Fahrenheit

by Alex Rosa

  I nod as if I understand. Lucky for me, he continues without me having to ask the many questions flooding my brain.

  “I lost a lot a few years ago. I was engaged to a girl. I’m not from L.A. I grew up in northern California where you make stupid plans like marrying your high school sweetheart. Whatever, I don’t want to talk about her. She left me when I returned from college, canceled the whole wedding, and I moved out of town. I was a stupid lost puppy. Luckily, the only thing that kept me moving forward was that I managed to find a job in Los Angeles. I was stoked because my grades from UC Davis got me work with a really well known psychologist, and she agreed to mentor me. However, I was a shadow of a person. It was hard to reflect my 4.0 grade point average that got me the job when I was still so broken. I did what I had to by going through the motions. Wake up, work, sleep, repeat. I didn’t know who I was without this other person, even if I had the dream job.” He stops to give me a serious smirk, as if to check if I’m listening.

  Still pinned beneath him, I try to give him my most polite smile. He doesn’t need to know my eyes are ready to bulge out of my head in shock, or that I want to grin like a maniac at all this information he’s willingly giving.

  “So, what happened?” I ask, hoping he’s going to finish the story.

  He lifts a heavy shoulder. “It’s going to sound crazy, but whatever. I’m sane now, for the most part.” He grins, winking. It’s unlike him, like this whole confession, and I’m so madly in love with it, I can’t find any more words. I can only lie here, entranced, listening.

  “Within six months, my boss could see that I was holding back, and not reaching my full potential of critical thinking, especially with the clients she was assigning me. It came down to her asking me how I thought I could I help others when I wasn’t able help myself. She practically took me on as her own mini science project. After a few talks, my mentor would ask me about my personal life, and asked me to submit notes on myself to her. Eventually, we became friends and she realized talking wasn’t going to fix how closed off I was. She was a bit unorthodox in her ways, but there might’ve been a method to her madness. She said that I was frigid, and bottling everything up, and that I should know better. She asked if I had other relationships since my failed engagement. I never pursued other girls. It was never a priority after losing her. Long story short, my mentor introduced me to Fahrenheit. It freaked me out at first. I didn’t know she was into freaky stuff. Hell, I was only well practiced in the missionary position up to that point. So, when Fahrenheit freaked me out, she told me not to take it so much for face value, but to use it as a tool to see what’s holding me back, and to see if it’d help. She told me to explore things I wouldn’t normally try, without any judgment. We never had a sexual relationship, though it was considered. Essentially, she wasn’t my cup-o-sexual-tea. She gave me permission to branch out. I tried things with women I didn’t know. Strangers worked for me. I explored things that I’d never be able to talk about. The secrecy made it less shameful, and eventually, I realized I had nothing to be ashamed of anyway. However, I like my privacy. The experience transcended into my professional life. I became clear, calculated, and at ease with myself. I also became more helpful to my patients. The control and identity I was able to manifest at Fahrenheit helped me find a balance within myself I didn’t know I needed. Sex became something that I needed to even the playing field of my mind, and with Fahrenheit, it never required me to take the woman I was involved with seriously. I didn’t want to be held back. That was probably the most important part. I wasn’t required to commit, which lessened the pressure.” He pauses to release a breath, watching me carefully.

  “Fuck. I’m talking too much. What matters is, within the first year, I had worked off so much steam, that I figured out who I was and what I liked in the process. I became confident enough to open up my own practice. My mentor allowed me to keep my patients. When all that happened, I was offered a membership to the club since I was so active, and luckily, I could afford it by then. So, I am sort of fucked up, but I can tell you that I’m able to successfully lecture people on how to become functioning, committed adults even though that’s not for me. Does any of this make sense? I guess that obliterates our personal-facts rule, eh?” He gives me a double eyebrow raise that helps transitions my pout into a smile. “There’s my whole life story for your brain to feast on. You’re welcome,” he sasses, but I can tell by the rising blush to his high cheekbones that he’s a bit embarrassed.

  Nate doesn’t do embarrassed well, but he’s managing it with sarcasm. A skill I’ve perfected and can admire.

  I have this overwhelming need to ease his nerves. I place a playful, chaste kiss at the corner of his mouth to soften the hard slant of his smirk.

  “I can’t wrap my head around this information overload. You’ve officially blown my mind! Are there any other shocking facts I need to know, because you’re on a roll?”

  “I have a cat,” he adds.

  I squeal, still pinned under his hold, my laughter jolting through my naked body as I shake my head. “A CAT! You’re killing me right now, Nate!”

  I try to picture him with a cute kitten, and I’m a laughing mess over it.

  He’s laughing, too. Pressing his face back into my neck, belting out the deepest, loveliest tune I could ever wish for. It tangles around mine, and the melody of our laughter becomes the soundtrack to the rest of our night. That’s until his lips drag against my collarbone, enticing a moan before we go for round two of the night.

  “No more talking,” he whispers before kissing me stupid.

  I submit. Like I would ever put up a real fight.

  We never mention my article, when it’s due, if I’ve written it yet, or if at any point we’re going to stop talking to each other after it’s all over.

