by Lisa Ferrari
That’ll be the end of the road for Claire.
I hate when I refer to myself in third person.
To my surprise, I feel suddenly pissed off, not wanting to let that scenario come to pass. I don’t know what it is about Stacy that motivates me, but it does.
I flip Kellan onto his back and proceed to ride him like I’m in a Zumba class. Even though I’ve never taken a Zumba class.
He erupts inside me two minutes later, coming so hard he’s unable to speak, so I guess I do a good job.
THE NEXT MORNING, I am awakened by the powerful aroma of coffee.
I open my eyes.
Kellan is kneeling on the bed, grinning his ass off, and holding a mug of steaming java in front of my face.
I sit up and prop myself up on pillows and he hands the mug to me.
It’s good. Black and sweet. It tastes like he put two packets of Stevia in it.
“What do you want to do today?” Kellan asks.
“I don’t understand the question. Train, eat, stress, train, eat, stress, bathe, sleep. Pretty much the same as every other day.”
“Not today.”
I’m still half asleep and my stress has already returned. I’m testy and bitchy. I realize it but I can’t seem to stop myself. “Huh?”
“We’re taking a trip.”
“What kind of trip?”
“You’ll see.”
This irritates me even more.
Kellan proceeds to pull out a suitcase and pack some clothes in it. He pulls out my suitcase as well and proceeds to pack it for me.
AN HOUR LATER, we’re in the Mister Beaumont, heading north up I-5. Kellan still hasn’t told me where we’re going.
The excitement and anticipation is finally cutting through the ardor of my shitty attitude. Plus we stopped at McDonald’s and Kellan let me eat two sausage McMuffins with egg and a whole bunch of ketchup. And more black coffee.
As we drive with the tops removed, the wind tosses my hair and I sip the cold sugar-free energy drink Kellan brought from the refrigerator. Apparently he stocked up while my cranky butt was still sawing logs.
We wind up in Fort Bragg, a small seaside town I’ve heard of but have never visited. Kellan has already booked a room for us in a cozy hotel perched on a cliff, overlooking a bay and a lighthouse. The room has a Jacuzzi tub and a fireplace and a huge bed. There’s a nice balcony with a view of the bay, and the Jacuzzi tub has the same spectacular view.
Kellan and I settle in and he immediately suggests we get naked and hop in the tub.
Sounds good to me.
I think I may even be in the mood for love.
I hurry to the bathroom to brush my teeth and clean my delicate lady parts while Kellan runs the hot water in the tub.
When I come out, he’s naked. He’s standing in front of the tub, with the view of the bay behind him.
Wow.
I’m definitely in the mood for some afternoon delight now.
In the car, Kellan said no training for the next two days, so we can rest, let our connective tissue heal, and then get back at it hardcore once we’re home again.
That sounds good to me. I need a break from that stupid treadmill, which I’ve nicknamed Black Beast. Exerting myself through making love with Kellan sounds like the perfect alternative.
Kellan makes a show of slowly undressing me.
It’s very erotic. He takes his sweet time, so much so that we both start giggling.
I feel myself getting wet.
I’m ready for him to put his Elder Wand in my chamber of secrets.
Did Aragog have a huge penis? Because how do spiders mate?
Claire, focus.
And what about Hagrid’s mom and dad? She was a giant, he was a normal human man. Did she put him in her vagina? Like Alice wanted to do to Dale in Stepbrothers after Dale punched The One They Call Derek in the face?
Claire!
It occurs to me to throw Kellan on the bed and ride him one time so I can have a much-needed orgasm. I can’t remember the last time I had one.
Kellan flips the switch on the wall and orange and blue flames spring up in the fireplace beside the tub.
It’s very romantic. It’ll be even better at night.
I’m ready to step into the tub when my phone pings.
“No phones,” Kellan decrees.
“Okay. I’ll turn it off.”
I swipe my lock screen by accident and see a new Instagram post, which was the last page I’d viewed. It’s a post from Calista. She’s in a CrossFit gym, doing power-cleans and jumping up and down on big wooden boxes and doing hand-stand pushups. She’s wearing a tee shirt that says Tough As Nails. The brief video concludes with her throwing down the Olympic weightlifting bar in triumph and clapping her hands, sending white chalk powder into the air. The rubberized weights bounce in dramatic fashion. She turns to the camera and does the fist-bump-on-the-heart two-fingered-kiss thing I did at LAX.
“Fuck!”
Kellan starts, splashing water on the carpet, alarmed. “What?”
“She’s stealing more of my moves. First the tee shirt, now the salute thing.”
“Who?”
“Calista. She has more than fifteen-hundred comments and thirteen-thousand likes. ‘Cali, you’ll get the part for sure.’ ‘Cali, kick that Claire girl’s ass she’s dumb.’ ‘Cali, your awesome I love you.’ It’s supposed to be Y-O-U-apostrophe-R-E, you assholes! I swear to God, people are getting dumber by the minute. The human race does not deserve to survive.”
Kellan sighs. “See? This is why I said no phones. This is why we’re here, to get away from it all for forty-eight hours so we can regain our sanity.”
