Authors: Helena Maeve
Marten grinned, his cheeks dimpling. “I love you too, monkey. Now… Do you want to shower with me so we can keep on going with the celebrations?”
Laughter caught in her throat. “Liar, you just want me for a crutch,” Jackie protested, “so you don’t fall and crack your head open.” All the same, she slotted her hand neatly into his, their palms as perfectly aligned as two puzzle pieces.
Chapter Three
Despite a long week and a busy Friday, Jackie woke early on Saturday morning. Marten’s hand was looped around her belly, a heavy, comforting weight that she nevertheless had to brush aside as she slipped from their bed and padded into the bathroom. Under the unflattering lights, her face looked almost ashen. This was it—D-day, the day on which, for better or worse, all her plans would come to fruition. She splashed water onto her cheeks and brushed her teeth, but it did nothing to clear her head. Coffee was the next best attempt.
She had only just curled up on the couch with a mug when she heard Marten’s phone ring in the bedroom—probably friends and family calling to congratulate him. His voice was muffled as he picked up, but a second later, she heard him roll heavily out of bed and start rootling around in the dresser. A similar clacking sound followed as he searched around inside the wardrobe.
“Everything okay?” Jackie asked from the bedroom doorway.
Marten yawned, still in his boxers. “I have to go in. One of the servers is down. I’m the first person from IT they could get in touch with…”
“Today?” croaked Jackie. “But—”
“I know, it’s Saturday,” Marten sighed. “I’ll try to get it fixed as fast as I can.”
“It’s not that.” Her feet shuffling against the cold floors, Jackie rubbed a hand through her tangled hair. “It’s your birthday. You shouldn’t be working, you should be…enjoying yourself.”
With me
. She had been counting on having enough time to work up the nerve to tell him about Tony over the course of the day. With him going off to the office, the prospect was growing dim.
Marten met her eyes, a frown tugging down the corners of his lush lips. “We’ll celebrate. I promise I’ll be back by noon. I’m sure it’s nothing big, probably just a rudimentary issue.” He didn’t sound convinced, but his attempts to put a brave face on didn’t go unnoticed. Jackie held out her cup. She could make more coffee. He needed to be awake for the drive to work. “Forgive me?” Marten pleaded, a wrinkle from the pillows still etched onto his cheek.
“Always,” Jackie said, and meant it. “I’ll fix you up something to eat before you go.”
She slathered a piece of bread with butter and two strips of freshly crisped bacon, still warm from the frying pan. A lazy brunch was one of their most treasured weekend treats. It didn’t need to be abandoned just because Marten had been called in early.
“For tonight…” he said, striding into the kitchen in jeans and a clean shirt. No tie—it was, after all, the weekend. “If you just want to get takeaway and watch movies…”
Their impromptu escapade a few nights back returned to haunt Jackie where she stood under the narrow band of spotlights in the kitchen. She hadn’t jumped him like that since, though almost every night until the last had been pleasantly exhausting. Parts of her were still throbbing with the memory. Her cheeks flamed. “And pretend it’s just another day in the life of? Fat chance, birthday boy. I’m taking you out for dinner…and then there will be a surprise.” Despite herself, she couldn’t help thinking of Tony’s text messages. They had kept a steady stream of conversation since their one and only meeting, albeit continuously interrupted by the constraints of daily life. Every night, without fail, he’d tell her to give the birthday boy a kiss for him. Jackie didn’t do it consciously, but once or twice the thought had crossed her mind. How would Tony’s tongue feel in her mouth? Would he bite at Marten’s lips like she did? Would he moan and sigh when it was over?
Marten’s eyebrows rose in question at the news and he seemed a little more awake as he shrugged his jacket on with both hands already thrust inside the sleeves. Jackie pecked him chastely on the cheek before he left, feeling a bit like she was cheating on him in spirit. It wasn’t that, surely. She desperately wanted him to be a part of whatever ended up happening with Tony. She told herself she was doing it for him first and foremost and any pleasure she took in the act was only coincidental. It was getting harder to believe with every text message and every half-baked fantasy.
