“Caroline, you’re always a sweetheart.” Linden raises his shot to her. “Come on Steph, let’s toast Caroline.”
“To Caroline!” we say in unison. She just shakes her head and walks away while we slam the shots back down the hatch. It burns but the heat turns pleasant in seconds. It reminds me very much of the heat between my legs. One mention of a BJ, even in the weird roundabout drunken way that Linden just did, and I’m picturing his cock, how hard it is between my hands, his salty taste as I lick his tip.
“One more,” Linden says, putting the other shot in my hand. We tip those shots back even quicker. Then he gets out of his chair, lowering his voice, “Meet me in the women’s washroom in one minute.”
He crosses the bar to the back. I love watching him go. The confident swagger he has, the sight of his muscles moving under his clothes, the wide expanse of his shoulders and the way his body slides down into a perfect V, those indents on the small of his back that I love to rub and lick. Of course no one can see that with his shirt on but I always know they are there.
Once he disappears into the back, I get up and slowly, ever so casually, look around the bar. People are laughing, someone is singing Santa Baby in a disgustingly sweet tone, a glass breaks somewhere in the background. At the table Kayla and Dan are talking about something and by the front door James and Penny are having a discussion. It looks like a heated one, which means they aren’t paying attention to us but it also makes me wonder if that’s what’s been wrong with Penny lately.
I feel hit with guilt over that. Had I been around more often, like I used to be, I would probably know exactly what’s going on. But I haven’t been. Things haven’t just been changing between Linden and me, they’ve been changing between everyone.
I shake my head, not willing to bring myself down tonight. For all I know, Penny and James are fine. And Linden and I? We’re more than fine.
I walk over to the bathrooms as casually as possible and do a quick knock on the women’s door.
“Hello?” I ask sweetly.
“Who is it?” Linden answers in a high-pitched voice. It’s eerily similar to his Robert Plant impression.
“A Disney princess,” I answer. I wait a moment, feeling the anticipation build, and the door unlocks.
I quickly step inside and see Linden on the other side, staring at me with a twisted smile. The bathroom has two stalls, a handicapped one and a normal one but luckily you can lock the entire area as a whole. I barely have a chance to lock the door behind me before I’m pressed back against by Linden’s sheer force.
My body operates on pure instinct. It craves him as much as my heart and mind and soul do. As he presses against me, breathing hard and kissing me, messy and wet, I put my hands around his shoulders and relish the ridges of his back muscles as I pull him in.
One of his hands is lost in my hair, tugging on it in short jabs while the other is lifting up the skirt of my dress. Once he discovers I’m not wearing underwear, he lets out a deep moan that I feel vibrate through me and he explores me with his fingers.
“So wet,” he murmurs. “My baby gets so fucking wet for me.” He sticks three of his large, long fingers inside me and I clench around them. “So greedy too.”
“Just shut up and fuck me already,” I hiss into his ear.
He laughs, low and rich, pulling back my hair at the same time before he sinks his lips and teeth down the exposed front of my neck. “No patience.”
“Not here, not now,” I tell him. “Not with you.”
“I’ve made you an animal.”
“So then you should act like one.”
He pauses and looks up at me, giving me the most devious look. “Is that so?” Like his cock, his accent thickens when he’s turned on and it ripples down my back. I clench around him again, wanting him in deeper but he withdraws his fingers and goes to undo his belt.
While I hear the quick zip of his fly, he scoops his arm around me and whirls me around so that I’m facing the bathroom stall. He kicks the door in and then pushes me through until my hands are up against the cool tiled wall.
“Spread your legs, wide,” he demands and before I can do so, his body is pushing between them. “Wider,” he growls.
I go as wide as I can without my heels slipping and try to control my stance. I’m not one to shy away from dirt in sexual situations but I do have to say I’m glad that the bathroom is spotless tonight. I’m not sure the men’s bathroom would be the same but even then there’s a thrill about needing something so bad, you don’t care where you get it.
