On a good day, it takes about ninety minutes to get from our townhouse to the new flagship Danforth Studio in Manhattan. And when it comes to New Jersey traffic, it’s rarely a good day. So it was three hours past the gala’s start time when I finally skidded into the studio, my dress shoes sliding against the smooth wood floors as I made for the event space in the open loft above the main studio room.
I’d tried calling Poppy on my way home, and then again several times on the way there, and there’d been no answer. No answer to my texts either, and that was how I knew.
She was furious with me.
But there was a baby! My mind protested, as if she were already arguing with me. You can’t be mad at a baby!
Once she would let me explain everything, it would be fine. I was sure of it.
I just had to find her first.
The gala was still in full swing. The stars twinkled in the many large skylights above. Tipsy donors danced as a band jazzed their way through Gershwin; waiters circulated with endless rounds of drinks; people chatted and laughed on the edges of the dance floor. I searched frantically for Poppy, pushing past the guests as gently as I could, even though I felt like punching my way through the crowd. I had to find her, I had to explain why I was late¸ late even though she had explicitly explained to me how important it was that I support her tonight.
Shit.
I’d really fucked up this time.
I caught a glimpse of bright red lace out of the corner of my eye, and I swiveled on my heel, seeking it out. And then there she was, hair swept high off her neck, a small cross hanging in the dip of her collarbone. The dress plunged to a low, lacy neckline, showing off the uppermost curves of her perfect tits, and while the lace flounced out into a tea-length skirt, the nude-colored sheath under it stopped mid-thigh. Metallic gold heels and that emblematic crimson lipstick completed the look. For a moment, all the blood went from my brain to my dick, and my tuxedo pants became entirely too tight. I’d love to fuck her in all that lace. I’d love for her to spread those shiny heels while I knelt in front of her and lifted her skirt, and then I’d eat her pussy right where she stood.
I smoothed my jacket down and subtly adjusted myself as I moved forward, and then I stopped. Poppy had so arrested my thoughts that I hadn’t noticed whom she was standing next to. Not just standing next to—she had her arm around his waist and his arm was strung casually over her shoulders, a lingering side-hug as they laughed with a pair of donors and she gestured with her champagne glass.
Anger balled in my stomach, anger that I had no right to feel, but felt anyway. Here I was on the spiral again, except I couldn’t be scholarly or enlightened about my continuing struggles with jealousy, not now. Not with Fucking Anton touching my wife so casually, so familiarly, as if they held each other like this all the time.
As I started walking again, my hands practically burning with the urge to throttle Anton, I remembered a picture from my children’s bible growing up. It was an illustration of Jesus chasing the moneylenders and merchants out of the Temple courts, one hand scattering a pile of coins to the ground while the other was raised high. In that hand, he’d held a whip poised to rain brutality on the defilers who’d polluted the most sacred space in Jerusalem. There had been overturned tables and broken stools and people fleeing and scattering, and all of that sounded exactly like what I wanted right now. To be flipping tables and lashing out in anger, to drive away the bastard who was touching my wife—my sacred space.
Poppy turned to say something to one of the donors and then froze as she caught sight of me stalking toward her. Several emotions flitted across her face—shock and anger and relief and worry—and then her good-breeding and expensive education whirred to life, replacing her raw expression with a controlled and elegant mask.
When I reached her, all I wanted to do was pick her up and drag her off. I wanted to toss her over my shoulder or grab her by the neck or any number of possessive actions that would show Anton—and Poppy—whom she belonged to. Who owned her.
But while all of those things were sexy and consensual in bed, they were shitty and misogynistic in public, especially at an event like this one, the culmination of years of hard work and one so full of influential donors. And I wasn’t so consumed with jealousy and possession that I’d forgotten the difference between the bedroom and the outside world.
It was a close thing, though. Even as I shoved my hands into my tuxedo pockets, even as I deliberately stopped out of range to make sure I didn’t cave to my urges and physically pull her away from Anton.
She’s a grown woman. They’re only friends. You’re just being jealous.
And besides, you are the one in trouble right now.
All of that was hard to remember with Anton hugging her. I dragged my eyes away from the spot where his hand cupped her shoulder and met my wife’s gaze.
“Good evening, Poppy. Anton. Sorry I’m late.”
