"Excuse me, sir, do you have any money on you?" The waitress demanded. She had been so warm and sweet with Megan, but with him, she seemed as though she had serious doubts about his right to so much as be in the same room as all these people right now."
"I, uh..." He began, but his mouth was so parched from the hangover that he couldn’t come out with anything more meaningful. The waitress pointed towards the door and shook her head.
"I’m sorry, sir, but we don’t allow homeless in here," she told him. "We have a soup kitchen on Thursday nights, you can come back then if you-"
"Dravid?”
Her voice. Her voice again. The voice that he had been longing to hear since the moment he woke up that morning. He turned, and there she was, the woman he had sent himself crazy trying to find all day long. She had a furrow in her brow, but as soon as they locked eyes, it was obvious that she recognized him.
"This man is with you?" The waitress asked, and Megan nodded at once.
"Yes, he’s with me," she agreed, and she gestured over to her table. "Come on, Dravid, sit down. You look like hell."
Dravid slumped into the booth opposite her, not realizing how bone-tired he was until he had taken the weight of his feet. The staff were still watching him, clearly wondering what the hell he was actually doing here, but none of them moved to actually kick him out now that he was with Megan, thank goodness.
"You want something to eat?" Megan asked, and she pushed the menu towards him. The irony of the situation was not lost on him; the first time they had come in here together, he had been the one offering her food, trying to get her to talk, the one dealing with the stares from the rest of the patrons. But now, he was sitting there, feeling like he had been peeled fresh off the sidewalk that morning, and probably looking like it, too.
"Sure," he agreed, and Megan ordered for the two of them – chicken and waffles, the very same thing that he had picked out for them the first time they had come there together. He couldn’t help but smile. Did she remember that? He had no idea, but he liked the thought of her, carrying all these little details of memories around with her, never forgetting the minutiae of his life, his mind, his preferences.
As they waited for the food to arrive, Dravid knew that he had to come out and ask her what the hell was going on. She was dressed like she was headed to a job interview – maybe that was where she had come from, he supposed, since he had been so firm with her the night before.
"Megan," He asked her, once he’d had a sip of water to try and moisten his parched mouth. "What...what’s going on?”
She sighed, and for a moment, just paused and looked out of the window, as though she was trying to put those pieces together just the same way that he was.
"I need to move on, Dravid," she explained, as gently as she could. He felt his stomach drop. It was the precise opposite of what he had been hoping to hear from her, but he supposed he couldn’t really hold that against her, not when he had been the one to lay down the law for her so harshly the night before. He lowered his eyes to the coffee in front of her, the bitterness of the beans filling his senses for a moment.
"And I want you to know, I’m grateful for everything that you’ve done for me," she went on. "And I wouldn’t have been able to do any of this had it not been for you. You saw me as an actual person when nobody else did, and I can’t...I don’t think I can overstate how much that meant to me."
Their food arrived, and she picked at it as he tucked in; he was ravenous, and this food was a distraction from what he was sure was going to be the bad news that she had to give him.
"Dravid, can you say something?" She asked fretfully, and he shook his head.
"Where are you going to go? " He asked. "What are you going to do?”
"I’ve been putting in a few job applications today," she replied, with a sigh. "I hope you don’t mind that I’ve put you down as a reference on most of them. It’s not like I can call up anyone else and ask for them to vouch for me."
"Of course," Dravid replied, and she managed a smile.
"And I’m looking into night school," she went on, speaking a little faster now, as though she could hardly believe that all this was actually happening to her. "I want to get a few qualifications, you know, so I’m not just stuck doing entry-level work for the rest of my life. I don’t know what I’m going to get into, but I think I would make a good cook, right?"
"If you can stop burning the toast," Dravid muttered back. She laughed – God, she had the prettiest laugh. He had never noticed it until now, but it was the kind of laugh that seemed to light up everything around her, casting away all the bleak shadows that filled his brain at that moment.
"Yes, if I can stop burning the toast," she agreed, and she cocked her head at him and just looked at him for a moment, as though there was something inside his head that she was trying to wrap her brain around. As though she could see it from the inside out.
"Dravid, I went to see my father today," she confessed, and he opened his mouth to protest – the man who had abused her so badly? She didn’t deserve to put herself through that discomfort, the pain of trying to make things right with the man who had made things so wrong in the first place. But she raised her hand to stop him in his tracks, like she already knew what he was going to say.
"And he passed away last year," she explained. There was a catch at the back of her throat, like she was having a hard time accepting it, but she managed to keep speaking, steadying her voice as she went.
"I went to the cemetery so I could pay my respects," She explained. "And I realized – I think I can put that part of my life behind me now. I held on to it for so long, but I’m ready to let it go. I want to move on with my life, I want to go forward now. And I don’t think I can do that as long as I’m still living with you."
Dravid’s heart sank. It was the last thing he had wanted to hear, but at the same time, the first thing he had expected her to say. In some way, he supposed, he was happy to hear her announce that she was ready to move on, but it stung to know that it meant she would be moving on from him, as well.
