How Long You Should Wait to Have Sex: a Novel (14 page)

“Chocolate?” I quickly offer.

“I was gonna say liquor, actually.” Busted. Minus one point Samantha. I decide to come clean.

“Yeah, that’s a little trick I learned in college to calm the nerves. You know before a test, or a business meeting—just kidding. I don’t usually drink at work—unless, of course, there’s peer-pressure… Or free champagne.”

He continues smiling, as he always does, but he doesn’t laugh at my attempt at self-deprecating humor.

“I thought you didn’t drink?”

Oh, damn it! I covered for one lie while forgetting about the other. This is why I shouldn’t lie.

“Right…” Time for more clean-coming. “Truth is, I just wanted to stay sober the night we met, because I knew I liked you, and I didn’t want to lose control and have sex with you prematurely. Sorry I lied. But it was for a good cause.”

His smile goes all the way back into the center of his warm blue eyes.

“So that means you’re nervous around me?”

“What? —Oh, because of the shot?” I am just giving myself away left and right here tonight. I am momentarily speechless and awkward. John must have picked up on it, because he changes the subject, for which I am internally grateful.

“Dinner smells great,” he announces, reminding me to go get the food and bring it to the table.

“Thanks. I hope you like French food. Personally, it’s my favorite.”

“Really? Me, too!” John exclaims, not surprising me with this information that I had already acquired on our first date, and am currently using to lure him into my web of destiny.

“How does this keep happening to us?” I concur, as I join him at the table. “We have so much in common!”

John takes a bite of my Coq au Vin, which I practiced making so many times since the day he asked to come over, that I can hardly stand the thought of eating it again.

“Mmmm,” he moans, “I certainly wouldn’t mind eating like this all the time!”

Expressions like “all the time,” make me so happy when they come from his mouth. This whole experience is sooo the opposite of when he didn’t call me after sex! I’m starting to think it really does matter how long you wait.

“I’m glad you knew you liked me from the moment you saw me,” he continues, being romantic.

“Did I say that?” Oh, right, I did, when I was explaining why I didn’t drink. “Yeah, see, that’s just cuz this other time, I did drink, and did stuff I regretted, and—well I—I should shut up now.” I really should shut up now.

“It’s not a big deal. You had a one night stand.”

He thinks he’s consoling me about someone else, doesn’t he? Well that’s awkward.

“Anyway it wasn’t exactly a one night stand. I mean, we ended up seeing each other again through…” Right, how do I explain this one? Through magic? You could say luck… “San Francisco’s not that big.”

“Tell me about it. When we first broke up, I used to run into my ex-wife everywhere. She probably thought I was stalking her.”

“Were you?” I tease, a little too grateful that the awkwardness is focused back on his behavior and not mine.

“How do we always end up talking about her? Let’s talk about you. Are you drinking tonight?” he taunts, holding up the bottle of wine, I stupidly opened and placed on the table.

“Considering you’ve already smelled liquor on my breath, not drinking now would make me seem like a liar.”
More of a liar
is what I’m really thinking.

He laughs at me adorably, as he pours the wine into my glass. Oh, yeah. I’m in trouble.

Turns out, drinking only makes us both more fun to be around. We crack each other up all night, and the conversation flows almost as quickly as the wine does. I’m feeling totally relaxed, and like everything is happening exactly as it’s meant to. As a bit of a control freak, it’s a rare occasion for me to just go with the flow and be in the moment like this. But hours are passing like minutes, and before we know it, the bottle is empty, our stomachs are full, and all I can think about is how glad I am that this is our third date, and I can finally revisit that glorious naked body of his for the first time.

“Hey, this being drunk thing of yours, isn’t half-bad,” he says, still teasing me about my earlier fib.

Then, as if I’ve perfectly timed dinner to my iTunes play list, Les Nubians “spontaneously” comes out of my speakers. John looks shocked.

“Is that Les Nubians? You know this is from my favorite album of all time?” he asks, not thinking for a second that he introduced me to this little known group, after which I downloaded all their music, so that I could feel closer to him, by listening to it on repeat. He’s right though. It’s not torture. They are very good.

“No way! I just had my iPod on random.” And by “random” I, of course, mean that I programmed a variety of unrelated songs so that it would appear to be random when this one came on.

