TinderElla:

by Eddie Cleveland

  “I mean, I was looking for someone like you and someone like the women I saw and just, I was looking to understand the whole scene,” I step back from Gabe, and break the spell we’ve both been under. The intolerable tension between us seems to shatter, like a rock being thrown through a window in a hot car, I feel like I can finally take a lungful of air as my woozy head settles and my wits return to me.

  “Why?” He doesn’t step forward, instead the intense stare he just held me under follows me as I make more room between us.

  “It’s for the movie,” I answer, pretending that there’s something out on the patio worth looking at. Anything to avoid the powerful, almost hypnotic state I feel when I look at him. “I’m playing a woman who is a nymphomaniac. She’s big into the sex club scene and it’s not a world I know anything about. I wanted to go see if I could understand the draw and maybe learn a bit about it so I can play her character convincingly,” I tell half the truth. Obviously, I’m leaving out the part about my own sexuality. How it’s stifled and I’m desperate to unlock it. How I hope that I can discover what’s holding me back through this role. How I don’t want to keep living a life where I hear so much about the amazing experiences people have with sex, like I am some kind of alien that can never truly understand.

  “Interesting, so it’s all just for research then?” I don’t look back at him. I refuse to meet his eyes, knowing damned well that if I do, he will see right through me.

  “That’s right,” I answer flatly. “You know, you’re right about me not being the kind of girl that goes to places like that,” I finally whirl around to face him, “but you looked like you fit right in there.” I feel a tinge of anger swirl inside me as it occurs to me exactly how comfortable he did look last night. Like he’s been going for years. Jealousy nips at my insides, how many women has he met there? How many has he fucked? I know it doesn’t make sense for me to care, but I do. I almost feel some strange sense of betrayal at the idea of him sliding his cock into some strange woman out on the dance floor. I can see it in my mind, and I hate it.

  Gabe shrugs nonchalantly, “I’m not a stranger there, that’s for sure.”

  “Well, if you do take this job, you can’t be bringing women back here. You’ve gotta keep that part of your life separate from working here,” I suddenly snap, the words dripping from my tongue like bile.

  “Oh really?” His eyebrows shoot up and his eyes twinkle with amusement as he walks across the room to me.

  “Really,” I reply, trying to sound less like a jilted lover and more like a professional.

  “And what exactly are you going to offer me to compensate for those lost nights?” He presses his body into mine and I step backward, bumping into the wall. My heart is racing and my knees might not hold me up. Passion floods through me, making me feel braver and saucier than I’d ever be normally.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” I look up at him from under my eyelashes, “what do you suggest?” The twinkle in his eye dissolves into something entirely different. It goes from an amused glint to a flash of hungry need.

  “I can teach you everything you need to know for your movie, sweetheart,” he pins me to the wall with his hips and drags his thumb slowly over my jaw. I open my mouth, aching to suck on that thumb. Flames flicker inside me as my blood boils for him. I want more than just his thumb in my mouth, but that’s where I want to start.

  “What do you think you can teach me?” I encourage him, pushing my hips slightly back against him, I can feel his erection forming as he grinds against me.

  “I can teach you how to fuck, how to feel, how to be free,” he murmurs, his mouth hovering over mine. I can feel his breath billow over my skin and I close my eyes, ready to feel his lips on mine. That’s exactly what I want to learn. That’s exactly what I need.

  Suddenly Fiona’s ringtone cuts through the tiny space between us like a knife. Gabe and I both jolt at the unexpected noise and I stand up straight as he moves back from me, his eyes never leaving my face.

  “I need to take this,” my voice is hoarse.

  Gabe nods curtly and strides across the room as I inwardly groan at the timing and answer my phone.

  “Hello?”

  11|Vanessa

  “Hey babe, I’ve got some news. Some of it is fucking awful and some is fucking amazing, how do you want it?” My agent, the straight shooter, cuts right to the chase.

