I carried the truth onto a crowded Delta Boeing, folded inside me like an overpacked suitcase, praying the zipper could handle the strain just a little while longer. I held it close during the two hour layover in Houston, and on the final plane to California, crammed between the window and a man who didn’t understand that I was saving my words. It would have been quicker, cheaper, easier to call you on the phone, but I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t send those words into the sky unprotected, hold my breath while they travelled to you, let them fall back down alone in a different state. At a different time. I could never do that.
I said I was coming to town to visit college friends, that maybe we could meet if you had some time. You invited me over for dinner. I ventured out from my hotel room to explore the city for those first couple of days, walking through parks and dining solo, politely explaining that I was waiting for a friend whenever someone tried to join me. I began to enjoy myself despite the lie; I didn’t have any friends in California except you.
Two days later, sun-kissed and hopeful, I knocked on your door. The truth was knocking too, in my throat and in my chest, so fucking loud that I thought you might hear it before you heard the door. You didn’t hear it though. She did. She opened the door and I felt it drop, hide, bury itself as deep as it could get.
I didn’t know you had a girlfriend.
You’d never mentioned her in posts or in photographs, but in a single moment I realize that I am an absolute idiot. She’s perfect. Thin and tan, light brown hair highlighted from sun, not a bottle. She is soft lips and flawless teeth and breasts so full and incredible I can’t tell if they’re real. They probably are. What the fuck am I doing there.
I stammer hello as she greets me, introduces herself with a name that sounds like a balmy day on the beach. Maybe I’ll call her by the wrong one later. It’s the least I could do. She tells me you ran out to grab a couple things and asks if I want a tour of the house. I do and I don’t. I want to know the space where you exist, see if I can feel you in it or picture you walking through a room, looking for your keys, but right now the only thing I can see in it is her. Certainly not myself.
She pours me a glass of wine in the kitchen and parrots what you’ve told her about me, which is apparently not much. Friend from back when, art, etc. I try to be as pleasant as possible and I laugh at her jokes but I don’t ask her anything. I want to know everything yet I don’t want to know any of it, so I sip my wine and smile and nod and wait for you to show up. I hear the door slam and you’re apologizing before you even enter the room, flustered and gorgeous and sorry, so sorry, for not being there when I arrived. I am so fucking happy to see you again that I don’t even care, I forget all of it, I just hug you and I am elated.
As worked up as I was before, and as nervous as I still am, being around you is oddly calming. Like a cold compress on a fever, still burning up but soothed enough that I can enjoy myself now, enjoy the food, the conversation. I even enjoy talking to your new, uncomfortably beautiful girlfriend. She is impossible to hate.
After we clean up the dishes she asks if we want to go swimming. We’re all a little tipsy by now, and fuck it, it sounds like fun. She says she can lend me a suit and I’m feeling brave enough to say sure. I want to be in the water, to be near you with so little on.
We bring out the bottle, set our glasses near the ledge, and get in the pool. We leave the lights off, just the glow from inside the house and a remarkably full moon. I feel like a kid for a minute, treading water, watching her threaten to splash you, you disappearing under the surface and coming back up. I’m glad that I came, even if I end up leaving with the same words that I brought.
She suggests it first. That it might be more fun without the suits. I laugh it off, she can’t be serious, can she? We hadn’t seen each other naked before, not really. Yours is off immediately, you don’t care at all. I can’t see you beneath the water but I want to. I wonder how you look, whether you’re hard or soft and how the water feels against your skin. It occurs to me that she knows exactly how you look, that she’s seen and felt your cock in her hand, her mouth, between her legs. It makes me ache between mine.
She takes her top off next, and although I’m embarrassed, I can’t help but admire her body. As expected, her tits are perfect. Large but still pert, nipples slightly smaller than I’d anticipated. You give her a whistle, and the next thing I know she’s throwing her bikini bottoms towards the side of the pool.
I feel frozen. I wouldn’t usually hesitate, I’d laugh and strip too, not caring who saw. I’d be confident and wild, but right now I feel as afraid as I am excited. You’re both encouraging me to join, telling me that it’s fun. I know that it’s no big deal, but for some reason I can’t move. I’m facing you when she swims over and stands behind me, the water only up to our hips. She says maybe I need a little help, and begins to untie the back of my suit. I don’t stop her. She undoes the knot, slips her fingers beneath the straps as she lifts the suit over my head, tossing it aside with hers. I expect you to whistle or cheer like you did for her but you’re just standing in the water, slightly deeper, looking at me.
I am suddenly very aware of how small my breasts must look next to hers, and blood rushes to my cheeks at the idea of you thinking the same thing. Somehow she knows, reaching her hands around me from behind, cupping my tits between her thumb and forefinger like she’s showing me to you. She kisses my ear, tells me not to worry. That you love the way I look. I don’t pull away when her fingers move to my nipples, hard from the breeze and the water. I close my eyes for a moment, try to understand what’s happening. “I know who you are,” she says. “It’s alright.” She kisses my neck, bites a little.
You move towards me, stretches of skin being revealed, dripping wet and reflecting the light. I don’t look away. I shiver when you reach your hand out to brush my hair over my shoulder, your palms and finger grazing my neck before settling behind it. You pull me close to you, feel my breasts against your chest, your erection pressed into my pelvis, and you kiss me. I feel like I’m part of the water around us now, the warm night, like no part of me exists except for where my body is touching yours. I kiss you back, feel your tongue against mine. I move my hand to your waist, to your face. I know that if I start touching you I won’t be able to stop. I won’t even try. My fingertips trace your collarbone and your chest, feel the damp hair trailing down, that same ache between my legs. I reach down to hold you in my hand, wrap my fingers around the thickness of your cock. I can feel the blood pulsing through it, trying to tell you that I’m your home.
“You two should get a room!” Your girlfriend is near the edge of the pool, smiling at us. “Seriously,” she says, “go upstairs. Have fun. I’ll join you later.”
We don’t make her say it twice.