by Maxi MacNair
They looked good together. Handsome together.
I spun on my heel—nearly threw myself off balance for the second time in the night by doing so—and went to find Megan and get another drink.
After weaving in and out between sweaty bodies and wafts of alcohol-breath, I frowned and bit my lip. My group didn’t seem to be where I left them. I cut back out to the perimeter and began to circle the dance floor. After what felt like three loops around, I pulled into a section of bar nestled in a corner of the club and ordered a shot of vodka. And then another one for good measure.
Drinking a lot was what single people did, right? I could do that.
A finger tapped me on the shoulder. I turned, ready to brush off the stranger asking to rub his body against me.
Dark eyes and a nonchalant smile greeted me. Derek.
“What are you doing here alone?” He said.
I turned back to the bar and spun the empty shot glass on its edge. “Went to the washroom and then couldn’t find them again. So I’m taking a break.”
“I’ll join you.” He motioned to the bartender.
“What happened to the hot blond you were chatting up?” The words spilled from my mouth like vomit.
I could feel his eyes bore into me.
He chuckled, spreading his hands. “You saw that?”
“In passing.”
“Well, I’m here now. You’re much more interesting.” He took a shot that the bartender passed him. I turned to face him just in time to see him draw a thumb slowly over his lips to wipe away any stray beads of liquid.
I wondered if he had kissed that woman with those lips, and suddenly realized that I was perhaps a little drunk. Stupid Max, coaxing me to be more outgoing—now I found myself crushing on a playboy.
“Come.” Derek held his hand out to me. It looked soft, and welcoming. “Dance with me.”
“I was already dancing.”
“Not with me you weren’t.” He leaned toward me. “I’d be honored to dance with you, Claire. Even just for a moment.”
My heart skipped a beat when he said my name. There was something about the way the ‘aire’ floated off his tongue.
“Fine,” I found myself saying.
I took his hand and he led me onto the dance floor. He smiled at me and began to move his body, rolling back his shoulders, and swaying just enough at the hips. I dipped my body down low, pulled myself up slowly with an undulation Tamara had taught me back in my clubbing days. It drew a smirk from him and before I knew it, our bodies breathed the same air, occupied nearly the same space. I could feel him even though we weren’t physically touching—it was a sensation I had almost forgotten.
At some point his hand brushed my waist, lingered there for only a second, but long enough for me to cover with my own. His other hand stayed at his side, but the look in his eyes suggested he only kept it there for my sake. Out of politeness.
When we drew closer in our dance, I could just barely smell him: a natural musk with a tinge of spice. Whatever his cologne was, I wouldn’t mind smelling more of it.
Just as I was contemplating if this was getting too dangerous to continue and excuse myself to find my wing-woman, Megan, before it was too late, he paused and spoke into my ear.
“Let’s go outside and get some fresh air.”
His breath on my ear made me tremble.
I nodded and followed him to the exit.
We dipped into the service road next to the club, just enough so that we weren’t standing in the middle of a sidewalk. I looked up into his eyes, aware of the heat rising in my cheeks and the speed of my pounding heart. His eyes were dark doorways to something mysterious, something alluring. Perhaps something dangerous. I wanted to know what it was.
He caressed the side of my cheek with the back of his right hand, slow and soft. It was a gentle motion contrasting with his smile that seemed stuck halfway between devious and caring. Though it could have been the alcohol confusing my judgement. His other hand drifted to the low of my back, seeming to fill it. He pulled me close and I seemed to fall into him, our bodies pressed together.
Then he tipped his head towards mine. First I tasted his breath. And then I tasted his lips—our lips fit together like pieces of a puzzle, our mouths complementary to each others. And then I tasted his tongue.
He tasted like liquor, but sweet, almost candied. His tongue teased me, dancing around mine when I was more than finished with dancing for the night. But his kisses were the perfect mix of sweet and airy, and hard with passion.
I don’t know how long we made out there, but I felt like a teenager again. Derek had me tight against him, his muscular arms pulling me close and I could feel him becoming aroused. I couldn’t say I wasn’t.
Eventually we pulled away from each other. He looked at me, questioningly.
I bit my tongue and looked to a crumpled soda can on the ground.
“Well? Want to come over? I have wine.”
I hadn’t had a one-night stand before. But would this be one if I had technically met him the day before? I knew the guy a little bit.
“You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”
I wanted to. My brain was trying to convince me out of it, but my body was resolute in its position. I had enough stress in my life with work—I should live a little. You only live once, right? And when would be the next time I’d have the chance to be with a man like this? Handsome beyond words, fighting the good fight for our country, and an incredible kisser.
“There you two are!”
It was Shay and Megan, stumbling past a group of people, laughing and faces flushed.
“Claire, Tamara wants you,” Shay said. She looked to Derek. “What were you guys doing out here? Leaving?”
“No,” I said, clasping my hands in front of me. “Just getting some air. I drank a bit.”
“Well, come on. The night’s not over yet and we’ve been looking all over for you.”
I hid a sigh under my breath. “Okay, okay.”
