Pretend I'm YoursA Single Dad Romance

by Vivian Wood

  She couldn’t bring herself to admit that, but nodded guiltily into his shoulder.

  He sighed. “Harper. That’s a sign that you’re hurting your body. Maybe permanently. I don’t know that much about all this, but I’ll learn. But I have heard about what bulimia can do. The ruining of the throat, your teeth …”

  “My teeth are fine,” she said defensively. It was only partially true.

  The last time she’d been at the dentist, months ago, he’d finished the exam and looked at her sternly. “Are you purging?” he’d asked. She was shocked into silence. Harper had never been asked so bluntly before.

  “Just sometimes,” she said. “I’m a model, so—”

  “You need to stop. The acid is wearing away the enamel on your teeth. And I can tell from the severity it’s not just sometimes.”

  She’d kept her eyes on her lap. “Isn’t there something you can do—”

  “I’m doing everything I can,” he said. “This is up to you. If you keep it up, though, you’ll be having most of your teeth extracted and dental implants before you’re forty.”

  Forty had sounded so old, so far away. There was no way she’d be a model at forty. What was the point in worrying about it?

  “Harper.” Sean’s voice brought her back to the present. “I’m proud of you for getting help. I’ll support you in it whatever way I can.”

  She started to pick at a cuticle as he cradled her in his lap. “Eating like this … it’s the only thing that keeps me thin,” she said. “I’m not naturally thin like a lot of the models. Nobody in my family is super thin. And I’m getting older. My metabolism is fucked to hell anyway. I don’t want to get fat …”

  “You’re not going to get fat!” he said. “And, besides, it wouldn’t matter to me if you did.”

  “Don’t lie,” she said. “I know that’s part of why you like me. You really think you would have been into me if I didn’t look like I do? Or did, I should say, when we met?”

  “I’m not lying,” he said. “And of course I thought you were hot when we met. I still do—more so, though, because I see you. All the way through, to the core. You think those eighty-year-old couples would find each other hot if they met then? It’s because they love each other. I love you, and to me you’ll always be beautiful. You’ll always look like you did the day we met. That’s just how it works. You captured my heart, and what you look like is no longer part of the equation.”

  “Really?” She raised her head and searched his eyes, but could find nothing of trickery in them.

  “Yes. Really,” he said.

  She raised her mouth to his. He tasted of morning tea and an undercurrent of sweetness. As his hands moved from her waist to her breasts, she raised her arms and allowed him to remove her shirt. But when he went to flip her onto her back, she resisted.

  Harper pushed his chest and straddled him as he leaned back on her pile of pillows. She could feel the hardness beneath his jeans press into the thin material of her silk panties. His hands reached beneath her short jersey skirt and he squeezed her ass as she released his cock from the denim.

  “Hey, hey,” he said. “Slow down.”

  “No,” she said, shocked when he listened. Desperate to have him inside her, Harper reached between her legs and pushed the soaked material to the side. She groaned as she directed him into her.

  As she began to ride him, her palms flat against his chest, she knew she should tell him about the pregnancy. But not yet, she thought. She’d done enough confessing for one day.

  19

  Sean

  Sean pulled into the small parking lot nestled into a side street of Hollywood Boulevard he’d never noticed before. “I read that celebrities come here,” he said as they looked at the nondescript building.

  Harper let out a laugh. “I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.”

  He looked at her. “You’ll do great,” he said.

  Sean opened the glass doors for her and they were greeted with what looked like a combination of a waiting room and the reception area to an upscale retirement home.

  “Can I help you?” He couldn’t help but check the size of the woman who worked at the front desk. Sean didn’t know if most people who worked in eating disorder facilities were in treatment, but she looked healthy. Like she worked out, but not excessively. However, he could see how in a place like Los Angeles, she’d be told she had a pretty face, but should lose at least twenty pounds.

  “I have an appointment. Harper—”

  “Yes, I have you,” the woman said with a chirp. She glanced around at the people who lingered nearby. “We prioritize discretion here,” she said kindly. “So don’t worry about sharing your surname or any personal details in common areas.”

  “Oh. Thanks.” Harper looked at him strangely.

  “I told you they treat celebrities here,” he said.

  “And are you her husband?” the woman asked.

  “Uh, no.”

  “He’s my boyfriend,” Harper said. It was the first time she’d said it since they’d gotten back together, and it was so natural. Boyfriend. Like everything that had happened between them was perfectly necessary.

  “I’m sorry, but only family members are allowed on the first day. Dr. Horst can arrange for future joint sessions if you’d like.”

  “Oh. Okay,” Harper said. She gave him an apologetic look.

  “It’s okay,” he said, though his heart sank. He’d spent the past three days amping himself up for this appointment. Sean had even researched what kind of support he’d be expected to survive on her road to management. “I’ll either go back home or find something around here to do. When will she be ready?” he asked.

  “At least three hours.”

  He watched as Harper flew through the paperwork and ticked off YES to a myriad of responses. At first, she angled the papers away from him. By the third page, she seemed to be checking the affirmative box for just about everything. Do you think your eating habits negatively impact your social life? Do you sometimes eat in secret? Do you sometimes eat to the point of pain, well beyond being full? Have you ever self-induced vomiting? Do you often choose the wrong, larger size, of clothes when shopping?