“We have to dance!” he exclaims, as he drunkenly jumps out of his chair, and leads me by the hand to the living room, which is in the same room, about three feet away from the dining room table.

Yes! I finally get to press his body against mine. I love being here, in his arms. This blissful feeling lasts about ten seconds, until he swings me around—probably because I’d told him I was into salsa—I lose my balance, and I fall toward the floor, taking John down with me. But all hope is not lost! On the way down, I grab the closet doorknob in a futile attempt to avert the fall, and instead, end up opening the closet door from which every dirty dish and piece of laundry I’ve hidden from him falls in a crash to the floor, on top of us. Awkward, awkward, awkward.

I try to make light of it, “Well… I guess you’ve learned more about me tonight than I maybe would’ve cared for.“

He just laughs, rolls on top of me, and kisses me gently, “I think we need dancing lessons.”

We both laugh, and the subsequent longing I see in his eyes matches the way I feel. It’s a powerful urge to get lost in his world, and let everything else melt away.

We kiss slowly and lovingly for what seems like twenty minutes, stopping every now and then to communicate through our gazes just how happy we are to be right here, right now.

Eventually though, as can never be helped, it gets more passionate and urgent and animalistic. He takes off my blouse and then his own shirt. Oh, I love his smooth, nearly hairless bare chest. We kiss faster and harder as he takes off my skirt and his pants. Before I know it, we are in our skivvies, and I realize that this is about to happen. I want it so bad, and I’m about to throw caution to the wind when Lacey’s voice resonates in my head, “Fine. Do it your way, but don’t come crying to me when you sleep with him and he never calls you again.”

What if she’s right? I couldn’t handle that again. Especially now that we’ve taken the time to get to know each other so much more. I have to stop. I have to stop myself. I have to stop him.

“Wait!” He stops and seems concerned. “I’m not sure I’m ready for this yet.”

He smiles at me affectionately, “That’s okay. We don’t have to make love.”

You see, Lacey, he does care about me. And I trust him. That’s the thing about John, he just makes me feel so completely accepted and understood. Whenever I’m with him, I just feel so good about who I am.

“Thanks for understanding.”

“Of course… Come here.” He pulls me in closer to him and kisses my nose, then my forehead. He smiles lovingly into my eyes. He squeezes me tightly, and when he releases we start kissing again.

It starts slowly, but quickly builds back up to where we left off, and soon, he is kissing my neck, my chest, my breasts—through my bra. Before long he is kissing my stomach, and slowly making his way to my inner thighs. I’m so turned on by this teasing that my pelvis moves uncontrollably toward his mouth. He takes my unconscious cues and begins kissing and licking me everywhere.

I should know better. Oral sex for me is the point of no return. I lose all control of what I should and shouldn’t do once it’s initiated, and before I know it, I have given him the okay, and we are making love.

I feel intense and out of control, like he could do anything to me right now and it would feel right. My emotions are overwhelming me. Thankfully, he doesn’t take advantage of my vulnerability. He simply peers into my eyes, pulls my body into his, and makes me feel like the luckiest girl in the world.

When it’s over, we relax in each other’s arms, and he caresses me. This feels so good, but I wasn’t expecting it, after we agreed not to. I just hope that Lacey was wrong. It would kill me if this all went away again. And I hate that I don’t get to decide. It’s all on him now. He seems hooked. He seems like he’s all in. No, he won’t pull that shit again.

“I know a place that does lessons on Saturdays?” John says with his face still buried in our embrace. “You wanna go?”

My smile grows so wide that I blush at how transparent I must be. Thankfully, he can’t see me, because his face is still nuzzled in my neck, which he kisses lovingly.

We’ve scheduled our next date. The plan to wait longer worked!

Chapter 16

The next day I am walking on a cloud. Even as Lacey drags me to the book signing that Marty roped her into.

“It’s amazing what a difference it makes if you wait to have sex!” I extrapolate proudly, as we walk into the City Lights bookstore, to find Marty sitting alone at a table with no fans.

“Oh my God, what a loser,” Lacey says under her breath, clearly embarrassed to be here at all.

