Whiskey at Midnight, page 8
She drives for thirty minutes until they are far away from anywhere their friends would think to go. It’s like an affair, something that single women in the 1950s probably did when they lived in small communities. It feels dirty and perfect. And that makes Emma feel a little better for wearing her lucky bra underneath her pink shirt.
Wren grabs onto Emma’s hand while she turns left at their destination. It’s early for dinner and the parking lot is still mostly empty. The brightly colored sign of the restaurant towers above them. “It’s a habit,” Wren says. “I go to restaurants when they’re not busy usually.”
Emma was never asked where she might want to eat. Wren picked the restaurant out herself. It’s not Italian and that’s all that matters to Emma. She’s had enough pasta to last her all year. And even though Wren doesn’t know where the disastrous date happened, because Emma is sure she never told her, it feels like Wren chose sushi on purpose, just for Emma.
Wren acts like this date is no big deal. It’d be more convincing if she hadn’t obviously put some effort into styling her hair and wearing something other than tattered jeans or tights with holes in them. Wren’s black boots are covered in little marks, but not close to falling apart like some of her others. She wears plain black slacks and a white dress shirt. But other than her attire, Wren acts like nothing else is unusual.
The restaurant is small and they are directed by the tiny girl standing near the door to pick whichever table they want. Wren barely looks at the menu while Emma studies it for minutes, glancing up only to say that she wants a water.
“Do you want me to order?” Wren asks, finally.
“God, I thought you’d never ask.”
Wren doesn’t ask about Cam, doesn’t bring up anything that could possibly lead to her.
Under the red lamps nearby, shining their light all over the restaurant, Emma begins to relax. She’s good at keeping a conversation going, even with someone like Wren, someone who seems fine with silence. She mentions the project they had to do together for an English class. It had been hellish. Wren spoke to Emma only when absolutely necessary and acted like she hadn’t even read the assigned book. Emma had told Cam all about it. How maddening Wren was as a partner. How Emma couldn’t even tell if Wren was getting any work done. But Wren had pulled it off somehow. She’d done her share plus a little more. So Emma just figured that Wren was a strange kind of girl, but not so bad, after all.
Wren grins at that. “I actually liked that book,” Wren admits.
“I sure couldn’t tell that at the time,” Emma says. “I liked the book too. But I hated the professor so much I ended up throwing the book out once the semester was over. Just because of the association.”
“That doesn’t make you sound impulsive and crazy at all.”
Maybe Wren isn’t the best conversationalist but Emma finds herself laughing and having a good time. They come up with nicknames for professors they’ve long forgotten the names of, nicknames like Frogbreath and The Straightback.
Emma laughs even more when Wren stabs herself in the lip with a chopstick. Wren is always so in control, even when she looks like she might fall apart or blow away in the wind, or even when she’s having an orgasm, that it’s a reminder that she is human.
In a rare moment of sharing, Wren swallows some eel and says, “I like classic rock best.” She doesn’t mention any favorite bands. Apparently Wren is above choosing things.
Emma touches Wren’s foot underneath the table and lets her own foot rest there, right next to Wren’s. It’s childish enough to make Emma giggle. But then Wren is kind of smiling at it, too, and it makes Emma pause.
Emma has never fallen in love with sushi like a lot of her other friends and classmates. Some of them, she knows, have sushi every week. They find the best places around town that have good deals and commit them to memory so that they could have sushi almost every day, if they really wanted it. It’s just fish and rice and too much avocado for Emma. Wren eats it like it’s the last thing she’ll ever taste, like Emma imagines all those other people do who have figured out that sushi is the best thing on Earth. After watching Wren, and the way her eyes slide closed upon tasting a piece, it starts to taste better. Maybe Emma could come to love it like everyone else.
Wren invites Emma back to her apartment after. She’d fought to pay for dinner at the table, until Emma had finally relented and allowed it. “I have some wine we can get into,” says Wren. Emma doesn’t have anything to do the next day, not until work in the evening. And really, they both knew the invitation was coming at some point during dinner.
