“Why don’t you pretend to be sick and get a lift home with dork-face, so that Fernando and I can finally be alone later?”
“No way, why don’t you?”
They would sit in Café South America, arms crossed, eyebrows furrowed and lips pinched together so they looked like one little slit. There was always a fight to see who would get the good spot – on the black furry couch with the boys, because whoever missed it had to sit alone, across the low table on a high hard-bottomed stool with no back. The stool sitter always looked a bit abnormal, like they weren’t really part of the gang, and uncomfortable, given they couldn’t lean against anything nor keep their spine straight out of fear of looking like a school-teacher. Taking turns (you one day, me the next) was also never bound to work.
Now if she told you it was actually due to this tension, due to this kindergarten-like rivalry that led to Serena sleeping with Dominique, you probably wouldn’t believe it. But it was. Sad as it may sound, it was actually a fight over who got to sit on the edge of the couch that led to the first sex episode. Tabitha had simply had enough of getting the stool time and time again. Not that it was Serena’s fault she got born small and Tabitha got born tall, but the height difference definitely worked against Tabitha. She just couldn’t ease herself swiftly or naturally in front of Serena.
On that Saturday night, Tabitha must have finally exploded from within.
“That’s it!” she said, stomping her feet and pounding her fists in the air. “I’ve had enough, this seat is a fecked up boulder and I want to sit on the couch.”
Serena, horrified, looked at Tabitha’s display and put on her best “do I know this person?” look. How embarrassing, she remembered thinking; because of you we both now look uncool.
But the really uncool thing happened when Tabitha reached forward and started pulling out chunks of Serena’s freshly washed and blow-dried hair. Serena had tried to grab her arm, tried to thwart the assault, but Tabitha’s rage was unstoppable. Tiny pinpricks of tears started popping out of Serena’s eyes; the hair pulling was severely painful.
“Stop it, Tabitha,” she managed to let out while the boys looked on in delight. None of them had ever seen a real live catfight before. “You can have the bloody couch, just stop pulling my hair.”
In the end, it wasn’t Serena’s increasingly distressed pleas that led to the cessation but a tap on Tabitha’s shoulder from Fernando.
“Look, chick. Maybe I should just take you home,” he said, licking his lips. Then Dominique came forward and volunteered to escort Serena home too, separately. It was as if they were Scary Sherry and Randy Macho’s Man Savage’s manager Elizabeth on the wrestling show and Fern and Dom were the referees who stepped in to help.
As it turned out if there was one way to turn a man on, it was by displaying a little bit of violence…towards other women. As Fern tore a shocked Tabitha off in one direction, Dominique took Serena by the waist and led her to his car, even stopping to open the passenger door, which was something he had never done before.
“Are you feeling okay?” he had asked, his green eyes sparkling like emeralds. Serena half expected the Wizard of Oz to tap on the window and ask for the return of all the jewels, surreptitiously hidden in Dom’s eye sockets.
Serena had tried to nod but Dominique wasn’t convinced.
“Why don’t I take you for a ride somewhere, until you’ve settled down?”
This time Serena nodded with full force.
“I would love that,” she had said, demurely. Inside her stomach, butterflies were popping bonbons and bottles of champagne. Ah, finally, the moment she had been waiting for had arrived!
This was when Serena learnt the meaning of Anti-Climax: the bigger the build-up, the harder the consequential fall. In smaller circles this was also known as Wham Bam Thank You Ma’am. One minute Serena and Dominique were parking their car somewhere discreet and romantic in Lovers Lane, the next her panties were off and her legs twisted up in air. There was no time to even say condom.
“Ar, I don’t think, I don’t think we should be doing this…” Serena muttered under the weight of Dominique. As far as she could tell, his thing wasn’t inside her yet but even still, it was too much too soon.
“Relax,” Dom murmured, running his fingers through her hair, “I promise I won’t hurt you. I’ll take care of you I promise.”
“Mmm,” Serena replied, loosening her grip. She let herself fall into a make-believe world where a promise is never broken and boys think with their hearts and not their dick. “I trust you Dom, so you can do what you like.”