They gestured me to follow and turned to head back into the building. I glanced over to Derek and shrugged with an apologetic smile. He matched my shrug and raised me a peck on the cheek, then folded my hand in his and led me back inside.
~
I fought through a steady, not-quite-pounding headache the next morning. My morning coffee made it worse, but then an Advil helped make it better. I wasn’t sure what time I had gotten home, or what time I went to bed after satisfying an uncontrollable urge to down a whole tub of Haagen Dazs. I stayed in my pajamas and made scrambled eggs with spiced peppers for a 1pm breakfast. My eggs tasted a little bit off, and I thought I might have forgotten salt, seeing as throughout the entire cooking process my mind was replaying the events of the night before.
Derek sneaking up behind me at the bar and asking me to dance. The way our bodies danced together, like the ebbs and flows of tides from the same sea. The smell and taste of him. I wondered if he was thinking about me right now, too.
My phone beeped from across the dining room table as I was shoving another helping of eggs into my mouth. I leaned over to see the notification text scrolling across my screen before it faded to black, my haste knocking over a stack of work papers. A text message from an unknown number.
I tapped open the message.
Hey, Claire.
Hope you aren’t too hungover today. Last night was great. Dinner tonight?
I couldn’t decide to smile or frown at it.
Another beep sounded from my phone as a new message appeared: P.S. This is Derek.
I typed back: I’ve had worse mornings. How did you get my private cell number?
I finished off the last of my breakfast while staring at the screen to light up again.
Ten minutes later I finally got a response: I asked Tamara after you left. Would have asked you myself. Sorry.
Thinking about it, it made sense, I supposed. Things got a little heated when a girl took Shay’s drink from the counter, claimi
ng it was hers. I recall trying to help, or thinking about helping, but it was really Megan who defused the situation and decided it was time to call it a night. The three of us left early, Tamara stayed behind. Rod or Rob or whatever his name was was holding her hand.
I responded: It’s fine. Just surprised me.
Hardly seconds later, came: So, what do you say? I know a great Greek restaurant downtown. It’s been in the newspaper before. Good reviews, not bad.
Now it was his turn to wait for a reply.
Dinner at a Greek place, with this guy I nearly went home with last night? I swirled coffee around in my mouth. What exactly were his intentions? Was he actually interested in me, or just trying to recreate the opportunity we missed last night? But maybe even the latter wasn’t bad, for a change. Maybe a little twist and adventure would do me good. But what if he was like my ex? Work wasn’t the only reason I didn’t pursue dating.
I called Megan and asked her for her opinion. She laughed, and told me in a very serious tone to follow my heart. And then reminded me that dinner was just dinner, and I could always go home afterwards if I didn’t like him and where the night was going. And that it was absurd to seriously fear he’d turn out like the jerk I dated all that time ago. Megan made sense. But I called Shay after, anyway. She basically said the same, only also took the opportunity to tease me a bit about it. The usual support received from friends.
I reread his texts and then sent: Sure. Message me the time and place. I’ll meet you there.
His response read: 7pm. The corner of Bishop Ave and 75th. Wear something tight, you pull it off well.
I didn’t know whether I should smile or frown.
~
“The reservation is under Correy, for two,” Derek said to the hostess. His eyes seemed to add, “or maybe for three, if you’d care to join.” I tried to convince myself it was just my imagination. Maybe that was just the way his eyes always looked: deep and inviting.
“Ah yes, there you are!” The hostess drew her finger away from the reservation list, smiling back at him almost too cheerily. “Right this way, sir.”
Derek took me by the hand and we followed her to a quaint table in a far section of the dining hall. His other hand rested on the small of my back, gently guiding me forward.
The place was sleek and clean, with white tables and black seats, and shimmering lights dangling from above. The open kitchen could be seen across the room, but any sound from it was muffled by the steady stream of customer chatter. The restaurant was packed, but somehow not that noisy.
“This doesn’t seem to be the type of place you could get a reservation at with only a day’s notice,” I remarked once the hostess left us to peruse the menu.
“I have my ways,” Derek said. “What do you want to drink? Wine?”
He ordered a bottle of a type of red wine I hadn’t heard of before, and we selected an appetizer of calamari and entrees.
Derek raised his glass of wine. “To meeting new people, and to the beautiful woman before me, blessing me with this date,” he said.
I laughed, a smile blossoming across my face. “I can toast to that,” I said, tapping my glass against his.
We drank and covered the typical first date material: jobs, primary hobbies, cats or dogs. He joked and I laughed. I tried to joke, he looked at me with an arched brow, then found amusement in that. He asked about how I came from a small town to a massive city, and if I had family here. I filtered the story to something digestible: saving up while working at a rundown diner, eventually moving to study interior design at college, and finally nabbed an internship at the firm I now worked for.
“And you,” I said between bites of roasted lamb, “have you always lived here?” The lamb was succulent, topped with a generous drizzle of a wine reduction, but as I ate it a part of my mind kept reminding myself to save room for the baklava and specialty greek yogurt with rose-flavored honey.
“No,” Derek said, shaking his head. “I’m from south Detroit.”
“Did you move up here with your family?”
