sighed as she walked up the dirty stairway to Phil’s apartment. She wanted to be held like an infant. She walked in the door, then through the living room, trying to ignore the month’s worth of accumulated dirty dishes, the piles of clothes, CD cases, and the assorted sordid detritus of three pathetically dirty man-boys. She walked into Phil’s bedroom.
“Hey, where you been?” he asked. “You took so long that my feet are getting cold. And where’s my coffee?”
She sighed. Sometimes, Phil was incredibly self-involved. “‘Hello, Tracie. How did you sleep? What’s wrong? Mother’s Day a little tough on you?’” she began, imitating his voice. “‘Oh! Marcus, your bully editor, cut your Mother’s Day feature to shit? I’m so sorry. And you worked so hard on that story.’”
He didn’t show any remorse, but he sat up in bed and opened his arms. “Hey, come over here, baby.”
Tracie hesitated, but the newspaper crumpled under her arm made her feel so bad that she needed comfort more than pride just at that moment. When Phil gave her that look, everything seemed better. He needed her, and Tracie felt so desired that work seemed instantly unimportant. She crawled in beside him. He gave her a deep, hot kiss. Tracie melted into his arms.
“Life is always hard for the artist, baby,” he said, holding her tighter and starting to rub her back. “You know, I just finished another story.”
“Really?” Tracie knew Phil could write only if he was inspired. He didn’t believe in deadlines. “They kill your creativity,” he’d said. “That’s why they call them deadlines.”
“What’s the story about?” Tracie asked shyly. Secretly, she’d always hoped he’d write something about her. But so far, he hadn’t.
“I’ll show it to you sometime,” he said, and pressed both of his hands on either side of her spine. It was soothing. He was so much bigger than she was. It felt great to be held against his wide chest, encircled by his arms. This was what she wanted. Not sex, not words, just dumb comfort. She nuzzled against him. Then he turned her to him. “Nobody kisses like you do. You love me?”
Tracie nodded and hugged him back. “And my ironing isn’t bad, either,” she said. “But I have to go. I’m meeting Jon.”
“Fuck Jon,” he said, then lowered his voice. “No, fuck me.” He nuzzled her ear. “I want you,” he whispered.
“Phil, I have to go or I’m going to be late. I have to meet—”
“The computer weenie.” Phil shifted his weight so that his whole length was against her. “Why don’t you stay here with my weenie instead?” he asked.
“Phil, I mean it. I have to—”
He grabbed her again and pulled her to him. “You look so sexy right now …”
“You only say that when you’re horny.”
“I’m horny all the time, so you always look sexy to me.”
They struggled with each other until Phil was on top of her. She gave him a deep kiss. Oh, she liked him to touch her so much. When he began to unbutton her shirt, she stopped struggling. He wasn’t always hot for her. Tracie was smart enough to notice that Phil withheld sex sometimes. She thought it was one of his power plays: make her want it and then pretend to be bored.
The sick part was, when he teased her it made her hotter for him. Most of the men Tracie’s age were only too happy to grab her and stuff their thing inside her. Phil was the first man she’d known who knew how to hold off until she was almost ready to beg for it. She shivered just a little, but he was close enough to feel it. “I know you like me,” he whispered. “You can’t help it, can you?”
“No,” she murmured, and he lifted her at the hips and pulled off her jeans as if she were no heavier than an infant. He ran his tongue from her knees all the way up to her breasts.
“So pink and so pretty,” he said, and she felt a little thrill run from the back of her neck directly to her groin. He hooked his thumb under the elastic. “These always remind me of those frilly paper things that cupcakes come in.” He kissed her again. “Come to me, my little cupcake.” For an insane moment, Tracie thought about the farm cakes she craved, but when Phil moved his thumb elsewhere, she was right back to business.
And business was good.
Tracie’s eyelids fluttered open. She hadn’t meant to fall asleep again, but the sex had been so good, and being held by Phil and slipping off to sleep after a really satisfying orgasm had been too hard to resist. Not a bad way to spend Mother’s Day, or any day, for that matter.
She remembered Jon again. She sat up and began to gather her clothes. Phil groaned, rolled over, and grabbed her back. He put the side of his face in the crook of her neck so that his mouth was just at her ear. “If you didn’t have to leave,” he whispered in her ear as he caressed her arm, “I’d be tempted to start kissing you right here.” He was quiet while he kissed the nape of her neck, then her shoulder. His breathing was getting heavier. “I’d move my way down to your nipples and then I’d …”
Tracie felt Phil’s erection against her leg. “Still playing hard to get?” Tracie asked.
“Hard, anyway. And you know why? Because of you, baby.”
Tracie reached down to the inside of Phil’s leg. “Oh, yes,” she cooed. She took one hand and began to kiss his fingers. But then she stopped. “What is this?” She held up his hand. They both looked at it. A phone number was scrawled in blue pen across his palm.
“Uh.” There was a tiny pause, the shortness of which only an experienced girlfriend could interpret. Was it the pause to remember or the pause to make up a plausible lie? “One of the guys’ new phone numbers. From the band,” Phil said.
“An 807 exchange? You’re telling me this is a Gland’s phone number?” she asked. “Frank’s? Jeff’s? I don’t think so. Since when did they move to Centralia?” She looked at Phil, hoping to see truth in his eyes.
“Jeff moved awhile ago,” he said, pulling away from her. He swung his long legs over the side of the mattress, sat up, and reached over to the night table for a cigarette. “I have to call him about rehearsal tomorrow,” he told her.
“Whose number is it, Phil?” Tracie asked. She picked up the phone, prepared to dial.
“Jeff’s,” he said, his back still to her. He lit a match, sucked in a deep lungful of smoke.
She hated him right then. She wasn’t stupid, after all. It was probably the phone number of that skinny little girl from Friday night. She should have known! She began to dial. “Phil, if I dial this number and I don’t get Jeff, I’m going to cut off your hand, so your penis never has a friend again.”
“Go ahead, baby,” Phil said calmly as he did a French inhale. “Of course, you’ll look like a psycho bitch and I’ll look like an asshole, but hey, I don’t mind.”
Tracie paused. Was he being casual or just acting as if he was? She couldn’t tell. And did she really want to know? Phil took a deep puff, then exhaled. “I mean, I can’t help it if Jeff’s old lady answers the phone and gets mad. She hates him to get calls there. Especially from women. And so late.”
“Late? It’s only ten-thirty.” God! She’d be late for Jon!
“Why don’t you stop fussing and come here and get what you really want?” Phil asked her. Sometimes she hated him. He put his cigarette down and opened his arms again to her.
“I miss you already and you’re not even gone,” he said, and rolled on top of her and kissed her again. His long body wasn’t heavy enough to really pin her against the bed, but she liked the sensation of almost being pinned. His mouth tasted sharply of tobacco, but his tongue was so warm and alive. It searched hers like a friendly little vole looking for a home. Tracie dropped the phone and reached