by Tina Martin
“Because he’s still trying to figure you out and it’s frustrating that he hasn’t been able to do that yet, especially when he can read people so well.”
“Ugh. This is exhausting.”
“Exhausting, but worth it. You’ll be fine, darling.”
“A feeling tells you that, too, I imagine.”
She smiles. Eats.
I begin on my soup, too.
Chapter Twenty-One
Magnus
I shouldn’t have hung up on her. Normally, I don’t resort to such juvenile displays of disapproval, but I didn’t know what else to do. I try to choose my words carefully with her because she’s fragile. Fragile because at any time, she can break and choose to back out of the deal and make the hard decision not give her father a lifesaving kidney and thus not giving me a baby. I can’t have that so I make concessions. I do things for her I wouldn’t do for another woman. I tolerate behavior from her that would normally cause me to dismiss a woman in the blink of an eye.
Shiloh’s different. She’s not doing any of this for the money. It’s for her father. I don’t want to disrupt that. Don’t want to irritate her, so I constantly remind myself of that.
But sleeping pills?
It shouldn’t have bothered me so much. She must’ve been struggling with this decision and trying hard to find something to get her through. She came up with pills. But I didn’t want her on pills. I want her to know what was going on at all times. Call me selfish but I want her to feel me inside her. I want her to know the length of me. To recognize me. Appreciate all I have to give.
I shouldn’t want that. It shouldn’t matter as long as a baby is made. But it does matter and I can’t make myself sleep with her knowing she’s not aware of my presence. I won’t.
An hour ago, I got another text from her. She said she’s working tonight, covering for a waitress who’s out sick. I decide to go straight there and talk to her. It seems this place – the place we met – is the only place we have somewhat productive conversations.
She sees me as soon as I walk in. My usual table is not available, but I sit at another one in the section where she’s working.
“Somebody came to fix the heat,” she says in passing, leaving a trail of intoxicating perfume behind. She comes back with water and lemon slices.
“Why didn’t you tell me it was broken?” I ask to keep her at my table a little longer.
“Because you’ve been avoiding me.”
I feel my jaw clench before I’m able to stop it. “I have been avoiding you,” I confess. “Still, that’s no reason to not notify me of something so important.”
“Well, you’re not the easiest person to talk to, Magnus, and I honestly don’t know what I did to piss you off, so I didn’t bother. Didn’t want the headache. Excuse me. I have to go to the kitchen.”
She rushes away, takes a table of four their food then comes back to stand next to me with the tray still in her hand.
“I’m not eating today,” I tell her.
“Then why are you here?” she asks, staring at me with those big eyes.
“Why do you think I’m here?”
“To—to bother me?”
“No. To talk to you.”
“I live in your guesthouse. You can come back there and talk to me at any time.”
“I could, but you seem more relaxed when you’re here.”
“Well, unfortunately, I’m working, Magnus. I don’t have much time to talk to you.”
“You can talk when you get a break. When people at your table are satisfied and don’t need you for anything. In the meantime, I want you to ask yourself why you think I would want to sleep with you after you’ve taken sleeping pills.”
She walks away, taking my question with her. When she’s able to come back a few minutes later, she says, “I thought it would be easier that way. You said we weren’t friends. You said I shouldn’t feel any emotions toward you. The pills were just a way of making sure I wouldn’t feel anything. I only took two.”
I can’t much blame her but I can’t help but want her to feel something when she’s with me, even though I doubt I could feel something for her.
She stares at me. I can feel her need to ask me something before her pretty lips part to make a sound. They’re glossy again tonight. Those lips…
“Why didn’t you do it? It’s not like I didn’t give you prior consent. You weren’t committing a crime. I’m bought and paid for, right? I’m yours to do whatever you wish. To follow your rules. To let you know my every move. To give you a son because I doubt a little girl would be good enough.”
It’s getting harder and harder to feign nonchalance with her. I push aside frustration and respond, “A girl would be just fine with me.”
She arches a brow. “Oh, really?”
“Yes, as long as she has your beautiful eyes.”
She narrows those eyes at me and looks confused. Then she rushes back to the kitchen again.
This interrupted conversation seems to work for us. Taking care of her tables and then coming back to me gives her time to process what I’m saying. Gives her time to think without firing back so quickly.
She’s about to breeze past me again when I grab her arm and say, “And no, you’re not bought and paid for. I don’t own you. And for future reference, I will not touch you if you’ve taken anything that makes you groggy, sleepy or incoherent.”
“Okay.” She eases her arm away from my grasp. “I get it.”
“Do you?”
“Yes. You’re adding to your rules as this nonsense between us progresses. I get it.”
I look her up and down – this petite lil’ thang who wants to challenge me so bad. Tonight, she really is going to get it. “Tonight’s Wednesday, by the way,” I remind her. “It’s one of our nights to try.”
“I know.”
“What time do you get off work?”
“Around nine.”
“Okay. I’ll follow you.”
“You don’t have to sit here until nine o’clock, Magnus.”
