Dreaming of You (10 page)

Logan held up the bottle of water as if to say cheers. “Thanks for the water, by the way.”

“See!” Finn pointed at Logan.

It’s amazing how even when I know I’m right, I’m still unable to get anyone to notice. “I give up.”

“It’s extremely important to drink lots of water after intense aerobic exercise,” Finn stated.

“Thank you, Guru Finn,” I said.

Logan started laughing. “Intense being the key word there.”

“All right there, ego boy.” I took his free hand in mine and wove my fingers through his. “We get it. You’re quite the stud.”

“I always say, when you got it, flaunt it.” Finn wiggled back into the chair a little more. “Now all we need is for more men to actually have what they flaunt.”

“Hmm,” Logan said, “you sound like a woman that’s had to fake a few.”

“Yes, well, I’m done with all that,” Finn said. “Now I just tell them, I’m sorry, it’s not working for me…just take your penis and go.”

Logan and I started laughing. “Like men with tiny dicks who say they are strictly tops. What’s up with that? When a guy informs me that he only tops, I’m expecting there to be a
sizable
reason for this, as if it would be wrong to ask them to waste their appendage being a bottom.”

“It’s amazing, ’cause when you think about sex in generalities, it doesn’t seem like it should be all that complicated.” Logan placed the bottle of water between his legs. “In reality, there are a million and one different little things, any combination of which, when put together, get a person off.”

I reached between his legs and grabbed his bottle of water. “And there are some pretty twisted freak daddies out there.”

“Like that guy I went out with last year.” Finn looked at me. “What was his name, Randall?” I nodded my head in agreement. “After the first few times we had sex, which were quite nice, I find out he’s into all this bondage shit. I’m as willing as the next girl to experiment, but it was the only way he wanted to have sex. I could deal with it every now and then, but there’s too much set-up and take-down time for that crap.”

“I dated a guy that was physically incapable of reaching an orgasm unless you pulled his hair,” Logan said.

Finn scrunched her face up. “Makes you wonder exactly how he stumbled onto that little nugget.”

“Well, at least on your first attempt at intercourse, you didn’t have a guy with a dick the size of a Vienna sausage ask you, ‘Are you sure you haven’t done this before, ’cause you’re not very tight?’” I placed the water bottle back between Logan’s legs, letting my finger lightly graze his balls.

“No he didn’t.” Logan shot me a half smile.

“Yeah, ’fraid so,” I said.

“Baby, I’m so sorry.” Logan patted my knee and gave me a peck on the cheek. “What did you say?”

“Nothing.” I shrugged. “I was sure he couldn’t have said what I thought I’d heard, so I asked him to repeat it, which he seemed more than happy to do.”

“You should’ve said, ‘Well, maybe it’s not so much my ass as much as that little nub of flesh between your legs you’re trying to pass off as a dick,’” Finn said.

“Fuck that, you should’ve decked him. Does he live here? ’Cause if he does, I’ll deck him.”

I leaned over and gave him a thank-you peck for wanting to defend the honor of my ass tautness.

Finn began talking about the guy who wanted her to put a canvas bag over her head, when I suddenly realized that what started out as being very general chitchat about men and sex had morphed into what could possibly become a horror movie-esque discussion about men in a very factual, specific sense…the ex-factor, aka I Know Who You Did Last Summer.

It dawned on me that in all our lengthy telephone calls over the past months, Logan and I never really discussed our pasts. I couldn’t even recall whether I’d informed him as to the evolution of Nathan’s and my partnership, from biblical to business. Part of me was completely mortified at the prospect of doing this face-to-face on the first day I’d seen him in months, and only an hour after we’d made love. Another part of me, the one that doesn’t look away when driving by a car wreck, unable to tear my eyes away from the tragedy, was curious for one reason only…I’d get to hear about his ex-lovers and try to figure out where, if at all, I may fit into his future.

As I stood in front of the oncoming train that could possibly splatter my hopes all over the room, I became that ten-year-old at Cub Scout camp playing truth or dare. Do I dare merely to get to his truth? At some point in every relationship, you have to spill it when it comes to one another’s sordid pasts. Compared to most of my gay friends, I doubted seriously whether my past was racy enough to garner more than an NC-17 rating. I hoped and prayed to please let him have been a bigger slut than I’d been…but only a little sluttier.

One out of two ain’t bad. The good part, he had indeed been a bigger slut than I had. The not-so-good part, apparently he’d screwed half the free world. I’d always thought sex should mean something, that it was special. Of course, my actions hadn’t always represented my beliefs, but all in all, I’d pretty much stuck to my guns. Except for a few alcohol-drenched moments, and Logan—the times I
had
hopped into the sack with a guy I barely knew—it had been my
intention
that it would turn into something more than casual. In Logan’s case, I still didn’t know what the hell was going on. I just knew that whatever it was, I liked it.

His views on sex were slightly different from mine. For Logan, sex could merely be “a good time had by all.” I decided not to probe into what the “all” in his statement referred to. If it meant what I thought it did, I didn’t want any details. He was of the “sex is a natural part of life” ilk. It didn’t have to mean anything. As he went on, I felt my heart begin to sink. He’d just told me he loved me an hour ago, and now I was starting to think I wasn’t so special; I was just a great lay. Momentarily caught up in the silver lining of all this, which was what a great lay I must be in order for him to get on a plane and fly halfway across the country, I missed whatever it was that had just been revealed.

