Take A Picture (It'll Last Longer)

When I woke up, I half expected to find that Ben had run off again but I was surprised, perhaps even pleasantly surprised, to find that the warm thing wrapped around me was not the comforter but Ben. I was less happy about finding that Ben drools in his sleep, not just on his pillow but on a little bit of my hair as well. I wiped my hair off on his shirt and then made an attempt to slip out of his arms. I had no success whatsoever because Ben is a lot stronger than I gave him credit for. He has a grip of steel.

Finally, I realized that Ben was deep in sleep and that I was just going to have to wait until he woke up if I wanted to move at all whatsoever. I did everything within my power to wake him up. I jabbed my toenails into his leg repeatedly. I shoved him. I tried tickling under his arms. I dug my fingernails into his collar bone. I contemplated slowly taking off his boxer shorts to see if that would wake him, but then I decided that he would like that too much and it might not wake him up at all. Besides, how would I look, taking off his boxers? Not to mention that I still wasn’t sure if I had the willpower to stop it at that. Ben’s whole ‘letting my guard down’ speech was still ringing in my ears and I was confused about practically everything. Not exactly the way I wanted to spend my time in Acapulco, but it wasn’t like I could do anything about that now. I was busy looking up at the ceiling above the bed and trying to get my mind off Ben’s boxer shorts when he woke up.

“Morning,” Ben said to me cautiously. I suppose he had reason to be a little afraid of me because we had in succession of four days gone from getting married, to being amiable on a plane flight, to getting drunk and making love, to having three colossal fights in a row.

“Morning,” I sighed before yawning. I wasn’t as awake as I had originally thought, I suppose. Ben looked nervous, probably because his arms were around me and he wasn’t sure if he would be better off removing them or leaving them where they were.

“Do you want breakfast?” Ben asked.

“In a few minutes,” I nodded.

“Do you wanna go eat it downstairs or do you wanna order some up here?” Ben asked me.

“I don’t know,” I shrugged. “What do you want?” Ben didn’t seem to know what he wanted at all.

“I don’t know either,” Ben replied sheepishly.

“So… are we going to eat breakfast or aren’t we?” I asked him curiously.

“I don’t know,” Ben shrugged. “I think there’s half an apple and two tenths of a bottle of water in the mini-fridge. I suppose we could have that to tide us over until we make up our minds…”

“Or we could just make up our minds now…” I began.

“Yes, but that would be the simplest, quickest way to do things, and we never do anything quickly or simply,” Ben pointed out.

I laughed a little and then laughed a lot because he had started tickling me. We were having fun for a few moments until Ben ended up straddling my waist, tickling me, and I looked up at him. Then things suddenly and quickly got awkward. He blushed bright red and jumped off the bed all together.

“So…um… do you wanna get dressed and go downstairs…?” Ben asked nervously.

“I don’t know…do you?” I replied, just as embarrassed.

“I will if you will,” Ben said.

“We aren’t making any decisions here,” I said to him.

“You’re the one who’s good at decision making,” Ben shrugged.

“Fine,” I sighed. “Let’s go downstairs.”

“I don’t know if I want to get dressed,” Ben murmured.

“Then we’ll order up here,” I said exasperatedly.

“But they don’t have eggy in a basket on the room service menu…” Ben moaned.

“Ben!” I said, annoyed, “we’re going to be up here until dinner debating what we’re going to do for breakfast!”

“Fine, okay, okay,” Ben sighed. “Let’s get dressed and go downstairs.”

“Dibs on the bathroom,” I squealed, getting up out of bed and rushing towards it. I didn’t count on the fact that Ben was standing between me and the bathroom so he grabbed me by my waist and picked me up.

“And where do you think you’re going in such a hurry?” Ben asked me playfully. He had me slung over his shoulders and while my legs kicked furiously, my eyes had a nice view of his butt.

“I called dibs! Now put me down!” I said to him, struggling as hard as I could.

“Oh, I’ll put you down,” Ben said. I could just picture the wicked grin across his face.

“What are you doing?” I screamed, because the only thing I could really see was Ben’s butt so I had no idea where he was going or what he intended doing with me once he got there. Next thing I knew, Ben did a pro-wrestler flip with me and I landed on the bed, in the mess of sheets we had left.

“Ben!” I said, “That hurt!”

“You landed on a pillow,” he snorted.

“What did you do that for anyway?” I asked him, sitting up on the bed.

“So I could do this,” Ben grinned before turning on his heel and sprinting directly into the bathroom. He had already shut and locked the door by the time I even got off the bed.

“Ben! Come on! That’s cheating!” I said through the door. “I called dibs.”

“You aren’t getting in here,” Ben laughed at me. “This is pay back for not leaving me any warm water for the past two days!”

“Pretty please! With sugar…” I began.

“Not going to work,” Ben said back. I thought for a moment.

“What if I offer to take a shower with you?” I suggested. There was silence for a moment and then the door opened.

“Are you serious?” Ben asked me, just his shorts remaining on. I grinned at him.

“Nope, I said before pulling him out of the bathroom, slipping in and shutting the door behind myself. “But you fell for it anyway.”

“Come on! That’s even worse than what I did!” Ben said through the door.

