A Beautiful Struggle (22 page)

“It’s ok. I'll be fine.” Famous last words.

I think we did six shots in total before
moving on to drinking vodka mixers, we were all laughing and dancing and just
being generally stupid – as you tend to be when thoroughly intoxicated.

The dance floor was packed. It was hot and
bodies were pressed against bodies gyrating away to the music under the
constant flashing lights. The music was so loud that I could feel it vibrating
in my chest.

Elliot and I broke away from the rest of
the group. I had my arms wrapped around his neck and was swaying to the music.
Grabbing a hold of my head to still my movement, he pulled me towards him,
kissing me. Long deep devouring kisses that travelled down my neck and back up
to my mouth. I started to get so lost in my body’s desire for him that my
awareness faltered. I started writhing up against him, feeling him becoming
aroused as I rubbed him through his jeans.

I felt a vibration as he moaned into my
mouth and pulled my body closer to his, gripping my behind and letting his hand
travel under my dress to rub between my legs, I lifted one of my legs and
wrapped it around his waist, pressing myself against his erection. He gripped
my buttocks tightly and pressed himself harder against me as we continued to
move to the music in the middle of a crush of bodies.

With the alcohol removing any concern for
what I was about to do, I reached between us and undid his zipper, sliding his
erection out and taking it inside me via the side of my panties. We both gasped
as we made contact, never breaking the connection between our mouths. I kept my
leg up and wrapped tightly around his waist as we moved our hips together – my
head was filled with the rush of desire I felt for Elliot, the dizzying effects
of the alcohol and the thump of the music; I didn’t care where we were, and I
didn’t spare a thought for getting caught, and obviously neither did he.

He groaned into my mouth as he came, and I
experienced a sheer rush of adrenaline, enjoying what it was I did to him; what
we did to each other, our desire was hard to control while sober – with us both
being drunk, neither of us stood a chance.

I put my leg back down as he slid out of me
and straightened himself up as discreetly as possible, he held my face in his
hands and grinned wildly at me, laughing and shaking his head before he kissed
me again, his expression said ‘How do you get me to do these things?’ which was
becoming a regular thing between us. I laughed with him, as we continued to
dance and kiss and touch each other, ignoring everyone else around us.

My mouth had gone dry so I told Elliot I
needed some water. He immediately volunteered to go and get me some. Nodding, I
told him I’d meet him at the bar – I needed to visit the ladies' room to clean
up after our little tryst. He nodded ok and we went in opposite directions,
holding on to each other until we couldn’t reach anymore, we couldn’t wipe the
smiles from our faces.

When I reached the ladies' room, the line
was snaking towards the door as it typically did in nightclubs. As I waited I
saw Stephanie talking to another girl while she touched up her makeup. Spotting
me too, she smiled at me in the mirror. Once she had finished applying her lip
gloss, she came over to where I was waiting in the line.

“You look like you’ve been having a good
time!” she cooed at me.

I laughed and nodded as the other girl came
and stood beside Stephanie, “So you’re Elliot’s girlfriend?” she held out her
hand to shake mine, “I’m Jasmine,” she told me.

“Hi, I’m Katrina,” I shook her hand in
return.

“So you have to tell us, how did you land
Elliot? He never goes out with any of us – not through a lack of trying on our
part,” Jasmine laughed. “So we’re all dying to know how you did it.”

“I didn’t do anything Jasmine. We just get
along.”

“Yes but I get along with Elliot too, what
makes us so different?” She didn’t seem to be saying this to be snide, there
was more of a genuine curiosity behind her words. I have to admit that I could
see where she was coming from, she really was a gorgeous girl, with dark
chocolate eyes, honey kissed hair and full lips. She was probably a head
shorter than me and had a classic hour-glass figure that men drool over. I
could understand that when you look like her, you are used to having men all
over you, so when a guy doesn’t give you the attention you are after – it could
be a little confronting.

Compared to her, I felt enormous and
awkward. I get my fair share of attention from men, but it’s rare that I get
that attention from someone who is taller than me. Normally, I find that the
tall fit men, I am interested in are always attracted to girls who look exactly
like the one standing in front of me.

“Jasmine!” Stephanie admonished her.

“What? I’m not being mean, I’m just
wondering is all,” Jasmine defended herself.

“I’m not offended it’s fine. I understand –
and seriously, I didn’t do anything special; we just get along. We train
together at lunch times and everything just kind of progressed from there.”

“Ah, see! I knew there had to be something
special about you – you’re a fitness nut too,” she said waggling her finger at
me and smiling like she broke the code.

It was my turn to use the toilets, so I
told them that I’d see them out there. When I had finished and left the cubicle
I almost laughed aloud when I saw my reflection in the mirror. My mouth was all
red from all the kissing earlier, and my hair was slightly messed up – I patted
some water over my face and wiped a bit of smudged mascara from under my eyes.
The girl next to me offered me her lip gloss and I happily accepted, applying
it before I smoothed down my hair and teetered back out to the dance floor
feeling slow and light headed.

Making my way over to the bar, I couldn’t
see Elliot. I looked towards the tables we had been sitting at earlier and
found him there talking to Michael and Gary. When he saw me, he smiled, holding
up the bottle of water he had gotten for me. I walked over to him and took it,
gratefully drinking half of it. Waiting for me to screw the lid back on, he
pulled me down to sit on his lap, absent-mindedly caressing my thigh as he
continued to talk to his friends.

A few others came over to join us, and some
of the girls asked me if I wanted to go and dance again while the men all
talked and drank. I was about to go, but Elliot tightened his grip around my
waist and implored me to “stay” before kissing me behind my ear, my heart
flipped with emotion and the intimacy of that one word – wild horses couldn’t
have dragged me off his lap at that point.

