Truth be told, my feelings for Eli probably can’t pass a purity
test. Some of them, maybe the majority, are just categorically lust. Not that
that matters really. Mainly he’s just nice to look at, even in the wheelchair.
Maybe even a little bit because of it. It’s kind of sexy the way his shoulders
move when he’s rolling himself. I’ve always been a sucker for broad-shouldered
men. I’m eager to see Eli’s bare, eager to kiss and caress them. I bet the
muscles are huge. His arms are also powerful too no doubt, and I’m yearning to
see them undressed. I’m yearning to see him—undressed. I keep imagining my
hands running all over that swarthy beige flesh that reminds me of the way I
like my coffee, all full of cream. I can’t stop thinking about the
possibilities. I try to go on like nothing’s happening, but my belly is full of
butterflies, nervous ones that flutter frantically dying to light somewhere—well,
on him.
These feelings are not so practical either. I keep wanting
to get way ahead of myself. I keep wanting to be in love. Normally I’m a slow
bloomer. Even when I like a guy I make him wait. He has to prove himself a
little. I usually wear my panties pretty tight, but not this time. I’m dying to
seal the deal—whatever deal that is. I tell myself that I’m just being a
thoroughly modern woman, that I’m liberated, how this is the new millennium,
and my mother’s rules do not, and should not, apply. But again, the truth is,
practical or not, pure or not, I just want Eli Abbot, and I feel like if I
don’t get to have him, in some form or fashion, it will be the loss of a
lifetime.
Alonso returns to our table. It’s Friday night after work,
and he and I, along with two other office mates, are out for Happy Hour. The
music is loud and so is the conversation around the table. Linda, one of our
four, is bitching about some slight or something that Stephanie, our
supervisor, has done or said. I’m not really following because one: I like
Stephanie, and two: my mind is on tomorrow night with Eli; that’s assuming he
makes it back to town and there’s not some work emergency that could determine
the fate of the free world. Carla, the other person who makes up our four, but
who reports to another supervisor, gives Linda advice on how she should handle
the situation. Now that he’s back Alonso just laughs and advises both Linda and
Carla that whatever it is they are complaining about is no big deal. I couldn’t
agree more, especially since I only agreed to going to Happy Hour because I
thought I’d have a chance to talk with Alonso about this thing with Eli. However,
in the context of this office foursome I’m not about to do that.
So I’m horrified when Alonso brings up the subject of my new
boyfriend, which Eli is not I hastily say.
“Not yet,” Alonso says. “But will be. Third time’s the
charm.”
“Oooh, do tell!” Linda says hungrily.
“Yeah,” chimes in Carla. “Is he tall, dark, and handsome?”
“Sí!” says Alonso. “Absolutamente.”
Eli was tall in the video clip I shared with Alonso. He
still is really.
“Alright,” says Linda. “Details, girl. ‘Fess-up. We know
still waters run deep.”
“He’s not my boyfriend,” I insist.
“Yeah, but do you want him to be?” Carla asks as Alonso just
grins.
Sí! screams my
mind, body, and soul as my lips mutter, “He’s really nice.”
My friends hoot like there’s been some kind of score.
“He’s on T.V.,” Alonso announces.
“Really?” says Linda.
And with that Alonso is off and running with all the details
of my budding romance. Except for one really big one that he doesn’t know about—the
wheelchair. It’s still my secret, and I’m not really sure why, except that
maybe it’s not really important, or maybe it is. Right now my friends are
celebrating my romantic triumph, enthralled by Alonso’s enthusiastic account;
and true confession, it feels good. As if I have any right to be, I’m proud of
Eli, and proud of myself too. No matter what happens, he’s the most exciting
Mr. Right I’ve ever dated. But I wonder what all of them would think if they
knew he doesn’t function like other
men. Would the office tortoise, me, be a little less impressive if they knew
the hare, Eli, couldn’t walk?
I’m still asking myself the same question the next night, as
I turn into the parking garage attached to Eli’s building. The garage
attendant, whom Eli has alerted that I would be coming, takes down my license
plate number, gives me a pass that I’m supposed to place on my dashboard, and
tells me which space in the visitors’ section of the garage is assigned to me.
Eli’s building is about what I expected, glass, steel, and granite, a monument
to modernity, much like the rest of the new, ever-growing Midtown Atlanta. They
do leave a few relics of the past: The Fox Theater, Margaret Mitchell’s House,
but really midtown is mostly all about upward mobility, and I do mean upward.
It’s no surprise that this would be Eli’s ‘hood,
if I dare call it that.
