Page 48 of Cocky Nerd
“Ido.”
He gets up off the bed. “Can I get you anything? You needwater.”
“Sure.”
He brings me a bottle of water, retrieves his cell phone from under the sofa seat, and disappears into thebathroom.
I stare up at the ceiling and feel more sparks of electricity shoot through me. I still feel too good to start worrying about what it means that I’m having the most mind-blowing, world-rocking sex imaginable with a man whose world seems unrockable, whose mind can’t be blown, at least by me. Maybe if I were an elegant math equation or a tech-related database that he could somehow stick his penis into, I would feel like part of his world for more than an hour at atime.
When he returnsfrom the bathroom, he’s wearing his glasses and pajama bottoms. He leans against the side of the bed and says: “If it’s okay with you, I’m wide awake, so I’m going to put on my Bose headphones, listen to Led Zeppelin and do some work for about anhour.”
I suppose that ranks higher than having him passed out beside me or out the door after a quick peck on the cheek, but lower than post-coital spooning. “How can you listen to Led Zeppelin and not get totallyhorny?”
“I only get horny when I listen to Led ZeppelinII.”
I smile. That’s my favorite. “Fair enough.” I slide under the covers and stretch out. “Can I ask you one thing before you put your headphoneson?”
“You can ask me two things, if you sodesire.”
“Well, it’s not a question, exactly. Can you tell me about your mom? I’ve never met her. I’m just curious. Did she inspire you to start thatfoundation?”
He crosses his arms in front of his chest and looks down. “I wouldn’t say she inspired me to start it, no…I need to get back to Sanjay on some important things. We’ll talk about her another time,okay?”
“Okay.”
He goes over to the desk and taps his fingers on thedesktop.
“I have one more question,” I say,cheekily.
He looks over his shoulder at me, raising an eyebrow. He looks so hot like that, I want to take another picture of him. A not-dickpic.
“Which Zeppelin album are you going to listento?”
“III.”
“Okay.”
He nods. “Okay. You going tosleep?”
“I thinkso.”
I can practically hear the voice in his head telling him to come over and kiss me goodnight before he loses himself in his work stuff. Or maybe he can hear the voice in my head willing him to do it. Either way, he does it. He sits on the bed beside me, kisses my forehead, runs his fingers through my hair and says, “Good night, beautiful. I’ll wake you up before I go to my meeting tomorrowmorning.”
“Wake me up when you get up. I want to have breakfast withyou.”
He smiles. “Okay.”
I watch him for a while,before drifting off to sleep. His ability to focus on whatever he chooses to is annoyingly attractive to me. His discipline and drive is no different from mine as a dancer, I realize. It’s just that it’s off-season for me, and he has no off-season. Or an off switch, itseems.
I imagine what it would be like, being in a relationship with him when I’m in ballet-mode. Maybe it would be perfect. He’d be busy, I’d be busy, we’d find an hour in our schedules a few times a week to practice exotic and health-enhancing bedroom arts together and just live separate successful lives that are conjoined by our genitals, shared history and love for my brother andparents.
Or maybe he doesn’t even want that. Maybe he just occasionally needs someone that he doesn’t have to make a constant effort with, for business trips and gala events. Maybe he doesn’t want the same person everytime.
It is disappointing that my euphoria has so quickly devolved into neurosis, and very unlike me to be wondering where I fit into a man’s life. I never cared much about whether or not Julian was thinking about me when he wasn’t around; I’ve just always been flattered and happy to hear from him when he wanted to see me. But then again, when I do see him there’s never been a spark, or challenge, and there’s certainly never been a feeling of comfort. Same is true for every other guy who’s notJohn.
I try to remember what it felt like, slow-dancing with him earlier, to hold onto it. Every muscle in my body remembers the choreography of that dance that Mrs. Broadhurst taught me when I was twelve. That Elvis song was what she had chosen for her first dance with her husband at her wedding. I couldn’t get it out of my head allyear.
I bury my face into the pillow, shocked and overwhelmed by the idea that for the rest of my life now, every time I hearCan’t Help Falling In LoveI’ll think of Johnny Brandt, the way his hand rested on the small of my back, and how he had no idea that I was lying in a bed behind him while he was busy typing away on his laptop, deciding on that song for my own wedding, hating that I’m unable to picture myself dancing to it with anyone other thanhim.
