“I’m on the pill.” She felt slightly dizzy. There were other considerations to think about when you hooked up with people you didn’t know. Considerations that had never been a part of her life, never been a part of her reality except ... Well, she had been sleeping with a man who was sleeping with other partners, so the truth of the matter was, if David hadn’t been practicing safe sex ...
She swallowed hard. “I’m fine, I think. My husband ... He was cheating. But I saw a video of him screwing somebody else, and he was wearing a condom, so at least there’s that.”
“Oh, Soraya . . .”
“Yeah. So, as long as you don’t do this all the time ...”
“I don’t,” he said. “That’s why I didn’t even think of it.”
They looked at each other for a long moment, and she wondered. She wondered if he was like her. If he had come out of a long-term relationship. But he didn’t offer the information, and she didn’t feel like she could ask.
“I never really did the irresponsible-teenage-behavior thing, so I guess this was my moment.” She had expected to feel more embarrassed. But she wasn’t.
He smiled just slightly, lifted his hand, and touched her face. He didn’t run away.
“Are we still on for dinner?” she asked.
“Oh, definitely.”
She looked away. “We did this backwards.”
“I hope not, because that implies that this won’t happen after dinner too.”
She bit her lip and waited for an avalanche of guilt to drop on top of her, but it wasn’t there. It wasn’t there.
“I would like it to. As long as you do.”
“I definitely do, Soraya, make no mistake.”
“Good. Me too. I ... I’ve never really dated. So I’m sorry if I’m bad at this.”
“What exactly do you think you’re bad at, because that was great.” He actually looked like he’d been hit over the head, and she couldn’t have received a nicer compliment.
“I was the good girl in high school. Boys weren’t really knocking down the door to get to me because they knew I wasn’t easy. Though it turns out I kind of am. All they would’ve had to do was carry a bag of groceries for me.”
“Here I was hoping I was a little bit special.” That made her chest feel tight. Did he want this to be something other than just sex? She had been so conditioned to believe that men who wanted sex like this, early and without strings, didn’t want a relationship. That they didn’t want anything more than an orgasm and to forget your name.
“Well, you are,” she said. “I made my husband wait until he married me.”
He laughed, and she couldn’t tell if it was a shocked sound or an amused one. Maybe both.
“I should let you get to dinner,” he said.
“Yeah.” She was glad he didn’t want to stay. Because she didn’t want him to spend the night, oddly. She wanted her own space. She couldn’t ... The idea of spending the night with him made her feel claustrophobic. She was just now figuring out living on her own. She was figuring out sex for the sake of it. It had beengreatsex. She was glad they were going out. But it didn’t need to be more than that.
Not right now.
“Okay. I’ll see you in a couple of days.” He said it affirmatively, not like a question.
“Yes. See you then. If I don’t run into you in the hall first.”
Just thinking about that made her heart rate pick up. Because if they ran into each other in the hall, maybe they would kiss each other. Maybe they would end up back in bed.
The excitement, the open-ended nature of it, the spontaneity, all of that was so foreign to her, and it really excited her.
They both got dressed, and he kissed her before he walked out the front door. She shut it and leaned against it for a moment, looking wistfully up at the ceiling. She waited for the guilt to descend, and eventually it did, while she was cooking, along with a healthy dose of fear. There were consequences for behavior like this. She’d always been told there were, and she believed it.
It’s okay. You had sex. The world isn’t going to end. It’s not like you were a virgin.
