“I have a place I like to eat,” he says. “It’s Italian and they know me there.”
I try not to smile, because even though it’s poorly done, I still find it funny.
“Topher? I think you’re supposed to ask the girl what kind of food she likes, or whether that type of restaurant would be okay with her.”
He glances at me, his eyes mostly glued to the road. Then he nods sharply.
“Okay. Sorry. Do you like Italian food?”
“As a matter of fact, I do.”
“I have a favorite Italian place. Can we eat there?”
“That sounds great,” I tell him, and the smile that breaks out on his face is tremendous. It makes me really happy that I’m the one who put it there.
* * *
The restaurant he takes me to is a family-owned place, only ten tables, and a sweet older couple who know Topher well.
After giving both of us kisses on each cheek, the Romanos seat us at a table in the back corner. We’re surrounded by candles and tiny white lights everywhere. There’s a bottle of wine in the center of the table and Mrs. Romano places two menus in front of us.
“I know what you want,” she says to Topher, “but you let your pretty friend look at all the choices and I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Topher agrees, and the Romanos wander away to talk to other guests and micromanage their waitstaff.
After I’ve read over the menu once I look up and find Topher watching me with his pretty green eyes.
“Carson didn’t want us to go to dinner.”
I sigh. “I know. That’s what I was trying to tell you earlier. I don’t think anyone is going to be happy about us kissing and going to dinner and whatever else we might do.”
He reaches across the table and touches my hand, rubbing his finger up and down my palm lightly. It sends tingles shooting through my arm and straight to my heart.
He’s thoughtful, and I know that he’s considering all the possibilities.
Finally, he picks up the bottle of wine and pours some in each of our glasses. “I don’t actually like the wine,” he tells me quietly, “but I drink a little whenever I’m here because it makes Mr. and Mrs. Romano happy.” He pauses. “Carson doesn’t have to like me kissing you, but he can pretend he does because it will make me happy.”
Then, just like everything with Topher, it’s decided, and he moves on.
Topher
I asked Rachel to come to dinner because I know that’s what you’re supposed to do when there’s a girl you really want to kiss. I’ve never been on an actual date, but I’ve watched enough movies and read enough books to know that this is what you do.
Carson was going to try to stop me. He had the same look on his face that he did when I was about to go cliff diving the time we performed in Acapulco, and when I brought a boa constrictor home to keep in my room in the fourth grade, and when I bought stocks for the first time. He doesn’t always think I can do things like everyone else, but he’s always been wrong before, and he’ll be wrong this time too.
So, I ignored him, and I took Rachel to my favorite restaurant, where it’s quiet and the Romanos know to seat me in a back booth, and I can look at Rachel as much as I want to.
And now that we’re here, I see why people go on dates to restaurants. It feels like you and the person you’re with are in a special place for only the two of you, even though there are other people around.
“What do you usually eat?” Rachel asks as she looks at the menu some more.
“I always have the cheese ravioli,” I tell her. “It’s the best I’ve ever had anywhere.”
“Then that’s what I’ll get too.” It makes me kind of happy that she likes the same food I do.
She leans forward a little, resting one elbow on the table. It makes her top gape a little at the neckline, and I see some of her breasts. They’re the prettiest breasts I’ve ever seen, and I’m hoping that I can touch them more after we have dinner.
“You know,” she says, her brow wrinkled a bit. “Carson isn’t the only one who won’t like this. Margo’s probably blowing up my phone right now, except I put it on mute while we were driving over.”
I cross my arms because I don’t want to hear about Margo or Carson or anyone else saying that I can’t be with Rachel.
“And she can pretend too. I listen to her most of the time. I don’t have to listen to her all of the time.”
Rachel shakes her head a bit. This conversation makes me itch. I want to get up and move away so that we can stop talking about it. I know that normally I do pretty much what Carson and Margo want. I do because usually what they want matches up with what I want. But once in a while I want something that they don’t think I should. And then it’s bad for everyone. I don’t want this to be one of those times, because Rachel feels good, not bad, and I want to be around her more than I’ve ever wanted anything else.
“I feel like I’m putting a wedge between you and your family,” she says softly.
“They’re my family,” I say. “They get mad sometimes, but then they get over it. They’re always here, unless they die like my mom.”
She shakes her head as a smile spreads over her face, and one spreads across mine to match.
“You have a way of boiling things down to the essentials.”
I shrug. I just say the truth. I’m not sure that there’s anything so special about that.
“Tell me when you’ll become a veterinarian,” I demand. I know it’s polite to ask people about themselves, but also it’s not hard with Rachel, because unlike a lot of people who I meet, she interests me in every way. I want to touch her, kiss her, listen to her, and know everything about her.
“I have two more years of school.”
“Where will you work then?” I take a sip of the wine in front of me. Yuck.
“I’m not sure.” She twirls the stem of her own wine glass and the wine sloshes inside, making a quick rhythm as it hits higher on one side of the glass than the other. It’s a fast high, long low, fast high, long low. “My dream is to open a rescue facility for pets, but that takes a lot more money than I have, so I’ll probably have to go to work in a regular vet clinic and hope that I can save enough money eventually to have my pet sanctuary.”
