Clayton just laughs, grabs a bar of soap and a washcloth, and begins washing my back. Taking his time, he lathers me from neck to toe, and then spins me to rinse. Afterward, he moves behind me and starts shampooing my hair. His hands are so gentle, I find myself closing my eyes and completely relaxing under his touch.
One of my clearest memories of my mother is when she’d wash my hair when I was little. I’d sit in the tub with my sisters, and she’d carefully pour big cups of water over our heads, then take turns washing our hair with sweet-smelling baby shampoo. I loved the feeling of her fingers working over my scalp and down the strands of my hair. How carefully she rinsed, then conditioned, and rinsed again.
That once-familiar sense of being cared for washes over me anew as Clayton’s strong fingers massage conditioner into my scalp and then work their way carefully down to the ends of my hair. It’s nice to be tended to like this for once, instead of being the one doing all the tending.
“There,” he says throatily when he’s finished. “Squeaky clean.”
He repositions me to rinse the conditioner, then grabs the soap and another washcloth and scrubs himself top to bottom. I watch him as he does it, fully enjoying the view. His body is rock hard, solid, and well-defined. There’s so much of him to learn, each line and rise and dip. I wonder how long it will take until I’ve mapped him out completely.
That is,ifhe’s going to be my husband…
The thought makes me pause.
Clayton must notice my subtle change of mood. “Why the long face? Ready to get out?”
I shake my head and smile. “Just taking in the view.”
After we step out, he wraps me in a huge, fluffy towel.
“Pretty nice towel for a guy who owns such basic furniture,” I joke.
“Now, now, it’s mid-range furniture.” He rubs the towel over my hair, covering my face playfully. “But I’ll have you know that I’m happy to splurge on the important things.”
“I don’t suppose you splurged on anything good in your fridge, did you?” I ask.
My stomach is letting me know that I haven’t eaten since breakfast, which wasn’t much.
“No,” he says, “but I’m a pro at ordering in.”
He gets a bunch of Thai food delivered for lunch, which we tuck into while sitting on his living room floor on a blanket, my phone propped up on the coffee table so we can use my Netflix account to binge episodes ofToo Hot to Handle, which I admit is utter trash, even by reality show standards, but I find it hilarious, ridiculous, and compulsively watchable. Clayton makes a lot of joking comments about the contestants at first, but pretty soon I can tell he’s just as invested as I am. You can’t argue with drama—even if it’s the drama of a bunch of hot, single people stranded on a tropical island who aren’t allowed to screw each other or else they’ll lose the chance to win $100,000.
At some point, my phone starts blowing up with texts from my sisters, and that’s when I realize that Clayton and I have spent half the day together already. I barely noticed how the time flew by, but it’s after three in the afternoon. That means Frankie and Livvie just got home from school, and I’ll bet they’re worried sick to find me gone.
“I’d better go,” I tell him regretfully as I text them back. “I’ll just call an Uber.”
Clayton’s hand covers my screen. “Stay. Please.”
I want to. “But my sisters...”
“Will survive without you until tomorrow morning,” he says gently. “Give me until daybreak, yeah?”
I think about it a moment. Truthfully, I don’t want to go home. I want to be here, in this cozy little house, with this man. This man who somehow knows exactly how to take care of me, and even seems to like doing it. How wild is that? “Okay. Just until morning.”
Later that night, as I drift off to sleep next to him in bed, both of us warm and naked, I finally feel sure of myself: I’ve made the right decision.
7
CHARLIE
I sleep fine,until I don’t.
I suppose being in a strange bed has a lot to do with it, but something else pulls at me until I drag myself from the strange sleep-awake in-between and open my eyes.
The bed is warm, blankets piled around me like a cozy cocoon. Stretching my arms, I’m suddenly aware of the dull ache between my legs. This is all new to me, the sex and the romance and the simple togetherness, but I’m finding that things with Clayton are just so…easy. It doesn’t seem possible, and yet there it is.
The thing is, Clayton isn’t like other guys. At least, not the guys I tried to date in high school. He has no trouble showing me his softer side, the way he takes care of me, the way he bathed me and fed me and tucked me in at the end of the night. He treats me like I’m precious and special. I have no idea if that’s how real adult relationships are supposed to be (obviously my parents failed to be solid role models in that regard), but I’m going with it.
I mean, yes, I know I’m a little naïve. I know it won’t always be like this, that it’s probably just some pre-arranged-marriage honeymoon type of thing, but I choose to believe that Clayton is really and truly capable of being that guy—the one he was yesterday—again and again, because deep down, that’s the real Clayton.