"Because I don’t want to live my life for other people anymore," she continued. "That’s what I was doing when I was with you. And don’t get me wrong, that’s what I wanted, that’s what I asked from you – but I can see now that it was just another excuse for me to hide out from what I really wanted. I didn’t have to be honest with myself when I could focus everything on just giving you what you wanted and what you needed."
"I understand," he replied. He couldn’t quite bring himself to look her in the eye. If he did that, then he would be admitting that this was all over, that what she was saying was real, and that he had to find some way to move on without her.
"You’ve taught me so much," she continued. "About myself, about...about pleasure and how I can actually go after it. But I can’t spend the rest of my life in that condo, hoping that tonight is going to be the night you touch me again. I think you’re right in what you said – I was pushing too hard for something that you couldn’t give me. I should have been able to see that before, and I’m sorry that it took so long for me to understand that."
"Of course," he murmured back. His own words, his own words had been the ones to put them in this place. If only he had been a little gentler, a little softer with her...
But then what? She would have just come to this conclusion a little further down the line. This was what she wanted, what she believed that she needed, and he couldn’t hold her back from going after it. By the sounds of it, her reliance on him had already been the barrier between her and the life she wanted for long enough. He should have been happy that she was moving on. And yet, that bittersweet tension was still consuming him; he wanted to see her off into the world, be proud of what she had become, but at the same time, the thought of losing her made his heart ache.
"Why did you come back here?" He asked, suddenly. When she was done talking to him, there would be no reason for them to stick around one another,
and he wasn’t ready for this to be over, not quite yet.
She smiled and looked around, fondly, as though there were a million memories in here that she wanted to relive. When her eyes finally came to lock on his once more, she answered him.
"Because this was the place my life turned around before," she explained. "The first night I met you. I would never have been able to do any of this if it hadn’t been for you, Dravid. I would never have had the confidence, I would never have believed that I was capable of living a normal life..."
She trailed off, her eyes a little misty, looking out into a future that she had only just come to accept could actually happen to her.
"And I’m hoping this is where the next turning point happens," she finished up. "I hadn’t eaten all day, and this was the first place that came to mind. Because everything changed here for me once before, and I don’t see why that couldn’t happen again."
And with that, it seemed as though she was satisfied with all that she had shared with him. She leaned back in her seat, clasping her coffee in her hands, and gazing at him as she waited for a response. She was utterly content, a small smile on her face, and it was clear that she was finally where she wanted to be in the world.
As Dravid sat there opposite her, he tried to think of something to say that would come close to summing up the mess of emotion that he was carrying with him right about now. But instead, he stayed silent. Because he knew that nothing would be enough to express the depth of everything that he was feeling in that moment. And sometimes, silence was better than any answer.
But, as he sat there, his mind started to turn. So, she didn’t want to be his maid anymore? He might have another proposition for her...
Chapter 18
How sweet it is
"You’ve got to be kidding me," Stacey laughed, as Dravid finished up his anecdote about the party that they had attended the week before. Megan nodded, backing up her man.
"It’s true," she assured her, but Stacey shook her head.
"No, I mean, you’ve got to be kidding me, you didn’t invite me to a party?” She replied with a pout, and the small circle around them laughed; Stacey winked at Megan, and Megan lifted her glass to her lips to keep the smile off her face. Last thing she needed was anyone who worked with Dravid catching on to the fact that Stacey had been the one to give her the intense carnal knowledge that she now carried around with her, however much fun it was flirting with Stacey right underneath their noses.
"I can’t believe you’ve been hiding this girl away from us for so long, Dravid," Nathan, one of his co-workers, remarked, as he glanced over at Megan. "She’s a treasure. And I must say, I didn’t see you settling down with anyone anytime soon."
"Let’s just say I’m good at everything domestic," Megan replied. "Including getting Dravid to buy into it, too."
"You sure are," Dravid agreed, and he pulled Megan a little closer and planted a kiss on her cheek. He smelled of the aftershave she had purchased him with her very first paycheck from the café that she was working at these days, and she couldn’t help but smile as she caught the scent of it. She had gotten that for him. She had been able to afford it. Because she was a working woman now, and working women bought their boyfriends little presents whenever they could manage it.
Boyfriend. Boyfriend! She could hardly believe that she could call Dravid that these days. Ever since they had run into each other in the diner where he had taken her the very first night that they had met, things had been so perfect between them that it almost hurt her heart to think about it.
He had asked her, that very night, if she would consider remaining in his life – not as his maid, but as his girlfriend. She could move out if she wanted, she could get another job and go to night school and change up her life – but he wasn’t ready to let go of her, not quite yet. He wanted to keep her at his side. Even if that meant taking things to the next level.
