“You did a great job last night,” I told him. “Your skit was the funniest.”
Mateo’s group ended up being all male, so they decided to do a faux Miss Spain contest. Which meant they all dressed up in drag. Mateo, was, by far, the most masculine of them all, even with a blonde wig, lipstick and a feather boa.
“Did you think I made an attractive woman?” he asked, handing me my beer.
I thanked him for it and then said, “No. You were the hairiest woman I have ever seen.”
He gave me a crooked smile and clinked the neck of his beer against mine. “I don’t think I could handle being a woman. You are far too…complicated.”
“We are?” I asked dubiously.
He nodded and put his hand on the small of my back, something he’d been doing more and more. I felt myself momentarily melt into him before I straightened up and let him lead me out of the bar and outside. Instead of stopping by the drinking game that was now taking place, he kept his hand there and took us out toward the path that sloped between the cottages.
The night now was dark, the stars clear and shining. I put my head back and could see Draco, Arcturus and Ursa Major, strings of diamonds in this velvet night.
“I was hoping we would see the stars tonight,” Mateo said. “Come, let us get away from the lights.”
Get away from the lights? Why?
My body shivered with the unknown and I immediately started to have a minor freakout in my head. What if Mateo wanted to kiss me? What would I do? I mean I couldn’t kiss him back, it would be wrong. But fuck if it would feel anything but right.
I was never very good at any battles that pit my body against my mind. My body almost always won.
He took me away from the patio, where Angel was drunkenly yelling “shithead!” during the drinking game, and over toward my cottage. For a split second I thought he was going to take me upstairs, to my room, to my bed, but he pulled me to a stop beside the low stone wall and patted the top of it with his hand.
I couldn’t tell if I was relieved or disappointed. Either way, it was for the best. From the light upstairs I could see Sara was home and spotted the shadows of Jorge and his roommate in the level below. Nothing was ever secret here.
I gingerly hopped up onto the wall and he sat down right beside me, his long, soccer-player legs dangling over the side. He swung them, the backs of his heels gently hitting the wall. I’d forgotten he was a little bit drunk.
“So how was your first week?” he asked me before taking a swig of his beer.
“Good,” I said, so utterly conscious of how close we were sitting, our thighs touching each other. Every time his leg swung, it shook mine. “Yours?”
“I am tired of talking,” he said. “My throat hurts. I have been having honey tea before I go to bed every night, like an old man.”
I nudged him playfully with my elbow. “You are an old man.”
He nudged me right back. “This is a new thing.”
I tilted my head and eyed him curiously. “What is?”
“You, touching me,” he said.
“Touching you?”
“Yes,” he said earnestly. “Like you touch everyone else.”
I felt my cheeks flush but I still had no idea what he was talking about.
“Angel, Eduardo, Ricardo,” he listed off. “You touch them, kiss them, hello and goodbye and when they make you laugh. Like this.” He placed his large hand on my thigh. My eyes widened in response. I couldn’t move. “Or like this,” he said as he put the same hand on my shoulder. His warmth seared through my bare shoulders, spreading throughout my body.
Oh, Jesus.
I sucked in a breath and tried to keep my voice steady. “I do that to everyone. That’s just how I am. It’s automatic.” Honestly, I don’t even realize it half the time, but I’m often touching someone if they’re close to me, man or woman, young or old.
He had a sip of his beer and looked down at the bottle in his hands. “You do not touch me.”
So, he noticed.
“Well…you’re married,” I said unevenly, wishing my heart would slow the fuck down, feeling completely exposed even in the dark of night.
“And so are many of them.”
“It would be inappropriate…”
“How do you know? Is this inappropriate?”
He took his hand and every so slowly, ever so gently, brushed a strand of loose hair from my face, tucking it behind my ears. His fingertips felt like whispers, telling my skin secrets. I closed my eyes at the touch, feeling it travel down my spine, bathing me in starshine.
I couldn’t remember how to speak. I felt like I was on beautiful drugs, the shivery feel of warm sun on a cold day. “No,” I managed to say, my voice no more than a wisp. I could practically see it float away.
“Then you do it to me,” he said, his voice even lower. “And let me decide.”
I opened my eyes and stared at him in trepidation. His features were so dark and mysterious in the shadow of the moon, the tension between us mounting.
“This is getting weird,” I said, trying to lighten the mood. “This is why I don’t touch you.”
He grinned. “Maybe the more you touch me, the less weird it will get. You can start, maybe, with my toes.”
I let out a small laugh, grateful for it. “You are such a freak.”
He shrugged and finished the rest of his beer. A weird, thick silence wrapped itself around us. I started wondering if he felt hurt that I wouldn’t touch him. I started wondering if he had expected me to. I started wondering why I wasn’t, why I was so afraid.
I reached over and delicately touched my fingers to his temple. I slid them along his smooth skin, catching his silky strands and pushing them behind his ears. The tips of his lobes felt so soft, I had to fight every single instinct to not wrap my lips and tongue around them. I wanted to bite them, feel them between my teeth. I kept my fingers there, now gently nestled in the luxurious feeling of his hair.
His eyes slid to mine, burning, smoldering, like they were lit on fire and my gaze back only stoked the flames. I couldn’t look away, couldn’t take my hand away. I felt like I was drowning.
His full lips parted slightly, enough for me to catch a glimpse of his pink tongue. The heat inside me pooled between my legs, demanding I pay attention to my needs, to my wants, to my desires. I wanted to straddle him, right there and then, right on that stone wall, and feel his wide shoulders beneath my palms, his firm waist between my thighs.
There was only one way out of this. The moral police that I had never known existed had apparently taken up some real estate in my brain. They reminded me that he was married, and a bit drunk, and I should know better than to act on a damn crush.
Without warning, I suddenly blurted out, “I hope you’ll be satisfied with that. There is no way I’m touching your toes.” I then burst out laughing, a crazy, hyena-type laugh that was half-fake, half assfuck insane.
Mateo blinked a few times, shocked by my apparent descent into Crazyville. With the spell broken, he chuckled and gave me his patented shrug again. “It was worth a shot, yes?”
“Yes,” I agreed, giving him a wan smile. “So.” I cleared my throat and shifted my focus to the field in front of us. “Was that the question?”
“Oh, no,” he said. “My question for the day, my dear Estrella, is about your tattoos. What are they, what do each of them mean?”
I breathed a sigh of relief. I was used to this question. I started with my ankles. I pulled up my leg and rolled up the hem of my jeans. “This was my first tattoo,” I told him. “It’s a tattoo of the moon from the Little Prince. I got it when I was fourteen.”