Leigh sighed. “He’s really not like that, Russell. He’s not a drunk, he’s just…just different. He’s not quite as regimented as we are.”
Dammit. This was definitely not the right approach. Any conversation she allowed to veer toward Jesse would definitely end in a fight, something that, despite her very best efforts, seemed to be happening a lot lately.
“Regimented?”
“You know what I mean.”
“It sounds like you think he’s all chill and Zen and that I’m stressed out and…and…regimented.”
“We are different people, Russell. And in my opinion, we’re the ones living like responsible adults while he’s lost and directionless, okay?” Leigh didn’t acknowledge to Russell that although this had been her opinion a mere month earlier, Jesse’s lifestyle no longer seemed so unappealing. “Look, why are we even talking about him? Who cares? I called to see what was going on with you. How was today’s postproduction meeting?”
“It was fine. Nothing out of the ordinary.”
“Russell, don’t sulk. It’s unbecoming.”
“Thank you for the etiquette lesson, dear. I’ll remember that.”
“Why are you being like this?” Leigh sighed. She had merely wanted to check in, exchange a few pleasantries, and get back to her book, but she sensed that Russell was preparing a huge State of the Relationship talk. They were his specialty and her worst nightmare.
“Leigh, what’s going on with us?” His voice grew softer, gentler. “Seriously, I think we should talk about it.”
Leigh took a deep breath and exhaled silently. She strove for calm although her insides were screaming, No, no, no! I’m sick of talking about it. Let’s not talk about everything. Can’t we just tell each other about our days and move on? Please don’t do this to me! and said, “What do you mean, Russ? There’s nothing wrong with us.”
He was silent for a minute. “Do you really feel that way? Doesn’t it seem like there’s a lot of distance? And what am I supposed to say when people ask why we haven’t had our engagement party yet? That my fiancée doesn’t seem to have time, even though we’ve been engaged for five months?”
Oh god, please not this again. “You know what a big deal this is—why can’t you be understanding?”
“Yeah, well, call me crazy, but I guess I thought that getting married would be a big deal for you, too.”
“Of course it is. Which is why I want to wait until everything can be perfect.”
This wasn’t completely untrue. Leigh knew she was dragging her feet with all the plans. Part of it was just an overall lack of interest in all things wedding-related—she wasn’t the girl who picked out her gown at age twelve—and part of it was the dread of dealing with both her mother and Russell’s, but when she was completely honest with herself, Leigh knew it went beyond that.
For a while she could tell herself that everything was moving too quickly. After all, it felt like only yesterday that they were kissing for the first time on a bench in Union Square. She’d liked Russell very much then, too—she’d thought he was sweet and good-looking, and she was flattered that he was interested in her. She hoped they would date and the relationship would develop or disintegrate naturally. Either two people grow closer and thrive, or the connection slowly fizzles and it’s time to break up. She’d enjoy her time with Russell and not get all stressed out about what the future held. Which had worked fairly well, until he had gone and proposed. And not just proposed, but slid that ring onto her finger while Leigh sat frozen in shock, and then kissed her mouth as it hung open in disbelief. She had never been less prepared for anything in her entire life, and it didn’t take a genius to see that she’d been haunted by doubts these past few months. What she didn’t know how to explain to Russell—or anyone else—was what, exactly, was wrong. Nothing had changed between them since they’d first met; he was still every bit as sweet and kind and understanding. The problem was that Leigh was still waiting to fall head over heels in love with him, and everyone else—her friends, her parents, and worst of all Russell—thought she was already there. In light of all this, was it really so strange that she just wanted to take her time?
It was his turn to sigh. “I understand. I just wish there was, I don’t know, a little excitement in your voice. Do you even talk about it to the girls?”
