A Tree! A Tree! (2018) Pt. 01

The sound of a generic incoming text woke me. Who, I asked myself, would be texting me at the ungodly hour of... let's see... ELEVEN in the morning on a Saturday? Especially when it felt like someone had dropped an anvil on my head.

I tried to remember what had happened the night before. I had gone out for some drinks with coworkers and former coworkers and...yeah. I didn't have a blackout. I just couldn't remember what happened.

Wait, I do remember huddling around this big black wooden table, a group of maybe eight of us, and as some weird sort of truth or dare thing, we started going around the circle describing our deepest darkest most secret sexual fantasy. I panicked at the idea of doing that — I would never do that in a public setting of any sort, certainly not among coworkers — and reached over and drank someone else's shot. Then I remembered why, even in college, I kept assiduously to a two-drink limit. It was the first alcohol I had had in five years (starting from when we were first started trying to get pregnant).

I started turning mentally inward as people started revealing fantasies far milder than mine. After that...it wasn't a blackout and I'm sticking to it.

I was feeling like I could live a long happy life without ever drinking alcohol again and the generic text was from Tom. Why on earth would he text me? We didn't work together anymore and he was not my type. Sure, he was cute (okay, really, really cute), and I wouldn't object to seeing him naked. But no. Not him.

My type was, as I explained to my therapist a few days earlier, assholes. "I have an asshole fetish. Not that kind of asshole. Not rimming. I mean I swoon over jerks. I fall for guys who act like jerks and I keep finding myself shocked — shocked! — to discover that oh my god they really *are* assholes."

I did this in my twenties. And then I met the father of my now three-year-old and let me tell you, he should've cured me. Major serious overexposure to asshole-ness. Putting him in the rearview mirror, putting him in serious EX territory, especially after what he did the day after we together dropped all the wedding invitations into the mailbox, you'd think it would have done trick. Been there done that. No need to get within seven miles of another asshole.

But noooo! I go into a bar with a bunch of coworkers, the first time since the darling little girl popped out, and I, a grown-up thirty-three years old, can feel my antenna twitching all excitedly when in walks a guy who radiates raw jerkness.

Which gets us back to Tom.

Tom...let's put it this way. When my daughter starts dating (at the safe mature age of fifty), Tom is the kind of guy I want her to marry. Assuming she's straight and he's straight and...fuck it. You get the idea.

He's nice. Really nice. Too nice. Two examples. Number one. Once a coworker brought his kid six-year-old in for a hour because of an unavoidable meeting. Tom talked Pokemon to the boy the entire time and without complaint stayed late to make sure he got his work done.

Number two. When he still worked with the company, his job involved among other things overseeing two intern slots. I once heard an intern trying to persuade his predecessor to try something. That guy said no. She tried another argument about why they should give her idea a shot, and he said, "Look, you're new here. I'm right. You're wrong. And that's that."

When Tom took over the position, his first intern make the exact same suggestion. He patiently explained why it wouldn't work. She gave another reason why it should. He agreed to try it and negotiated with her how they would decide whether it was working and when they would stop if it didn't work out the way she thought it would. It wasted the company about a hundred bucks plus a few hours of staff time before she agreed it didn't work. But Tom thanked her for her creativity and encouraged her to keep making suggestions. Her next one saved the company ten thousand dollars. I could overhear their conversations and it was so strange to hear Tom take a nineteen-year-old so seriously.

Too nice. He would never bother me with a Saturday morning text unless it was an emergency. Which means something was probably going wrong. He only texted me a few times when we worked together.

No, I texted him once I locked myself out of my car and of all the names in the company directory he seemed the least likely to be bothered by a request to help. He seemed thankful for the opportunity to help. Too nice.

So his texting on a Saturday morning at the ungodly hour of eleven meant something was wrong. I texted back a "Hi! What's up?" I racked my headached brain trying to think of whether there was a job opening that he might be interested in. But I didn't think he wanted back at the company.

He asked me out for coffee.

Uh. Hmm.

"What for?"

I was googling 'hangover cures' when his reply came in ten minutes later.

"I wanted to talk about last night."

Now I had to play it cool. Ask the right questions, maybe figure out what the fuck he was talking about.

"What about last night?"

"Something you said."

Helpful, he was not.

"Could you be more specific?"

