Let's Waste Time

It still didn’t end. Even though we said a million times that it was wrong, it was a terrible idea, we should stop. We kept going. We didn’t want to stop. But it didn’t last much longer anyway.

The following week, Trent was coming to visit. He was going to spend more than just a night with me. He said we would talk, we’d cuddle and do a bunch of couply things. He wanted to make it an actual date. And I had this feeling in my gut that it meant he was finally going to let Sasha go, and we could be together. So I was excited and anxious. Ready to start this new chapter of our lives.

I got dressed up. Pinned up my hair on the sides to take it out of my face. I even wore my contact so he could see the green of my eyes and take me seriously as someone who was an adult who wanted to have a real adult relationship. My skin was cooperating with me. My hair cooperated. It felt like a good sign that something wonderful and amazing was about to happen. I wore my favorite special occasion dress and everything.

When I got to the restaurant, I sat down at the bar and ordered myself a drink. Trent couldn’t text me until he was on the ground. So I had to wait patiently. I waited. And waited some more. And then finally, at eleven, I realized he wasn’t going to show up. There were no canceled flights. No delays. He didn’t text.

I fought back the tears and took a cab back home. It was Friday night, and instead of going out to do something fun like other twenty-somethings. Or even just hanging out with my nerdy ass friends. I decided to just go home and cry some more.

I was wrong. This wasn’t a special and amazing day. Of course it wasn’t. Because it was me. And nothing ever worked out the way I wanted it to. My life was a mess. I had no love life. I had nothing real. I dragged myself out of the cab and kept my eyes on my feet as I walked up the steps to unlock the door. I wasn’t going to let myself cry until I was safely locked in my apartment.

Then Chris’s door opened, and he popped his head out. Our apartments were old, so we could kind of hear everything. I heard it when his floors creaked or he flushed the toilet. I’d hear it when he got home. I’d heard it when he let his friend bring home a girl to bang. So I shouldn’t be shocked that he’d heard me too.

“Marley?” he said. I looked up.

“Hey.” I hurried to wipe my eyes just in case I let something slip out. He looked me up and down.

“I almost didn’t recognize you without the glasses.” I smiled halfheartedly. I knew this was his attempt at making a joke. He’d seen me without my glasses. But I guess he wasn’t paying much attention when we were on top of each other.

“Contacts. I was supposed to have a date.”

“Supposed to?”

“I got stood up.” I shrugged, and he nodded to himself. His eyebrows furrowed, and his lips were parted as if he was deep in thought.

“That sucks,” he decided. I nodded.

“Yeah, would you like to come over?”

“Why don’t you come over to my place instead? I need to put the dishes away and take a shower.”

“Yeah, okay. I can do that.” I followed him into his apartment, and then I helped him put away the last of his dishes. It was weirdly domestic and ordinary. We didn’t talk.

“So um—want to join me or would you like to wait?” he asked when we finished.

“I want to join you.”

“Cool. Okay.”

I followed him into the bathroom and waited for him to turn the shower on. I was pretty sure he knew what I was doing, but he didn’t say anything about it. So I just kicked my shoes off and dropped my dress. Then he was pulling me into the water.

I didn’t really need to shower since I had before I left. So I took his soap and his spongey thingy and got to work. It turned sexy very quickly. He was slippery and warm, and it didn’t take long before he abandoned the idea altogether. He wrapped his arms around me, dragged me out of the shower, and then half-carried me to the bedroom to dump me onto his bed, wet skin and hair and all.

But I was still angry and hurt. So I rolled him onto his back, gripped the headboard, and took it all out on him.

I don’t think he minded very much. He seemed to be enjoying it. He dug his fingers into my hips, whispered a few curse words, and then I stopped paying attention to him. Until I happened to glance down and notice two things that were kind of odd. One, he had his neck bent in what was probably an uncomfortable position. And two, he was staring at me.

I couldn’t tell what the expression meant. It looked torn between confusion and fear. Maybe even a little curiosity. It was the same way he’d looked at me the day we had breakfast together. I’d brushed it off as his attempt at making me feel important when I was feeling pretty low.

Honestly, I found it odd that he was even looking at me at all. We never looked at each other during sex. It felt intimate and intrusive. We got each other off and went about our business. We didn’t need to see each other’s faces beyond making sure we’d done the job right.

He knew exactly what I was doing. He knew that I was using him to get back at Trent. That I was using him to get rid of my anger at Trent.

I decided I’d just ignore him. He could stare at me if he wanted to, the weirdo. As long as I didn’t look back, it wouldn’t be personal. So I looked back up at the window. The streetlight was shining directly into my face. And then I felt his hands move from my hips. He cupped my face and forced me to look back down at him. I paused. He was studying me.

“Shit,” he said as if he’d just made a mistake. “You have green eyes.”

“I know.”

“I didn’t notice. You’re always wearing glasses. I guess I just thought they were blue.”

“I don’t usually wear my contacts.”

He still looked a little perplexed. I didn’t know what to make of it. Was I supposed to go back to what I was doing before? Or was I supposed to say something? He’d seen me without my glasses before, but like I said, it was only during sex, and we never looked at each other. I guess I’d never paid much attention to his eyes either. They were blue. But in the light from the streetlamp in the alley behind the building, they lit up vibrant and pretty.

“Your eyes are blue,” I observed. He nodded once.

“Yeah.”

Something shifted. I couldn’t tell what it was. Just that we were staring into each other’s eyes during an intimate moment and noticing unique features. It was a little too personal. We were treading on dangerous grounds.

I didn’t know what to do. It didn’t seem right to go back to what I was doing before. The mood didn’t fit. The anger and pain had subsided, and now all I felt was confusion mixed with something I couldn’t quite place yet. My heart was beating fast, and that urge to kiss him came back. I squeezed his bare arm, and he decided to take control of the situation. He moved up like he was going to kiss me. Eyes on mine the entire time.

But he didn’t. He just moved me onto my back. My head came to rest on the pillows so that I was the one looking up at him, and the way the streetlight fell over his face and highlighted just how truly beautiful he was.

It wasn’t the same. Usually, when we did it like this, I’d have my legs sticking straight up, or he’d throw one of them over his shoulder. He’d lean on his arms or sit back and pull my hips onto him. It would be fast and straight to the point.

But now he had his chest against mine. My legs wrapped tightly around him. He moved his head to my shoulder. I wrapped my arms around his ribs, digging my fingers into his back. He wasn’t rushing it. He was taking it slow.

He felt amazing. He always did. But it felt personal. Not the kind of sex that lovers like us had. This was the kind of sex lovers who genuinely loved each other had. This was the kind of sex that led to cuddling and waking up in each other’s arms. Kissing and laughing and all those wonderful couply things I wanted so badly.

I couldn’t stop it. I didn’t even try. I pinched my eyes shut, dug my fingers into his skin, and buried my face in his neck. I could feel him breathing hard into mine. I whimpered, and he groaned, and it finally happened. What he’d tried to do before. He made me feel, for just a moment, that someone loved me.