And if she happened to be a little excited as she rushed to check her smartphone’s inbox, so what? It didn’t mean she was glad to be alone in an empty apartment, her bare feet cold when they could’ve been warmed by Marten’s broad palms. Much to her disappointment, Tony had actually slept last night rather than bombard her with messages. She felt strangely bereft at the silence and found herself typing
Good morning
and pressing send before she could think the better of it. The fine line between sane, harmless acquaintance and strange stalker lady had long been crossed.
She didn’t have to wait long for a reply.
Morning, lovely. Shouldn’t you be busy with the birthday boy?
He had tacked on a smiley face, in case she couldn’t tell that he was alluding to sex. Jackie wrote back.
Busy today
.
Had to go to the office
.
She paused, thumbs hovering over the touch screen. She wanted to ask if he was available to meet, but didn’t know how to do so without appearing as though she was inviting him over for a quickie while her boyfriend was away. As long as their illicit friendship was only illicit because they were conspiring to prepare Marten’s birthday surprise, she could pretend text messaging with another man was perfectly harmless. It wasn’t.
Let’s have coffee
.
They settled on the place they had gone to the last time Jackie had thought it smart to meet a man behind her boyfriend’s back, and she was surprised to find her hands shaking as she applied her makeup in the bathroom mirror. It was why she decided to go without mascara or eyeliner and only settled on a dash of pale pink lipstick to mark her lips. No more effort than she would’ve put into meeting with her friends. It wasn’t like she was trying to make herself
liked
by Tony. Despite the rumblings of anxiety in her belly, she also took a piece of crispy bacon with her on her way out of the door and chewed it pensively as she waited at the bus stop. Anything to quench the startled butterflies in her belly.
This being the weekend, the punctuality of the work week was utterly absent. Jackie was five minutes late and texting her apologies in the most unambiguous terms by the time she arrived at the café. Tony grinned at her through the window and beckoned her over to a booth. They were the only two people inside, barring the bored-looking barista.
“I’m so sorry I’m late,” Jackie started, paraphrasing what her thumbs had already spelled out in her last, and so far unsent, text message. “There was no bus, so I had to run and try the Metro line—”
Tony smiled. “You’re here now.” Beside his steaming teacup sat a latte all but waiting for Jackie to take the first sip.
“For me?” Why did her heart jump to think he had remembered what kind of coffee she drank? He was probably just an attentive guy.
Tony nodded. “It’s not non-fat…”
“That’s fine,” Jackie said, plucking off her jacket as she sank into the booth. “I, uh, thank you. I’ll get the next round…”
Or maybe lunch?
supplied that small treacherous part of her brain that knew exactly how far from innocent her whole predicament had become.
“So,” Tony pressed, leaning forward on his elbows. “How are you? Having second thoughts yet?” His blue eyes were intent on her as he spoke, as if with one question he could unlock all her secrets and see all the way into her heart. It made Jackie feel exposed, but not uncomfortable. She wondered what it might do to Marten.
She shook her head. “No second thoughts, no. I’m a little nervous, I’ll admit, but…” She thrust out her chin. “I’m still game if you are.” They were in this together, she had decided, and whatever happened tonight would be their shared responsibility, albeit with Jackie carrying the lion’s share as the instigator. They were all adults, capable of making these calls.
They were all going to get along just fine. It was a portion of self-deception that fell apart as soon as Tony brought up their covert plans, “Does he suspect?”
“No.” Jackie frowned. “I don’t know. Marten can be—”
“Marten!” Tony suddenly exclaimed, his open palm smacking the table top with a dull thump. “
That’s
his name!”
Jackie blinked at the outburst. “You forgot?” A thought crystallised as she watched relief wash across his face. “Is that why you’ve been calling him ‘the birthday boy’ all along?”
Behind his cup, Tony chuckled sheepishly. “Yeah, I’m terrible with names. I probably wouldn’t have remembered yours if you hadn’t texted me. Jacqueline sounds very
Dynasty
.” And that was one comment that Jackie was going to ignore.
“About the texting… I hope you don’t mind.”
“I told you,” Tony answered gamely, “unless you’re a spambot, I’m happy to receive any and all emails.”
Jackie folded her hands around her cup. “Why is that?”
“Hmm?”
