A part of me is starting to believe there’s no other life where she’s keeping me at arm’s length. Even though that life is creeping up on us with each hour taking us closer to morning.
She tastes like the sweet wine she’s drank with dessert, the rum cocktails she’s been throwing back since we got here and like moonlight, as silver and soft as her hair. Moonlight is cold too. But there’s none of that coldness in this kiss she’s giving me.
I don’t know how many songs play while we just stand here in the middle of this dance floor, holding each other and kissing. Drinking up all the moonlight. Burning it up.
I’ve had too much to drink tonight. But I’m completely sober right now.
“Why don’t we take this somewhere a little more comfortable” I suggest during one of the brief pauses for breath amid all that kissing.
She bites her bottom lip and nods. “And quieter.”
I take her hand and lead her out of the club, across the empty wide avenue to our car. The night is even cooler than it was earlier, and the moonlight washing down on us holds no warmth. But the fire is still burning. The one deep inside that nothing can put out. I hope.
I drive fast back to our hotel, running red lights, trying to escape the cold moonlight, trying to outrun it.
But I failed.
I see that clearly in her gorgeous silver blue eyes, as the door of our hotel suite closes behind us and I reach for her to kiss her again. To pick up where we left off. To go further. But there’ll be no picking anything up.
“We should go back to the motel,” she says, kicking off her high heels and rolling her long her into a knot at the back of her head.
“Why?” I ask after she’s already passed me on her way to pick up her biker jacket and boots.
“Because I want to prepare for tomorrow.”
She disappears down the hall to the bathroom, where she’ll be taking off that silver dress that I had hoped to slide off her perfect body as soon as we reached this hotel room.
She turns on the shower—another thing I’d hoped to be doing with her before we had to return to our other lives. Anyone else, and I’d be knocking on that bathroom door, turning on mycharm and trying hard to still shift this night into the direction that I want it to go into.
But the way she spoke, the way she left me alone in the dark living room of this suite, left no doubt that she’s serious, left no crack in that would allow me to turn it around.
I walk to the kitchenette and pour myself a glass of water. It’s too warm, tastes too much of chlorine and does not quench my thirst.
I never expected to feel this way. Didn’t even know it was possible. It’s getting rejected, being frustrated and something I think they call forlorn, all rolled into one hot mess in my chest.
She comes out of the bathroom fully dressed, steam sort of rising around her like those mists around the full moon on autumn nights. But it’s definitely winter in this suite.
“Are you ready?” she asks, then proceeds to stuff the silver dress and heels into one of the shopping bags with the dresses and normal clothes she will be wearing when we begin the long, drawn-out and, in my opinion, pointless hunt for the priest tomorrow.
It’s like all that kissing and all that dancing never happened.
No woman has ever done this to me. Rejected me so completely I’m doubting my recollection of what has happened. Doubting my recollection of the kisses.
I want to ask her if she’s for real right now. If she really doesn’t think we started some kind of magic in that night club that deserves to be played out in full.
But I’ve never yet begged a woman for anything. It’s the other way around, usually. And I’m not about to start now.
“Sure, I’m ready,” I say, chug another glass of water, pull the keys from my pocket and walk to the door, holding it open for her.
She gives me a tiny little glance that suggests maybe she felt the magic too, but the sternness is back in her eyes in the next moment as she passes me and exits the suite.
Cold and untouchable as moonlight. That’s the truth of what she is. But I’ll never stop wanting her. And I think that’s gonna be a problem. Because I think this problem has no solution.
15
Alice
I was someone else in that club. Definitely not Alice the Sarge. But not shy, introverted Bianca either. I was someone who has no name because I’ve never met her before.
