Chapter 15
Fifteen
Cole
I feel her go tense. “O-okay?"
I don't want to ask, but I need to understand. "I don't know how to phrase what I'm trying to ask."
"Just be blunt. Don't worry about my feelings. Just ask what you need to ask."
I sigh. "Oral sex." I feel her go even more tense.
"Maybe I'm imagining things, but…there’s something there with you, about…
that. And I don't think it has anything to do with me.
When we were dating, you did that for me a few times, but it wasn't…
it wasn't a thing, with us. And…and listen, that shit feels amazing, okay?
I'm a normal-ass dude, Lace. I love it. I want it. But…fuck, I don’t know.
There's something there that I just…I dunno.
See? I don't know what I’m trying to say, other than that I sense something to do with you and oral sex. "
She pulls away from me, stands facing my bed, shoulders hunched. "You always were a little too insightful, Cole Mannix."
"Tell me."
She shakes her head. "You don't want to know. Trust me."
It's my turn to follow her across the room, not quite touching me. “Lace—"
She holds up both hands, shakes them. "Don't—don't touch me.
Like you just said, I'm on a knife's edge, here.
I want you. I fucking need you. I haven't…
I haven't felt wanted in years. Not…not really.
Not for me. For my body, sure. But not the way I can feel from you.
Cole, you want me. You can't know how that feels. Not after…"
"After what, honey?"
"After ten years of Eddie Fascinelli." She steps away from me as if she can feel my proximity.
"If you touch me, I’m going to jump you.
So if you want an answer, stay away from me.
I'd rather swallow gravel than talk about this, Cole, but you deserve answers to any questions you ask. So here you go."
“You don't have to—" I start.
“Yes, I do. And you're right. There is a thing there.
" She's silent for a beat. "My relationship with Eddie was transactional.
I didn't understand that at first. When we started dating, it wasn't like that, in my eyes. Yeah, he took me on fancy dates to expensive restaurants. Took me on rides in his fancy cars. But he didn't buy me anything super expensive until we were engaged. And it didn’t…it didn't seem like it came with any strings at the time. Just a pretty necklace because he likes me, and if I want to show my appreciation with my body, then that’s normal and fine, right? That’s what I thought, stupid, naive, twenty-two-year-old me. He gave me the necklace, just because. Then, the next day, he came home from work in a bad mood. He’d had a bad break in a case, and he was tense.
Stressed. Upset. I was convinced, at that point, that I actually loved the bastard, so I…
" she shrugs. "I asked him how I could make him feel better. How could I cheer him up?”
My blood boils. "I can guess at his answer."
"Whiskey and a blowjob, he said. I thought he was kidding." She shakes her head. “He was not. So I…yeah. I poured him a whiskey on the rocks and he drank it while I blew him."
My stomach revolts, but I clamp down on the visceral reaction. "Lace."
"That's how it started. We had sex, of course.
Regular old sex. And it wasn't…there were times it was actually pretty decent.
Not good and not often, but sometimes it was pretty okay.
It was…it was never enough, though. He… I—nothing I did was ever enough.
And that was familiar to me. Growing up, I could never do anything right for my father.
It was never enough—never—I was never good enough.
And with Eddie, it was the same. He wanted me to stay home and not work, so I did.
I quit my job that I fucking loved, that I worked—" her voice cracks, breaks.
"I worked…so fucking hard, Cole. You don't know.
I worked two jobs to put myself through school.
Took night classes. Early morning classes.
I slept maybe four hours a night for fucking years.
Took classes more than full-time while working more than full-time so I could get my degree as fast as possible.
And I fucking did it, Cole. And then I gave it up for fucking Eddie.
I became the trophy wife he wanted. I…we don't come from money, Cole. Not like that. Eddie did. He grew up rich, got richer, and had expectations. I molded myself to fit them. Wore the clothes. Carried the purses. I learned to play golf and tennis with the ladies. The fucking ladies.” She spits the word, vitriolic and disgusted.
"Brunch with the ladies. Planning charity events with the ladies. "
She was never a girl's girl. She was close with Amy and a few others in our circle, but she was never the sit around and giggle and gossip type. So brunch and tennis with the ladies? That's not the Lacey I ever knew. Which I suppose is the whole point.