A man seated at the lobby front desk buzzes me into the
building. Indeed, I’m reminded of a hotel as I enter the lobby and approach the
large desk that’s all polished wood trimmed with brass. Alonso would love it. He
loves Buckhead and once he finds the man of his dreams, I’m sure he’ll move to
a place like this, where the real estate prices are high and the parking is a
premium. I give the man my name and Eli’s name. Then he actually calls Eli on
the phone to announce me. I think of Scarlett O’Hara and the little silver
trays on which the slave butlers carried calling cards. Times they are
a-changing. The desk attendant directs to a bank of elevators across the way
from the desk. I thank him and he wishes me a good evening. I hope so, I say in
my head.
During the ride up, I check my face one last time using my
compact mirror. I’m anxious and it shows in the light sheen on my face, which I
quickly but carefully mop away with a light dusting of pressed face powder. Instead
of wearing them, I’m carrying my glasses in my purse, a small shoulder-bag this
time. I’m not planning on needing to see far away. The elevator reaches Eli’s floor
and pings. The doors open and I step out into a quiet corridor of blues,
browns, and grays. I stop for a moment and try to absorb the calm tranquility
the space suggests. Everything’s going to be fine, I tell myself, and even if
it isn’t it won’t be fatal.
I ring Eli’s doorbell and wait, and notice that the peephole
is at an impossible position for him. Seconds later he opens the door. My first
thought is God, he’s hot. Tonight he’s wearing a red polo shirt with short
sleeves that reveal the biceps I always knew were there. The dark hair on his
strong arms matches the beard on his face which I have come to adore.
“Hi,” he says pushing back from the door so I can come in.
“Welcome.”
“Hi,” I return making my eyes stay on his face although his arms
remain available to me through the miracle of peripheral vision.
Do I get to kiss him hello, I ask myself, do I dare? While
I’m wondering about it, thank God Eli catches my hand and pulls me down to him.
I go merrily, gratefully, and we kiss, lingering long enough to show that we are
glad to see each other. Nine days is plenty of time to conjure up the demons of
insecurity even if there are a couple of calls and texts in between.
I’m pretty much ready to crawl right into Eli’s lap but I do
manage to keep my feet on the floor, despite the appreciative look he gives me
going up and down and then back again to my eyes. He likes what I’m wearing,
and I’m wearing jeans in spite of Alonso’s advice; jeans and a teal-colored,
v-neck blouse because I’ve been told I look good in teal and a v-neck is both
slimming and inviting. Following the kiss, Eli wants to know if I had any
trouble finding his place, and I say no due to the magical wonders of GPS. Didn’t
that come from the space program anyway? Talk about your flying to the moon.
By the time Eli is leading the way from the entry into his living
room, my heart is still racing but my senses are normalizing. I’m able to notice
the soft music playing for example. It’s something classically jazzy though not
sultry, so it creates a neutral mood. Thank goodness.
“Can I get you something to drink?” Eli asks.
“Yes,” I say. “What do you have?”
“Wine, water, sparkling and plain,” he runs down a list,
“Beer, vodka, scotch.”
“Wow. You’re like a bar or something.”
He turns his chair and heads to the kitchen. I follow him.
“You never know what you’re gonna have a taste for,” he
says.
“Right,” I reply.
His kitchen is an open space and continues the neutral color
pattern from the living room. He can roll his wheelchair under the sink and I’m
pretty sure the dark granite counters are lower than usual. Tammy could stand
at her sink, at her counters too. I suppose that’s not an option for Eli.
“I’ll take some wine,” I say seeing the open bottle of
merlot sitting on the counter and two waiting goblets.
It’ll take the edge off I think. He pours the wine. I come
to the counter and take my glass.
“Cheers,” Eli says raising his.
“To your lovely home,” I say gently connecting my glass to
his glass.
We both take a drink.
“Thanks,” Eli says, and then smiles at me in that special
way he has, the victor’s grin I call it, and I vibrate like a silenced smartphone
receiving a text. God—I hope I’m reading it right.
“I hope you like spinach lasagna,” he says. “It’s what’s for
dinner.”
“I do,” I say just happy to have something else to focus on.
“Did you make it?”
“I made the order anyway,” he smiles crookedly. “And I can
vouch for the restaurant.”
“Do you know that owner too?”
“No, just the head chef.”
“Of course,” I laugh.
I’d bet dollars to donuts that Eli Abbot was one of those
popular kids in school. Aside from his good looks, he’s got that personality
that radiates confidence and draws everybody to him. A part of me still can’t
believe he’s not married. And if nothing else, there has to at least be a
wanna-be-significant-other somewhere. Maybe he’s in one of those commuter
relationships, where she lives in one city and he lives in another, which by
definition kind of makes me a jump-off, and I don’t even seem to mind it. He’s
just that magnetic. I can do this—be just a friend with benefits.