  I can’t tell if we avoid the topics, or if tonight we’ve been too distracted getting to know each other.

  Regardless, it’s pure fucking bliss.

  Pun only kind of intended.

  I’m not a lady when I sleep. An ex-boyfriend once called me a starfish because I extend all my limbs out like the sea creature, and go rigid.

  So when I stretch out my leg at the knee with the normal force I’d inflict when alone, and it ignites a deep, gargled, “Ow” from someone beside me, I know something is off.

  The worst part of this situation is my eyes are trying to adjust to the morning, and I’m barely coherent when I recognize the warm slithering around my body is a man’s arms unwinding from my naked torso.

  “Oh shit!” is the first thing I hear, and it’s not from my mouth.

  This is not a good sign, and finally my brain catches up with the situation as my eyes open.

  “Nate?”

  I shake my head, rubbing my eyes, trying to acclimate, but the frantic body next to me speeds up the process, shuffling sheets as he utters profanities under his breath.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

  Of course I remember last night with Nate—the sex, the personal confessions, and oh yeah, more sex—but I don’t remember falling asleep. Although, I do remember feeling warm, safe, and smelling something wonderful, like stale cologne, man, and sex. It soothed me into slumber, but I guess I didn’t realize the connotations when I dozed off.

  “Nate? What’s wrong?” I yawn, not processing the situation that’s unfolding.

  I turn to see Nate rising from the bed. I sit up when I’m accosted with the naked sight of Nate springing up to find his clothes.

  He’s not looking me in the eye or at me at all.

  Red alarm bells start to go off in my head.

  “Is everything all right?” I try again, keeping my voice steady, but still unsure.

  He finds his underwear, slips them on in one swift move. When he’s standing, he says, “This shouldn’t have happened. This was a mistake.”

  My left eye twitches in annoyance. Those are the two things a girl doesn’t want to hear when she wakes up next to a man.

&n
bsp; “What’s wrong with you?”

  He shrugs, but it looks painful. He grits his teeth with the lift of his shoulders, and I realize it isn’t pain, but instead a look of guilt.

  He puts on his jeans, and finds his shirt and jacket.

  “Fuck!” he sputters. “I shouldn’t have come here. I should’ve known better. It was already getting dangerous.”

  I climb out of bed, not having patience for clothes. I wrap the sheet around my body. I trail behind him as he tries to find his shoes. He’s bent over, bumbling around in search of them.

  “Why are you being such an ass right now? Look me in the eye, damn it! I think I deserve that much.”

  He stops at the swift change in weather between us. His back straightens as he swivels around to face me. He looks sad. His eyebrows angle downward, and his eyes are round and glow in a warning that tells me he’s about to rip my heart out.

  I didn’t even know my heart was on the line until he speaks.

  “I didn’t mean to lead you on. I don’t want you to think this meant anything—me staying over. I just—”

  I wave a flippant hand, cutting him off. “Newsflash! I’m aware you’re a commitment-phobe. Have I asked you to be my boyfriend? NO. Have I demanded anything of you other than the odd personal fact? NEVER.”

  He shakes his head, bewildered and almost terrified. I’d almost call it cute if the guy didn’t look like he wanted to put an entire continent between us.

  Then it hits me.

  My lip bobs as I gather my emotions together for this man while attempting to figure him out. “Call me crazy, but maybe you’re acting like this because it’s you who thinks there might be more between us. Is that what you’re afraid of? What you’re feeling? Scared? It’s okay, because I—”

  His face ices over into a rigid abyss of non-emotion. “No.”

  “No?” I whisper. My confidence evaporates with the word.

  Usually, talking fixes everything, but Nate doesn’t even want to try. It’s nothing like him, and I’m terrified I don’t know him at all. The Nate I know doesn’t run. He’s pragmatic, determined, and calm. This Nate is none of those things, and I don’t know how things changed so fast.

  He turns away from me, finding his shoes, and slips them on as I watch him ignore me.

  “You’re seriously going to be that guy who treats the girl like shit for no reason, because he’s the one with the issues? That makes you as bad as Garrett, you know that?”

  The prominent click in his jaw tells me he hates what I said, but he still doesn’t look at me. Instead, he rises fully and turns in the direction of the door.

  “Nathan!”

  The quiet huff I hear gives me a sliver of hope.

  I clutch the sheet close, clenching a ball of fabric against my heart, mimicking the tight, suffocating feeling gathering beneath the skin there.

  “You’re scolding me?” he asks.

  So he remembers that part of our conversation last night.

  “Yeah, I am. Don’t leave like this.”

  I’m trying to tell him with my tone that we didn’t work through this bizarre experience with one another to throw it all away like he’s doing now. He doesn’t have to be my boyfriend to be something more to me, right? Maybe I’m the fool.

  I watch the gulp of his throat, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “I have to. It has to be this way. I didn’t mean to cross so many lines, and now I’m going to hurt you. I never wanted that …” He sucks in a breath.

  He gawks at me one final time, his amber eyes piercing mine before dragging the length of my body, as if committing the image to memory. It’s soul crushing to witness.

  I’m too shell-shocked to speak. With terrifying clarity, I know why he’s doing it. He’s saying goodbye.