“Of course I do,” Leigh lied. Emmy and Adriana asked about the upcoming wedding plans incessantly—they desperately wanted to plan a bachelorette party—but Leigh always found herself changing the subject. Why didn’t they understand that this was all going way too fast? Even thinking this, though, made her feel guilty, so she softened her voice and said, “Baby, I’m excited about everything. We’ll get married, and when that’s finished we’ll go somewhere exotic and very, very far away, like the Maldives, and we’ll just relax and enjoy each other, okay? I promise.”
“Will you wear that bikini I love? The one with the metal circles on the hips and in the middle of the top?”
“Definitely.”
“And you won’t bring your laptop or a single manuscript, not even just for reading on the plane?”
“Not a single one,” she said with certainty, although this gave her pause. “It will be perfect.”
“Deal,” Russell said, sounding as though the issue had been completely resolved.
“I’ll call you later to say good night, okay?”
“You’re definitely back tomorrow, right? We need at least one night alone together before the big Meet the Parents Thanksgiving.”
“Of course we do, baby. I’ll definitely be home tomorrow night,” Leigh forced herself to say. She wasn’t particularly dreading Thanksgiving in Connecticut, even though she probably should be, considering Russell’s entire family was flying in to spend the holiday with hers, but her desperation to hang up the phone was overtaking everything else right then.
“Mmmwah!” Russell made a loud kissing noise into the receiver, a little inside thing they’d always done when they were apart.
Leigh did it back, feeling silly and slightly annoyed and then guilty for feeling silly and slightly annoyed. They hung up and she felt relieved, then exhausted, too tired even to reopen her book.
She awoke with the disconcerting feeling that someone was watching her. She glanced out the window and could see a few scattered snowflakes highlighted by the light above the front door. The room was nearly pitch-black, but she could feel someone else’s presence.
“Jesse?”
“Hey. Sorry. Did I scare you?”
As her eyes adjusted she saw him sitting across the room in the mahogany rocking chair. His hands were crossed over his chest and his head rested against the chair back. The smell of fresh garlic and baking bread wafted in from somewhere.
“What are you doing here?”
“Just admiring your sleep.”
“My sleep?”
“I came up to wake you for dinner, but you looked so peaceful. I don’t really sleep, pretty much ever, so it’s always nice to watch someone else. Probably creepy, but I hope you don’t mind.”
“It’s actually ironic, because I don’t sleep anywhere else but here. There’s something about being out here that’s better than Bambien,” Leigh said.
“Isn’t it Ambien? Without the B?”
“Bath plus Ambien equals Bambien. But even that only works some of the time.”
Jesse laughed and Leigh felt a surge of happiness. And for the first time in her thirty years of life, Leigh did something without giving any thought whatsoever to any potential consequences or reactions. With a completely blank mind and absolutely no anxiety, she climbed off the bed and walked over to the rocking chair. Not even standing above him made her nervous; she extended her hand and, when he accepted it with only the slightest confusion on his face, she tugged him upward. They were face-to-face, something that felt strange because Russell was so much taller. Leigh looked down at her hands, interlaced with his, a moment of intimacy that was undeniable, unmistaka
ble. He unhooked their hands and put them behind her neck and entangled his fingers in her hair, and their lips pressed together and opened; Jesse’s tongue on her own was more surreal than exciting, strange, or foreign.
From there everything moved quickly. They fell back onto the bed and within seconds they were naked. It was a violent, needy sex Leigh had rarely experienced. Even though he played with her hair, cupped her face, kissed the tip of her nose, stroked her back—he didn’t hesitate to pin her down almost roughly, hands over her head. Afterward, Jesse pulled her close, still on top of the covers, and ran his fingers lightly across Leigh’s shoulders until goose bumps rose along the backs of her arms. He asked if she was okay, did she feel all right, did she want some water? When Leigh was quiet for a few minutes, he lifted her chin and kissed her with such softness she thought she might die. They kissed like that for minutes, many minutes, lazily and languidly, and when Jesse pressed the flat part of his tongue across her bottom lip, Leigh had the sensation that she could disappear entirely into his mouth. Neither lifted their head from the pillow; they turned and kissed, so warmly and softly until something snapped and the urgency became overwhelming; their teeth clashed and their nails dug and their hands again grabbed and pulled.
