Annie

I think the last time I saw TJ was the summer after High School graduation. I don’t know why I remember things like this but I had asked him to a movie. I remember the only reason he could go with me was because his girlfriend, a new girl to the school had gone on vacation with her family. TJ wasn’t a wallflower, he had other girlfriends in high school but they didn’t matter. He always had a crush on me. I could have him whenever I wanted. He was sweet and did things for me. He was the one that was there the night I needed a ride to and from the clinic. We didn’t get home until midnight. He got grounded for it but he never told anyone we went to the clinic. For four years he was my little puppy dog and I had abused him the whole time. I was a month away from leaving Denver for the last time. He was headed to State. I only asked him to the movie for one reason. I owed him for the hours of biology and Spanish tutoring. He was going to get what he had wanted since we were freshmen in Mrs. Reed’s earth science class and he first stared at my boobs.

We ate pizza after the movie. He bought. He drove me home and I invited him in. My parents wouldn’t be home for hours. I still don’t know if he was scared or just clueless but he didn’t come in. I remember standing out front and watching him drive away in the convertible.

He wasn’t at the tenth anniversary or the twentieth. He had no way to know he was the only reason I went to either of them. At the tenth, I wanted to show off my globe trotting lifestyle and my French husband. At the twentieth I was single and alone and just wanted to see him because I wanted to feel it again. I wanted to feel his eyes on me and feel the confidence that came from his total devotion.

TJ had been a dork. He was good looking but he just didn’t have what it took for me to screw him. I had a reputation back then, I deserved it. He didn’t care. My mother, with her typical French indelicacy had said he just wanted my boobs. My father, who actually knew me knew better. He would tell me so when TJ would go trotting out of the house late during finals week having just taught me enough to pass my test.

TJ wasn’t hard to find. The Internet is a powerful tool for finding lost loves. I sent him an email to his work address. He replied from a personal address. We exchanged life stories. I put the best spin possible on having travelled the world and then being left for a young girl. I was proud of setting myself up in a new city with my own business and a suddenly successful career. TJ sold stuff. He was one of those guys in a suit on the plane on Monday morning and then on the plane home on Thursday night.

I asked if he ever got to Houston.

Yes, he said. About once a month.

I told him to give me a call the next time he was in town.

He replied his wife wouldn’t like that very much.

I wondered why he hadn’t brought up his wife earlier. I hadn’t said anything in his earlier email.

He didn’t know why, he replied. He said maybe he still had his crush on me. He said it was pitiful how he still thought of me at times, especially when his son played games at our old high school and he would have to walk around the campus. He attached a picture. His wife was sweet. His youngest son was adorable. His teenage son hurt. It could have been a picture of TJ.

I decided to play offended. I told him he sure must think a lot of himself. I just meant a friendly lunch. What kind of slut did he think I was?

I was the worst kind of slut, he said. I was the kind of slut that slept with everyone but him. That was the problem, if we met and didn’t do anything, it would be just like it had been before, me getting his attention and him getting to go home with blue balls. If we did do something, well, he would get what he always wanted but he had moved past that. He said he knew, intellectually that it was nothing but a crush but said that’s not how it felt. He had felt that he loved me. All those guys, all those times he had had to hear about what I’d done at a party still hurt. He wished me well. He signed off “Love,”

Fuck. I do not like being put off. Fuck him. I am not the worst kind of slut. I am the god damndedest best kind of slut there is. I ankara escort deleted the whole string of emails, called one of the men I was seeing, poured a glass of wine and waited for him to get there.

I was in bed, the police detective on top of me pretending to get off thinking about being the worst kind of slut when I realized I had to do it.

I flew into Denver on the early morning flight. I picked up my shitty rental car and drove to the Hilton downtown. I mentioned I had searched TJ. He was speaking at a conference on global Internet threats. I had booked myself into the convention. I didn’t, as a children’s book editor, have much need to learn about computer hackers. I sat through half of one of the early speakers before taking off and wandering town. I stumbled into a high-end boutique and splurged on a dress. It was sheer in places; a slit revealed my thigh almost to my hip and the neckline plunged indecently. I also purchased a bra and panties but back in the hotel I discovered I couldn’t wear either with the dress. I was a proper slut when at 3:00 I headed down for his presentation. He had started when I entered the ballroom. I thought he paused as I walked in but I could have been making that up. The techy nerds around me stared.

TJ had always been tall. He played basketball and ran track and I remember him as this tall goofy nerdy kid with feathered hair. At the podium, he seemed even taller. Her wore a black suit with a thin subtle pin stripe. His jaw was square, his shoulders broad. He wore a crisp white shirt and a purple tie. He had aged well. His hair was cut short but was as dark and think as I remembered. He talked about the threat posed by the Russian mob and the government of China and I resolved to change all of my passwords that night. He finished and started taking questions and I stood to leave. I was obvious, pausing several times so that I was sure he saw me. I ordered a glass of wine and waited.

