Belle
His face looked like a potato.
I never noticed before. Maybe it was because I wasn’t used to seeing him in the morning light. Maybe it was because, under normal circumstances, he would pat my ass and kiss my cheek on his way out the door, and I’d roll over in bed and sleep for another thirty minutes before dragging myself out of the sheets that smelled like him. Maybe it was because normally when I kissed that dumb potato face, I was so distracted by his lips that I didn’t care.
Maybe it was because for the last year and a half, Doctor Jordan and I had an understanding, and that was all that mattered.
He had a busy schedule as a pediatrician and wasn’t looking for anything serious. I had sworn off anything resembling a relationship long, long ago. What we both did want was steady, reliable, mind-blowing sex.
And for those reasons, we were a match made in heaven.
I had a firm three-date rule — meaning, no guy made it past three dates with me. That was just enough time to have some fun without catching any serious feelings. But with Jordan, we’d had an understanding. We didn’t date. We didn’t have deep, long conversations. What we had was casual sex without anything more demanded of us.
Jordan was tall and lean, athletic, built like a golf pro. He always dressed like a doctor. You know what I mean — khakis, polos, long sleeves under a sweater vest, his golden hair always gelled and swooped to one side. He had what I liked to refer to as a news broadcaster smile, wide and bright with too many teeth, but I much preferred what that mouth did under my sheets. And he even wore these wire-framed glasses from time to time, mostly when he was reading something, that just topped off the whole look.
When it came to me and Jordan, I didn’t need much.
I didn’t need flowers. I didn’t need Valentine’s dinner dates. I didn’t need to meet his family. I didn’t need his time, or attention, or anything other than a great lay on a consistent basis.
And he never asked anything of me, either.
When we were together, we talked briefly, maybe ate a late-night dinner or had a bottle of wine while we joked around, ended our short time together with a romp in the sack, and then we went about our day to day without having to answer to anyone else.
It was perfect.
And now, the potato-headed motherfucker had a girlfriend.
He was ruining everything.
“I really am sorry,” he said for the fortieth time that morning. It wasn’t even seven yet and the jerk was dressed and ready for work, teeth brushed and breath minty-fresh, his white coat laying over the arm of my sofa and waiting to transform him from average good-looking guy to smokin’ hot doctor.
I, on the other hand, still hadn’t cleared the sleep from my eyes.
Jordan folded his hands between his knees, leaning closer to where I sat across from him. “I didn’t expect it to get serious with Ella. I mean, neither of us did. We met at the conference, and we both thought it would just be a little fun, but… I like her, Belle,” he said, looking at me like the dog he was about to kick out of the house. “I really do. And she wants to take it to the next level.”
“The next level,” I deadpanned. “Meaning, the level where I get booted.”
He grimaced. “Don’t think of it like that.”
“How else am I supposed to think?” I huffed, tossing my hands up in the air.
“I don’t even know why you’re upset,” he said. “We’ve never been exclusive. We’ve never even gone on a proper date. Surely, you didn’t think this would last forever.”
I ground my teeth, but to his credit, he didn’t say it with even a slight hint of annoyance or pity or arrogance. It was a genuine, accurate statement, as if he was reminding me that the shirt I was wearing was blue.
The fact of the matter was that had this been the version of me that existed even a few months ago, I wouldn’t have batted an eye at him calling off our little arrangement. If anything, I’d known it was coming — eventually. He told me about Ella when he met her, and they’d been hanging out just as consistently as we had. It didn’t bother me, and again, had this been a few months ago, I would have wished him luck with his new girlfriend, biting my tongue against telling him that he was likely going to end up with his heart broken, and then I would have saluted him on the way out the door and made a silent bet with myself as to when he’d walk back through it after he and his precious Ella broke up.
But the me who existed now had been slowly waking up over the past few months and realizing that everything around me was changing.
Except for me.
My best friend was getting married. My party friends were all settling down into relationships. The few single buddies I still had were dispersing, either moving to different cities or slipping into varying levels of alcoholism that I did not find cute or appealing. All my previous friends with benefits were locking themselves down, losing my number, politely asking me to take them off my for a good time call list.
And then, there was me.
Belle Monroe.
President of the Single Forever Club, and newly removed from my position of Hot Doctor Jordan’s Favorite Fuck Buddy.
“I guess you just couldn’t help yourself,” I commented after a moment, meeting his gaze. “Had to get in one last round before you locked yourself down, huh?”
Jordan’s neck turned red, and he cleared his throat, looking away from me ashamed. The motherfucker had called me at almost midnight last night. And normally, I wouldn’t care.
But normally, he wouldn’t be dumping me the very next morning before I even had the chance to make a cup of espresso.
I made a mental note, jotting this down as just another prime example of why the three-date rule is essential.
Jordan stood, grabbing his white coat off the arm of the couch. “I am sorry, Belle. You know I care about you.”
I held up a hand, cutting him off before he could say another word. “Don’t.”
“Why does it make you so uncomfortable to hear that? We’ve been…” He paused, waving a hand between us. “Doing whatever this is for over a year now.”
“This was a fun arrangement, one that mutually benefitted both parties.”
Jordan heaved a sigh at that, looking out my floor-to-ceiling windows at the Chicago skyline being dusted with the morning sun. “Well, I guess it shouldn’t hurt too bad to lose me, then.”
My cold heart defrosted a bit at his words, and I met his disappointed gaze like a dog with her tail between her legs.
But I didn’t have anything to say.
I’d shut out the possibility of anything resembling love a long, long time ago. Love, I’d learned, was a trap. It was a glitter-covered black hole that would swallow you up and spit you out and leave you shipwrecked and alone time and time again. The only way to avoid that kind of heartache was to not participate at all, to cut all strings before emotions had the chance to form.
That was how you kept yourself safe.
And no one could change my mind about that — not even hot, sensitive, caring Doctor Jordan.
Jordan watched me for a long moment, waiting, like he wondered if his words had struck some chord with me. He watched me like maybe this was the day I would confess all my feelings.
But I just sat silent.
Resignation found his features, and he nodded, something of a smirk on his lips as he leaned down long enough to press them to my forehead. “Goodbye, Belle,” he whispered.