27. Harrison
27
HARRISON
T he sun is pouring into an unfamiliar room, and Daisy is curled up beside me with her hand on my chest. Based on the bare legs twined with mine, she appears to be wearing very little aside from a camisole. And I have no fucking idea where we are, why she’s in my room, or what godawful thing I might have done last night to allow this to happen.
I remember saying goodbye to Oliver and how pissed I was that he was whispering to her. I remember her not at all funny joke about giving him a hand job, and the way I wondered if it was possible to make yourself sick with desire for someone. I think I told her we needed to stop for the night. There’s really not much beyond that.
I pull a washcloth off my forehead, and she starts to rouse.
“Hey,” she says sleepily. “Let me get that for you. You need a new one.”
She sits up, pushing messy curls out of her face, looking decadently flushed and pouty and disheveled, the way I imagine she’d look if she’d spent the whole night letting me have my way with her .
I was already hard, and that thought doesn’t help. I reach down to adjust myself and discover I don’t have a stitch of clothing on.
“Daisy,” I rasp, “why am I naked?”
“The roofies I put in your dinner worked better than I could have hoped.” She climbs from the bed, taking the washcloth with her, wearing nothing but a camisole and the tiniest shorts as she walks toward the bathroom. Jesus . “You gave me the night of my life.”
I grip myself tight beneath the covers and will away my body’s reaction.
She emerges a moment later with a wet washcloth and places it on my head. “You were burning up. I think you probably shed your clothes in the middle of the night. I stayed to keep an eye on you because you were a thousand degrees.”
She leans over me to glance at the clock on the nightstand. Her breast is brushing against my chest. One tight nipple grazes my skin, and I have to hold myself rigid not to react. “It’s nearly eight,” she says. “What do you want to do? My shift isn’t until one. I can get someone to cover me pretty easily if you’re not ready to go home.”
“Daisy,” I hiss between my teeth, “can you stop leaning against my chest?”
“Sorry,” she says hurriedly, leaning away, and I feel like an asshole. She took care of me all night, and now she’s apologizing because of my raging libido.
“We should get back,” I reply. “If you could just give me a few minutes to shower, I’ll be ready to go.”
“Oh, sure.” She blushes. “Sorry. I’ll go to my room. Just text when you’re ready.”
She climbs out of bed, grabs her sweatshirt off the floor, and walks out. I go to the bathroom and turn on the shower, gripping myself as I picture her on the deck of my house, bent over in the blue yoga pants. I imagine the wet feel of her as I spread her legs wide, that moment just before I push in. The water in the shower isn’t even hot before I’m coming to the thought of it.
We manage to get back to Santa Cruz in time for her shift, though she only leaves after I swear that I’m fine.
I’m really feeling much better, but I called in sick anyway because I’m not in the mood for Baker’s bullshit—he’ll be annoyed that I’m coming in at midday, so he might as well just be annoyed that I didn’t come in at all.
I rinse the surfboards, clean out the car, and then go to Daisy’s beloved rich people store and get stuff for dinner. It’s a weak thank you for the fact that she dropped everything to come along with me this weekend when she didn’t have to and then spent the night in my room, putting wet washcloths on my head and politely ignoring me while I apparently took off all my clothes.
It’s a weak thank you for the fact that I’ve allowed her to take care of me for weeks when she didn’t have to. She’d argue that she’s staying here for free, but she went above and beyond— she got me back to being the person I was not just before I discovered Audrey was cheating but the person I was before Audrey was ever in the picture at all.
I’m still putting together why I gave up everything I enjoyed for a marriage that didn’t make me happy, but the important part is that I’m ready to fix what went wrong, and I’m not sure I would have been if it weren’t for Daisy making me see it.
I’m reading the paper with a beer in hand when she gets home that afternoon. “If you’re taking off work to sit home and drink, I may have gone too far in my quest to make you relax a little,” she says, walking onto the deck .