Let’s call those words a big mistake. Fifteen minutes later his thing was laying limp, having already dispersed of its load and Serena was stepping out onto her driveway, fully dressed but a bit shaky. She wasn’t quite sure what had happened. They had had sex right? But if that was the case where were the cuddles, where was the loving feeling? She certainly hadn’t felt any love inside; only shame and self-pity. Oh and let’s not overlook feeling very, very ripped off … in her dreams, having sex with Dom had seemed so much more fun.
Doing it with Fernando, now that was fun… if anything it helped Serena get over her wrath towards Tabitha. One day she was feeling pissed at Tabitha for being a stubborn bitch (who refused to admit it was her temper tantrum that got their friendship into this mess). And the next, Serena was drowning in guilt. Oh gawd what had she done? She had slept with her best friend’s love. Suddenly it didn’t seem valid that it was an accident, an alcohol-fuelled hump in Café Bar South America.
Honestly Serena had thought it was Dominique coming at her again, when the bathroom lights flicked off and some man bent over her body flat against the wash basins. If she had known it was Fernando lifting up her skirt, inserting his thing through the side of her briefs, she would have resisted, she would have walked away. And that was saying something, because by Lord it was good.
Tabitha didn’t forgive her though, and thus the Cold War period coincided with Serena feeling like a big, big slut. She knew Tabitha had every right to be fuming mad (she would be too if the shoes were reversed) but that didn’t stop her from feeling miserable. Serena wasn’t used to been apart from Tabitha, she wasn’t used to having an empty space beside her in the car. Worse yet Serena felt stupid calling other girls from college to go out with her, because they all knew it was only because of the Cold War episode.
“As soon as Tabitha comes back into the picture, you’ll be dropping us like hot potatoes,” they would say. It was irritating because they were right.
Sometimes Serena would make her way alone to Café Bar South American, in hopes of bumping into Tabitha or anyone familiar. More often than not, Tabitha wasn’t there but the Awesome Foursome was and they would call her to their table and make room right in the middle of the couch.
“Join us; what would you like to drink? Whatever you want, it’s on us.”
They treated her like a fragile princess, which was a one hundred and eighty degree turnaround and a small price to pay for Serena ruining her own life.
Back then if Serena had told anyone that she had slept with two of the four boys, they would have looked at her like a freak. Make that a freaking whore.
“You did what? Banged two best friends?”
But it wasn’t like that, honestly. When she was with them, Serena forgot about the sexual interludes. They were like hazy, distant moments in the past. It was quite liberating to feel like that because it meant she jumped the highest of hurdles and become one of the boys. To screw and not lose your heart, now that was an art. To screw and then be able to drink beer together with your conquests made you a master.
That summer Serena became a master, with a doctorate degree. Sleeping with both Ramiro and Enrique were part of the final exams. The other girls who hated her, who were in fact jealous of her closeness with the Awesome Foursome, looked at Serena with envy. How did she do it? The questions lurked in their eyes. Not to be thrown away like a dishrag, that was an ach
ievement in those days.
Soon after Tabitha and Serena started college again and got paired up as partners in a tutorial by a teacher who didn’t know better. The Cold War lasted only ten minutes in that environment. Try as they might, they couldn’t keep the smirks off their faces as Mister Plonkington got mini-stiffies in front of his students and let out tiny poofs of silent gas whenever he bent over to pick up a dropped pen. If silence and distance were poison in arguments then laughter was the definite antidote.
They made up, of course; Tabitha was even willing to put that sordid experience with Fernando aside when she learnt that from him Serena had also caught crabs. The only condition was that they promised never, ever to go to that Café South American Bar again. No more sucking up bad boys asses; no more putting wankers onto pedestals. It was time they got some self-respect, Tabitha decided, let’s put that feeble past behind us. As from today, their future years and lives ahead were going to be all about empowerment.
