Marian Keyes - Lucy Sullivan Is Getting Married (50 page)

"Yes, Lucy."

"No, I mean really?"

"Yes, really."

"In that case, can we go to bed?"

85 Astonished by my brazenness, I took him by the hand and led him into his bedroom.

I was torn between acute lust and acute embarrassment. Because I was afraid that it could still go horribly wrong.

It was all very well for him to go around telling me he loved me, but the real test, the real issue was the bed one.

What if I was terrible in bed?

What about the fact that we'd been friends for more than ten years? The potential cringe factor was high. How could we possibly be all gooey and romantic about each other and not laugh?

What if he thought I was hideous? He was used to women with huge breasts. What would he say when he saw my fried eggs?

I was so nervous that I almost changed my mind.

But not quite.

I had a chance to sleep with him and I fully intended to avail of it. I loved him. But I also lusted after him.

However, after the flying start where I brazenly took his hand, I ran out of trollopy steam. Once I got him into the bedroom, I didn't really know what to do. Should I drape myself seductively on his duvet? Should I shove lucy sullivan is getting married / 599

him onto the bed and jump on top of him? But I couldn't, it was too morti- fying.

I perched on the edge of his bed. He sat down beside me.

God, this was so much easier when I was drunk.

"What's wrong?" he whispered.

"What if you think I'm hideous?"

"What if you think I'm hideous?" he asked.

"But you're gorgeous." I giggled.

"So are you."

"I'm so nervous," I whispered.

"I am too."

"I don't believe you."

"But I am, honestly," he said. "Here, feel my heart."

That made me edgy. In the past I had submitted my hand for the alleged feeling of a heart and instead my hand had been placed on the young man's erect member and then rubbed up and down said member at high speed.

But Daniel really did place my hand on his heart. And, yes, there did seem to be a fair amount of commotion going on in his chest.

"I love you, Lucy," he said.

"I love you, too," I said shyly.

"Give me a kiss," he said.

"Okay." I turned my face up to his, but I closed my eyes. He kissed my eyes, and my eyebrows, and along my hairline and all the way down to my neck. Light, tantalizing kisses that were almost unbearably pleasurable. Then he kissed the corner of my mouth and gently pulled at my lower lip with his teeth.

"Knock off the arch-seducer stuff," I complained, "and kiss me properly."

"Well, if my form of kissing is not to Madam's satisfaction..." He laughed. 600 / marian keyes

Then he did the smile thing that he did so well. And I kissed him--I couldn't help myself.

"I thought you said you were nervous," he said.

"Shush." I put a finger to my lips. "I nearly forgot about it for a second."

"How about if I lie down on the bed and you lie here next to me in my arms?" he asked as he pulled me down next to him on the bed. "Is that too arch-seducery for you?"

"No, that was nice and clumsily done," I said to his chest.

"Any chance that you might kiss me again, Lucy?" he whispered.

"Okay," I whispered back. "But I don't want any slick moves from you--like you taking my bra off on the first try."

"Don't worry, Lucy, I'll fumble."

"And you're not to say `What's that, Lucy?' and take my panties out from behind my ear. Do you hear?" I said grumpily.

"But that's my party trick," he said. "It's the most spectacular thing I do in bed."

I kissed him again and I relaxed a bit. It was wonderful lying so close to him, inhaling the Daniel smell, touching his beautiful face. God, he was sexy.

"Do you really love me?" I asked again.

"Lucy, I love you so much."

"No, I mean, do you really, really love me?"

"I really, really love you," he said, looking into my eyes. "More than I've ever loved anyone, more than you can imagine."

I relaxed for a second. But only for a second.

"Really?" I asked.

"Really." lucy sullivan is getting married / 601

"No, Daniel, I mean, really, really?"

"Really, really."

"Okay."

There was a little pause.

"You don't mind my asking, do you?" I asked.

"Not at all."

"It's just that I've got to be sure."

"I completely understand. Do you believe me?"

"I believe you."

We lay smiling at each other.

"Lucy?" asked Daniel.

"What?"

"Do you really love me?"

"Daniel, I really love you."