Emma doesn’t ask about Wren’s roommate. It only took the first ten times of the mysterious roommate not being there for Emma to stop asking. Wherever the girl lived, it must not be at the apartment with Wren.
The drive back to Wren’s apartment is mostly quiet. The volume on the radio is still low enough that it can barely be heard. Staring out the windows, at all of the buildings they pass, Emma is hit with a sudden thought. Had they really had an entire meal without any reference to fucking?
Wren leads the way up the stairs to her apartment. She turns her head around, as if she’s unsure Emma is really going to be behind her. Her fingers are clumsy as she pushes her key into the lock. When the door is opened, she stands aside for Emma to go in first. Emma barely makes it into the apartment before she stops in her tracks. A fresh bouquet of lilies is on the coffee table, right next to the clean ashtray. Wren’s never seemed the flower type, probably only likes the outdoors because that’s where she’s supposed to smoke.
Behind her, Emma can feel Wren’s breath on her neck. “Do you like them?” asks Wren. It all falls into place, why exactly these flowers are sitting in a room that has probably never seen flowers before.
The only thing Emma can think to do is to turn around and give Wren a chaste kiss on the lips. Wren is trying and it might be Emma’s new favorite thing in the world.
The first time Cam really kisses Mark in front of Emma, more than those fluttery pecks on the lips that they like so much, they’ve been dancing to all the terrible music in the bar. Emma can do nothing but watch, fuming. Steve had been there, earlier in the night, but left suddenly, citing a need for sleep before work in the morning. For once, Emma wishes he was there. Cam closes her eyes when she kisses Mark and runs her fingers along the back of his neck. When they part, they’re both smiling. For the first time in three days, Emma feels her heart break.
Wren walks up to her then and stares for a moment. She takes Emma’s mostly finished drink and downs it. She hands Emma a brand new one. It’s fucked up, this kind of enabling behavior from Wren. Emma feels even worse.
Wren watches her, no one is paying attention to them so Emma doesn’t say anything, and dances next to Emma. She never gets close enough to touch Emma.
Emma gulps down her drink, a terrible idea, and walks over to an abandoned table to set the empty glass down. It’s the alcohol and the fact that she can’t feel her face that makes her grab for Wren and dance with her. It has to be.
Emma has watched Wren dance before. Everyone has. Wren dances like she’s not even in the bar anymore. Sometimes she keeps her eyes open, sometimes she slides them closed. She has a magnetic effect when she dances. Everyone wants to be near her, just to try and feel whatever it is that she does. And that’s why Emma knows that people will watch them now, because Wren is someone to watch. Emma closes her eyes so that she doesn’t see anyone else, not even Mark and Cam. It’s just her and Wren and the way Wren lazily places her hands on Emma’s back. Emma feels like she might slip away at any moment.
The song changes and Wren moves in closer. She smells like cigarettes and whiskey and something else that Emma can’t place. Then, Emma feels Wren’s lips upon hers. Emma’s eyes fly open, darting around the room, but no one has seen the quick kiss and Emma closes her eyes again, letting Wren get by with it this once.
Emma’s had enough to drink that she’s barely moving her hips, but she can feel Wren gliding against her, holding her steady, just being there in her space. When she opens her eyes again, another song has come and gone and she doesn’t see Cam or Mark. She looks at Wren after, almost misses the hurt look on Wren’s face.
“I’m going out for a cigarette,” Wren says, a little roughly.
Emma orders another drink at the bar and then follows her out.
Another thing that has to be just because of the alcohol, Emma takes a whole cigarette from Wren and smokes it. It fits the night so well that she enjoys every second of it. She finishes and Wren is still standing there, looking around at the black, cloudless sky.
Wren’s shoulders are a little hunched. She’s small in her long tanktop. Emma probably wouldn’t be able to tell in the dark where Wren’s tits are if it wasn’t for the long beaded necklace that Wren wears. The beads are really a dark brown, Emma has examined them in better lighting, but they look black outside. It’s the most wounded Emma has ever seen Wren, if that’s what it is. It’s so hard to tell. And there shouldn’t be a reason for it. They’re just having some fun. It’s Wren who says that line all the time. They’ve gone on one date, that’s it.
