Chapter 16
16
Stupid emotions. They should be illegal. Experiencing a low self-esteem meltdown? Here’s a ticket for being idiotic. Crying because my arms are too tired to wash the filth and germs off myself? Might as well just throw me in prison for the absurdity of it all.
Peter pokes his head in the bathroom door, then walks in all the way when he finds me sobbing into the bath water.
I deserve a life sentence. I’m only making it harder to breathe with my hysterics.
He crouches beside the tub with a frown. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I wheeze. “I didn’t drown. I’m doing great.”
“You don’t look so great.”
I sniffle then cough. “I look exactly like someone who’s had a devastating disease rendering them unable to perform basic hygiene for an unknown number of days.”
“You’ve been with me for five days,” he explains gently. “Do you want me to help you, or would you rather I leave?”
“Why would I want you to leave?” I wail.
He tips his head as he studies me with a furrowed brow. “You can tell me if you want privacy. If you’d rather me not see you naked.”
“What?” I screech then cough. “You’ve already seen me naked! What does it matter now?”
He rolls his lips between his teeth, either trying not to laugh or trying not to puke. Uncertain. Finally, he puffs out a breath of air as he breaks the seal of his tomb of unknown variable. “I’m going to ask you a question, and I want you to genuinely think about it before you answer.”
“Yes, I want you to wash me.,” I blubber, anticipating what he’ll ask. I understand he’s trying to be respectful, but that’s ludicrous between two people who had sex three-hundred and seventy-eight days ago. “I’m weaker than an infant. I can’t do it. I tried.”
“Okay.” He chuckles as he reaches out a hand to wipe water from my face. Could be bath water. More likely tears. “You obviously trust me enough to help you in the bath, so that’s more than I probably deserve. I’ll take care of you. Please don’t cry anymore.”
I can’t even slam the water with my hands the way I’m itching to. “Do you think I want to be crying over something so stupid?”
He pulls his shirt over his head, mumbling, “Don’t do it, Pete. Don’t fall on the sword before you’ve fought a single battle.”
I forgot that he talks to himself, too. He always tried to hide it—unlike me. That makes me smile. A little.
“What don’t you want to do?” I sniffle.
“Nothing.” He shakes his head rapidly as he tugs down his glorious sweatpants. And his underwear.
I blink at the sight before me. Sculpted muscles everywhere. And…hair. Lots, lots more hair than I remember. I have the strangest urge to run my fingers through it and play with it the way I usually reserve for the fabric of my clothes .
“You look different,” I blurt.
He glances down then back up at me with a hint of panic on his face. “I haven’t…um…really needed to do any manscaping in a while.”
A peal of laughter slips out of my chest before I slap my hands over my mouth. Then I cough. Between my fingers, I mumble, “You manscaped? For me?”
“Y-yes.” He stumbles over the single word the same way he stumbles into the bathtub.
It’s adorkable.
I forgot.
No. That’s not right.
I purposefully denied how attracted I was to this man and all his endearing quirks.
It was easier that way. If I was never really taken by him, then I didn’t have to feel so stupid for being used.
Wordlessly, he turns on the faucet, drains some water from the tub, then focuses the blissfully warm spray on my matted hair.
“Lean your head back,” he instructs softly.
I do.
He takes his time lathering my hair with shampoo and massaging it into my scalp. I sigh and relax into his ministrations. I wrap my arms around his knee to stay upright.
Without direction from me, he rinses my hair then applies conditioner, using his fingers to work out the knots with the aid of lubrication. He rinses my hair again before pulling me back to lean against his chest, the water warmer now from the fresh flow.
“Thank you,” I murmur.
He nods against my cheek. “You’re welcome.”
We lay together in silence as the water chills around us .
“Your body hair is tickling my back and my butt.” I’m suddenly aware of the foreign sensation.
He laughs then turns his head to cough away from me. “I didn’t know I was going to be getting naked with you again. Definitely not like this.”
