I can’t figure my out best friend anymore.
Sometimes, when he looks at me, I swear something in him has changed. The glances are more intense, his eyes seem molten and charged. Sexual.
And I like it. I love it. I want it. I want there to be this change, for this to be a thing because then maybe, maybe I would act on it. Maybe I would take that chance and turn him into something more than a friend.
But there lies the problem. How do you ensure someone feels the same way about you without telling them how you feel? This isn’t grade school. I can’t pass on a message to James and get him to fish around. First of all, sometimes I get the feeling that James is a bit wary of me and Linden’s relationship and I know there is no way he’d be accepting of it, regardless.
And if I tell Linden how I feel and he doesn’t feel the same way that would ruin our friendship. It would ruin everything we have together, not to mention the relationships we’re both in.
When it all comes down to it, I’m not really sure if I can ever do anything about it. I’m just seeing things I want to see and living in a fantasyland. The reality is totally different. My reality is Aaron, sweet but stupid Aaron with his bronzed skin, killer highlights and endless summer attitude. Linden’s reality is Nadine…
…and I can’t really come up with any positive adjectives for the girl, so I won’t. But I now wonder if Linden is going to stay with her if it turns out he’s really unhappy. In some ways, I can’t believe he even admitted that to me. Once upon a time we would talk about our dating lives with each other, but that all changed in the last year. Now, it’s like it’s completely off-limits and that’s only added another mile of distance between us.
It’s not that I want to hear about him and Nadine, particularly if they are happy. And I really don’t want to hear about their sex life. Linden has been known to be extremely forthcoming about that and this morning I could hear some kind of sexual activity going on in their bedroom that culminated with Linden moaning, a sound that turned me on so much I had to hop into the bathroom and get myself off before I soaked my underwear.
But even though I don’t want to hear about their relationship, I want to know that he’s happy. That he’s okay. I want to feel close to him again.
And, I guess, I want to know if the whole pact thing was ever something he took seriously. I wonder if it still counts if we’re both thirty and end up single again. If I broke up with Aaron and he broke up with Nadine – all in the natural course of things – would that mean that the pact would still be honored?
Would he seriously still consider marrying me? Could I seriously consider marrying him?
Could we at least fuck each other’s brains out until we figured out what to do?
Because that, that sounds like the best pact of all.
“Earth to Stephanie,” James is saying now, waving his hand in front of my face. He is sitting across from me, Penny on one side of him, Linden on the other. Aaron is beside me, and Nadine beside him and across from Linden. Their end of the table seems a bit strained but I’m realizing that that’s just how their relationship is. I have been avoiding eye contact with Linden more often, though. Ever since we went to Gualala together, she’s been watching us like a hawk. I’m surprised she wasn’t spying on us while we were on the beach.
“Sorry,” I say, clearing my throat. “Spacing out a bit.”
“Thinking about work?” he asks with a sympathetic tilt to his head.
“Yeah,” I tell him. I don’t like lying to James either but it’s easier this way.
Penny leans across the table and says, “We’re going to play truth or dare. Are you in?”
I raise my brow and take a sip of my overly hoppy beer. “Look, I know I said age is nothing but a number, but…”
“Oh, it’ll be fun,” she says. Everything seems fun to Penny. Out of everyone sitting at the table, I’m hoping – and betting – that she and James will go the distance. They’d have a real rock and roll wedding.
I shrug. “All right, I just hope we have enough beer to bury all the shame that will come later.”
Linden pats the case of beer that’s on the ground beside the table. “Don’t worry about that.”
I meet his eye for a second and then quickly look away. It’s more awkward to do that than it is just to stare at his brooding face in the dark, his masculine jaw lit by the flickering fire.
The game, like I suppose all truth or dare games, starts off innocently enough. When we choose dares we are clucking like chickens (me) or chugging a whole beer (Penny) or mooning everyone (James). When we choose truth we are telling each other we were caught for shoplifting in tenth grade (me), faking orgasms when we’re too stoned to finish (Aaron, which doesn’t really surprise me), and cheating during college (Nadine).