Chapter 21
Getting back to reality, Serena found herself suddenly pleased to be in the company of three ex-lovers. At a time when her emotions and confidence were feeling quite unstable, thanks to her tiff with Jasper, it helped to have her attractiveness validated.
“You look so much more beautiful now,” Ramiro swooned, and Serena beamed, despite been a bit bothered by the now part. Did that mean she was ugly before? No, no, good-looking men like these didn’t sleep with ugly women. It had to do with the ‘matching hypothesis’ she learnt back in her Introduction to Psychology class. People were attracted to and formed relationships with those that were similar to them in particular characteristics, such as physical attractiveness. Hopefully they didn’t just mean personality, because on that count the boys were lost causes.
“Can I get you a drink?” Dominique asked, proffering Serena a bottle of her own home wine.
“I would love one,” she replied, passing her freshly emptied glass his way. It was time for a refill anyway; time to let her hair down and reminisce of good times with old pals.
“So what have you guys been up to?” Serena inquired next because that was the first and only question she could think to ask.
Damn how original. It was this very reason she didn’t turn up at her ten-year high school reunion. Really what would she and any of her ex-cohorts have to talk about? Anyone worth talking to Serena had kept in contact with and the rest could get quite easily stuffed. Sharing a classroom together once upon a time didn’t give anyone automatic access to Serena’s biography nor to her dramatic story of big rise to movie-set make-up artist. Especially since it wasn’t really a dramatic rise; more like a break-in followed by a five-year plateau.
“Ah the usual,” Enrique said, “working, resting, playing.”
“Not still at Café South American?” I hope, Serena added silently.
“Yes, yes, of course at Café South American. I own it now.”
“I guess that makes it all right then.”
The boys continued to fawn over Serena for the next half hour. Surprisingly it was not so much the past they were interested in as the present, as in right now.
“Will you dance with me?” Dominique begged.
“No dancing,” protested Ramiro, “I want to take you outside, show you the stars.”
Serena giggled at all the attention, no matter how pathetic it was. “You guys were nothing like this back when I was nineteen.”
“That’s because we were stupid then and now we’ve grown brains,” Enrique winked with a grin.
Oh my, THE smile! Serena looked at Enrique in awe and tried to remember how many times she had made a wish at a wishing well to be the benefactor of that beam. A hundred, a thousand? Weren’t she and Tabitha once so desperate that counting Enrique’s smirks seemed like a good way to pass the time? First one to get five has to buy the other a sickly sweet cocktail.
Though a bit drunk, Serena could tell the boys were all fighting for the alpha male, king buck position. Their flirting was on full speed and unless she soon showed more interest in one and not the others their Casanova behavior was going to get ridiculous. Embarrassing not just for her but also for them.
Not that she minded Ramiro and Dominique making up for lost time and fighting over her, but the groveling was akin to corrupt politicians about to be deposited in jail for life. Plus the heart never forgets; seeing Ramiro and Dominique now reminded Serena how it took both of them less than fifteen minutes to zip up their pants after sex and fifteen days to speak to her civilly again.
This was why she liked and always had liked Enrique the best. Maybe it was because she screwed him last or maybe because he at least acknowledged her crush by giving her a stack of his sister’s old Cosmopolitan magazines to keep. Though she was supposed to shred them for an art class assignment, Serena was sure Claudia Schiffer still dwelled in a box of old mementos somewhere.
“Enrique,” she said, taking her pick by the arm and leading him towards an empty dark corner. “I would love to hear how you came to be the owner of Café Bar South America.”
Ramiro and Dominique were left standing in their wake; mouths dropped open, unable to suppress their shock. Ah sweet revenge, Serena thought to herself as she sat Enrique down and plopped her bottom right into his lap, this gesture had been almost ten years in the waiting.
Serena wasn’t planning to kiss Enrique. She swears to God she wasn’t.
All she wanted was a bit of fun to pass the long-winded yet despicably wild party faster. If she hadn’t positioned herself with Enrique, Serena knew what her doom would have been. Tabitha would have alternated between showing Serena extreme attention while force-chugging liters of cheap and nasty alcohol down her throat and completely ignoring her, thanks to the sighting of a potential goat-keeper. Hiding herself away with Enrique was a preferable option.
