Chapter 12 Jamison #2
Charlie: Or…maybe he was perfectly happy and you ditched him too fast to notice? Oh my god you’re an idiot sometimes. How fast, exactly, did you leave?
Me: Um. Basically as soon as we wiped ourselves off?
Charlie: Jamison!
Me: What?
Charlie: You owe this guy an apology. Not for taking advantage of him or whatever you’re worried about, either. But for running out on him post-nut. That’s a massive dick move. He probably thinks you just wanted to use him to get off.
Shit, would he think that? I didn’t know him well enough to guess where his mind would have gone, but it didn’t take much knowledge to guess that it would have gone somewhere unpleasant or other.
Wow, I really was an idiot. I’d taken a perfectly pleasant sexual encounter which ran a decent chance of being positive on both sides and turned it into guilt on one side and probably feeling used on the other.
Me: How do I apologize to him? We haven’t even spoken since that day, and normally we text practically every day.
Charlie: How well do you know this guy? How serious was the date? Like, is this a ‘deliver flowers to his job’ type of thing, or would that be overkill?
Me: Um, he works from home. But I don’t think he’d like having attention drawn to him, anyway.
Charlie: A shy boy? Who is this, anyway? Anyone I’ve met or heard about? I didn’t even know you were dating anyone other than your weird obsession with no-condom man.
Me: …
Charlie: Jamison Alistair Duschene, what the everloving fuck. You cannot trust a guy who doesn’t use a condom, and you had sex with him again? Did you at least use fucking protection this time?
Me: [slow blink gif] I told you that he didn’t do that on purpose, Char. Stop being a bitch. And I’m not going to give you details about my sex life other than to say that yes, we were safe.
Charlie: Well thank god for that. But why are you still seeing this guy, anyway? Text him your test results and be done with the whole sordid episode.
Sordid? Suddenly my temper was rising. How dare she call us “sordid”?
We made a mistake, but the sex was hot and sweet, and the second time around even more so.
There was nothing sordid about what Hen and I had done together.
We cared about each other’s happiness and health and…
just about each other. My fingers were back on my phone before I could stop myself.
Me: Fuck you, Charlie.
Charlie: Me? What? What the hell, Jamie?
Me: Don’t call us “sordid”. Don’t act like I’m somehow dirty or like Henry is unworthy just because we fucked up once. Sex is a beautiful thing and I don’t need you treating me like something you scraped off the bottom of your shoe just because I had some.
Silence, my phone unmoving in my hand for long seconds. Then it gave a buzz that, I swear, was almost tentative.
Charlie: I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sound like I was belittling you. Or him. I just don’t think…
Me: I know what you “don’t think.” And you can stop not thinking it. Hen is a really nice guy who co-made a drunken mistake with me once. And we’re doing absolutely everything a responsible adult does after making that mistake, as carefully and maturely as possible. So drop it.
Charlie: You really like this guy?
Me: I really like this guy.
I’d typed and sent the message before I really had too much time to consider what I was saying, but as soon as I hit send, I paused with my thumb hovering above the keyboard.
Did I really like this guy? Certainly Henry was a pleasant guy to talk to.
He was gentle-natured. Talented. Sexy. Managed to flirt with me in a way where I was never sure if he knew he was doing it or whether he was just that sweet.
He let me practice tying his hair in knots, and he was always there as a sympathetic ear when my stress got too high.
Yeah, I liked the guy. And sure, we were sort of in a honeymoon period where we were on our best behavior with each other, and I was sure there were things about him that would drive me nuts once I got to know them, but for now? I was a fan.
Charlie: Ok. I’m sorry I badmouthed him. I’ll try to keep it in check. But be patient with me; when the anxiety starts talking…
Me: Char, I love you, and I understand your anxiety has a mind of its own, but you’re a grown, intelligent adult.
You’re capable of not blurting out rude or offensive things, even if you think them.
And if you ever meet Henry - not that I’m saying you will, jesus fuck don’t start reading into this - but if you ever do - I will murder you if you say them to him.
Charlie: Understood. Sorry, bro. So, uh…what are you going to do to get back on Henry’s good side?
Me: Fucked if I know. I’m the twink, aren’t I supposed to be the one being romanced by the big, strong man in all the stories?
Charlie: Snort. You may look like a twink, but you’re 900% too forceful to play the role. Put on your big-boy pants and apologize to the guy. Speaking of which, is he a “big, strong man”? What’s he look like?