  Sean wanted to ask her about it. Is this really what your life is like on a daily basis? But he knew just letting him see the responses was a huge step for her.

  He looked around the waiting room and played a game. Patient or visitor? Sometimes it was obvious, but for the most part it wasn’t. There were men and women, all ages and sizes. Some clearly had money, or at least spent it, while others looked like they could have been waiting for the city bus.

  The squeak of rubber shoes on the floors and the overtly plastic greenery were eerily familiar. So was the scent of industrial cleaner. All rehabilitation centers were the same at the core. He remembered his own admission, even through the haze of the worn-off alcohol. How the receptionist offered up the same, tight, toothless smile. How the cheap waiting room furniture looked more tired than any of the people who sunk into it, though the style suggested it was new.

  Most of all, he remembered how he felt under the glare of those bright lights—so raw, like he was on display for the world to see. His first day had been raw and painful. There had been a thread of fear that ran through him like he’d never known before. Scared, not knowing what to expect, his own admission had been marinated in moments of sheer terror. But when he glanced at Harper’s face, she seemed calm and collected. Maybe that was the big difference. She’d chosen to come here, had probably torn it apart in her head a thousand times. Sean had been dragged. There had to be a huge difference between signing up for swimming lessons and when someone else pushed you into the deep end.

  It hadn’t just been the drying out that had him on edge during his own rehab. It was the demand that he face his feelings instead of numbing them. How he’d been commanded to reach into the ugliest parts of himself and turn the pieces over and over.

  “Well
. I guess this is it.” Harper’s voice brought him out of his thoughts.

  “You ready?” he asked as he stood up with her.

  “As ready as I’m going to be,” she said with a shrug.

  A nurse was paged to escort her to her first meeting. Sean watched her thin figure retreat until it disappeared around a corner.

  “She’ll give you a call when she’s ready,” the receptionist said. “You’re welcome to wait here. We have a small café down that way.”

  “No,” he said, almost too quickly. “I’ll just wait for her to call.” He didn’t want to tell the receptionist that he couldn’t stand to sit there any longer. That the walls crept closer with every minute.

  As soon as he slid into the driver’s seat, he whipped out the phone and called Joon-ki. “Hey! Good to hear from you. Everything okay?” Joon-ki asked.

  “Everything’s okay with me, yeah,” he said. “I just dropped Harper off at rehab.”

  “What?” Joon-ki’s voice changed. “Sean, you didn’t tell me she was an addict. You know how dangerous it can be for you—”

  “Rehab for anorexia,” he corrected quickly.

  “Oh. That’s … I’m sorry. Is everything okay?”

  “I guess it’s as good as it can be. It’s outpatient, at least for now. You working?”

  “Just finishing up,” Joon-ki said.

  “Must be nice, being done with work on a Thursday at ten in the morning.”

  “Yeah, the great joys of being a systems integration specialist. That’s why we have grads lining up around the block to take over our jobs.”

  “I think you’re spoiled. You’ve been setting your own hours and working from home too long.”

  “Maybe,” Joon-ki admitted. “Did you want to meet? Go to a meeting? How long do you have?”

  He paused. A meeting would help pass the time, maybe settle his nerves. “Yeah, sounds good,” he said as he checked the time. “Meeting’s not for an hour. If you want to grab coffee before, it’s my treat.”

  “Sure, are you in Hollywood? Just give me fifteen minutes.”

  “Yeah, let’s do the one oh one.”

  Sean waited for Joon-ki in the kitschy diner with a thick white mug of the drip of the day cradled in his hands.

  “Hi,” Joon-ki said as he slid his narrow frame into the vinyl booth. “You look on edge.”

  “I feel even worse,” Sean said.

  “Why’s that?” Joon-ki smiled up to the waitress and ordered his usual, with an extra shot in the dark.

  “I feel like I failed her,” he said. He’d had one quarter of an hour to think about his first line, and that was the best he’d come up with.

  “An eating disorder is a mental disorder,” Joon-ki said gently. “One of the deadliest and most underdiagnosed. For all you know, your support partially helped her find the strength to seek out help. And I’m guessing that she’s suffered from anorexia for several years. How could you have failed her?”

  “I didn’t see,” Sean said quietly. “She was right. She was … so scared that I’d up and leave her because she wasn’t going to be a model anymore. She’s terrified she’ll get fat. And maybe she’s right.”

  Joon-ki raised a brow at him, but didn’t say anything. He’d never judge.

  “Not that I’d leave her. Or that she’ll get fat, not that that matters,” Sean said quickly. “But maybe she’s right that I fell for her because of how she looks.”

  “Sean, that’s natural! There’s nothing wrong with being attracted to the person you’re with. Or for that being the driving factor when you first meet. You don’t have to be a martyr, and go around seeking out people you’re intentionally unattracted to just to prove something.”

  He sighed. “I know, but maybe I did something that made her feel like her looks are all that mattered.”

