While he sleeps

He sleeps half sitting up with his mouth gaped open and I watch him silently, glad that I’m awake first. He overwhelms me sometimes, with all the breakfast making and sweet text messages. The pessimist in me waits for the asshole to emerge, to open his eyes and say, “What am I doing here?”

He hasn’t exactly said he loves me, but I know that he does. When we made the decision to pursue this relationship, we were sitting on this very bed facing each other, legs crossed and hands clasped. There were obstacles, things and people in the way, and I wasn’t sure how it was going to progress from that point, but I knew that I wanted it to.

“You were sitting in front of me at a basketball game and you were wearing a navy jacket with stripes on the inside of the hood. Your hair was in pigtails and braided…I loved your hair like that. I’ve wanted you ever since that moment; I’ve always wanted only you.”

Years ago, he said those exact same words to me and I ran like my life depended on it. But when he said them this time, I was ready. Ready, but amazed none-the-less. I treated him terribly in the past and not once has he ever admonished me for it. Instead, here he lies…with his hand stretched out reaching for me, vulnerable once again. And for the first time in the history of our multifaceted relationship, so am I.

Last night I was trying to watch TV and he wouldn’t stop bothering me, leaving a trail of loud, smacking, wet kisses up my neck.

He makes gnawing and growling noises and chews on whatever limb he can get to. He’s always staring at me, asking me what I want. And sometimes, when we’re having sex, he tries to talk dirty…but for some reason it just doesn’t work. Coming out of his mouth, the word “pussy” could just as easily be something as mundane as “potholder”. He wears the most ridiculous clothing and he talks about his job incessantly.

All of that crap would’ve been a deal breaker for me a few years ago. Now, I talk to him about the things that I can’t live with (like the chewing and the clothing) and I let the rest go, accept it with the good.

I sleep in his arms and I let him spend time with my kid, who thinks he’s the best thing since sliced bread. I hold his hand when we walk down the street and I sing in the shower even though I know he’s listening in the next room. He lets me be exactly who I am. He makes me happy.

I scoot closer to him, wanting to get warm again, and his lids start to flutter. He opens one blue eye and smiles. “Good morning beautiful”, he says, pulling me to his side.

“Good morning.”

“Have you been awake long?”

“For a little while”, I say, winding one leg through his.

“What have you been doing over there so quietly?”

I smile. “Watching you sleep.”

“Hmm, I’m sure that was interesting.”

“More like…enlightening.”

“How so?”

I don’t answer him, because I’m not quite ready to yet. But I feel it happening, like puzzle pieces sliding into place, so very different than all the instantaneous flash and burn of previous relationships…but exactly right. Scary and comfortable, all at once.

He continues to stare, waiting on an answer. I think he knows how I feel, he can be very intuitive, but he’s also still a man. I’m not going to rush this one. And until I’m completely ready to say the words, until that last piece falls into place, I’ll keep quiet.

“Well”, he says, one eyebrow up.

“Come here.”

I pull him on top of me and wrap my legs around his waist.

He growls and nips at my neck. “Are you trying to distract me with your pu…”

“Potholder”, I say loudly, making him jump. I start laughing and, though he looks extremely confused, so does he. Maybe he’ll figure it out while I’m sleeping.

 

The mature notch

We sit at opposite ends of his slippery leather couch, holding drinks neither of us need. I watch him bring the glass to his lips, mustache momentarily disappearing, and I wonder what on earth I’m doing here.

He’s telling me about his job, something to do with engineering. I’m interested and I’m not – I feel as though he’s filling the time according to some rule of sexual etiquette I’ve never learned. Set the scene, chat up your prey, seduce them slowly and deliberately. That’s not the way younger men do things. It’s not unwelcome exactly, just unfamiliar.

He leans over, lifts my feet and settles them in his lap. Still talking, he massages them, making slow deep circles. I haven’t had a pedicure in ages and normally I’d be embarrassed by my rough heels and chipped nail polish, but I find I don’t care. It feels nice, but the smile he gives me as his hands start to travel higher, stroking my ankles and calves, doesn’t have the effect I think he intends it to. It’s suggestive and rather cheesy. I’m more amused than aroused.