This is one of those situations.
Linden pulls my skirt up and slips his hand between my ass cheeks, entering one finger into me. I flinch a bit – I wasn’t expecting that – but he quickly removes his finger and uses his hand to steady his cock.
“Maybe later?” he playfully suggests.
“Maybe.”
He then primes himself at my opening and waits for a few beats. I can feel the heat coming off of him, his size and immensity at my back, the way his eyes burn into me. I know he’s looking at my ass, at his dick as he’s about to push its inflexible length inside me. Before I can urge him in, he pushes with one large, powerful thrust.
My fingers clench against the tiles, my elbows and knees locking to keep me in place. I can’t help the cry that escapes from my lips, and then the soft “oh,” as he slowly, agonizingly, pulls himself out.
This man is larger than life.
He is my life.
He is my Linden.
And he’s pounding me from behind in the woman’s washroom.
With one hand gripping the top of the bathroom stall and the other holding me in place at the waist, he drives himself in with hot, deep jabs that hits the right spot every time.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he hisses, inhaling sharply. “Baby, I’m coming, I’m coming.”
Before I even have a chance to try and catch up, he lets go of my waist and slides a finger over my clit, petting it twice, and that’s all it takes to set me off like a bomb.
I explode outwardly, until I feel like there is nothing left and he explodes into me. I can feel him inside, hot and potent as I throb around him and then his arm is under my belly, holding me up while my legs begin to give up.
I almost fall in the toilet. That would have been a tough one to explain.
“That was incredible,” I whisper, trying to catch my breath, to bring my head back down from swimming in the stars.
He kisses the back of my bare shoulders. “Now who is being cheesy?”
I turn around and give him a sloppy grin. He’s got that look I love in his eyes; sleepy, happy and satisfied. I love it because I’m the only one who gives him that, the only one who can render such gentleness from this bear of a man.
He bends down and pulls a few swatches of toilet paper off the roll and then sweeps it up my inner thighs in a very soft, tender fashion.
“People will get suspicious if you have semen on your legs,” he explains with a smile before tossing the paper in the toilet. “Personally, I love the look on you.”
We step out of the stall and quickly smooth ourselves over in the mirror. I’m just about to unlock the door to head out first when there’s a knock at it.
I freeze. Maybe if I don’t say anything, they’ll just go away. I look at Linden and put my finger to my mouth.
The person knocks again and says, “Hello? Steph?”
It’s Kayla.
Damn. Well, I guess it could be worse.
I motion for Linden to go into the other stall which he does and then I unlock the door, opening it a crack.
“Hey,” I say brightly. “What’s up?”
“What are you doing in there, I’ve been looking for you.”
“Uh, I had stomach problems.”
“So you locked the whole area?”
“Bad stomach problems.”
She grimaces and then looks over my shoulder. “Who is that?” she asks and then she’s pushing
open the door and stepping into the room.
“Linden?” she asks, staring down at his shoes. Not many guys wore combat boots today.
“No, it’s some random guy,” I quickly say.
“Who, Ireland Brownnoser?” she says and then pushes open the door to the stall. “I knew it!” she exclaims.
Linden emerges from the bathroom, not looking as sheepish as I would have expected.
“Shhhh!” I hush her and go to lock the bathroom door behind me. “Keep it down. No one knows.”
“No shit, no one knows,” she says, narrowing her eyes at Linden. “God, Stephanie, how could you with this jackass?”
“Uh, you did it with this jackass,” Linden points out.
“Linden, shut up,” I tell him. I turn to Kayla and give her a pleading looks. “Please don’t tell anyone. We just are figuring shit out and don’t want people to know.”
She folds her arms and taps her foot, the bottom of her shoe echoing in the room. “Mmm hmmm. And how long were you two going to fool around for?”
I look at Linden and shrug. “Forever?”
Kayla lets out an exasperated sigh. “I knew it. I knew something was up.”
“Well hopefully no one else will know.”
