- Aiden -
hen I got home, Chelsea was out.
There was a note on the fridge saying she was staying the night at Bianca’s so they could go to an early casting call the next day. I figured her staying there was partly because I’d made her uncomfortable by broaching the topic of her not eating habits.
Unfortunately, I also knew her and Bianca’s favorite thing to do was get together and avoid food. On the plus side, I had the place to myself for the night which was fine by me.
After all, I had a stressful day at work trying to train a new assistant and my hands were wrecked from working knots out of the team all day. I had just enough energy left to order some food and pass out. I dialed the number for India Gate and asked for the chicken korma and a side of onion bhajis.
I tried not to eat take out often, especially take out from the deliciously greasy Indian place, but I couldn’t skip an opportunity to eat something fattening in peace. Normally when I got it, Chelsea would stare at me like a stray dog while I ate, her eyes growing momentarily wider every time I lifted a bite to my mouth. But no matter how drunk we were or how hungry she was, she never let herself try any.
In fact, I got the sense that she felt guilty just breathing in the smell of the nutty curry and the aromatic naan. She was so sensitive to it she’d probably be able to smell traces of it in the house when she got home.
If only she could gain weight from merely sniffing Indian food. I’d waft it under her nose while she slept.
I walked to the fridge to grab a beer. When I set it on the counter and popped the top off, my eye was drawn to an enormous pile of laundry flowing out of the laundry closet into the hallway. I took a sip of crisp ale and then set the bottle down, rambling towards the mountain of dirty clothes.
I knew once I was full of Indian food, the chances of me peeling myself off the couch and doing any chores was nil, so I bent over and grabbed a pile in my arms and stuffed it into the metal drum. I could feel the muscles in my hands aching as I grabbed the remaining handfuls and crammed them in.
And then something stopped me.
I squatted down and picked up the black panties. Her black bra was there, too, right at the bottom of the pile. I closed my eyes and tried to think.
We hadn’t had sex all week. And last week, the only time we did it was in the shower when she offered herself up as an apology. There was no reason for her black panties to be dirty. She only wore them when she knew she was going to get laid.
I tilted my head to the ground. Green for luck, purple when she’s stressed, pink when she’s trying to catch my attention… I couldn’t remember what blue and red were, but black- black was definitely for when she intended to get fucked.
I clenched my jaw and breathed through my nose. Then I dropped the panties on the floor and kicked them to the side of the hallway. The back of my neck felt hot. Something wasn’t right.
I went back to the counter, grabbed my beer, and sat down on the couch. I didn’t want to jump to conclusions. After all, maybe her other underwear was just dirty so she grabbed the black ones. That’s what a normal girl would do.
But Chelsea wasn’t a normal girl. She was obsessive, methodical, controlling. I’d seen her get borderline hysterical over the right underwear not being clean.
And the black ones? They were sacred. They were fancy. They would fall apart if they were over washed or over worn.
When I realized I was still clenching my jaw, I tried to relax. I didn’t want to give myself a headache… or make the one I already had any worse.
I grabbed her laptop off the shelf under the coffee table and opened it. I wasn’t sure what I was looking for or expecting to see, but I had to do something and I couldn’t go out because I had to wait for my food.
How dare she fuck with my Indian when she wasn’t even here?!
Unfortunately, I had no idea what her password was.
Much to my dismay, it wasn’t “I love Aiden.” Or anything else I could think of for that matter.
I closed her laptop and put it back where it was.
I needed to try and think rationally. I decided another beer might help. I went to the fridge, grabbed another, and sat down on the couch again, stretching my sore hands.
It was time to look at the facts.
She was wearing her sexy underwear for some other reason than to entice me. But that was all I had as far as proof that she might be cheating on me.
As far as reasons why I might want to think about ending things anyway, I had a much easier time coming up with a list.
First of all, even though she was hot, her maturity hadn’t progressed past that of a nineteen year old girl for reasons unknown to me, though I suspected malnutrition. As a result, I felt like a babysitter most of the time.
On top of that, she lied to me about not having her wallet at least once. Maybe it was an accident. Or more likely, she thought I was a cash cow and would rob me of any money I had now and any wealth I managed to build in the future.
What’s more, she hated my best friend with a passion. That alone was probably reason enough, especially considering that Lucy was super sweet and always had my best interests in mind.
Most of all though, she didn’t love me. She said she did, but love was more than saying sorry with blowjobs. A whole lot more. It had to be.
And I wasn’t blind. Chelsea didn’t go out of her way to flirt with me like she did when we were first going out. She was fun and carefree then. That’s what attracted me to her. She was focused and passionate and thoughtful.
But that wasn’t the Chelsea I was sharing my bed, my life, and my car with these days. She’d changed, and not for the better.
And maybe I’d changed, too. Either way, it was becoming increasingly clear that the ways in which we were changing weren’t complementing each other. On the contrary, we were probably bringing out the worst in one another.
And last but not least, I was obviously a huge disappointment to her.
Not that she would ever admit it, but when she met me I was an athlete, and not just an athlete, but a star. I was going places, places she wanted to go, places she wanted to be seen. And in my heart, I knew that my personal setback wasn’t one she was prepared to cope with. She’d done her best, but the truth was that neither of us was the person we were when we got together initially.
And whether or not she was sabotaging our relationship on purpose or only subconsciously, there was very little left to salvage, and even less to fight for.