Chapter 14

14

When Carter and I first kissed, nearly one year ago…it was hot. Although I also initiated that one, he quickly took control, not letting me rip our clothes off pretty much immediately by holding my wrists on the bed, on either side of my head. "Lentamente," he'd whispered, "please, mami." That just made me crazier, kissing him harder, pushing my hands over his stomach, where his muscles undulated under as he tried so hard to not thrust. He wanted to go slow with me, gods know why, but I liked it. Correction: I loved it.

I've spent so many stupid nights thinking about it. Wondering how it would have been with him. I bet it wouldn't have been like with Johnny, who always kept his eyes closed tight, thinking about his most recently viewed porno. That isn't conjecture. He literally told me that he had a hard time staying hard if it was "just me."

Nate kept his eyes closed a lot of the time, too, when we were together. It brought me out of the moment. I kept wondering who he was really thinking about.

This wasn't the case with Carter. He kept his glimmering gold eyes wide open, looking me over and over, like I was some kind of goddess made manifest in human form. Like he couldn't believe he'd been given the privilege of touching me. When he pulled my shirt up to my neck, he'd stared at my bra for so long, I thought maybe he didn't like what he was seeing. But then he immediately proved me wrong with his mouth.

I always thought if we had gone all the way, it would have kept on like that. It would have been the closest I'd ever gotten to lovemaking in my whole life.

Now though, what we're doing. It's the complete opposite of lovemaking.

When I basically jumped on him, lips first, he grabbed my ass and whisked me to the counter, where I wrapped my legs around him tight. Our mouths connected the whole time. Like we rehearsed this shit.

We kiss each other like if we don't, we'll drown. He dips his tongue in my mouth, over and over, in tune to his hips, pressing his hot, hard length right where I want it the most.

I'm going to come. I'm going to come and all of our clothes are still on .

I moan his name when he breaks the kiss to slide his tongue down the side of my neck, and this does something to him. He jerks his hand from my hip to the open leg of these little shorts I've got on, and his fingers dig their way under my panties. The shock of feeling him there makes me gasp.

"You're so wet," he says, breathless like he can't believe it.

"I'm always wet for you," I respond.

And I don't know why, but me saying that, it's all wrong somehow. He freezes and then slides his fingers from my shorts. He pulls his hips back from mine a few inches as he says, "You shouldn't tell me stuff like that." Before I can respond, he looks into my face and adds, "We shouldn't have done this. This…it's a mistake."

And you know what this pendejo does next?

He leaves .

He literally runs away from me, grabbing his shoes on his way out the front door. He doesn't look at me as he gruffly calls, "My family will be here for lunch on Tuesday." The next thing I hear is the door slamming and then his car's wheels squealing to who knows where.

All because I told him, what? The truth?

It is the truth. Ever since Carter and I first kissed last year, something about that idiot just instantly turns me on. Something about the intense way he watches me, or how stupid nice he is to me.

Or was, rather. What he did just now, leaving me on the counter, breathless, eyes full of tears, a sky full of lightning—this is more than not nice, or mean, even. It's cruel.

I will never forgive him for this.

I spend way too much time trying to figure out the sleeping situation, since (a) no way in hell am I sharing a bed with that asshole again, and (b), the pull-out he so chivalrously offered feels like it's made from the demolished parts of a greenhouse. I may as well sleep inside a shark's mouth, right over its many layers of teeth, for all the comfort it provides.

I also don't want to go to Nadia's. It feels too much like admitting defeat, not just to myself and to Carter, but also to my family. We've been married for mere days. Days . Granted, I'm not exactly known for my relationship expertise, but even I know sleeping elsewhere after just days of marriage, even a fake one, is classified as pathetic. Knowing my luck, one of his family members will see me hauling ass back home, and it will make its way to Abuela Erika, and all of this will have been for naught.

I refuse for all of this to have been for naught.

So I snoop all around Carter's house and find a sleeping bag. I spend half an hour making it up in his gym room. I move my bedside table—the one next to my side of the bed in which I spent exactly a single night—next to it, along with the little lamp, and my stack of books I'm in the middle of, as well as a candle. The carpet in this room is thick so it isn't bad, not really.

I pick up my phone and schedule an appointment for a local PI with good reviews. I register to the local dahlia society's annual tuber sale, happening in only two days. And then I Insta-stalk Leilani, who apparently is having the time of her life, stealing art from nonwhite people and "riding the tide of love with the universe in motion" all over NoCal.

She's also managed to acquire a whole new face since moving. When I click on her latest selfie, I swear my jaw drops and rolls out the door like on some kind of old-school cartoon.

Look, I'm not a plastic surgeon, or even a doctor of any kind. But my favorite sort of reality television features cosmetic surgery— Botched , Nip/Tuck , you name it and I'm a whore for it. Thus, in my trashy-TV-informed opinion, Lani's had Botox injections on her forehead and eyebrows, filler in her nasolabial folds, and most obvious of all of these, lip injections. The way she's pursed them after slathering on shiny fuchsia lip gloss, it looks like the top lip is about to bust open.

I've got nothing against cosmetic surgery. Amá Sonya has had at least one facelift that I know of, and I'm pretty sure she gets her lips filled routinely. I think she looks elegant. I've even investigated getting a (small) BBL, but the long list of risks didn't seem worth it to me.

