Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Fifteen
Iris regarded herself in her bedroom’s full-length mirror.
She was nine years older than Madison and felt like a different species.
Her eyes clocked all her well-worn insecurities: the slight dimpling on her stomach she wished was flatter and firmer, the indent on the side of her hips she wished was smoother and rounder.
Her breasts looked nice when she pushed them up and together, but they didn’t hold themselves up like Madison’s.
Iris eyed the perfume bottle on her dresser.
She dabbed the blotter on each part of her body she hated.
Her thighs. Her belly. The empty space between her breasts.
Then she closed her eyes, and it was as though she was remembering a version of herself she hadn’t been yet.
She was clothed in something more luxurious, a silk kimono slipping off her bare shoulders.
With her eyes still closed, she caressed her body, imagined someone else doing the same, finding her skin smooth, supple, and delectably creamy.
In her mind’s eye, she saw rumpled white linens, glowing skin, and a vase of flowers on the bedside table, filling the room with their delicate fragrance.
With a deep inhale, the body she touched was no longer flabby, it was soft, yielding, and beautiful.
Then she opened her eyes. It was dark outside, and her messy room was lit only by her reading lamp.
She saw Hugo lying on a small pile of dirty clothes on the floor; his tail thumped the ground when he caught her looking at him.
The laundry reminded her, she had a set of sheets likely ready in the communal dryer.
Iris shuffled down the hall in her fuzzy slippers dragging her empty canvas hamper to the second-floor laundry room.
Her sheets had a few minutes left on their cycle, so she decided to wait.
The room was small, not much bigger than an apartment galley kitchen, with the machines on one side and a peeling poster of directions on the opposite wall.
The air was close, heated by the thrumming dryers and scented with the clean, synthetic musk of dryer sheets.
Her neighbor David appeared at the door holding a giant cushion on his hip. “Oh, sorry, I can come back later if you’re using the washers.”
“Nope, just emptying the dryer.”
He hesitated in the doorway.
“I won’t bite.” It sounded like someone else’s line, Iris was instantly embarrassed to have said it.
But David smiled. “I didn’t think I’d run into anyone. I’m not dressed for company.” He was wearing Adidas slides, basketball shorts, and a white T-shirt. He reminded her of the guys she used to crush on in college.
Iris wore a tattered T-shirt from the now defunct Spotted Pig restaurant and an even older pair of gray Soffe shorts reading Cape May across the butt. “It’s a laundry room. If we had better clothing options, we wouldn’t be here.”
“Gronk barfed on his dog bed.” He shuffled over to the washer beside hers. “Sorry, I don’t know why I just blurted that out.”
“I’m glad you did. I want to know the designated barf-washing machine so I can avoid it forever.”
He chuckled. “You can use it for when Hugo ralphs on your stuff.”
“He has such a long windup, it gives me plenty of time to move him to some wipeable surface.”
David looked at her, puzzled. “Windup?”
“You know, the—” She commenced a truly exemplary imitation of a dog gagging.
He cracked up. “How are you still cute doing that?”
Her blushing cheeks stifled her laughter.
The dryer beeped, and she opened it and pulled out her hot bedsheet. She struggled to fold it without letting it touch the dirty floor.
David stepped in to help. “Okay, we’re folding it hot-dog-style first.”
Iris frowned in confusion. “You mean lengthwise?”
“Yes, excuse me, I didn’t realize you went to private school .”
They stepped back from each other to pull it taut and make each long side meet at the corners.
“Okay, now horizontal, or hamburger-style, if ya nasty.”
Iris giggled as they stepped toward each other to make their corners meet, holding the top of the sheet high above their heads so the bottom wouldn’t touch the ground.
Although they were hidden from each other by the bedlinen curtain, Iris felt David’s hands close around hers as he gathered her corners with his.
But as soon as their fingers touched, he stepped back, and they were pulling it taut again.
With each fold, they drew closer and closer, and the curtain separating them dropped lower and lower.
“Perfect,” he said, looking directly at her.
“Thanks.” She held his gaze for a moment before placing the sheet in the hamper. She could feel him take a step closer behind her. She smoothed the folded cotton while contemplating her next move.
David beat her to it. “So, did you break up with that Connecticut guy?”
“A while ago. But he wasn’t from Connecticut.”
“Could’ve fooled me.” He poured detergent into the machine.
“Do you have a girlfriend?”
“Single as a Pringle.”
“Pringles are literally the only chip that comes spooning other chips.”
He scrunched his face into a pout. “That’s why being alone hurts so bad.”
She laughed and gave him a playful shove; his tee was so thin, she could feel his body heat. “So then why don’t you ever flirt with me?” she asked, uncharacteristically bold.
“I have no idea.” He turned to face her, leaning on the washer with one arm. “Why haven’t you flirted with me?”
“I’m shy.”
He laughed like she was being sarcastic, although it was the truth. Until recently.
“And we live in the same building,” she added.
He took a step closer. “New Yorkers don’t talk to their neighbors anyway.”
The kiss was both unexpected and inevitable. And neither of them wanted to stop there.
“What about the dogs?” she joked, as he was devouring her neck. “I don’t want it to be awkward for them.”
“How ’bout, outside of the laundry room, we’re just friendly neighbors with clean clothes?”
“What happens in Laundry Room A stays in Laundry Room A?”
“Exactly.”
Her face eased into a smile, and they resumed their make-out. David lifted her butt up onto the whirring washing machine, sending pleasurable vibrations through Iris’s thighs. Her arms draped over his shoulders from her newly elevated height, as David nestled himself between her knees.
“One more thing.” He pushed off her and reached a long arm to the laundry room door, turning the lock. Then he flipped the lights off. In the dark, the digital displays on the machines glowed an unearthly blue like spaceships.
Iris giggled again as he slipped her shorts and underwear down her legs. She stopped giggling when she felt his stubble between her thighs.
—
Iris hurried back to her apartment on jelly knees, overcome with extreme giddiness and embarrassment.
She could not believe what she had done, or rather let be done to her in that laundry room.
Even with Ben, she would let him do that for a maximum two minutes before relieving him from what she imagined was a sexual chore, despite Ben’s protestations to the contrary (though he never protested much), and reciprocating.
She was a giver, after all. She had convinced herself that she didn’t really like it, anyway. Other women might, but not her.
Today, she liked it.
Mentally, she couldn’t believe it, couldn’t bear thinking back on it. But her body had loved it, was still loving it, and she couldn’t stop thinking back on it. It occurred to Iris that she had never before gotten out of her head while getting head.
And she didn’t know if David got off, maybe he did, maybe he didn’t, she didn’t ask!
He seemed to enjoy himself—it was his idea, anyway.
When he stood back up, he whispered in her ear, “We’re gonna get caught if we stay here any longer.
” If that had been an invitation to go back to his apartment, it had gone over her head.
Being reminded of getting caught doing something so out of character, so naughty, so obscene, had triggered her flight instinct.
So she got dressed, grabbed her hamper, and bolted.
Was she a horrible, selfish, greedy slut? No, she wasn’t that bad.
But she was close.
And she liked that, too.