We only met hours ago, introduced by a mutual friend, yet already he knows more about me than any one night stand ever has. That’s partially her fault – telling him over dinner that I write a blog, encouraging me to tell him my crazy stories. And because I didn’t think it mattered, because I looked at him and saw nothing but a friend of a friend whom I’d likely never see again...I did. We shot pool and threw out statistics and sordid tales like playing cards.

“I’ll stay because I’m drunk, but I’m not having sex with you”, I’d said only a short while ago. The streetlights in the parking lot made him look like a pirate when he smiled – black hair, whiter than white teeth, deeply tan skin and that damn mustache. We both knew I was lying.

We stop speaking and he stares at me, the cheesy smile becoming a dirty leer. I can’t help but grin back because this feels rather ridiculous. I’m going to fuck him for sport, because he’s 20 years my senior, because I’m drunk and curious. I’m not sexually attracted to him at all, though he’s moderately good looking. I’m even more amused when I realize his reasons may be similar – he might fuck me for sport, because I’m 25 and I doubt women my age beat down his door on a regular basis.

He stands up and pulls me to my feet, leading me down one hallway then another. His room is open and spacious, shuttered windows cover two walls. The bed is tall, headboard cattycornered causing it to jut out into open space. Soon I’m sprawled across it naked and for once, not even a second of self-consciousness plagues me. Maybe I should stop sleeping with men I’m not initially attracted to more often.

I’m surprised by how good he is, how attentive and tireless, how kinky. For someone I’m sleeping with just because I can, he’s exceeding my expectations. But occasionally he looks at me in a really intense way, almost glaring, and with that mustache...I have to stop myself from laughing.

I fall asleep next to him, which is something I never do. Not the sort of cat napping I tend to do before sneaking out with my panties in my purse, ensuring they have no idea that I snore and occasionally drool, but hard sleep, only waking when he nudges me for more sometime near dawn. I scratch “low libido” off of my older man mental stereotype list.

*****

He asks me out to dinner and, before I really have time to think about it, I say yes. He’s been reading my blog and he likes it. It’s strange to know that a one night stand could read what I write, but even stranger still that I’m seeing him again. I’m not sure I can write about him, knowing he’ll read it.

There’s standing room only at the bar while we wait for our table and I suck down three Jack and Cokes before we’re seated. He has just as many, but I have a feeling that’s a regular occurrence. I want to have sex with him again because it was good, but I’m not sure I can do it sober. His age is no longer a novelty notch for my belt and more like some strange self-experiment I shouldn’t be doing.

He asks if I like wine and I say that I do. He asks if I like red or white and I say that I prefer white. He says he prefers red and orders that, assuring me I’ll like it.

The waitress pours a little in our glasses and though I consider it, I don’t do the pretentious swirling and sniffing. We both raise our glasses to our lips and he nods at the waitress. I nod too, even though I think it’s rather bitter, and she fills our glasses, leaving the bottle on the table.

“Do you like it”, he asks.

“Yes”, I say, to be nice.

The dynamic has changed with this dinner. I’m nervous for the first time and I think it’s because it feels like a date. I’m filled with mixed emotions about it – I’m amused, horrified, excited. Somehow just sleeping with him doesn’t seem as bad as going out with him.

We empty the bottle of wine and I feel infinitely more relaxed. I totter out the doors in my heels, pausing to pull a pair of sandals out of my purse – it’s a long walk back to the car and I doubt I can manage it in those death traps. It’s a nice night for it though and the conversation and laughter flows easily. His laugh is very high pitched and it makes me laugh harder, turning it all into a big vicious cycle.

When we get back he offers me a drink. I take it, shedding shoes and pants as I meander back through the hallways to his bedroom. I climb up on his bed and decide I’d like nothing more than to jump on it.

I haven’t jumped on a bed in years, but here I am in my lacey boyshorts and shirt, drunkenly bouncing around his mattress like it’s a trampoline. I have no idea what he makes of this, since I’m too busy laughing and enjoying myself, but when I stop, he’s right there at the edge, pulling me to him. I wonder if he thinks I’m finally acting my age.

*****

He invites me over to his place to watch the bowl game. I’m reluctant because I have my period and that means if I go, I’m going for the express purpose of hanging out and nothing else. Spending time with him without sex on the menu seems like a waste, and possibly another step in a direction I’m not sure I want to go, but I’m bored. I don’t care if he sees me looking bloated in a pair of leggings, with minimal makeup.