He lowered the fork he had raised to his mouth and took a sip of his wine.
I kicked myself for asking something that was obviously a sensitive subject.
“No,” he said once he put his wine glass down. “My parents got divorced when I was in middle school. It was messy, so I lived with my aunt until I was old enough to enlist and go elsewhere.”
“Oh, I see.” I bit the edge of my lip and tried to draw attention away from my embarrassment by assembling another bite on my fork.
“Yeah, I don’t keep in contact with them. I have nothing to say to them.”
“Are you also an only child?”
He nodded. “It was probably best that they didn’t have any other children. I was just lucky I had my aunt…”
What was he implying would have happened if he hadn’t had his aunt to look after him? Even with his eyes lowered to his plate as he spoke, I could see the distance in them, continuing the thoughts he left unspoken. And with it came the slow beginning of an awkward silence. I didn’t know what else to say. Would changing the subject to dessert be too abrupt? I didn’t want him to think I didn’t care about his past, but I also didn’t want to make him feel like uncomfortable. I felt like an idiot teenager unable to makeup her mind.
I swallowed my indecisiveness and took his hand from across the table. He looked up at me, almost startled, at my touch.
“Hey,” I said, looking into his eyes. “The present is what’s important now, right?” I squeezed his hand and smiled sympathetically.
The rich color returned to his eyes and he returned the smile. “Right,” he said. “Sorry about that. How could I let myself get distracted from such a lovely woman as yourself, Claire?” He ran his thumb over the back of my hand. It made my heart flutter and I grinned stupidly.
“Let’s finish eating,” he said. “Then we can get you some dessert. I can see in your eyes that you’ve been thinking about it.”
Derek caught the waitress walking by and said a few sentences to her that I couldn’t hear about the noise of the restaurant. When Derek saw the waitress on her way back he leaned in.
“Close your eyes,” Derek said and I could hear the sound of plates being set on the table.
“What?”
“Just trust me.”
I frowned, suspicious, but curiosity won and I sighed, closing my eyes.
“Now open your mouth.”
“On a first date? In public?” I could feel my face heating up as I imagined the scene from an outsider’s perspective.
“Yes, in public.” The tone of his voice made me suddenly feel like a miniature furnace.
I laughed, unable to retort, then leaned forward in my chair. “Fine, but just one bite.”
I parted my lips and closed them around the spoon of Greek yogurt he offered me.
“Okay, that’s beyond delicious,” I said after swallowing, still swirling the sweet taste of the honey around in my mouth.
“You have a little on your face,” he said.
I groaned internally, automatically drawing a hand up to cover my mouth.
“Just joking.”
I harrumphed at him and turned my attention to continuing dessert.
“Hey, where’s mine, Claire?”
“You’re not getting one,” I said teasingly.
An expression of dramatic hurt took over his face, but was then replaced by a devious one. “What about later?”
“I make no promises,” I said with a purse of my lips, and helped myself to a piece of baklava.
~
Somewhere between leaving the restaurant and flagging a taxi, I agreed to go to his place. He had posed the question casually, landing a soft kiss on my cheek, as if it was already part of our plan. His method prompted honesty, and so I agreed without wasting another breath.
His place was on the twelfth floor of an average-looking apartment building. There was no peeling paint, but the front foyer had
tiles that could use replacing and it wouldn’t hurt if the decor had some updating to the 21st century. I was expecting a bachelor pad, and that was what I got. It was small, but a decent size for a single person.
“Want a glass of wine?” Derek asked from inside the open-concept kitchen while I stood in the living area trying to stop my brain from picking apart the way he arranged the model sports cars on the fireplace mantel. “Champagne? Or something else?”
“Wine’s fine,” I said.
“Take a seat on the couch, I’ll be there in a minute.”
I did as he said, suddenly becoming aware of the fact that yes, I was in Derek’s house; yes, he was about to bring me more wine; and yes, there was a high likelihood of the night becoming quite heated. I watched Derek as he poured the wine into the glasses. With the way his shoulders and biceps shifted under his shirt, he made the mundane movement arousing. The realization was a bit alarming since I thought I would have been nervous—it had been a while since I was last with a man. I decided he didn’t have to know.
“Here,” he said.
“Thanks,” I said, taking the glass.
He picked up a small remote and the stereo came to life. He fiddled with it for a moment, then set it down. Gentle music came from the speakers.
“You like jazz?” I asked, honestly taken aback with disbelief.
“I do,” he said, moving to light a handful of blood-orange colored candles positioned around the room. “If the occasion and mood is right.”
I set my wine on the coffee table and shifted on the couch, trying to subtly stop the hem of my dress from riding up. When I had my glass back to my mouth, Derek was next to me, leaning back into the couch with an air luxury about him. He didn’t look anything like what I would picture a typical military man to embody. His black pants that I suspected had been recently pressed and equally crisp navy top, reclining with a glass of wine. His eyes matched his hair in the dim lighting and reflected the flimsy amber glow from the candles.
He drew a sip of his wine and I caught a flash of his tongue.
“Claire,” he said. “You do things to me, you know?”
