Nothing More Beautiful (18 page)

He smiled at me. Then, without warning, he
grabbed my legs near my hips and plunged inside. I groaned from the
pain and pleasure, the filling sensation swooping in, stretching,
engulfing.

His breath hitched as he looked down at me,
his eyes distant, as though he were somewhere else.

I forgave it, the feeling of something
building inside of me back, growing, tensing, about to explode. I
closed my eyes, my body shaking as he thrust, harder and harder,
like a wild jackhammer pounding. The pulse in my throat increased,
and I could feel it thumping, my adrenaline surging. The feeling
continued to escalate, his thrusts now wild, savage, and I knew at
any moment my body would erupt in ecstasy.

His rapid breaths climbed and climbed until
he screamed, “AH!” A series of grunts followed, then he stopped
deep, deep inside me, and I tried to keep going, but he pinned me
down, rendering me immobile. He shuddered as his climax ended. I
held still as he pulled out. His eyes returned to normal from the
distant glaze they’d possessed, and he rolled over, catching his
breath, lying on his back.

“You didn’t—” he managed to get out,
fighting for breath. He waited a moment before he tried again. “You
didn’t come.”

I turned over, lying on top of his chest,
kissing below his neck, buying time as I thought of what to say.
What would he want to hear? With all my other boyfriends I had lied
and it had never gotten anywhere, so I decided with Vince to give
honesty a chance. “No,” I said, my breaths already back to normal.
“I never have, actually.”

“Never?” he said, his voice cracking in
shock.

“It’s not from lack of trying,” I joked, but
he didn’t find the comment amusing. “I guess I’m not wired to have
them.” I could feel the sperm swimming their way down and out, so I
excused myself and headed for the master bathroom. When I returned,
he was sitting, his back propped up against the headboard with
pillows buffering the thick wood.

He looked eager to continue from where we’d
left off, but then decided against it when his phone rang. Terrance
was at the door with our food. Vince dressed and sauntered to the
entrance.

I dressed and made my way to the kitchen,
electing neither to ask why he seemed so distant during the act,
but also not wishing to continue with our previous topic. The mood
was mellow and I didn’t want to ruin it with serious questions.
Vince shut the door and unloaded the food on the giant table,
spreading it out. “I’d like to do this again,” he said after
wolfing down half a dozen Gorgonzola fries.

I hesitated, unsure if I should make a third
attempt. I could hear Danielle in the back of my mind,
money
won’t buy you orgasms
. On the other hand, I really liked
spending time with him, more than with anyone before, including
Ryan. “Tomorrow night?”

“I can’t. I have to work tomorrow night.
Friday?”

“Sure, I can do Friday.” I scooped up a
spoonful of mac and cheese, licking my lips for show.

The rest of the night went as well as the
last, though neither of us mentioned what happened in the bedroom.
The conversation never paused until I said I had to go home. He
frowned at that, puzzled.

“I’ll see you Friday?” he said, waiting at
the elevator.

I smiled when the elevator dinged, its door
withdrawing into darkness. “Friday,” I said, stepping inside. I hit
the button for the ground floor and the doors slid closed, cutting
off Vince’s wave.

And that ended another disappointingly
orgasm-less night in the ongoing string of letdowns.

“R
eally? A third date?”
Danielle stared at me from the kitchen, her hands on her hips in
dismay. “After last night, you’re still willing to go for a third?”
She returned to the stove top, out of view.

“I don’t know,” I said from the couch,
gazing at the ceiling. Colby-Jack was lying on the couch’s arm
above my head. “We connect so well in all other aspects, and it’s
not like he’s the worst lover I’ve had . . . It
just doesn’t make sense to call the relationship a failure and move
on.”

She popped her head into view. “That’s
exactly what you need to do. You’ll find someone else out there who
you’ll connect with on
all
levels, not just most.”

“But what if I don’t?” My fear of spending a
lifetime alone was giving me serious pause.

“You’re too beautiful to be single long,”
she encouraged. “It might take twenty guys, but you’ll find what
I’m talking about.”

“Twenty? I’m not a hooker, Danielle.” I
sighed, looking at Colby-Jack, listening to his soft wheeze as he
slept.

