Eden

 

The first thing I do after Markus drops me at my apartment is throw myself on the couch. My breathing is coming fast, and my palms are sweating profusely. I place my hand on my chest, close my eyes, and take long, deep breaths, trying to bring my breathing into a steady rhythm. I’m not usually the type of woman to react like this to a man. I can’t remember any other time when I’ve been so struck by a member of the opposite sex.

 

What the hell was that? I ask myself.

 

My apartment is a mess, but it’s always a mess. It comprises of a living area, an adjoined, parasitical cubicle-kitchen, a snug bathroom, and a cozy bedroom. Books are strewn across the living room floor, piled high on the coffee table, and stacked up in miniature towers on the floor. My bedroom door is open, and I can see it’s just as messy as the living room, with clothes strewn over the bed and books piled up high. I know that if I turned around, dishes would be stacked beside the sink. It’s not that I’m a slob (or maybe there’s a bit of that), only that I’ve been focusing so hard on my video game.

 

Why do you care so much? I ask myself again, but no answer is forthcoming.

 

I place my laptop bag on the coffee table, still with one hand against my chest, still breathing steadily. Then I just sit there for a few minutes, calming myself. With my free hand, I scratch at the cushions of my couch, my nails making small tsk-tsk noises. Slowly, my heart beats less frantically. I don’t realize how heavy my head is until the heaviness disappears.

 

When I’ve calmed down, I get up and go to the corner of the room. To a casual observer, it would look like there’s nothing more than a pile of clothes here, discarded lazily. But when I reach the mound of t-shirts and pants, I pull them free to reveal an exercise bike imprisoned beneath it all. I climb on, and pedal.

 

Soon I am making the chh-chh breathing noises, and the scrape of the pedal is drowning out my heartbeat. Sweat it out, I tell myself. Just sweat it all out.

 

I keep thinking about the moments when I thought he was going to kiss me, going to make a move on me. As I cycle, my pussy burns. Burns. I wouldn’t be surprised if it singed a hole in my underwear and set my shorts on fire. The denim rubs against me as I go faster and faster. I close my eyes and lean forward, seeing his face. Maddox. Even his name is interesting. Maddox. And his square jaw, his strong nose, and his tight, muscular body. And the way those men followed his orders without question.

 

“Stop it,” I say aloud as if that will make it easier. “You are a feminist and a feminist doesn’t gush. You are a feminist, and a feminist doesn’t gush. You are a feminist and a feminist doesn’t gush!”

 

I snap the words at myself, whip-cracks meant to force me back to the real world. The real world where I’m not obsessed with a man I only met today, where his face doesn’t invade my thoughts moment by moment. The real world where my thoughts are clear and untouched by the leader of a motorbike gang.

 

But even when I leap off the bike and go into the bathroom, strip off my clothes, and get into the shower, I think of him. The water trickles down me, beading at my nipples and dripping down between my feet. Sliding down my chest, my belly, to my pussy. Sliding down my back between my ass cheeks. The water is his hand, I think, gasping, having to fight the urge to reach down between my legs and touch, touch, touch. The water is his hand, and he’s doing it, now. Yes, he’s doing it like no other man can—like no other man will dare.

 

I get out of the shower and wrap a towel around me. Then I go to the mirror and rub the steam off it with my forearm, revealing my reflection. I’m red-faced, and my lips are parted. My eyes are wide. I haven’t seen myself like this—ever. I can’t remember a time. I look like one of those women you sometimes see at nightclubs, leaning drunkenly against a brick wall, looking in wonder up at some man who’s seduced them. I always imagine women like that must be weak, to fall for a man so quickly, so abruptly. But now I have to change that judgment because I am that woman.

 

Dammit. I slump down on the couch in the towel and stretch my legs out, resting my feet on the coffee table. What has that man done to me?

 

I should be working. But I want to wait until Maddox’s programmer has taken a look at the game. If there is a programmer. Still, tomorrow morning, less than twenty-four hours, and I’ll see him again. Maybe, I tell myself, it was the excitement that got to me more than Maddox himself. Maybe I’m not as far gone as I think. Maybe meeting an outlaw leader, riding on the back of his bike, going to the clubhouse… maybe all this combined to make me hot, flushed, steamy, and sweaty.

 

Keep telling yourself that!

 

I shake my head, hurling beads of water over the couch, and then jump to my feet. Just get on with something. Pick up one of these books and take some notes. Take another look at the code. Do something other than pine after this man!

 

I nod with determination, but even as I get changed into a neutral blue summer dress, I imagine that Maddox is standing behind me, watching me.