She takes a seat on my couch, steals my spoon and the ice cream, and nods as she takes a bite. “You said when this whole thing with Franco first started that you two would either be incredible together, or you’d destroy each other. And, so far, it seems like the latter.” She points at me with the spoon. “You’ve slept together, what? Three times? Meaning, three separate incidents? The day you met, at your place after your weird date-but-not-a-date, and the day of the barbecue. And in between those times, you threw yourself into ninety-hour work weeks, tore yourself apart with your own workouts, and have been totally ignoring me.”
“I’m not ignoring you.”
Her eyes well up, surprising me. “You are too!” She slams the ice cream down on the side table and scrubs at her face. “I barely see you anymore! You’re always working, and even when I do see you, you’re barely there. You’re just…cold. Shut down. I know you see yourself as some ice queen, but I’ve never felt that from you toward me…until lately. Now? Yeah, you’re ice-cold, all the time.”
“I’m, look—”
“NO! You look! You’re so fucking stupid, you know that?” She stands up, pacing away, and then stopping to face me from across the living room. “You and Franco are made for each other! Don’t you see that? It’s obvious to everyone else, except you! And him, too, apparently, because Jess is just as fed up as I am. I don’t know what happened with you guys the day of the barbecue, but whatever it was, it must’ve been big, because ever since then you’ve been just… a block of ice. Like a statue of yourself carved out of a glacier.” She gestures at me. “And for someone who brags about being so healthy and so fit, you’re awfully blind to the fact that you’re overworking yourself—you’re ten seconds from burnout, Audra. You’re thinner than you’ve ever been, and at this point it’s not a good thing.”
She pauses, blinks hard, staring at me even harder.
She’s not done yet, it seems. “You’re so fucking stubborn, you’d rather literally work yourself to death than admit you’re hurt, or that you want him, or that you feel something for him, or whatever it is. I don’t know—god knows you sure as hell won’t fucking tell me! I’ve tried to be understanding, tried to give you your space, let you figure it out, tried to just be your friend and love you no matter what, but I can’t just stand by and pretend it’s fine anymore! It’s not fine, Audra. You’re not fine. He’s not fine. This whole thing is absolutely bonkers, and it could be so simple but you’re both so goddamned stupid and stubborn, so blindly clinging to decades-old hurt that you can’t see what’s right in fucking front of you!”
You know Imogen is serious as a heart attack when she swears like this.
“Imogen, it’s not—”
“I’m not done!” she snaps. “It is that simple. It is. It is absolutely without a doubt that simple.” She sits back down. “I don’t know what to tell you to do. I don’t know what the answer is. If you can’t let yourself love Franco, then maybe you need to leave, because you’ll never get past this with him around. And if you don’t figure it out, you’re going to crash, and it’s going to be messy. Ever heard of adrenal burn out? I know you have. That’s where you’re headed, babe, and I’m telling you so there’s zero chance you’re not aware of it.”
I sigh. “I know, I know, I just—”
“Franco could be the best thing that’s ever happened to you, Audra. I know Jesse is the best thing that ever happened to me, and I know they’re different kinds of men, but they’re cut from the same cloth.” She sighs. “But you know this. I can tell just by looking at you that you know this. There’s nothing I can say that you don’t know.”
I uncork a bottle of wine. “Can we just put this on pause for a minute, Imogen?”
She stares hard at me for a long time. “Honestly, Audra, I’m at a loss. Will you tell me what’s going on? I know something happened with him, and I know you’re compensating for it by icing yourself over.”
I pour two glasses and hand her one, taking a long sip from mine. “We went to his house, and we had sex. Really, really, really intense sex. Unprotected sex. Emotional sex. We connected, Imogen. I felt it, he felt it. And then when I told him I was going to get a Plan B to cover all the bases even though I was on birth control, he freaked out. Something about the Plan B idea just freaked him out. So I went out and he told me about his parents and his ex, and why he’s the way he is about sex and relationships—suffice it to say his story is enough like mine that I totally get it. So then I told him my story, about my shitty parents and fucking scummy-ass Jared and the whole thing. And then, on a—I don’t know. A whim, maybe? Not a whim—it was…as close as I could get to putting myself out there, I guess—I asked him what we were going to do then. What now? That’s what I asked him.” I stop and swallow hard. “You know what his response was?”