Then it takes a drunken turn.
“Aaron,” James says. “If you had to fuck any of the girls here, not your girlfriend, who would it be?”
My eyes bug out. I’m curious as to what he’s going to say but it’s still kind of invasive.
But Aaron laughs while squeezing my thigh out of reassurance and says. “That’s a tough call, dude. Your girlfriend is super hot. Really.” Penny blushes awkwardly at that. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her look awkward. “But Nadine has really good fashion sense.”
What? Hey, wait a minute. Since when does dressing like a female lumberjack equal good fashion sense? I own a damn clothing store.
“Plus I think that bitch thing is kind of hot,” he adds.
Now Nadine, who was looking pretty smug over the fashion comment, is glaring at him. “I’m not a bitch, I just know what I want.”
“Sure,” Aaron says. “But you could probably be a little nicer about it.”
I’m watching Linden for his reaction, I can’t help it. He’s actually smiling. No, he’s laughing. Aaron is on point for once.
“That didn’t really answer my question,” says James.
“Can’t I just say I’d do them both, preferably at the same time?”
James’s eyes roll up. “Cop out.”
“Okay my turn,” Nadine quickly says, even though it’s so not her turn. “I have a dare for you Aaron. I want you to kiss Penny. With tongue.”
“Whoa,” James says, shooting her daggers with his eyes. “That’s pushing it a bit, don’t you think? And that’s not how the game works.”
“You afraid she’s going to like it?” she retorts haughtily.
“I’m down,” Penny says. She elbows James in the side. “Hey, grow up. It’s just a little tonsil hockey.”
“The maturity level at this table astounds me,” Linden comments.
Now everyone is looking at me, I guess expecting me to protest or at least find this weird and unacceptable. The thing is, when I imagine Aaron kissing Penny, or doing her and Nadine as he mentioned in the previous scenario, I don’t even feel a twinge of unease. No jealousy, no nothing.
“Why are you all looking at me, I don’t care,” I tell everyone. It probably isn’t the best show of my love for him but whatever. “Kiss away. He’s good at it.” I add that last part for Penny and wink at her, mainly to piss off James.
Penny starts to lean across the table toward Aaron but Nadine yelps, “No, do it properly! You have to stand up.”
Both Penny and Aaron sigh, simultaneously aggravated by the fact that they have to move. They gather at the end of the table, right beside me so I get the front row show. Aaron grabs her around the waist, Penny grabs him by the face. They both giggle nervously, eyeing us shyly before they kiss.
It starts off slow and awkward, gets a bit more heated when you can tell their tongues are going into action, and then ends on a sweet note.
“Not bad,” Penny says, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “Firm but tender.”
“So kissing Aaron is like kissing steak?” Linden jokes.
Aaron gives James the thumbs up. “Nice lady you’ve got there.”
“Lady?” Penny repea
ts. “Oh brother.”
But they sit back down and the game resumes. James doesn’t seem bothered by it anymore and to be honest, I still didn’t feel anything as I watched that. It was just kind of weird, like I was observing some sort of experiment and not getting the results I wanted.
Did I want him to enjoy it, to want to kiss Penny? Did I want that as an excuse to break it off, to say we weren’t meant to be together?
I guess because of the extremeness of the last dare, things go back to truth telling for a while. We’re all playing it safe now, asking the easy questions, the ones you don’t mind being truthful about as long as you’re among friends.
Then it’s Penny’s turn.
She claps her hands together gleefully and wiggles in her seat. “Oh, this is going to be good,” she says and as she says it, she’s staring right at me. I can see the fire’s reflection in her lenses.
“I want you, Stephanie,” she says, pointing at me, “to kiss Linden.” Her finger switches over to him.
I’m too stunned to speak but Nadine isn’t.
“He’s not kissing her!” she exclaims in disgust.
“Hey,” I can’t help but protest, tired of the way she’s been referring to me lately.