I never expected he would make me wait. I sat in the bar fending off every sort of suitor imaginable from tech nerds to salesmen to an FBI agent. It was after five when he came in. He had a short bald man with him, and a homely woman in a pantsuit. He didn’t come up to me but instead moved to a table. The other two sat and he came to the bar. We were separated by a couple of suits and although I know he had caught me looking at him and given me a strange look of recognition he didn’t come over. He took three drinks back to the table and sat down with his back to me.

It took everything I had not to approach him. I ordered a third glass of wine and resolved it was my last. If he didn’t come up to me soon I would leave. I was getting looks from a kid across the bar. I say kid, he was probably thirty. He was just a kid to me. I would fuck him. I would show him a thing or two.

I was nursing my wine but was already half way through when a long black arm extended just past my shoulder.

“I’m sorry.” The familiar voice said behind me. Then to the bartender, “I guess we need to cash out.” At the end of the arm, the hand had extended an American Express card. “You seem incredibly out of place. Your husband drag you to this?” The voice said and I looked up at him. God, his eyes were deep and black, his face was older. It seemed hard. It was just now that I remembered he seldom smiled. He wasn’t smiling now.

“Hi.” I said. He had to recognize me.

“Hi.” He said back casually. Did he really not recognize me at all?

“Your speech was terrifying, TJ.”

“Really? I thought it went well. Not as well as my presentation on “A Room With a View. That will always be my masterpiece.”

I remembered that book report. He hadn’t read the book. He hadn’t even seen the movie. He had watched a review of the movie. He worked the class into a frenzy clowning through it. Mrs. Anderson chastised all twenty of us for being rude during his presentation but felt it was obvious he had read the book and understood the subtleties of it social commentary or some shit like that. He had gotten an “A.” He knew exactly who I was. When the bartender set the ticket in front of him he reached around me. Both long hulking arms wrapped around my shoulders as he signed. He was Thomas now.

“You çukurambar escort look good, Annie, little skinny though. You should eat.” He took his slip and left me sitting there. I didn’t turn, expecting him to be back. When it felt like it had been too long I looked for him and saw him moving through the lobby for the door with the bald man and the Lesbian.

Alone, I looked back at the kid with the bushy long hair. He was in a suit, probably some sort of techie. I raised my glass to him and he came over. I asked the bartender for my tab and signed the check to my room. The boy asked if I wanted a drink. I told him I had already had too much. He said he liked my dress, I said I liked his suit and ran my hand over his arm. He was a confident little cougar fucker and suggested we go upstairs. I said sure.

The Hilton is an older hotel. They have black and white pictures up from when it was the tallest building in Colorado. The elevators were painfully slow. I clutched my little bag and tried not to show my anger, disappointment, and frustration. If it didn’t come soon I knew I would tell the boy to get lost. The little arrow above the door had turned green but the doors still hadn’t opened when I heard the heavy footfalls on the tile floor. I turned just as I thought they would run me over and was met with his broad chest and purple tie. His hand was on my cheek by the time I looked up and then his lips were on mine. It was a firm and deliberate kiss. It was short and when he pulled away I had to reach up and bring his head back down. I kissed him this time and it was softer, our lips lingering. The door opened behind me with a rattle. I broke loose the kiss and looked over to apologize to the kid who just had gotten screwed out of his night with an older woman. He was already walking away.

“Him, really?” TJ said to me.

“He was cute.”

“God, you are a slut.”

“Are you coming up?”

“Yes,” he said. He kissed me and pulled me into the elevator, his strong hand on the small of my back lifting me so that I wasn’t so much walking backwards as dragging my feet. The doors closed behind us and he set me down. I pressed seven.

“First kiss. Was it what you hoped?”

He turned and stood beside me. “That wasn’t our first kiss.”

“No?”

“No. There was a party.” His voice was soft. I felt regret in his words, if not regret, just sadness. “At Jeff’s house. You were so shitfaced you could barely walk. I was with Andrea Taylor but she was there just to try to get with Brandon.” He paused but I didn’t say anything. I wanted the elevator to move more quickly. I remembered there had been a party but that was about it. “Trey had gotten you to the bedroom. Andrea had struck out with Brian and had decided I was good enough. We were going up to the Pass. I was probably going to get laid when Jeff grabbed me. He told me Trey had you in the bedroom and had come out looking for a rubber. Jeff and looked in and you were passed out. Jeff was scared. He didn’t know what to do.”

“I think I did that a lot.” I said. It was an apology but it just drew a stern look from him.

