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Fifty-nine minutes later…Oops! That was the only thing I could think as I stared up at the huge photo of us on the billboard at the side of the road. No, scratch that – big fucking oops!
Pulling out my phone, I opened the email app on it and searched for the magazine and any emails I might have received from them. And there it was… the email confirming that the photo had won the competition, and just to make it even better the photo would feature on billboards throughout the country. Sounding way too calm for the situation, Jose asked, “Is this the only one?”
I’m not sure I wanted to answer that question. I remembered seeing that I had an email from them, but it wasn’t unusual for places to email you marketing shit after you entered a competition, so I hadn’t thought much about it. If memory serves me right, I’d come home later after completing a piece that had taken six hours, and as I’d walked through the door, Jose had dropped to her knees and had my cock in her mouth before I could say hi. Granted, that had been because we’d been sexting back and forth since I’d left that morning, and I’d sent her a long text about what I was going to do to her when I got home, but still. I remembered it well, because she’d said that she bet she could get me to come first, and I’d made the mistake of saying ‘I dare you’. On that occasion, I’d meant it innocently, and she’d taken it literally. It had been an awesome moment, and I’d immediately returned the favor, but it meant I’d forgotten to double check my emails. So, here we were, standing staring at a picture of the two of us that was being looked at throughout the country.
I. Was. Fucked.
Deciding it was better to lead with honesty and run, than lie and end up on the ground with my balls in my brain, I took a deep breath, and then let it out again with the word breathed alongside it. “Nyeh.”
Turning to face me, she raised her eyebrow. “Nyeh? What does nyeh mean?”
Handing her my phone, I unlocked it and showed her the email on the screen. It sounded better when it was worded this way, like it was exciting and a huge honor. We were on these boards, some of the massive marketing boards you saw on the sides of buildings in the city, the cover of the magazine, and there would be some other mentions of it on talk shows and shit like that. That was no big deal, it was a great photo. “What the fuck?” she whispered, sounding horrified as she read it. She’d obviously missed the tone it was written in like I had the first time. “Read it again, it sounds better the second time around.”
When she didn’t reply, I chanced a look at her to see her looking back at the photo with her mouth open. Eventually she found some words for me. “I had a concussion.”
“See, we know that, baby, but the rest of the country doesn’t. You just look beautiful and relaxed in the photograph.”
“I look like I have a concussion.”
Sure, her eyes were half mast, but people definitely would go for either relaxed or tired when they saw it. “I disagree, and the judges disagreed, too. They wouldn’t have chosen our photograph if there was anything wrong with it. If you remove the fact you had a concussion and just look at the picture for what it is, you’ll see an absolutely gorgeous woman being held by her man, while she looks at the camera in a sleepy-relaxed type of way,” I argued, wincing slightly. Seeing the first tear fall down her cheek made my balls crawl up into my armpits. What the hell?
Turning her so she faced me head on, I took a deep breath in and prepared to fight. “Josephine Harrison, I want you to listen to me right now. I’m fucking proud of that photograph and the fact people will see it for a couple of weeks… well, months. Know why?” I waited until she shook her head and then carried on, fighting through the ‘I fucked up’ inferno. “That photo is us, you in my arms, your beautiful face in full view while I’m behind you, holding you up for everyone to see. You look relaxed and content, something that few people saw you look until that day, regardless of whether you had a concussion.”
“I did have a concussion,” she repeated.
“I know,” I growled. “But the rest of the country doesn’t. They see you looking like you haven’t got a care in the world because of the man behind you, and that’s what I want your life to be like. No matter what, I’ve got your back, and I’m doing everything I can to ease all of your burdens. Sure, it would have been better to not be blindsided by it…”