He's laughing.
She pushes his chest.
He shakes his head, gripping my beer still.
They don't see me.
I slip outside. I am about to run, but I see the car. I race across the street. I need the car. I need Stuart.
My lungs are getting thick. The air isn’t coming the way I need it to. His face is stoic as he opens the door, barely registering me. He's so used to it all.
I'm breathless when I leap into the seat. The smell is like my hand sani. It's therapy. I take huge, lung-filling breaths. I hold my trembling hands out. Stuart gets in and squirts the cold alcohol on me.
"Where is Michelle?"
"Inside."
He sighs, "Okay. Home or drive?"
I don’t look at him. I can't. I'm so ashamed. "Drive." My voice is weak and hollow. He doesn’t say anything. He drives.
I open my eyes when I start to feel nauseous. My heartbeat is crazed still. The vibration of my phone brings me back.
I glance at it.
'Where u go?' from Shell.
'Home'
'K. Tell Stuart I said hi.'
'Tell Sebastian I said bye.'
'K. Sorry Em.'
I shake my head and work at not feeling sorry for myself, 'No. I am.'
I can't help but wonder if there was ever love and peace inside of me? Was I always so filled with fear and pain? Was there ever a time when someone held me in their arms and made me feel safe? Was I always scared of cologne and touching?
I look out the window at the dark city streets and see nothing but places to hide.
When Stuart drops me off, I climb the stairs and fight the defeated feeling.
"Look at it this way. You left the house, you went to a bar, you didn’t run out after a second. You were in there for almost an hour."
I smile back at him, "Thanks Stuart."
He shrugs, "It's cool. Tell Michelle to text me later."
I nod, "Night." I turn and climb the rest of the stairs. I let him be the one who's right, not the voice in my head that calls me a freak.
Michelle doesn’t come home right away. It makes me wonder. Is she kissing his lips? The lips I've caught myself staring at. Staring and wondering if they feel the way they look. At least if they get together I can hear the details of what he looks like naked or feels like kissing. I can live through her, like always.
I'm almost insane by the time she comes strolling in the door. She shakes her head, "Sorry. Did I wake you up?"
I watch her. She pulls her phone out and sends a message.
"No. Did you have fun?" I ask. My tone is shitty. I know it is. I'm not sorry.
She shakes her head, "Not so much. It was alright. That Sebastian guy is strung out on you though. Oh my god. He yakked my ear off. Like questions and trying to get your number and sweet fricken god."
A smile forces its way across my lips, "Really? He didn’t hit on you?"
"Uhhh, no. Dude. Ho's before bro's. You saw him first." She sighs, "But he did stop every other guy from hitting on me. He's huge and smoking hot. No one even spoke to me all night. But Stuart was texting me." That puts a grin on her lips.
Sebastian likes me? Even after he saw it? He gets it? I almost pinch myself but decide against it. Better to live in a dream world than no world. I roll over and fall asleep. I'm safe from the lonely and crazy excited for the gym tomorrow.
I wake the next day and race to the gym. I try to act casual, strolling in. I saunter over to the wipes and the up to a machine and pull my hair up into a ponytail. I clean and start at a walk, looking around, wondering if he's coming. Suddenly he bounds in and hops on the machine next to me. "Hey. How's it going?"
I shrug and grin like a fool. "Good. Sorry I bailed last night."
He shakes his head, "No. I get it."
I sigh. He looks yummy and he gets it. Seeing him makes me happy. He starts his machine, "Wanna get breakfast after this?"
I nod, "Sure. Can we get pancakes? I love pancakes."
He winks, "I know a place."
I melt. I can't stop watching him and his form when he runs. I start my speed increases and constantly have to bring my eyes around. The way his pecs bounce and flex when he runs is horribly distracting.
I wonder what he looks like without the shirt. I laugh at myself. When it comes to boys and anything dirty, I'm all bark and no bite. I want to bite but I shut it down before I even let myself entertain the thoughts. It's all I ever let boys be, thoughts, ideas, and dirty stories from Shell.
I finish my run early and get us both wipes. I'm grinning and waiting when he's finally done. He's sweaty and in that moment, I realize I'm seeing another person's sweat differently. It dawns on me that I don’t consider him other people. That’s huge for me.