“I do. I need to make sure you’re not up to any funny business. That pink-haired girl with all the tattoos looks like she has a stash of pills she could lend you.”
“I don’t do drugs.”
“Right. Just sleeping pills.”
She smacks her lips. “It was melatonin.”
“I don’t care what it was. I know it better not be in your system when I touch you. I want a healthy baby.”
“So do I.”
“Good, then I’ll be sure to put one in you tonight.”
She walks away from me. She knows how serious I am. Tonight’s the night. Tonight, I’ll give her my baby.
* * *
When she’s off work, I drive behind her, following the Porsche I bought to my own house. I park in the garage while she continues on to the guesthouse. As soon as I’m parked, I walk to the back before she’s able to enter the house.
“You good?” I ask, still seeking clarification she’s okay with what’s about to happen.
“Yeah. I’m fine.”
The car door slams. She’s not fine with this. Her actions tell me she’s not.
Even still, I follow her inside. She goes straight to the loft, puts her things down on the dresser.
“Can I at least take a shower first?” she asks.
“No,” I respond reaching for my belt and releasing the tension that has filled the front of my pants. Can I take a shower? Why would I allow her to do that? Why would I let her wash away the scent I love so much now that it’s baked into her milk chocolate skin and has blended with her natural, blissful smells? I want that smell. Want to remember her by it. Want to remember this night – the night I make her mine.
I’m surprised at how much I want her. How much I desire her. Usually, I’d have to make myself want a woman. With Shiloh, it’s effortless. I don’t fight for stimulation – I fight for self-restraint, telling myself this is a part of the plan. My plan. The plan I laid
out for myself. The plan I’d already written a will for. A plan that involves a baby – not a woman to love and desire. Just a baby.
So why do I desire her so much?
“Where do you want me?” she asks with a straight face.
“Don’t say it like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like this is some kind of transaction.”
“It is a transaction. You’ve said as much.”
“Then I recant those words,” I say, stepping out of my pants. “We’re making a baby.”
I turn off the lights before I remove my boxers. I don’t want to scare her off. Don’t want her to see me naked. I want her to feel – not see.
It’s dark in the room but not dark to the point where I can’t see the silhouette of her.
I walk over to the bed where she’s sitting and help her take off her pants. She removes her panties.
I’m naked from the waist down.
So is she.
In the bottom drawer of the nightstand, I retrieve a bottle of lubricant I put there – I doubt if she knew it was there – and after applying just the right amount, I eased down over her, feeling her legs open for me. Her stomach quivers. My weight slowly holds her hostage.
I close my eyes. I don’t want a visual connection. Just the physical one. I tell myself this is business but as I inch forward to her center and hear her whimper, I know I can’t label it as business, especially when it’s borderlining on pleasure. It is pleasure.
I feel her hands on my back. I cringe. “Don’t touch me. Keep your hands above your head,” I tell her. I must separate the two – business from pleasure. I keep my body tented over her so my stomach isn’t touching hers. We’re not chest to chest, though I see the shadows of her peaks that makes my mouth water. I don’t need that kind of intimacy. Don’t want my face too close to hers for fear I might think about kissing her. I don’t kiss.
I press forward, feeling the heat of her overtake me. Listening as her whimpers grow louder as I take her innocence. Our fit together is tight, so tight, I feel like she’s squeezing me. She grips me with her inexperienced muscles but not intentionally. It’s something that can’t be helped.
When I’m settled, reaching the bottom of her well, I move – forward then back. Forward and back some more. She doesn’t move with me.
Just whimpers.
Then a gasp comes followed by more whimpers.
More gasps.
In my mind, I imagine she’s whispering my name and telling me things a lover would say. Like how good I feel and how much she needs this. It’s almost as if I want to hear her say these things, but her body is speaking instead. I’m stroking the matchbox, sparking a flame, one I’ll douse but not yet.
I stop myself. I don’t want to give her my seed so soon. I want her to feel me and know that if we produce a child, it’s because we made it in heat. In passion. Doesn’t really matter how that passion came about. It’s here now with us – man and woman, husband and wife, two people who hardly know each other but creating a bond that will glue us together forever, even when I’m gone.
Her body’s shaking. She grabs a pillow and holds it over her face to muffle screams she wants to make but keeps them inside as if I’m not privy to them. As if she’s ashamed to let me hear her shout to these walls how good it feels to have me buried into her depths. She internalizes it all except a few gasps toward the end of her rapture and when I feel her steadily squeezing and releasing me, I topple over, eyes still closed and eat the roar that threatened to escape my mouth.
“Mmm…” I hum. That, I couldn’t keep in, but I say nothing else even though I’m still moving on top of her. I feel myself giving and giving and giving. Molten liquid surges out of me. The transference seems never-ending. I want to give her everything.
She gasps more. I lick my lips, feel sweat on my forehead. The deed is done.
So why do I not want to withdraw from her?
She’s steadily panting.
I’m panting.
