Just One Drink (64 page)

Wild Night

It had been years since Teresa had thought about James, and there he stood; in the coffee shop that she worked in, in their old college town, in a leather jacket while she was wearing an apron. Fate couldn’t possibly be more cruel. Teresa pulled aside one of the other young baristas and attempted to formulate a sentence, but looked over her shoulder and saw him approaching the register. She tossed the barista towards the register and escaped into the back room of the store.

Her mind quickly raced to all the possibilities of why he could be back in town. An old fraternity get together? She would have heard something from one of his friends in passing for sure. A party she didn’t hear of? Unlikely, but it was possible. Maybe an alumni get together? That could be it. She sent all those emails straight to spam anyway, she didn’t need the constant reminder of how long ago she graduated. While she loved her time in college, the last thing she wanted to do was run into James after everything she had said the last time they saw each other.

Teresa pulled out her phone, bringing up the messaging app and frantically typed a message to her best friend as she peeked around the corner of the doorway, trying to see if James had left or not. She had scrawled out a short message and double checked it quickly before sending it: “James is in town. In the coffee shop. Find out why.”

Shoving the phone back into her pocket, she peered around the corner into the lobby of the coffee shop again just in time to see James put the top back onto his coffee, stirring it a bit before he lifted it up to his lips. With his free hand he removed the sunglasses from his hair and placed them back onto his face, glancing around the room slowly.

Teresa stared intently at his profile, somewhat obscured by his short, reddish beard, but the strong jaw line still prominent. She noticed that he was growing his beard back too. It reminded her of when they were together. Instinctively her fingers could almost feel it, the thick, curled brown hair tangling itself between her fingers. It was something she remembered vividly from when he used to-

Just then a hand reached out and grabbed her shoulder, snapping her out of the day dream. She spun around to find the cold gaze of her manager. Knuckle tattoos and all gripping her slightly shaking shoulder. She took a moment to steady her breathing before she met her gaze. As she did, the cold gaze seemingly turned her to stone.

“Why aren’t you on your register,” the manager questioned as she looked over Teresa’s shoulder into the lobby. Her eyes immediately fell on James. Looking back at Teresa’s now downcast eyes her stony gaze softened into a smile. “Darling, if I allowed every person that was trying to avoid an ex take a 5 minute break no one would get any work done around here,” she looked at James again as he held the door open for another guest.

“But if all my exes looked like that I wouldn’t be avoiding them.” The manager tapped her on the back and prodded her back out towards her register.

******

“No, I honestly don’t know why he’s back in town and I don’t know why you think I would be the one to know it.” Liz is seated on a worn out futon in a small, studio apartment. Teresa is pacing around the room with a glass of red wine in one hand, the bottle in the other, liquid sloshing around in both.

“I mean, I might have heard that he was moving in with Mike because he got a job teaching, but that’s just a rumor and I can’t confirm or deny that,” Liz trailed off at the end of that statement, speaking more into her wine glass than at her friend. Teresa spun on her heels so fast she nearly spilled the contents of the wine glass all over her and the small rug in the center of the room.

“He’s moving here, like back to town. When?”

“Technically, I think it’s ‘moved’.” Liz said sheepishly, once again protecting her face with the wine glass. Teresa ran to the futon and slumped into the seat beside her, wine sloshed out slightly onto the futon. She absently wiped it away as she looked into the distance.

“Well now what do I do? I should get a new job. No, I need move,” Teresa exclaimed, taking a swig from the bottle, ignoring the glass. She smiled coyly and turned to Liz. “We need to move.” Liz shook her head, mouth full of wine. “Come on, we always said that we should move after college, let’s do it.” Swallowing her wine, Liz looked back at Teresa.

“No, I don’t need to do anything,” she looked away, “and plus, that was something you said you would do with James, never with me.” Teresa sighed and stood up, beginning to pace the room again. “All joking aside though, what are you going to do?” Liz’s eyes followed Teresa as she walked back and forth through the room.

“In my personal opinion I think you should just-” Teresa pointed her finger at Liz to get her to stop and her eyes screamed ‘don’t say another word.’ Liz paused for a moment, but continued. “Call him.” Teresa groaned obnoxiously loud and looked at Liz sarcastically.

“And tell him what, Liz?” Teresa took a pull from the bottle of wine. “That the company I took the job with went bankrupt? The same job that I chose over him? The job that drove him to move away?” Teresa took another swig from the bottle.

“And that now, I work at some coffee shop, where I’m just a barista, and that half the people I work with aren’t even old enough to drink?” She put the bottle to her lips only to find that it’s empty. She glanced down at the glass, still full of wine and took a sip of that instead. She tossed the bottle onto the floor beside the futon as she sat down.

“That just seeing him brought me back to the moment we met, even though I had gotten so good at forgetting about him and moving on.”  Liz and Teresa sat in silence for a few moments, contemplating, each sipping from their wine glasses and sighing.

“Well, I probably wouldn’t start there,” Liz said laughing.

****

Teresa was always one to sleep with a comforter, regardless of the weather, but something about the way the wine hit her made her decide to only sleep with just the sheet. The thin cotton hugged her body perfectly, one naked leg escaped the embrace, the cool air of the fan caused goosebumps to cascade over her body.

Just as she dozed off she heard her bedroom door creak open. Under any other circumstance she would have been nervous but the red wine took hold and lulled her to sleep.

