The Infatuation (Josh and Kat #1 , The Club #5) (31 page)

“I tried to be in love with Nate. I really did. But,
apparently, passion isn’t something you can force. If it were, I
swear I’d be passionately in love with that boy to this very
day—because he so deserved that.

“My third serious boyfriend was the one who
shattered my heart into a million tiny pieces. Garrett Bennett. Or
as I like to refer to him, The Asshole.

“I met Garrett on the first day of my junior year. I
was walking to class with Sarah when Garrett beelined right to me
from across a large lawn and asked me out, saying I was the most
beautiful girl he’d ever seen and if I didn’t say yes to a date,
I’d ruin his life. Well, to say my panties were wet at the sight of
him is an understatement. The boy had an animal magnetism I’d never
encountered before. So, of course, I said hell yes.

“On our first date, Garrett took me to a really nice
restaurant, the nicest restaurant I’d ever been to, actually. Not
the burgers and fries I’d been expecting. As it turned out, his dad
was a senator and his mom some sort of philanthropist-lady who
organized trips to Africa through her church. And the dude played
on the freaking golf team at our school. (Who
does
that?) He
seemed sort of fancy to me, but in a good way.

“But it wasn’t his swankiness that made me like him
that night. Our conversation flowed easily and I laughed a lot. He
was hysterically funny. (And did I mention he made my panties wet?)
Actually, wait, let me amend the statement that he was hysterically
funny. I’m not really sure if that’s true, in retrospect. The guy
could have recited the phone book that night and I would have
giggled like a fucking idiot. I was just instantly smitten. It was
Nate, but in reverse. In fact, more than once during dinner, I
thought,
So this is what Nate felt!
If you’d asked me that
night, ‘Do you believe in love at first sight?’, I would have
shrieked, ‘Yes!’

“So, anyway, when Garrett asked me to come back to
his place after dinner, I said
yes
,
yes, yes.
I’d
only intended to make out with him, to tell you the truth, because
honestly, up until then, I’d never had first-date sex or even a
one-night stand. (Even that guy I banged after breaking up with
Nate lasted two months.) Plus, Garrett had made a few comments
during dinner that made it clear he’d come from an extremely
conservative religious background, unlike me (organized religion is
pretty much nonexistent in my household—as long as I’m dumping my
entire life’s story on you, might as well hit you with religion,
too), so I didn’t think first-date sex would be in the cards with a
guy like that. But one thing led to another and another, pretty
damned quickly, actually, and soon, Garrett and I were at his place
having headboard-banging sex like nothing I’d ever experienced
before.

“This kind of sex was a revelation to me. Before
Garrett, I’d never had such uninhibited, wild sex. Even sex with
the after-Nate guy wasn’t nearly as explosive as sex with Garrett
Bennett. Our chemistry was off the freaking charts. I felt like I
could be as wild as I wanted to be with him, like there were no
limits—and that opened up a whole new side to myself I didn’t even
know existed. I’d been giving myself orgasms for years before then,
and I’d had orgasms during oral with guys, but this was the first
time I had orgasms during sex with a guy—during actual
intercourse—and it was like, wow, wow, wow, wow.

“I was immediately addicted, as you can probably
imagine. I could never get enough. I wanted more, more, more, every
chance I got. And so, from that day forward, for the better part of
the next seven months, I banged Garrett as much as possible, which
wasn’t as much as I would have liked (because, as he kept telling
me, golf is an extremely time-consuming sport, especially for
someone trying to go pro).

“But suffice it to say we had a ton of sex. But we
also had lots and lots of conversations, too, mostly in bed, during
which I told him pretty much every honest thought I had about
anything and everything, never holding back. For some reason, the
uninhibited sex made me feel uninhibited in all ways, like I could
tell Garrett anything. No topic was off limits, and I just babbled
and babbled.

“In some very big ways, it was obvious Garrett and I
came from strikingly different backgrounds and families, but it
didn’t matter. I just always felt like Garrett totally “got” me and
secretly saw the world the way I did, despite his parents’
expectations about what and who he was ‘supposed’ to be.