That was the last thing she’d expected. She couldn’t have imagined that under his cold exterior that he saw her as anything more than a maid who he could occasionally stick his dick into. She hadn’t even considered the possibility that he was growing attached to her, and would never have imagined he’d have asked her to come back. He seemed so angry with her when she’d smashed the vase, and she’d been quite sure that he’d have been happy to see the last of her. Thanks for your time, see you around. Here’s your last check. Goodnight.
But he asked her to stay. As his girlfriend. His girlfriend – she kept having to repeat that to herself over and over again, hoping that at some point it would actually start to make sense to her, but it still came as a shock even to run that word through her mind. She had never been anyone’s girlfriend in her life before, but now, she was on the arm of one of the most desirable bachelors in the city – and he couldn’t seem to get enough of her.
They still lived together, technically, but she wasn’t in the spare room now, listening to him bringing other women home as she tried to sleep. No, she slept in his bed now, next to him, and sometimes he would be the one to bring her breakfast instead of the other way around. She knew that it was going to take a good amount of time to get used to this new way of functioning, but she could do it. When she lay in bed, first thing in the morning, and was greeted with a kiss on the forehead as he brought her a coffee, she knew that this was the way things had meant to turn out.
He hadn’t breathed another word about another woman since they had officially gotten together. For a while, she had wondered if he missed it, but when she shyly asked him outright whether he thought back to his time with other girls with any sense of loss, he kissed the back of her hand and shook his head.
"Not at all, baby," he murmured to her, eyes locked to hers, letting her know that he meant this. "I only want you. You’re all that I need."
And she had smiled back at him, and known that he meant every word. She still had these little flashes of insecurity every now and then, but they were getting less and less with each passing day, as she grew more and more accustomed to having him see her as a true equal. They had to learn to be with each other on these new terms, get to know one another not as maid and boss, not as victim and saviour, but as lovers, on the same level as one another.
And yes, that had meant re-thinking their sexual life, too. Megan didn’t have to act out to get his attention any longer, and there was something impossibly decadent to her about being able to ask for him whenever she found herself craving his touch; about sleeping wrapped up in his arms, feeling the warmth of his whole body against her own. There was so much she had to learn about this kind of intimacy – beyond just sex, the sort that was built from gentleness, tenderness. Her body could be used for so many things, she was beginning to understand, not just the pain that suffering that had been her normal for such a long time. She could love with it – not just make love, but show love, take love, absorb the love that she could see that she deserved.
This evening, he had brought her along as his date to a company party; one where all his friends, all the people he worked with would get to meet her for the first time. It was her coming-out, in a way, into the real world, as his other half. A few people had expressed surprise that he was actually here with a long-term girlfriend and not just someone none of that had seen before nor would again, but they all seemed to like her well enough.
"You must be one hell of a woman if you’re keeping him interested," One of his female co-workers remarked, and Megan noticed that she was eyeing her with some amount of jealousy. She snuggled happily against Dravid and nodded in agreement.
"I suppose I must be," she laughed along with her. She knew that she was going to get a lot of that, from the people around Dravid, the people who knew him best. They all seemed so curious to know how they had come to be together, to be so secure in their love, but Dravid had kept his mouth shut about their story. He said that if she wanted to share it, she could do it on her own terms. Maybe, one day, she would tell them everything. But for now, she was en
joying being the mysterious woman on his arm too much to get in the way of that.
Mostly, she just listened to their conversations, marveling at how at-ease they all seemed with one another. For such a long time, she had been caught up in the practice of just staying alive, but these people, these people had more than just that. They had hobbies, passions, stuff they just couldn’t stop themselves ranting about.
One day, she promised herself, she would have all of that, too.
By the time that they headed home, she was a few drinks in, and feeling more than a little frisky; Dravid sat with his hand tucked between her thighs in the car, and she tightened her muscles around them, letting him know that she was as ready for him as she was ever going to be.
They stumbled over the door together, hanging on to one another, and Megan giggled as she hooked an arm around Dravid’s shoulders to keep from tipping over.
"You okay?" He asked her, as she leaned on him to kick off her heels.
"More than okay," she replied, and, as soon as her shoes were off, she pressed herself against him and kissed him, hard. His hands came to her waist, sinking into her flesh, and soon, they skimmed up to undo the zip that was keeping her red wrap dress clinging to her body. She shivered slightly as she felt it slip from her shoulders, exposing her bare-naked body underneath.
"Mmm," he murmured, planting a kiss on her shoulder as he looked down over her nakedness. "And you’re telling me you were hiding this all night and didn’t think to tell me?”
"I think I prefer to show, not tell," she replied playfully, and she touched her finger to his cheek and tilted it to face her once more. Their lips met, and she parted his lips with her tongue and kissed him properly.
Before she knew it, he had scooped her up in his arms and was walking her back towards the bedroom, the dress and the shoes abandoned in the middle of the living room to be dealt with later, if at all. Megan hung on to him for dear life, loving the way that he made her feel so small and so delicate when he carried her like this. As though she was something precious that he needed to protect.
Megan Disgraced Page 15
