Chapter 114

I turned to the man who was talking to me. There was something in that voice that made me evoke a thousand memories. I looked at him carefully for a while, because although his face was very familiar to me, I couldn't place him. I opened my eyes like saucers and my heart stopped for a fraction of a second when I recognized the owner of those green eyes that were looking at me.

In front of me was the personification of all my fears, traumas and insecurities. The man who served as a benchmark to compare all the people who came into my life after him. It was a beautiful vision, and at the same time a nightmare come true.

“Antoine,” I said his name with difficulty. If the mere memory of him stirred up a lot of emotions in me, can you imagine “what his presence did to me?”

The imposing figure of a six-foot-tall man lay before me. His eyes were greener than I remembered them and he had a beautiful smile (the one that brought out a couple of dimples in his cheeks) plastered on his face. He retained the same fine, almost boyish features that had once enchanted me, though no doubt the neat stubble, several days old, gave him a manly, grown-up touch that was very sensual. His nose straight and outlined. His full, pink lips. His dark brown hair, very short, almost level with his head. He wasn't the skinny boy I remembered. He had strong, toned arms.

“Wow,” “Aháva!” “I can't believe it's you,” he said with noticeable elation. He came over to me and hugged me tightly. “I thought you moved to Nebraska.”

“I did, I blurted out,” and I couldn't help but laugh like a brainless girl. I came back a couple of months ago, I added.

The sudden throat clearing of someone to my left reminded me that I was in company.

Antoine, this is my friend Gabrielle, I said.

The named extended her hand in his direction.

“My pleasure,” she said flirtatiously.

Antoine shook his hand and reciprocated formally. He locked his gaze on me and smiled the way I remembered him smiling, making my legs tremble.

“I didn't think it” was you at first, but I'd never forget those eyes of yours in a million years.

“I think it's the only thing I've kept the same,”  I said, waving my hand in the air and giggling like a fool.

And indeed, I was. The last time we met, I was at least twenty pounds heavier, my hair was jet black, my teeth were a little crowded, and I dressed like I was the lead singer of some symphonic metal band. My change over the last thirteen years was abysmal. I followed a balanced diet and supplemented it with intense jogging and TRX1 sessions. My body was athletic instead of chubby. My hair was a light reddish blonde and my teeth were perfectly aligned, thanks to the late braces I had to wear for five years. I dropped my gothic dress code and instead of looking like a vampire from the movie Underworld, I looked like I was straight out of the new issue of Glamour magazine.

“I can't believe you recognized me,” I added, shrugging.

“I told you, I'd never forget those eyes of yours.”

Antoine's intense gaze stirred in me a thousand memories, feelings and sensations. I dreamed so many times of seeing him again, but I never imagined that I would feel as I did the day he left me in the middle of that square, in the rain, tears streaming down my cheeks.

“Fuck!” I thought that after so many years without seeing him, my heart wouldn't race like it did every time I saw him. I felt like a teenager again and I think he noticed, because his cocky grin showed it. That fucking smile was still as beautiful as ever.

Someone else's throat clearing broke the connection of our gazes.

“Oh, my God!” “what kind of manners do I have?” Antoine looked embarrassed. This is Cedric.

I looked at the guy next to Antoine and couldn't help but feel a strange pang in my chest. He was towering and athletic, with black eyes and a sly smile. “Who could it be?”, “could it be his?” I shook my head hard to get that thought out of my head. I reached out my hand towards him and shook his tightly, flashing him my best smile.

Cedric, the man said.

I opened my eyes, surprised, for I recognized him too. It was Antoine's cousin.

“Of course!” I said. Cedric. I remember you.

“Right!” The man pointed his index finger at me. We met on my grandfather's birthday. I remember you.

I've been in town for a week, Antoine smiled again, and I'm staying at your apartment. “Are you coming in?” he asked suddenly, pointing to the entrance of the nightclub.

“Yes!” Gabrielle and I said in unison.

Antoine and his cousin stepped aside for us to pass. We entered the place and I noticed Ant, as I once nicknamed him, walking beside me.