We drink beer and watch the game, playing beer pong at half time. When my team is still losing badly in the third, I make him turn it to something else. We get on his computer, look up YouTube videos that make us laugh and share them with each other. I sit on his lap and it feels a little awkward, but most likely just for me.

Moving to the couch, I watch some sort of criminal drama show he’s put on. When he returns from the kitchen with more beer, it’s to a commercial with a Star Wars reference. Laughing, he bends down in front of me, eye to eye, and says, “Aly, I am your father.”

I’m appalled and I know my mouth hangs open as proof. He is, indeed, almost exactly my father’s age. I internally shake myself and laugh to hide how much that goofy little sentence rattled my cage, but I doubt it’s convincing. I’m not sure which part bothers me more: The fact that he could be...or the fact that he said it, even jokingly.

*****

We go out for drinks and play pool at a bar around the corner. I’m having a good time and getting fantastically drunk until a group of young couples comes and sits in our empty area. They’re playing other games and apparently waiting to use the pool table I don’t want to give up.

He solves this problem by inviting a couple to play against the two of us. Soon we are laughing and chatting with them and he’s buying everyone rounds of shots. The girl playing opposite me is a hair stylist and we talk shop. She gives me a business card with her name on it and drunkenly mentions a discount. We are fast friends now, as only two drunken women who are strangers can be, and she rolls her eyes at me when her boyfriend admonishes her for not paying attention.

“So are you two dating”, she asks. Her face says she’s genuinely interested in the answer and when I look up at him, his expression mirrors hers.

“Um, ha ha.” I shrug and laugh, then decide to go the easy route. “I don’t know”, I say looking at him again, “are we dating?”

My knee jerk instinct was to reply “well, we’re fucking...”, but when I saw his face I wasn’t sure if I should.

“Yes, I guess we are”, he says.

A short time later, I see someone I know. It’s only Travis, my cousin’s old high school boyfriend, someone I only speak to out in public, but I’m suddenly very self conscious about my...date. He starts to come toward me to say hello and, rather than letting him come all the way over, I meet him halfway.

We hug, exchange pleasantries, cover the usual “who have you seen, who’s doing what” topics and he introduces me to his girlfriend. I see Travis glancing over at our pool table curiously, but I offer no explanation about my company.

“Who was that”, he asks when I return.

“Oh, that was just an old friend from high school. He dated my cousin for a long time.”

He makes a comment about me not introducing him and I feign surprise, apologize. I’m drunk after all – social niceties easily escape me. But I’m relatively sure he isn’t buying it.

The boyfriend of my new, drunk friend tells him how lucky he is to be taking me home. Maybe he thinks so too. Maybe that’s why he chooses to ignore my poorly concealed slight. Maybe we really are using each other equally.

He makes me breakfast the next morning and we sit at his dining room table. This is new.

I look at him and try to imagine introducing him to my friends and family as my boyfriend. Premature, yes, but all this time I’ve been spending with him makes me picture it and, in my head, it looks painfully awkward.

*****

We go to a Mexican restaurant near his house. I order a burrito and he laughs at my exaggeratedly Southern pronunciation. But this dinner feels different. I think we’re both losing what little bit of interest we’ve had in each other.

I’m not around often enough, I don’t contact him much, and I happen to know that he’s seeing other women, going out of town with them. I don’t mind, since I’ve been sleeping with someone else when the mood strikes me, but I have a strange feeling that he thinks I will.

Or, maybe I’ve had it all wrong from the beginning. Maybe he’s not my fuck buddy that I’m sort-of-but- not-really-dating because classifying it makes me feel weird. Maybe I’m his...and all these dinners, drinks and hangouts are just bonuses for sharing the fountain of youth.

*****

That was the last time we saw each other.

The next time we spoke was through text message, discussing plans to hangout. He was supposed to let me know what we were doing and after the original “let’s do something”, and my affirmative reply, he just never wrote back.

I didn’t even pursue it, didn’t bother to ask what the hell happened, because I already knew. He’d fallen in love with another woman he’d been seeing, someone closer to his age. Go figure.

