Fifteen
I don’t think I would feel so bad about lying there next to him, unable to sleep because of the nuclear levels of lust running through me, if it were not for the fact that he just goes right off. Out like a fucking light. As if nothing at all is going on with him. He is fine and dandy, not a care in the world, completely unaffected.
He even looks like he’s having peaceful dreams.
I glance across the enormous, ridiculous divide between us, and his head is turned on the pillow toward me. And the expression on his face can only be described as oblivious contentment. There’s almost a smile on his lips; both his eyebrows are a little raised like a man in the middle of saying a cheery hello.
It’s hell. This is hell.
And the kind of hell I can’t do anything about.
There’s no way I can slip to the bathroom and get myself off. I could hear him flossing when he went in there after the kiss that killed sense. I made out a comb going through his hair. Doing myself will sound like a herd of elephants stampeding through a vagina, by comparison.
I can’t.
I can’t.
I have to just focus on falling asleep, instead. And I do, it’s true.
But then I dream, and oh god, the dreaming is horrendous. In it, I’m running from some monster from a slasher movie. And I stumble, and crash into trees. My torch stops working. Somehow I keep going the wrong way.
Then suddenly there he is.
Coming right out of the darkness at me.
You’re safe now , he says, as he scoops me up in his arms. And even though I’m not the sort to like being scooped, or even the kind of person who might find that sexy, somehow it is when it’s him. I go all swoony, like some princess in a fairy tale. Only instead of thanking him with my hand in marriage or whatever, I do it by dragging him down onto the forest floor, and having hot, sweaty sex with him.
Only it’s not exactly hot, sweaty sex.
It’s softer and sweeter, to the point where I want to call it something else. Making love, I think. This is what making love must feel like. And I want to blanch over that. But the thing is, it isn’t too much or too intimate or too eye roll-y, like I always thought it would be. It feels good. It makes me moan and squirm beneath him, arms going around his body to hold him closer. And when I do, he doesn’t pull away. He leans into it. He whispers against me. God, you’re lovely , he says, just like he did in reality. Only this time, I know he means it.
It’s real, so real.
And it practically pours pleasure through me. In fact, it almost feels like I’m coming, just hearing him say it. Like the heat is building and building, low in my belly and then – oh god, oh god, I think I am. I think maybe it happens, all heavy and intense and too much.
But more important:
Real. Jesus, I think it was real . I wake up to the last embers of it thrumming through me – like a fucking teenager having a wet dream. Over something that wasn’t even kinky or lewd. It was just soppy sex, after he saved me from monsters in some horror movie that doesn’t exist.
And worse: he heard me, oh god, he heard me.
‘Are you okay? You were moaning,’ he says.
Because of course I was. I still want to moan now, seeing him leaning over me in the darkness. Shoulders all massive, thick black hair slightly mussed, eyes heavy with sleep in a way that’s indistinguishable from when they’re heavy with confused desire. One hand on the divide, because naturally he doesn’t want to breach it. Though I can tell he would like to.
Innocently, just to comfort me, of course.
But what would that matter, when even the thought riles me up? I almost say to him: Just go ahead. Put a friendly hand on my shoulder. I promise I won’t try to suck one of your fingers into my mouth until your eyes roll back into your head.
Because they would, I know.
If I just dared...
‘It was just a bad dream,’ I blurt out.
But it doesn’t help. Because he says, ‘Do you want me to hold you?’ and I swear I come so close to saying yes I have to clench my teeth, to catch it before it comes out. And long after he’s gone back to sleep, I still feel it.
That sense of wanting something I’ve never wanted before.
From someone I know can never really give it to me.
T he good thing about day two of this endless nightmare is that it includes a lot of distractions. I have a whole itinerary of things to do, starting with a meet and greet with the group I’ll be a part of. Which sounds dull and not like it will distract me at all. But it is immediately more than I thought it would be.
I get to a building called the library – which for some reason I had assumed was not a real library – and have to stop and take a second in the arching entranceway, beyond the dusky, stone-floored foyer. Because it is, in actual fact, a library. And one that pretty much surpasses any other library I’ve ever been in.
Everything from floor to ceiling is this deep, dark wood, polished to such a high gleam I feel like I could see my face in it, if I leaned in close. There are actual busts around the place, of probably super-important rich people. And I am pretty sure it has three floors. There’s a staircase at the end of this central open area, and it leads up to what looks like a balcony of books circling said place, followed by another balcony after that.
Though it’s the books themselves that are really impressive.
I think they’re leather bound. Every single one is a plain colour, with gold lettering along the spine.