“Honestly, I felt like I’d met my perfect match—my
soul mate, if you will (a phrase I’ve since banished from my
vocabulary). We never said ‘I love you’ to each other, because
Garrett made it obvious he didn’t feel comfortable with saying
‘trite’ words like that—but that was fine with me. I knew in my
heart how we both felt—so I didn’t need to hear the stupid, trite
words.

“About six months into our relationship, I invited
Garrett to meet my family and, much to my thrill, he said yes. I
was super nervous about it because Garrett meeting my family was a
pretty big deal to me, but, much to my relief, everyone in my
family wound up loving him to pieces. Well, everyone except my
oldest brother Colby, who despised Garrett almost instantly. ‘What
the fuck is wrong with you, Kumquat?’ he said. ‘Can’t you see he’s
using you?’

“I couldn’t believe my ears. I felt completely
offended and hurt, like Colby was telling me I wasn’t good enough
for a guy like Garrett from a fancy family with a senator-dad. ‘No,
honey,’ Colby said. ‘He’s a loser—not even close to good enough for
you. He’s completely full of shit.’ Well, I lost it. I told Colby I
was gonna marry Garrett one day and it’s too bad he wouldn’t be
invited to my wedding and until he learned to say something nice
about my future husband he could just forget he had a fucking
sister. (Full disclosure: I’m sort of overly dramatic sometimes
when I get mad.) Colby said, ‘Don’t worry, Kumquat, I’ll be there
to pick up your pieces when he breaks your heart.’

“I was pissed as hell at Colby, especially since
everyone else loved Garrett the way I did. But Colby’s comments did
make me wonder why Garrett never brought me home to meet his
family. But Garrett just kept finding excuses, telling me his dad
(the senator) was traveling, or his mom was getting a facelift or
bringing school supplies to underprivileged youth in Guatemala or
some other rich-person-helping-the-world thing like that—and it
just never worked out.

“Finally, about eight months into our relationship,
I was supposed to go to a concert with Sarah for her birthday, but
she came down with the stomach flu. So I decided to use the
opportunity to give Garrett a sexy surprise at his apartment.

“When Garrett opened his apartment door, I clutched
my trench coat, intending to rip it open and flash him my birthday
suit underneath, when I glimpsed a beautiful brunette over his
shoulder inside his apartment. She was sitting at a candlelit
table-for-two, a vase of red roses at its center—something Garrett
had never once set up for me. Even from a distance, I could see a
large, sparkling cross around her neck. And when she moved her hand
to her mouth in surprise, something twinkled brightly on her finger
in the candlelight.

“Instantly, every doubt and concern I’d stuffed down
and reasoned away for months—and every single word Colby had said
to me—came slamming into me full-force. In a flash, I knew that
pretty, demure girl in Garrett’s apartment was his girlfriend—and
maybe even his fiancée if I was reading that flash on her hand
correctly—and I knew with every fiber of my being that he’d already
said those three little ‘trite’ words to her, the ones I’d longed
to hear him say to me. Motherfucker.

“When I tore out of there, sobbing, Garrett followed
me, explaining to the back of my head that Maggie’s father was some
lah-de-dah über-wealthy businessman who’d invented air freight or
some shit like that and she was a really sweet girl from his church
back home and well-connected and, he said with utmost reverence,
Maggie was saving herself for marriage.
At that last
statement, I whirled around to face Garrett, my mouth hanging open,
my heart shattering. ‘Are you calling me a slut?’ I asked. He
didn’t reply, which was reply enough. ‘I thought you
loved
me
,’
I said, wiping away the hot tears streaming down my
cheeks. ‘I thought you wanted to marry me one day.’ And do you know
what that motherfucker did? He chuckled at the thought of marrying
me. And then he said, ‘Come on, Kat, you’re a great girl—super
fun—
but you’re just not marriage material.’
”

I sit and stare at the screen for a minute, tears
streaming down my cheeks. Man, those words from Garrett still cut
me to the core. I wipe my tears and place my fingers on my keyboard
again, but I can’t see well enough to type yet. I can’t believe I’m
letting The Asshole get to me, even to this day. But I can’t help
it. The pain of getting blindsided like that never fully goes away,
I guess.