Afterward Leigh rested her head on his chest and through half-closed eyes peeked to see Jesse awake, looking at her. Not with curiosity or love, though; he looked as though he was trying to remember every detail. Eye contact during sex was supposed to be the ultimate intimacy, a glimpse into the soul, blah, blah, blah. But no matter how close she’d felt to Russell or to other guys before him, meeting eyes had always felt forced or contrived, as though they’d both read the same article insisting lovemaking included eye contact. It always made her uncomfortable, took her out of the moment, but this was different. When Jesse’s eyes found hers it was hard to breathe; no one had ever looked at her like that before. It was out of a movie, and Leigh felt like a movie star. It no longer mattered that she had a small rash on her belly from an allergic reaction to a new lotion, or that Jesse’s skin was a bit too pale for such dark chest hair, or that they were both red and sweaty and panting; they had become the two sexiest people on earth. They had, in a very real way, found each other.
At some point they fell asleep because when Leigh opened her eyes the sky was beginning to lighten. She eased herself out from under the throw blanket Jesse had pulled over them, and she tiptoed to the bathroom across the hall, waiting for the floods of regret, guilt, and self-flagellation. Nothing came. Instead, she peed and braced herself for the familiar stinging of a UTI, but miraculously, she felt fine. Splashing water on her face, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror and nearly fainted. Her chin and cheeks were raw, and patches were lightly bleeding from beard burn; her lips were swollen; the skin on her neck was splotched red with teeth marks; her hair was tangled in ratty knots; there were bruises on her inner thighs from where he’d pushed himself against her. Her head throbbed from hitting the headboard, her pelvic bone ached from grinding, and the sensitive skin between her legs felt like it had been sandpapered. Even her feet ached from curling her toes for so many hours.
Never before had she felt so awful, if by awful one really means absolutely fucking fantastic. She returned to the guest room and found Jesse sitting in bed, still naked under the blanket. Light from the bedside window illuminated his face, and Leigh could now see the clock: 7:23 A.M. He looked up and, for the first time in hours, she was overcome with self-consciousness. She was standing there completely naked in the glow of full daylight before this man she barely knew, her author, for chrissake. Had she really done this?
“Leigh.”
She forced herself to look directly at him. The room was cold and she could feel the hair on her legs beginning to prickle.
“Leigh. Sweetheart. Come here.” He lifted the edge of the blanket and motioned for her to join him.
She climbed in next to him. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled the covers over them both. He kissed her on the forehead like her father used to when she was sick. And what her father would think if he could see her now…not just in bed with someone—bad enough for a dad—but with the man she had been assigned to edit…and what about Russell…her fiancé…she was still wearing the beautiful ring he’d placed on her finger only five months earlier. She was a filthy, disgusting slut, unworthy of all of them.
“You look like you’re in the throes of a crushing panic attack,” Jesse whispered in her ear. He pulled her even tighter against him, but it was protective, not sexual.
“I’m a filthy, disgusting, unworthy slut,” she said before she could stop herself, but the second the words were out she regretted them.
Expecting a denial or, at the very least, another hug and some sympathetic clucking—Russell’s specialty—Leigh was horrified, and then supremely pissed off, when Jesse started to laugh.
She wrenched her body away from his and stared, dumbstruck. “You think that’s funny? You think it’s amusing that I basically just ruined my life?”
He hugged her tighter and rather than feel suffocated like she usually did, Leigh allowed herself to relax. Jesse kissed her lips and forehead and each cheek before saying, “I’m only laughing because you remind me so much of myself.”
“Oh, great,” Leigh muttered.
“But we didn’t do anything wrong, Leigh.”