  “Bad news first,” I plug the ear I don’t have pressed into the phone and walk out of the room into the hall like I’m trying to hear her over a concert or something. The house is pin-drop quiet, it’s, the sexual tension I can’t seem to hear her over. Even though it’s silent, it makes my blood rush in my ears like an ocean breaking waves.

  “Your co-star quit. He couldn’t get the salary he was demanding and it all fell through,” I can hear her breathe out smoke into the air as she talks.

  I stop pacing the hall floor and almost laugh. “That’s, the awful news? Dramatic much? That’s not the end of the world, they will replace him,” I shake my head at Fiona’s theatrics.

  “No, Vanessa, you didn’t let me finish. They did replace him already. They’ve got it all figured out, but, babe, are you sitting down?”

  “No,” I pinch my fingers onto my nose between my eyes and wait for the big announcement, “just tell me.”

  “Your new co-star is Erik,” her words hit my heart like a rock and then that rock seems to slowly sink inside of me until it settles in my gut.

  “No,” I spit out the word like it’s burning my mouth.

  “Yes, I’m sorry honey. I know you two had a bad break up, but the studio is loving this. They’ve already made a big announcement and everything. And someone supposedly leaked the whole romance that you two had so the buzz is already building about you guys working together.

  “No, no, no,” I feel like if I say it enough this will stop. Fiona’s words, will stop and just like Dorothy repeating how “there’s no place like home,” I will wake up in my bed and this will all be a dream.

  “It’s true. I’m sorry hun.” She sounds like a dragon breathing fire as she smokes on her end of the phone. I lean my head against the wall and whimper. “But I hate that douchebag. How am I supposed to pretend to love someone who makes me want to stab them in the face? This is so fucking stupid,” I hit my forehead against the wall.

  “I don’t know, isn’t, all acting just make believe? Do that.” She answers plainly. From anyone else I’d think they were being a snarky bitch, but with Fiona I know her bluntness is just her nature. She’s right, of course, it shouldn’t matter that he used me like a prop for months, taking me to all the Hollywood parties and telling me he could really see a future together only to cheat on me and break up with me via text right before the Oscars because I was “too chunky to be Oscar red carpet material.”

  The fucking prick.

  “What is the good news?” I flatten my face into the wall, hoping that she’s going to tell me her good news is she’s fucking with me and this is all a lie.

  “Just a sec,” I can hear her phone jostling around and the wind whoosh over it as she yells in the background, “Where did you learn to drive, you fuckwad? Get the fuck outta here!” She screams. “Sorry about that,” her voice is suddenly crystal clear and calm again, like she wasn’t just another raving lunatic on the LA. freeway two seconds ago.

  “Fiona, you really need to get a handsfree set. Like, seriously,” I groan. “One of these days you’re gonna kill someone.”

  “Not because of talking on the phone, that’s for sure,” she argues, “but if they can’t learn to drive,” I can hear her teeth gritting, “then I just might.”

  “Fiona,” I sigh, but I give up before I say another word. I know she won’t listen anyway. “What’s the good news?”

  “Right, right, right. The good news is you thought this movie might propel your career and you’re right. Since that whole supposed leak and the co-star thing all the rags are picking up the story. Entert
ainment Tonight wants to do an interview with you and Erik, TMZ is covering the replacement. It’s all everyone seems to be talking about. I’m telling you, Vanessa, this is going to put your name on Hollywood Boulevard!”

  But at what cost? I can’t help but feel like I’m selling my soul a little if making my career means working with a man who treated me like garbage and made me feel bad about myself. I try to push the thoughts, the anger I still have for him, all aside, and focus on the good, but I’m failing. This role was supposed to be for me. It was supposed to help me understand myself and possibly help me explore the part of my sexuality that I still have never uncovered. Now, it’s going to be all about Erik fucking Fisher. The guy who could never even come close to making me cum. The guy who told me I was too fat to be sexy. So much for this role helping me in my personal life. Now it’s just going to be a job. A job I dread.

  “Ok that’s great,” I answer her cheerlessly.

  “You don’t sound happy about it,” she pouts.

