I bring the bottle to my nose and inhale deeply, then fall back against the pillows with a satisfied moan.
Kate laughs. “Don’t snort it. It’s moisturizer. I didn’t realize fighting dry skin got you so revved up.”
I look at the bottle. Vanilla and lavender. I take another deep sniff. “It smells like you. Every time you’re near me, you smell like…like a bouquet of fucking sunshine with brown sugar on top.”
She laughs again. “Aw, Drew, I didn’t know you were a poet. William Shakespeare would be so jealous.”
“Is it edible?”
She makes a face. “No.”
Too bad. I’d have poured it on my food like a rich hollandaise. Guess I’ll just have to settle for tasting it on Kate.
Now that I think about it—that is the preferable option.
“They make a bubble bath too. Since you like it so much, I’ll get some.”
It’s the first reference she’s made about a next time. A hook-up at some later date. A future. Unlike my past bump-and-grinds, the suggestion of a second go-around with Kate doesn’t fill me with indifference or irritation. Instead, I’m eager—excited—about the prospect.
I stare at her for a moment, soaking in the strange enjoyment that comes from just looking at her. I could make a full-time profession out of watching Kate Brooks.
“So,” she asks, “did we decide on a movie?”
She settles up against me, and my arm goes naturally around her. “I was thinking Braveheart.”
“Ugh. What is it with that movie? Why are all men addicted to it?”
“Ah, the same reason women are obsessed with the freaking Notebook. That is what you were going to suggest, right?”
She smiles slyly, and I know I guessed right.
“The Notebook is romantic.”
“It’s fucking gay.”
She hits me in the face with the “perfect” pillow.
“It’s sweet.”
“It’s nauseating. I have friends who are flaming homosexuals—and that movie is too gay for them.”
She sighs dreamily. “It’s a love story, a beautiful love story. The way everyone tried to keep them apart. But then, years later, they found each other again. It was fate.”
I roll my eyes. “Fate? Please. Fate’s a frigging fairytale, sweetheart. And the rest of the story is a bonfire of bullshit too. Real life doesn’t work like that.”
“But that’s—”
“That’s why the divorce rate is so high. Because movies like that give women unreasonable expectations.”
And the same goes for romance novels. Alexandra practically took Steven’s head off once because he borrowed one of my Playboys. Yet every summer, there’s The Bitch laying out on the beach with her Fabio-covered soft porn.
Yeah, I said, “porn.” That’s what it is.
And it’s not even good porn: “He moved his trunk-like manhood toward the weeping petals of her womanly center.”
Who the fuck talks like that?
“Real guys don’t think like Nolan or Niles or whatever the hell that douchebag’s name was.”
“Noah.”
“And any man who would build a room in his house for some chick who blew him off? Any man who would wait years for that same girl to show up at his door, knowing she was with someone else? He’s not a man at all.”
“What is he?”
“A big, hairy, unwaxed vagina.”
Was that too crude?
I’m afraid that it was.
Until Kate covers her mouth with her hands and falls over on the couch, convulsing in a fit of deep, snorting laughter. “Oh…my…God. You’re such…a…pig. How…how do you even come up with these things?”
I shrug. “I call them like I see them. I won’t apologize for it.”
Her laughter dies down, but the smile’s still there. “Okay, no Notebook.”
“Thank you.”
Then her whole face lights up. “Oohh, how about Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy?”
“You like Will Ferrell?”
“Are you kidding? Have you seen Blades of Glory?”
It’s one of my favorites. “The Iron Lotus? Classic.”
She wiggles her eyebrows at me and quotes expertly, “You got some sweet cream to soothe that nasty burn?”
I laugh. “God, I love y—”
And then I choke.
And cough.
And clear my throat.
“I love…that movie.” I fiddle with the remote, and we lay down on the couch as Anchorman starts.
Okay—don’t get crazy on me now. Let’s just all calm down for a second, shall we? It was a simple mistake. A slip of the tongue. Nothing more.
My tongue’s been getting quite the workout lately, so I think it’s allowed.