I thought I had been sapped of any and all energy, but it’s apparently untrue. I have enough to trace my fingers over the ridges and valleys of Peter’s arms, of the veins that pump life through his body. Over the knuckles of his hands, between the length of his fingers. His knees bracket my thighs, sticking out of the water. This standard-size tub isn’t nearly big enough for the both of us, yet I’m not uncomfortable. The longer I continue my mindless mapping of the contours of his body, the more my brain seems to come back online. The questions linger and simmer like water at a slow boil. At the top of the pot—his unintentional confession about manscaping.
“You said that you started working out to get my attention,” I muse aloud. A potent hit of shame shudders through me at the knowledge that I’m just as susceptible to biological programming as the next animal. I shake it off in the interests of pursuing this thread of curiosity. “You also admitted that you manscaped for me.”
I roll the strange word around on my tongue. I’m not unfamiliar with the meaning in popular culture, but it still feels odd in my mouth. Or maybe coming out of it. Never in a millennium did I imagine having a conversation about manscaping.
“That’s true,” he replies haltingly.
“Yet you abandoned the manscaping while increasing the workouts.” I dig my fingers into the ropey muscle of his forearm. “At least it appears that way.”
“You are correct,” he assures me with a stuttering breath that ricochets through my back resting against his chest.
“Explain that to me. I don’t understand. ”
“Working out became a good outlet for my frustrations,” he says, shuffling himself a bit behind me and jostling me in the process. “After you left, I threw myself into my new position as the director of Chester R&D, but it wasn’t enough to fill the hours between work. Exercising is a much healthier coping technique than drugs or alcohol.”
“You considered doing drugs?” I yelp with more than a little horror.
Truly, I had no idea how much I crushed this man as much as he nearly destroyed me.
“No.” He scoffs. “Hence the increase in weight-lifting efforts.”
“So, you’ve admitted to studying my likes and dislikes.” I abandon the tactile sensations of Peter’s body in favor of skimming my hands over the smoother surface of the water. “You changed yourself to be more desirable to me. Without me, you kept what you liked for yourself and abandoned what you did not. Because you were not attempting to attract other women in my stead.”
That last statement should bring me relief, but it doesn’t. It would be easy to dismiss my anxiety about the topic because it doesn’t match up with my fantasy of Peter’s imagined life after me. That would be a lie.
The truth is the very thought of Peter with another woman makes me seethe with white-hot jealousy.
“Also true,” he admits. There’s a hint of unsureness in his tone.
I turn in the circle of his arms to meet his gaze, to be able to study his expression as I unload my true feelings on the matter.
“The ways you changed yourself are another form of lying to me,” I state with finality.
His eyes bounce over my features as he stares at me in the same way I’m studying him. He shakes his head slowly, a silent denial. “Lying and employing means of attraction are not the same. Mating rituals of many animals are well documented. I simply had the motivation to employ those of the human variety to entice you to be with me. Without you, I had no reason to continue all of those behaviors.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Humans are the only species in the animal kingdom that engage in the socially complex construct of decoupling through divorce.”
“Divorce, yes.” He tips his head side to side in a show of both agreement and disagreement. “We’re not the only species to engage in decoupling, though. In fact, many studies suggest humans aren’t meant to be monogamous over the breadth of our increased lifespans.”
He winces as soon as the words leave his mouth. “Pretend I didn’t say that.”
Memories of a killer squid documentary float through my mind, but I brush them off in favor of not losing my train of thought.
“I can’t relearn to trust you if you continue to lie to me.” The words are expelled from my chest with great force.
Have I ever been this brutally honest with someone?
Sure, many times in my life I’ve been accused of being abrasive in my honesty, but those were over trivial matters.
This essay isn’t as good as you think it is.
Yes, that outfit makes you look fat.
No, I don’t believe he really loves you if he’s capable of treating you in a disposable manner.
I never offered those criticisms without constructive feedback. Moreover, I was explicitly asked to provide advice in those cases.