While the lasagna warms, we return to the living room to drink
our wine and talk for a while. I sit on the sofa. He stays in his chair. I’m
already wishing he’d sit beside me, already wishing we were making out. Of
course maybe that’s the wine talking. Dinner first, I tell myself. The night is
young. Be patient. Things are going well. I’m glad I didn’t follow Alonso’s
advice tonight about skirts. Eli and I match. His jeans are the same color as
the ones he wore in the airport. Maybe they are even the same ones. I never
imagined that just days later I’d be sitting on his leather sofa drinking his
wine. It’s like I had to wake-up to have this dream. Okay—now I know it’s the
wine talking.
Sitting across from me like this, Eli is pretty much on full
display, the good and I guess what some would say the bad, meaning his disability.
I’m careful to mostly keep my eyes above his waist. It’s not dark in his living
room and right now there’s no table to cover him, or a seat back like on the
plane. Tammy used to say that that was the worst part of it—people staring. She
had learned to ignore it she said, but there were times when it bothered her. Maybe
it bothers Eli too sometimes. In any case, I try not to stare but I do have to
look at him. I want to look at him.
He’s wearing Oxfords again, and I wonder if he does that to
make sure his shoes stay on his feet. Tammy used to complain about that, about her
shoes coming off, and she usually wore shoes she could lace-up or strap-on. Maybe
Eli does the same. I catch myself looking at his legs which for now are very
still. The left one sort of leans into the right one creating an angle; but otherwise
they look relatively normal. Like he
could stand up and walk into the kitchen. But he can’t. I know he can’t. And it
okay with me that he has to place his wine glass between his legs to push himself
in his chair. When I think of him naked I’m imagining his legs too, his feet, and
his penis whether it functions or not.
Eventually while Eli is putting supper on the table, I have
the chance to examine his living room more closely. I made the obligatory offer
to help him, as any good guest would do, but he declined, as any good host
would do. He has a nice view of the city but I can’t really appreciate it with
my glasses stored in my purse, so I focus on the interior. Being someone whose
walls are replete with art work and photographs of friends and family, I decide
his walls are pretty barren, almost austere. There’s the one enormous abstract painting
hanging over the leather sofa, and another picture which I’m guessing to be
of him and his family.
“Is this you with your folks?” I ask about the picture.
“Yeah,” he answers from the kitchen. “My parents and my
sister.”
It’s bigger than the usual 8X10, and that gives me a warm
fuzzy. Eli is proud of his family and is not embarrassed to show it, at least
that’s what I get from the big picture. The portrait is professionally done in
black and white, and by a photographer with some artistic skill. Mississippi
and Morocco all blended together, with a family dog, a golden retriever, I
think. Eli is younger. There’s no beard, and he’s kind of skinny, although you
can tell he was going to be a bigger man someday judging by his father, who is
tall and broad, like maybe he played football or something. Eli’s mother is
very pretty. She appears to be shorter, and softer in the picture, and clearly
Eli has her dark intense eyes. His sister is also pretty and seems to have
taken some height from their father. Their faces seem to glow even in black and
white. They seem happy, natural, easy together, not like the still-life
portrait that is my family picture.
“It’s a beautiful picture,” I say to Eli. “How old were you
when it was taken?”
I walk over to the dinner table and set down my wine glass. The
lasagna serves as a centerpiece, with a salad on one side and toasted garlic
bread on the other. The plain white porcelain plates glow under the hanging pendant
lamp. Eli sets a nice table. I’m impressed.
“Eighteen,” he tells me. “We took it the summer before I
left for college.”
“You were very handsome,” I say.
“Were?” he teases me.
“Yes,” I smile. “You are now too, of course.”
“Am I, Lorna?”
I’m taken aback by the sudden seriousness of his tone, and
his gaze is penetrating. My smile fades. But yes, he has his mother’s eyes. Surely
he knows that he’s still beautiful. I mean, he’s friggin’ irresistible. Damp
panties don’t lie.
*****
Oh, this was mean to stop at this point! I want to hear more.....Can't wait for your next update now. This Story is just so good! I can really feel Eli's attractiveness and understand why Lorna is so drawn to him. Thank you!!!
ReplyDeletearghh... cant wait !! can't wait for 7 days more!
ReplyDeletebut thank you..
YL
I love how you're taking time to develop this pair. The suspense is building! I can't wait to see what happens after dinner ��
ReplyDeletePowerful and wonderful!
ReplyDeleteThis is absolutely one of my all time favorite stories so far. You are an amazing writer. You should publish this story, I think Eli deserves a wider audience to fall in love with him.
ReplyDelete"Am I Lorna?" with just 3 words you create more dev thrill than others with a whole story. You have a wonderful gift! Thank you for sharing this story with us!
ReplyDeleteSOOOOOO GOOD!
ReplyDeleteHow can you stop with 'damp panties dont lie' ??. Need more soon
ReplyDeleteNeed more right now! Lol. It's great as always
ReplyDelete