  “No, I am. For sure,” I lie. “I’ve just gotta go, I’m heading out for yoga and don’t want to be late. Love you babe,” I chirp, hanging up before she has a chance to protest.

  I drop my hand that’s wrapped around my phone to my side, dangling like a dead fish on a line. Pushing myself up from the wall, I take a deep breath, trying to bury the anger and disappointment back down inside, but it keeps splashing up the back of my throat like stomach acid, tainting my tongue with its foul taste.

  Fuck that guy!

  I whirl around and head back down into the guest room where Gabe is messing around with the television on the wall and he looks up at me with surprise.

  “Listen,” I feel my stomach tighten into knots as the bad news about Erik overshadows my life. “I need to know if you want this job or not because I don’t have time for games and if you don’t want it, I need to find someone else,” I snap.

  “Woah, good phone call?” He crosses his arms zeroing in on the source of my anger precisely.

  “It doesn’t matter. Do you want the job or not?” I put my hands on my hips and face off with him defiantly.

  “Sure, I’ll take the job,” he answers slowly, “on one condition,” I can see a spark behind his eyes.

  “What’s that?” I answer crisply.

  “I’ll take the job and I won’t even argue with your thing about bringing women over as long as you agree that I’m going to do things my way and if I’m going to protect you, you’re gonna play by my rules,” the way he says it sends a shiver down my spine. It isn’t hard to imagine being punished, laid out across his lap with a bare red bottom, for disobeying whatever these mystery rules are. Honestly, it sounds enticing.

  “Deal.”

  12|Gabe

  “What do you think, Axle? You think you got enough stuff?” I laugh as even he seems to notice how much bigger the bag I packed for him is than the one I’ve got my stuff in. His dark brown eyes look up at me and he pants, making it look like a big doggy grin. “Yeah, I think we’re just about set here too,” I agree with him like he’s actually talking to me. Like I don’t just carry on a long, rambling and one-sided conversation with my dog all the time. People probably think I’m crazy as I walk down the streets of LA. chatting with him, but I don’t care. He’s great company and he understands me, which is more than I can say for most people I’ve met in this city.

  Except for her.

  Vanessa’s face swirls in across my eyes in a blurry vision. This girl has got me feeling a way I told myself I never would again. A way I never thought I could. Her plump lips are so juicy and pink, I want to kiss them, bite them, and watch them as my cock slides between them. That part isn’t so different from other girls, the thing that’s different is, I also want to listen to the words that come out of them, and I want to make them smile.

  I look down at the duffle bag overflowing with Axle’s stuff. A dog bed made of memory foam is shoved inside at the bottom and his toys, bones and leash are stuffed in on top. Compared to my bag of mostly toiletries and a few clothes, it’s not hard to see who the priority is in this house.

  My stomach growls at me and Axle tilts his head, listening intently. “I’ve gotta get some food soon,” I nod down at my belly. I would normally go downstairs and make something, but I just got rid of all the perishable food from the kitchen. I guess I could open a can of soup, but after cleaning everything up, I’d rather just grab a burger on the road.

  I zip up the bags and sling them over my shoulders. My thighs bang against them as I walk down the hall and head down the stairs. Axle is right on my heels, curious as to what all this is about. He knows something is up, that we’re going somewhere, but he has no idea he’s in for an address change for the next three months.

  Halfway down the stairs, I hear my cell phone ring and I hurry up. Dropping my bags, I grab my phone from the TV stand and answer it just as it’s about to go to voicemail.

  “Hullo?”

  “Gabe! Gabriel! My man! Gabe the Babe! I mean, shit, ignore the last one,” I don’t need to look at the number to know it’s Ryan. I served with him in the SEALs, in fact he was on the same mission that ripped my face up. Although, he managed to get out of that explosion unscathed. Ryan is the kind of guy who brings the fun to the party. He knows how to have a great time and make everyone feel awesome. The girls love him too, and he’s a kick-ass wingman. All around great guy.

