Blocked?
Beep-beep-beep! She whammed her hand on the alarm button, but it was elusive; a little too far out of her grasp, but instead she whacked the heel of her hand on the corner of her end table and listened to her own yelp of protest.
“Damn it.” She opened her eyes, giving the machine a glare meant to melt circuits. 6:00 a.m.—time for work. Really? Had she really only gotten two and a half hours of sleep at best? Shit.
She stood up, forced herself to stretch and then wondered why she felt so sore, so sticky, so—
Oh. Dylan’s tongue on her clit, lapping in circles as his finger slid in and out, her legs on his shoulders and — That’s why. She closed her eyes and sighed heavily, letting emotion wash over her and just feeling it, knowing that blocking it, denying it, or pushing it aside would do her no good.
Let it be and it would fade. Force it away and she’d carry the pain forever.
What she had thought might have been just wasn’t meant to be, and she had to accept that. Too good to be true, really —the night was some sort of magical, very authentic encounter with a hot guy way out of her league.
But that was okay. It was okay. It was a new day and she reached for her smart phone, confirming the time and then seeing that she had about twenty-seven texts from Josie, and she’d have to answer those later. Josie would make her spill everything, tell all, and would congratulate her for refusing to accept second best.
Right now, though, Laura needed to wallow. And that, like so much else, was okay.
Her coffeemaker gurgled, the tell-tale signs that the cup was just about finished. She had forgotten that before the date she’d set it all up just like she always did, had come home from work and set up the coffee for the next day. Grateful, she sloshed the coffee into her mug and sat down, booting up her computer to check email, today like any other morning, although she knew deep inside it really wasn’t.
Dylan, Dylan, Dylan, Dylan, Dylan.
Laura popped into her email, ignored a bunch of ads, found nothing of real value in there until suddenly she noticed that the online dating site had sent her a message. “You have a new request to chat.” Yep—boom, boom, boom, boom. A hugely full inbox.
She had 17 new requests to chat. Yeah, right— they wouldn’t be chat requests, but rather fuck requests. Thanks, guys, I’m all chatted out and my fuck request meter is broken.
She knew it was all right, deep down. That’s what she wanted— she wanted more of last night. The magic. The thrill. Being charmed and charming someone back. Falling into that special knowing and feeling warm and safe and excited all at once, the heady passion of the new.
The image of the pictures all over Dylan’s room filled her brain—that woman, his girlfriend, his wife, his whatever. He didn’t wear a ring, but that didn’t mean anything. She had learned that within her second or third date after college. The married men always lied and they tended to be the slickest—and this guy was pretty slick. Laura took a deep breath and it almost tasted like he was in her, as if his scent had permeated her lungs, as if it coated her trachea, as if—
Inhale. Exhale. She breathed in, she breathed out—breathed in sadness, breathed out happiness, breathed in sorrow, breathed out joy. No matter how hard she tried, though, it wasn’t cutting it. Caffeine would have to do what meditation could not, no matter what her yoga teacher said about the evils of coffee. You can pry my caffeine from my cold, dead, outstretched hand.
She sucked down the cup of coffee, poured herself another and thought what the hell and clicked on one of those chat messages in email. Hmmm. Hey there, Mike, she thought to herself. Some guy named Mike wanted to meet or wanted to chat with her. Mike— let’s see, he’s 32, 6’5”, 180, okay he sounded like a runner. Online dating was devolving into ordering from a menu. Would you like fries with that?
There it was: “likes to run marathons and works at a ski resort.” Oh, dear— her idea of running was waving madly at the bus driver and sprinting when she was late for the morning bus, and skiing? Lodge. Hot toddy. Not snow.
Deleting his message would have been the easiest thing in the world, and her finger even hovered over the button, but something stopped her. If Josie had been there and asked, Laura couldn’t have explained it. She just...stopped. Clicking to his profile, she read up on him. He looked kind of like the opposite of Dylan. This guy had sandy blonde hair and Nordic features while Dylan was Italian and dark and swarthy. Mike looked long and lean with pictures of him riding a bike, shots of him crossing finish lines, and pictures of him camping.