Chapter 15
chapter
fifteen
Jules
I have a rule about Payton in my house.
He comes in, he gives me multiple orgasms, and then he leaves.
That's the arrangement. Clean, containable, no ambiguity about what this is or what it isn't. I was very clear about that when we started this, and he agreed, and it has been working perfectly fine for several weeks now, which is why tonight is not a problem.
Tonight is not a problem.
I pour myself a glass of wine and try to remember the last time I had to talk myself into believing something this hard.
He shows up at seven with Thai food, which was not requested and is not part of the arrangement. Still, I let him in because I'm hungry and because it's been a day.
"You didn't have to do that," I say.
"I know." He holds up the bag. "You have plates?"
"Contrary to what my kitchen suggests, yes."
We eat at my coffee table because my actual table is covered in my most recent art obsession, collaging.
Payton doesn't comment on it. He also doesn't comment on the fact that I've been quieter than usual since he arrived.
He just lets the silence sit without rushing to fill it, which is either deeply considerate or deeply annoying, and I genuinely cannot decide which.
"Bad day?" he finally asks.
"Mediocre day with bad edges."
"You want to talk about it or you want to pretend I didn't ask?"
"Option two," I say. "For now."
He nods, passes me the spring rolls, and doesn't push.
Later, after the Pad Thai and the single episode of a sitcom we both enjoy, we move to the official reason he’s here.
Over the last several weeks, we’ve had a lot of sex. Some nights, just once; sometimes we go for a second round. But something about tonight is different. When he slides inside me, his eyes locked on mine, I’m very aware of our connection. The physical connection. The physical intimacy.
I don’t know why it’s front and center in my mind, but it is.
Then when he slows the pace, using long, thorough glides in and out of me, I feel caught in a web. I can’t look away from his pretty blue eyes. And the way the pleasure shifts through his features. I watch his mouth as he tells me how good I feel, how nothing has ever been this good.
He’s not wrong. Sex with Payton is hot and always satisfying.
I think it’s probably me, feeling melancholy or whatever, but I already know that I’m going to have to do some work rebuilding my walls when tonight is done.
His fingers thread through mine, my arms above my head as he slowly fucks me.
Doesn’t really feel like fucking, though.
Feels like something else entirely. But I refuse to use or even think those words.
The climax that rocks through me pulls his name from my throat in a raw cry.
The pleasure pulses through every molecule in my body and almost feels like my very cells are rearranging themselves.
When we’re finished, and Payton has done his thing—disposed of the condom and gotten us both glasses of water—I’m lying on my back staring at the ceiling. Payton lies next to me, one arm behind his head, the lamp on the nightstand throwing everything in amber.
The day’s bad edges have mostly smoothed out. I won't tell him that's his fault. That I’m feeling contemplative and melancholy because I saw him in a different light.
"Can I tell you something?" I say, which is not a thing I usually say, so it gets his attention immediately—I can feel him turn his head to look at me without actually looking back.
“Always.”
"I saw you today. In the hallway, with that kid—Marcus, the one who sits in the back and looks like he's actively daring someone to notice him."
Payton is quiet for a second. "He was having a hard time."
"I know. I could see that from the doorway.
" I keep my eyes on the ceiling, because this is somehow easier to say to the ceiling than to his face.
"You stopped. You didn't make a thing of it, you didn't call attention to it, you just—sat down on the floor next to him, right there in the hallway, and you talked to him like he was a person instead of a problem to be managed.
" I pause. "And then you made him laugh.
I don't know what you said. But whatever it was, he went back into class looking like a different kid. "
Payton doesn't say anything.
"I'm telling you this," I continue, "because I have been a teacher for eleven years, and I still sometimes get it wrong with kids like Marcus.
I still sometimes default to fix-it mode before I've actually figured out what needs fixing.
And you just—did it. Instinctively. Without any of the eleven years.
" I finally look at him. "You're going to make one hell of a teacher, Payton. "
Something happens to his face when I say it. Not a smile exactly.