I wasn’t hurt and when I look back on it, we had a good time together. You can’t really regret great sex and fun dates. I was, however, a bit angry about the invitation he never bothered to cancel – I found it extremely rude. But still, even after that slight, I couldn’t write about him.

He asked me once, after we’d seen each other a few times, why I hadn’t written about him yet. He was well aware that I generally don’t leave an interesting man, date, or sexual encounter untold.

At first it was because I thought he wouldn’t like it – no man I’d slept with or dated had ever had access to my blog before. I figured he wouldn’t want me to put all of his personal business out there. It’s certainly not for everyone. But no, he seemed to really want me to talk about him. Maybe it had something to do with ego.

When he told me to go for it, that he didn’t care, I was actually excited. I’d been a little disappointed that there was finally something I wasn’t technically allowed to write about.

But when I tried...the words wouldn’t come. Somehow, knowing he’d be reading it had me blocked. There was the tiniest part of me that didn’t want to offend him in any way, but the main problem was this: What if he disagreed about our time together? What if he said it didn’t happen quite that way? I didn’t want to be challenged.

That was last year and I’ve since realized a few things about writing and relationships.

Everyone sees things differently – writers especially. There are details that stand out in our minds that other people find so insignificant, they don’t even register. And more importantly, everyone feels things differently. Everything I’ve said about my time with him is true – it’s what I felt, it’s what I thought and if it differs from the way he remembers it, that doesn’t make it wrong. It just makes it mine.

I’ve wasted a lot of time these past few months trying to avoid things, people, emotions. It’s one of the reasons I’ve had such a hard time writing...because writing, for me, is the opposite of avoidance. This story is my way of giving fear and avoidance the middle finger, a step toward getting back some of what I feel I’ve been missing. And, of course, to finally give him the post he deserves.

The lunch date

Our first date happened almost seven years ago and I wasn’t attracted to him then. I was young, bored and I liked the way he complimented me with a serious expression, refusing any protests, feeble or otherwise. I let him take me out, I let him kiss me, and I let him buy me things to the point of being ridiculous.

But eventually I got tired of trying to like him “that way”, of letting him touch me when I didn’t really want him to, and stopped returning his calls. I found someone else and conveniently forgot about him, until his name would show up randomly on my phone or I ran into him in town.

Most of the time I ignored his texts and calls, saying only the bare minimum to be polite. I would wave and hurry away when I saw him out. But every now and then, he would catch me in a rough patch. Whether it was due to boredom, loneliness or deflated ego, he’d happily step in and boost me back up. And with an attitude that said I was clearly doing him a favor, I’d let him.

When I didn’t need him, he irritated me. I hated that he always seemed to show up everywhere I went. I felt like he was stalking me at times, but really, if I’m going to be honest (and this is all going to be brutally honest), he wasn’t doing anything that I didn’t allow him to. I never would have admitted it to myself, or anyone else, back then...but I wanted him on the back burner, just in case. Telling him off might have meant alienating him completely. And too, he was so fucking nice that I just couldn’t bring myself to really be mean to him.

Except now I realize that I was cruel to him all along. I knew he was crazy about me, possibly even in love with me. And instead of calling time of death, I let him repeatedly shock our relationship back to life. Let him hopefully watch a bunch of feeble lines on a monitor and wait for them to get bigger, all the while knowing what he didn’t – my heart would never work properly for him.

Seven months ago I made a stab at behaving like a decent human being. I had feelings for someone and, no matter how at odds their words and actions sometimes were, I knew they didn’t feel quite the same way about me. Because they never came right out and said “I don’t want you”, I kept thinking “it could happen”. But it didn’t, it won’t, and I knew there was a distinct possibility they were doing to me what I’d done to him, whether they realized it or not.

So when I received a message asking me to hang out and, as usual, telling me how wonderful I was...I finally said what should have been said ages ago. I told him that he wanted to be more than friends, he always had, and I didn’t. I told him that I couldn’t hang out with him unless he was prepared to accept that. I was proud of myself for not dicking around, for saying it in what I thought was a decent, but clear way. He responded that he was sorry for making me uncomfortable, which made me feel like an ass, and then he promptly disappeared.

