Someone to Love(52)

“The heater worked last night!” She marvels, and my heart sinks like a stone.

I fired it up while she was gone, hoping she’d come to my bed willingly.

My chest grows heavy. Kenny managed to deflate my ego with one prick of her tongue. I was nothing more than a heater. And last night, when she didn’t need my services, she didn’t bother to show.

With all my heart and soul I wish she wanted me. A part of me wants to weep like a schoolgirl at the thought of Kenny getting it on with Cal or any other asshole that happens to rub up next to her.

My lips twitch a mournful smile. I want to look away, pull my gaze from hers, but she’s hooked me, reeled me in with those sea glass lenses.

“Look at me, Kenny.” I glance down at my body. “I want you to see every part of me.” I grab a hold of the towel cinched at my waist, and her lips part, her eyes magnify in size at what I’m about to do. She shakes her head ever so slightly, mortified that I had ditched “good morning” and went for the carnal jugular before she could down her coffee. I open the towel, slow and methodical, exposing her in full to every inch of my being.

Selfishly, I don’t want Kenny to see me for the first time in front of strangers while she tries to sketch me with shade and light. Selfishly, I wish she wanted to see me, to have me all for herself.

She turns away, quick as a hurricane, and spills the contents of her mug in the process.

“Shit, Cruise. Good morning to you, too.” She lands her cup hard on the sink and leans toward the window.

“Lesson of the day.” I come up from behind—adhere myself to the curve of her body and don’t bother to pull away once I feel myself grow. “I want you to see me like this,” I whisper almost ashamed of what I’m asking her to do. “You don’t have to touch. Just look.” It comes out sad, forlorn because I know deep down inside she won’t—that I don’t deserve to have her look at me.

“Cruise…” She turns her head into my shoulder. She doesn’t say anything, and for a minute, I think she might cry, that I might turn into a giant pussy and join in on the sob-fest.

I offer a gentle kiss to her cheek, and our lips find one another for the first time in a week. It’s as if she were afraid to kiss me lying in my bed, as if my mouth were the portal to unspoken treasures, and once she entered she could never leave.

That visual of her touching Cal on the collar, laughing at whatever flew from his lips, rolls through me like rancid fat, and I pull away.

“I guess I’ll see you in class,” I say, cinching up my towel.

She takes a breath, never taking her sad eyes off mine. “I guess you will.”





11


Kendall

The Big Surprise





It’s my birthday.

I arrive late to Professor Look-At-Me-Naked Elton’s class and take a seat next to the thin-lipped girl who greets me with her traditional snarl.

Figures. It’s going to be a crap day all around, I can tell.

I came so close to telling Cruise that I have feelings for him. That I don’t want to pretend to play this sick little game I thought was cute a few short weeks ago. That I actually want to engage in a monogamous relationship with him and do everything with his body that he would ever want, but the words wouldn’t formulate on my lips. Technically, it was his fault for sidelining me by asking me to conduct a body-scan before breakfast. Hell—who am I kidding? I would have inhaled his body for breakfast, but a part of me is holding back. If Cruise doesn’t want just me, then I suppose I shouldn’t want him in that way—and, frighteningly enough, I think I still do.

“The finality of love.” He belts it out like a song, looking hotter than a bonfire in his dark corduroy jacket, his inky jeans and cowboy boots—my heart lurches just laying eyes on him.

To hell with it. I’m jumping in his bed tonight and having myself a nice little birthday. He’s wearing cowboy boots for God’s sake. The man doesn’t fight fair.

“Today, I thought we would touch upon the vulnerability we face once we’ve fallen in love.” Our eyes meet, and he gives a quick wink. Obviously, he thinks love is a joke, and only he and I are privy to the punch line. “Can anybody tell me why a person becomes vulnerable when experiencing love—especially for the very first time?”

Miss Thin Lips spikes her hand in the air like she’s about to have an accident. Personally, I’m rooting for the accident.

“Cheryl.” He nods with a prolonged blink.

Ha! She is totally getting on his last nerve.

She clears her throat and cuts me a look as if she heard. “It’s because love embroils its participants in a psychological power exchange that takes place once you trust someone with your heart.” She wiggles proud in her seat after dispensing the armchair psychiatry. “If I were to fall in love with someone, and they broke that sacred trust, I would forever be wounded and therefore protect my heart from ever being crushed in such a violent manner again. Naturally, I would build defenses. I might even resort to meaningless sexual exchanges as nothing more than a device to satisfy myself—there wouldn’t be any real love involved because I would probably stop believing in it.”