Embraces the Night

Sleeping alone is the only way Emily ever slept. Her home and her bed were her haven. She always kept a very feminine very frilly bed. She was a girl and really liked girly things. Pink satin sheets, oversized, soft, fluffy pink pillows, even a lacy pink canopy. Her room was her space and she liked it that way. She learned a long time ago never to let anyone spend the night in her house.

Emily sighed, ran her hand over her soft sheets and turned on her side to look at the man lying next to her. What was his name again? John, Joe, Josh... Damn, it was something that started with a J. Anyway, it was time to get him out.

It’s not that he wasn’t handsome. He was, he had classic good looks GQ style. His face was perfectly shaped, nice square chin, brooding blue eyes and the cutest damn dimple on his left cheek. Everything about him was good-looking, even his hair looked perfect in his sleep.

"Um, hey you awake?" she heard him grumble, but couldn't quite make out the words. "Hey you need to head out... We have a strict policy in this house, no men allowed overnight. Ah sorry." She really tried to sound like she was sorry, even though she was more embarrassed than sorry.

Emily wasn’t even sure why the hell she brought him home. Dam Alcohol she thought. I know better than this. I hate the day after feeling and really have to make sure this doesn’t ever happen again. Emily hated being the one night stand kind of girl, but with her history and issues she really didn't have a choice.

Emily currently lived in a house with six other females. She’d moved around a lot in her short lifetime, and found it easier to rent a room than an apartment. There were several benefits to renting a room over an apartment; such as, leasing. It is easier to move out quickly when she needed to, leaving roommates was much easier than breaking a lease. Another reason that Emily preferred this type of living arrangement was that people in general loved to make the rules when they lived together. This house had a no male overnight rule. Absolutely no, no, no, no men in the house overnight!!!

Emily loved this rule. It helped to keep herself in check. When one of the roommates, Madaline, started to get into a pretty serious relationship, she wanted to have the rule reversed. She walked around the house for days, trying to get all of the roomies on board. She convinced a few, but not all of them. Emily was the loudest voice against changing the rule, she wanted it kept in place. Eventually, everyone agreed and that made Emily very happy. Before tonight, Emily had never even came close to violating the rule. Hell. She hadn't even had a date, no less brought someone home.

She looked back at the guy now sitting on the side of her bed. He’d started to move off and grab his jeans. He slid them over his naked legs and pulled them closed. Commando style she thought. He has really nice legs and his hips and ass fit real nice into those jeans. Emily stopped herself before allowing those thoughts to continue. He pulled on his socks, slipped his band-tee over his broad shoulders and turned to look at Emily.

The second her eyes met his she remembered. Josh... Yeah, that was his name , Emily thought. He leaned in and snatched Emily into his arms, then dropped a soft kiss on her lips. "No problem Emily, I gotta get home anyway. I have an early appointment at work tomorrow. It was great tonight. Give me a call later, maybe we can get together sometime soon and do this again." He gave her a sheepish smile and winked.

Again........ Emily thought, No way. She never, ever saw a guy more than once. She wished she could, but after just one date, she was never able to do it again. If she could, she would want someone as yummy as Josh.

When she was younger. She would try to have normal relationships, but she couldn't do it. She would get physically ill. If she even tried to have dinner with a guy more than once she was throwing up her guts.

There was something very, very different about Emily. Not that she appeared different. She looked pretty normal; 5'5", with a slender build, 130lb tops, perky breast, and a striking heart-shaped face that sported bright blue eyes. Her curly dark brown hair rounded her out to make her one hell of a good-looking woman. But that's where normal stopped.

Emily found out the hard way, looking for love was dangerous. Dangerous enough to kill her. She learned her first lesson in love before she had even turned five years old.

She had a friend at the playground her mother would take her to once a week. One day she and Brian, another five-year old pretended to get married. It was fun; they made fake rings out of dandelions and ran around the park calling each other husband and wife. Emily like Brian and couldn’t wait to play with him again.

She spent the week telling her mom and dad about her husband. She even told strangers she met on the street that she was married to Brian.

Just like clockwork, Mom packed her up and they headed to the park. She could still remember skipping along the sidewalk and pulling on her mom's arm to make her move faster. She was so excited to see her husband and to pick up where they’d left off. They arrived at the park, before Brian and his mommy. Emily went to sit in the sand box and wait for him.

He arrived with his mom about five minutes later. He ran over hollering to her “Wife, wife. I’m here wife! Did you miss me?”

Emily had opened her mouth to tell him yes, but her voice had stopped working. She remembered it felt like someone had tied a ribbon around her throat and had squeezed it shut. Like when her daddy pulled the garbage back out and tied it up before dragging it to the curb. Emily didn’t remember how she got to the hospital or what the doctors had said. But she remembered the shots they gave her, the test they forced her to take, and the pain in her back from the needles.

Her face had swollen, her throat had closed off, and her cheeks had turned blue. Emily was having an extreme allergic reaction. It was a mystery to the doctors, despite all the various allergy panels they had tested on Emily, she hadn’t had one positive on the tests. She spent months being dragged back and forth to the allergists to find out what happened that day at the playground. But the tests found nothing. Eventually, Dina, her mother, decided it must have been something at the park and that meant no more parks for Emily.

When Emily was in third grade, she got her second lesson in love. Emily had a crush on her neighbor down the street. His name was Ken; he was a cute little red-head, the same age as Emily. She played with him almost every day after school. She had hoped that he like-liked her, but he never showed any signs. Then one day, Ken asked Emily if she would be his girlfriend. She, of course, said yes. She had been doodling Ken’s name on her school books for months. They held hands and laughed. They played for the rest of the day and when the sun went down, Emily went home to dream about her “boyfriend”.

The next day, Ken knocked on the front door and asked Dina if Emily could come out to play. She called up the steps “Emily, Ken is here to play.”

Emily heard her mother and started hopping down the steps. She was so happy, as she hit the bottom step, and looked Ken in the face, something happened. She felt her eyes start to burn, her head felt so heavy, her legs had become like jelly. She felt herself falling and thought I’m going to break my leg and I won't be able to play, then nothing. Ken and Dina watched as Emily fell down the last three steps. Her body slammed to the floor and immediately started convulsing.

Another hospital, lots more tests and still no answers. Emily's parents were clueless. They had all types of inspectors run tests on the house. They checked for mold, bugs anything and everything. They couldn't find a damn thing. Emily just kept having episodes, each one worse than the one before. In desperation, they moved out of their house and out-of-town. Finally, Emily got healthy again.

In seventh grade, it happened again, but this time Emily put two and two together on her own. His name was Timmy. He was the school clown and boy did he make Emily laugh. She just loved his humor and thought he was really cute. One day after school, Timmy leaned in and gave Emily a chase kiss on the lips and said “You’re my girl, Emily”.

She remembered walking home and thinking His girl and about how much she liked him. The next day she dressed extra special and made a card for Timmy. But when she walked up to him to give him the card, her vision went dark and Emily went down.

It took six weeks in the hospital for Emily to get healthy enough to go home. The doctors were baffled, but Emily knew. She was allergic to boys she tried to date. If she wanted to live to a ripe old age, she needed to keep her heart in ice and never ever have a second date.

Now, that doesn't mean she couldn't enjoy a guy from time to time. After all she was a 27-year-old woman and she had needs.

Emily decided if she wasn't going to have love ever, since falling in love would mean more than one date, then she was at least, from time to time, going to have some fun.

Josh was out of bed and heading for the door when he turned again and said "Hey Emily, guess I'll see you around the office. I really had a great time. Have a nice night" and he walked through the door and out of the house.