“Tough luck,” I snorted, slipping off my clothes. I moved to turn on the shower nozzle.

“What if I offer to take a shower with you?” Ben said hopefully. I just laughed and turned on the water.

What I didn’t count on was the fact that Ben knows how to pick locks on account of sometimes he has to sneak into meetings held by politicians and town celebrities and stuff to get the shot he wants. Within a matter of seconds, the door had popped open and I screamed before shutting off the water and grabbing a towel to cover myself up with. Ben’s eyes went straight to me when I heard a shrill noise come out of my mouth and he looked at me like I had suddenly spouted a second head.

“What?” Ben said like it was nothing that he had just gone full on Norman Bates on me, “It’s not like I haven’t seen it before.” Twice, I mentally added.

“What happened to privacy?” I shrieked at him.

“I just wanted my toothbrush,” Ben shrugged before picking it up off the counter. He stood there, brushing his teeth, and I was standing in the shower, dripping wet with a towel wrapped around me. I hadn’t even had time to soap myself down or anything.

“I’m right here!” I said to him angrily.

“You haven’t moved,” Ben said, looking in the mirror at an angle so it looked like his reflection was looking at me.

“Ben, can you please get out so I can take a shower?” I begged. He frowned while brushing his teeth, making him look like a rabid dog.

“What are you going to do when we get home to Chicago and we both only have fifteen minutes to get ready for work, how are we going to avoid being late if we don’t share the bathroom? You only have one and you used to share it with Elle…” Ben began.

“Yeah, but most of the time Elle took her showers over with Dirk,” I replied.

“You’re just going to be difficult, aren’t you?” Ben snorted before spitting into the sink.

“I’ll just be five minutes,” I said to him, “then you can have the bathroom back.”

“Actually,” Ben said, leaning like he was about to step into the shower. “I’m done.” Then he turned the water on me and left the bathroom, laughing. He had turned on the cold water and I instinctively shrieked, throwing the towel to the ground and reaching to turn the hot water on.

I was so getting him back.

After I dressed and dried my hair, I found Ben sitting on the bed, channel surfing for the zillionth time since we had arrived. I put my hands on my hips and rolled my eyes at him tiredly. Ben looked up at me with a mischievous grin on his face, due in part to the fact that he had semi-sabotaged my shower moments before.

“Guess what?” Ben asked me.

“What?” I asked.

“All the channels are still in Spanish,” Ben said.

“Thank you Captain Obvious for another amazing insight,” I snorted.

“Ready to go?” Ben asked, jumping up off the bed like he was a kid. Not much changes with him.

“Why not,” I shrugged.

He opened the door for me and we walked to the elevator, talking about nothing in particular. The elevator doors opened and inside was this really amazingly hot businessman type reading The New York Times with a copy of The Wall Street Journal tucked under his arm. He smiled at me and I smiled back coquettishly. Since our engagement lasted half of a week and our wedding took place in front of a judge who wanted us out of his office so he could go play a round of golf with the mayor, it was a bit easy for me to forget that I was sporting an actually rather expensive wedding band on my left finger. Right next to the cheesy twenty-five cent engagement ring from the toy dispenser. Ben did not forget for an instant that I was now legally Mrs. Ben Dawes and put his arm around me so suddenly, I nearly jumped away from him and straight on to the man in the suite reading the paper.

“They’re supposed to have a live band playing at one of the resort restaurants tonight,” Ben said to me, like he was in love with me or something, “you wanna go check it out?”

“Um,” I said unsure, “I guess.” Now not only was his arm around me but he was kissing my neck in a manner that sent chills down my spine. Good chills, in fact.

“And I was thinking we could parasail tomorrow if the weather is good,” Ben said, between kisses. His lips felt really good against my skin but I couldn’t help but notice the hot businessman was eyeing us.

“Ben,” I said under my breath, “you might want to cut that out. We aren’t alone, you know…”

“Oh, I don’t mind,” the businessman replied warmly. “Newlyweds?”

“Uh-huh,” Ben answered with a grin, pulling me closer towards him.

“Well, congrats,” the businessman said.

“Thanks,” Ben replied. The doors opened and the businessman stepped out, Ben walked out keeping his arm around my waist and I pulled behind the nearest plant.

“What was that?” I demanded to know.

“I was defending your honor!” Ben said, acting like I was harassing him.

“You had no reason to do that!” I said back.

“He was giving you the eye!” Ben replied.

“So?” I snorted.

“He’s not allowed to do that,” Ben said. “You’re married!”

“What? Did you think I was suddenly going to forget about you and start dancing naked in front of the guy?” I asked Ben, annoyed.

“No,” Ben replied, “but I don’t like the idea of some guy looking that way at the girl I’m married to. It’s a matter of principle.”

“Principle? You turn the cold water on me and then you talk about matters of principle?” I snorted.

“That was different,” Ben shook his head. “The shower nozzle wasn’t giving you the eye.”

“First of all, shower nozzles don’t have eyes and secondly, what the hell is that supposed to mean anyway?” I said exasperatedly.

“Look, can we finish this after I have my eggy in a basket?” Ben asked.

“Fine,” I said, relenting a little, “but if you know what’s good for you, you’ll eat your eggy in a basket as slow as possible.”