Page 17

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SADIE

I don’t know what I’m doing.

Instead of checking my shopping list, I’m stranded in front of the sauces aisle staring at his texts. Again.

All of yesterday I played it cool. I went about my day like everything was perfectly normal. Do my job, be friendly with the customers, try to avoid the really friendly ones. Smile. And try to not think about how I just left the hottest man alive. When I wasn’t itching my hives under my polo.

I didn’t make a single text to him, leaving the possibility of more in his court. Not a “Good night” or a “hope you slept well” or even a mess of eggplant emojis after a thirsty “u up?”

I can’t shake the feeling that I completely blew it without knowing why.

“Hey stranger!”

I finally tear my eyes away from his last text before our date as Lucy waves to me. She pulls her cart to the side and parks. “What are you doing here?” she asks.

“Getting more peanut butter. I think. Crap, let me check.” I pull up my list, but Lucy stops me.

“Shouldn’t you be in a helicopter on its way to Paris sucking some Adonis billionaire cock?”

An older lady gasps, but Lucy just stares her down. “What?” she shouts as the woman rams her cart into a display of crackers while trying to turn around and shooting us dirty looks. “Like you wouldn’t if you could. So…?”

“I don’t think he’s a billionaire,” I say as an excuse. It’s not like I wouldn’t be willing.

“Psh.” Lucy waves her hand. “Semantics. He’s rich, hot, and…did you seriously do it seven times?”

“Eight,” I admit, blushing not from shame but pride. The way he stared at me as I was leaving, I half expected it to be nine.

Then…crickets.

“No guy fucks that many times without wanting to at least hit an even ten. We’re talking here!” Lucy shouts at a man shoving around us to get to the cookies. “So…why are you here and not chained up in his bed? Lube’s over in aisle 15.”

“I’m…” I don’t know, but I have my suspicions. He’s rich, he’s hot, he obviously gets off on spreading the big girl on his cock. But that doesn’t mean he wants to be seen with her. “I’m starting to think you want to live vicariously through me.”

“If any rich, jacked men want to hammer me all night, I’d sign my life away on the dotted line.”

She’s not going to let this go. “He…he hasn’t texted me back.” As if I need to prove my reality, I show her the last message. “I’m sure he’s super busy.” Being an unemployed bouncer. That really eats into the day.

“Nothing? Not even an ‘I want to make you my sex slave. My lawyer is sending over the contracts tomorrow’?”

“That’s what I thought was going to happen,” I admit to her, almost hopeful I can manifest it into reality. But nope. I’m just the girl who got one great night and then was ghosted. “Who knows? Maybe he’s doing business things in Milan or other fancy business cities.”

Lucy gives me such a stare, I nervously scratch at my hives. They get two good itches before I stop and take a deep breath. Not only does that make it worse, touching myself there reminds me of him coming all over me. So I’m left both sad and horny at the same time.

“I can’t figure out what set this one off.

” It’s been persistent like an allergy attack, but I haven’t eaten anything to piss it off.

“It’s not like clothes are made out of eggplants.

Maybe it’s in a soap. I did get a new one that was on sale.

It has hyaluronic acid in it. Could I be allergic to that? ”

“Sade. Stop. People are looking.”

My nervous itching finally stops, and I peer around the aisle. People are glaring all right, but not just at me trying to claw my skin off. “Should we move?” I ask.

“What’d he say?” Lucy tramples over me, forcing everyone to backtrack. “When you left? Was there an ‘I had a good time?’”

“Yes.” I nearly sigh. The way he’d leaned against the doorframe in his gray sweatpants with dawn’s light glistening across his bare chest was a scene worthy of an oil painting.

“‘Let’s do this again?’”

“Ye… No.” I stare over at my friend, who’s no longer looking at me. “He didn’t say that.”

“Oh…”

“Should? Should I have said that? I mean, I want to. A lot. Preferably when I don’t have to work the next day, and there’s Gatorade and snacks, but… I fucked it all up, didn’t I?”

“No. No. He’s a man. They’re simple creatures, like jellyfish.”

“Huh?” Aubry was no squishy aquatic animal, though his touch could sting me in electric ways.

