Unmaking Marchant (2 page)

Well, obviously.

I think of the last time Adam and I went to a party—the Napiers' spring swing dance. We decided to stay at Adam’s townhouse afterward. When I dared suggest Adam strip his vomit-covered clothes off and shower without—gasp—having sex first, he called me a bitch, and later that night, he called me a stupid whore. 

“What’s wrong?” he asks again.

I tremble with anger, but I keep my mouth pressed firmly closed. If he doesn’t know, I’m not about to tell his drunken self.

His head falls on my shoulder, and he looks up at me through his eyelashes. “Don’t be mad at me, Sur. We’re gonna have a good night. You’ll see.”

I can’t tell exactly how drunk he is, but it doesn’t matter. He drank, and we said he wouldn’t.

“I’m not so sure about that,” I mumble, shaking him off me and scooting closer to the door.

I take a few deep breaths, gathering my patience. Preparing to discuss this whole drinking thing before Arnold gets much closer to my house, so if it turns into a fight, I can have him drop Adam off at Adam’s townhouse.

I’m about to broach the subject when Adam leans over, opens up the mini fridge embedded in the partition wall in front of us, and pulls out a bottle of my favorite Aubert Pinot Noir.

He dangles it in front of my face. “Want to half it with me? Your favorite, baby.”

“Of course not.” I glare at him. “Do you have selective amnesia?”

He drops the wine into his lap and puts on his petulant, I-know-I-messed-up-and-now-I-can’t-hide-from-it face as he makes another grab for my hand. I snatch it into my lap, setting my gaze on the partition
in front of me. “Baby, I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. I didn’t have too much. I just needed…to loosen up, you know? You know how my social anxiety is.”

Which is why I keep suggesting that he find himself a therapist.

I don’t look at him. Not now, and not during the next fifteen minutes of our drive to Crestwood Place. I realize, belatedly, as we roll down my driveway, that Arnold brought Adam here, when I should have asked him to please take Adam home. I don’t want to talk to Adam anymore tonight.

My eyes sting with tears as the limo stops, and I glance at him. He acts like such a child sometimes. How can I marry him if he’s not willing to grow up? How can he really love me if he doesn’t care enough about the drinking issue to just stop? Especially since he calls me ugly names when he gets drunk. My parents don’t do that. Neither do my friends. Until Adam started drinking a lot, no one—
no one
—had ever called me any name.

I don’t deserve that—right? 

I think again about something my mother once told me: Most people never really change, and after marriage, bad habits tend to get worse.

Adam is leaning over his lap, with one elbow propped on his knee and his face in his hand, like he’s upset. He hasn’t touched the wine, but does that even matter? A tear spills down my cheek as I remember all the names he’s called me during drunken moments—whore, bitch, cunt: things he would never call me when he’s sober, but he’s said them enough times when he’s drunk that I’m convinced he’s always thinking them.

How can I marry someone who thinks that I’m a cunt?

And isn’t that a nasty little word?

I imagine my father’s face. I would bet millions that he’s never,
ever
called my mother a cunt. Even “bitch” seems hard to imagine coming from his lips. It should be unfathomable for Adam, too. What’s wrong with him that it isn’t? Or is it something wrong with me?

Am
I a cunt?

I’m not, right?

Most people who know me think I’m nice. I have my moments, sure, but so does everyone.

I remember slamming the door of Adam’s town house last time he drank. “If you name-call me again, I’m leaving you! I really am!”

Then he proposed and promised to quit.

I can no longer ignore my suspicion that he’s been drinking in New York, too. Like, maybe almost every night. What happens when he moves to Napa? When we live together? I can’t do this all the time!

As if he hears my thoughts, Adam raises his head and blinks at me.

“Adam,” I say, “you need to go home. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

I expect contrition. Understanding. Instead, his eyes widen like I’ve slapped him. His shoulders square, and he reaches out to grab my elbow. “No way, baby. I want to get in the pool.”

I frown. “You what?”

“Skinny dipping. It’s your fantasy.” He grins. “I’m feeling loose tonight. I think I can do it.”

Adam’s so uptight, he’s never been willing to take a naked swim with me, not even when we’ve been the only ones at home.

“Lizzy’s gone now,” he says. “This is our night.” He kisses the top of my hand. “Last night drinking. I fucking swear. I love you, baby. We can stop going to parties if we have to. I’ll make the therapist appointment. Just let me swim with your fine self.”

I struggle not to roll my eyes; then Adam kisses me gently on the lips. Despite the overwhelming scent of alcohol, I don’t pull away when his arms wrap around me. He pulls me close to his chest—a signature Adam move that always makes me feel safe and sheltered—and for a long second, I can tell myself that he’s my Adam. The guy I started dating in ninth grade. The one who could barely get a condom over himself when we lost it to each other in the fields behind Harvey Goldman's house.

I inhale his cologne and ignore the smell of the alcohol. I allow myself to ignore everything as he lifts me out of the limo and carries me around the back of my house. In the still of the night, I hear Arnold pull off, bound for the smaller, whitewashed house where he and the cook and my security guard have rooms.

The egg-shaped pool is crisscrossed by thousands of globe lights strung between the main house and the garden house. Tonight, the stars twinkle between them. It’s beautiful.

“Adam,” I say as he sets me gently on the pale tile. He looks down at me, and I wrap my arms around his neck and look at his familiar face. “It really hurt me that you did this after you promised you wouldn’t.”

I stare into his eyes, looking for some hint—any hint—that he gets it. That he understands why I’m upset.

He takes a step away from me and hangs his head, looking back up after a long moment staring at the Salvatore Ferragmo calfskin leather shoes I got him for his birthday. “I understand, Suri. I guess…I have a problem. Maybe I need to try AA or something.”

