“Give me one more chance. Dinner. I’m not your patient anymore. It’s not risking your job to have dinner with me.”
She looks at me for a long time before grabbing her keys, opening the door, and sitting behind the wheel. I move inside the door, keeping her from closing it while I write my number on a gum wrapper from my pocket. I hold it out to her. “Call me when you change your mind,” I say.
35
Julia
It’s been a week since he gave me his number, a week and a few days since he sauntered into my life and left it in shambles. But every time I look at the stupid gum wrapper with his cramped handwriting on it, I can’t make myself throw it away. I can’t throw him away, even though I should. I think about him all day. I’m addicted to him and I keep waiting for the withdrawal to fade, but it only gets worse. My skin burns and aches for his touch again. I’m ashamed by how many times I’ve pleasured myself thinking about him since that day.
Leo.
I pour myself a cup of coffee and move to the kitchen table, idly tapping through my phone to read my newsfeed on Facebook.
His calloused hands roam my body, squeezing my breasts until it hurts.
I take a bite of my bagel and realize I didn’t even remember to put cream cheese on it. Ugh. I chew the tasteless bagel and try to keep my mind focused. I have a trying day ahead of me at work. Ever since Ted caught us…
His tongue swirls in my mouth and his cock moves inside me.
I clench my hand on my coffee cup and close my eyes. Stop it. Stop thinking about him. Stop remembering. I have way more important things to think about, like how I’m going to make this month’s rent and pay the three thousand dollar hospital bill for my mom’s chemo, or how I’m going to keep my sanity working for Ted when he knows he can literally end my career with a phone call.
I look at the gum wrapper again. I want to call him. Even if it’s just to tell him how much of an asshole he is one more time. Before I know what I’m doing, my fingers are flying over the numbers on my phone. It’s ringing. I stare at the phone in disbelief at first, slowly raising it to my ear and waiting. What are you doing? What the fuck are you doing?
“This is Leo,” he says through the phone. His voice is so much sexier than I remember.
“It’s me,” I say. “I just wanted to call to tell you to—”
“I missed you,” he says.
“Then why didn’t you come wait by my car again?” I ask. I feel the conversation spinning out of control again, like he can dictate the direction it will go by the force of his will alone. I’m supposed to be the psychologist. I’m the one with years of training in the human mind and how to control a conversation. I want to growl in frustration. None of that seems to help around him.
I can practically hear the smirk in his voice. “Would you like it if I did?”
“I would like it if you gave a shit about what you put me through.”
He pauses. “Is that why you called? Or do you want me to ask you out to dinner again?”
“What makes you think I want that?” I ask. As much as I want nothing more than to see him again, I’m stronger than that. I’m not going to beg him for it. I’ll take my pride over my desire if I have to.
“Because you haven’t stopped thinking about me,” he says. “You’re calling me a week after I gave you my number. That means you spent a week holding onto that little scrap of paper, trying not to call because you are pissed at me. You tried for an entire week and now...here we are. You must really want to see me again.”
I blush. Maybe he should have been a psychologist. “Well, it’s a good thing you’re not the psychologist here, because you’re completely off target. Want to know how badly I want to see you again?” I slam the phone down on the table and press end call.
I cradle my head in my hands, wanting to just scream. You’re losing it, Julia. You’re really losing it this time. The phone rings a few seconds later. It’s his number. I watch it, hand hovering over the phone. I know if I ignore it, this can all end, right here.
I’ve convinced myself that going out with him would be a failure, that it would be weakness. Maybe the truth is avoiding him would be the weak decision. Maybe all along I’ve been doing the cowardly thing by running from him and trying to cut him out of my life. I decided to own my mistake, but I’m never going to find any sort of closure about what happened unless I give Leo another chance. I need to do this, for myself, even if it might be dangerous.
I pick up the phone.
I’m wearing my sexiest dress when I meet him outside my apartment. Leo wears a coal-gray suit with a black dress shirt. His hair is pushed away from his face in a careless way that is irresistibly sexy. He has the kind of face that would look good with any hairstyle or no hair, even. His suit fits him perfectly, accentuating his broad shoulders and drawing lines that drive my eyes down his body. But tonight isn’t about fantasy. It’s not about re-living those moments we shared in my office. It’s not about us. It’s about moving on, closure, and a chance to face my mistake and move past it.
Still, when he looks me up and down and smiles appreciatively, I can’t help feeling my heart flutter.
“You look amazing,” he says.
“Thank you,” I say. I spent longer than I intended getting ready. It didn’t seem to matter how many times I told myself this wasn’t a date. I just wanted to look good. I’m allowed to want to look good when I go out in public, aren’t I? It doesn’t have to mean I’m trying to impress anyone. Then again, that doesn’t exactly explain why I wore my sexiest underwear, too.
Jersey City towers around us, blotting out the stars in the night sky, and the road is choked with red tail lights as people inch their way to their destinations. It’s an ugly, crude place, but it’s home for me now. I went to grad school here and fell in love with something about it. Even though it’s still a big city, it doesn’t have the same anonymous feel that New York always had to me, like I was a faceless body in the crowd. I know the cashier at the Goodwill and I know the kid who is always walking his dog by my place around the time I head out for the office. Something about it makes me feel more like I’m home than New York ever did.
“So where are we going?” I ask.
“A place nearby, come on, we’ll walk.”
He puts a possessive hand on my back and I hate how good it feels. We just walk through the city like it’s the most normal thing in the world, comfortable in each other's silence and at ease. I even begin to forget why I am so angry with him. Some of the psychologist in me comes out and I start wondering if maybe I’m just projecting my anger on him, blaming him for all the unfairness in my life.
We reach a small staircase that leads down under an awning. There’s a man in a suit standing outside who notices Leo and hurries inside immediately. Leo leads me down the stairs where we’re greeted by a maî·tre d’.
“Mr. Citrione! It has been too long,” says the balding man. He smiles wide, but his eyes dart from Leo to the street behind him. What is he looking for?
“We need a table for two,” says Leo.