“What do you mean, we didn’t do anything wrong? I wouldn’t even know where to begin. Maybe with the fact that I’m engaged? Or you’re married? Or that we work together?”
She emphasized the working together bit, but it wasn’t until she’d listed everything that Leigh admitted something to herself: She’d been waiting for Jesse to offer a reasonable explanation for his marriage, something along the lines of “We’re actually divorced” or “I’m not really married.” She knew this was unlikely. But that hadn’t stopped Leigh from hoping.
He pressed his finger to her lips and shushed her, which she was surprised to discover she found cute and not enraging. “What happened between us happened naturally. We both wanted it. What’s wrong with that?”
“What’s wrong with that?” she snapped, her voice taking on a mean, almost vicious tone. “What about your wife?”
Jesse rolled over onto an elbow so he was hovering above Leigh and looked directly into her eyes. “I’m not going to patronize you with the usual shtick about how miserable we are and how she doesn’t understand me and how I’m about to leave her, because that’s not true and I don’t want to lie to you. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t extenuating circumstances. And it certainly doesn’t mean that I don’t want you desperately right now.”
Well, that was definitely not what she wanted to hear. The I-hate-my-wife-she-doesn’t-understand-me shtick would’ve been just fine as far as she was concerned. The fact that it wasn’t forthcoming made her even more acutely aware of how wrong this all was, something made more confusing by the fact that it all felt so right. So right? What the hell was she thinking? This was lunacy…. There was nothing right about betraying Russell or having sex with the man she was supposed to be working with. It had been a horrible lapse in judgment, inexcusable even, and it would be a miracle if they all got through this unscathed. Of course she could no longer edit Jesse, that much was clear, but that seemed an insignificant price to pay for her overwhelming stupidity.
It was time to leave. Immediately.
“What are you doing?” Jesse asked as Leigh wrenched herself out from under him and wrapped herself in the throw blanket. She grabbed her entire overnight bag and, with one hand clutching the blanket to ensure she remained covered, she half sprinted, half hobbled to the bathroom. Only after locking the door behind her did she allow the blanket to fall, but this time she couldn’t face her body in the mirror. Knowing she would only sob if she allowed herself the luxury of a shower, she pulled on a pair of clean underwear, jeans, and a button-down and wrapped her knotted, frizzy hair into a bun. She took the time only to
brush her teeth and, with that single task complete, Leigh clamped her jaw shut to keep herself from crying and opened the door.
He was standing in the doorway wearing a T-shirt and boxer shorts, looking miserable. Leigh wanted nothing more than to hug him, a desire she found both repellant and appealing, but she managed to squeeze past him without so much as brushing against his arm.
“Leigh, sweetheart, don’t do this,” he said, following her down the hall and then the stairs. “Sit with me for a minute. Let’s talk about this.”
She swept into the kitchen to gather her papers and notebooks and saw the remnants of the dinner they’d never gotten around to eating. A casserole dish of hardened lasagna rested on a hot plate between two place settings and two poured glasses of red wine; two simple silver candleholders were covered in melted ivory wax.
“I don’t want to talk. I want to leave,” Leigh said quietly, with no intonation.
“I know, and I’m asking you to wait.” Leigh glanced at him and noticed his stubble was sprinkled with gray and the hollows around his eyes were so dark they could be mistaken for bruises.
“Jesse, please.” She sighed, her back to him as she slid her files into her bag. She remembered she’d left Something Blue in the guest room upstairs, but there was no way she was going back for it now.
He placed his hand on her shoulder and pulled at her gently to turn her around. “Look at me, Leigh. I want you to know that I don’t regret last night at all.”
For the first time since she’d gotten out of bed, Leigh met his gaze. She stared at him with her iciest narrowed-eye look and said, “Oh, I’m so relieved! Thank goodness you don’t regret what happened. I’ll sleep better tonight knowing that. In the meantime, get your hands off me.”