Tension leaves me in a rush. I can feel my shoulders deflate like a popped balloon. “You’ll actually consider that?”

“I guess I have to.”

Yes!

I smile. I can’t help it. “Adam, thank you. That makes me feel so much better.”

“Anything for my girl.” He grins and steps close enough to kiss me quickly on the mouth, then starts stripping off his clothes.

My body temperature skyrockets. I can’t help it. Adam is lean and cut. I’m not very tall—only five-foot-four—so at five-foot-ten, he’s just my size. His blue eyes and mahogany hair look great with his naturally tanned skin. His grandmother is from Spain, and you can totally tell. 

My mouth falls open when he tugs his boxers off, revealing a stiff erection.

“Ohh la la.” I giggle and step over to him, and Adam does a deft job getting me out of my dress and slip. He kisses down my neck and over my bare shoulders. A brisk breeze blows, causing chills to pop up on my skin. He tweaks my hard, round nipple, and I gasp.

“Bad boy…”

He kneels, thumbing me through my panties before he pulls them down and tosses them over his shoulder. He takes my hand and leads me to the stairs at the shallow end of the heated pool. Steam drifts off the water, and I watch as it laps against Adam’s knees, then thighs, then hips. He’s submerged up to his chest when he turns and tugs me in behind him.

I sink down to my shoulders, glad my hair is swept up off my neck as I twirl around. It feels exquisite.

I look over at Adam. He’s up to his pecs now, smiling a sweet smile, looking soft and attentive: the nice drunk he’s never been.

“Come here baby.” He holds his arms out, and my eyes fly to a bruise on his left shoulder, thinking for a second that he’s finally gotten the tattoo I always fanaticize about.

Oh, well.

I step over to him, running my wet fingers through his hair and tugging his lips down on mine. As I do, I press my naked body against his and Adam groans a little.

“Baby… Oh yeah.”

He starts kissing down my neck, just the way I like it. He kisses my collar bone and down my breast to my nipple, which he teases with his teeth. Through my haze of lust, I tell myself I’m not going to let his drinking ruin things for us. He’ll go to AA. He did better tonight. He drank a lot in a brief time period and he’s not calling me names.

One of his hands cups me in the water and he slides a finger in. I gasp, wriggling against him.

“You naughty, naughty boy.”

I find him, too, stroking him as he moans.

He jerks out of my grasp, lifts me in his arms and presses my back against the side of the pool, lifting my legs so he can find my center. He spreads my lips, stroking twice before he takes himself in hand, and, holding onto the side of the pool, pushes inside of me.

It’s supposed to feel good in the water, but I know after a couple of strokes it doesn’t. I feel stretched too tight, and it stings.

He begins to thrust a little harder, kissing my mouth and stroking my neck with one hand as the other holds my hips.

“Oh, yeah…”

I bite my tongue, trying to get used to the sensation, but the pinching feeling just gets worse.

“Adam,” I gasp. I push against his shoulder. “Stop, it hurts.”

His eyes open, as he continues pumping. “Stop?”

“I’m really sorry, but it hurts.”

He pulls out and lets go of me. I sink into the water while he spins around. “Damnit, Suri. This is bullshit!”

A shiver sweeps me as the wind blows. I wrap my arms around myself and hope he’s just being a frustrated guy. This is
my
fantasy, after all. Something he’s never felt comfortable doing. And I just shot him down.

Shoving my worries aside, I put on my sexy face and beckon him closer, curling my finger in a come-hither motion as the water laps around my shoulders. “Come here,” I tell him, trying not to shiver as the breeze picks up. When he gets close enough, I’m going to grab his dick.

But he doesn’t come. Instead, he turns around, running his hands roughly through his hair. “Jesus, you sure know how to kill a buzz.”

“Come here, Adam.” When he doesn’t, I grab his bicep and turn him around. I grab his dick with one hand, stroking as my mouth finds his. He kisses me back roughly. Almost painfully, as if he’s trying to bruise my lips. I try not to say “ow”—I don’t want to put a damper on our sex life, especially when we only get to indulge several times a month—but he keeps it up, kissing so hard my teeth are almost cutting into my mouth, then moving down my neck and biting. Not sexy biting; real biting.

I can’t help it. I push his shoulders. “Adam, stop!”

He shoves one wet hand into my hair, wrapping a strand around his fingers. “Come on, it’s been a fucking week or maybe more.”

He grabs my hips and pulls me closer to him, easing me toward the side of the pool again. Lifting me up, so the deck is digging into my back. Putting my legs atop his shoulders. He strokes my thigh and licks me twice, then pulls me abruptly back down into the water and enters me again.

Again, it stings. I’m not sure why. I close my eyes and try to loosen up, but eventually I have to squirm away. I push against him, looking up into his dazed eyes. “Adam, I’m really sorry. It just hurts.”

He gives me a weird look, almost a sneer. It’s not a look I see on him often, so I’m not sure what it means. He laughs a little. “Don't you want to be a good wifey?”

The comment is so ridiculously sexist and entitled, I can't believe it came from Adam's mouth. I’m so disgusted, I almost want to hit him. Instead, I splash him.

“You’re being a jerk, just like you said you wouldn’t be.” I take a few steps back, already glancing at the stairs. There are no towels out here, but I don't care. All I want is to get inside, away from Adam and his issues.

Adam splashes me back, spraying water in my face. As I blink at him through my smeared mascara, I find he looks legitimately pissed off, as if I’m the one who’s ruined our night.

“Fuck you,” he mutters.

My jaw drops. I throw up my arms, shocked although I shouldn’t be. “This is what you
always
do! You have a drinking problem, Adam!”

“Fuck you,” he says again.

“Don’t talk to me that way!”

He sneers. “I’ll do what I want. You can’t blame me. You’re being a cock tease, Suri.”