I lick my lips, swallow down the overwhelming sensation of dread, then power on. “Your excuse of human mating rituals is valid, but the appropriate time for that misleading behavior has elapsed. I would like to see the real version of you going forward.”
Another shudder rolls through my tense yet utterly exhausted muscles. I think I know why. In all my years of being asked to provide my opinion, never once has it impacted me personally in any way. I’ve never voiced honesty about what I want for myself. From someone else.
Peter pulls me against his chest more firmly. He swipes some wet hair away from my cheek as he breathes in so deeply that his nostrils flare. He slowly nods as he focuses his gaze on my lips then my eyes. “I agree to those terms with one caveat.”
I slump my shoulders with the realization that he doesn’t completely agree with my completely logical request.
He licks his lips then tips his head toward mine until the brush of his breath warms my chilled cheeks. “I want you to acknowledge that it’s not necessarily a bad thing for someone else to motivate us to be the best version of ourselves.”
“Only if the best version of ourselves is something we also like. For ourselves,” I counter.
A faint smile tips up the corners of his mouth. “I agree with that addendum.” His expression returns to his baseline frown as he continues to cradle me against his chest and stroke my cheek. “Now, I have some observations and questions about you.”
My shoulders tense again. “Does this have anything to do with my manner of dress? With me being unprofessional at the office?”
He blinks, a quick fire of fury brightening his eyes before he snuffs out the flame. “I still don’t know who filed that complaint, but no. That’s someone else’s stupid problem.”
That admission brings me a modicum of relief. I was convinced that it was Peter himself who filed those HR complaints against me.
He swipes his thumb painfully slowly across my bottom lip. “ You’ve admitted that you believe you have a low EQ. That you’re socially awkward. I want to know why you think this.”
This isn’t such a difficult question to answer. I’ve had plenty of experience to back up my hypothesis. “That idea was formed early in my life.”
He nods as he situates me comfortably against his chest once more, wrapping his arms around me to ward away the chill.
“In the fourth grade, I believed Kelly Robinson was my best friend. I discovered in fifth grade that she was using me to do her homework for her. She didn’t like me at all, but I had no idea. She thought I was weird .” I make air quotes. “In eighth grade, a group of girls invited me to a school dance with them. I assumed no one had dates, but they all had boyfriends and spent the evening dancing with them. I sat by myself on the bleachers. I still don’t understand why they invited me. My junior year of high school, one of the football players orchestrated an elaborate HoCo ask in the hallway for me. The rest of the team joined in. They all sang Van Morrison’s ‘Brown Eyed Girl,’ while he kneeled on the linoleum with a poster board that read, ‘Don’t leave me hanging. Say sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-de YES.’”
I can still picture the glitter all over his hands, his jeans, falling onto the floor beneath him. The entire hallway full of students froze, suspended for what I thought was a perfect moment in time. I could feel the other girls’ jealousy. Directed at me. Could smell the tension in the air as he waited for my response. Those jealous girls didn’t consider that he used an inappropriate song choice.
Of course, I said yes. I’m not stupid. Any girl at our school would have killed for the chance to go to Homecoming with the team’s star quarterback. I didn’t recognize the red flag that the boy clearly did not know the color of my eyes .
“Did he hurt you?” Peter shatters my memory with his question. “At the dance?”
“No,” I answer honestly. “We didn’t go to the dance together. He ended up taking Kelly Robinson instead.” I shake my head and glance at my hands that are now tangled balls of fingers against my chest. “For months, I had to hear all the gossip about how he got her pregnant that weekend.”
“Christ,” Peter coughs out.
“I know.” I nod. “Dodged a bullet on that one, as it turns out. Kelly didn’t graduate with the rest of our class. She dropped out when she had the baby.”
“What a bunch of assholes,” Peter grinds out.
I shake my head in disagreement. “It was my fault. I couldn’t recognize that they were teasing me.”