"No, but, Lucy," he said awkwardly. "I mean do you really love me? As in really, really?"

"I really, really love you, Daniel."

"Really?"

"Really."

Very, very slowly, he took off my clothes, skillfully managing to snag zippers and yank things that shouldn't have been yanked. Every time he opened a button he kissed me for about an hour before he opened the next one. He kissed me everywhere. Well, almost everywhere, thankfully he left my feet alone. Fergie had a lot to answer for--men seemed to think that they had to suck toes before they had fulfilled their bedtime duties. A few years ago, it had been cunnilingus--the watching paint dry of sex, I always felt. I didn't like men going near my feet, not unless I'd had plenty of warning--enough of a warning to have had a pedicure. He kissed me and opened buttons, kissed me and peeled my shirt off one shoulder, kissed me again, peeled my shirt off my other shoulder, kissed me again, didn't comment on the grayness of my white 602 / marian keyes

panties, kissed me again, said my breasts weren't like fried eggs, kissed me again, said they were more like hamburger buns, kissed me again. "You're so beautiful, Lucy," he said, over and over again. "I love you."

Until I had nothing on.

There was something very erotic about being naked while he was still dressed.

I clamped my arms around my chest and wrapped myself up in a ball.

"Get your clothes off," I giggled.

"You're so romantic, Lucy," he said, peeling one arm off my chest, then the other.

"Don't hide yourself," he said. "You're too beautiful."

He gently forced my knees away from my chest.

"Get lost," I said, trying to hide my excitement. "How come I'm not wearing a stitch and you're still fully dressed?"

"I can take my clothes off, if you want," he teased.

"Do it then," I said, trying to be brisk.

"Ask me."

"No."

"You'll have to do it, in that case."

I took off his clothes. My fingers were trembling so much that I could hardly open the buttons of his shirt. But it was worth it.

He had such a beautiful chest, such smooth skin, such a flat stomach.

I traced the line of hair from his bellybutton with my fingernail, as far as the waistband of his trousers and a shiver ran through me when I heard him gasp.

Out of the corner of my eye, I had a quick look at the groin area of his pants, and was appalled and thrilled when I saw the way the fabric strained.

Eventually I plucked up enough courage to slowly start lucy sullivan is getting married / 603

opening his pants. But I wasn't used to men in suits. Daniel's trousers had a system of buttons and zips that could rival Fort Knox.

Eventually we liberated his straining erection.

He passed the underpants test. Which was more than could be said for me. My panties had seen better days, most of them inside a washing ma- chine, mistakenly put in with a black wash.

He was gorgeous--and something that made him even more attractive to me--he wasn't perfect. Although his body was beautiful, it wasn't one of those muscular elaborately patterned ones that Chippendales seem to have.

The feel of his skin on my skin was indescribable. Everything felt so sensitive, the skin on the inside of my arms tingled as I wrapped them around his back. The feel of the roughness of his thighs against the softness of mine made me weak, his hardness against my wetness was explosive.

All embarrassment had gone. Only desire remained. When I caught his eye I no longer felt a hysterical urge to laugh. We'd passed over the line--we were no longer Daniel and Lucy, we were a man and a woman.

We hadn't mentioned birth control, but when the time came we were both responsible adults living in the HIV positive nineties.

He produced a condom and I helped him put it on. And then, we...um, you know...

He came in about three seconds. It was mind-blowingly erotic to see Daniel's face scrunched up in ecstasy, ecstasy that I'd caused.

"Sorry, Lucy," he gasped. "I couldn't stop myself, you're so beautiful and I've wanted you for so long."

"I thought you were supposed to be great in bed," 604 / marian keyes

I complained teasingly. "I never heard that you were a premature-ejacula- tion merchant."

"I'm not," he protested anxiously. "I haven't done that since I was a teenager. Just give me five minutes and I'll prove it to you."

I lay in the circle of his arms and he kept up the constant volley of kisses and stroked my back and my thighs and my stomach.

And in an admirably short time, he made love to me again.