I knew, even before I finished talking, that I had not successfully scrubbed the jealousy from my words. I knew that my expression surely betrayed every conflicted emotion that I felt. All of this was confirmed when the two donors mumbled excuses, and left Poppy, Anton and me alone.
That was fine. Because now Anton looked supremely uncomfortable, dropping his arm from Poppy’s shoulders and clearing his throat. “Hello, Tyler.”
I studied him. He was a few years older than I was, with light brown hair and amber eyes, several inches shorter than me, and—I noticed this with terrible, selfish glee—he was a little soft in the stomach and thin in the arms, something that even his well-tailored tuxedo couldn’t hide.
He didn’t seem abashed or flustered, at least not in the way that someone who had done something wrong would seem abashed. His discomfort seemed to come from a place of supreme shyness. In fact, he was offering me a shy smile now, and I hated the fact that he looked so handsome while he did it.
“Anton, do you mind if I speak to Poppy for a few minutes?”
“Of course,” Anton said hurriedly, already moving away from us. “See you in a bit, Poppy.”
He left and the band finished their song, the loft drifting into a tide of quiet chatter. Poppy and I stared at each other for a minute, me hungry for her and her angry with me, and then finally she stepped forward, so close that her dress brushed against the fabric of my tuxedo trousers.
“I don’t want to talk here,” she said firmly. Her heart-shaped face was tilted up to mine, that sharp chin defiantly set, and I couldn’t help it, I reached up to touch her jaw.
There it was: a flutter of the eyelashes, a small intake of breath. She was as hungry for me as I was for her.
“You’re mad,” I said. It wasn’t a question.
“Yes. And I meant what I said—I don’t want to talk about this here.”
“What I want right now has nothing to do with talking.”
The moment I said it, I knew it was the wrong thing to say, but I didn’t fucking care. Everything felt like it was closing in on us—on me—and I couldn’t breathe for the stress and loneliness and anger rolling off my lamb in hot, metallic waves. I was furious and aroused and it didn’t matter that I was the one who had been late, that I was the one to let her down, I only knew that my chest felt like it would burst with all the conflicting feelings inside of it. I only knew what I needed. And right now, I needed her.
If she had been a different woman, she would have slapped me. As it was, I could see spots of color blossom high in her cheeks and the lines of her neck stiffen as the band struck up a new song.
“If you think,” she said in a dangerously low voice, “that this is going to end with me fucking you, you are severely mistaken.”
“Will you at least listen to me? I am sorry I’m late, but—”
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “Whatever you have to say, it won’t help us right now.”
I pressed my lips together, not trusting myself to speak because the only words that came to mind were indignant ones. Defensive ones.
Poppy leaned closer, her chest pressing into my ribs. From any other vantage than my own, it looked like a gesture of marital affection, but they couldn’t see the flare of her nostrils or the diamond-hard eyes that now glared up at me. “You are so jealous of Anton, and you know what? You should be. You should be jealous, because at the end of the day, he’s the one who is consistently there for me. He’s the one I tell my thoughts and fears to, and he’s the one who knows—” she broke off, her eyes sliding away from mine.
I found her chin with my fingers and turned her face back to mine. “Knows what, Poppy? What could he possibly know about you that I don’t?” Still holding her chin, I brought my mouth to her ear. “I know the things you think about when you’re alone. I know every single fantasy you have in that pretty head of yours, and I know which words and which sights get you wet. I know what the inside of your pussy feels like and I know what the inside of your soul feels like. I know what books you fall asleep reading at night and I know which blanket is your favorite to use by the fireplace and which is your favorite to use in the recliner. I know how to make you come so hard that you forget who you are, and I know that you are so hungry for my orgasm that you’d drop to your knees right now and let me jerk off onto your face. Right here, right now, in front of all these people. Wouldn’t you?”
Her breathing was rapid now, her chest expanding and deflating against my own chest, and there wasn’t a part of her that wasn’t covered in goose bumps. I let go of her face and pulled away, satisfied that I’d made my point, and for a minute, I thought it had really worked. I thought I’d convinced her to let go of her anger.
I was wrong.
She stumbled back as if I’d pushed her—which I had, in a way. I’d pushed her with my words, and she looked so stung and so stimulated—all wide pupils and parted lips and flushed skin—and then the tears surfaced, large glassy tears in those hazel eyes, spilling over onto her cheeks. She turned away and pushed past the guests in the loft to go downstairs.
