What He's Been Missing (29 page)

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Authors: Grace Octavia

BOOK: What He's Been Missing
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“What about Scarlet?” I asked. “You don't think I think about her? About you two? She's the one you married. The one who has your last name. I'm just second. Not even second. I'm like a mistress or your whore.”
“Don't do that,” he said.
“What's up with her? We know where Xavier is. Where's Scarlet? Is she still at your place? My God, you haven't told me anything.”
“She's fine.”
“So you talk to her?”
“We had lunch a few times.”
“What the fuck?” I pulled away from Ian. The song went off and then started playing again on repeat. “Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because it's nothing. I'm still here. Right? I'm where I want to—”
“Yeah, I heard that before. What's going on with you two?”
“What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean. Just level with me. Before you asked me to just talk to you like your friend; now I need you to do that for me.”
“Nothing's happening.”
“Are you getting a divorce? Getting separated? What?” I screamed.
“It's too soon to say.”
“What?” I felt a chill. “It's been two weeks, Ian.”
“Two weeks isn't a long time,” he said.
“Yes, it is if you're living with a woman.” I went and turned off the stereo with the remote. I started blowing out the candles.
“What? Wait! Stop!”
“You said you knew. You said you were sure.”
“I am.”
“Then why won't you get a divorce?” I didn't even know where this was coming from. I was building into a rage. My tears went from joy to anger.
“It's just two weeks. It's going to take time.”
“You don't even want to touch me. We don't kiss. We don't have sex,” I listed.
“You didn't seem too excited to kiss me just now either.”
“I'm nervous!” I screamed.
“About what?”
“Whether you're staying.” (Who the hell was speaking? Where was this coming from? Was I becoming one of those women? A mistress?)
“What?” Ian stopped me from blowing out another candle. “Wait, Rachel. Just wait a minute. I didn't mean for us to fight. I just wanted to have a good night together. For us to talk and maybe kiss. I wanted to celebrate us. To thank you. How did we get to this?”
“There's just so much going on right now. I don't know.”
“Look at me.”
I looked into his eyes. They looked the same as always.
“I'm Ian. I'm not here to hurt you.” He grabbed my hand. “You know what—I think we need to relax. To just take a load off and breathe.” He pulled me to the bar and went searching through the empty bottles.
“What are you looking for?”
He pulled the Patrón from the back of the shelf. “Shots!” he said.
“This is no time for shots.”
“Just because you said that, it's the perfect time for shots.” He set the bottle on the bar and got two double shot glasses.
“I have to work in the morning,” I said.
“You own your own business. Call in sick.” Ian poured the shots and handed me one. “This shot is to
what's up
.”
“No lemons? No salt?” I asked.
“Fuck lemons and salt. Throw it back!” He banged on the bar and we took the shots. He started pouring again. “This shot is to
what next
!”
We took the shots. He poured again.
“You pick the shot this time.”
I was already feeling the tequila. I said, “This shot is to
what the fuck
!”
We took the shots. He poured again.
The liquor rushed right to my forehead. I felt like I was balancing a heavy weave on my head. I was swaying a little.
“No, don't punk out on me now. Hands up!” He pointed for me to pick up the little glass. “This shot is to
whatever you want
. Throw it back!”
We finished the bottle with whats and ended up on the floor again, laughing.
I was telling Ian a story about Alarm Clock and Donnica's wedding. About the chocolate fountain and all the weedheads dipping everything from asparagus to shrimp in the chocolate.
He laughed and rolled over onto his stomach. The tequila was all in his eyes.
“Come here,” he said.
“What?” I sounded like I knew what he wanted. The tequila was in my eyes, too. I could feel it.
“If you don't come to me, I'm coming to you,” he said seductively.
I leaned over to his face. He came up a little, tilted his head to me, and opened my lips with his tongue. We started kissing and rolling around on the floor.
My shirt came off. I unbuttoned his pants. Felt his muscles for the first time.
We stumbled, embracing and kissing, pulling off clothes in a drunken dance to the bedroom.
I pressed my hand against Ian's penis.
He pushed me onto the bed like he didn't know me—like I wanted him to—and pulled off his shirt.
“I want you so fucking bad,” he said, staggering and reaching into his pocket. He pulled out a condom.
I laid my head on the pillow. I looked at the blinds, the slats facing up to the ceiling. A little light was coming in from the moon.
Ian had turned around. His pants and boxers were down beneath his butt. He was shaking his head.
“You OK?” I asked.
“Just getting the condom on,” he said. “I'm fine.”
After a few seconds that felt like forever, he was talking to himself. Cursing.
“You need me to—”
“I'm fine,” he said. “I just can't—”
“Maybe if I—”
Ian dropped his hands at his side to show his frustration. “Rachel, just don't try to help. I'm fine.”
“OK.”
He cursed a little more and then he took some deep breaths.
The alcohol was starting to wear off a little.
Ian sat on the edge of the bed and threw the torn condom wrapper to the floor.
“I'm too nervous,” he said finally.
“But you were just hard,” I said. “I felt it.”
“I know, but now that we're about to do it—I think it's just my nerves.”
“But we did shots. Aren't you relaxed?”
“Maybe I'm tired,” Ian said. “And I didn't eat anything yet.”
“True,” I agreed, but really that was just because I knew I should. I laid there for a little while with goose bumps sprouting all over my arms thinking about what I could say to help Ian relax, but nothing seemed right.
“You want me to fix you a plate?” he asked, sounding as if I should be excited about the opportunity to eat. “I got some Thai tea, too. I know you like that.”
“Sounds good, babe,” I said.
“Great.” Ian hopped up and pulled up his pants and walked out of the room without turning around.
After we ate, we spooned and Ian kissed me on the back of my neck. I don't remember ever going to sleep. I laid with him with my eyes open and on the light from the moon.
 
