Page 56 of Finders Keepers
“Quen—Quentin—” His name tumbles from my lips unbidden asoh, oh god, I’m—
Before my eyes shut involuntarily as every single nerve in my body lights up simultaneously, I catch him jerk forward as he lifts the T-shirt higher. I can no longer see him, but I hear him repeat, “Fuck,” and then groan, ending in a long, stunned sigh at the same moment I’m finally able to take a deep breath myself.
Well.
I suppose that will have to count as a draw.
25
I’m surprised tofind my head doesn’t split right in half when the alarm I accidentally set goes off at nine-thirty Sunday morning. That’s what having three drinks will do to you in your thirties, I guess. I wonder if Quentin is equally miserable.
Quentin.
Oh shit. Last night.
I cannot believe Quentin and I…What exactly do you even call what we did? The most technical description, I guess, would be that we mutually masturbated from a distance. At a distance?
No English class ever prepared me for this particular grammatical conundrum.
After I get dressed and ready for the day and brush the furry feeling from my tongue—which goes a long way toward making me feel more human—I climb back into bed and message Sabrina:Quentin and I hooked up last night.
Then I add,Sort of. The exact circumstances are a bit unconventional.
Her response comes a few minutes later:????
My phone buzzes in my palm before I can reply, an incoming video call on the screen. I answer and Sabrina’s flushed, cherubic face appears. She’s walking on the treadmill at her university’s gym.
“Hey, I figured this would be—”
“First we were mouth-blocked by Smash Mouth and then I was standing naked in front of the window because I was drunk and it felt nice! And then he—”
“Wow. Hold please.” She pops in her earbuds. “Now that your strange sexcapades will not be broadcast to the entire Queen’s University gym, you can proceed.”
I flop down on my bed. “You’re the one who called me! You should’ve been prepared.”
“How was I supposed to know you were going to launch right into ‘we were mouth-blocked by Smash Mouth and then I was standing naked in front of the window’?” she counters, her voice lowering to a whisper as she quotes me. “And what does that all evenmean, Nina? Take a very deep breath and start over.”
In through my nose. One-two-three-four. Out through my mouth. One-two-three-four-five-six. The breath exercise is like a partial system reboot, the energy coursing through me much less frantic. “Okay. So.”
I fill her in on everything that happened yesterday between Quentin and me. The slow dance to S Club 7—“Oh man, I freaking loved their show,” Sabrina interrupts, then sings the chorus of theS Club 7 in Miamitheme until I ask her if we can get back to my story, please—and the hand-holding on our walk home. The kissing on the porch. How, at first, I thought things wouldn’t progress any further, but then…
“Oh. Wow. That’s…hot? Weird? I’m not actually sure.” Sabrina pushes a button and the treadmill slows until it comesto a stop. “David Bowie would approve, at least.” She raises her eyebrows as she glances over my shoulder at the poster on the wall. “What did Quentin say after? What didyousay?” she asks.
“Neither of us said anything.”
“You just stared at each other? Creepy.”
“No, we didn’t stare. Not for more than a second or two anyway. I didn’t really know what to say or do, though, so I waved, and then I closed the window and went to shower.”
“Youwaved?”
I groan as I cover as much of my face as I can with one hand. “I panicked, okay?”
“And he hasn’t texted you or anything?”
I check my phone again to be certain I didn’t miss it in a half-asleep state at some point overnight, but my last message from him is the picture of Faustine. “Nope.”
She grimaces.
