“Asher?” I said, confused. “It’s alright. Can we lay here for a little while?”
“No,” he said.
“Asher…”
“I shouldn’t have done that, Jessika. I took things too far. That was extremely unprofessional of me. I don’t know what I’m going to tell Beatrice. I don’t know if I can tell her. This entire day was a bad idea.” He paced through his guest house living room, looking distraught.
I frantically tried to think of something to say or do, but I couldn’t. He had a point in everything he said. We shouldn’t have done this. I knew it was a bad idea. A married man? Why would I even do that? Why was I here in the first place? What was I doing?
And then I remembered.
“Yes,” I said, a whisper, unsure if this was what I should do or not. “Asher, I’ll do it. What you asked, your request. I agree. Just… please…”#p#分页标题#e#
“What?” He stopped pacing and looked at me.
“I’ll be an egg donor for your wife,” I said, then added, “And a surrogate mother. I’ll do it.”
He smiled, happy, but only for a second. Then the reality of what had happened and what we’d just done came crashing back down on him again.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” he said. “We can’t… we can’t do this again, Jessika, and the temptation will always be there, especially…”
Especially, I thought, if I were already pregnant with his child. Through medical means, the impregnation process, however that would work for the situation he required, but still. If I carried his child, even if it was for him and his wife, I knew it would be easier for both of us to explain away another casual encounter like this.
Except that wasn’t my reason for agreeing. I didn’t know how to tell him that, couldn’t explain it all myself, but that wasn’t what I wanted. I didn’t want anything casual with him, ever. I wanted more, anything. Intimacy and conversation and… but I’d ruined it in one fell swoop.
“Asher, please.”
“You can stay in the guest house tonight,” he said. “I’ll have Jeremy drive you home in the morning.”
His Absolute Orders
*
A Reverie Interlude
Asher and I, sitting on a park bench. A quaint tablecloth, with a spread of sandwiches, potato salad, and sliced, raw vegetables are between us. I tease him and toss a slice of cucumber at him. It clings to the fabric of his fancy dress shirt, then falls into his lap. He threatens to throw a spoonful of potato salad at me and I shriek and laugh and tell him he wouldn’t dare. We’re both laughing.
Our daughter, our beautiful daughter, comes running up. She was playing on the swings as we watched over her from the bench. She politely asks her daddy if she can please have a baby carrot. He smiles at her, so sweet and calm, holds up the tray with the carrots so she can have her pick.
Idyllic. Everything nice and wonderful.
And then I woke up.
…
Asher left me after our photography session. I don’t think he expected it to go as far as it did, and to be honest I never expected it to, either. When I agreed to join him for lunch, I didn’t expect to come back to his home afterwards and do anything, let alone become the model for an impromptu photo shoot. I didn’t expect to take off my clothing and pose in scandalous positions for him, nor did I expect to concoct some ridiculous idea of seduction and convince him that it was fine.
In fact, it wasn’t fine. Because of that, because of what I’d done, I’d lost him forever. I’d never had him to begin with, and I knew he was a married man, but I wanted so desperately to believe in something. To believe that he had a rocky marriage of convenience and he wanted me, maybe that he could love me. Except, how?
I had known Asher for two days. This morning was the start of the third day. The first had been a short, though thorough meeting, and the second was our first somewhat full day together. This third day was our last, and after that I would never see him again. I’d played at a game of temptations and now I was paying the price for losing.
It was so wonderful, though! I could see why Asher enjoyed photography. Or, I didn’t quite understand it, but I saw how much he got into it. I hadn’t meant to, not exactly, but I became so swept up in his passion for his hobby that I wanted and needed more. In the end, without thinking, both of us had sex on the floor in front of the fireplace in his guest house. Why did I think this might lead to something more? Honestly, right now I couldn’t have answered.
It led to nothing, though. Asher told me to leave. I lay on the floor, having slept there overnight, waiting. Before he left, he told me that Jeremy would bring me home in the morning. It was morning now, but no one had come for me yet. When he did, I wasn’t sure what I should do.