"I would rather not put it in a text."

The plot thickens. I couldn't think of anything else to say — there's a reason other than single motherhood that I don't drink that often — so I typed back, "The plot thickens."

"Please. This is hard for me. Could we just meet?"

"Now you can stand a spoon up in the plot," I typed back, slightly irritated.

"Could we please just meet?"

I sighed."Fine. But it can't be until two Saturdays when my kid is at his dad's again. And I'm over this hangover. Unless it's work related?"

"Definitely not work related. Two Saturdays. Where and what time?"

******

I'll admit, I had pretty much forgotten about coffee with Tom until I got a gmail alert fifteen minutes before it was to begin and I found myself scrambling to get to the coffeehouse.

He was already there, nursing a fancy dancy coffee in a ceramic mug that had, written on the side, a witticism that was trying too hard. His face couldn't seem decide to blush or beam.

"Can I get you something?" he asked eagerly.

"I can get myself something."

He looked disappointed.

"It's 2017. A girl can get her own drink. Not that I really count as a girl at age thirty-three but whatever."

I got an Americano with some random nut milk for creamer. Not that you asked. Christ, I'm starting to sound like Grumpy Cat. No, really, this story is about sex. I swear.

I sat across from him at a table for two. I took a sip of my drink. "Not bad."

"The business model of this chain is to imitate Starbucks as closely as possible but to actually have good-tasting coffee."

I laughed. "Ouch. I didn't think you could say something that sarcastic."

He smiled mysteriously.

"Okay, I've had two weeks of suspense. What the hell is this about?"

He suddenly looked abashed. "No small talk to start with?"

"Afterwards," I said.

His pale cheeks turned a little pink. (I should add that he has a curious kind of handsome. His dad is Irish. His mom South Asian. He looks Indian except he's quite pale. And his hair is black as black can be. And spiky. The effect is sorta like live-action anime. Very cute. Harmless cute. Not Mr. Trouble.)

"Do you remember what you said at the bar the other night?"

Curiosity makes me direct. "Honestly? No."

"Oh boy," he looked away in embarrassment. "You're not making this any easier."

"Sorry."

"Do you remember talking about fantasies?" he asked.

My turn to suddenly feel awkward. "Nooooo..."

"Oh dear," he muttered. He took a big gasp of air and dove in. I'm typing it with spaces between the words but that's out of a courtesy to you, dear reader, and a minor tweak of reality. He talked really, really fast. It was one long word. "When it was your turn, you talked about luring a guy into the woods thinking he would get lucky and then tricking him into getting handcuffed to a tree and leaving him there for a few hours."

Once I was able to mentally add spaces between his words, I covered my mouth in horror. "I did not!" Can you hurt yourself by blushing too fast?

He nodded quizzically. What did that mean?

"Oh my god," I said behind my fingers. "Oh shit. I couldn't have." I added indignantly, "There's no way! How could you suggest a thing?"

"Then how do I know about this fantasy of yours? Hmm?"

"Oh shit. Oh my god." I dropped my hands. "Did Rebecca hear this? Because she's been acting weird toward me since that night."

He gave me a painful smile. "She was sitting beside you."

"Oh shit. Oh my god." I groaned. "And now I am repeating myself." I tried to gain my composure. "Thank you for having the courage to tell me. I really appreciate that someone has the class to tell me because I had no idea I've been making a fool of myself at work for two weeks running. I'll apologize to people on Monday." I groaned again. "Though God knows what I'll say."

We fell into an awkward silence. So I thanked him again. He didn't say anything.

"You alright?" I asked, taking a sip of my drink. I wanted him to ask me if I was alright so I could say, "Hell no!" He didn't get the hint. Instead...

"I want you to do that to me!" he blurted out.

Once I realized he meant the whole handcuff-slash-tree thing, my mouth did the full guppy as my jaw slowly opened and closed in shocked awe. His face kept changing shades of red and pink. Very obvious on his pale skin. Then my decency returned.

"Aww... Tom, I couldn't do that to you. It's a revenge fantasy."

He started to look crestfallen.

"Look, look," I hastily added, trying to assure him, "I tend to fall for assholes. No, I always fall for assholes. Afterwards I want to blame them and ignore how many red flags I ignored. For weeks. Or months. Or in the case of my daughter's father, years." I was starting to ramble. "But anyway! You're a good guy! I couldn't do that to you."