“I’m sorry, what?” I asked.

“I’m going to the kitchen.” Finn was getting up out of her chair. “Either of you need anything?”

“Yeah, a glass of wine would be great.”
Any more truth and I’m gonna need the bottle
. Logan said he’d have the same, and once Finn disappeared around the corner, he looked at me.

“You, on the other hand, are a bit of a mystery to me,” Logan said.

“How so?”

“I’m sort of in new territory with you.” He pulled a leg up on the couch so he could turn to face me. “When I saw you at the restaurant that first night in Atlanta, it was like being struck upside the head with a two-by-four.”

“Wow, that bad, huh?”

“No, ding-ass.” He placed the back of his hand on my cheek. “I couldn’t take my eyes off you. It was instant, like someone flicked on a switch in my brain. For the first time in my life, I swear I was jealous. I wanted to be the one at that table with you.”

“Okay, I’m likin’ this, keep going.”

He smiled and let out a little laugh. “I’m being serious and you’re joking around.”

I most certainly wasn’t, but I decided to smile and play along. “Sorry, please continue.”

“I don’t know what I’m trying to say, I just—” He stopped and lowered his head. “Things are different with you. This isn’t just a fun sex thing for me.”

Okay, so I’m not just a great lay?

“When you left the restaurant with Nathan that first night, it felt like I’d lost something. I felt sick to my stomach and kicked myself in the ass all night for not going over and introducing myself. Then the next morning…there you were. I mean, what are the fucking odds?”

I quietly leaned over and kissed him, but on the inside, I’d turned into Sally Field at the Oscars. You
like
me! You
really
like me!

“Holy sex fiend, Batman,” Finn gasped, walking into the room with three glasses of red wine. “You two just can’t keep your tongues out of one another’s mouths.”

Logan and I smiled at one another and turned our attention back to Finn.

The stories kept coming, and as I sat on the couch holding Logan’s hand, I felt calm and at peace…for about five minutes. While I believed everything he declared to be the truth, I wondered in the back of my mind, is this someone who can give me what I need? Am I going to be enough to satisfy his apparently large sexual appetite for any length of time? How long would it be before he became bored with me? Shaking my head, as if to rid my mind of all its doubts, I resolved to just enjoy the week and stop analyzing everything.

* * * * *

The next morning, I was supposed to take Logan by the restaurant and show him around. When we were ready to leave, he informed me he would be more than willing to go anywhere I wanted so long as I wasn’t behind the wheel. Since this wasn’t the first time I’d ever heard this, I wasn’t exactly shocked. I’d never gotten so much as a speeding ticket, a fact Logan had a little trouble believing, but whatever.

We finally made it to the restaurant and I took him around and explained our operations. He liked the way we streamlined the service staff by placing two waiters per table. One to stay out front, take the orders, refill drinks, and the other to bring out the food. We liked it because it cut down on congestion in the kitchen and at the bar. He was shocked at how many restaurants a city of this size could support. I didn’t think it was that rare. While we’re a bit on the more expensive side, unless you have a large family, which most people don’t these days, it’s less expensive to go out than buying groceries.

Nathan came in around eleven and whisked Logan back into the kitchen to show him around. I used my free time to put together a liquor order and place a few phone calls. When I finished my stuff, I looked at the clock to see an hour had come and gone. I got up from the table and walked through the kitchen doors to find the two of them. They were back on the line wearing chef jackets, chopping, sautéing, grilling, and yapping away, comparing techniques. I stood there for a good five minutes, arms crossed, and looking particularly sexy in a pair of retro wide-leg gray 1940s-inspired pants and a lightweight pale yellow cotton sweater that clung in all the right places. Not that it seemed to matter since neither one of them bothered to look up. The place could catch fire and you still wouldn’t be able to get their attention. Now I really loved my job, but I just didn’t quite understand the fascination with something they each did on a daily basis.

“Hey,” I said, “what’s goin’ on in here?”

They each looked up, startled that I had walked in without them noticing. They simultaneously smiled, looking completely wholesome and innocent, like two little boys right before they throw a water balloon at you. Not wanting to seem like the evil babysitter sent to break up the fun, I smiled back and began shaking my head.

I walked over and hopped up on the cold red marble-top prep table. “Ya travel halfway across the country and within twenty-four hours you’re doing the same thing you do at home.”

They looked at one another, nodded, and both sneered. As if it were a dirty word, they both said, “Front of the house.”

“They just don’t get it,” Nathan said.

“They’re just here to make money and socialize,” Logan continued.

I laughed at them as I let my feet swing back and forth as they dangled over the side of the table. “Oh…I forgot. What you guys do is
art
.”

Nathan continued to chop up veggies as he shook his head, obviously disgusted. “Of all the…”

“Yeah, yeah, don’t give me any lip, I’m not the snob here.”

“Ingrate,” Logan added, turning around and throwing some leeks into a pot. “We’re making lunch.”

“Oh…well, what is it?” I asked, reaching over to stick my finger in a pan of sauce as Nathan smacked my hand away with a spatula. “Ow!”

“Why don’t you make yourself useful and cut up some of that bread we threw in the warmer?” Nathan pointed to the warmer as if I had forgotten where it was.

I hopped down off the table to begin my chore.

Logan eyed the prep table a little as he handed a bread knife and cutting board to me. “That’s a funky prep table. Where did you guys find that? I’ve never seen one like it.”