She lets out a slow breath. “What?”
“And…nothing.” I make a face and shrug. “That’s exactly what he said, verbatim. So there it is. And nothing.”
“And if he’d said something else, like ‘and now we figure this out’—would you have been okay with that?”
I can only shrug. “I don’t know. He didn’t, and it seems futile to speculate.”
“Ever consider maybe he’s as unsure of what he wants and is as scared of being hurt as you?”
I think of his final question—did you want there to be something? Did you want there to be a now-what? I shrug it off, but with great difficulty.
“What’s the point of any of it, Imogen?” I ask. “I’m not you, and he’s not Jesse. It won’t work and we both know it.”
“But it could work, couldn’t it?” Imogen asks, and her words echo the words I hear whispered deep inside me.
I can’t reply. My throat is closed, knotted tightly. I don’t dare let it out—not even in front of Imogen. It’s too much, too dear, too deep.
She waits for a long time, and when it becomes clear I have nothing to say, she rubs her face with both hands, and then stands up. “I’m not going to drink this one away with you, Audra. You’re making a huge mistake in pretending there’s nothing there, that there’s no way to make it work, and no use in even trying.” She hesitates, looking sadder than I’ve seen her in a long, long time. “You’re my family, Audra. I love you with all my heart, always, no matter what, but I’m not on your side in this one. I mean, I am on your side, always, and I support you always. But you’re making a mistake, and I can’t just sit idly by and let you make it.” Her usually warm and endearing green eyes are unusually distant. “This is one time where I can’t and won’t just sit here with you, enabling you by biting my tongue and helping you drink and fake your way past it.”
God, my heart aches.
“Imogen, come on.” I stand up and follow her, feeling panicky and desperate and wrought with emotion I can’t choke down any longer. “We enable each other in everything. It’s what we do. Don’t bail on me now.”
She’s already at the door. “I’ve been enabling your refusal to get over Jared for almost twenty years, Audra. He fucked you over and hurt you and made you look stupid, and you made it a thousand times worse for yourself with that idiotic newspaper stunt you pulled—and don’t forget you didn’t consult me on that, because you know I wouldn’t have let you do it. What happened hurt, Audra, and you had every right to lash out and be angry and whatever. But you’ve been hoarding that pain and letting it rule you ever since. You’re like…you’re like Smaug from The Hobbit, and that old pain is your treasure. Just let it go.” She hugs me, holds on tight for a long time, and then pulls away, her hands on my shoulders, her eyes filled with tears, as are mine. “I’m not bailing on you, Aud. Neither of us have siblings, so we’re the sisters neither of us have ever had. But I wouldn’t be a good sister or a good friend if I didn’t finally do something. Maybe you’ll never forgive me for this, I don’t know. I hope you will. But if you’re going to keep acting like everything is fine, like you’re fine, like you’re so totally cool with being alone
your whole life, like hooking up with every Tom, Dick, and Harry in metropolitan Chicago is okay, but never having anything real or meaningful or impactful with any of them is actually what you want in your life, then I can’t be part of it. I won’t be. Especially when there’s a man living less than five minutes from here who could, possibly, love you in a way you’ve never known but have always secretly and desperately wanted and needed.”
A part of me wants to be angry, wants to get defensive, wants to lash out at her and act like she’s abandoning me. But I know better. I can no longer ignore the blatant truth in everything she said and, like everything else in this entire situation, I hate it.
The truth burns.
I blink hard, but hot salty tears drip down my cheeks anyway. “I really want to hate you right now,” I whisper.
Imogen hugs me again, a tight, fierce embrace that lasts until I’m uncomfortable with it and start squirming.
“I know,” she says, eventually letting go. “I wish I knew what else to do, here, Audra, but I just don’t. I won’t apologize, because I know I’m doing the right thing, but I will say I’m sorry I can’t support you in the way you want me to.”
“I get it,” I say. “I don’t know that I have a way past this right now, but I’ll figure it out.” I pause as I suck back a breath and try not to totally break down in inexplicable sobs. “Somehow.”
