fact that I didn’t need his judgmental attitude. But I’d also evened it all out by slapping him good and hard, so it wasn’t resentment I held as much as impatience. He needed to get over it so we could work on the Vancouver piece, whatever that would be.
Angie, another waitress, came by with a ticket, and I poured her drinks. Then Tanya. Then the new girl, whose name I’d forgotten. They were all working harder because I wasn’t on the floor, and Robert was making less, so I tried hard to pull my weight. By the time I turned around, Darren was gone, and two hundred-dollar bills sat under his empty bottle. Robert went for them, but I snatched them first.
“What the fuck, Monica?”
Not being able to talk was getting on my last nerve. I showed him the money and grabbed him by the back of the neck, whispering as clearly as I could, “Paying back a loan.” I looked him in the eye with all the intensity I had. I wasn’t taking an argument for an answer. I pushed him away.
Then I saw Jonathan at the end of the bar. It was the same seat he’d occupied the night I’d kissed him overlooking the Valley on Mulholland and again at the food truck lot. He leaned on both elbows, talking on the phone and watching me. I hadn’t seen him at the Stock since the day he’d left me hungry and begging for him on Sam’s desk. I assumed he was intentionally and respectfully avoiding my shifts. I approached him. He opened his hand, and I took it just as he finished his call.
“Hello, goddess.”
I mouthed, Hello, king.
“Still not talking?”
I shook my head, just staring at him. I was used to him, the curve of his jaw and the color of his hair. He was a familiar thing I was getting to know deeply, line by gorgeous line. I wanted to crawl over the bar and drop into his arms.
“When do you record with that guy?”
Thursday, I mouthed. He watched my lips move with an unnerving intensity.
“And what were you intending to do about this problem?”
I shrugged. I was anxious about the non-talking. I didn’t think about much else, but I didn’t have a cure. I knew it wasn’t physical; fear that kept my vocal cords from connecting.
“Do you have plans after work?”
I shook my head again. Yesterday, I would have been able to answer, but this thing had been getting worse. His concerned look told me he noticed. I caught sight of Sam approaching and slipped my fingers from Jonathan’s and went back to the service bar.
Jonathan didn’t make an appearance at the bar again, which was just as well. The dinner crowd was larger than usual, and we were busy enough for me to get a few grateful looks from Robert. My shift seemed to end in no time at all, but it was dark, and the heat lamps had just been turned on when relief arrived.
Debbie handed Robert and me our envelopes. “Nice night,�
� she said. “Thank you both for working together. You—” She pointed at me. “—get that throat looked at. You did fine, but we don’t need you at the service bar. We need you on the floor, acting witty and charming.”
I nodded, mouthing okay while keeping my eyes downcast. She’d been very kind not to send me home as soon as she realized I couldn’t talk, and I was grateful.
At my locker, I got out my clothes and stuffed my envelope in my pocket. I felt it then, a hard piece that was too rigid to be cash. I tore open the envelope. There was far less than I was used to, as seemed just under the circumstances, and a key card for one of the rooms in the Stock hotel.
My phone blooped right then
—room 522 be naked—
A ripple of electricity coursed between my legs. Despite the fact that he and I had so much to discuss, despite the fact that I couldn’t speak and should go see a doctor, despite everything, I wanted him immediately. I grabbed my bag and shuffled to the elevator, texting on the way.
—Honestly, why bother if I can’t scream your name?—
—You’ll scream—
—I think I’ll just go home and wash my socks—
I was getting out on the fifth floor when I realized the one thing that should get me home right away. I cursed myself. I should have put him off with an honest rescheduling, if for even an hour. But now my jokey, sarcastic texts meant I was on my way up, and my diamond navel ring was on my piano. Fuck.
I stood outside the elevator, staring at my phone. I had to just do it.
—Actually, can I...
I never finished the text. Everything I considered typing sounded like a complete fabrication. I’d already told him I didn’t have any plans. He’d already seen I wasn’t sick or otherwise indisposed. I was just going to have to put on my big girl panties and deal.
nineteen
I didn’t know what to do with myself. I was supposed to be getting undressed and waiting for him naked, but I couldn’t stand before him in all my nude, diamond-less glory. He’d see the missing jewel at some point, of course, but I’d rather it not be in the first three seconds, with him clothed and me squirming and naked.