I could give her the money. I could also earn her the money on the stock market. But somehow, even I know that’s not something I should say right now. So I file it in my head and someday I’ll tell her that she can have whatever kind of animal place she wants.
“Do you like rescuing animals?” I ask.
“I like knowing that every creature has a place where it can be its best and have love. So yeah, I guess I like rescuing animals.”
I like that. Not everyone understands animals, like not everyone understands me, but Rachel makes it feel like it doesn’t matter if other people don’t understand me. Because she does, and I think that might be what matters to me.
* * *
We talk about a lot of things at dinner—trips we’ve taken, things we like to eat, the pets we’ve had. It’s perfect. But now I’m driving Rachel back to Margo’s apartment, and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I know what I want to do, but not exactly how to do it—where to do it. Do I come in and ask to go to her bedroom? Do I just kiss her and touch her here in the car? Usually, women just come to the parties after our concerts, and we go to a hotel room or a bathroom backstage and they give me a blowjob. Carson told me a long time ago that I should just stick to blowjobs so that I don’t have to worry about catching diseases or getting a groupie pregnant. And I don’t usually like to touch people that much, so blowjobs work well.
But with Rachel, I think I might want to do other things besides blowjobs. I know I like the way it feels when I kiss her, I know I want to touch her breasts again. I also know that I want her to touch my dick with her hands and her mouth. And I think maybe I’d like to have sex with her.
But I’ve never had sex, and I know that everyone else my age h
as. I don’t want to do something wrong, I want her to like it, to like me. Maybe I need to watch some of those movies that Garrett used to get before he went to rehab.
“Are you okay?” she asks as we drive. “You seem quiet even for you.”
I glance at her before I look back to the road. She’s so pretty.
“Um, I’m thinking about things.”
“Yeah? What kinds of things?”
“What will happen when we get back to Margo’s apartment.”
“Uhh…” She looks confused.
“Like if you’ll let me kiss you again.”
She dips her head and her hair falls over the side of her face. I want to brush it back so I can see her, but I’m driving so I can’t.
Her voice is smaller than usual when she answers me. “I think if you kissed me again, I wouldn’t complain.”
Something big expands in my chest, and I really like that feeling. It’s almost like one of the feelings I get in my dreams it’s so big.
“Good,” I say. Then I drive faster than the speed limit to get to Margo’s apartment.
Rachel
We pull up in front of Margo’s building, and Topher parallel parks, then turns the engine off.
He unbuckles his seatbelt and reaches down and unbuckles mine as well.
Before I can do anything else he’s climbed out of the car and is walking around the front bumper before opening my door. So, maybe he meant a kiss on the front steps? I’m really not sure what’s going through his head. But then he takes my hand and helps me out of the car before opening the back door and ushering me into the rear row of seats. It’s a bold move, but imminently practical, which kind of suits Topher.
He slides in after me and shuts the door.
“Even I knew that console would be in the way,” he explains with a shrug.
I start to laugh, but before I can get it all out one of his hands slips into the back of my hair, while the other one finds my hip and he pulls me closer. I slide a few inches on the leather seats, until I’m flush against him, his hard chest pressed to my soft one.
His lips find mine, and it’s ten times more intense than it was this afternoon at the recording studio. He crushes his mouth to mine, his tongue dipping, swirling, stroking, his teeth nipping and scraping.
I moan, and it seems to encourage him as his hands join the game. His hold on the back of my skull tightens, and he slips the other hand underneath my top, palming my breast through my satin bra, making my nipples pebble immediately.
His breath comes fast and harsh, and my core aches, hot, wet, needy.
“I like you so much,” he breathes, shifting to pull me on top of him, I cooperate enthusiastically by straddling him and pressing down against his already hard cock.
He groans and I can’t help but rock back and forth as he devours my mouth, and pulls my bra aside to squeeze my breast and roll the nipple between his thumb and forefinger.
“God, Topher,” I gasp, “that feels so good.”
His hips thrust up, as he dry humps me while his lips explore my neck and collarbone. I’m rocking against him, so desperate for relief I think I might die. The seam of my jeans presses against my clit and creates just enough friction to drive me crazy, but not enough to do the job.
Then, his strong, hand is slipping down the front of my jeans and underwear, and he’s running his middle finger through my folds.
“So pretty,” he whispers, nibbling my earlobe. “I like everything about you.”
His finger touches my clit and I cry out.
He stops moving and pulls back to look at me. “Are you okay?” he asks.
I gasp out a laugh. “God, yes, keep doing that. More of it. Don’t stop.”
Then he smiles and puts his lips back on my neck, and his fingers back on my clit. Hallelujah.
He rubs and presses, and damn he’s good at it. He alternates between that and plunging two fingers inside of me. The first time he does it he growls, “You feel good,” and I nearly come.
Since his hands are tied up doing really fabulous things, I reach down and unbutton and unzip his jeans. His cock is rigid, straining against his boxer briefs, and I ease the elastic band down until he’s exposed.