“Sleeping with twenty people doesn’t make
you a hooker or a whore,” she said. “It makes you committed. If
Vince doesn’t do it for you, then Vince doesn’t do it for you. You
can’t change that. You gave him a chance and it didn’t work out.
Plus you were overly concerned about him spending money on you. I
mean, do you really see the relationship going somewhere?”

I evaluated that question, scrutinizing it
from all angles, and it seemed so muddled. Could I see Vince as a
father? It was hard to say with his busy lifestyle, but then again,
so was mine. Would either of us ever be home? The thought of
retiring entered my mind, but it sounded dull and uninspired. I
couldn’t do it. I needed my business, needed to know that I could
bring home the bacon, too. It was in my blood to work for my
money—not have it handed to me—and I liked it that way. I liked
knowing I was achieving something.

Besides the money, though, there was little
else stemming our relationship. I could get by without having
orgasms, couldn’t I? After all, I’d been doing it for 25 years,
what was another 50?

“You didn’t answer me,” Danielle said, her
head reappearing in the doorway.

“I was thinking—jeez.”

“And?”

“And I don’t know,” I said, getting off the
couch.

She disappeared again, back to frying.
“Well, there’s your answer. Dinner’s almost done, by the way.”

“I don’t know if I can eat,” I said, my head
swirling with confusion.

“Of course you can eat, it’s chicken fried
rice.” I could hear the sizzle over the kitchen fan, and the smell
did draw me in, making my mouth water.

My stomach growled, unfed since eleven a.m.,
and I had done an extended run outside, about six miles. It felt
good to be outside and running again, muscle memory returning, my
form getting back to what it had been in high school. “Yeah, you’re
right.”

She turned off the stovetop and removed the
pan to a trivet, scooping the dish into two deep bowls. “Here ya
go.” She handed me a steaming bowl. “You know, it’s funny, you’re
the one with the cooking degree, but I’m the one who cooks more at
home.”

“My degree is in pastries and management,” I
reminded her. “Plus, that’s what I do most of the day. A break is
nice sometimes.”

“Yeah, I guess,” she laughed.

I retrieved two forks from the silverware
drawer and handed her one, heading into the living room. Despite
having a table, we rarely ate at it, except for breakfast on the
weekends when I went into work later. “What do you want to watch?”
she asked, scanning through our Netflix queue. “‘
Orange is the
New Black
?’”

“I kinda already watched the third episode,”
I admitted, sitting on the couch.

“Without me? You said you’d wait.”

“I got bored,” I defended, “and it’s not
like you haven’t watched a show without me.”

She glared at me. “You’ll just have to
rewatch it then.”

“That’s fair,” I said, with a mouthful of
fried rice. “This is really good. Hot, but really good.”

She grinned as she selected the episode.
“I’m glad you approve.”

“And I promise I won’t spoil anything.” She
only laughed, knowing that I had a bad habit of divulging
endings.

“So what about this Vince situation?” she
asked after we ate and the show ended.

“You really think I should just end it?”

She nodded. “A clean break.”

“Do I have to do it in person?”

“You slept with him, but only went out
twice . . . I’d say it could go either
way.”

I went and got my phone from my bed. “Two
dates . . . I think it’d be all right if I only
texted him, right?”

“Break-up by text is rough,” she said,
making a sour face. “You did say he’s a nice guy, after all.”

“That’s why I think over the phone would be
so much harder.”

“Well, it’s up to you.”

I stared at his phone number. “I can’t do
it. I can’t call him.” I opened up the text screen and wrote out
Hey, I had a lot of fun with you on our last two dates, but I
can’t make it tomorrow. Sorry. Actually, I don’t think we should
see each other anymore. Sorry. We are not really in the same place.
Sorry. I wish you the best of luck.
“Will you read it? I’m not
very good at this.” I handed Danielle the phone.

“That’s an understatement. You apologize too
much, and your writing is so proper for a text,” she criticized.
“And what’s with the last line? It sounds like a rejection
letter.”

“Isn’t it?”

She handed back the phone. “You know what I
mean. Anyway, I’d take out at least two of those ‘sorry’s.”

I reread the message and erased the first
two “sorry”s. My thumb hovered over the send key. I drew in a deep
breath. “Okay, here I go.”

