“No,” I tell her. “I’m ready. Let’s do this.”
“Okay,” she smiles and she leans back in, kissing me.
She leans back just enough to get her shirt off, and she pulls mine off while she’s at it.
Skin to skin now, she’s pressing herself into me, and her warmth reminds me of Leila.
Okay, I’ve got to just push through this. It’s understandable that I’d be a little hung up right now, but it’s over with Leila. She won’t even answer my calls.
“Okay, seriously,” Wrigley says.
“What?” I ask. “I didn’t do anything that time.”
“I’ve been trying to put your hands on me, but you keep pulling them away. Obviously, you’re not into this, so maybe I should just go.”
“No,” I tell her. “Really, I’m fine. I think I’m just a little out of it, but I definitely want to do this.”
“You’re sure?” she asks. “This isn’t one of those high-pressure situations where you tell me you’re not down to fuck and I have a conniption fit.”
“I promise,” I tell her, “I’m fine.”
“All right,” she says and she’s kissing me again.
I’ve got to keep my mind focused here. I don’t know what’s with me, but the more Wrigley and I touch, the more I hear her breathe, the more I feel the soft warmth of her skin, the more I’m picturing Leila, and the more I just want to break down and cry.
Wrigley’s hand makes its way down my chest and settles on my upper thigh.
My head’s in the game now, and I’m holding her close while she reaches up and undoes my pants with one hand.
At least one of us still has game.
Pants open, now, she reaches in and nothing.
“Okay, you’ve got to tell me what the fuck is going on,” she says. “I’ve seen you a lot drunker than this, and you’ve always been hard and ready to go.”
“I’m just nervous,” I tell her. “It’s been a while since you and I have been together like this.”
“Nothing’s happening, Dane,” she says. “What the fuck? You’re not even sporting a halfie.”
I lean forward, elbows on my knees, palms over my eyes. “I don’t know,” I tell her. “I just can’t do it. It’s not you, I promise you that. I’m just in my fucking head and I can’t get out of it. I can’t let go and just let this happen.”
I’m waiting for a response, but none comes.
After all her time and effort, stalkerish though it may have been, she can’t be very happy with me right now.
“Fuck!” I grunt and pull my hands away from my eyes, but Wrigley’s just sitting next to me with a smile on her face.
“I knew it,” she says. “You really are in love with her, aren’t you?”
“What?” I ask. “No, I thought I was, but how can I be in love with someone who just—”
“You can’t help who you fall in love with,” she says. “It doesn’t work like that.”
“I thought this was what you wanted: you and I getting back to where we were before Leila and I—”
“That would have been nice,” she says, “but that’s not why I’ve been giving you such a hard time.”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you really think I’m dumb enough to think that stalking you is going to make you want to be with me? That has never fucking worked and it never will. Anyone who says differently is lying to themselves.”
“Then why—”
“I wanted you to be sure,” she says. “I could tell that morning after we technically became a thing. Every time we talked about your roommate, you got this look in your eye. It’s the same look I had a long time ago and there’s not another one like it.”
“I don’t understand,” I tell her. “What were you trying to accomplish?”
“I was just planting seeds,” she says. “While I know that look, I also know you. I know that you wouldn’t just get out of your own way and let something happen—even being in love—without a little help, so I helped.”
“You’re talking Greek,” I tell her. “I don’t understand how any of that was supposed to help my relationship with Leila.”
“Oh, don’t be such an idiot,” she says. “Even tonight’s about that. Do you really think I’m so deluded that I’d try to jump you when you’re clearly heartbroken? That would just be me taking advantage of you, and you’d end up resenting me for it. That last part is kind of why I’m telling you all this: I don’t want you to resent me for anything.”
“But you did try to jump me,” I tell her.
“You made the first five moves,” she says, “but I knew you’d stop it before it got that far. I didn’t count on your body saying no before you did, but that’s just the way it goes, I guess.”
“What am I supposed to do, though?” I ask. “I don’t know where she lives. She wouldn’t tell me. She won’t answer my calls, and anyway, I just spent the whole night with you—a lot of it with both of us naked, and—”
“Yeah, but notice anything?” she asks.
“What do you mean?”
She squeezes my still flaccid member and says, “Most of the time, all it takes for a guy to get hard is a pleasing view or a little friction, and I’m pretty sure I’ve been giving you both for about the last ten minutes, and not so much as a semi.”
She lets go of me and starts getting dressed.
“I’m having a little trouble believing you’ve been doing all this just so I’d end up with Leila,” I tell her.
“It’s not just that,” she says. “I wanted to see if it was real or just a phase. I wasn’t lying when I told you that I wasn’t so keen on giving up on my fuck buddy, but you’re in a different place right now. It wouldn’t be fair to either of us to keep pretending like there’s still something between us.”
My head is hurting, and I’m not sure if it’s because of the alcohol or because what she’s saying actually makes a weird kind of sense. It’s definitely a Wrigley kind of sense.
“So, what do I do, though?” I ask again. “It’s not like I can just call her up and tell her the good news that I tried to get with someone else, but couldn’t get hard, so that must mean we’re meant for each other.”
“I think you know that the two of you are meant for each other,” she says. “But yeah, I probably wouldn’t mention how you came to that particular conclusion. I get that the two of you aren’t really together right now, but I can see that disclosure backfiring. You know where she works, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay,” she says. “Send a letter to her at work. Don’t do anything over the top—you don’t want to embarrass her, but you need to let her know that you haven’t forgotten about her, that you still want to find a way to make things work if you can. After that, I don’t know, but I bet you’ll get a response.”
Well, this has easily been the strangest night of my life, but at the same time, I can’t help but think it could be one of the most important.
“You know what?”
“What?” Wrigley asks.
“You’re right. Thank you for whatever voodoo you’ve been doing to help me see that, but I can’t just give up on her and me. I need to know if there’s some way we can make this work.”
Wrigley tells me that it might be better for me to call her again when it’s not four in the morning, but the phone’s already in my hand. I turn on the screen, ready to late-night drunk-dial Leila when I see the notification at the top of the screen.
“You have one voice message.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Five Alarm
Leila
We’re back at my apartment, Will and I, and I’ve been doing everything in my power to feel okay getting close to him.
So far, it hasn’t been working so well.
When I first showed him in, I was fully intending on ripping off his shirt and seeing what it’s like to ride a fireman, but I just ended up taking him for a tour of the apartment.
When we got to my bedroom, I told myself that this would be a perfect segue back toward sex, but I just stood there for a minute before asking him if he wanted something to drink.
Even after he said no, I still walked away from him and to the kitchen where I keep the liquor.