Chapter Eleven #2
After dinner, we tuck Emmy into her rollaway cot, then sit out on our private patio out of her earshot.
Our room is off the hotel’s main building and from here, we have a view of the pool below and its orange loungers, palm trees, and a sliver of Sunset, all lit up and lined with billboards.
We take a hit off the complimentary vape pen.
“Could this be our lives?” Oliver asks, then coughs on the weed.
I smile, taking in the cloudless sky, the way his shoulders have already relaxed.
“We’re anonymous,” he marvels. “We could do anything.”
“People would eventually know us. Just like anywhere.”
“Maybe. But maybe with fewer rules.”
Neither one of us wants to go to bed. There’s a slight breeze through the palm trees. Even the striped umbrellas give a gentle, romantic shrug in the wind. The tiled patio is cool beneath my feet. Maybe it’s the weed but the air feels charged.
When I turn my face toward Oliver, he holds my gaze.
He has a hungry look in his eyes, and my body instantly responds.
I get up from my chair and hover above him.
He takes my hand and pulls me closer until I’m in his lap, straddling his hips.
The ocean is miles away but I swear I can smell the salt water.
I kiss him and tell him how good he tastes.
He sweeps the hair from my neck and kisses along my jaw down to my breasts, both of us making contented noises, small and quiet.
“Show me three things you like,” he whispers into my neck.
“This.” I take off my Longhorns T-shirt and let it fall to the ground. Oliver takes one of my nipples in his mouth and cups my other breast with his hand. I press into him, tightening my legs around his hips.
Oliver says, “Show me what else.”
“This.” I take his hand between my thighs, showing him just the right pressure and speed.
“Like this?” he says when I let go.
“Slower.”
He responds. And I want to draw this out, stay out here forever. I lift my hips then stand, just long enough to slip my underwear off. I lower myself back into his lap and guide his fingers slowly back inside me, lining them up so they rub against my G-spot.
Oliver moans louder this time and I cover his mouth, both of us laughing. My head feels light and my whole body has invited the sensation of being stoned and somewhere new. “Show me one more thing you like,” he says, into my hand.
“This.” I unbutton his pants and together we pull them off, moving faster now, until he is naked too. I push farther into the chair. I feel the smooth skin of his erection before guiding him inside me.
“This is my favorite,” I tell him, lifting my hips.
We move together in languid circles. “My favorite,” I repeat.
Oliver’s breath on my neck. The skin of his chest, taut and smooth, against my breasts.
My favorite sensation is Oliver inside me.
My favorite touch is his hand at the small of my back, holding me.
My favorite reaction is his mouth, slack with pleasure.
Below us, two silhouettes swerve drunkenly to the pool and fall onto a single lounger. I place my lips on Oliver’s to quiet the sound of his breathing. The others are nearby but oblivious. Just feet away.
We stop kissing, gasping for breath, Oliver leans back, then drops his chin in imitation of Ernest. “You like sex?”
“Yes.”
“There’s this guy you should meet. He’s staying at the Chateau Marmont.
” Oliver begins to laugh, stoned and happy.
I press my hand against his mouth again to muffle any sound.
He gently bites at my palm and now we’re both laughing.
He buries his face in my chest and I hold him there to steady us both.
“We have to finish,” I insist. “It feels too good.”
A small smile still plays at the corner of his lips and I want to melt into him I’m so in love. His mouth opens slightly like he’s going to say something else but he doesn’t. We hold each other’s gaze and all I want to do is stop time and live in this moment forever.
“Make me come,” I whisper, and his smile slowly disappears.
He nuzzles my neck and a delicious chill runs up my spine.
I look up into the sky, palm trees swaying above us.
I smell the salt air, then the chlorine on Oliver’s skin.
We are still stoned. We’re bleached by the L.A.
sun, languid and blissful as we fuck. Oliver moves in and out of me, faster and faster, until both of us are completely overcome.
“Diana,” he moans again and again. My fingers dig into him and this time he covers my mouth as I cry out in ecstasy.