  “I can promise you that it was society that did that. And the industry she’s been in for however many years now. Sean,” Joon-ki said as he reached across the table and gently touched his forearm. “I don’t mean for this to sound rude, but don’t you think it’s a little egotistical to think that you drove a girl to an eating disorder after just a few weeks?”

  He could feel his ears burn. “Well, when you put it like that …”

  “It’s really easy for us to blame ourselves when somebody we love struggles with something like this. Will you be going to therapy with her?”

  “I think so. At least sometimes.”

  “Then whatever issues may have impacted her disorder will be addressed and hashed out there, with a professional mediating. Just save these fears and feelings for those sessions. Not that you can’t talk to me, of course. I’m glad that you trust me. I just want to make sure you bring this up in therapy, too.”

  “Yeah,” Sean said as he nodded. “I will.”

  “Just remember that it’s not about how you feel. Her process is about how she feels. She’ll be fragile right now, so just protect her to the best of your ability.”

  “Thanks for the reality check,” Sean said. “I needed that.”

  “Should we head to the meeting?” Joon-ki asked as he finished the coffee to the dregs.

  “Let’s do it.” They stood up and Joon-ki clapped him on the shoulder as they headed to the church across the street.

  20

  Harper

  Harper put down the toilet lid and sank onto the hard plastic seat. Outside, her escort, a girl whose name she’d already forgotten, waited patiently by the sinks. Harper could see her shoes with their thick soles, but nothing else. The girl listened for the sounds of gagging.

  Day three of rehabilitation and it ate away at her. She hadn’t expected it to be so hard. Of course she knew it wouldn’t be easy, but this was like being drawn and quartered. For the past six hours in group, she’d been slammed with everyone’s stories. She’d expected that—but what she hadn’t expected was to see so much of herself reflected in them.

  There was Billy the ballet dancer, who everyone quickly dubbed Billy Elliott. Today, he talked about the time he’d restricted himself so severely for three days before a performance that when it came down to it he couldn’t even dance. He’d wanted to look flawless in his skintight, beige costume and hadn’t even brushed his teeth for seventy-two hours because he thought a drop of water might make its way down his throat. The lack of food and water had punched up his insomnia. When he’d arrived at the performance, he hadn’t slept in thirty-five hours and had passed out before he could even get his costume on.

  “That was my last chance, that’s what the director said.” He said it so matter-of-factly, like everyone got kicked out of one of the best dance companies in the world. Billy didn’t look older than nineteen, and his life was already over. And here I am complaining about not modeling for another decade.

  There was the forty-three-year-old mother of two who traced her anorexia to the year her second daughter was born. “It started out, you know, normal. I just wanted to lose the baby weight,” she said with a shrug. “I was thirty-six at the time and certainly didn’t fit the mold of what an anorexic should look like.”

  “Anoretic,” one of the thinnest girls replied. Nobody liked that girl, and it wasn’t just that she tried to play therapist. Harper had instantly sized herself up against everyone in the room and knew this girl’s thighs were at least half her size.

  “It doesn’t matter,” the group leader, a doctor decorated with three degrees, said. “Please continue.”

  The mother sighed. “I mean look at me!” she said. “I was closer to forty than thirty, half-black, not exactly rich … who would have thought I’d get an eating disorder? I mean, I know anyone can have an eating disorder,” she corrected herself quickly. “But, you know, I just didn’t think it would happen to me. I just … it started with a diet. With working out more. I hadn’t been to a gym in like four years. And when I got to my first goal weight, why not set it even lower? I was getting attention from men who weren’t my husband for the first time sinc
e college. All these women were telling me how great I was looking … and then that I was too thin. To eat a cheeseburger and all that. And that’s what really felt good. You know? Women, they stop complimenting you when you turn into a threat.”

  That hit home for Harper. It was true. Women were quick to pile on the compliments to fat women. Your tits are amazing! You have such a pretty face. But when you were really hot? They got nasty. It was how you could tell you looked good.

  “Harper?” the group lead asked as she turned to her. “Is there anything you’d like to share today?”

  “Um … no. If that’s okay,” she said.

  “Of course. It’s a good idea to listen during your first week. Observation is a great way to get your feet wet.”

  “Harper? Are you okay?” The escort’s voice sounded like a boom in the otherwise unoccupied bathroom.

  “Uh, yeah!” Harper said. “One minute.” She thought about flushing the toilet, but didn’t bother. The girl knew she hadn’t done anything in there anyway.

  When she emerged, she was greeted with a small but kind smile. “If you ever just need to get away while you’re here, decompress, you can always go into one of the meditation rooms,” the girl said. “Trust me, they’re a lot more comfortable than the bathroom.”

  “Thanks,” Harper said. She used the last of her day’s strength to offer up her own smile.

  She made her way into the bright sunlight and was thankful for the familiar scent of her car. For the first two days, Sean had driven her, but she felt guilty. Why should he spend his day chauffeuring her around? Outpatient was supposed to help keep life as normal as possible.

  Exhaustion spread through her, all the way to the marrow, on the short drive home.

  “How was it?” Sean asked when she walked inside. He had his feet up on the coffee table and a sketch pad in his lap.