And I mean, I know Caleb Miller is a gazillionaire. In fact, I remember reading an interview with him in which the only thing he was willing to say was that being rich is disgusting, and he wants no part of it, and if that means dumping it on anything he can he will.
But even so.
This is nuts .
I almost don’t want to walk into the place, in case I somehow make a mess. And all my fear of not fitting in here is really ramping up. I think everything with Beck made me forget that this might be something I’m not really cut out for. But now it’s back, and it’s brought reinforcements. I actually find myself wondering if I have time to go back and wear something other than this flowery dress and cardigan combo that I thought made me look like a writer. But definitely doesn’t make me look like this kind of writer. These people are going to show up wearing berets and brogues and tweed.
They’ll have leather-bound notebooks.
And fountain pens.
And all I have is the laptop I borrowed from Beck and the soft little satchel he gave me to put it in and a bunch of pens that I know he uses because they write really well, but probably aren’t fancy enough for this. This is so much more than he has prepared me for, with a notebook that has a picture of a smiling penguin on the cover and all his strange little bits of advice.
Tell yourself what you would tell me whenever you find yourself stuck, he said to me before I left. But that doesn’t help me here. Here I’m supposed to be right for this on the spot. Worse: I’m supposed to be the kind of right his wife would be. And that idea makes me want to turn around and walk back out. This was just supposed to be fun, and now it’s a million things I hardly realized I desperately wanted. And I am pretty sure I am going to fail at it, hard. Doubly so, because this isn’t just something I can play off as fun anymore. It’s something I have to succeed at on multiple levels. To a super-high degree. And if I don’t I won’t just expose Beck. I’ll expose myself.
So I go to leave.
Just as a girl who looks like a nursery school teacher dashes in. She’s in dungarees, and her trainers are red. And she says, ‘Oh my goodness, am I late? Hi, hello, I’m Meera.’ Then she sticks out her hand, and I shake it without even knowing how to respond. Because I think if I do, I’ll say, Thank you. Thank you, Meera, for being just like the me I want to be.
And not the me I don’t think I could ever achieve.
And she’s not even the only one.
They all look the same way I currently do. Amazed by this place, certain they don’t belong, and either so shy they don’t speak, or so nervous they babble away like Meera. A skinny guy in a yellow overcoat introduces himself to seemingly everyone, and then gives us a rundown of his vital stats. His name is Julio, he’s twenty-eight, he just got married to his long-term partner, David, and he likes cats and kimchi and going on cruises.
And it’s just nice .
It’s soothing.
Suddenly I don’t have to pretend to be the life of the party. I can just stand there, awkwardly clutching Beck’s satchel, with the other ones who are awkwardly clutching their satchels.
Like kids on the first day of school.
Waiting for the teacher to come and tell us what to do.
And the teacher in this case is Dina. Dina, who is as lovely and professional as Beck said she is. She swoops in in a gust of vanilla-scented perfume and a flutter of silk and cashmere layers, and ushers us all into a ring of seats I barely know are there until she gets us sat down. Then she stands at the front and speaks, in the measured tones of a radio presenter.
‘Welcome to the first annual Harchester Writing Retreat,’ she says. ‘We hope you’re all having a wonderful time so far. Now – on to the start of your writing journey here, courtesy of our patron, acclaimed and beloved writing legend Caleb Miller.’
And there he is.
Or rather, there is a flat screen behind Dina, on which is what looks like somebody’s elbow, and half a couch, and finally an annoyed-sounding American accent grumbling out at us. ‘The only thing I want to say is don’t waste your life like I have. Seize what’s important right now, do not wait. And good luck with that, because it’s almost impossible. The end,’ he says.
Then even the elbow image we got shuts off.
The screen goes blank.
And Dina for a moment can’t even hide her oh, brother sort of expression. Like she’s fully used to the shenanigans of this man, and is annoyed for the seventeenth time that she must now smooth over whatever mess he’s made. So I laugh, and I say, ‘Well, I mean, he’s not wrong.’
Then everybody laughs.
Including Dina.
And she gives me this look – this knowing sort of thing, as if she is fully aware of who I am, and has heard exactly what I’m like. Though I’ve no idea what the specifics of that might be. Something far too nice courtesy of Beck, I’d imagine. And there’s another nice thing from him, too, once we have our writing prompts, and I’ve found a cosy nook in the library, and I check my email.
I told you everything would be fine , it reads.
Because of course he did give me the exact correct things I would need. And he knew I was scared, underneath my bluster. And he also knew that I would be okay. He pays too much attention for it to ever be otherwise, and in the best sort of way. Just quietly there, noticing everything you’ve always been afraid of everyone seeing, but secretly longed for them to, anyway.
Honestly, it’s no wonder he’s driving me out of my mind.