Emma’s not even convincing herself anymore.
“We don’t have to be a secret,” Emma says. It’s the first thing she’s said or done that might not be because of the alcohol.
“Okay.”
Wren finally stops looking at the sky and puts her cigarette in the ashtray. It’s burnt out some time ago. She smiles at Emma, but it’s not completely genuine.
Emma takes Wren’s hand on the way back inside, drops it when they reach the bar and Mark and Cam are standing there. Mark is talking about work. Cam is completely enthralled. Mark wears his usual pair of khakis and a dress shirt. But then Wren has whispered something in her ear and she’s missed it.
“What?” asks Emma.
“We don’t have to rush anything,” Wren says. She scoots past Emma and orders another drink from Reese, who grins when “whiskey” tumbles out of Wren’s mouth. Wren doesn’t even look at Emma when she has her drink and heads toward the speakers, swaying to the music.
The only reason Emma feels like a piece of shit is the alcohol.
Emma is playing with Wren’s hair days later after they shower. Even with wet hair, Emma can see the subtle natural highlights in Wren’s hair. They still haven’t done anything in front of their friends. Nothing that they haven’t done before at least. It’s become increasingly obvious to Emma that Wren is waiting on Emma to take the plunge. The world probably won’t end if Emma kisses Wren out in the open where anyone can see. But it might.
With Emma’s fingers in her hair and her head in Emma’s lap, Wren hums in contentment. “I’m not sleeping with Steve anymore,” she says. Just like that. Like it’s so easy for her to drop someone, like she’s decided she doesn’t like one particular brand of soda and has switched to another.
Honestly, Emma had forgotten about Steve and Wren. She frowns at the reminder. Wren had been hanging out with her more during karaoke rather than standing next to Steve. And maybe that’s why Steve was suddenly working on karaoke nights, though that seems to be over now.
With Wren’s sudden announcement, images of Wren with Steve pop into Emma’s mind. Wren on a bed, doggystyle, with Steve pulling at her hair. Steve’s cock in Wren’s mouth. Did they ever use Wren’s shower like she and Wren do?
Wren twists around to look at Emma. With her makeup gone, she looks young and even smaller. She has an expectant look on her face.
“Oh,” Emma manages to say.
On nights when Emma comes to Wren’s straight from work, Wren offers to rub her feet. It’s part of their weird domestic thing they have going on. If Wren didn’t always use it as a prelude to fucking, it might seem sweeter.
Those are the times, when Wren is concentrating on Emma’s feet and nothing else, that Emma almost says something sweet, something you might say in a normal relationship. But then Wren leans forward and kisses the inside of Emma’s thigh and Emma is instantly aroused and the words die on her tongue. They’re not normal. None of what they do is what someone could call love.
They always fuck harder on karaoke night after they see Cam and Mark. On those nights, Wren lets Emma do whatever she wants to her. In the harsh light of day, Emma winces at the bruises and bitemarks she’s left all over Wren’s body. Wren hisses whenever Emma is attacking her body, but she never puts up a fight or tells Emma to stop. Sometimes Emma realizes what she’s doing halfway through. Her hands begin to shake and she kisses Wren’s collarbone tenderly. There’s always bruises there.
It’s during those times that Wren lets out a shaky breath. “I won’t break. You can go as hard as you want,” she tells Emma. That always works. After Wren says that, Emma pounds into her cunt with three fingers, the magic number that keeps Wren’s eyes closed so that she can’t watch Emma deteriorate in front of her.
When Emma is finally able to hold Wren’s hand in front of everyone, it feels like some kind of victory. Steve raises his eyebrows when he sees their joined hands and shoots Emma a look that reminds her of murder. There’s nothing she can say. She’s gained what he has lost. She’d probably hate him if the situation was reversed. But then he winks at her. It’s the closest Steve is going to come to saying he’s happy for them. Mark doesn’t bat an eye. His non-reaction is so telling that Emma bites her lip. All he knows her as is Cam’s friend, Cam’s lesbian friend. And, of course, Wren would be holding a lesbian’s hand. Wren probably fucks anything that moves. Cam just watches. It’s worse than if she was happy or angry at the sight of them.