“There's a table over there,” Gabrielle pointed.

We walked in silence to the place and sat down. Antoine immediately waved to one of the waitresses to bring us something to drink. I ordered a Kamikaze, Gabrielle a Cosmopolitan and the boys ordered a bottle of tequila.

“At what point did our girls-only, Harvey-forgetting evening turn into a reunion with my first great love?” “It had to be a fucking joke!” “How was it possible that of all the places in town, Antoine was right in the same spot Gabrielle randomly chose?” “Fate is sadistic and loves to fuck with my existence,” I thought.

I disconnected from my surroundings for a moment and conjured up memories of the past. God!” “Of all the things I could remember it had to be that specific one....”

“Antoine's lips on my mouth, his long fingers intertwined with mine, while our bodies gave themselves to passion and his moans collided with the skin of my neck?”

I shook my head hard to get those thoughts out of my head and looked at the man in front of me. “Gods!” He still possessed the gift of making my heart race, my hands tremble, and my words choke.

No. I couldn't stay there. There were too many intense emotions to deal with them all. I stood up as if propelled by a spring. I glanced at my friend and she frowned. I gave her the signal I always gave her when I needed her to play along. I coughed and cleared my throat, then grabbed my right earlobe and gave it a slight halo.

I remembered that tomorrow we have to get up very early, I looked at the boys with mock distress. We must get the new merchandise," I looked at my friend.

“Right!” Gabrielle exclaimed, standing up as well. She tapped her forehead with her hand. I forgot, she feigned embarrassment.

That's why I loved her. She and I always had a unique rapport. We had our own secret body language to communicate. In the store was where we put it into practice. When I would toss my hair to the side and wet my lips with my tongue, it meant: “Tough customer.” “Come and help me.” When I adjusted my glasses and put my hand to my chin in front of one of our suppliers, it meant: “The price is high.” “Forget it!” We won't buy from him or her anymore. Gabrielle was quick to pick up on this and, in the case of a difficult customer, she would go over and tackle him or her. She had a special gift for appeasing people. If it was one of our suppliers who decided at the last minute to increase the cost of merchandise, she dealt with it in a very professional manner.

I must admit that dealing with people is not my thing. I always tend to get carried away by my emotions. You could say I'm easy to fool and she was my guardian angel, the one who kept them from seeing my idiot face.

“It's so late! she said as she looked at the watch on her wrist. It was almost one o'clock in the morning.

Antoine got up too.

“Really?” “We just ordered drinks.” “They could at least have a drink with us,” he commented.

I tried to say something, but the woman who served us when we arrived came over to our table with our drinks. She put them on the table and left.

Antoine picked up his glass and raised it high.

“Cheers!” To reunions, he toasted, he took a sip as he laid his eyes on me.

Gabrielle looked at me, waiting for me to say something. I nodded to tell her it was okay, that we could stay a little longer. And we did.

I lost track of time. One drink became two, three, four, five... six. The hours passed as if they were minutes. We talked about everything. I learned that Antoine had just returned from France, where he had been working in an art gallery, after getting his degree in art history and specializing in post-modern art. He told me that he was single, "for the moment" (he emphasized that) and was staying with his cousin, while he got a place to move out on his own. He planned to stay in the city for a while.

For my part, I told him a few things about my life, that I studied to be a teacher, but that I worked with my friend at her store and that I was also single, "for the moment" (I emphasized that too). He laughed out loud when I drew the quotation marks with my fingers and said that I was still the same lovely girl I had always been. I didn't understand what he meant and didn't want to make a big deal about it either.

I didn't realize at what point Gabrielle forged such an intimate friendship with Antoine's cousin, for they talked a lot with each other and seemed to want to do more than just talk. Their lustful glances put them on display.

I started to feel very uninhibited and without being able to help it, I let Antoine get very close to me, making me feel a lot of strange things. Things I hadn't felt in a long time. “God,” “what was I supposed to be doing?” Part of me wanted to run away, to get as far away from Antoine Delattre as possible and not look back. But another part of me, the irrational, stupid, in love part of me, was screaming for me to stay with the only man I've ever loved in my life, remembering each and every moment I had with him.