"For him. So he'd care about me. So he'd love me." She scrubs her cheeks roughly. "God. You don't want to know about this, Cole."
"No, I fucking don't. But you're gonna tell me anyway."
"Why?"
"Same reason you needed to know about Mom and Dad and how things were for me."
"Fine. We need to talk about this shit to pay some sort of penance?
Fine." She looks up at me with wet, hurt, angry eyes.
"Even in bed, I never felt like I could please him. Never fucking mind that I was always left unsatisfied. That he could never make me come and never even bothered to try. It didn’t matter that I faked ninety-nine percent of my orgasms with him because he couldn't find my clit with both hands, a map, and a flashlight.
Again, mainly because he didn't care. But he managed to make our lackluster sex life my fault.
I wasn't into it enough. I wasn't loud enough.
If I'd just let him try this or that…and I did.
I degraded myself for him, Cole. Did things I didn't want to do.
Things that hurt. Things that made me feel gross.
" Silence; what do I say? Nothing. I wanted this, now I have to listen. Fuck, it hurts, though.
"The only thing I could ever do that he seemed to approve of was suck his dick.” She shudders, sighs.
“That? Now that, apparently, I could do right. At a certain point, I understood that it was transactional. When he wanted to feel like we were a good couple in a happy marriage—usually to prove something to himself when one of his colleagues’ marriages fell apart—he would take me on elaborate dates, and we'd have sex.
But that was for him, too. For my part, when I wanted something, that's how I got it. And wanting things was the only thing I had to bring me any kind of dopamine in my life.”
“Lacey—"
She shakes her head, and I go quiet. "I accepted it.
I went with it. I knew he'd never love me.
All I would ever get out of the deal was stuff.
Chanel, Hermes, Yves Saint Laurent, Louboutin, Cartier, De Beers, Porsche, Wolf, Viking, Burberry…
that was my end of the deal. But to get those things, to get the tiny jolt of dopamine and serotonin, I had to go down on him.
I had to…I couldn't just do the deed, though.
It had to be a performance. My whole life was a fucking performance for his sake.
I started to conflate my ability to suck his dick with my worth as a person.
" She sniffled. "There were some dark fucking days, Cole.
Do you have any idea what it's like to feel as if your only worth as a human being is your skill at performing oral sex?
That's when he would praise me. When he'd act like he cared about me—after I’d made a whole big porn movie production of giving him head because he needed to relax after a hard day of billing his fat fucking clients five hundred dollars an hour to make his underlings do all the work. It was only then, after I gave him that, that he’d give me affection or kind words.
And the next day, he'd come home late with shopping bags.
There'd be a new purse or earrings or bracelet or something.
" She lifts her eyes to mine. “Giving head is all I'm good for.
That's the message Eddie spent a decade instilling in my brain.
So I got good at it. I think I've convinced myself that I love doing it.
I just…I don't know what the truth is, anymore.
I don't know who I am anymore. Do I actually like doing that?
" She looks up at me. "And it's even more confusing when I’m with you.
Because… everything is different with you.
I feel seen with you. I know you care about me.
It's obvious. You make it so fucking clear that I'm… that I matter. That you care."
"Because I do!" I snap. "I care so fucking much, Lace."
"And I know that!" she snaps back. "I fucking know you do, Cole.
I just said that! That's not the problem.
The problem is that I want to be with you.
But do I want to be with you just because you make me feel good emotionally?
Or because I think if we can get back together, it'll…
I dunno…erase the last awful decade and a half of my life?
I want…" she shakes her head. "I don't know how else to say this. "
"Just say it, Lacey."
"I don't know what I want, Cole. I want to be loved.
I want to matter. I want to be seen. I want to feel good.
Physically. I want to be more than just a trophy wife.
More than the hot piece of ass with the giant tits who'll flirt with Eddie's jackass friends.
I think if he wasn't possessive of the things he felt were his, he'd have tried to pass me around to his friends. And the fucked up thing is, I’m not sure I can say I wouldn't have done it.
Because he had me that fucked up. That desperate for approval, or attention. "
"Jesus fucking Christ, Lace."