Ian and I had three more failed drunken sex nights before we settled on spooning without question. It was so tiring and so stressful to consider why it wasn't working for us in bed. And although Ian kept saying that he wanted us to be open about everything just as we'd always been, I knew not to push him about not being able to get it up. Really, I wasn't “getting it up” myself. Something just wasn't feeling right with us being together in that way. Every day I felt like it would be the day when it felt easy or natural, but my heart only twittered at the idea of talking to Ian, holding his hand, doing shots with him, and going to sleep.
A few nights a week, he'd fall asleep on the couch and I'd lie in bed remembering Xavier tearing away my underwear in the elevator. The look on Mrs. Jackson's face. I'd slide my fingers between my legs and be careful not to moan or move around too much.
 
We spent Thanksgiving in Social Circle with Grammy Annie-Lou. Saying it had been too soon, Ian hadn't told his parents about leaving Scarlet and he didn't want to go to New Orleans. I hadn't even told Grammie Annie-Lou about Ian getting married, so her dinner table was the perfect refuge. It did hurt me that Ian felt he couldn't tell his parents that we were getting together, but I trusted his decision and decided to focus less on creating new issues before we fixed what was becoming our biggest issue: the lack of sex.
My birthday, just a few days before Christmas, seemed like the right time. Krista's weedhead boyfriend Manuel sent a bag of hydro to the office for me the day before my birthday with a message from Krista that he had the good marijuana that was sure to leave any man (in his own words) “ready to cut Sheetrock.”
I hadn't smoked “grass” (that's what they'd called it in the country back then) since high school, but I was willing to give it a try, thinking that if Ian and I could just get over the sex hump, we could be closer.
When I got home that night, I tossed the little clear bag of neon green grass onto the kitchen table where Ian was sitting and grading a stack of term papers, and told him what Krista's boyfriend had said.
“Why did he say that?” Ian asked. (Somehow I didn't think he'd be smart enough to pick up on why Manuel would make such a comment.)
“Just as a joke. He didn't mean anything by it,” I said, knowing he really meant to ask if I'd told Krista about our bedroom misadventures, which I had.
Ian looked back at his papers.
“So do you want to smoke it tonight?” I asked. Ian had smoked marijuana through college and I knew he still smoked with some of his intellectual weedhead guy friends sometimes.
“Let's wait until tomorrow. For your birthday. We can smoke it then,” he said. “I have to get through these papers. Grades are due online in the morning.”
“OK,” I said.
Ian stayed up all night grading papers and fell asleep on the couch.
In the morning, he came into the bedroom and kissed me on the back of my neck.
“Good morning, birthday girl,” he whispered.
“Good morning.” I turned around to him and smiled, still half asleep.
“I'm going to the office for a little while. I was thinking, do you want to meet for lunch later? Start off the birthday celebration at our spot?”
“Sure.”
“Great. I'll see you there at 2:00
PM
,” he said. “And we can smoke your Viagra-laced weed tonight.”
I laughed and rolled back over to catch my last few minutes of sleep. I'd taken the day off, but I had scheduled an early spa treatment.
 
I sat in the back booth at Fado for an hour waiting for Ian. Every time I thought to call him, I decided to give him a little more time. Furthermore, Shane kept bringing me free beers and even had a few sips himself in honor of my birthday. Got to love Irish men. They never miss a reason to celebrate.
Shane and I toasted a few times before I realized that two hours had gone by, when Ian finally called.
“Get your ass over here,” I said into the phone. “I'm starving. . . and drunk. Where are you?”
“Um . . . just . . . I'm still in the office,” Ian said in a low voice.
“Fuck! So you're standing me up on my birthday?”
Shane widened his mouth and rolled his eyes in mock disdain at my announcement.
“You'd better get over here, bro. Rachel is good and drunk!” Shane hollered over my shoulder into the phone.
We laughed, but there was silence from Ian's end. I suspected it was because he was with a student.
“I'm sorry, I can't make it,” he whispered, lower this time.
“Oh,” I said.
“How about later? Can we meet for dinner? I can make reservations at Bacchanalia.”
“Bacchanalia for dinner on my birthday,” I repeated, loudly enough so Shane could hear and he gave a thumbs-up. “Shane approves. What time?”
“Let's say eight,” Ian said.
“Cool. I'll be there and not square,” I joked.
“OK.”
“Is everything OK?” I asked. He sounded so tense.

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