“And, again,” James says, sounding fed-up, “that is not how you play the game.”
Penny slaps the table with her hands and leans over it so she can look down the table and Nadine in the eye. “Why can’t she kiss him? You made me kiss Aaron, her boyfriend. I think now she should kiss your boyfriend.”
I know what Penny’s doing. She’s trying to make things even and I think trying to rattle Nadine at the same time. I could kiss her for that but I also kind of fucking hate her for daring me to kiss Linden.
Because, I mean…I can’t do that.
I can’t even think that.
But suddenly there is a tap at my shoulder and it’s Linden. He’s gotten up and he’s standing behind me, waiting for me.
“Hold on,” I say and I look over at Aaron because at least Aaron is going to protest as much as Nadine is.
But Aaron is staring at me, smiling actually, with that damn goofy grin, and nodding his head like this is the coolest idea in the whole entire world. “Go on,” he says and nudges me with his arm.
Thanks a fucking lot, I think to myself and I slowly get up, all the while trying not to look at Linden. But I can’t look at Nadine either because her arms are folded across her chest and I’m paranoid she may pick up the empty beer bottle beside her and throw it at me. I know if she did, Penny would have my back in a second, but still. It could break my nose and my nose is cute.
Linden grabs my hand – actually grabs it, like this a thing that we do, grab hands – and he pulls me toward him.
“Come on,” he says to me with that trademark smirk. “I’m not that horrible, am I?”
No, I think as I stare at his face and feel the heat from his hand transfer onto mine and warm my whole arm, then my chest, then my body. No, you’re not horrible at all. That’s the problem.
Penny starts clapping excitedly. “Well, well, get on with it.”
I can’t even give her a look, my eyes are locked with Linden’s. He’s looking at me with such sincerity that it’s hard to believe what the truth really is. This is a dare and we are just friends. We don’t do this, no matter how many times I’ve dreamed and thought and masturbated to this, we don’t do this.
But his hands come up to my face, holding my cheeks and his palms are so large and warm that I feel my nerves spark and fray and light up my whole body. He is holding me there in the most tender, disarming way, like it’s his job to protect me, to care for me. But his eyes, his eyes are anything but tender. They are dark and wild and even worried, maybe thinking that this is wrong and we shouldn’t be doing this.
Or maybe they’re worried that we’ll find out we should.
And under all that worry there is desire and lust and a million other simmering feelings that I’ve craved, needed, wanted.
I wonder if he can see the fear in my eyes. I wonder if he can see the truth.
He’s leaning in closer now, his eyes trailing off of mine and down to my mouth, down to where his lips are moving to.
I don’t know what to do with my hands. I don’t know what to do.
So I stand there and I close my eyes and I wait until I feel Linden’s lips on mine.
They press on me, flush. They are soft, so soft, like a pillow I’m sinking into, like there is no bottom. Linden’s lips beg, absolutely beg, for more, for more of them, for more of him. And then his mouth is parting and I am kissing him back, kissing the taste of him, which is so much more than just beer. It’s spicy and wild, like his smell, and it’s addictively sweet.
Our mouths fit perfectly, our lips move in rhythm against each other, that soft, wet, luxurious caress of skin on skin. It makes me want more.
So much more.
Now I know what to do with my hands, or maybe my hands know what to do with Linden. I think they’ve always known. I’m reaching for his waist, for the sides of his leather jacket, the very one I bought him for his birthday. I know it’s not supposed to be part of the kiss, but I can’t help it. I want him closer to me and I want more of him.
I get more. His tongue darts into my mouth, slowly sliding along mine and then our mouths are wider, our lips firmer, our kiss hungrier, wetter, harder.
I want to keep kissing him, feeling him, feeling this. It’s stirring up gold-winged butterflies from inside my belly, it’s making my thighs squeeze together, it’s making me want to bite his full bottom lip, to tug at his hair, to feel his hard, rigid body beneath my fingers.
This kiss is breathless and it’s making me want all the things I can’t have.
