3 Crushes and a Wedding Ch. 06

Scarlett was standing in front of my door, knocking. She spun her head around instantly, giving me no opportunity to avoid the encounter. It was bound to happen soon, wasn't it?

The sight of her still wrangled my insides, but the initial shockwave spread quickly and wasn't followed by any residual aftershocks. My discussion with Kay had seemingly paid off; I fully understood now that my story with Scarlett was never meant to be and I wasn't going to let her alter that conviction anymore. But more importantly, the little time I'd spent with Megan had cemented my feelings. She was my first, my only priority. Everyone else was a figurant.

I gave Scarlett a nod and kept walking toward my room — and her — each step bringing me more confidence in my decision and feelings. As I got closer, I noticed something was off in her face and look. She seemed sadder than usual, perhaps more wistful.

"Hi." She took a step back to allow me access to the card reader.

"Hi." I swiped my card and opened the door, wondering what my next move would be. Allowing her inside wasn't an option. No matter how sure I was of my new resolve, I didn't want to immediately test it by letting her come within a few feet of my bed.

I pushed the door open, took one step inside, and spun around. She'd tried to follow me and nearly slammed into me. We stopped inches away from each other, with her face so close to mine that I could see the speckles of dark brown in her eyes.

Her expression switched from smiling to surprised to confused in a split second. I remained stoic.

"Can I come in?"

Was that a hint of begging in her voice? Don't yield, Zoe.

"No."

I sounded confident. Good.

"I'm sorry about the elevator."

"It's not about the elevator."

Shock first lit her eyes then reverberated through her entire face, forcing her eyebrows to furrow and arch in a dance of confusion and defiance.

We stared at each other, unwavering, until she took a step back. A little win for me. I was finally standing up to her, but more importantly, to the illusion of her that I'd built in my mind for so many years. She shouldn't be here, doing this, and I shouldn't be enabling her.

"I just wanted to talk." Her mesmerizing dark eyes were using all their power to hook me, but I fought back. The nasal voice was subsiding, revealing the low tone I'd heard her use a few times during the weekend.

For the first time, I was seeing her under a new, unflattering light - and it wasn't just the hotel's poor hallway lighting. Underneath all that confident exterior, she seemed broken and desperate.

"We've already said all there is to say." I sounded very cold.

"Oh..."

The full realization of what was happening here finally hit her. I wasn't going to be her weekend getaway play-toy anymore, and I wasn't going to indulge her one-time fun lesbian experimentation. Whatever she still wanted from me, she wouldn't get it. I was no saint, I'd used her too and I was as much to blame for both of our fun dalliances, but at least I was aware of my mistakes now.

She took a few steps back and leaned against the hallway wall facing my room. I stood still at the doorstep, defiant and victorious. This was my little win, my own version of slaying a dragon and conquering a minotaur. Not that she was either... She'd just, as the saying goes, lived rent-free in my head for more than a decade, and I'd finally evicted her.

She stared at the floor for a few seconds before whispering, "You mind-fuck me."

After another long pause, she raised her eyes and repeated it. "You mind-fuck me. And I don't mean that in the 'you mess me up' kinda way, even though that's true, but you also really screw my mind. Every time you look at me, it's like you're reaching out into my head with a ten-inch dildo and fucking my brains up. And out." She took a breath and whispered again, "You mind-fuck me."

What are you supposed to reply to that?! I remained silent. None of what she was saying would change my mind, I'd promised myself that. But I'd be lying if I said that her slow disintegration didn't affect me a little.

"You don't want to let me in, fine, but it's not like I chose this, Zoe." She gestured at the empty space between us. "I wanted the past to stay in the past, and the present in the present — two completely separate boxes. But life has a funny way, doesn't it? Now all my boxes are jumbled up and you get to mind-fuck me whenever you want and say 'no' when that doesn't suit you anymore. It had to be you, here, of all people. It had to be you." She stared at me, a little teary-eyed now, and cried out in a high-pitched but breathy voice, "Why did it have to be you? Why is it always you?"

