7. Chapter 7 Staley
Chapter 7 Staley
“ L et me get this straight. You cuddle people for a living?”
Gabby invites me to coffee after class so we can bond over how terrible page three in the syllabus is. Two words elicited cries of despair from us: group project. If I’m being specific, Gabby muttered mierda, and I went all in with a double fuckity fuck sticks.
It turns out that Gabby is a senior too, except she has a penchant for organization and office supplies, whereas I thrive on coffee-stained clothes and chaotic schedules.
Instant friendship out of mutual dislikes? Check.
“Yes. For a living.”
Gobsmacked, Gabby chews the straw in her iced coffee like a smoker who is trying to kick a bad habit. Her Julia Roberts smile, painted with charming bright-red lipstick, coats the mutilated plastic. She’s making a crime scene of the drinking apparatus while questioning me. I would hate to see what kind of chokehold she has over someone she kisses.
Explaining what I do to make money is never easy. People assume three things about me:
I’m a paid sex worker. I’ll take “Things I’ve Never Put in My Mouth” for $400, Alex.
My daddy doesn’t love me. False. In the history of all father-daughter relationships, a father never loved his daughter more.
I’m an immoral hussy. It’s been ages since I’ve mattress-danced with anyone, and morals have zero to do with sex.
Cuddling and sex work are respectable jobs, don’t get me wrong, but there’s not enough time in my schedule to bang as often as I cuddle.
Gabby continues to bore a third eye into my forehead; apparently, it’s the first time she’s seen a magical unicorn walking down the sidewalk.
“Yes. Professional cuddler at your service. Wanna book a session with me?”
Embarrassed by my proposition, Gabby laughs and swats at me in an “oh, you!” way.
“How much money do you pull in as a cuddler? I don’t know if you could pay me to spoon someone who had BO. What if they have a creepy doll collection staring down at you while you’re supposed to be the big spoon?”
Picturing Gabby as a big spoon makes me snort-laugh. If I were to measure her against a doorjamb, fun-sized would be her precise measurement if I account for her high ponytail accessorized with a velour scrunchie. Small in stature, voluminous in personality and style.
“Most customers clean up before their cuddle session. Body odor isn’t as big of a concern as you might think.”
Except Theo, who, despite his disheveled state, oozes bright and refreshing citrus scents. There were no signs of a recent shower at his front door this morning. Revived from the dead, minus the smell? A typical college guy drinks a little too much, makes a bad decision under the influence of a very expensive bourbon, and still wakes up with the bedroom eyes of Chris Cornell. Theo took my breath away and not because of his smell.
I’m the kind of cuddler to offer the client a few extra minutes to get “cleaned up” if the situation requires it, but with Theo, I savored the disarray because he was incapable of fully guarding himself. His refusal to budge or utter a single word, maintaining his insolent smugness, was not cute. Theo had no problem telling the rowers I was in a contest with to shut the hell up, essentially, but he couldn’t manage more than two or three words to me when we were alone.
It’s fine. This is a job and nothing more. I need the money, and apparently, he needs the cuddles. Gruff personality aside, I can tolerate a lot if it helps me improve Dad’s quality of life.
If holding him in an embrace to raise his cortisol instead of reducing it was a mutually exclusive thing, I would have cuddled him until he was tapping my arm for mercy.
A half nelson. Hmm. I should talk to my bosses at Cuddle Like You Mean It. Our clientele would benefit from some diversification of cuddle positions, even if they’re derived from a wrestling mat.
Gabby surveys my face.
The image of full-nelsoning Theo does things to my lady bits, tingly things.
“There’s so many people here. Horny people, Staley. They could attend a kegger on Friday night, bump and grind with twelve people before closing time. Why would they shell out money for a cuddle? Do they miss their mommies?”
Gabby will never hire a cuddler, which is okay. “Or is this some sick way for dudes to try to take advantage of a babe like you? Are you safe in this job?”
Safety is an interesting concept, one I’ve had a few years to consider, and one I feel confident in with my job. When I was small, Dad put special locks on all the cupboards, padding for the sharp corners of tables, baby gates, and security systems in our house. Safety, in his eyes, was the prevention of injury.
He did his best to protect me, but scrapes still happened, and he’d bandage me all the same. We’ve swapped roles, and his safety is in my hands. It isn’t how he would have wanted things. The amount of guilt I wake up with equally consumes and frustrates me. I’m doing an absolute shit job at keeping him safe, and I’d love nothing more than to ask him for his advice on how to do better. But I can’t.
Dad has loved and protected me. Now, I fight to secure a safer future for him—for us. The extra locks on doors, windows, and appliances cost money, something I have very little of. The more I cuddle, the safer my dad is. His safety comes before mine.
“I accept your flattery by calling me a babe. It’s only a fluke. I had a cuddle session this morning, and I try to be presentable for new clients. My more-established clients prefer me a bit more casual.”
Gabby stands halfway from her seat and gives me a small curtsy at knowing a babe when she sees one. She’s so uninhibited, and I think I will try to find time to drink more coffee with this one.
“To answer your question. I make an okay amount of money as long as I do ten cuddle sessions a week—”
“Ten cuddles a week? I broke up with a girlfriend once because she hugged me too much. Meanwhile, you’re out here rawdogging life, cuddling ten people weekly. I’m wagering a guess that some of these people aren’t even likable?”