“No brain, and no spine. You’ve got to do all the thinking and doing for them. Text him. Tell him you need him in your bed right now.” Lucy lunges for my phone, but I dodge away.

“I thought that’d make me look desperate.”

“Desperate times…” She reaches again, but at my nearly six foot height, I easily hold the phone above her head. Still, Lucy jumps a few more times before she gives up. “You like him, don’t you?”

He’s so sweet in a way I never see anymore.

Even after he got everything he wanted, repeatedly, he took the time to make me breakfast. And I can’t put my finger on it, but there’s something deep inside of him.

A darkness that should scare me, but doesn’t.

Also he looks adorable with his hair all smooshed to one side after sleeping.

“Yeah,” I admit.

“And he likes you,” Lucy leads with.

I don’t know. Sure, he said he was into my tendency to blather on, but that could have just been a way to get me naked. Boy did he want me naked. “He likes parts of me.”

“Good enough.” Lucy leans closer as if about to tell me all her secrets in the world. “Look, this doesn’t have to be love. Maybe he’s spooked after a bad relationship. Keep it strictly pants-optional. You’re not seeing each other, just meeting up to eat and fuck. Casual.”

“Casual…” Keep any emotions out of this. It’s strictly business, joining one end to another.

“You like his cock,” Lucy damn near sings at me.

“I’d die for that cock,” falls out of my mouth. I yelp and slap a hand to try to stop it, but it’s too late. I said that, out loud, in a grocery store, in front of the jams . If there is a hell, I’m going there in the hardiest hand basket.

“So…” She will not let this go. Almost like she hopes to join us on those helicopter rides to Paris. I stare at my friend, seeing though her scheming, before I remember there is no helicopter. And even if there was, he wouldn’t take me.

I’m the hookup at a motel.

Well, a hotel.

In a fancy suite.

Overlooking a city as he fucks me against the floor to ceiling windows.

Is that such a bad thing?

My finger hovers over the keyboard. What the hell do I type?

Let’s do it!

You+ me = bone town.

Eggplant peach, eggplant peach, eggplant peach, water droplets

I like how safe I feel with you and hope you feel the same.

I shiver and close out my messages.

“Maybe I’ll do it later,” I tell her and reach for the jar of peanut butter I may or may not need. Can’t go wrong with too much peanut butter.

Lucy groans, disappointed in me. But if I never try, then I won’t get rejected. It was one thing when I just wanted to fuck the man that saved my life, but now… Things are getting sticky whether I want them to or not.

“Hey!” I cry out, dropping the peanut butter into my cart. Nestled behind it is a jar I recognize, and one I never expected to see again. “It’s banana sauce!” I hold it out to Lucy like I’m selling it.

“What’s banana sauce?” she asks.

“Oh, it’s so good. Sweet and tangy, like a fruity barbecue sauce, but not.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I had it at Aubry’s. He made—”

Lucy lunges for the jar. “Really?”

“Yeah… He added it to his spaghetti, which was something from a fast food place in the Philippines. I think his island was called—”

“Oh my god. You have to take a picture of it and send it to him.”

“I do?”

“Yes! Come on, you’re thinking of him and you find that sauce right now. It’s kismet.”

I turn the jar around. Sure, it was weird that it was here behind the peanut butter and not in the Asian section. But it’s not like I found it in a bank. And I’m often thinking about Aubry.

Always. I’m always thinking about him.

Then again, it’s a way in without being clingy.

“Okay,” I say and stretch my arm out to get the jar in focus.

“No, no.” Lucy takes my phone. “You’ve got to be in it. Hold it to your cheek. Closer. Closer. Scrunch down.”

I’m obeying without a second thought. “Okay.”

“And…smile!”

She snaps three quick pictures before I can blink. “How was it?” I ask.

“Hang on.” Lucy’s messing with my phone. “I’m editing it. Doing a little facetune. Fixing the lighting.”

The seconds pass into minutes, and I get worried. Her fingers are flying a lot for simple edits.

“Okay, now. Let me see.”

With a dramatic flourish, Lucy presses a button on my phone just as I get my hand on it. As I stare at the screen I see myself and my breasts so close it looks like I’m shirtless. The picture isn’t in my photo app. It’s been sent to Aubry.

Along with the text, “You can banana my sauce any day.”