—
On Saturday, we walk a few blocks in the California sunshine and wait in line for banana pancakes at The Griddle, which we all agree are worth it.
We spend the rest of the day by the pool, still only a handful of other people around.
We drink mojitos in the hotel’s famous sunroom.
We listen to guests at the table next to us discuss weekend box office totals.
We’re so in love with the Hollywood charm of the hotel we never want to leave.
We eat an early dinner in the room and watch Vertigo in bed, Emmy between us. She’s asleep before James Stewart is hired to report on Kim Novak’s strange behavior. Oliver reaches across Emmy to hold my hand and we fall asleep like this.
On Sunday, Emmy is wide awake and dressed by seven a.m. The concierge has provided us with a rental car and we’re on our way to Disneyland by seven thirty. Even Emmy is confused by the heaviness of the Sunday traffic. “A lot of people must be going to church.”
“L.A. is beginning to lose a bit of its charm,” Oliver says, changing lanes.
An assistant in Natalie Hutton’s production office sent instructions telling us to park at one of the Disney hotels and pick up our tickets there. But when we arrive, a woman dressed like Mary Poppins is standing near the desk holding a sign with my name on it.
“It’s just like the airport!” Emmy marvels.
Mary Poppins explains that she’s our private guide for the day, courtesy of Natalie’s team.
We smile politely, imagining a day of chatting about Disneyland’s rich history until we realize that her real job is getting us to the front of every line.
It’s game-changing. As we skip to the front of the ninety-minute Space Mountain line, Oliver whispers, “How badly do they want your life rights?”
When we exit the ride, Emmy shouts, “Can we go again?” and we circle back to the front of the line.
By the end of the day, Emmy is levitating, swinging a new light saber and carrying her princess autograph book full of big, looping signatures.
She falls asleep two minutes into the ride home and Oliver carries her into the hotel room and gently lays her on the rollaway bed.
I un-Velcro her sneakers and as Oliver pulls off her Elsa watch, Emmy opens her eyes and asks Oliver if we are going to all live together again.
“I hope so.” He kisses her cheek and by the time he switches off the light, she’s lightly snoring.
I swipe a bottle of rosé from the fridge, and Oliver and I head to the patio, as if this has been our nightly routine for years.
Oliver takes a seat while I stand at the railing, both of us looking out over the pool.
We recap our day, including our shared suspicion over whether our guide is sleeping with Goofy.
“She was so professional until he appeared,” I remark. “Emmy didn’t even ask for a picture and she practically dragged us over.”
“I wonder what he looks like under the costume? He could be a young George Clooney?”
“But wouldn’t Disney have made him a prince?”
For several minutes, we fall completely silent. I listen to the sound of cars from Sunset Boulevard below, laughter and clinking glasses from the pool. In the quiet, Oliver says, “There’s something so lonely about single parenting. Did you ever feel it?”
I turn to face him. He looks as tired as I feel. “Every day.”
“Not to say we should get back together because our days with Emmy will be easier but…”
“No, of course not.”
“How is it going for you? Is that how I say it? How does a good communicator ask his girlfriend that is still his wife if she is happy?”
“Is that what you go by these days?” I tease. “A good communicator?”
“I guess if you have to ask—”
“I am. Happy. You?”
“Yes. But…” He steadies his glass on his knee, keeping his eyes on it and not on me. “As a good communicator…The truth is, there is this shadow for me. Of how things were before. I don’t want to go back.”
“Me neither.”
“So what do we do?”
“Keep going.” I move toward him. I set his glass on the table and climb into his lap. “Keep being honest with each other.”
He wraps his arms around my waist and kisses my neck. “Keep touching each other.”
“Yes.”
“Even when we were apart, I still felt this connection to you. I hated it most of the time. That I couldn’t get you out of my head.”
“I want to stay in your head.” I kiss his cheek, his stubble short and rough against my lips.
“Me too.”
“Show me three things you like.”