“Yeah right. You can’t hide this shit forever. You should just go out there in the middle of the room and tell everyone. Get it over with.”
I shake my head. “No. Just because two friends are fucking each other doesn’t mean the whole world deserves to know about it.”
She gives me a caustic look. “Actually, I think your closest friends deserve to know about it.” Then she turns and heads to the door, shooting me a look over her shoulder. “And if you think you’re just friends still, you’ve got another think coming.”
Then she leaves. The tension stays with us in the washroom.
I give Linden an apologetic look. “Sorry. She’s pushy.”
He nods. “I know. Well, hopefully she won’t blab.”
“She won’t.” But I’m starting to wonder just how long we can keep this charade going. Something has to give. We both can’t keep lying. If James is the problem, well, then at this point it’s James’s problem and not ours.
But tonight isn’t the time to talk about it. Tonight is about having fun. After the New Year, then we’ll come clean. We’ll sit James down and explain to him that…well, we’ll try and define what we are. And then hopefully he’ll understand. It might be weird for him at first but over time I think he’ll see that nothing has really changed between the three of us.
And yet as I kiss Linden on the cheek and then make my way out into the bar, pretending I was never in the washroom with him, I know everything has changed already.
I have no idea if it can ever go back.
***
Hours later, after the party ended and too much alcohol and Christmas cookies were consumed, I end up at Linden’s place.
It’s starting to feel like home to me. It helps that his apartment is new and not leaky. Not that my apartment leaks anymore, thanks to him and his handyman skills, but there is something about Linden’s that makes me feel so safe.
Maybe because I’m never there alone, I’m always with him. Whether we’re making scrambled eggs together in the morning, binge watching TV shows on Netflix, or just getting off in the shower, he’s always there.
He’s steady. He’s reliable. He is my rock.
He is my Linden.
Always has been.
Always will be.
This night though, after the hot fuck in the bathroom, being found out by Kayla, getting drunk on Jameson and Burgundy Lion merriment, I feel like he’s more than all those things.
He is my lover.
And my love.
And I can’t keep these butterflies in my chest any longer. I want to let them out. I want them to touch him, graze him with feather soft wings, so that he knows just how I feel about him.
We tear off our clothes and climb into the crisp sheets of his bed. We are both too tired and still too satisfied to have sex, so we curl up in each other arms. He kisses my temple, his lips lingering there, as he holds me close.
I don’t want him to ever let go. He told me he wouldn’t.
“Linden,” I say softly, so soft that I’m not even sure if I’ve spoken or if my words have disintegrated into the air. Everything has more meaning when it’s late and you’re in the dark.
There is a long pause and then he answers. “Baby blue.”
“I…,” I begin and then suddenly everything I was about to say – that one simple phrase – is stripped from me. I can’t continue. I don’t just love Linden, it is so much more than that. It’s something beyond words, beyond such a common, every day thing. You see ‘I love you’ written everywhere and I’m suddenly struck at how it’s just not enough. It doesn’t describe how I feel.
“What?” he whispers, his lips now brushing against my ear. He holds me tighter. “Please tell me.”
I swallow and start again. “Linden. There is a space in my chest that I’ve never noticed before. It’s like, all this time, I’ve had a whole other heart in there and that heart holds a whole other world. I never really noticed it because it was hidden. It wasn’t activated. It wasn’t shining and so I couldn’t see it. But now it is.” A tear trickles down my face but I don’t wipe it away. “You’ve made it shine, Linden. That new heart, that new world, it’s all you. I feel like it takes up every inch of my body, like I’m blooming each day. You’re in me and I can’t hide it or contain it or ignore it. You blind me. You are me.” I take in a deep breath. “I guess I’m trying to say that I love you.”
Silence. It’s as thick as the night. I hold my breath, waiting for his response, wondering what he’s going to say. In this moment that drags on and on, I am filled with hope and I am filled with fear. Because as much as Linden makes me feel like I have a love inside I can’t even begin to contain, I’m scared he doesn’t feel the same way. That he doesn’t even come close.