“I sent Andy off pissed and got you. Trey tried to fight me but I guess I was scary or something because it didn’t happen. I wrapped you in a sheet and Jeff grabbed your clothes. He gave me the keys to his mom’s Cadillac. I didn’t even have my license yet.”

“You took me home like that? Jesus. What did my dad do.”

He smiled at that. “So you came-to in the car. You were pissed I had interrupted you. At the light at Lincoln you kissed me. You wanted me to pull over. You kept showing me your tits and asking why I didn’t want them. You passed out again before we got to your house. “

“Classy.” I said. He didn’t respond. “Did you pull an ‘Animal House,’ leaving me at the stoop?”

He looked down at me again. The disapproval was wrenching. “I’m not Friedman.” I knew the reference. My dad had broken the football players nose my sophomore year when he left me half naked on the doorstep. “I carried you to the door and rang the bell with your foot. Your dad answered. He was as red as Mrs. Wildman’s Caddy. He saw me standing there and opened the door wide enough dikmen escort I could carry you in. He pointed me to your room and I carried you back there. Your mom came storming out yelling in French swinging at me and your dad pulled her back. I have no clue what they said. She calmed down. I laid you on your bed and she took over. I headed for the door. Your dad took me by the arm to his den.”

“Shit.”

“He gave me a beer and we talked about where I was going to go to college.”

“Seriously?”

“That was our first kiss.”

The elevator door opened. “Do you remember the movies? After Graduation?”

“Leprechaun, I think. Something stupid. You were wearing the surf tournament tank top you had stolen from me.” I had loved that tanktop.

“You gave it to me. Why didn’t you come in?”

“I was a good boy then.” The elevator chimed. It wanted to leave.

“And now?”

“Not so much.”

That was about it for talking. He took me to my room. We kissed continually. They were firm and desperate. His hands explored me over my dress and then he slipped it off my shoulders. He knew what he was doing. He was firm where he needed to be and soft where it was better to be soft. Naked on the bed, lying on my back, he looked down at me with a look I can only describe as reverent. He undressed slowly till he was down to a designer pair of briefs. The idea that he just wore them regularly, not when he was expecting to get something, made him better somehow in my mind then the men I usually took to bed these days. He came into the bed with me. We kissed more. He kissed more of me. I tugged his briefs off of him and he moved with urgency. He wanted me. I imagined him thinking he was finally going to take me.

“Wait.” I told him. “Condom?” I whispered.

He sat up. He inched to the side of the bed, reaching over to pick up his underwear.

“No?” I asked. I was honestly surprised.

“No.” He looked at me. He didn’t seem disappointed. If anything, he seemed relieved. “I shouldn’t be here anyway.” He looked at me lying there and I didn’t like it. I wanted him to be in love with me the way he always had been.

I couldn’t have him thinking of me however he was thinking of me. I pulled him back down to me and he pulled away. I had to stand up and push him down. Can you rape a man? He said no but he couldn’t resist. I pressed him into me. He closed his eyes at first but as I moved on him, he relented. His hands moved up my legs and eventually he opened his eyes. He felt my breasts. His hips moved with mine. He came quickly. I was a good and proper slut and it struck me I hadn’t felt a man orgasm inside of me in years. I groaned, I cried out. I took him fiercely as if I could fuck the years away. When I collapsed on the bed beside him we switched roles. He was strong and fit considering how old we were. He fucked slowly but deliberately. I relished the feeling of cum inside me. Later, when he dressed and left I would lie in bed thinking about it. I would have to do something about that in the morning.

We only did it those two times. I wanted more and asked him to stay, wordlessly he turned from me. I had told myself I was coming here for him. I was going to give him a gift. He knew better than that. He knew before I did. I had come for myself, as if I could make something up to him. I had gone there thinking I wouldn’t feel like a tease or a slut or whatever after it happened. Instead I didn’t feel any differently. I got bumped to first class on the flight home. I was shit faced on vodka when the plane landed. The detective didn’t return my calls. I had to call one of my other friends. He was married, luckily it was still only mid afternoon when I landed. He got to see the two hundred dollar bra I had bought in Denver. He liked it.

TJ did actually call. He had waited six months though and I couldn’t see him at that point. Not without explaining to him why I didn’t see the doctor when I got home. I really didn’t know why I waited until it was too late to do anything about it.

It was a rough pregnancy. Women should not get pregnant at 46. There were complications. A slut can get guys to help her out with a lot of crap. I’ve never changed a flat. Shit, I didn’t even put gas in my own car until I was out of college, but a slut is fucking lonely when she is confined to her bed after week 28. I got through it though. She is healthy. I named her Tommy. I hope she isn’t a slut but it might be out of my control.