I stood mesmerized by her contorted face and despairing eyes. She was coming apart, and it was like watching a train wreck happen in slow-motion in front of me. I couldn't take my eyes away. But something else was there, a truth I hadn't really considered until now. A truth she'd so carefully hidden it had become invisible to everyone, including her.

She was only shifting and focusing blame on me.

"It isn't me," I just said.

She furrowed her brows. "What do you mean?"

"This isn't about me, Scarlett. I'm an illusion. I am the truth you don't want to accept. I am the life you chose not to live." I pointed at her each time, my tone getting more ominous as I talked. "I am your best dream and worst nightmare. This is about you. You're not mad at me, you're mad at you."

"What..."

"You know what."

She tried to fight back, but her defiance was nothing but an act of last resort. "It's not me, it's you," she fought back. "I'm not gay."

The fact that she knew what I was talking about was enough proof of the contrary, wasn't it?

"Sure," I shrugged sarcastically. "What did you come here for?"

She looked at me for what seemed like an eternity, words failing her. Finally, she opened her mouth and whispered repeatedly, like a mystical incantation, "I'm not... I'm not... I'm not."

"You sure?!"

I don't know what took over me but I stepped toward her. One by one, my feet were closing the distance between us, but I wasn't pulled by her, I was virtually pulling her to me. I wanted her body to react to me, so it would scream the truth to her as well. She wasn't just gay for me, like she'd affirmed during our sauna talk, she was just gay. Maybe bi. But definitely, definitely, attracted to women in general, and me in particular in this situation.

I stopped mere inches away from her, raised both my hands and placed my palms on the wall on either side of her face, and leaned in just a little. Her closeness didn't affect me anymore, at least not in the same way it had the day before. She looked like a fragile, scared girl, and I saw bits of my own confusion and indecision in her, except I'd gone through those when I was in my late teens and early twenties, while she was being forced to acknowledge them in her mid-forties.

"Why did you come to me, Scarlett?"

She stared at me, like a deer caught in headlights.

"Do you just want to fuck me or are you just desperate to fuck any woman? Do you think a one-time fling will satisfy your curiosity so you can go back to living your perfect little wife life with no drama and no scary incomprehensible urges to kiss a woman or dive into her tits or grind into her?"

I explicitly chose that language to trigger her. We were still in the hallway, though, so I spoke in a low tone, which helped get the secrecy and urgency of the message across. I gave her a second to catch her breath, but judging by her harrowed look and sweaty forehead, it wasn't nearly enough.

"Do you really believe it's just me? Or am I the only woman who's made advances at you? Is it just me or did I happen to be the only one who forced you to take a peek out of the lofty closet you've locked yourself into?"

That's it. That's as far as I could go. I'd said my piece and put a big, unflattering mirror in front of her. It was now on her to acknowledge the reflected truth and decide what she was going to do about it. But whatever decision she'd make, I wasn't going to be part of it, that had to be clear. My life lied elsewhere, with a pair of smiley half-innocent and half-naughty green eyes.

"I'm sorry I can't let you into my room. You're not ready for any of this. Plus, I'm not right for you, and you're definitely not right for me." I was about to push myself off the wall, and her, when a movement on my right caught my eye.

I turned my head and saw those same green eyes I'd been thinking about, except there was no smile in them.

Megan.

My head swung back and forth between Scarlett's confused face that was still inches away from mine and Megan's surprised and disgusted expression. Fuck. I knew what this looked like to her.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

She shook her head and instantly spun around and disappeared behind the corner. My frozen body took a second to react, then I pushed off the wall and began running. My heart leapt out of my chest and splattered across the carpeted hallway floor. I stomped over it and kept running. As I was rounding the corner, I heard the elevator ding at the end of the hallway. Fuck these huge hotels.

"Meg! Wait!" I shouted breathlessly, even though I'd barely run fifty feet.

She turned to me, a look of... I can't even describe it... on her face, then turned back and walked into the cabin.

By the time my feet made it to the end of the hallway, the lift had already closed its doors and moved.

Fuck.