“Just because no one knows about his book doesn’t mean it isn’t good,” my publicist side automatically consoles.

She grabs a copy of the book, which is called, “To Know Yourself is to Love Yourself: a guide to discovering self-love and the female orgasm,” and instantly shoots me a “Do you see what I mean about him?” look.

I do, but all I can think about is my own stroke of good luck, “Well, I don’t have to worry about that anymore. Since I’ve got a helper now.”

“You slept with him? But I thought you said you were waiting?” She seems vaguely disappointed in me.

“I did wait! It was the third date. And anyway, you were wrong about him. But we can always ask Marty. He’s the expert.” We are just arriving at his table anyway.

“Watch out for the crowds, wouldn’t want you to get caught in a stampede, on your way to the author,” Marty jovially announces to us, as we approach.

I laugh loudly. Lacey seems uncomfortable. She hands him the book to sign, in her effort to get this over with quickly.

“What do you think, Marty,” I start in, “if I’m going out with a guy for the fourth time this Saturday isn’t it safe to assume that he likes me?”

“I’m gonna need a little more back-story than that, but sure. Probably,” Marty concurs.

“Saturday?!” Lacey screams, “But that’s my event! You have plans with me.”

Oh no, I totally forgot. The days have been getting so mixed up since the whole switch back, time shifty thing.

“Shit. I’m so sorry,” is all I get out. I don’t wanna have to cancel my plans with John.

“I could take you,” Marty offers, unable to hide how much it would please him to do so.

“Well there’s an idea!” I agree, relieved at the out.

“Samantha!” Lacey nudges, not hiding the fact that this idea repulses her and she blames me—as well she should, since it is my fault. That said, I really like this new development, and I genuinely believe that Marty would be good for her.

“You always complain that the assholes you date turn out not to be nice guys. So maybe it would be good for you to date someone who’s not an asshole in the first place?”

“I’m really loving your friend, Lacey,” Marty conspires with me.

And that’s when my phone rings. It’s John. He misses me. Yay!

I tell Lacey and Marty who’s calling, as I pick up, and immediately start blushing.

“Good, cancel on him,” Lacey demands, as soon as she hears that it’s John. I walk away to get some privacy.

“Hey!” I say into the phone, a little too eagerly.

“Hey, babe,” John says, calling me babe. Ahh! “I’m gonna have to cancel on Saturday.” What? No! Why? He doesn’t offer a reason, and I don’t know if I should pry, but my main priority is rescheduling, so I focus on that.

“Well… um… yeah, Saturday wasn’t really good for me either. Did you wanna try for Friday or Sunday?” He doesn’t answer right away. “Or else next week would be fine?”

There is a silence that goes on just long enough to get me thinking about the worst. And then the worst comes.

“I don’t think we should. I mean, you’re a great girl. You’re gorgeous and smart and funny, but…” But nothing! What more could you possibly want? That’s everything!

“And you have such interesting insight into stuff,” he goes on, as my eyes start to well up with tears.

“Hold on, I’ve gotta go somewhere I can hear you.” I can hear him fine, but I don’t want to break down in this quiet store, so I run outside to the noisy street and face away from the traffic for privacy. “Okay, what?” Oh, God! He can probably hear my voice cracking already.

“I feel bad. You’re everything I want, and I’m probably passing up a great opportunity but—“

“What did I do? How can I fix this?” I beg, stupidly.

“No, it’s not you. I just don’t feel ready to get into anything serious yet.”

I can’t believe this is happening. Is it because we had sex? What I want to say is, “You stupid idiot! Don’t you see that we’re perfect for each other? Don’t you want to be happy?” What I say instead is nothing.

“Samantha? Are you there?”

And what makes him think that I want something serious?! I never said that. At least not in this more recent version of events. I mean, I talked about how I imagined marriage would be, but that doesn’t mean I imagined it with him! At least not that he knows of. I just liked how much fun we were having.

“What makes you think I’m serious?” I bargain, already trying on the third stage of grief.

“Because you are… And I thought I was ready. But I don’t know—it’s so soon, with my wife and—I… I figure it’s better to do this now, before more time goes by and we get more attached, and it gets even harder for us. I’m sorry… I really, really like you. Can we be friends?”