“Audra, god—”
“You’re right, Imogen,” I cut in over her. “I know you’re right. You’ve been right. I hate it, and I hate you for it, but you’re right, and I love you, always and forever and no matter what.”
“I hate leaving like this,” she says, her voice thick.
“It’s fine.” I wipe at my eyes with the back of my wrist, and then open my door and shove her out. “Go. Wake Jesse up and fuck him senseless, because one of us has to be getting some.”
She laughs. “That was the plan anyway, babe.” She frowns. “So, wait—you’re not—”
“I haven’t been with anyone except Franco since the day I met him,” I admit. “I just…can’t. I’ve tried, too, and I just…can’t.”
Her green eyes lock on mine, and I see a spark and a sparkle, and a hint of a smirk on her lips.
“Don’t you say a goddamn word, Imogen Catherine Irving!” I say, laughing.
She mimes zipping up her lips and throwing away the key. “Not a word. But I don’t have to say it, do I? You know exactly what I’m thinking.”
“Yeah, yeah. I told you—he’s the one who shut it down, not me. I was on the verge of being willing to consider something, and he shut it down. So it’s on him, not me.”
“And since when do you sit idly by and wait for someone else to give you what you want, especially a man?”
“This is different, and you know it.”
She sighs. “Yeah, I guess it is. You can’t force him to want something.”
“Exactly.” I give her another gentle shove. “Go. Get out of here. You have a cock to suck.”
She rolls her eyes at me. “You’re so nasty and vulgar.”
“Yep. And you love me for it.”
She hesitates. “We’re okay?”
I laugh, another abrupt, unexpected half-sob escaping, tangled up with a laugh. “Yes, we’re fine. I’m not, but we are.”
“Can I leave you alone?” she asks.
I nod. “Yeah. I’ll be okay.”
“Don’t try to drink your way past this.” She lets out a resigned breath. “We’ve both done way too much of that, and it’s not healthy emotionally or physically.”
“I’m going to bed,” I tell her. “And you’re right, yet again.”
“Call me, okay? You’re not dealing with this alone.”
“I will, and I know.”
She walks away, then, and I watch her go. When she’s out of sight, I close the door, lock it, and turn back to my living room. The pint of ice cream is melting all over my side table, so I hurry to clean it up and throw away the melted remainder. There’s Imogen’s untouched glass of wine on the table and my partially finished glass, plus the partial bottle on the counter, the cork forgotten beside it. Not one to waste a perfectly good glass of wine, I set my resolve and find my funnel. I pour both glasses of wine back into the bottle, shove the cork into the bottle, and put the bottle aside.
And honestly, I feel a little better about myself for having done that.
I’ll never admit this out loud, but wine and ice cream don’t actually fix things. They make a hell of a temporary bandage, but they don’t really fix things.
I shut the TV off, climb into bed, and try to fall asleep.
I can’t, though.
I keep replaying that day at Franco’s house—specifically the moment he asked me if I wanted a now-what. I’d lied to Imogen about that—or rather, withheld the truth. I feel like shit about that, but I feel even shittier because I lied to him. And to myself.
I did want that. I did then, and I do now.
I don’t have the slightest clue what a now-what looks like or feels like, but I know I want a now-what with Franco. I want him bare inside me again, consequences be damned—and no Plan B the next morning either. I want him to kiss me. I want to go to sleep and wake up with him, and have more sex and have breakfast, and have more sex and watch TV and have more sex…
I find myself quietly crying, tears sliding down my cheeks as I try to picture what that would feel like. Normally, I’d ask myself why the fuck I’m crying, but I don’t have to. I know exactly why.
Imogen said it: I have secretly and desperately wanted to be loved. My whole life. I never felt loved by my dad, or by my mom. I thought I was loved by Jared, and I’d hung all my hopes and dreams for a happily ever after in which I would ride off into the sunset on the back of a white charger, my arms around a golden knight in shining armor, and be loved and be happy.
And then he fucked me over and crushed the nascent little blossom of hope I had, the tiny seedling of belief in love and men.