Kellan looks at me imploringly.
The pull of cyber humiliation is too great, and I resume scrolling down through the comments. Every now and then someone says I’m awesome and Calista is stealing my shit. But I promptly ignore those and focus entirely on the self-destructive comments praising Calista.
“I don’t understand. Calista seemed so nice in the bathroom.”
“She is nice. I guess. I’ve barely spoken to her. But Sheila and Aaron and Rami and Heather all speak very highly of her. Look, she wants the part just as much as you do. It’s not personal.”
“But she’s stealing my moves. First carrying the guy on her back on the beach, and now the tee shirt like mine and she even did the salute thing I did.”
“Calire, half the people in the country are doing that. They just saw Perry Ferrell do it on Conan. Everyone knows you did it first. Besides, it doesn’t matter. All that matters is that we get the parts in the movie together. And we can’t do anything about that right now. Therefore, the only thing that matters is that you get your sweet ass in this tub with me so we can begin relaxing right fucking now!”
Kellan makes a dramatic show of slapping the water. He’s on his knees in the Jacuzzi tub, staring up at me, waiting, smiling, trying to be playful, trying to be patient.
“Okay.” I turn off my phone, toss it across the room onto the bed, and step into the tub with Kellan.
It feels heavenly.
It’s a couple’s tub, and there are molded cut-outs for each of us. The water jets gently massage my back and the sides of my quads.
“Ohhh…. I needed this.”
“That’s for sure.”
I look at Kellan, hurt that he’s suggesting I needed aquatic intervention.
“I mean, we both needed it.” He smiles.
“Okay.”
We settle into the water.
Kellan takes my hand and I close my eyes and put my head back.
My thoughts drift back to Calista.
Tough As Nails.
I’m Iron Born, she’s Tough As Nails.
I can’t stop thinking about it.
She’s going to continue stealing my moves and garnering public support.
She’s going to get the role in the movie opposite Kellan.
And one day I’m going to walk into
his trailer and find them together.
Naked.
With his dick down her throat and her fist up his ass.
Or his wang up her butt and his fist in her vagina.
Or some such manner of extreme fornication.
But it won’t matter who has what in whom or where because the damage will already be done.
“She’s going to get the part. I know it.”
Kellan sighs. “Claire… come on.”
“What? I can’t help it. Her ass is down in Redondo doing CrossFit and my ass is soaking in a bathtub staring at a lighthouse. Do you think that’s a real lighthouse?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
Kellan lets out a deep sigh.
He’s been very patient with me, but he’s clearly close to his limits.
Even so, my anxiety gets the best of me. I can’t keep my mouth shut. “Think that lighthouse is haunted? Think this hotel is haunted? What year was it built? Have there been any books written about this place, like the Kate Morgan book I got at the Del Coronado?”
“Claire….”
“You think Calista would suck Aaron’s dick for the role?”
“Claire!”
“What?”
“Let it go.”
“I can’t.”
Kellan lets out a deep sigh. “Okay, wait here.”
Kellan stands up and grabs a towel and gives himself a cursory drying off.
“Where are you going?”
“Nowhere. Just wait here.”
Kellan crosses to his suitcase and rummages around in it. He then rifles through his satchel, and finally he disappears into the bathroom.
He comes back a few seconds later carrying a metal can of cookies. When he gets closer I’m able to read the writing on the side of the can.
“Piroulines? We’re going to eat French cookies?”
“Not exactly.”
Kellan sits on the edge of the tub and opens the lid on the cookies. Inside is a plastic bag which I smell right away: it’s weed.
“What is that?”
“Technically, it’s medical marijuana. But it’s called Sour Diesel.”
“We’re going to smoke pot?”
“Fuckin-A right we are. Your head is about to explode. You’re obsessing over Calista and complete strangers online, you’re stressed out, and you’re cussing like a truck driver. We’ve got to do something.”
“I didn’t know you smoked pot.”
“I don’t. I mean, I have in the past. A long time ago. But I think this is a good example of one of those times when it can help.”
Kellan takes a pinch out of the bag and puts it in a little wooden pipe. He hands it to me, along with a lighter. “Here, cherry hit.”
I take it, but don’t smoke right away.
“What does that mean?”
“It means it’s a fresh hit. That you get to go first. You’ve smoked before, right?”
“Yeah. It’s been awhile, though. Denise and I did it a few times, but she quit after she failed the Bar Exam the first time.”
Kellan bursts out laughing. “That sounds like Denise.”
“Where’d you get this?”
“From a doctor.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That I have anxiety and nervousness and bouts of depression combined with bouts of mania which qualify as undiagnosed bipolar disorder.”
“Do you really have all that?”
“I may have embellished a little. But, sometimes. Not so much since I met you. And the past few years have been pretty good. But before that, I was a mess. Once I started winning shows and getting endorsements and making a lot of money and I suddenly had success, and all these obligations, I took a real nose dive. I tried antidepressants but they were a nightmare. They turned me into a zoned-out insomniac. It was terrible. One of my friends took me out on his boat and got me high one day and I felt a zillion times better. I hadn’t smoked since college and I was never really that into it anyway because I never knew how to get it and I never really knew people who had it.
