Not just for two weeks. Even a month won’t do. It makes no sense, and yet, it makes perfect sense, especially when I take into consideration my sister’s ridiculous fortune teller visit and my sudden belief in things like fate and kismet.
“Ho?” Reggie rasps quietly, her voice a little strained, probably because I’m applying my full weight on her.
“Yes?”
“Two things. One, you need to get off of me before I become cartoonishly flat, like pita bread.”
I roll over, taking her with me and pressing her to my chest, peppering her face with kisses.
“Done. Second?”
“About your question.”
“Which one?”
“The marry me one.”
Ugh. Things said during sex should never be taken seriously. She literally told me she was going to turn against her own country to get dicked by me.
“Yes?” I can hear my voice growing cold. It was obviously a figure of speech. Why bring it up?
“Were you serious?”
“Yes,” I hear myself saying. Well then. Evidently, it wasn’t a figure of speech. Depending on Reggie’s answer.
“I mean, no, I wasn’t.” I chuckle, then clear my throat. “I don’t know,” I say finally.
Smooth, Horace. Very bloody smooth.
“Can I think about it?” She has the audacity to ask, sucking her lower lip into her mouth and nibbling on it.
Like this is serious.
Like this is real.
Like I’d ever…
“Naturally,” I hear the deranged, barely-patient smile in my voice.
She nods into our embrace. I find the shell of her ear and whisper into it, “I’ll get you, eventually, little Reggie. The sun never sets on the British Empire.”
* * *
We go through three more rounds of sex that night.
The only reason we stop is because I’m quite sure one of us is going to catch fire if we continue all the thrusting and grinding.
It is four o’clock in the morning when we decide to give our genitals a timeout for not controlling themselves around each other.
Reggie falls asleep in my arms, but for me, sleep never comes.
I think back to the moment that brought me here, to this off-chance meet-cute with a complete stranger from the other side of the world, and what made her slither into me, past my skin and bones and reservations, past the walls I’ve built throughout the years, with such terrifying ease.
I remember all the times women I’d been dating and seeing grilled me about my assets. My company. My estate. My vacations. It was never about what I saw, what I did. Always which hotel I stayed in, what did I buy, the underlying question hanging in the air like a sour fart: how much are you making?
Reggie ignored my obvious wealth from the get-go, other than slow-clapping at my lavish apartment and wiggling her busted toes with delight when she first stepped onto my heated bathroom tiles.
Women always try to either play hard to get or throw themselves at me, whatever tactic they think would harvest more success. Whereas Reggie simply...exists. Natural, unfiltered, and slightly unhinged. What you see is what you get with her. She doesn’t have any hidden agendas or Prada dreams.