He seemed to be deciding whether to be more disappointed or angry. "Nice guys finish last, is that it?"

How was I supposed to respond to that?

"Uh... No... I..."

"You don't take me seriously, do you?"

"Well," I said a little irritated, "you're eight years younger than me. Wait, why do you want someone to do that to you? It's so mean!"

"I... oh forget it." He sighed and started to stand.

Panicking, I waved him to sit back down. "Please! Let's figure out a way to move through this awkwardness. If we don't, the next time we run into each other on the street, we'll both die blushing. The coroners wouldn't know what to think."

He sat back down. "Where do we go from here?"

I took a deep breath. "Let's see. First I should thank you for your vulnerability. It's really sweet."

He rolled his eyes.

"Okay! That's not helping. Uh... shit... I'm thinking." I threw my hands up in bewilderment. "Are you sure you've never been an asshole to a woman?" I said with a giggle. "That would really help."

He looked forlorn.

"See, it's men like my daughter's biological father that should be chained to trees." I sipped my coffee. "For forever." Another sip. "Nothing? Are you sure? Tell me about your first crush. There's got to be something."

He smiled.

"What?"

"I like that bossy tone." Then he imitated me, "Tell me about your first crush."

It was my turn to roll my eyes. "I can't believe we're having this conversation. We still work in the same field remember! What if I end up being your supervisor some day?"

He smiled wolfishly.

I rolled my eyes back the other way. "Okay, pal, your first crush."

He started talking. It was pretty sweet. Painfully so. Maybe natural selection does work against niceness because it was a wonder he ever got laid, his tale was so sickeningly saccharine. By crush number three I was getting bored and these junior high girls were blurring together. So I started asking him questions to make him talk as if these were at least PG stories and not G ones.

He perked up under my questioning. He said he liked my tone. His romance life? Still tame. Other than teasing him about his having simultaneous crushes in college on seniors named Emma and Jane who were best friends it was b-o-r-i-n-g. He'd flunk out of asshole school the first week. First day.

Impatiently I asked, "Why didn't you ask them out?"

"They were out of my league."

"So you suffered in silence? Dude, is your purity test score still in the nineties? Have you ever done anything naughty?"

The bluntness of that question seemed to take him back. "What about you?"

I shook my head firmly in the negative. "Nope. Buddy. This is about you." I felt equally bold and rude saying that. It was such a violation of the rules of conversations. We should take turns answer each other's questions.

As if I hadn't gone far enough out of the etiquette zone, I blurted out a very crass, specific question. His voice quivered as he started to answer. I don't know what was in my coffee, but I snapped at him, "Don't you dare get evasive." I hesitated and then tried to figure out how to word an apology.

Weirdly after that he started to get very demure. He slumped and kept looking down. It wasn't low energy. He was kinda excited about it.

And strangely... so was I. I had never been put in a situation in which I could ask someone personal questions without the risk of having to answer such questions myself. The more probing my questions got... I realized that he was getting turned on.

When he mentioned masturbation, I pounced. I had never asked a guy questions about it. I never had the courage to ask a lover how frequently they did it, what they thought about while doing it anyway, things like that. Not only was it educational — it had never occurred to me to wonder what men do with all that semen anyway — his obvious mortification was causing a slick tingling feeling between my legs.

It also explained to why I always had this intuitive sense that it was infinitely ladylike if a woman masturbated in a work restroom but gross if a guy did. Just a few nail-polished fingers or the way the counter in the women's room at the end of the second floor was juuuust the perfect height for rubbing your clit. Ahem. Hypothetically speaking of course. I never did anything with any counter. Not work. Not the spare bathroom in my college apartment junior year. Not... this is getting awkward. My tangents should stick to Grumpy Cat impersonations.

After forcing him to describe the technical details of humping a pillow, I announced, "I need to use the restroom." I was feeling drunk. "Another Americano with almond milk or cashew milk or whatever it is." I picked up my cup a quarter inch and dropped it back on the table for emphasis.

When I got back to the table, there was a fresh drink for me.

"Thank you for letting me get you a coffee."

For want of words I grunted. As soon as I did it, I opened my mouth to apologize but I realized he seemed to like that uncivilized bossy grunt.