“Anyway, I went and got this, so we could smoke together. I thought it might take the edge off for you. This whole Hollywood thing is supposed to be fun. But it’s all new for you and you’re struggling a little and that’s to be expected. But this is big. This is probably one of the biggest opportunities you or I will ever have in our entire lives. It’s not the end-all-be-all, but it’s big. We don’t want to blow it. So either hit that or pass it back to me. Puff-puff give, puff-puff give.”
I look at the little round ball of green herb in the bowl of the wooden pipe. It has fuzzy little orange hairs on it, and lots of small white crystals. The pipe looks like it’s made from cedar. It has a Golden Gate Bridge image embossed on it. “When and where did you get this?”
“In San Francisco, after my photo shoot in the rose garden. That’s why I was late getting home.”
“And what is it exactly?”
“Sour Diesel.”
“And what’s it going to do to me?”
“Get you high.”
“I know, smart ass. But am I going to feel giddy and laugh a lot or am I going to get all introspective and quiet?”
“Diesel is a Sativa, and it’s known for its dreamy, cerebral high. It’s supposed to be good for writers and for creativity, so I thought it would be perfect for you. But go easy on it at first, since it’s been a while.”
“This is our first time getting high together.”
“I know. Quite a milestone, huh?”
“I’m nervous.”
“Don’t be nervous. Just take your time. We’ve got all night.”
I strike the lighter and put the pipe to my lips. I touch the flame briefly to the bud and inhale. It glows red and crackles.
But the smoke is hot and I’m able to hold it only briefly. I pass the pipe and lighter back to Kellan. He takes a hit and exhales calmly like a stud.
Kellan gets into the tub and sits facing me.
We sit there, looking at one another.
Five minutes later, we’re both grinning ear to ear.
“How do you feel?” he asks me.
I take a moment to do an inventory.
I realize that…I feel good.
Better than good.
“I feel great.” I have a huge smile on my face. I do my best impression of Ross at Nana’s wake after he hurt his back and he swallowed four of his mom’s tranquilizers. “I feel great. I feel, I f-feel, great.”
“You look better. You look relaxed.”
“I couldn’t give two shits about Calista Tough-As-Nails Bacon-Bikini Perfect-Legs Roth right now, let me tell ya. She’s doing her thing, we’re doing our thing, and that’s all that matters. Right?”
“Right. Want some more?”
“Okay.”
Kellan refills the cute little pipe and hands it to me. I manage to take a better hit this time.
“What did you say it’s called again?”
“Sour Diesel,” Kellan replies, holding his breath.
He exhales and two plumes of smoke come out of his nose. Like a dragon.
“You look like a dragon.”
Kellan smiles his dazzling smile. I want to lick his teeth.
Kellan and I go on grinning at one another, enjoying the hot, bubbling water.
Enjoying being together.
After a long, pleasant silence, I ask, “Hey, do you think Hagrid’s mom put his dad in her vagina?”
“What?”
“I was thinking about it a little while ago. How did the two of them do it?”
“I was going to ask you about that. She was a giant, right?”
“Right.”
“And he was, like, a regular human. Right?”
“Right.”
“So, how did that work? I wondered about that when I read that part. What was J.K. Rowling thinking?”
“Don’t know.” But I love the fact that Kellan and I had a similar thought process. And that he was ast
ute enough to make the connection about the disparity in size between Hagrid’s mother and father.
It makes me love Kellan all the more.
And with that, I attack Kellan, shoving my tongue in his mouth and grabbing his big beautiful cock without preamble. I kiss him fiercely, eyes open, savoring his stunningly-handsome cornflower blue eyes I’ve privately loved since the moment I met him.
We make love in the tub.
We make love in the chair beside the fireplace.
We make love on the bed.
We make love standing up, in the middle of the room, with Kellan supporting me, impaling me upon him.
WE MAKE LOVE nonstop for hours…pausing here and there to chug energy drinks and take another hit of Sour Diesel from the Golden Gate Bridge pipe. I tell Kellan it’s like a bridge to enhanced consciousness, to a place where fear and anxiety do not exist; it is a quiet place, where there is only Love, with a capital L.
His face is between my thighs. He smiles up at me, his beautiful blue eyes glassy. “As long as you feel good, baby,” he purrs, and reinserts his long hot tongue into my vagina.
I DON’T THINK about Calista Roth once.
But does thinking about the fact that I haven’t thought about her count as thinking about her?
Doesn’t matter.
Because Love.
And Kellan.
And the sea.
And Kellan.
I stop counting, and eventually lose track, after my sixth orgasm.
It’s the single most intense and satisfying sexual experience of my life.
I HEAR A droning sound, a horn.
Kellan and I are half-asleep, wrapped in each other and in the tangle of bed sheets. The bedside clock says it’s 11:09 p.m. We’re coming down from our superb high.
“What is that?”
Kellan doesn’t open his eyes. “I think it’s the lighthouse.”
“Like, a fog horn?”
“Yes.”
I lift my head and peer across the room through the windows. “But it’s not foggy.”
