Poonam Sharma - Girl Most Likely To

He brought my palm to his face, and kissed the middle of it, before tilting his head to rest his cheek inside. He had already parted my lips with his stare by the time his fingers grazed my jawbone. He laid the gentlest kiss on my lips, holding my face lightly in place, like a house of cards he was sheltering from the wind. He searched my eyes before letting his cheek glide along mine and finally burying his face in my hair. The familiar chill set in as he yanked my hips up and around so that I was straddling him.

We sat face to face and I admitted to myself then that I had decided to give in. It was one of those moments you wanted to savor, almost more so than the act, especially when you find yourself back in the arms that used to hold you. And that was how it went…as we wrapped ourselves around each other. As we pressed ourselves together, trying to merge. As his arms resettled among the familiar curves of my back, and his hands dove in and out of my hair, grabbing a clump firmly, and yanking backward to expose my neck for him. As we consumed each other, we took our time because there was nowhere else we would rather have been. He rose to his feet and I tightened the grip of my legs around his waist and allowed him to carry me toward my bed. And lay me down. And climb on top of me. And take me.

He crawled in through my eyes while repeating how much he had missed me. How glad he was that we were together again. This was how it was supposed to be, and he told me that I knew it. As we tumbled around fighting for control and for more of each other, I felt adored and completely, totally open. And even though it was my first, I kept thinking best blackout ever.

At the end of our second date so many moons before, Jon had invited me to his apartment.

“For a cup of coffee,” he had explained, “or maybe a glass of port.”

“Sorry.” I shrugged. “I can’t do it.” I avoided his eyes while my heels dodged the cracks in Prince Street.

“Why not?” He stopped, took my hands in his and smiled down at me. “You got another date comin’ over at midnight?”

“No, no. It’s not that. It’s just that I barely know you.”

“Well, if you come back to my place,” he said, cocking his head to one side, “then I might let you get to know me.”

“And also perhaps find three heads in your freezer,” I completed his sentence.

He smirked and raised an eyebrow at me.

“I’m sorry, but I mean, you could be a cannibal…or a Republican. And my instincts are to trust you, but it’s too soon. This is New York,” I concluded. “I don’t make the rules.”

“Who does make the rules, then?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Why can’t you make your own rules?” he asked, tucking my hand into his elbow as we continued walking.

“Because that’s not how it works. You wouldn’t understand. You’re not a woman.” I leaned my head on his shoulder as we turned a corner onto West Broadway.

“You got that right.” He tilted his head upward toward the moon. “And I like it that you’ve got morals. It’s a good thing. It’s refreshing.”

“Besides,” I added, “think of it this way—maybe I’m the crazy one. Maybe I’ve saved you the trouble of waking up alone, tied to your bed, feeling used, trying to decide whether you’re more insulted by the fact that you’re covered in raspberry jam, or that your f lat-screen TV is missing.”

When he arrived to pick me up for brunch two days later, Jon brought along a bouquet of white lilies. Pinned to the cellophane was a Polaroid of the inside of his freezer, containing only two frozen lasagnas and a copy of that morning’s New York Times. This was a man I had every reason to believe I could trust.

It was the morning after the blackout, and I nearly tumbled out of bed to grab my cell phone. I often slept closer to the window than to the bedside table, but since Jon had already slipped into the shower, the ringing jolted me out of my comfortable state of goofy-grinned, postcoital malaise. He had sprung out of bed muttering about how the lack of electricity for the alarm had caused him to sleep late. As he scrambled around the apartment in search of his clothes, I grabbed his watch off the bedside table, squinted and announced that it was eleven a.m. Since the city was still shut down, I told him, there probably wouldn’t be any customers lined up yet for lunch outside Peccavi. Then I settled into the spot where he had been sleeping, and drifted back into my dreams. In the moment between waking up and opening my eyes, I could smell him on myself. The walls were red, the air was still and I was back in love—that suspension of disbelief, borne of instinct, nursed on hormones, cloaked in a warm, blinding light. I grabbed and f lipped open the cell phone.

“Hello?” I chirped as if I was the lady of the house, savoring her rockin’ tan the morning after she had had her way with the pool boy.

“Hello?” the caller asked.

“Um, yes, hello. Who is this?” I sat up in bed, pulling the sheet over my breasts even though I was alone, and began to finger the knots out of my hair.

“Who is this?”

“Well,” I joked, determined not to let the caller’s attitude ruin my morning, “you called my cell phone, so you probably already know who I am.”

“No,” she explained as if I were riding the short bus, “I called Jon’s cell phone.”

Assuming she was a salesperson or an investor in the restaurant, I chose not to accept the negative energy. I would kill her with kindness instead.

“Oops, I’m sorry. I must have thought that his was mine. His phone, I mean. We have the same cell phone. Anyway, he’s in the bathroom. But I can give him a message,” I cooed, scrambling naked around my apartment in search of a pen, and feeling like the Lady of My Own House again. “Who may I say was calling?”

Booboo watched my stumbling from underneath the desk chair, tentatively, as if preparing to pounce.

“Lissette. The mother of his son, that’s who. Who the hell are you?”

I doubled over.

Have you ever seen a photo of someone you used to belong to, and wondered if that’s really how they looked? So strong was my faith in the decency of this man that I might have been less shocked if advised by my pedicurist that she had discovered an additional toe. I was aware that the sentiment made me a cliché, but all I could take in at that moment was how much I hated that I had no idea.

His what?!?!?! Whose son? Wait a minute…“son”? Wait…What? Even as my throat was swelling shut, I kept trying and failing to swallow.

“Hello? Hello?” she asked again. “Who is this?” She sounded like someone who might punch me in the face over a pair of shoes on clearance at Macy’s.

“I, um…this is Vina,” I managed, eyeing the bathroom door and wondering if I should tell her anything else. Feeling dizzy, I had to take a seat.

“I…I didn’t realize he had a girlfriend,” I continued, squeezing my eyes shut. “Or wife? Or, um…look, I’m sorry. I don’t want to know. I mean, I’m not sorry…I didn’t know about you or the…the baby? Believe me. I’ll give Jon your message. And I’ll throw him out. But can I just ask you something? How old is your kid? I mean, I know this is awkward. But I need to know.”

“Two months,” she replied after a pause. And then all I could hear was a dial tone ringing inside one ear and the glub, glub, glub of my own blood pulsing inside the other. Booboo yawned and stretched across the window sill, having had his fill of me. I thought that blood was supposed to be rushing right now, although I wasn’t sure what it was supposed to be rushing toward. Mine seemed to be draining out of my head like beer from a bottle turned upside down.