I felt an inhuman urge to kiss him, but I managed to control myself. “I couldn't, I shouldn't!” My stupid masochistic instinct reminded me that nothing was over. I still felt something very intense for the Frenchman who looked at me and smiled, and who was the cause of my phobia of relating to other men.

Antoine took a piece of lemon and soaked it in the salt that was on a little white saucer. He put it in his mouth and savored the bitter, salty taste, but he didn't drink any liquor. I felt my heart race as I watched him lick his lips. He repeated the same action about four times. When I asked him why he didn't drink more tequila, he told me he had just come down with a bad cold and didn't want to abuse his body. I believed him.

I couldn't take my eyes off him for a single moment.

“At what point did he become a fucking Calvin Klein model?” He was so much more handsome, more manly, more sensual... “God!” I had to bite my lip to repress the desire to jump on him and kiss him. And that, just that blessed gesture, was the trigger for a series of catastrophic events that followed.

“Oh, Aháva, you know exactly what you do when you do that,”  said Antoine, holding a hand to his head.

“When I do what?” I asked, “What are you?”

I couldn't finish the sentence, as I felt a hand on the back of my neck, followed by a pair of lips crashing against my mouth. I opened my eyes at the sudden invasion of my personal space, but it took only a second for my self-control to go to hell. I surrendered once again to his charms. The kiss was wild and voracious. His right hand clung tighter to the back of my neck and mine rested on each of his cheeks. I gasped as I felt his warm tongue brush against mine. He moved his lips with a slyness I'd never known. I remembered his shyer kisses. The man kissing me showed he had acquired a lot of knowledge over the years.

He broke away for a moment to take a breath and took hold of my mouth again. My heart was pounding and my head was spinning, I don't know if it was the alcohol or the rush of the moment. He ended the kiss and pressed his forehead to mine, his hand still holding the back of my neck.

“For God's sake, Aháva!” “You have no idea how much I've dreamed of this moment...” “of the day when I could hold you in my arms and kiss you till I was breathless,” he said, his breath coming in gasps. I opened my eyes very slowly to find that he had them closed. I closed them again, surrendering to the endless sensations coursing through my body.

The memory of that night, he continued,  haunts me every day. “The way I left you...”

My heart stopped at the memory of that night, and a rush of pain and sadness hit me. I opened my eyes and pulled away from him sharply. Antoine belonged to my past, and there he was to stay. I stood up, but he held my arm.

“Forgive me,” I could read his lips but not hear him, because the music was too loud. He stood up and grabbed my shoulders. I know I don't deserve your forgiveness," he looked me straight in the eye, but I hope someday you can give it to me.

Thirteen years, Antoine, “thirteen fucking years I've been waiting for you to say that word!” “Why now? “Why after all this time?” I turned my head to look for my friend, but she was nowhere to be seen. Shit, I mumbled as I realized that my guardian angel couldn't help me.

“I looked for you, Aháva!” “I swear by all that's holy.” “But I didn't find you.” “I've lived all these years with the guilt of having been a jerk, of having hurt you the way I did, but I did it for your sake.” “You had to stay away from me.” “I didn't deserve you. You were never going to be happy with me, because I'm a fucking...”

“You're a selfish bastard who never stopped to think about how I felt.” “It only mattered what you wanted,” I blurted out angrily. Tears rolled down my cheeks.

“No, Aháva.” “It would have been selfish of me not to have let you go.” “You deserved better than me...” “you deserved someone who didn't carry a fucking secret on their back, someone who didn't have to lie every day for fear of being labeled an aberration.” “You deserved someone who people wouldn't point out on the street because of fucking rumors.” “You deserved...”

“Shut up!” I said. You have no idea what I deserved.

“I loved you,” he mimicked my tone of voice. My eyes widened. “And I don't think I ever stopped,” he lowered his voice.