His fingers are still working their magic on me, and I have to stop and close my eyes, even though I want to see more of him. He grunts and thrusts his fingers into me faster, and before I know it I’m clamping around them, wave after beautiful wave of sheer pleasure cascading through me.
“Oh, Topher,” I hiss, my head falling back and my chest arching toward him. He lifts my top and bra up and over my breasts before taking a nipple into his mouth and sucking, making the orgasm go on even longer, until I’m completely spent, and slumped against him, my head on his shoulder.
I kiss him softly on the neck, and I feel a shudder go through him.
“Are you okay?” he asks again.
“So much better than okay,” I whisper.
“That was long A, short B, long A,” he says, sifting strands of my hair through his fingers.
I lift my head to look at him. “What’s that mean?” I ask, confused.
He shakes his head a tiny bit. “The beats. The beats of you. There are beats in everything, patterns, and when I close my eyes I can see them in colors.”
“What do you mean?”
“Everything in the world has rhythms. I hear them, and see them.” He pauses. “You have special ones. Pinks and blues. Pretty. Like you.”
Then he kisses me softly on the cheek and a piece of my heart flies over to him and is lost to me forever.
His hips press up against my core again and I reach down to wrap my hand around his cock.
“I want to learn the rhythm of you, Topher Leigh,” I tell him. Then I pump my hand up and down a couple of times, and his eyes drift shut. His hands fall to the seat beside him, and he lays his head back. He looks like a Greek god in repose, and I inch back until I can drop my knees to the floorboards between his legs. I lean forward and take him in my mouth, and he groans in ecstasy.
As I set up a new rhythm, his hands find my hair and he gently runs his fingers through it over and over, never pushing me to take more of him than I’m able, never asking me to change the pace I set. He just sits there, breathing hard, moaning occasionally, touching me tenderly as I lave him, and suck him in as deeply as I can, relishing the heft and thickness of him, slicking him with his precum and my saliva until he glistens in the moonlight seeping in through the tinted car windows.
“I’m supposed to tell you when it’s time,” he murmurs from above me.
“Just let me handle it,” I answer him before taking him in as deep as I can and making my cheeks concave. He jerks in the seat and then he’s groaning as he comes in my mouth and I swallow it down. He tastes sweet and salty all at once, and when he’s done, he grasps my head and lifts my face so I meet with his lips as he kisses me hard and long, hot and honeyed. Kisses me until my mind too is a swirl of beats and colors, hearts thumping, breaths matching, bodies throbbing.
When he finally pulls away, he says, “Did you feel it?”
And even though he hasn’t explained what he’s talking about, even though anyone else might think we’re both insane, I know precisely what he means.
“Yes,” I gasp. “I did, and it’s amazing. You’re amazing.”
He pulls me back onto his lap, and this time we simply hold each other, hearts puzzling out something that’s rare and special, and that scares me as much as it fills me with more peace and hope than I’ve ever had in my life.
* * *
When I walk into the apartment, Margo is sitting at her computer, headphones on. Judging by the graph of sound waves on the screen, she’s working, so I quietly shut the door and start to tiptoe to the guest room.
“When Carson told me where you’d gone, I thought for sure he was kidding,” she says behind me. I sigh and turn to face her.
“Hi, sorry I didn’t tell you myself, but Topher was in a hurry
to leave.”
She shakes her head, her gaze dropping to the headphones in her hands. “What are you doing?” she finally asks.
I stop to really think about her question. “I’m not sure, but I am sure that he’s amazing, and that I don’t want to ignore him—ignore whatever this is.”
She tosses what are probably five hundred dollar headphones onto the desk in a fit of pique. “Really? That’s the best you’ve got? Why can’t you just say you’re having a fling with the rock star? Because it can’t be anything else. You live in Colorado. He lives in L.A. You’re a vet student, he’s…” she pauses, stumbling on her next words, and something inside of me roars to life, something I didn’t even know lived there.
“Be very careful what you say next,” I bite out.
She glares at me. “He’s not like the rest of us,” she sums up. “He’s special and I mean that in good ways and bad ways. He’s not ever going to be someone’s boyfriend or husband or father. Surely you realize that.”
And then, in spite of the fact that I’ve only had one date with the guy, in spite of the fact that I just met him a week ago, my guts twist and my heart squeezes so hard I fear it might shrink a size or two.
“Take. It. Back.”
“What?” Margo looks at me like I’ve lost my mind.
“Take it back. Take back those ugly words that decide Topher’s future for him. You don’t know that he won’t ever be a boyfriend. You can’t say that he won’t someday be a husband. And you sure as hell shouldn’t decide that he doesn’t have the capacity to be a father. You call yourself his best friend? You should be ashamed.” Then I march to the guest room and slam the door.
Topher
Carson is watching some old movie when I get home. He’s been watching movies that our mom loved ever since she died. I tried watching one with him, but it made my stomach hurt so I stopped.
Dreaming of Rhapsody Page 5