I thought about him for awhile after that. I wondered how he was doing and if he would come back around and try to be my friend, or if maybe that was something he’d never be able to do. I crawled even farther up my own ass, and wondered how long it would take him to get over me. How much time was I worth? But after a few months without a word or a glimpse of him, I forgot to wonder.

Then a few weeks ago I was driving home. I’d had one of the toughest, most emotionally charged days of my life. I don’t cry that often, but when I do it’s...volatile. I’d been blubbering for most of the hour it takes me to drive home when my phone went off. It was a message from him. He’d passed me, seen what a spectacle I was, and wanted to make sure I was alright.

Of course that set me off more, but I replied that I was okay. Then he said, after seven months of silence, “I always hoped it would work out between us. I’m still crazy about you.” Etcetera, I’m gorgeous, etcetera, he misses me.

And instead of saying “don’t” or “I’m sorry”, I latched onto those words like a life raft. I said “thank you” and sent a smiley face, knowing it wasn’t a good idea.

“Why didn’t it work out?”, he asked.

“I don’t know”, I said, all the while hating myself. I was feeling rotten and I wanted someone to make me feel better and I knew that, with a few noncommittal responses, he’d do just that.

He comforted me, asked me out to lunch, and I accepted. I was back on the vicious cycle, attempting to justify my behavior like I always had before – by telling myself that maybe this was it for me, maybe I was supposed to be with someone that loved me more than I loved them. He was a great guy, with a lot of qualities just screaming “settling down material”. Maybe I’d read too many romance novels and was overlooking what was supposed to be my chance, while I waited for a passion that didn’t exist. But I knew better – even though I was stepping back into the ring, this time I was completely aware of what I was doing. I was going to sucker punch him, and apparently no amount of self-loathing was going to change that. If I was cruel before, I was downright sadistic now.

Two days ago he showed up right on time for our lunch date. Everyone else was gone when I let him in the front door and he followed me back to my office. I was nervous, but it wasn’t the fluttery nervousness of a normal date. It was a nervousness born of knowing I was doing something wrong, and wondering if he’d call me out.

“You look nice”, he said.

I was surprised by how relaxed and casual he was and I forced myself to calm down too. He didn’t reach for my hand or my arm as we walked to the café, like I thought he would. He didn’t touch me at all.

I’d made jokes about getting a free lunch out of him, because that’s what I do...make terrible jokes. But when we arrived I waved away his protests and paid. I couldn’t have that on my conscious too. And apparently, buying him a club sandwich was supposed to make me feel better.

We sat down at a table by the window and we talked – about our kids, our jobs, and all manner of things we’d missed out on in the months we hadn’t spoken. I found myself laughing with him and feeling comfortable. He didn’t question me or compliment me, he didn’t look at me like he wanted to peel my skin off and wear it like a wetsuit. It felt normal – like two friends having lunch.

On the walk back I looked at his face, relaxed and confident, and I wondered if he knew. I wondered if he thought he was “wearing me down” or if, like me, he simply couldn’t stop himself from gravitating to what he knew would never work, out of some unfulfilled need.

In the lobby of my building he hugged me goodbye and kissed me on the cheek. “That was nice”, he said. And I agreed, smiling and waving as he walked out the double doors and into the parking garage.

But my smile didn’t stick around very long. I’d no sooner sat down at my desk when I thought, “Wait...what just happened? Is he over me? He’s never that casual. What was wrong with him?” I knew I was being an egotistical asshole, but I couldn’t help wondering why he didn’t fawn all over me like he normally would.

Two hours later I received a text message that said, “Thanks for lunch, had a great time. You looked stunning, as always.”

That was more like what I’d come to expect. And because my vanity knows no bounds, I grinned like a Cheshire cat.

I’d be willing to wager that I’ll hear from him again soon, and I’m not really sure what will happen. After exploring every unflattering angle of my behavior, and branding myself with labels I hate, yet completely deserve (like needy and cruel), I know something has to give. I know that, no matter how many times I may try to pretend or convince myself otherwise, he isn’t what I’m looking for. Now I just have to figure out if I’m the kind of person that needs something so badly, they take what isn’t rightfully theirs. I hope not. I hope I can find the courage to push him away for good and learn how to be truly alone, because maybe that’s all fate, God, or whatever decides these matters, is waiting for.