"Jules—"
"I'm not being nice," I say, preemptively, because I know how that sentence was going to continue. "I'm being accurate. There's a difference. I don't do nice for its own sake; it's a waste of everyone's time."
"I know you don't." The corner of his mouth turns up. "That's how I know you mean it."
I look back at the ceiling. Something in my chest is doing a thing I'd rather it not do, warm and a little inconvenient, the same thing it's been doing more frequently lately in his general vicinity.
"It's a compliment," I say. "Don't make it weird."
"I'm not making it weird."
"You're looking at me like that."
"Like what?"
"Like I said something significant."
"You did say something significant."
“Payton."
"Jules." He says my name back in the same tone I used his, patient and a little amused, and I hate how much I don't hate that. "Thank you. Genuinely. That means more coming from you than from anyone else, and I think you know that, and I think that's why you almost didn't say it."
I don't answer that, because he's right, and confirming it would require acknowledging more than I'm currently prepared to acknowledge. Instead, I reach over and turn the lamp off, which is a coward’s move, and I'm aware of it, and the room goes dark and quiet around us.
I don't mean to fall asleep.
That's the thing I keep coming back to when I surface into consciousness at some unknown hour of the night, heart already doing something inconvenient before I've fully figured out why.
I don't mean to fall asleep.
Yet here I am, on my side, one hand tucked under my own cheek. My body is deeply, traitorously comfortable, in a bed that is not just mine right now.
Because Payton is still here.
Asleep, from the sound of his breathing—deep and even and entirely unbothered.
His arm isn’t quite around me, more like it’s lying on my hip.
I am warm in a way that has nothing to do with the blankets and everything to do with the big beautiful body behind me.
I hate everything about this moment including how much I don't actually hate it.
I need to leave.
Even though we’re in my bed, in my house. I could leave my own house. It's an option. I own shoes.
Instead, I lie very still, staring at the opposite wall in the dark. I conduct a thorough internal interrogation of every sensation currently operating in my body and find several that are deeply unwelcome.
I don’t want to be anywhere but here. Right here. Next to him.
And that’s a totally new feeling for me. All my life I’ve been moving, on to the next thing. Searching for something I couldn’t put a name to. And now I’ve found it. The idea is as comforting as it is terrifying.
I wait for the panic to hit. The feeling of my something trying to claw its way out of my body. But none of that comes. Instead, my body is relaxed and aside from my mental theatrics, everything feels right.
I should wake him up. Tell him it's late. Hand him his jacket with the brisk, and tell him I’ll see him at school on Monday.
I don't do that, though.
At some point, against every intention I have ever had, I fall back asleep.
The second time I wake up, it's morning, gray light pressing against the curtains, and the situation has not improved.
If anything, the situation has worsened. Because now Payton’s arm is definitly slung over my body and he is currently the big spoon to my little spoon.
Booty calls do not spoon.
I don’t spoon. I’ve never spooned in my life. I fork and then get out of the damned drawer.
"Morning," he says.
I take a breath. “You’re still here, Payton.”
“I am. Guess we both fell asleep.”
“This is supposed to be just sex," I say.
A pause. "I know what it is for you.”
The gentleness in his voice is worse than if he'd argued. That’s when the panic starts to creep in. So, I sit up. I grab some random clothing from the floor and head into the bathroom.
"You should go," I say over my shoulder. "I have things."
"Okay."
I can hear him out there, getting dressed. He's not going to make this a confrontation; he's just going to let me kick him out. I’m not sure I know what to do with a man who gives me exactly the exit I ask for while making it crystal clear that he wants more.
I step out of the bathroom in time to see him grab his jacket.
He gives me an easy smile. “Jules."
"Don't."
"I wasn't going to say anything."
"You were about to say something."
"I was going to say I'll see you at school Monday." He gives me a little nod. "That's all."
I cross my arms. "Fine."
"Fine." He walks to my door. And I follow.
“Have a good rest of your weekend,” he says. Then he's gone before I can answer that.
I stand in my own doorway for a long moment after his truck drives away. That’s when it hits me. I walked him to the fucking door.