with Alex tonight?’ But just saying the words sent shivers all the way down my spine.
‘I knew this would happen,’ Jenny shook her head, swiping her Metrocard. ‘You weren’t even OK dating two guys, you were never going to be able to sleep with two guys. Not at once.’
‘Christ, it’s not a threesome, Jenny.’ I followed her down the stairs, shaking my head. ‘And you didn’t want to share that information with me? Really, I’m OK seeing them both, I like them both in different ways, but I don’t know. Tyler is so much fun, and Alex is, well, it’s different.’
‘But you like him more than Tyler?’ she asked.
‘It’s different with Alex, harder to explain. I like the way he makes me feel about myself. With Tyler it’s kind of more about how he literally makes me feel,’ I tried to explain without blushing. ‘Did you ever do that experiment at school where you get three white flowers and you put one in an empty vase, one in a vase with water and one in a vase with food colouring?’
‘Yeah,’ Jenny nodded, ‘but I really don’t know what that’s got to do with you getting your kicks with some hot banker.’
‘Shut up,’ I smiled wryly and hopped on the train as the doors slid open. ‘OK, don’t laugh but the flower without any water just wilts and dies, right? And the flower with the water blossoms and it’s just really ordinary but beautiful, then when you add the food colouring it—’
‘It takes the colour into the flower,’ she finished for me. ‘Oh my God, you’re so meta! Doll, your first analogy. I’m so proud of you.’
‘Thanks. I feel validated,’ I said, patting her thigh. ‘I know it’s cheesy, but it’s the best I can come up with. Before I was just suffocating, with Tyler, it’s like classic and romantic, he has a structure to his life that I recognize. But with Alex, it’s fun and exciting and different. I don’t know where it’s going, everything is so new.’
‘New and exciting is good,’ Jenny said, nodding thoughtfully. ‘But when you’re in a delicate emotional state, that’s you doll, or when you just need to go out and have lots of great sex because you’ve only slept with one guy your whole life, again like you, maybe classic and romantic is the best.’
‘Maybe. I just don’t know. And I don’t know how long I can keep seeing them both. It does feel weird, whether it should or not. But seeing Tyler almost takes the pressure off whatever’s happening with Alex. Not that anything bloody has.’
‘Well, how about you give Alex his shot in the bedroom tonight and make your decision tomorrow?’ She grinned as the train slowed down, approaching our stop. ‘God knows, I’m going to need you to get the hell out of Jeff’s, oh, I don’t know, as soon as we get there.’
‘Things are going well then?’ I smiled. ‘I’m really pleased. I’m not going to say anything other than, I’m glad things are working out.’
‘Like I said,’ she said, hopping out of the carriage, ‘it’s fate. Sometimes you have to put all the psychobabble stuff on one side and go with your heart.’
‘Wow!’ I linked arms with her as we strutted up the stairs. ‘I just lost all respect for you.’
‘I know,’ she smiled, happily. ‘Isn’t it amazing?’
The first thing I would have liked to have known, before I agreed to dinner at Jeff’s, was that he was a terrible cook. Which he was. The second thing that would have been helpful to know, was that, in Jenny and Jeff world, ‘dinner’ was apparently a euphemistic term for practising oral sex skills on each other’s forks and fingers. I tried not to watch while I nibbled a polite amount of the spaghetti and mush that had been presented to us the second we walked through the door. We had only been in the apartment for approximately fifteen minutes and already, it was quite clear that Alex and I were in the way. Alex openly stared, occasionally nudging me with his knee. I couldn’t even look at him. Apart from the awkward hello and half-kiss we’d shared before being rushed to our seats, we hadn’t really spoken. Jenny and Jeff’s red-light show was making the atmosphere so tense, I didn’t know where to put myself. I felt like a maiden aunt at an orgy.
‘So, how was your weekend?’ Alex asked me and Jenny, breaking the strained silence and twirling limp spaghetti around his fork. I noticed no one’s plates matched. The apartment was super swank on a Tyler scale, but it seemed as if it was just possible that Jeff hadn’t been too worried about his housekeeping recently. I figured he had something else on his mind. And possibly other parts of his anatomy.
Jenny response to Alex was a low moan as Jeff’s hand vanished under the table, so I took it upon myself to answer-slash-try to distract Alex from the incredibly inappropriate behaviour on the opposite side of the table.
‘It was OK, I wrote.’ It wasn’t a lie, I had written. ‘What did you get up to?’
‘I wrote too,’ he nodded, looking dead ahead. ‘It was good actually, I think I got some good stuff out.’
I smiled and nodded politely, trying to think of something to say that wasn’t ‘For Christ’s sake, get your hands back on the table, it’s unsanitary’ but our hosts beat me to it, dropping their cutlery and more or less giving up any pretense of eating, before moving on to the main course, each other. I could have killed Jenny.
‘So, Jeff,’ Alex started. So brave, to try to attract his attention. ‘Your food tastes like complete shit. What is it supposed to be again?’
‘Pasta,’ Jeff said, distracted by Jenny, massaging his shoulders. I couldn’t think what strenuous activity he might have undertaken that would necessitate a massage, it certainly wasn’t the cooking. ‘It’s just pasta.’
‘It’s delightful.’ Jenny tried some sort of erotic manoeuvre with a forkful of soggy pasta, but it did not come off well. Unlike the pasta, which dropped directly into her lap.
‘OK, then,’ Alex gave me a sideways smile, ‘nice. This totally makes up for your girlfriend throwing up all over my place.’
‘I want to know what’s for dessert,’ Jenny asked, actually getting out of her seat and putting herself in Jeff’s lap. Jesus, she was shameless.
‘I have ice cream,’ Jeff breathed heavily. ‘I got your favourite.’
‘I don’t really feel much in the mood for ice cream,’ Alex said, pushing his chair back and standing to leave. ‘But I do have some excellent day-old-pizza that’s crying out to be eaten. Angela, can I interest you in a slice of pepperoni?’
‘Yes. Yes, you can,’ I said, following him away from the table. ‘Thanks Jeff, Jenny.’
‘You’re going?’ Jenny started to make some noises about staying for coffee, but whatever Jeff whispered in her ear sent them off into squeals of delight and a short sharp ‘bye’.
‘Jesus, what was that all about?’ Alex laughed, slamming his apartment door behind him. ‘Does your friend like an audience or something?’
‘I want to say “no”, but the best I can give you is, I really hope not,’ I said, hovering by the sofa. There didn’t seem to be any puke stains on there, so I sat down cautiously.
‘Beer?’ He opened his huge fridge, balancing a pizza box and a six-pack on one arm.
‘Thanks.’ I took the bottle and sat in silence, not sure about what my next move was supposed to be. His apartment was the opposite of Tyler’s, every inch of it breathed him. There were CDs lying around on every available surface, notebooks littered the coffee table, and I was never more than three feet away from a chewed-on pen or pencil.
‘I don’t know, I guess it’s cool that they’re so in to each other.’ He settled down and opened the pizza box. No really, it was at least one-day-old pepperoni pizza. ‘I just figured when Jeff invited me round for dinner, it would actually be dinner.’
‘Me