12. Sex Ninja
SEX NINJA
Grace finds me the following morning, exactly where she left me, curled up on her couch with Paws McCatney in my lap. Face red and puffy after a long night of expelling every drop of moisture in my body through my eyeballs. I’m not an attractive sight.
She passes me a cup of coffee, and the smell alone has the same effect a bell would on one of Pavlov’s dogs. My stomach tightens, and I glance around for the familiar presence of the strong, beautiful, perfect man who usually hands me my morning caffeine.
“Try not lookin’ so disappointed,” she jokes, running her fingers through my hair before taking a seat beside me on the sofa.
My fluffy ball of comfort immediately abandons me in favor of greener pastures. Traitor.
“Did you get any sleep?”
I shake my head and glance out the front window at the street.
It’s Sunday, so at least I don’t have to wrestle between the guilt of not showing up for work and the fear of looking Owen in the eyes for another twenty-four hours.
The thought of walking back into the cafe tomorrow has nausea swelling inside me.
I push it down, swiping at my cheek as if there are any tears left to wipe away.
We sit in silence for a while. Me doing everything I can to avoid Grace’s eye contact, and her pretending to be distracted, combing through the cat’s fur. I can feel the countless questions she’s holding back.
Yesterday, I’d been unable to vocalize the hurricane of thoughts spiraling inside me.
This morning, I can name it for what it is: the suffocating crash that follows any time I put myself out there.
Anytime I dare to step over the line of what people expect of me and ask for more.
It’s anxiety and disappointment and shame. So much shame.
I’m driving myself insane replaying that moment with Owen, convinced I missed a crucial clue.
Certainly, there must have been a sign I ignored that foreshadowed his rejection.
One I still can’t find. The emotional whiplash of having everything I wanted within reach one minute and yanked away the next has settled into something physical. An ache that won’t let up.
“It’s time you talk about it.” Grace sets down her empty cup, and the cat jumps off her lap to stick its nose inside, inspecting for any remaining dregs.
I shake my head again, even though I know she’s right.
She hadn’t pushed when I showed up here, a sobbing mess.
Just force-fed me ice cream and let me sniffle pathetically in the background while she watched Real Housewives of Atlanta reruns.
I don’t remember eating actual food, but the fact my stomach isn’t protesting tells me she must’ve also convinced me to consume something that wasn’t sugar-based.
A hand cups my arm, and I give in to the gentle pressure, curling into her lap and wrapping my arms around her middle like a child clinging to his mother. The cat on the coffee table looks deeply offended at losing his spot before hopping down and stalking toward the kitchen.
I take a breath and mutter into her thigh, “Owen kissed me. Then he changed his mind. Said it was a mistake and he doesn’t want me.”
Her hand pauses mid-circle on my back. “That doesn’t sound like somethin’ Owen would do.”
I shrug. It’s oversimplified, sure, but it sums up what happened pretty well. “I don’t think I can face him again, but I’m not sure I can handle calling my mother to ask her for help moving home either.”
The word home doesn’t even fit Vancouver anymore. It never did. I squeeze my eyes shut and try to picture what home is supposed to look like. All I see are steady green eyes.
“Let’s not jump to extremes,” Grace says gently. “Walk me through it. From the moment I left yesterday until you showed up at my door. Don’t skip anything.”
So I don’t. I tell her everything. How his slightly chapped lips felt against mine.
The breathy way he said my name. The look of horror when he pulled back, and the war in his eyes when I told him how I felt.
How I was certain he wanted me as much as I wanted him.
How I offered myself up on a silver platter.
How my entire world caved in when he said, I won’t do that to you.
By the time I finish, my throat is raw, and tears are slipping down my cheeks again. My body must be pulling the moisture straight from the atmosphere at this point, because the rest of me feels like the Sahara with how dehydrated I am.
Grace lets out a long sigh, nudging me until I’m sitting up and looking directly at her. “I mean this in the most lovin’ way possible. You, Finley Josiah York, are a fuckin’ idiot.”
I blink at her. “That’s not my middle or last name.”
“Unimportant.” She waves me off. “Situations like this call for a full government name. I had to improvise.”
It takes a second for the other part of what she said to register, but I’d already come to that conclusion myself.
I know I’m not blameless here. I pushed and pushed until I got a reaction from Owen.
Sure, that reaction was confusing and contradictory as hell, but I can’t be angry at him for not wanting the same things I do.
I never should’ve let myself get carried away.
I open my mouth to say as much, but she raises a hand to stop me. “I’m gonna spell this out for you, because I’m afraid if I don’t, you’ll never get there on your own. Owen didn’t reject you.”
“Urm…I was there.”
“He set a boundary, babe. Poorly. Without proper explanation. And yes, he made it extra confusin’ by running away afterward. Not once in what you told me did Owen say he didn’t want you. He gave you a whole list of reasons why he shouldn’t. That’s not the same thing.”
“Doesn’t matter when the outcome was the same,” I mutter.
“You said you were certain he was considerin’ it before you asked him to fuck you?”
I cringe. For some reason, hearing those words from her mouth sounds so crass. “Yeah. He told me to tell him exactly what I wanted.”
“And did you? Was that what you wanted? Truly?”