Enrique thought so too.
“Ah Serena, why did you not ever come back to say hello all these years? We were all such good friends and then one day, kaboom, it was like you fell off the face of the earth.”
Serena laughed.
“I doubt that you really gave a crap Enrique. You were all too busy flocking your feathers to even notice Tabitha and I were gone.”
“You think I am that shallow?” he asked, eyes wide open. There was hurt flicking on and off at their edges. “You think I did not miss our conversations about fashion and pop stars that we said had to go? Leg warmers, stonewashed jeans, Bros and Skid Row, didn’t we predict their downfall way ahead of time? I am today still waiting to see that 1988 December MAD magazine issue you promised me.”
“What?” Serena exclaimed. Then she remembered, she did promise Enrique a funny MAD magazine. She’d even bought at one of those second-hand comic shops for him. At two dollars it was a bargain but Enrique would have paid fifty for it. It was the only one missing from his collection.
“I guess our disappearing act was rude, and so was not following up on a promise, seeing as I always keep promises. What can I do to make it up to you?”
“Would a kiss be asking for too much?”
Enrique unleashed his irresistible smile again and Serena wondered how or if she could ever escape. If she wanted to escape that is. But the truth was at this moment (two thirty four on Monday morning the Grandfather clock revealed) and with no work tomorrow, she was happy to be nestled in an Enrique’s embrace. Wasn’t that the best way to get over an old flame, to replace him with another?
“Okay, just one kiss,” she said, biting her bottom lip.
It wasn’t often that she played with fire but the thought was now seductive. New lips gently pressed against hers made Serena feel like a wayward schoolgirl, a schoolgirl who had just hatched from the cumbersome egg and was fingering freedom for the first time in her life.
The kissing quickly progressed to something more; as is customary.
“Is there somewhere we can go that’s a little more private?” Enrique whispered, in between heavy breaths. His arms were wrapped tightl
y around Serena’s waist but the pressure in his arms could hardly compare with that coming from his pants.
“Like upstairs?” Serena asked, motioning to the staircase with her head.
It was rather noisy down there in the living room. The party attendees showed no signs of going home; in fact it looked like in the past fifteen minutes a mini people explosion had taken place. With the front door now wide open, young men and women were streaming in and out, not all of them on foot either. As far as Serena could see, two Swedish-looking blondes had just been carried out on the shoulders of Dominique and Ramiro. Nice to see the boys were pining away for their lost lamb-who-was-now-a-fox.
“Upstairs is good,” Enrique smiled.
“I don’t know,” Serena said, pulling the requisite resistance trick. “If I go up with you, I might do something I regret.”
At that Enrique frowned.
“Have you ever done something with me that you regret?”
“Maybe.”
Serena couldn’t quite bring herself to say yes. He had after all been the best of the four, the most gentle and kind.
“Then you are right. Best we stay down here and let all these people keep you safe.”
“No!” Serena exclaimed. She grabbed his collar and pulled it close to her chest. What sort of game was he playing at, she wanted to cry. You’re a guy and are supposed to be completely wooing me. I’m a girl and am supposed to battling my eyelashes and stamping my feet. Woo me more! Woo me more, her eyes pleaded.
“Does that mean you want to go upstairs?”
Serena nodded like a dog salivating over a big hard bone. Or was that more like a horny girl salivating over a big hard bone?
“Then take my hand.”
Using his inbuilt sex spot radar, Enrique found the spare bedroom, Serena’s room, with no instructions. Surprisingly no other hot and bothered couple had claimed it for themselves. It had to be fate. Before Enrique could even sit on the futon, Serena pushed off all the rumpled clothes and tried to daintily shove them underneath the bed but no good; that led to visible lumps the size of Mount Everest. Retrieving the clothes and kicking them into the cupboard instead seemed like the next best thing. No point in making a futon any more uncomfortable than it already was.
The Numbers Game Page 21