I turn toward her, my gaze immediately falling to her rack, though I’m hardly at fault for that. The goddamn shirt they make her wear at work pretty much demands you look at her rack.
“I fucking hate that job,” I tell her. “They need to give you more clothes.”
She takes the seat beside me. “That would be counterproductive. The lack of clothes is the only reason I’m earning so much there.”
I hate that too. I hate that some creep is drawing pornographic pictures of her, that a thousand other creeps are imagining God knows what. “Just quit. I can help you out next semester.”
“You’re already letting me live here rent-free. I’m not taking your money.”
Take it as a favor to me. I really don’t want you at that damn job, in that fucking shirt.
She climbs to her feet, side-eyeing my beer. “In spite of the exquisite care you’re taking of your immune system, you probably ought to get a solid meal tonight. Let me shower and then I’ll run to the—”
I wrap my hand around her wrist to stop her. “I already went to the store. I’m making us steak, and it’s marinating right now. Stop trying to take care of me all the time. It’s my turn to take care of you instead.”
Her gaze meets mine. I didn’t mean for it to sound sexual, but it sort of did, and she’s not about to let it go. “How exactly are you going to take care of me?” she purrs, licking her lips.
I laugh. “I knew you’d go there. By feeding you, Daisy.”
“What are you going to feed me, Harrison?”
I groan, discreetly placing the paper over my lap. “You truly can make anything sound filthy, can’t you? It’s a skill.”
“Too bad it’s not a skill I can be paid for. ”
“You could be paid an awful lot for that skill,” I reply as she walks away. “Don’t get any ideas.”
“Too late!” she calls back. “I’m applying right now.”
She goes to shower, and when she returns—barefoot, wet hair knotted atop her head, sun-kissed from the weekend outdoors—it hits me all over again how right this feels with her, how easy it is to have her around. It’s a dangerous line of thought—one I’m allowing myself to have far too often when it absolutely can’t happen.
We make dinner together. I want to inhale the smell of her shampoo every time she passes. How the hell did that idiot in DC ever let her go?
“The guy you told me about in the car yesterday,” I venture as we sit down at the table. “Is he why you swore off men?”
She looks away. I fucking hate that she’s hiding something from me when she’s too goddamn open about almost everything else. I hate that she’s hiding this in particular. Is she not over him?
“He’s part of it, yeah.”
“What’s the other part?” It comes out sounding regrettably jealous.
She stares at her hands. “It wasn’t the first time it happened. Men…they convince themselves I’m something more than I am.”
My brow furrows. “More?”
“They have this ideal. Like Griff, the guy who keeps drawing me at work in those costumes. He obviously wants some sexy warrior princess with huge knockers, and he sees it in me.” She pushes the steak around on her plate. “Another guy will want something entirely different, and he’ll think he sees that in me, but over time, it all falls apart. They want some combination of porn star and mystery girl when I’m really just a shitty student who isn’t especially good at anything—and they don’t want that. ”
I want to tell her that she’s simply had a little bad luck, but in some respects, Daisy’s looks are a form of bad luck. In any movie, she’d be cast as the siren, the sexpot luring every guy to his doom. I’ve seen the way men look at her, and they’re not seeing a sunny girl who just wants to be out in the water and make a nice smoothie bowl when it’s done.
I rub a hand over my eyes. “Daisy, your ex sounds like a jerk. If he didn’t appreciate you for who you are, he didn’t deserve you.”
“It’s more than that. I’m…” her words die off. “When some guy comes in acting like I’m everything , I start to hope maybe there’s more to me than there appears, and then he takes it all back, and I wind up a lot lower than I started. I just want off the treadmill.”
I hate this conversation. I hate that the way to fix this problem is by forcing her to give some other guy a shot. “There’s a lot more to you than any of these exes of yours seem to realize, and a million men who would feel like they’d won the lottery if they got you exactly the way you are right now—whether or not you go to law school or become the head of the UN or whatever bullshit your mother hopes for. You need to date someone you know , not some guy who sees you and decides who you are based on your looks alone.”
