Holiday Hijinks (7 page)

“Obviously,” he says. “How do I know you’ll remember that next time you get skittish?”

I reach for the waist of his jeans and tug him closer. “You’ll have to drill it into me until I know it by heart.”

He shakes his head. I feel the hardness between his legs. “Damn, Ruthie,” he says, kissing me.

“So everything is back to normal?” I ask. He nods, but I can’t help but see the guarded shadow in his eyes. I’ll have to fix that.

The timer for the pasta beeps and I let him go. “Our room is to the right, second door. Go unpack and I’ll get this ready.”

He picks up his bags by the door but stops when he nears the stove. He kisses the back of my neck, and I smile to myself. He loves me and that’s all that matters right now.

Chapter 10

The next day we’re blessed with good weather. Warm for the season and pleasant enough to sit on the edge of the beach in a tank and shorts. I’ve got my bikini on underneath just to pretend it’s really summer. Unfortunately, Finley dipped her toe in the ocean and declared it, “Cold as a witch’s tit,” which was enough to keep me away.

“So he hasn’t given you the ring back yet?” she asks. We’re sprawled on lounge chairs futilely trying to catch winter rays. The boys toss a baseball back and forth closer to the water.

“Nope. I’m afraid to even bring it up.”

“You two sounded on good terms last night.”

“I owed him a little make up sex.”

“Sounded like you rocked his world,” she laughs. “Ryan was a little shocked. I may have to step up my game.”

“Yeah, I think Carter’s going to have to go to the hardware store. I’m pretty sure we broke the dresser.”

Finley’s jaw drops. “How the hell did you do that?”

“You don’t want to know.” It was really a matter of stability more than anything else. The mirror connected to the dresser couldn’t handle the force of Carter plowing into me from behind. I had to hold onto something.

“Well, I’m sure he’ll give the ring back soon enough—oh shit.” She’s staring at the boys and I see that Carter’s stripped off his shirt and tossed it on the sand. “I know
this breaks like, a thousand girl codes, but damn he’s spectacular.”

“It’s okay.” I eye the cut of muscle below his hips.
Spectacular indeed.

“He still never stops moving, does he?” Before the game of catch he built a sand castle, ran five miles and considered a swim.

“No. Never.”

The boys play for a bit longer and Finley and I talk about our holidays. I watch Carter’s every move. The way his muscles ripple and flex when he tosses the ball. The way his abs tense when he runs. He glances at me more than once and I know he
peacocks on purpose, because I’m a sucker for him and his body. He likes that I like it.

“You warm enough,” I ask when he walks up, tossing the ball and glove in Finley’s empty chair. She and Ryan went off for a walk down to the pier.

“Yeah, it feels good.” He stretches out on a towel he laid on the sand. After a minute I feel his fingers on my toes. “Ryan said there’s fireworks on the pier on New Year’s Eve. We can see them from the house.”

“That sounds fun.”

“You wore me out last night,” he says, closing his eyes. Soon his breathing evens out and he dozes off.

I close my own eyes, happy to h
ave the warm sun on my face, the roar of the ocean in my ears and my man nearby.

*

“Which bathing suit are you wearing under that?”

Carter follows me up the steps and down the boardwalk. We wash our sandy feet with the hose.

“Black.”

“Cherries or no?”

I lift up my shirt and give him a peek. A sly grin forms on his face. “You know I love that one.”

“I know.”

I turn and walk up the porch steps, swaying my hips. I love to tease him and he loves to be teased. I feel his finger dip beneath the top of my shorts, at the small of my back, and an excited chill runs down my spine.

“No.”

We both turn and face the door where Finley waits with her hands on her hips. “No?” I ask.

“I told you we were going shopping th
is afternoon and then having dinner. No sex.” Carter coughs at her forwardness, but Finley just rolls her eyes. “Please, like I can’t read the looks on your face by now. Of course you only have two expressions. Before sex and after sex. Save it ‘til later. Go shower and dress. We’re doing touristy stuff for the afternoon.”

She walks back inside and the screen door slams behind her.
Carter has a mixed expression of amusement and annoyance on his face, while I pout thinking about how my vagina really hates waiting. Then I have an idea.

I lean forward and whisper in his ear. “Meet me in the shower.”

We enter the house and find Finley waiting outside the bathroom door, hands on her hips. I spot Ryan on the couch reading a book.  He shakes his head in pity as we walk by. “What now?” I ask.

“Separate showers.
Don’t make me supervise.”

“You suck,” I tell her, pissed that she knows me so well.

*

Finley takes us to the tour
ist district of Myrtle Beach, a dozen stores with the same tacky nautical souvenirs. Everything is terrible yet we still manage to spend money on the most ridiculous things.  Who needs a bottle opener that looks like a shark? Apparently Ryan does.

We eat dinner
on an enclosed porch overlooking the water at a local bar. The booth is crammed in the back corner, away from the other customers. Country music plays over the loudspeakers and midway through dinner a band sets up on the tiny stage. Fried food seems to be the local favorite and Carter eats two baskets of hush puppies by himself.

“My coach is going to kill me when he sees how much weight I gained over the holiday.”
He rubs his sort-of bloated belly.

“Whatever,” Finley says. “You’ll burn that off and more with another round of the sexual Olympics tonight.”

“Come on,” I say, taking a sip of my margarita. “We’re not really that bad.”

Ryan snorts but says nothing.

“You two are a couple of nymphos,” Finley says. “Look, I’m not judging but really, you two can barely go a couple of hours without getting it on.”

“To be fair, we just went several days at my parent’s house without having sex.”

She narrows her eyes. “How long did you really last?”

Carter thinks about it and asks, “Does oral sex count as sex?”

Finley shouts “Yes!” at the same time that I yell, “No!”

“We lasted about 32 hours,” he says.