  He opens his mouth to speak more, and all I want is a small apology. I don’t even need a full explanation. I just want to hear him tell me he feels bad for what he’s about to do. It would at least make me feel better in comparison to all my previous romantic encounters, but instead, I’m flooded with disappointment.

  No sound emerges from Nate’s mouth. I can’t tell if it’s out of pride, guilt, or something else I don’t understand.

  My brows pull together in confused anger.

  He shakes his head and turns around, opening my bedroom door and flees my apartment.

  I don’t understand. It was only an overnight snuggle.

  I try to ignore the weird pain spreading through my heart, like I’ve been stabbed, and the knife keeps twisting.

  Maybe he was right. Maybe he is the villain.

  “I’m rattled. Very rattled.”

  That’s all I can give as an explanation to anyone at work who asks how I’m doing. It’s also how I look.

  I barely managed a shower because I felt this strange primal need to latch onto something as silly as the smell of Nate’s skin still left on mine.

  I didn’t anticipate feeling this way, and I blame it on the way he left.

  He accused me of having feelings for him, or at least implied he didn’t want to hurt the possible feelings I might have.

  I always toyed with the idea of how nice it would be to have Nate as mine, but it never crossed my mind as a serious option. So, having feelings for him never seemed in the cards.

  That’s until he said those things, and acted like every other man in my life: like a dog with his tail between his legs.

  Regardless, the situation unveiled some serious feelings I do in fact have with my sex club mentor, and I’m pissed off about it.

  I’m pissed off about a lot of things actually.

  Like how he left and hasn’t called. However, he doesn’t have to, does he?

  That’s the problem. I don’t know how to handle this. I don’t know where the expectations begin, and the reality ends.

  I tell myself repeatedly that Nate is a luxury, not a necessity, and the only thing I gain from that is hearing a single lyric on repeat from a song by the Rolling Stones reverberating in my head:

  You can’t always get what you want.

  My fingers hover over the keyboard of my computer as I stare at the blank Word document, waiting for the words to come. They don’t.

  I didn’t know there was ever a possibility of me hating my assignment, too.

  I glower at the screen, waiting for unfiltered anger to override my emotions, but it’s like a stalling engine. The anger inside me revs with determination, but quickly sputters to a halt, letting the hurt win the race.

  I give in, picking up my phone from the desk, and decide I need to take charge, or that I simply lack patience.

  To each their own.

  I call Nathan Sanders.

  Pressing the phone to my ear, my nerves rise into goose bumps on my skin, and a few drops of sweat form unattractively on my upper lip. I’ve never been the one to call Nate, ever. He’s always been the one to reach out.

  My, how things have changed. Stupid boy.

  On the fifth ring, it switches to voicemail. I do not intend to leave one, but still don’t hang up. I find myself hoping to hear his voice in the recording.

  This is when I know I’m in over my head, and the realization is like a natural disaster in the form of a flash flood of emotions.

  “Lauren, you’re losing it,” I grunt, slumping back against my chair when I hear the standard, robotic female voice telling me to leave a message. I press end, and toss the phone onto my desk like a little girl who’s gotten mad at her Barbie doll, or maybe in this case, it’s Ken who’s at fault here.

  “How’s my journalist in the making doing this fine afternoon?”

  I spring forward, my back going rigid. I wipe at my face before placing my hands on my desk. My fingers slam down on the keyboard. I pretend to be typing, even though it’s gibberish on the screen as Rebecca’s heels click-clack into my office.

  “Super awesome!” I spew.

  Her nude platform heels shuffle to a stop. “Everything all right?”

  She’s
been the one person I’ve been avoiding all day, and I can’t give her the same answer I’ve given everyone else. She’d make a meal out of it.

  I purse my lips together in a tight smile, shrugging and nodding like a lunatic. Awesome.

  She squints. I’ve always been a terrible liar, even if it’s nonverbal. My face is nothing but a transparent window to what I’m battling inside my head.

  Rebecca’s eyes drag over me, scrutinizing my appearance for clues to what she already senses. My Ugg boots, leggings, sweater, and high-perched ponytail give me away as the girl who doesn’t give a shit today.

  “How’s your article coming along?” she asks, not needing to ask how I’m doing again. If I lied once to that question, I’ll lie again, and Rebecca doesn’t like her time wasted, but she can be strategic for the truth.

  “Fantastic,” I continue to lie.

  She nods through a look of feigned annoyance as she plops down in the chair in front of my desk, putting us at eye level.

  “How’s Batman?”

  “An annoyingly, enigmatic douchebag,” I reply.

  Her lips twitch, as if she’s figuring out that’s the first truthful thing to come out of my mouth since she walked in.

  The truth comes swiftly, and in this situation, I’m not short of rude sarcasm when it comes to the sexual vigilante currently commandeering my mind.

  “I bet. Did you get everything you needed for your research?”

  I nod. This is also true.

  “Great. You haven’t sent me any rough drafts, so I assume that you don’t need me to review anything.” Her tone is flat, but still manages to wield a challenge behind each syllable, as if daring me to admit failure or floundering.