Danielle saw my wavering and reached over
and tapped the send key. “You’re welcome,” she said in a superior
tone.

My jaw dropped as I stared at the screen, a
small part of me wishing I could take it back, but everything moved
too fast in the digital age. The message had already reached him
before I exhaled.

EITHER VINCE’S PHONE WAS
being upgraded again, or he was choosing not to respond to my
breakup text, which was probably the most likely scenario. It was
hard to gauge his interest in me, and how hard the news would hit
him. He might just move on without skipping a beat, but I doubted
that.

It actually affected me more than I thought
it would. I was barely able to crawl out of bed on Friday morning,
depressed and regretful. I wore my most comfortable pants that I
could pass off as professional, and a baggy t-shirt, which was well
hidden under my apron.

When Danielle arrived home, she found me
face down on the couch, one of my favorite spots for reflection.
“Pizza?” was all she said.

“Yeah,” I answered.

“Pepperoni and olives?”

I rolled over. “Yeah.”

“I’ll call Ashley, too.” She ordered the
pizza and invited her fiancée over. “You want to talk about it?
Bridgett said you were mopey all day.”

“I just think I made a terrible, terrible
mistake, Danielle. Vince was a great guy.”

“But not Mr. Right,” she pointed out.

“Oh, fuck Mr. Right,” I growled. “He doesn’t
exist. Vince does.”

“Then call him and say you made a
mistake.”

“You can’t just dump someone and then
suddenly change your mind,” I said, shaking my head. “Especially
since I dumped him by text.”

A knock at the door interrupted her reply.
She hurried to the peephole. “Holy shit.”

“What? Who is it?”

“It’s fucking Vince,” she whispered, turning
to me.

I jumped off the couch. “What?” I whispered
back. “Let me see.” She scooted over and I spied through, sighting
Vince on the other side. “What’s he doing here?”

“I don’t know?”

He knocked again, louder this time.

“What do we do?”

“Open the door?” she ventured, still keeping
her voice at a whisper.

I straightened up, sucked in a big breath,
and rested my hand on the doorknob. Danielle sprinted for the
kitchen, out of sight but within hearing range. I opened the door.
“Vince, what are you doing here?”

“Hey, Maci,” he said nervously. “After I got
your text last night, I’ve been going over our relationship,
because I thought everything was going well, that we were doing
well . . . Anyway, your text shocked me, to say
the least. And after going through everything in my mind, because
we connected so well, there was only one hiccup that I could
detect, and that was the sex. Am I wrong there?”

I gaped at him, frozen, speechless. My brain
had stopped communicating with my mouth and it wouldn’t form a
syllable.

“Are you going to say anything?” he asked
after a minute went by in awkward silence.

“You caught me a little off guard,” I
finally got out. “I wasn’t expecting you to just show up.”

“I thought it would be best to communicate
face-to-face,” he said, shifting his weight to his left. “So, am I
wrong?”

“I—I—uh—no. No, you weren’t wrong.”

“So it was the no orgasm thing, right?”

I nodded, too embarrassed to speak.

“Can we talk privately?” he asked. “I can
see Danielle peeking from the kitchen.”

I twisted back and saw a trace of her eye
before she retreated. “Yeah, we can talk in my room.” I closed the
door after he crossed the threshold, leading him to my room,
locking the door behind us. He unslung a black messenger bag, which
I hadn’t even noticed until now, and laid it on the bed. “Nice
bag.”

He smiled thinly. “Thanks, I had never liked
bags like these before, but Alma got it for me because my backpack
was falling apart, and I’ve gotten used to it. But I didn’t come
here to talk about my bag.” His lips hardened in a straight line,
serious. Another long pause stole the air in the room. “So, what
was it? My ineptness? Did I go too fast? Was it because I didn’t
talk dirty, because I can talk dirty, if that’s what you want.”

“I don’t know what it was,” I said with
honesty. “I’ve just never had one, and Danielle got it in my head
that I need to find someone who can give me—those—and since I
didn’t with you, I figured I wouldn’t, so I sent you that text, but
then I regretted sending you the text. UGH!” I sat down on the bed,
rubbing my exhausted eyes.