I’m scared now that I’ve scared him away.
Oh god, why isn’t he saying something?
I panic. “Maybe that was too much, maybe-“
“Shhh,” he says, turning my head so that I’m staring into his eyes. They are so deep and unreadable in the dark. But when he turns his head just enough, the light from outside catches in them. They are watering.
I feel like I’m a dam about to burst.
“Stephanie,” he says, his voice soft but choked. “Did you know that no one has ever told me that they loved me?”
It feels like there’s a rock on my chest. “What?!”
“It’s true,” he says. “I’ve never heard anyone tell me they loved me.”
“But, but…” I think back, scrolling through memories. Hadn’t I ever told him that, as a friend? Hadn’t James? Hadn’t his parents, his brother? “Nadine?” I ask.
He shakes his head only slightly. “No one. Nadine and I were very close but those exact words were never chosen. Believe me. I know. I know this because now I’ve heard them for the first time, just now, from you, and you can never forget something like that.”
But his parents never said they loved him. My heart is crumbling for him. I want to cry.
“And because no one has ever told me,” he goes on quietly, “I never had anyone to tell. I didn’t really know what love was because no one defined it for me. I only knew what it wasn’t. But you, Steph, you’ve always been different. You’ve had my heart from day one. James saw you first but I can guarantee you had my heart before you had his. I’ve never got to tell you this, because I kept this love to myself. If no one would share with me, I wouldn’t share with them. I was a greedy fucker.” He pauses. “But I loved you. Never as a friend. Always as something more. From the moment you walked into the bar, you owned the word and what it meant for me. I prayed and I dreamed that one day I would get to tell you myself. That no matter how you felt, I would tell you that I loved you and nothing could change that. Tha
t it was mine to give to you.” He inhales deeply and says, “And so, I love you, baby blue. I am in love with you. You are love to me. And I’m honored I’m finally able to tell you.”
Now I am speechless. Floored. And my soul is oh so fucking full I can barely live. I can only grab his face and kiss him as sweetly, deeply and sincerely as I can. And then I laugh and smile and he does the same.
“I suppose though,” he says, wiping away a tear but still grinning like a crazy person, “if I had more practice in saying it, it wouldn’t have been such a convoluted speech.”
“Speak for yourself,” I tell him. “We both took the roundabout way to say three words.”
“But sometimes those words aren’t enough,” he says, kissing my hand.
“No, they aren’t. But you are.”
That whole new heart inside me is growing. I don’t think I could ever make it stop.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
LINDEN
There is a problem.
There is a major fucking problem.
I’d just put the empty bowl of cereal in the dishwasher when there was a knock at my door. Considering Stephanie just left me three minutes ago, I assumed it was her forgetting something. Maybe, my brain wants to think, she came back for one more round and can’t get enough of me.
I opened the door, about to say exactly that (“Back for more, baby?”) but I am so glad I didn’t.
James is standing on the other side.
“Uh,” I say, trying to find the words but all I can think of is, did he see Steph as she left? Does he suspect? Why is he here? Is it even possible for me to play it cool right now? I attempt to, anyway. “Hi James.”
“Hey,” he says. His voice is low. He doesn’t seem angry, so that’s a good thing. But he does seem troubled. Even more so when his gaze briefly lowers and he flinches. “Maybe you should put on some pants.”
I smile, suddenly aware that I’m only in my boxer briefs. That’s not normally a big, big deal, but since I was just thinking of Steph, I know I have a bit of a chubby going on.
“Sorry,” I say, quickly turning around but gesturing for him to come inside. “Come in, what’s up man?” I quickly head to the bedroom and look around for signs of Steph. She’s pretty good about not leaving her stuff around – I can’t even convince her to leave a toothbrush, she just carries it in one of her millions of purses – so I shuck on a pair of jeans and go back out.