Only a short time later however she awoke to the gentle caress of hands on her exposed leg, the fingertips delicately dancing across the mountain range of goose bumps. She giggled slightly and the fingers stopped, replaced by lips. If there were a spot of her leg that didn’t have a goose bump before, they certainly did now.

The kisses fell upon her thigh like light rain drops as she sighed quietly and rolled onto her back. The lips followed the curve of her legs, passing over her womanhood to give equal attention to both thighs. Her moans increased as the lips became teeth, and nibbled slightly on her supple inner thighs.

Her hands twisted and grabbed at the sheets, willing the teeth to become a tongue and to allow her some release. Almost immediately the teeth turned to lips and began kissing her gently on her own lips. The tongue began to tease the clit and outlined the pussy itself with quick flicks.

The tongue and lips deftly lapped and sucked as Teresa’s moans grew louder and louder, the orgasm building up inside her. The hands returned and spidered their way up her legs, one finger playfully teased itself up in between her legs, gently sliding inside her.

Teresa let out a small squeal of pleasure as the finger immediately began to twist and thrust back and forth, the tongue now flicking her clit exclusively. Tentatively she released the sheets and slowly reached down, trying to figure out who this is. Her fingers met a tangled mat of curly hair, her fingers interlocked with the curls just like they used to when she was with-

Teresa bolted up right, waking up, panting slightly, panties completely soaked through. Raising a hand to her chest, she notices her erect nipples and fell back into the messy bed groaning. She checked the clock and noticed that she had an hour before she had to get ready for work.

Reaching down and slowly pulling off her panties she tried to finish the job from where the dream left off. Her finger slowly massaging her clit, her head and back contorting in pleasure. Biting her lip she closed her eyes and saw James’ face staring back at her. Moaning slightly she imagined him there with her, once again.

****

Teresa sat inside the small diner, sunglasses still on, slowly stirring her coffee. A few days had passed since she dreamt about James and his signature style of French kissing, but she hadn’t been able to get it out of her head. She had attempted to recreate the conditions and setting every night since, but had failed, only ever ending up with bad red wine morning breath and a hangover.

So here she sat, in a mom and pop diner, waiting for Mike to meet her. She had always felt like Mike had a soft spot for her and maybe she would finally be able to get some use out of it for once. He was James’ best friend and she never felt comfortable messing with emotions before, but she was a woman on a mission.

Just as she thought this Mike entered the diner and looked around. She waved at him seductively, but didn’t even get a smile out of him in return. He took his sunglasses off and walked across the room, sitting down across from her.

“I’m doing really well, thank you. You’re right, it has been too long. Work is good, keeping me busy, I’m a youth minister now.” Teresa sat there, confused. The waitress made her way to the table and Mike picked up the menu. “I’ll just have water for now, thank you.” The waitress looked at Teresa as she stammered out a response.

“I’ll have the same I guess.” The waitress smiled and walked away, quickly bringing back the two glasses of water. As she walked away, Teresa shook her head and looked at Mike. “What was-”

“So, you wanna know about James, right?” He looked up from the menu and locked eyes with Teresa.

“What? No, I mean, we haven’t talked in a while, I figured we could catch up.” She nervously flipped through the menu, not able to concentrate on any of the options, her mind raced between all the questions she had about James.

“Really? I’m naive, but I’m not stupid. You don’t talk to me, return my calls or emails, nothing for two years but suddenly now that James moves back you want to ‘catch up?’ Yeah right.” He took a sip from the glass of water, the condensation leaving a water stain on the table.

“Well, I mean...I do want to know how you’ve been too.” She looked as she said that, a concerned look falling on Mike’s face.

“Listen, that was a bit rash to come in like that, that’s not me, I mentioned I was grabbing lunch with you and that was what my friends thought I should do.” He put the menu down just as the waitress came back. “Hey, give us a minute or two, please.” The waitress nodded and walked away as Mike reached across the table and took Teresa’s hand.

“Look, he would kill me if I told you this, but-” Mike leaned in a bit closer, “when he moved away he got involved with this other girl and apparently it ended pretty badly. It’s why he moved back. He doesn’t really talk about it much.” Mike let go of Teresa’s hand and opened his menu again, carefully avoiding Teresa’s gaze. Teresa sat back in her seat and sighed.

“He uh, was with somebody else?” Mike looked up from the menu looking concerned.

“Well, I mean it’s been a few years. You can’t imagine he would have just been sitting around waiting for you to call him.” He closed the menu again, “I mean, you’ve been with people. I’ve seen you out on dates.” His voice trailed off as he looked at her.

“He told me he would never love again though.” Tears welled up behind her eyes and Mike frantically looked around the room as if trying to find some help.

“Listen, I don’t know any of the details,” tears began to fall, “but, but, if I can find out-” Mike floundered to find words as Teresa continued to cry. “Okay, listen, we’re having a party this weekend, why don’t you and Liz come along?” As he said this, Teresa stopped crying and opened her menu.

“I’ll have to see if we’re available, but we’ll try to be there.” Mike sat back in his seat and opened the menu again, completely confused at what just happened.

****

Teresa stood naked in her closet, her bare back facing Liz who sat on the end of Teresa’s bed, eyes glued to her phone, thumbs scrolling across the screen.

“So, I’m thinking that I should pick something that is pretty easy access, you know?” Teresa said as she held dresses up in front of the mirror, gauging the apparent sluttiness of each compared to the others. “I don’t want to come off *too* slutty so that just any guy will think they have a chance. I’ve gotta play this right.”