Me: He is. He’s maybe six-four, two hundred pounds-ish?
Big but neither barrel-chested nor skinny.
He’s got this beautiful red hair down to his shoulders that he always wears pulled back for work.
He was able to pick me up at one point without keeling over, probably because he spends his days hauling wood all over and damn, the man has muscles.
Charlie: Wood? What does he do?
Me: Oh, I didn’t tell you? He’s a woodworker. Builds furniture, works on houses sometimes, occasionally he whittles things like toys when he’s bored.
Charlie: You’re dating a lumberjack. You’re dating a lumberjack. Does he wear flannel?
Me: Lol. Not so much. Mostly just ratty old t-shirts and jeans covered in sawdust. Don’t ever light a match near him.
Charlie: I’ll, uh, keep that in mind. Ok, back on topic. Operation: Apology. Go.
Well, shit. I didn’t even know if Hen was upset, such that I owed him an actual apology, or whether he’d taken it in stride - maybe he was used to his partners bailing after sex - or whether he was just confused and needed an explanation more than he needed an apology.
And the only way to find out the answer to that was… to talk to him.
Did not want.
I mean, I loved talking to Hen under normal circumstances, but after a week of tension-filled silence? There was no way this wasn’t going to be weird as fuck.
Me: I don’t know, Char. You’re a woman, you tell me how I’m supposed to do this.
Charlie: What, because I’m female I’m supposed to be the touchy-feely one who does all the emotional labor? Fuck you very much for the stereotyping.
Me: Uh.
Charlie: Uh-huh. Backtrack, go on.
Me: Sorry. [embarrassed emoji] I blame societal conditioning? But also you’re a smart person and you have emotional intelligence that I lack so I maintain that it was reasonable to ask you for advice.
Charlie: Hmph. Fine. How upset do you think he is? Or, I mean, is he upset for sure at all?
Me: I don’t knowwwww. I think he’s probably confused at the very least because we were having a good time, hanging out, in no rush, and then suddenly I was gone. If I were him I’d be wondering what the fuck happened.
Charlie: Put yourself in his place. Or at least try. Is he upset about the sex happening, you ditching him right afterward, or both?
Me: God Charlie, if I knew that I wouldn’t be going crazy in texts to you right now.
At first I thought that of course he’d be mad that I pressured him into sex, but he really did seem to be totally into it at the time, so maybe not?
But then that means that I ditched him in five seconds flat for no reason, and I’d definitely be mad about that if I were him, so maybe I took no problem and made it into a big problem, and how the hell do I explain that logic to him?
I heaved out a breath and sank deeper into my desk chair.
Why was I even still at my desk? I was clearly not getting any more work done at this point.
I heaved myself to my feet and crossed the apartment to my living room, where I sank into my cushy recliner and curled my legs under me.
While I waited for Charlie’s reply, I started doomscrolling Facebook.
College friend having their eighth wedding anniversary. Good for them. Cute cat meme. Aww. Charlie taking a selfie she looked great in. I idly thumbed in a positive comment and submitted it on the photo. She really did look better in a dress than most cis women I knew.
Finally, my phone buzzed and I flipped back to my texts.
Charlie: First step is to talk to him. Like, literally just be exchanging words with him again after this week’s radio silence. Send him a meme, a ‘hi’, just anything.
A meme. That seemed a lot more doable than words. I flipped back to Facebook and navigated to a meme page I followed, looking for just the right image.
Charlie: Hello? Did I break you?
Oops, I’d gone silent again.
Me: Looking for a good meme to send him. It doesn’t have to be an apology meme, right?
Charlie: Better it’s not. Be casual.
Me: Right. Ok, looking.
I flipped back to Facebook. Meme about kindness.
No, he might take that wrong given the note we left things on.
Political meme? Hell to the no, the last thing we needed was for me to find out his politics were wrong.
Cat meme? Cat meme. I mentally narrowed my search and started scrolling faster.
Hm, did Hen speak any Spanish? Why did I have so many Spanish cat memes in my feed, anyway?
Finally, I settled on a photo of a hairless Sphynx cat with a caption of “Huh, those trimmers work better than I expected.” Random?
Yes. Funny? Also yes. It didn’t convey any particular message, which I was choosing to view as a good thing, because that meant it could pass as an incidental, “I wasn’t not talking to you, I just happened to not have anything to say until I saw this funny thing” share.
What? There was logic in there somewhere. I flipped back to my Charlie texts.