The two of them go outside to smoke. Emma doesn’t have one of her own. She hasn’t had enough to drink. Mark’s still on her mind. He’s got stubble on his chin now. Emma’s never kissed someone with stubble. Family members, on the cheek, don’t count. She’s never run her fingers through the hair on a man’s chest. She can’t see the draw.
“Are you gay?” Emma asks. She should have asked before they fucked the first time.
Wren shrugs. “I’m not the kind of person who worries one way or the other.” It’s exactly the kind of answer Emma expects from Wren.
Cam watches them like a hawk all night. Emma knows because she can’t help watching Cam herself.
Emma kisses Wren on the cheek. “I’m going to the bathroom,” she tells Wren.
She’s not really surprised when Cam is standing in the hallway when she exits the bathroom.
“Gotten over it then?” Cam asks. That thing, that look in the eye that Emma has been looking for over the last two years is finally there. There’s no doubt about it now. But Cam’s jaw is also set and her shoulders are tense.
Knowing someone for over three years means they deserve some kind of honesty. Emma shrugs her shoulders, a habit she’s picked up from Wren, and says, “Does it matter?”
Cam rolls her eyes at that and turns to leave. Just saying it felt dirty. Emma turns right around and heads back into the bathroom. She washes her hands, scowls at them when they shake under the water. It’s only when Wren comes in looking for her that she notices she’s left the door unlocked and that her hands have turned pink from washing them so much.
Emma is using Wren. Fucking her so that she doesn’t have to think about Cam all the time. Letting all of the bad feelings leak out of her body to take up residence on Wren’s as bite marks and scratches and bruises that fade to an ugly yellow. It’s a harsh revelation, but there’s no other way to explain what is happening. The only reason Emma doesn’t loathe herself for it is that seeing Wren smile makes her happy. If she still feels something like happiness, it can’t all be that bad.
Steve reminds her of this while standing at the bar. Wren is off dancing, had kissed Emma when Emma offered to go get her another drink. Steve doesn’t even bring up their relationship, if you could even call it that. Emma doesn’t. He looks toward Wren and says, “She looks peaceful.” At the time, Emma takes it as him saying she’s doing something right, even if everything else is so fucked up. But later that night, when Wren is between her legs, Emma closes her eyes and sees Wren swaying on the dance floor. She isn’t so sure Steve wasn’t just talking about Wren dancing.
It starts to feel normal. The bruises that Wren hides sometimes, wears nonchalantly others. The taste of herself in her own mouth when she kisses Wren after Wren’s gone down on her. Emma even forgets to look at Cam sometimes when they’re all out. Wren doesn’t say all the words Emma needs to hear, but Wren lets her go on about her fears, like her semester of student teaching, and listens when Emma complains about the craft people who come in at work.
It’s only sometimes that Emma feels Cam’s lips on hers when it’s actually Wren kissing her. But Wren kisses her softly so rarely that Emma easily forgets those moments of weakness.
Mark and Wren go to get drinks for everyone one night and it’s the most absurd thing Emma has seen in weeks. Wren has neglected to cover her bruises at all. There aren’t many. One is noticeable on her chest, right by that long necklace, and another is on her right shoulder where Emma held her down.
Emma waits next to Cam and focuses her attention on Steve. He’s dancing like an idiot nearby. She and Cam are so the opposite of the girlfriends waiting on their doting boyfriends that Emma wants to pull her own hair out. She stares so hard at Steve, who really needs to shave his head again, that Cam has to clear her throat a second time to get Emma’s attention.
“What are you doing?” Cam asks.
“What?”
“You don’t use people, Emma. What are you doing?”
It’s the worst thing Cam can say, given the situation. Cam, her friend who hasn’t noticed much of anything about Emma in the last few months, who didn’t notice her losing weight and then returning to a normal weight. Cam, her friend who now only sees how she’s using someone. Cam saying it puts it all out in the open. Every bruise, every night Emma showed up unannounced. Emma can’t stop the tears that spring forth, but she refuses to let them fall.
