Chapter 8 Wedding Season #6
As we climb the stairs, I can feel his eyes on the back of my neck.
The flights of stairs seem to take an eternity.
When we reach his apartment, he unlocks the door and then takes my hand to lead me inside.
As soon as the door closes, we both spin at the same time, pressing toward each other as he kisses me, pushing me up against the door.
It is an explosion of a kiss, his hands sliding behind my back, my hands slipping around his waist to pull him closer. I hear him whisper my name, and then we are wrapped around each other, all over each other like teenagers, his lips on my cheek, on my neck, on my shoulder.
“Do you need anything?” he says after a moment, breathing hard, his mouth against my collarbone. “Anything to drink, water?”
I shake my head, dazed and hot.
“A shower?” he asks. “After the dancing?”
“We’re both sticky,” I murmur. “I don’t mind if you don’t.”
He shakes his head against my shoulder as he keeps pressing me against the wall, then licks the salt from my neck. My knees almost melt beneath me. His hands glide around my waist and pull me even closer and everywhere that we’re touching lights up.
Another pause for breath. I can’t remember the last time I was this turned on.
He pauses and heaves a long sigh, not looking up. I wonder if he’s thinking about his ex again. “What is it?” I say, afraid for a moment.
“I just feel…”
“What?” I try not to sound worried.
“Relieved,” he says. “I’m so relieved that I saw her, and I got through it, and I didn’t lose you. You didn’t give up on me.”
I run a hand through his hair, meeting his eyes. “I’m not going to give up on you.”
He gives me that same unreadable look for a moment, then kisses me again.
“Let me get you some water,” he says.
His apartment is high-ceilinged but narrow, a railroad-style one-bedroom with limited furniture: I suspect that his wife must have taken a lot of furnishings in the divorce, and he never bothered to buy more.
The living room has only a television, a classic leather sofa and an old-fashioned rolltop desk.
There are two barrister bookcases filled with various paperbacks and law school tomes.
It all seems very Ollie, special but a little buttoned-up; even his books are behind glass.
He walks around his clean, minimalist kitchen, pouring two glasses of water.
“What you said the other day, when we were in the water,” he begins quietly, handing me a glass of water. So I guess we’re going to talk about it now. My casual little ‘I love you.’
“I was probably drunk on seawater,” I try to joke.
He shakes his head. “It’s not that I don’t…” He takes a breath. “It’s not that I don’t think things are going that way.”
“It’s okay. I didn’t say it so you would say it back.”
“I just…I don’t want you to think I’m trying to play it cool. It’s not that at all. It’s just that I’m superstitious about that particular word.”
I nod once. “Okay.”
“But I’m serious about you.”
“Okay.” I give a little smile. He takes a step forward and puts one hand on my waist to kiss me gently, and I can’t tell whether he’s trying to tell me that he loves me or apologizing that he doesn’t.
His eyes are warm, the rings of green and brown so beautiful this close that it’s hard to look at them for long.
When he leads me to the bedroom I feel a brief sense of panic.
I haven’t slept with anyone but Nick in years.
He pauses as he notices my hesitation. “We don’t have to—I’m just afraid my back will stick to my leather sofa if we sit down there.”
“That old line,” I whisper.
“You’re so stunning,” he says quietly, his expression entranced. “I don’t know what you’re doing with me.”
“You’re sexy. And handsome. It’s just been a really long time since I did this with anyone,” I say.
“Me, too. Two years.”
I wonder if it’s true. He could have anyone, I think.
His bedroom is high-ceilinged and clean, with pale sheets and wide, old-fashioned windows covered by light grey curtains. I sit on the bed, and a moment later he is kissing me. I lean back, and his arm cradles my head as it lands. This could actually happen.
He rests on his elbows above me, his hand trailing up my side.
I have a sense of clarity about how much I really want this.
It has been so long since I truly wanted to do this with somebody, but I want to know everything: what he looks like with his shirt off.
How he will undress me. Whether he will be bold, or shy, or intense.
He leans down and kisses me through my shirt, and I think: he is not being shy.
He’s being assertive and tender, and I need more of him, and of this, and I am lighting up like an old-fashioned carnival ride, all flashing bulbs and whirling motors…
and then my cell phone rings, with the inevitability of single parenthood.
I reach into my pocket and pull it out, glancing at it.
“Not the babysitter,” I say, tossing it aside.
Ollie murmurs a laugh and then kisses me softly as I start to undo his shirt buttons…first the top one, then the next. This is actually going to happen.
He begins to undo his own buttons even more quickly as I slide one hand underneath his shirt, feeling how warm his skin feels beneath my fingertips.
He pauses to peel away my shirt and tosses it, then takes in the sight of me in my black bra and jeans.
He runs one finger along the bra strap and slides it aside to kiss the skin underneath it.
This is actually going to happen.
He finishes pulling his own shirt off and tosses it. I look at the shape of him, his shoulders strong and dotted with freckles, his chest lean and strong. I run one of my hands through the light layer of hair that runs up his chest. He slides one hand behind me and unlatches my bra.
He shivers a little, then leans forward to pull my bra away, to tease me with his mouth.
“I like you so much,” I whisper. I love you.
He kisses me tenderly, and it is almost enough. This is actually going to happen.
My cell phone buzzes. Someone has left a message. I glance at it.
I slide a hand along his thigh, touching him as his head bows against me.
My cell phone buzzes again.
“Just one second,” I say breathily.
I run my hand along his back and then look at the phone again.
“Just one…” My back is arching as I glance at the voice message that is being constructed visually by my cell phone. “This is Dr. Yukovitz calling from Rochester Memorial Hospital. Please contact the…”
I sit up quickly. “Hold on.”
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s a hospital, I should…”
Ollie’s face is pure concern as I listen to the full message. I grab my discarded shirt as I listen.
“It’s Nick,” I say at last. “He’s gotten in a car accident. I guess I’m his emergency contact.”
Ollie nods, once. His mouth forms into a frown.
“This doesn’t mean…” I trail off.
“I know,” Ollie agrees. His voice is kind, but his eyes look distant.
“I should probably...”
“Yeah. Of course,” he says quietly. “Can I help, or call a cab, or…”
“A cab sounds great.”
I get dressed and then lean over and press my face into his neck. I kiss him once softly on the shoulder, then once on the lips.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper.
He nods. “It’s okay. It’s not your fault.”
He almost sounds like he means it.