  “Hey man,” I ignore the old nickname the guys gave me and his embarrassment for using it, but my fingers grip onto my phone tighter and my back straightens. Before I looked like someone Krazy Glued some skin to the side of my face, I used to be pretty hot shit, and I fucking knew it too.

  It feels like a lifetime ago that I would look in the mirror and smile smugly at what I saw. Before I put a ring on my shallow, cheating fiancé's finger I had my fingers stuck in more cherry pies than I could count. A simple smirk was enough to bring home more women than I could count. I wince at the memory. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen that same swooning look, in a woman’s eyes just from walking into a room. Now, when I grab my coffee in the morning, I see how people’s eyes shift away from me. Like I’m a monster walking out of the shadows and into the daylight that no one is prepared to face, so they just pretend I don’t even exist.

  “Buddy! I’m heading out on an epic road trip on my Harley, I’m gonna hit all you guys up for a visit,” he sounds like his usual chipper self.

  In the SEALs we all have nicknames for each other. Usually it’s one word, like ‘toaster’ or ‘coyote’ but with my old swagger the guys zeroed in on my looks. “Gabe the Babe” stuck for me and became what all my buddies called me. It wasn’t meant as a compliment, more of a tongue in cheek, doesn’t-he-think-he’s-so-pretty, kind of thing. Sometimes, since the IED shredded my face, I’ve wondered if this has been some kind of curse for how I treated people back then. Like it’s all a terrible karmic payback for the hearts I callously broke and women I used.

  “When are you gonna be here?” I cringe, hoping he tells me it won’t be until this three months is through. I want to see him, but I’ve got this obligation to Vanessa now too.

  “I’m heading to Oregon first to see Connor, then in about a week I’ll be down your way,” he answers. I can almost see the shit-eating grin on his face.

  “Man, you’ve got some bad timing,” I sigh. “I just took a job as a bodyguard for an actress out here, I have to stay at her place and it’s all expenses paid,” I explain.

  “Wow, that sounds like a sweet gig, does she need another one?” he jokes around.

  “Nah, it’s all set up, but I’m not getting rid of my place. The studio she’s working for is covering my rent while I’m there, so you can still come and crash here. I should definitely be able to get away for a night. We can have some brews and catch up,” I wish there was more I could offer. I haven’t seen Ryan, or any of the guys for that matter, since the night of the explosion. I was helicoptered out to an overseas base for emerge
ncy medical assistance and by the time I returned to US soil they’d all gone back to their hometowns.

  “Sounds like a plan, I’d love to see you for longer but I’ll take one epic night,” he laughs.

  “Cool, give me a call when you’re heading this way and we’ll do it up,” I smile.

  “Will do,” he answers. “Later man.”

  “Later.”

  We hang up and I grab the keys to my Jeep and jerk my head at Axle. “Come on, time to see your new home,” my dog hops up and prances over to the door, clearly excited.

  Hell, with the way this summer is shaping up, for the first time since before we went out on our mission that night in Afghanistan, I’m feeling pretty excited too.

  13|Vanessa

  I slurp up the last of my protein shake like I’m trying to suck the bottom out of the glass. This diet is bullshit. There’s no way I’m going to be able to sleep properly with my stomach so empty and growling. I close my eyes and remind myself of the old saying about the camera putting on ten pounds. With all the high-resolution cameras that we have now, it’s more like twenty. I know we’re filming a topless scene near the end of our schedule. I need to look as good as I can for it.

  I would hate to be too fat to be on-screen fuckable.

  Suddenly the powdery chocolate flavor from my shake turns bitter in my mouth as anger rises inside me about Erik again.

  You know what? Fuck him.

  Fuck that guy.

  I’m not going to let him ruin this movie for me and I’m not going to give him the satisfaction of knowing how much he hurt me. I will be cheerful and completely breezy when I have to deal with his ass. I refuse to whimper around the set like a puppy dog that someone kicked just because I’m stuck with him as a co-star.

  I refuse.

  Outside, I hear the beep of someone locking their car door with their keychain fob, and my heart skips a beat.

  Gabe’s back.