It turns out watching him eat pancakes is better than eating pancakes, or watching him run. I barely touch my food, watching his jaw move and his eyes light up when he speaks is better than eating.
It's official.
He's my favorite person in the world. I've known him for a week and it feels like a lifetime.
Meeting for workouts and breakfast becomes an instant tradition.
Two weeks later he asks me out on a date again. Finally. I do the butt hop thingy that Shell does. But then I glance at my phone and shudder. My fingers twitch when I drag them over the buttons sending the text I have been dreading all day, 'I'm going out'
'Him again?'
I'm grinning when I send the next word, 'Yup'
'Yup isn't a word. Where?'
'I don't know, it's a surprise'
'You know how I feel about surprises' I make duck lips and think about that. I don’t like them either.
I text, 'I don’t like them either, but I'm trying to be a normal girl and he makes me feel that way'
'I want to know where you're going when you do'
'K'
'K is a letter not a word!'
'O.K.'
His reply of '…' makes me smile. He's such a crotchety bastard.
My smile grows when I see Sebastian standing at the bottom of the stairs by my dorm, looking dressier than normal. He's leaned against the railing in dark-grey dress pants and a matching dress shirt. His hair is styled with product and his face is completely clean-shaven. He smiles when he sees me coming through the door. He doesn’t look like a college boy. It's like the night at the bar, only I don’t feel like throwing up and sweating. Not yet.
"You look beautiful."
I smirk. I know I don’t. I'm wearing black dress pants and a pale green sweater. I look casual. I always look this way.
"Where are we going?" I take the steps slowly.
He shrugs, "You are going to have to trust me."
I don’t like that feeling, but I nod and take his arm. Touching his shirt feels nice. His bicep is strong. He natters on about business and I ignore him. He is very intense with his courses. He's always talking about business, like he's working already. He manages to keep the details on the light side but still tells me tons. I watch his jaw move and the way his lips form the words starting with a w. They stick out, plump and kissable. Wednesday, water, workforce, watchdog. They all become my new favorite words. I sigh.
"So what do you think?" He's watching me. I've missed something crucial in the long-ass story. I have ignored a question of sorts and instead spent the long-ass time watching him.
I wince, "No."
He laughs, "No, you don’t think it's smart to get a hybrid car for running around the city with?"
I am confused-when did we start talking about cars? I shake my head sarcastically, "No?" So glad I told him about the earth sciences articles I wrote.
He laughs, "Sorry. Was I boring you?"
I laugh, because if he knew what he was doing to me, he would think I wanted something other than dinner. Of course, my being all bark and no bite means we would both be disappointed.
We walk for a long time. He tries to pry things from me. I answer with the skill and precision I always do.
"So how many brothers and sisters do you have?" He nudges me as we walk up a hill, past some office buildings.
"Lots. I was raised in a huge family. Where are we going?"
He laughs, "We are there." He points to a glass door in an office building. He opens it casually, laughing about something.
I don’t hear him. I just see the inside of it is a huge foyer with wide windows and a front desk. It's a new place. I twitch. My stomach starts to clench.
I never realized where we might have been heading.
I assumed a safe place in the public, a place like the OCD restaurant.
He walks to an elevator and pushes the button. He's still laughing and joking. He doesn’t see that my hands are sweating. I force myself onto the elevator. When it starts moving, the walls slowly inch their way toward me. My heart rate is skyrocketing. My arms are sweating now. The elevator stops and my knees almost buckle.
He's nattering on about things I don’t hear. He points for me to step off.
His hand is on the small of my back.
I'm almost hyperventilating.
I'm frozen.
He steps off, pushing me forward.
We walk down a hallway that I swear is getting narrower. He opens a dark-colored door. Inside is a glow, like there's candles or firelight. It's a huge space with high ceilings and walls that only go halfway up. Like each room has no ceiling.
The door closes with a click that sounds like a hammer pounding inside of my head. I jump and look around. It's a house. A penthouse apartment. It's got a view of the whole city.
I see another man in the corner of my eye and I'm gone. I've bolted for the door and raced down the hall. He's calling me. He's running after me but I get to the stairs, ignoring his shouts and heavy footsteps that slap the hallway and echo all around me. I run as hard as I can. My legs have trained for this moment. I jump and run until I get to the bottom floor. I bust through into the foyer. I can hear the elevator, but I crash through the front door and out onto the street.