"I was afraid the barista wouldn't have it ready by the time you were back," he exclaimed.

I was about to say something reassuring but I sensed he wouldn't like that, so I said with a mock haughtiness, "You got lucky. This time."

He gasped and his look turned blank after his mouth goldfished.

"Did you just cum?" I demanded.

I didn't know it was possible to blush and beam simultaneously but there you have it. "No, I..."

He looked downright giddy. As I sat down I realized I was buzzed by more than the coffee.

He resumed staring down. With my inhibitions apparently out back in the alley on a smoke break, I sat down and I observed, "You're not making eye contact anymore."

He blushed again and risked a quick glance at my eyes before resuming his submissive posture again. "I..."

"Are you staring at my breasts?" I said accusingly. I was just as startled to hear me say that as he was.

"No! I... I'm sorry, no! I..."

"Why not?" I growled. It felt so naughty to say that. And ironic. So ironic. I mean guys are always... oh, I don't need to explain it.

He was completely flustered. Obviously fuses were getting blown in his brain as he struggled to answer my dangerous question. I had to admit his stuttering and gasping for air was pretty cute. Whatever they spiked the coffee with, a second dose of it had me undoing a few buttons of my blouse. Once he realized what I was doing, it was like the seat of the chair was giving his ass electric shocks.

I folded back the sides of my blouse so a lot of cleavage was exposed. "You're not going to hyperventilate are you?" I realized I was smiling so hard that my jaw was starting to ache.

He was a complete wreck. He couldn't help but look at my decolletage but instantly looked away. Over and over. And his breathing. God, his breathing. It was doing more to soak my panties than to get oxygen to his brain.

"Just so you know, it's really obvious whenever you look here..." I dragged a finger between my breasts.

He started to moan and then caught himself. "I... I'm so sorry." He struggled to make eye contact and sound serious. I wiggled my finger still between my breasts. His eyes immediately went to the motion.

"Jerk! Don't you know not to stare at a woman's rack?!" I teased.

He suddenly regained some of his composure. "There you go!" he said grandly. "See, I'm a jerk!"

I looked at him stupidly for a second before I realized why he said that. "Bastard!" I growled.

"That's me!" he said proudly.

"Okay, you asshole. But I'm only going to cuff you to a tree because I want to see you naked!"

Time stopped. I noticed, as if it belonged to someone else, that my finger was pointing at him in accusation. And my voice was booming. And everyone in the coffeehouse was looking at me. They had different looks on their faces, but they were all definitely staring. I had everyone's rapt attention. Projecting into the center of the room with an announcer's voice, I boomed, "Sorry about that!" with as much insouciance I could fake. "Carry on. We're not the droids you're looking for."

I cradled my head in my right hand, using it to block my vision of other people and their vision of my face. Which was on fire. I could've lit a candle by touching its wick against my cheek. "Wow, that was embarrassing," I giggled conspirationally. I risked a glance at Tom.

He was also blushing but he had a desperate look on his face. He leaned forward and nervously asked, "N-naked??"

Regaining some composure, I dropped my hand and sat up and said, "Duh. What would be the point of cuffing a guy to a tree with his clothes on?"

"But someone might see! Tree aren't exactly indoors!"

"Dude, you want to do this, it's on my terms." The look on my face dared him to disagree.

Conflicted. That's the word for his expression.

"I can't."

"You will," I said, utterly intoxicated by the situation. I smirked and then leaned forward with a whisper. "You desperately desperately want it and I'm willing to do it." I sat up straight. "On my terms."

For a moment, he looked like he was praying before he blurted, "Okay fine!"

"My parents have a cabin. I'll give you the address. Tomorrow at ten."

He had such an ecstatic look of shock on his face that I wondered, again, whether he made a mess of his pants.

I laughed. I hid my face in my hands and giggled, "What's gotten into me? God I'm soaked." After a moment I regained my posture and composure and got my hair out of my eyes. "Am I still blushing?"

"A little," he said.

"Just so I understand: you want me to treat you like an asshole who did me wrong and then was foolish enough to get into my clutches?"

My putting it that way seemed to have him choking on arousal. He nodded his head up and down enthusiastically.

"Buddy, there's a difference between leaning into a punch and handing someone brass knuckles while saying, 'Hit me!' You get that, right?"