Water’s rushing—not the shower, the toilet. And the sound of someone throwing up. I didn’t think women who got master’s degrees got drunk, but she must really be wasted. Is she on the other side of that door with all her hair hanging down? Girls hate that—having hair in their face when they’re sick.
A pile of hair elastics sits on her dresser. She might want one. I could give her that. Gather back the dark waves of her hair…Like she’d let you touch it.She could barely pretend not to recoil at me holding her waist earlier. I let her go before she could tell me to keep my damn hands to myself.
Still…
I grab one of the elastics, pop it around the doorknob to the bathroom. My fingers rattle the knob.
“Brayden, is that you?” Savannah calls through the door.
And I don’t want her to catch me. Don’t want to hear her tell me to let her alone. So I do what she says—what she’s about to say—and leave her there. No matter how much I don’t want to.
I toldBlake I’d be fine today, so that’s what I am—fine. I wake up still in last night’s clothes. I need to strip them off, go for an early run, get ready to go to the park. I lay here instead. My head is fine. The lights aren’t even too bright.
But the walls are thin: from my bedroom, I feel like I can hear Savannah’s every breath next door.
I fell asleep last night lying on top of the covers, listening for—I don’t know what. If she needed anything. But of course, she didn’t.
Now, I can hear her moving around, can smell whatever body wash she uses in the shower and the faint aroma of her perfume. She smells like roses, like something fresh and fragrant. That scent I caught when I slid the necklace around her neck, the locket that’s been passed down through my family. The one I always imagined giving my real wife someday.
She got married in that dress—the green one that made her eyes glow, that exposed the creamy tops of her shoulders. The one that made me want to shove the straps down, to scrape my teeth across the back of her neck so there’d be no question of who she belonged to.
I settled for a necklace instead.
Was she wearing it now?
Was she wearingonlyit?
I woke up hard. Usually, I’d ignore it. Now, I spit on my hand, shove my fist into my shorts. Jerk myself with the suddenwetness leaking from the tip. I imagine Savannah in the shower, water sluicing down the generous curves of her ass, over the points of her nipples. I imagine going in there and asking…for what? A hundred fantasies, none of which has any chance of actually happening. Maybe she’d let me taste her. Maybe she’d use a toy on herself and make me watch until I couldn’t take it anymore, then she’d drop to her knees. Wrap her pretty pink mouth around my cock, her green eyes staring up at me as she sucks.
A word slips past my lips without my permission, followed by a moan. I increase my speed, stroking myself meanly, but there’s a block there, a barrier and I just need?—
The door between our rooms opens suddenly. Frantic, I withdraw my hand from my boxer briefs, roll over, mash my face against the pillow. Pretend she hasn’t caught me jerking it while still wearing last night’s clothes.
After a moment, I look up to find Savannah standing there in a short silky bathrobe with a low vee that dips between her breasts, hair a wet tangle on her head. “Good morning,” she says.
I barely manage a sound. My cock throbs between my legs.
“Oh, you’re—” she begins, and a wave of shame comes over me to be caught like this, practically humping a pillow, ready to come in my pants. Then she adds, “hungover.” She huffs in exasperation and closes the door.
I lie there for another minute. Her hair dryer comes on, the noise blowing all my other thoughts away. Eventually, my cock softens, and my alarm goes off. This time, I get up for real.
My head poundsfor the first block of my run, but after that I feel better. Despite what Blake thinks, I don’t party harder than I can handle. Everything out here is clean and clear and easy to understand. Nothing smells like roses, just the odor of lawns cut by men on riding mowers, all of whom look like my father.
Back at the house, I shower, then send Blake a chipperGood morningtext just to prove my point.
Blake: Did you eat breakfast?
After my run, I considered and rejected the idea of breakfast. You can douse a hangover—not that I’m hungover—in cold-brew and Liquid I.V.
Me: I’m fine
Blake: That’s not an answer, Bray.
I type out a response—if you wanted to make sure I was eating, you shouldn’t have moved to Boston—erase it, then head to the ballpark.
When I get to the clubhouse, I change at my stall into workout clothes, then start to pull off my wedding ring. Working out in metal rings is dangerous. You can lose blood flow to that finger.
It’s not real.Our marriage is just on paper, just for show.
