Page 108 of Change My Mind
His mouth tipped up into a teasing smile. “Why? Is the Lady going to come and smite me if I do?”
I pinched again, although I noticed that he didn’t call her by her full name. “She might.”
“I thought that was just in theatres?”
“Yeah, it is. Unless you grew up a Henry, where it became this whole thing. A bit like Bloody Mary, and if you said it three times in a twenty-four-hour period, then Banquo’s ghost would haunt you. I think Dad made up the story as a joke one Halloween because we stupidly said that we weren’t easily scared, and I went along with it because I didn’t want Clara to call me a chicken. At the time, we thought it was bullshit, but then, a few years later, we fucked around and said it in front of a mirror, why I don’t know, and then it dropped on the floor out of nowhere. From that point on, we believed the curse was real. And look, logically we have always known that it was because this mirror was badly hung near a door that was banged shut one too many times, but also, the curse is real. As to why Clo and I love it so much, that is inherited from Dad, the same way we inherited his nose.There are witches and ghosts in it too, so how could we not love it?”
“Of course. Witches and ghosts.”
I pinched his nipple one more time. This time, he whimpered. “You doing lunch or dinner today?”
“I think dinner. Actually, no, I know it’s dinner. Can you come to Vivi’s later?”
“Sure. I need to eat anyway.”
One of Eli’s thumbs swept down from my hip to rest just above my clit. “Two more questions; how much time do you have before you one hundred per cent need to get ready, and when you said you had nothing left, what exactly were the parameters for that?”
I checked his phone. “Fifteen minutes max, and I cannot deal with any kind of penetration.”
Eli nodded his head once and then tapped my thigh to encourage me to shuffle up the bed until his face was exactly where he wanted it.
I had barely satdown in my chair after teaching my first lecture before a loud knock echoed in my office.
“Come in!” I called. The door creaked open slowly, and then unexpectedly, Josh’s head popped through the gap. He wasn’t supposed to be around now. He was supposed to beina lecture.
“Morning. How was your lecture?” he asked as he stepped fully into my office and closed the door behind him. He looked tired. The blue-black under his eyes made his entire face look sallow.
“It was a nine a.m. Monday morning lecture about a white whale; it went as expected,” I replied. I tried to inject somehumour into my voice, but it fell flat. I pulled my phone out of my jacket pocket and sent an SOS message to Becky. “How has your morning been?”
“Are we really doing this? Small talk about our mornings like the last week didn’t happen? You’ve been ignoring me.”
“I already told you that I wasn’t interested beyond the date we had and that weird exchange at my sister’s engagement party. I’m not ignoring you. We’re just colleagues who don’t really have much to say to one another beyond small talk about our mornings.”
“But we had a nice time on that date. I don’t?—”
I cut him off. “I have a boyfriend.”
It felt oddly thrilling to say that out loud for the first time. I had never seen myself as someone who would one day have a boyfriend, but it felt right.
It felt comforting getting to call Eli that.
Josh seemed genuinely shocked by that information.
“When did that happen?”
“Last week. I had a conversation with a friend, and it became apparent that we had strong feelings for one another, and now here we are. A couple. I am sorry that you found yourself caught up in it. That wasn’t my intention.”
That was a calm, diplomatic response.
“But it happened anyway. You get to just run off into the sunset and leave me broken and having to pick up the pieces. I don’t put myself out there a lot, and I thought we could have something.” There was an almost pleading tone in his voice.
“I’m sorry that I don’t feel the same.”
Josh didn’t have the time to get as angry as he clearly wanted because Becky opened the door. She leant against the open door jamb and took in the scene before her. She looked at me cautiously, and I tipped my head to signal that I was okay.
“I thought you had a lecture now, Josh?” Becky asked, her tone measured and firm.
Josh looked down at his watch and swore quietly.