I can’t have you, I think to myself for a moment, trying to bring myself to reality, to the present, to what we really are to each other.
This is just a dare.
And then I am being shoved backward, hard, by small hands against my chest. I break apart from Linden and gasp as I nearly stumble into the grass.
“Get your fucking hands off him!” Nadine shrieks at me.
For a moment I am angry that she’s all up in my face and then I am horrified at what she might have seen.
How could any of that have been appropriate?
As Penny gets off her to seat to come over to me, telling Nadine, “Hey, calm your tits, it was just a dare,” I look over at Aaron. He’s no longer smiling. He’s frowning, perhaps confused, but he doesn’t look angry either.
But James, James looks angry. And Linden, Linden is staring at me with so much damn sorrow that I don’t know what to do. I feel like I ruined something here, that I got too carried away.
“Excuse me,” I say, moving out of Penny’s grasp and heading back to house. I can’t be out here with these people. They all saw me kiss Linden, they all saw me enjoy that way too much. I’m hoping I can explain it away by saying I was too drunk and it was just all fun and games or just giggle and say that Linden’s such a good kisser, I couldn’t help myself or that hey, isn’t fun to make your boyfriend jealous and then wink at Aaron.
But I need to compose myself first before I can come up with any of that. I need to calm my breath, clear my mind and shove that kiss into the past where it belongs.
It was just a fucking dare. It didn’t mean anything.
It just meant everything to me.
I go back in the house and immediately fill up a glass of water. I drink two glasses full and then feel like I’m going throw up.
I hear the front door open and shut and I freeze, only breathing again when Penny comes in the kitchen.
“Are you okay?” she asks, her thin brows furrowed in concern.
What do I even say to that?
“Did she hurt you?” she adds.
“Oh,” I exclaim, looking down at my chest where Nadine had shoved me. “No. No, I’m fine.”
“Man, I was so close to clocking her in the face,” Penny
says, leaning against the counter and appraising me. “Are you really sure you’re okay? You look really shaken up.”
I swallow uneasily. All the water has done nothing for me. I still feel dry and panicky and sick.
“It was just a surprise, that’s all,” I say to her. “I didn’t think she’d get so upset.” I watch Penny carefully.
She shrugs. “She doesn’t like you. That’s kind of why I wanted you to kiss. It’s my fault. Plus I thought it would be fun to see two friends who have never screwed each other make out. Are you sure you’ve never slept with Linden?”
I shake my head violently. “I haven’t.”
“Well, that’s too bad. That was some kiss.”
“Is that so?”
“Yeah,” she says. “I swear even James was jealous at one point. It was pretty smoking. But it was also a dare. I mean, Nadine made me kiss Aaron, it’s only fair. The damn chick can talk the talk but she can’t walk the walk.” She reaches into her bra and pulls out a red lipstick, swiping it on her lips before offering it to me. I politely decline.
“I think I’m going for a little walk,” I tell her.
“Okay,” she says warily. “But don’t go too far. And don’t ignore the party for too long. We are all your friends out there. Nadine isn’t. She doesn’t count so ignore her like the rest of us do.”
I nod and head out the door. The wind is picking up again and I zip my jacket up to my neck. I have no plans in going far at all, in fact I make it about as far as the Suburban and then lean against it on the other side so I’m sheltered against the wind. In the distance I can hear the crack of the flames as the wind stirs it up and Aaron’s laughter. It should make me feel less alone, but it doesn’t.
Just what the fuck happened out there? Did that kiss actually exist or was it all in my head? Obviously Penny saw something between Linden and I – as did Nadine – but how much of that was because I was getting carried away? How much of that kiss was my wants, my desires, my doing?
And just what the hell was Linden going to think of me now?
I close my eyes and lean my head back against the passenger-side doorframe. I just want to go home. I want to get in the car and drive back to SF and go to my store and continue on with my little life. I work hard and I have no time for anything, but it’s safe. Aaron is safe. Everything is so fucking safe.