“Of course not. I want to have the man’s babies and live out some storybook happily-ever-after. I couldn’t exactly tell him that, could I? That would’ve had him sprinting for the hills.”
Yet somehow I managed the same reaction anyway. I press my fingertips into the headache blooming at my temple. “Just tell me what I’m missing.”
“You have a man who, in the twenty-two years I’ve been alive, has never dated, never brought someone home, never been spotted on the apps.
He’s rejected Elodie—who we both know is a sure thing—about a thousand times.
For all we know, he has zero experience with another man.
This could be the first time he’s ever felt attraction to one.
“Hell, unless he’s some kinda sex ninja, he might not've been with a woman in those twenty-two years either. Trust me, gossip spreads through this town like wildfire. No one sleeps with anyone without it becomin’ front-page news.
“The man is basically a monk. And that’s what you led with? That’s all you asked him for? Sex? After one kiss? He’s already conflicted about your age and takin’ advantage of you, and you practically begged him to do exactly that. Didn’t he tell you himself he doesn’t do casual?”
Shit.
“You scared the fuck outta the man, babe. He didn’t say no because he isn’t in to you. He said no because he isn’t willin’ to use you, and he thought that was the only thing you wanted from him.”
I hang my head. Now that Grace is breaking it down, it couldn’t be more obvious. I can’t do that. I won’t do that to you. Goddamn it. How did I read the situation so disastrously wrong? I have a long-running habit of making bad decisions, but this one takes the cake.
“I know I told you to flirt with him—I should’ve been clearer. A man like Owen isn’t gonna respond well to someone flingin’ themselves at him. He’s too righteous for that. He needed you to pump the brakes, and—”
“I floored the accelerator?”
She nods solemnly. “You punched that sucker straight through the floorboards.”
I groan. “What’s the solution?” Is there even one? The idea there might be a way to claw myself back from this shit show feels impossible to grasp.
“There’s this new thing I’ve heard about. It’s been makin’ leaps and bounds in feminine circles, but the male population is still strugglin’ to catch on. It’s called communication.”
“Comm-un-i-ca-tion.” I stretch the word out, pretending to test the weight of it on my tongue. “Yeah, never heard of it.”
She snorts and gives me a pitying smile. “You have to talk to him. Tell him how you really feel. What you actually want—not what you think he wants to hear. And you give him the space to do the same.”
“What if we don’t want the same things?”
I’m not sure I could survive putting myself out there again only to get the same result. If I take Grace’s advice, I don’t get to hide behind sex this time. I’ll have to lay everything out. Cut myself open and hope it’s enough.
“Then you’ll know he isn’t your forever person.
I won’t claim to be a love expert, but I’ve watched enough of The Bachelorette to know you can’t force somethin’ that isn’t meant to be.
The right man for you will want the same things you do.
He’ll think the sun shines out of your perfect ass and worship the ground you walk on without you havin’ to shrink or compromise a single part of who you are.
Anyone who makes you feel like you need to settle for less doesn’t deserve access to your heart. ”
She pulls me into another hug, and I feel the energy of it like a pulse all the way down to my toes. “Because your heart is pretty fuckin’ special, Finley. I know Owen sees that.”
Unlike in the movies, I don’t take off running through the streets to beg for Owen’s forgiveness—but it’s a near thing. One look in the mirror is enough to tell me that if I showed up on his doorstep like this, the only one running would be him in the opposite direction.
It takes a herculean effort to drag myself into Grace’s shower and wash off hours of wallowing, but standing under the near-scalding spray gives me a much-needed pause to think.
To replay the conversation I had with Grace and figure out where I go from here.
The longer I stand there, the more that earlier clarity dilutes.
My feeble courage slips down the drain along with the soapy suds.
Grace said I have to put it all on the line.
Tell Owen my feelings—my true feelings—and not hold anything back.
The certainty I need to approach him with my heart instead of my body sounded logical coming from her lips.
Yet, wasn’t that always what got me in trouble before?
How many men have I thrown myself at, heart completely exposed, only to be rejected?
Told it wasn’t my heart they were interested in at all.
I didn’t mean to lead you on, Finley. They were always so damn apologetic. I thought this was a casual thing. I only wanted…
None of them were cruel enough to finish that sentence. Not until Declan, anyway. He’d had no trouble. I only wanted sex. I thought that was clear. How could you have possibly read the nothing between us wrong?
I lift a hand to my chest, rubbing at the brand that memory left. I’d thought that ache was behind me, thanks to Owen, but faced with the possibility of having him—of loving him—it rears its ugly head.
Do I have it in me to walk that familiar path again, after promising myself firmly the last time would be exactly that?
Can I let myself be vulnerable, knowing what’s left of my fragile heart will shatter if Owen doesn’t feel the same way?
I’m not sure I could handle another rejection. Not from him.
A loud pounding on the bathroom door breaks my spiral before it becomes a full nose-dive. “I’ll have to charge you for hot water if you don’t quit procrastinatin’,” Grace calls a moment later.
There’s no real irritation in her voice, but it’s enough to have my fingers reaching for the tap, cutting off the now-lukewarm stream.
“Owen’s never gonna give you a shot if you show up lookin’ like a prune.” Her footsteps disappear down the hall before I can come up with a witty enough response.