I pull myself from her and find a breath to ask, “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” she whispers.
In the darkness, I step into my boxers, grab my pants and shoes from the floor and leave quickly, walking to my house before I get the idea to spend the night with her. I can’t spend the night. It’s business. Nothing more.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Shiloh
I didn’t think it would feel like this. I didn’t know if I would feel anything. Emotionally, I mean. Physically, I felt all of him, surprised by my body’s need to take him all in. Surprised that when he took me, I could actually handle him if you can call what I did handling him. All I did was lie there. He did all the work.
I couldn’t touch him. That’s not allowed.
He didn’t kiss me. Said he doesn’t kiss.
He could have but he didn’t ravish me with strokes or show a lack of concern for my plight. He was gentle, as gentle as a man of his size and strength could reasonably be. He didn’t leave me writhing in pain beside the usual discomfort that comes with losing one’s virginity. For ten minutes, I felt him up to my spine. For ten minutes, I was his.
He hadn’t said a word during. He only asked me if I was okay afterward and that surprised me. Then he was gone. Didn’t say any parting words. He scooped up his clothes and left.
Now that I’m in the shower and have time to think, what was he supposed to say exactly? Thank you? It’s been real? Let that marinate?
I’m not sure if anything would’ve sufficed but saying nothing felt awkward. Like he was done with me and had no further use for me – at least not for tonight. Saturday, we’d be at it again.
After my shower, I still feel the aftershocks of his strokes an hour after it happened. Still feel his thickness pushing my walls. I re-warn myself not to think too much of the way he has my body feeling. This isn’t for me. It’s for him.
It’s to help my father.
It’s to give Magnus a baby.
Close to midnight, I have a sudden yearning to call papa. He’s usually in bed by now and I hate to wake him if he is, but something is telling me to call. Probably the war going on in my mind. My conscience. I need to justify what just happened. What I’ve done. Need to hear the man’s voice of whose life I’m trying to save.
“Hey there, Lo. What’chu doing calling yo’ old man this late?”
“I had you on my mind, Papa. How was your day?”
“Oh, stop it. You don’t want to hear nothing ‘bout my day.”
“I do. Tell me. What did you do?”
“Not a doggone thang.” He chuckles. “I got up early, took a shower and made me up some toast.”
“You didn’t toast the whole loaf this time, did you?”
He chuckles more. “No. Not this time. Not this time. Oh, and I got myself a surgery date.”
“That’s awesome, Papa!” I say, feeling my gut levitate with excitement. “When is it?”
“Friday.”
“Friday? As in this Friday!”
“Yes. I’m gettin’ me a new kidney this Friday. I’m gon’ be a new man. God bless the man it came from though. It’s bittersweet, ain’t it?”
“It is. Papa, you should’ve told me when you first heard.”
“I know. I know. I was busy.”
“Making toast?”
“Well—ah…I sorta ventured off today. I fired up ol’ smoky and visited your mama. I told her the good news.”
I smile. My father hasn’t visited my mother’s grave in months. I thought he’d given up talking to her. I personally don’t believe it’s healthy for him to visit the cemetery, hanging on to someone who’s gone. It’s preventing him from moving forward and discovering new things. New people. New relationships. But he’s happy. Who am I to rain on his parade?
“I’m glad, Papa—glad you did that.”
“Me, too. I’m gon’ need you to drive me to the hospital.”
“Of course. What time do you need to be there?�
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“They said six o’clock.”
“Okay. I’ll get to your house around five to make sure we’re not rushing. Have you packed an overnight bag?”
“No.”
“I’ll do that for you, too.”
“Thanks, Lo, but I don’t need no overnight bag.”
“Yes, you do.”
“Nonsense. The same thang I wear going in is the same thang I’ll wear coming out. You know they gon’ make me put on a gown, anyway. Don’t make no sense. A man wearing a gown…”
“It’s standard, Papa, and you’re not wearing the same thing in and out. I’m going to pack you some clean socks and underwear along with a fresh pair of pants and a shirt.”
“I swear you just like your mama, girl.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” I smile, briefly thinking about her. I am like her. I have an innate love of family and I’ll do anything for papa. “Hey, Papa, did you tell Selah?”
“I tried to call that girl. Her number’s disconnected. Do you know where she hangs out at?”
“Not particularly. I wouldn’t know where to find her.”
“She’ll get wind of it somehow. I’ll keep calling her number. Maybe she’ll get her phone back on.”
“Okay, Papa,” I say. Drug addicts don’t care about keeping their phones on. When it comes to paying the bill or buying drugs, well—
“You get some sleep, Papa.”
“You, too, Lo. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight,” I place my phone down. My insides ache – the part down below and the thing that beats in my chest. I don’t know how I’ll survive these transactions with Magnus. Don’t know if I’m strong enough after all.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Magnus
I’m sitting in my therapist’s office. I’m supposed to be at work but I had to meet with her right away in light of recent events. I need her to help me understand my thoughts – my current state of mind – because I don’t.