That said, Lani has spent her entire life professing that she'll never do anything "fake" with regards to anti-aging, that with her routine of organic essential oil facials and mud and algae baths, she would age gracefully the "natural way." Seeing her face transform in such a short amount of time just reinforces what an asshole hypocrite she is, and it pisses me off enough that I toss my phone halfway across the room before tucking myself in for the night, having had quite enough of the internet for the day.

I fall asleep, and when I wake up, at seven thirty in the morning, thanks to my alarm?

I'm back in bed.

"What the—" I mutter, glancing up. Then I jump up.

The table's back, along with my books, my candle, my phone charger. The long line of pillows in the middle of the bed is there, along with the throw pillows I had collected to make up my gym room bed.

"Carter!" I yell, stomping out. "Carter, what the fuck?"

But the coward is gone.

I swear, I'm so mad I feel like a hurricane is instantaneously going to descend upon our house and rip it to pieces. The sky outside is dark, and wind howls against the windows like angry spirits.

Until I see that the pull-out is made up. Well, messed up. I approach it slowly. I definitely folded it up yesterday, which means Carter undid all that work. Which means Carter spent the night here.

I push my breath out, defeated. The sky clears and sunshine pours through the wall of windows, making everything appear edged in yellow gold. My mood shifted that fast.

He put me in bed. But he knew I didn't want to sleep next to him, so he didn't do that against my will. And I gotta say, that bed is a hell of a lot nicer than carpet, no matter how thick.

I hate how thoughtful that was.

I spend the day digging up sod from the front yard. I have to grow Sage's damn dahlias somewhere. Because yes, I, Teal Flores, a woman who doesn't know the first thing about plants, am going to grow my sister's wedding flowers. And weirdly enough, I don't mind the work of it—of shoveling, at least. Digging through the rough, tight knots of grass roots is kind of like running, only it doesn't make my knee feel like it's breaking into several thousand pieces.

After showering, I look at jobs some more, and then spend a good twenty minutes stressing out over dinner, even though it's only three in the afternoon. Carter didn't ask me to make a meal. But he's expecting it, right? I'm the one staying at home, not working, with access to the nicest kitchen I've ever cooked in. Then again, I really don't feel like cooking for someone who is now making a legitimate habit of running away from me. He can tell me he's attracted to me all he likes, but actions speak louder than words. And right now, his actions have bruised my ego and my feelings and, to be honest, have made my chest feel a bit like someone punched a hole through my sternum.

But also—I don't want to be selfish anymore. Hence New Year's resolution number one.

I decide to call the least selfish person I know to get some advice.

"What's up?" Sage asks. I put her on speakerphone as I prepare a cup of café Cubano on Carter's awesome espresso machine.

"Question. If Tennessee put you on the kitchen counter and fingered you, and then told you it was all a mistake and ran away, and it's been a whole day and you haven't seen or heard from him since, but …if he did kind of a nice thing while you were sleeping after all that…would you cook him dinner?"

I guess Sage was drinking water or something, because the only thing I hear in response is sputtering and coughing.

"Hello?" I ask. "You good, Sage?"

Then Sky's voice is on the phone. "Hey. Did you just say Carter fingered you?"

I close my eyes and stifle a groan. Not that I don't necessarily want Sky to know my problems, but that girl needs to get laid or something. She always focuses on the pervy parts of anyone's business.

"Was he any good at it?" she presses, even though I haven't even answered her first question yet. See, that's exactly what I'm talking about.

There's some fumbling with the phone, and then Sage speaks up, her voice a little hoarse but no longer choking. "You're on speaker now. 'Cause Sky's here. Which you already know." She clears her throat. "So let me get this straight. Your husband put you on the counter, touched you—"

"Fingered her," Sky corrects.

Sage ignores this. "And then he said it was a mistake and took off?"

"Yes."

"And you want to cook him dinner?"

"I'm wondering if I should cook him dinner."

"What are you thinking of making for dinner?" Sky asks.

I shake my head even though neither of them can see me. "I don't know yet! Because I don't know if I should make food in the first place!"

"Well," Sky begins thoughtfully, "did he at least give you an orgasm?"

I sigh. "Is that really relevant?"

"Yes," they both respond at the same time.

"Well, then, no. He left me hot and bothered and disturbed." And some emotion way too close to heartbreak to admit to.

Sage responds first. "Don't cook him dinner. Come out with us."

I scrunch up my nose. "Where are you guys, anyway?"

"Nadia wanted help fixing the wallpaper in her en suite."

"Oh. Ew." I hate home repair crap. If you need help getting ab definition for the summer, I'm your girl. If you need someone to make a few fancy meals, I can do it. Apparently if you need someone to dig up sod, I'm down for that, too. But if you need someone to repair a broken stair, or paint a wall, or clean the gutters, do not call yours truly. I'd very much rather hire anyone to take care of that stuff.

"So right now, stop thinking about Carter," Sage says. "Watch a movie, paint your nails, put on a sheet mask. Then get dressed up and meet us at Evergreen's Brewery for dinner."

I make a face. "That's all the way in Troy!"

"What's the problem, you got a job to get up for in the morning?" That sick burn is from Sky, who adds, "Because I do!"

"What?" I shriek. "You got the job? Why didn't you say anything?"

"I'm telling you now. And we'll celebrate tonight. No excuses."

And then my baby sister hangs up the phone.

"Okay, then," I say as I grab my café and a bottle of nail polish on the way to the sofa.