She doesn’t understand that ten cuddles equals two copays for the doctor and the monthly electric bill. This money keeps Dad in our home with me, where life is the most familiar, and placing him in an assisted-living facility would cost way more.
“What was your last cuddle session like? Man? Woman? Do you chat with them during their sessions, or do they lie silently? I have to admit, I’m so fascinated by this.”
I’ve got twenty minutes before I need to get to my Human Biology class—also needed for graduation—and then do two more cuddle sessions—one with another new client—and rush home to relieve Leslie.
“Gabby, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you. My last session, well, there wasn’t any cuddling.”
The memory of this morning melts me as the chair I sit in swallows me whole.
“Staley, I believe impossible things every day before I put eyeliner on. Try me.”
Confidentiality at Cuddle Like You Mean It is of the utmost importance. I take it seriously, and I’m not willing to jeopardize a job I love and pay the bills by spilling the tea with a stranger. I can withhold some details and still vent a little, right?
“It was the oddest cuddle I’ve ever attempted to do.”
Gabby tilts her head in question, her straw chewing coming to a complete stop.
“It’s safe to say today’s client was shocked to find me on their doorstep, but my surprise was equally matched.”
“Ohh, were they hot? I bet they were hot. Once in high school, I had a boyfriend, my only boyfriend—we’re talking Jordan Catalano hot—his name was Apollo.” Her eyes go all moony, daydreaming about a past love. “The only boy to make me see stars.”
“Yes ... I mean, no. We aren’t supposed to classify our cuddle clients as attractive in any capacity; it blurs the contract lines. I’m a human, and it’s impossible not to appreciate the human form. I offer a professional service, and anything outside of those parameters may be grounds for termination.”
Gabby shakes her head in disbelief and presses me. “You mean to tell me a gorgeous human books a cuddling session with you, and not for one second do you think you might want to smash?”
I breathe long and smile because there’s no way to hide my eagerness. I’d advance on Theo, but because he’s frustrated me with his unwillingness to reciprocate, I can’t tell if today was a game for him. It would likely be a one-and-done situation where we never hooked up again. When he shut those jerks down, the tectonic plates within my heart caused a seismic shift—a 6.5 on the Richter scale.
“Thinking about doing something isn’t the same as acting on it. It doesn’t matter; after today, there’s no way in hell they’d book me again. They were gorgeous and broody. Would I climb this person like a telephone pole if there were a kitten stuck on top of it? Yes, yes, I would. But I promised to stay five hundred miles away from people who aren’t into me.”
Who am I kidding? I’d climb Theo’s pole with or without the kitten. Satisfied with my answer, Gabby slurps the last of her coffee and beams at me.
“You’ve got chutzpah, Staley.”
Group projects are the devil’s work. Today’s coffee chat with my new friend, Gabby, gives me hope it won’t all be bad. And because the universe has divine timing or a twisted sense of humor, the ping of my phone disrupts my hopeful thinking. An email inquiry for a cuddle request hits my inbox for one week from today at 8 a.m. with none other than Theodore Sullivan. What the hell?
Ugh, men are infuriating. If Theo thinks I’m coming back to his house after he was a USDA grade-A Jerk Wellington, he’s got another thing coming.
“Bad news?”
I let my head collapse to my folded-up arms on the table and grumble. Before I fill Gabby in on the cuddle request, my phone rings. Startled, I pick it up and launch right into the questions, assaulting Leslie before she can get any words out. She never calls.
“Leslie? What is it? Is Dad okay?”
The hot, fun feeling leaves my stomach, dropping out the bottom and leaving me flailing.
“He took a little fall. We’re at the emergency room now. A possible broken collarbone. It’s not great news, but the doctor said he should heal up fine with a little time and proper support for the arm.”
I grip the phone tighter as the sweat builds on my palm, and shallow breathing follows. I know Gabby is still seated across from me because I can make out the red outline of her lips and the murky waving of her hands, but not much else. Panic attacks sneak up on me like this, sometimes, often ending with shadowed peripherals.
Unplanned emergency room visits are dire to our money situation. The last ER visit alone took twenty cuddle sessions to pay the balance off. I wish I could quit school, but I promised Dad I’d graduate.
The hem of my shirt takes the brunt of my worry as I clench the fabric between my closed fist. Crying on a first friend-date is a surefire way to lose a willing and eager partner for this god-awful poetry project. Gabby takes notice and slides her hand across the top of mine, and it’s enough to stop my breathing from heading into choppy territory, a gentle reminder to do my square breathing: in for four, out for four. Repeat until the square is closed.
“I’ll be right there. What hospital are you at?”
“Staley, don’t leave school. He’s getting discharged now. Russell is a little shaken up, but not more than usual. I’ll take care of him. Finish your day.”
I nod for only Gabby to see because if there’s anyone I trust in this world to care for my dad, it’s Leslie.
“Leslie? Will you tell him I love him, and I’ll see him tonight when I get in?”
“Of course I will, sugar.”
The cuddle request stuns me, and I can’t see past the trees, but when I open it, I can’t help but stop breathing for an entirely different reason: another tip—this time for one hundred dollars, and a message to me in the notes.
Staley, we got off on the wrong foot. If you give me another chance, I can try to explain.