After that, I salted the soil of hope and belief in love and men, killing any possibility of anything ever growing there again. And I clung to that barrenness, salting the soil again and again throughout the years, making sure nothing could ever grow there.
But somehow, something is growing.
Not even a seedling, yet. More of a germinated seed, a tender little tendril of something green under the soil, just barely poking up to reach for the sun.
I fall asleep, eventually, but it’s to dreams of Franco, of hands, of lips, of breath—erotic dreams of wet warmth leaking out of me, sensual dreams of clinging to Franco through breathless spasms of mutual connection.
I wake in the middle of the night alone in my bed, and he’s not there, and my eyes sting and my chest contracts, and I know I’m at the most serious moment of my entire life.
For once, I have absolutely no clue what to do.
I don’t fall asleep again, and yet I can’t seem to stop dreaming about Franco.
Each successive dream, whether erotic or tender or sensual, only makes my heart clench harder and my body yearn more desperately for something I fear I’ll never have.
Chapter 13
Three endless, miserable days pass. I dream of Franco, and I’m absentminded at work, and even my own workouts suffer. Finally, I submit to the inevitable: I reschedule all my clients, pushing everyone back two weeks, citing personal health issues. For the first time since…ever, I have an entire two and a half weeks off—no clients, no meetings, no seminars or workshops…and no workouts.
I have no clue what I’m going to do, but like Imogen predicted—I’m burned out. Psychologically, emotionally, and physically I’m just…gassed. Smoked. Done.
My first day off, I sleep in until noon. I watch Netflix and indulge in some midweek healthy carbs, when I usually only allow them into my diet on the weekends.
The first day rolls slowly into two, and I don’t work out, which is difficult. I don’t drink, which is also difficult.
/> At the top of day three, I tell Imogen that I’m taking time off from everything, and she squeals loudly over the phone, hangs up, and then calls me back ten minutes later—she’s taken off three of her vacation days, got her shifts today and tomorrow covered; it’s Monday so she has a full five days off, and she’s headed my way with her bags packed.
I splutter. “Bags? Where are you going?”
She laughs. “Where am I going? You mean where are we going! I’m stealing you! We haven’t had a vacation together ever in our whole lives ever and we’re taking one right now!”
“Um. Where are we going?”
She laughs again, a light, tinkling, giggle. “Oh, you’ll see. I have plans in the works.”
“Plans in the works? What does that mean?” I ask.
Another giggle, and I’m getting annoyed at the giggling—whenever Imogen has something up her sleeve, she gets the giggles, and it has always annoyed the ever-loving shit out of me. “Can you please just trust me? Please? Pack a bag with lots of bikinis and flip-flops and sundresses, and that’s all I’ll tell you.”
“Imogen, you know I don’t do well with surprises.”
“Tough. Deal with it.” I hear her muffle into the phone and talk to Jesse, and then she’s back to me. “I’m on the way. Go along with it, and just trust me.”
“Okay, okay.” I pause. “Bikinis, sundresses, and flip-flops, huh?”
“And maybe some nice stuff in case we want to go to a fancy dinner or something. I don’t know! Just pack for everything, but especially for a lot of beach time.”
And then she hangs up as I hear her getting into her car, with Jesse’s voice rumbling in the background.
I go into whirlwind mode. I spend a few minutes trying to pick bikinis, and then just say fuck it and grab all them out of the drawer in a giant handful, toss them into my suitcase, and call it good. Bras and underwear, sundresses, skirts, tops, a few nicer dresses and a few pairs of heels, some flip-flops and some gladiator sandals, my to-go makeup and toiletries kit, and a few T-shirts to sleep in. Things I don’t bring: workout gear, condoms, or vibrators. The only thing that got me past Jared was a period of total celibacy, and I’m already well into another one, with almost a full month under my chastity belt. Might as well keep it going, right? I haven’t heard a word from Franco, Imogen hasn’t brought him up, and I’ve avoided going anywhere he might be. If it’s over, it’s over. Fine. There’s nothing to be over anyway. I’m not going to try to stop thinking about him; I’m not going to try to get over him by getting under someone else. I’m just going to…live my life, and figure it out one step at a time.