Page 29 of The New Couple in 5B

He looks away. I stay silent. The place is so quiet. Distantly, I hear the elevator moving through its shaft.

“I haven’t been able to give you very much,” he says finally, still looking down at the floor. “And you neveraskfor anything. We didn’t have a princess wedding. Your ring—is tiny. We didn’t even have a honeymoon. We’re always hustling—for this part, for that assignment.”

I reach for him. There’s an electric connection between us. I felt it the first moment we met, and it has never diminished even a little. When he looks into my eyes, it’s lightning.

“I don’t need anything,” I whisper. “I love our life. I love my ring.”

I do. I don’t care if we have to hustle. We’re young; it’s exciting, all the possibilities ahead of us.

He hangs his head. “But I want to give youeverything.”

“All I need in this world is you, your love and your honesty. Don’t lie to me, Chad. Don’t keep things from me. Let’s make the big choices together, okay?”

His faceted eyes search my face, brow still knitted with concern.

“I’m sorry. Ipromise. Never again.”

“Okay,” I say, holding his gaze.

“What did I do to deserve you?”

“Well,” I say with a smile, rubbing my hand up his leg. “You have a huge—”

He moves in quickly, his kiss hungry, interrupting my dirty talk.

Then we’re tearing at each other’s clothes, and they fall softly to the wood floor.

There is nothing but skin and desire, as he enters me hard and deep. I think to stay quiet—how thick are the walls? But I don’t—I hear myself moan, deep, over and over. I wrap my legs around his, and lose myself in the heat between us, feeling like I could never be close enough to him. That even this is not close enough.

Rosie, Rosie, oh, my God. Rosie.

When he puts my breast in his mouth, I experience a seismic orgasm and his body answers. We’re both loud, too loud. And when we realize it, we start laughing.

“I wonder if they heard us,” I say, still giggling as he lies against me. His weight, the scent of him, his warmth so soothing.

“The walls are thick,” he says. “I’ve never heard them.”

“Heard them having sex?” I ask, mock horrified. As if older people weren’t romping like teenagers on the couch. Maybe they were. I hope so. I hope we’re still going at it when we’re Charles and Ella’s age.

“No!” he says, widening his eyes. “At all. I’ve never heard them at all.”

He props himself up on his elbow and we lie naked for a few minutes, just our breath, his arm across my middle, both of us lost in our thoughts. I haven’t told him about the boy in the basement. But I have made an inner promise to call Dr. Black, my shrink. I wish I could say it’s the first time I’ve experienced anything like this. But it isn’t. Even though we’ve just promised to tell each other everything, I keep this to myself. I know. I’m a hypocrite.

When he gets up to go take a shower, I lie in the dark for a while, putting my hands to my belly, wondering if that was it, the moment we conceived, our first time in our new apartment. I like the narrative of that, that we conceived a baby our first night here. We’ll call him Parker, for Park Avenue. Silly.

A noise from the foyer catches my attention. What was that? I listen again. It was a hiss, like white noise. I think about the intercom and Abi, and how weird that is. As softly as I can, I say:

“Hey, Abi?”

Just silence and I’m relieved. Maybe you need to be right in front of the intercom, which is in the small foyer, otherwise he can’t hear you.

But then: “Yes, Ms. Lowan.”

A little jolt of surprise has me sitting up, pulling the throw blanket around my shoulders. Holy cow. It works. And it must be nearly eleven. Is hestillon duty?

“Oh,” I say, embarrassed like a kid caught making a crank call. “Just checking the intercom.”

“It’s working very well,” he says. Is there a smile in his voice? “Is that all, miss?”