“It was more complicated than it sounds,” I defend.

Ryan hold
s out his fist and offers it to Carter to bump. Finley whacks her boyfriend on the head.

“What?”
he cries.

“
You know what, asshat,” she says. “Come on, dance with me.”

We’re left alone with the remains of a fried feast. I shift in the booth and say, “Do we have sex too much?”

“I’m sorry, what?” Carter asks looking at me like I’m crazy. He’s right. I am crazy and it’s Finley’s fault for bringing it up but it’s not like I haven’t thought about it before.

“Do we have sex too much? Like is this all our relationship is based on? Fucking and getting off?”

“Of course not. Do you?”

“No,” I say. “Except we kind of went bonkers over the break when we couldn’t have it all the time. And then when we did we got caught by my family. And then we totally melted down and semi-broke up.”

“That wasn’t all about sex, Ruthie.”

“No, but when we’re having sex everything is fine. We get along really great, but when it’s time to be real something happens
to us and we kind of fall apart.”

“Do you really think we can’t handle real life?
” he asks.

“No.”

“Then what’s this all about?”

I take a deep breath. “Are you going to give me the ring back?”

“Wait, what? The ring?”

“Yes, the ring you gave me for Christmas. Are you going to give it back?”

He runs his fingers over the top of his water glass. “No, not now.”

Oh.
“Why?”

“Because you’re not ready.
When I push you too fast,
that’s
when things fall apart between us. It has nothing to do with sex, but everything about you being afraid of commitment and me.”

He’s right, of course, but it doesn’t make the rejection feel any better. Carter sighs and grabs my hand. “
That ring is yours and only yours. But I’m saving it for when you’re ready and when you won’t run away fifteen minutes after I give it to you.”

“I’m such a flake.”

He scoots closer and kisses me. “No, you’re not. You’re just scared.”

“And you aren’t?”

“No.” He shrugs. “I’ve known you were the woman for me for a long time. I’ve experienced life without you. I don’t want to do it again.”

“How will you know when I’m ready?”

“I’ll know. Don’t worry.”

I realize then that age has nothing to do with commitment.
That someone can know what they want when they’re only 19. Carter knows. I can see it in his eyes and in the set of his jaw. He’s made up his mind.

“You’re it for me,” he says, softly in my ear. The familiar chill of arousal rushes through my body.

“I know we just talked about how we may have a sex problem and we both agreed that wasn’t true, but what does it mean if I tell you I’m not wearing underwear right now?”

“I’d say I’m really glad you wore that skirt for easy access.” His hand travels up my leg, to my upper thigh. He doesn’t go further which only makes me want him more.

“Finley’s going to be mad,” I say, calculating our options. There’s the bathroom or behind the building. We could go down to the beach or back to the car. His fingers stroke upward and I inhale, gripping the edge of my seat.

Or
, you know, we could handle this right here, in the dark corner of this shitty bar.

“In a way it’s her fault. She should have let us get this out of our system hours ago,” he justifies, giving me another kiss.

God I love him.

*

“He finger banged you in the booth? With people around and food on the table?”

“Yes.”

“And why, exactly are you telling me this?” We stare at each other’s reflections in the bar bathroom mirror. My cheeks are flushed.

“Because I’m a compulsive confessor.
And maybe next time you’ll mind your own business.”

“I can’t decide if I’m repulsed or impressed.”

I run my fingers through my hair, trying to get it under control from the windy weather. “Me either, but God he has the most skilled fingers of any man you have ever met. I don’t know how he does it, but he literally can make me come with the barest of touches. It’s like the anticipation alone is enough. He can breathe on my skin and I feel like I could orgasm.”

Finley locks eyes with me and then blinks, grabbing her bag on the way out the door. “Come on.”

“What’s the rush?”

“I just need to get
home, that’s all.”

Carter offers to drive and I keep my eyes forward, off the scene in the back seat. Finley and Ryan discrete
ly giggle and whisper behind their hands. More than once they go quiet, kissing out of sight. It’s a little uncomfortable but I realize all the sex talk must have gotten to her. We speed down the highway back to our cottage and Carter’s barely stopped the car when the two of them hop out and run into the house.

“What was that all about?” he asks, looking at me for an answer.

“I think maybe they just needed some privacy.”

It’s our turn to stay awake, disrupted by the sounds of our friend’s lovemaking.

“Okay, I get it. This is weird,” I say, lying on the bed, looking up at the ceiling. Finley’s sex moan floats through the walls.

“It’s
like this a lot in the frat house. You get used to it.”

“Really?”
I’ve avoided that house like the plague.

“Oh yeah, and everyone talks about it the next day
, too.”

I prop up on an elbow. “What do they say?”

“They compare notes. Talk about who did what with who. If anyone banged the same girl. It can get a little awkward.”

“Do you ever talk about me?”

He’s facing the ceiling but I can see the outline of a small smile on his lips even though the room is fairly dark.  “Eh, sort of. Nothing personal, I promise.”

“Like what?”

“They ask about you. Most of them have seen us around campus and ask why you don’t come around. They know I go to your place instead. It’s logical since you live alone. Plus, I’d never let you around those dirt bags anyway.” He turns his head to face me. “They assume you’re a sex goddess, because you’re older. They’re right.”

He runs a hand down my arm, eliciting a trail of goose
bumps. “Do you think we’ll always be like this with one another?”

“Like what?”

“So…horny?”

His eyes flick down to my lips. “I think
it’s part of who we are and our attraction to one another, but I can see, biologically, how maybe it would fade off some.”

“Because I’m old?”

“No, because one day we’ll have a house and jobs.” He drops his hand to my belly and rubs it gently. “Babies.”

“Babies?”

“Lots of them,” he says, smiling.

“How many?”

“As many as you’ll let me have.”