The second time lasted for much longer and he did it achingly slowly and tantalizingly and with all the attention focused on me and what I wanted. No one had ever been as selfless and giving in bed to me before. And I climaxed as I never had before, shuddering and trembling, my eyes wide with shock and pleasure.

This time when he came, he kept his eyes open and looked at me. I nearly dissolved, it was so erotic.

We hugged each other fiercely, we couldn't get close enough.

"I wish I could unzip my skin and put you inside me," he said. And I knew what he meant.

We lay in silence for a while.

"There now, that wasn't too bad, was it?" asked Daniel. "What were you afraid of?"

"Lots of things," I laughed. "That you might think I had a horrible body. That you might make me do weird stuff."

"You have a beautiful body. And what kind of weird stuff?"

"Well," I explained, "there are some men who say things like, `Can you just stand on your head, here, don't worry about the pain, I'm told it gets easier to bear after a while. Now, keeping your legs at a one-thirty-degree angle to each other, I'm going to enter you from behind, lucy sullivan is getting married / 605

now you can move your entire body in a kind of pincer like movement, approximately eight inches, no, I said eight inches, that's more like ten--stupid bitch, are you trying to kill me?'--that kind of thing."

He laughed and laughed, and that felt wonderful too.

And then, more sleepily, more relaxed, we made love again.

"What time is it?" I asked later.

"About two."

"Do you have to work in the morning?"

"Yes, do you?"

"Yes, I suppose we should get some sleep," I said.

But we didn't.

I was starving, so Daniel went to the kitchen and came back with a packet of chocolate cookies, and we lay in bed and ate them and hugged each other and kissed each other and talked about nothing in particular.

"I should join a gym," he said ruefully, poking a finger into his stomach. "If I had known that this was going to happen, I would have joined months ago."

That, more than anything, endeared him to me.

When we finished the cookies, he commanded me, "Sit up."

I sat.

He brushed the sheets with vigor.

"I can't have my woman sleeping on chocolate cookie crumbs," he said.

As I smiled at him, the phone rang and I jumped about a foot. Daniel answered it.

"Hello, oh hello, Karen, yes, I am in bed actually."

A pause.

"Lucy?" he asked slowly, as if he'd never heard such a name. "Lucy Sullivan?"

Another pause. 606 / marian keyes

"Lucy Sullivan, your roommate? That Lucy Sullivan? Yes, she's right here beside me.... Yes, right here beside me in bed," he said. "Would you like to speak to her?"

I made all kinds of frantic denial actions and made a cross of my two index fingers and held them toward the phone.

"Oh yes," said Daniel cheerfully. "Three times. Wasn't it three times, Lucy?"

"Wasn't what three times?" I asked.

"The number of times I've made love to you in the last couple of hours."

"Um, yes, three," I said faintly.

"Yes, it was definitely three, Karen. Although we might do it again before the night is over. Is there anything else you need to know?"

I heard screaming and ranting from Karen. Even I heard the crunch when she banged down the phone.

"What did she say?" I asked.

"She said she hopes we give each other AIDS."

"Is that all?"

"Er, yes."

"Come on, Dan, what else did she say?"

"Lucy, I don't want to upset you..."

"You've got to tell me now."

"She said that she slept with Gus when you were going out with him."

He looked at me anxiously. "Have I upset you?"

"No, I'm kind of relieved. I always felt that there was someone else. But are you upset?"

"Why would I be upset? I wasn't going out with Gus."

"No, but you were going out with Karen when I was going out with Gus. If she slept with Gus, then..."

"Oh, I see," he said cheerfully. "It means that she two-timed me."

"Do you mind?" I asked anxiously. lucy sullivan is getting married / 607

"Of course I don't mind. I couldn't care less about Karen sleeping with him. It was you sleeping with him that bothered me."

We lay in silence, the circle of bliss ruptured.

"I'll have to move out," I said finally.

"You can move in here," he offered.

"Don't be ridiculous," I said. "We've only been going out with each other three and a half hours. Isn't it a bit soon to be talking about living together?"

"Living together?" Daniel sounded shocked. "Who mentioned living together?"

"You did."

"No, I didn't. I'm far too frightened of your mother to suggest living in sin with her only daughter."