“DON'T...”  I raised my index finger and pointed at him, “SAY THAT,” I glared at him harshly, “Damn it!” I shook my head and shook my head, “This is crazy,” I shook my head, “We shouldn't have...” I left the sentence halfway through and walked away from him, my only goal was to find my friend, “Gabrielle!” I called out to her.

“Please, Aháva...” “listen to me,”  he asked.

“I've heard enough,”  I made it clear that I didn't want to hear it. “GABRIELLE! I shouted again as I scanned the place with my eyes.

She and Cedric left a while ago," Antoine shouted.

“What?” I refused to believe that my friend had left with a new acquaintance.

“Yes” “They wanted to be somewhere private...”

“No.” Gabrielle is not like that," I grabbed my purse and pulled out my cell phone to call her. I didn't, though, because I read the message in my inbox.

“I'm sorry I left the way I did, but...” “God!” “Did you see Cedric?” “He's hot and he's a sweetheart too.” “I swear if I go another month without sex, I'm gonna go crazy.” “I love you girlfriend.” “See you tomorrow for an update on our adventures.” “Have fun with your beau.”

P.S. “Don't worry.” “I'll take care of myself.”

“What the fuck?” “How was it possible that Gabrielle had run off with a man she had just met?” “That I enjoyed my beau? But didn't she notice my discomfort?” “Damn it!” I didn't have time to tell her that Antoine was the same man I'd told her about so many times; the fucking asshole who'd broken my heart into a thousand pieces. I showed her a picture of him once, but the Antoine in front of me was very different from the puny fifteen (almost sixteen) year old boy who took my virginity.

My head was spinning and I felt like I was going to pass out at any moment. I had to sit down and take a deep breath.

She was drunk. I knew it.

Suddenly I felt Antoine very close to me and I lifted my face to look at him. “A thousand fucking times!” “Why did he have to be so beautiful?” “Why instead of turning into a fucking magazine model didn't he turn fat and bald?” Then it would have been easier to turn him down and... “walk away from him!” But my will was overridden with a mere brush of his hand.

His manly hands held my face gently. I closed my eyes and a few tears rolled down my cheeks. He wiped them away, running his thumbs tenderly over them. I shook my head, but he didn't let go. The next thing I felt was his lips on mine. My heart beat fast and I inertia pulled my hands to his head, pulling him tightly to me. Our lips brushed very slowly and our breaths quickened. There was no tongue. It was the most tender kiss I'd ever had in my life. “Gods!” “I loved him.” I never stopped, and I knew it wasn't right for me to love him, but my stupid heart didn't understand reason.

“I know things didn't end in the best way,” he whispered without pulling away from my mouth, “but if...”

“You made me run after you, like I was a fucking madwoman,” I interrupted him, whispering as well. I had my eyes closed, trying to keep my tears in streaks, “and when I finally caught up with you, you slammed the door in my face and screamed at the top of your lungs that....”

With his hand he covered my mouth and pulled away a little. I opened my eyes and I could see genuine regret in his gaze.

I know very well what I said, and there isn't a day that goes by that I don't regret doing it. I was a damned fool to hurt you the way I did....

“Let go of me,” I muttered. I need to go.

“You need to leave, but I know you don't want to leave, because you still have feelings for me,” he said. “I can feel it when I touch you,” he brushed the back of his hand across my cheek, and I couldn't help but shiver. “I can feel it when I kiss you,” he pressed his lips to mine in a short but concise kiss. A rush of sensations ran through me from head to toe. “Aháva, please, let's go somewhere quieter, where we can talk calmly.”

“We have nothing to talk about, I did my best to push him away from me.” I stood up and grabbed my purse, pulled out a hundred-dollar bill, and placed it on the table. It's to pay for what I drank, I said and turned around, ready to leave.

Once again, he grabbed my arm.

“Don't go, Aháva,” it was a plea. “Come with me.” “Let's go and remember the old days, when we loved each other madly....”

The jerk must have had some knowledge of hypnosis, because his voice demanded and my body gave in without resistance. I took a deep breath, not turning around, gathering my strength to pull my arm out of his grip, but he outwitted me. With one swift movement he pulled me to him and kissed me again, passionately and violently.

I got carried away...