“Most people would be put off by some chick harassing them at all hours of the day.” Something else was bothering her about their last meeting and the ease with which he had accepted being part of her birthday celebration. “Why did you agree?” Jackie asked, worrying a fingernail into the lacquer surface of the cup. “You don’t know me or Marten, we could be psychopaths…”
“You don’t look like it,” Tony said. His smile was slipping, if only by increments, and Jackie wondered at the wisdom of making him fret. She wanted him to go along with her plan—didn’t she? “I trust my instincts,” Tony went on, “and the woman I met didn’t seem like she was in this for some nefarious purpose. Are you going to tell me I was wrong?”
Jackie shook her head. “I just… I’m not sure I could see myself agreeing, in your shoes.”
“Maybe that’s because you don’t walk in my shoes.” There was something tight in Tony’s smile when he spoke, a trace of weariness that didn’t do too well under close scrutiny. He seemed entranced by the swirls of colour in his teacup for a long moment before he spoke again. “I have a hard time making friends. Part of that’s my career and part of it is the fact that I’m not the easiest person to get along with. As for relationships, it’s easy to pick a bird up in some club, take her home… But as soon as she finds out I take my clothes off for a living—and that I do it for other blokes, too?” Tony shook his head. “Doesn’t really fly, you know?”
When he smiled, the corners of his lips barely twitched up. It seemed to take a great deal of effort to manage even that much. This was obviously a sore spot for him. Jackie was beginning to regret ever prying. “I know plenty of people in the business who get married and have families. For me, though, it’s been an obstacle. So when a pretty brunette sends me an email saying she and her boy toy love my work, what am I supposed to say?” He snorted. “I’m easy to flatter, sweet pea.”
What you are
, Jackie thought,
is lonely
. She kept the theory to herself, biting back an unbidden flash of empathy before it swelled into something more.
“You want to see a movie?” She had counted on meeting him for coffee, maybe a Danish, not a day’s loitering around Rotterdam while Marten was at work. And yet she couldn’t help but feel like she was using him if she only met with him when it suited her.
Tony seemed as taken aback as she felt, so Jackie powered right on by adding, “There’s a shitty romantic comedy playing at the Wolff. We can make the matinee if you want…” She gave him the option, though she only half expected him to take her up on it.
One thing Jackie was fast beginning to realise about Tony was this—he never said no to strange and new experiences. Thanks to this daredevil streak of his, they found themselves slipping out of the theatre some three hours and much popcorn later. The movie had been as terrible as anticipated, but being a matinee on a Saturday, the cinema had been blissfully empty, leaving ample room for their sniggers and mocking commentary.
Tony brushed a few stray kernels of popcorn off Jackie’s sweater and shook his head. “I can’t believe you made me sit through that.”
“Oh, please, I saw you tear up at the end.”
“What can I say?” He laughed. “I’m a sucker for all that true love bullshit and lovers riding off into the sunset together.”
“Really?” Jackie quipped, holding the heavy metal door open for Tony to step through. “And how is that working out for you?” It took her a moment to realise how callous it was to bring up the very thing he’d said made him unhappy. She might have blamed it on the movie, but it had been a comedy, not a death metal record played backwards. It hadn’t even had any fictional powers of persuasion.
The old-fashioned panels overhead announced the next Big Blockbuster in blocky letters. Their light shot shadows over Tony’s face. “I’m a believer,” he answered, reaching his hand up to touch her hair.
Jackie felt her breath catch, thinking he was going to lean in for a kiss, but Tony only brushed a stray curl behind her ear. “Oh…”
“Don’t sound so disappointed,” Tony said, misunderstanding. “I’m not going to burst into crocodile tears and ruin your evening. You and the birthday boy are in perfectly safe hands.” It hadn’t even crossed her mind. Their evening plans were going to be a little challenging to set in motion, yes, but the more Jackie got to know Tony, the less she found she could think of him as just another prop.
She opened her mouth, perhaps to say something along these lines or apologise or call the whole thing off, when Tony announced that he was feeling ravenous. “What do you say to lunch, lovely? My treat.” He had already bought her coffee this morning and, while admittedly Jackie didn’t know what adult-movie stars earned per film, she couldn’t imagine it made for a lavish lifestyle.