When the club closed we all went outside
together, some wanted to continue to party elsewhere while others said their
goodbyes and made their way to the taxi rank. Elliot’s friends were very
complimentary towards me and said they hoped to see me again soon.

Elliot put his arm around me, and we walked
over to join the queue so we could catch a taxi back to his place, “Did you
have a good time tonight?” he asked me.

“I did. Your friends are really nice.
Thanks for introducing me.”

“I’m glad you like them. They seemed to
like you.”

“Well, I think I was a bit of an enigma to
them. They said you don’t bring girls out very often.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Good,” I told him seriously, I didn't
think I could have taken it if I was perceived as just another girl hanging off
Elliot’s arm.

We stopped when we reached the end of the
line, and he turned to me, “I’m not hiding my feelings for you anymore Katrina.
I don’t give a fuck about work anymore. I just care about being with you.”

“Really?” In my drunken mind, that was one
of the most romantic things anyone had ever said to me. I kissed him, emotion
mixed with alcohol swirling within me. It was at that moment, I knew that I had
fallen in love with him.

A night of dancing had left my feet aching,
so I took my shoes off in the cab and walked up to his flat in bare feet.

We weren’t as urgent with each other when
we got inside this time, instead he led me to his room, and we took our time,
slowly undressing and touching each other. I loved to run my hands over his
chest and down over his abs, feeling the hard strength rippling just under his
smooth skin.

When he laid me on the bed, he took his
weight on his hands and held himself over me looking down, searching my face
with his eyes. I smiled, languishing under his gaze as I reached up to run my
hands through his thick hair.

“I’m in love with you,” he said seriously.

“I’m glad, because I’m in love with you
too,” I whispered back, my voice too choked with emotion to make any real
sound.

He leaned down and kissed me, making love
to me so tenderly that I almost cried with the beauty of it. I had never
thought that I would be this enraptured with a man again after what had
happened with Christopher but here I was feeling like I had no option but to
surrender to what I was feeling and let it consume me.

I’d like to say that the next week we both
went and found new jobs, riding off into the sunset together, but that’s just
not how it was. Instead, when I arrived at work on Monday, I saw that Elliot
wasn’t in yet. I tried calling him on his mobile and didn’t get an answer.
Concerned, I called his house, feeling surprised when his father answered.

“Oh, hi, is Elliot there at all?” I asked
politely.

“Who’s this?” his father demanded.

My heart skittered across my chest
nervously, “Um, it’s Katrina, is he there?”

“Katrina huh? And who are you to my son
Katrina? Because I haven’t heard your name before.”

I stammered taken aback at his abrasive
tone, “I, uh…”

“You wouldn’t happen to be the little
westie girl he seems so willing to ruin his career over would you?”

I could feel my face burning; this isn’t
what I had expected when I dialled this number, “Can you just tell him I called
please?”

He didn’t answer, instead he grunted and
hung the phone up in my ear. 

The ‘westie girl’? Was that man serious? I
understood that Western Sydney came with its fair share of stereotypes, but
being from there didn’t automatically make me classless and uncouth.

I was fuming, feeling agitated I needed to
talk to someone about it - David was out of the question, and my mother would
panic. My brother would be at work and unable to talk, and I didn’t really have
any close girlfriends to talk to. I decided my best options were to talk to
Kayley, who I trusted, or Carmen, who was in a similar situation to me.
Weighing my options, I decided on Carmen and went to her office.

She looked up at me and smiled when I
tapped on her door. “Are you busy right now?” I asked.

“No, not really, come on in. Is something
wrong?” she asked when she saw the anxious look on my face.

I kept my voice low so any passer-by
wouldn’t overhear what we were talking about, “Yeah, it’s kind of relationship
stuff - is that ok? It’s just you’re the only one who really knows what’s going
on right now.”

“It’s fine, Katrina. Why don’t you shut the
door and take a seat,” she told me kindly. I had become quite friendly with
Carmen since I had been working here, sometimes catching the train home
together in the evenings or stopping by for a chat with each other during work
hours. I think it was nice for both of us to have someone around that we could
talk freely with.

I told her briefly about how my
relationship with Elliot had been progressing and how we had spoken about
getting new jobs so the policy wouldn’t affect us anymore. I then told her
about the conversation with Elliot’s father this morning and how he called me a
‘westie girl’.

“So, I’m more than a little confused right
now. One minute he tells me he loves me and the next he’s not answering his
phone, and I am getting insulted by his father because I come from Western
Sydney. What does he think? That I’m some uneducated low-life who is set upon
dragging his son down with me? What the hell difference does it make where I’m
from?!"

“Well from what I know Elliot’s family has
a lot of money. With the exception of his mother, they're all born and bred
along the northern beaches and have that upper class mentality at times. I
copped it once from one of Andrew’s friends, I can’t remember what I did, but
he said to me ‘You can take the girl out of Penrith, but you can’t take the
Penrith out of the girl.’ – I was livid, and I wanted to scratch his eyes out
for being such a dickhead; but that would have just proven him right, so I
smiled and laughed like it was nothing instead.”

“What did Andrew do?”

“Nothing, we had our first major fight over
it and almost broke up. Obviously, we didn’t and now he defends me with a bit
more gusto. Maybe you just need to give Elliot a bit of time to stand up to his
dad? He gets a lot of pressure from his father, since he still pays for
everything. Junior solicitors don’t make a lot of money, so he’s still needs
his dad to help make ends meet. Just be patient, if he was willing to change
everything for you yesterday, I’m sure his feelings haven’t changed that much
over night.”