I watched her go, that red lace fluttering around her legs as she fled from me, and I knew I should stay put. People don’t run away unless they want space, and Poppy had plenty of reason to want space from me right now, given that I’d just made her cry in front of all these influential people. Guilt held me by the back of my neck, closing my throat and twisting my gut, and I just wanted to smash something—a window or a car door or even my own bones. Even more than that, I wanted to chase after her and apologize for being such a giant prick, for being the worst husband in the world.
But Feminist Ally Tyler was telling me to respect her space and her boundaries, to accept that the rest of this discussion had to happen on her terms, and that meant not running after her and bending her over the nearest table.
Fuck.
I hated doing the right thing.
Hated it.
I lifted my eyes to the ceiling, wondering what God would want me to do. There were no bible verses for how to let your partner walk away from you when you were both mad as fuck, especially when you were both horny as fuck on top of it all. There were no bible verses for having an erection in a tuxedo or for watching your wife disappear down an open flight of stairs while the slow, jazzy strains of “S’Wonderful” echoed against the high white walls and glass ceiling.
I guess I’m on my own again, even though I’m doing the right thing and it fucking sucks. Thanks a lot.
I should go home. Poppy would have to come back eventually, and we would talk then. Except, I’d probably have to work on my dissertation all day tomorrow…and the day after that and the day after that, not even counting the classes that I would have to teach, and of course not counting the fact that Poppy would have to work herself…
Shit, I missed Missouri. I missed my entire world being focused on one building—St. Margaret’s—and I missed Poppy working from home and on her own schedule. How were we supposed to fix this when we had no time together?
It didn’t matter. I should go.
I started moving through the guests, towards the back staircase, when I noticed a familiar form descending down the large front stairs to the main studio, in the same trajectory Poppy had taken.
Anton was going alone, and while part of me reasoned that he probably just wanted to check on his friend whom he’d seen visibly upset as she ran away from her own party, another part of me churned back into full-blown rage. Fuck boundaries, fuck doing the right thing. He didn’t get to go after my wife. That was my prerogative, my privilege, my job.
I changed directions and followed him, my dress shoes loud on the steps as I descended into the studio. I couldn’t see Anton or Poppy, so I drifted around the corner into the long hallway that led to the smaller studio rooms, all with their large mirrors and long barres.
Empty studio after empty studio, and then, in the very last one, I saw Poppy. She was alone (thank God), hugging herself and looking out of the window, her back to the door and me. In the mingled light from the moon and the streetlights, I could see her shoulders shake as she cried softly to herself. A lone tendril of hair had escaped from her updo, hanging in an elegant curl against her neck.
I stepped into the room, closing the door softly behind me.
She turned her head, looking back over her shoulder. She didn’t speak.
“Tell me to leave, and I’ll leave,” I said, taking another step closer. “Tell me not to touch you, and I won’t.”
A tear spilled over her cheek, gliding down to her jaw. But she remained silent.
“Say red or whisper it or mouth it even—and I’ll go, no questions asked. I’ll get a hotel room so that you can come home without me there.”
Still nothing from her. I’d halved the distance between us and I kept coming closer, determined to give her a choice. To let her know that she could say no to me at any point, and that I would leave if she did.
I finally got close enough to touch my lamb, but I didn’t yet. I was so fucking hard for her, and my hands practically vibrated with the need to seize her, but I didn’t.
She was still looking at me over her shoulder. Tear tracks glistened on her face, and that stray lock of hair on her neck hung so gracefully against her skin…I wanted to tug on it. I wanted to bite that neck and suck hard on the delicate skin there.
“Just say red or leave or go, at any time. And I will stop.” I met her eyes. “Do you understand?”
Without blinking, she inclined her head the barest amount.
Not good enough, I thought.
“Say ‘yes, Father Bell, I understand,’” I commanded.
It was either the demand that she call me by that name or the tone of voice that did it. The breath left her body in one ragged exhale, and she finally turned to face me, lifting her tear-streaked face to mine. For a moment, I thought maybe she wouldn’t respond, or maybe she would tell me to leave, or maybe she’d resort to physically pushing me away.
She didn’t do any of these things.
“Yes, Father Bell,” she whispered instead. “I understand.”