“I’ve never told anyone (except Sarah) what The
Asshole said to me that night,” I finally type. “I’ve always been
too embarrassed and ashamed, I guess. I didn’t even tell Colby what
Garrett said. All I told him was, ‘You were right.’

“And yet now I’m telling you,” I write. “Why?
Honestly, I don’t fucking know.”

I have to stop typing for another minute. I’m too
emotional. Why the hell am I baring my obviously pathetic soul to
Josh like this? Is getting his stupid application really this
frickin’ important to me?

No, it’s not. I don’t care about his application
right now. Writing this to Josh isn’t about me getting his stupid
application anymore. This is about something much bigger than
that.

I wipe my eyes again. I’m veering way off track
here. Have I even answered this particular question yet? I’m not
sure. I re-read the question at the top of the page again. Oh
yes.

“So that’s pretty much the story of my
ex-boyfriends,” I write. “Besides those three guys, I’ve dated
plenty of guys for a few months here or there and had sex with a
truckload besides that, as I’ve mentioned, but no one serious
enough to bring home.”

I glance up at the question I’m supposedly answering
again. Oh, yes. Okay.

“As far as blood tests,” I write, “I’ll submit to
any kind of testing you require (as long as it doesn’t involve
math). But in the interest of saving time, let me just tell you
what the testing would reveal: I’m clean. About two months ago,
when I went in to get a new prescription of birth control pills, I
got tested. And even though I’m on the pill, I insist on condoms
every single time I have sex, no exceptions, unless I’m in a
committed relationship and the guy’s been tested. (But, hey, like I
say, if you require formal medical testing before my application
can be approved, then I’ll sign or do whatever you request.)”

Sexual orientation? Please choose from the following
options: Straight, homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, other?

“Straight. But in the interest of full disclosure, I
should inform you I made out with a girl during my senior year in
college. It’s a long story that can be summarized as follows: Truth
or Dare combined with Ecstasy combined with a pervy boyfriend
(hers) can lead a girl to do anything once. I can honestly say the
experience didn’t cause me to question my sexual orientation
whatsoever. In fact, it wasn’t nearly as hot as it sounds, I’m
sorry to say. But, regardless, I’m definitely straight.”

Do any of your sexual fantasies include violence of
any nature? If so, please describe in detail.

I sit and think. Well, jeez. I have lots and lots of
fantasies, for sure, some of them pretty darn elaborate, but do any
of them involve actual
violence
? No.

I place my hands on the keyboard and begin typing.
“I have lots and lots of fantasies—it’s kind of a
thing
with
me,” I write. “And not a single one of them involves actual
violence. However, a couple of my fantasies involve the
threat
of violence, but only as a backdrop to setting the
scene. For instance, I’ve got a bodyguard fantasy that only makes
sense if there are bad guys coming to get me, or else why the heck
do I have a bodyguard? (And to answer the question that’s just
popped into your head, no, I didn’t have sex with any of the
bodyguards Jonas hired to protect me from The Club.)”

I smirk to myself. Sure, I
almost
had sex
with Derek the Bodyguard, but Josh doesn’t need to know that.

I begin typing again.

“The threat of violence is also prevalent in another
one of my fantasies, one in which I’m held captive by a
sex-slave-master. The sex-slave master absconds with me one night
and forces me to be his slave, but he never actually hurts me. And,
also, in regards to violence, a second sex-slave-master comes to
steal me away from the first, but my original captor fights the
other bad guy to the death and protects me (which kinda turns this
scenario into yet another bodyguard fantasy, doesn’t it?).”

I stare at my screen. Holy What the Fuck Am I Doing,
Batman? I can’t write all this shit to Josh. He’s gonna think I’m a
freaking loon, which I am. I’ve never told anyone about the
elaborate, imaginary pornos bouncing around in my head. What if
Josh reads all this and decides I’m too much of a freak? Or worse,
that, based on this stuff, we’re not sexually compatible? That
would be pretty soul crushing.

I let my fingers hover over my keyboard again,
trying to decide what to do.

Fuck it. Better to be completely honest and get
rejected for who I really am than to hide myself and make him like
me. Like my new favorite singer, Audra Mae, said in her powerful
song, better to be The Real Thing, for better or worse.