Her gaze meets mine, and for a moment it’s there between us, that tension, that pull. Because yes, I know her. I like her barefoot and dancing while she makes a sandwich.
“Not now, obviously,” I say, looking away. “I’m guessing this breakup was really recent, and maybe you need a few months off from dating, but when you get back to school…” I trail off awkwardly.
I was trying to say it can’t be me, but I also don’t want to watch it happen . I’m not sure I really conveyed it, however.
“It wasn’t that recent,” she replies, not meeting my eye. “We broke up last November. ”
I stare at her. “You’re telling me you haven’t dated anyone in…eight months?”
She laughs. “You’re pretty judgmental for a guy who hasn’t dated in six.”
“Except there’s a world of difference between the dissolution of your marriage and a college breakup. At twenty-one you kind of bounce back, normally.”
Her smile falters. “Why would I bother, though? How many great relationships have you seen? Your parents divorced; Scott makes my mom miserable. Caleb and Kate were a shitshow, and so were you and Audrey.”
“My mother and stepfather are absolutely besotted with each other, and it’s nearly been three decades,” I counter. “And even if you never want to get married, there are other benefits to a relationship.”
“Sex?” She rolls her eyes. “I’m going to say something, and you’re probably going to argue or think I’m crazy, but sex is really overrated.”
The desire to say let me prove you wrong is already so strong it’s nearly choking me. I knew I shouldn’t have introduced the topic. I swallow. “How so? You sure bring it up a lot for someone who doesn’t like it.”
I both do and do not want her to describe once again how good she is at getting herself off.
“I like it on my own .” The quiet, embarrassed words hit just the way I knew they would. I subtly adjust myself beneath the table.
“But guys have a foreplay card,” she continues. “And there’s variation, but it’s all roughly the same.”
“A foreplay card?” I ask. “I’m certain I’d have heard about this by now if it were really a thing.”
She hitches a shoulder. “It’s just like this list, like you all are pushing buttons or checking boxes. You grab a few things and then rub something too hard or just poorly. Half the time it’s uncomfortable or doing nothing, and even if it’s okay, you’re so impatient after a minute or so that it moves along to sex…and then it’s over.”
I shouldn’t have a hard-on, listening to her describe what were clearly abysmal sexual experiences. I have one anyway, of course.
I channel some calmer, more adult version of myself to give her the answer I should give her instead of the one I’d like to. “Daisy, I think maybe you’ve just had a run of really bad luck.”
She shrugs. “Maybe, but am I supposed to keep putting up with it while some guy slowly tears me down and makes me doubt myself? I’m tired of jumping through hoops to win someone’s approval and failing, all for a bunch of supposed benefits that never arrive.”
I inhale through my nose, preparing to say something I already regret. “When you get back to school, find a guy who already knows you and won’t put you on a pedestal. Someone who doesn’t expect you to make his wildest fantasies come true. Maybe…just have fun. Just enjoy yourself, and don’t get swept up into some big, serious relationship.”
She laughs. “Wow, I can’t believe Mr. Overprotective is suggesting I just fuck around. If Liam heard this conversation, you’d be in so much trouble.”
Liam couldn’t possibly hate it as much as I do. “You need to be with someone who cares about you enough to make it worth your while but who isn’t expecting the performance of a lifetime. Someone who will take his fucking time building up to—” I stop myself. A description of how this mystery guy should take his time would get way too graphic, and would basically just be a list of all the things I’ve pictured doing to her. “Someone who realizes foreplay is ninety percent of it. And if you can’t tell a guy that what he’s doing isn’t working, you shouldn’t be with him in the first place. ”
She glances at me. Maybe she’s asking why I can’t be that guy.
I guess there’s a part of me asking why I can’t be that guy too. All the answers I once had are mattering a little less by the minute.