Just like I didn’t recognize that Peter was using me to win a bet. I thought he really liked me. That he wanted to have sex with me because he was aroused by me.
He insists those things are true, but it doesn’t line up with my prior experiences.
With a firm finger below my jaw, he lifts my gaze to his. He’s frowning again, the now-familiar tick in his jaw showing his true displeasure. “That was nothing you did wrong, Elise. Just like in grad school when those assholes made that bet.”
“Oh, that’s another thing.” I shake free of his hold and face forward again, staring at the clean, bright white tiles on the other side of the wall. I appreciate that his grout is free of mold stains. “In grad school, I had a handful of platonic girlfriends. Or so I thought. They used to call me and text me often to ask my advice about their romantic woes.” I twist my fingers more tightly as I confess, “I didn’t leave MIT immediately after discovering the bet. I went to my friends first. I asked for their advice in return about what to do with the situation. Just like when I tell jokes, all I received in response was…crickets. ”
Peter rests his forehead on my shoulder. He makes a choking sound.
“Logically, the best course of action was to leave campus. I did not wish to have a confrontation with the entire department nor to deprive them of their degrees. I achieved what I set out to do as well, so I packed my apartment before heading to my parent’s house in Connecticut.”
Peter squeezes me tighter in his arms.
“I—” He pauses to clear his throat. His words are warm against my shoulder and neck when he speaks again, “I don’t think you have a low EQ, sweetheart. I think you’ve just learned some very painful lessons.”
“Yes,” I agree easily enough. “I experience emotional pain often because I am not good at interpreting other people’s intentions toward me because I have a high IQ combined with a low EQ.”
“Why did you come?” he asks suddenly then clarifies, “Why did you check on me? If I hurt you so deeply, why not just leave me to rot in my apartment? Why drag me to the ER and get yourself sick?”
“A world without you in it is no place I want to be,” I admit. It is the truth.
Peter is a truly brilliant man. Society would suffer without him.
“Hmm,” is his only response.
I frown at the murky bathwater, vividly remembering my panic when I discovered him alone in his apartment, so dangerously ill. The days since are a blur, but that’s understandable.
“It makes sense now,” he murmurs more to himself than to me.
“I’m glad you understand my perspective,” I also murmur.
“I think I do,” he says before pressing a firm yet soft kiss to my cheek. “I’m forming a different hypothesis, though. ”
“What’s that?”
“Give me a few days to marinate on it.” He jostles me forward then rises to stand and step out of the tub. “For now, it’s time to tuck you back into bed. Your fever’s returning.”
He’s not wrong. Without the heat from his body, I tremble uncontrollably. Even the sweet gesture of Peter drying me off with the fluffiest towel feels like torture.
In spite of my physical discomfort, the act of laying in fresh sheets when I’m freshly washed makes me sigh with happiness. It’s truly one of life’s simplest yet greatest indulgences.
He tucks me in as promised, pulling the comforter around my shoulders and neck before placing a kiss on my forehead.
“One more question for you.” He brushes his lips to the corner of my mouth without really kissing me. “What if I told you that I never stopped loving you? That I know—beyond a shadow of a doubt—that you’re my person. My magnet. And I want to spend the rest of my life with you.” He pulls back far enough to look me in the eyes. “What would you say to that?”
I furrow my brow. What am I supposed to say to that?
“I would say…” I lick my lips then glance away from the promise in his eyes. It’s too heavy, and I’m still too sick, and I can’t think straight, and… “I would say that you seem very certain of yourself, but that’s an awfully presumptive thing to ask of me after such a bad year and the amount of hurt we’ve caused each other.”
“Hmm.” His gaze drifts to my lips. “But you didn’t say no.” He smiles softly before I can respond. “Get some rest. I’ll wake you in two hours when you can take another round of meds.”
He closes the bedroom door behind him.
As much as I want to overanalyze that conversation into itty-bitty pieces, I can’t. I’m so exhausted. Sleep pulls me under easily.