We finally pull into Chicago around midnight. My butt is numb from over fifteen hours in the car, and my whole body is buzzing with excitement to see Ben. I can’t wait to see the look on his face when I ring the doorbell to his apartment.
I called him a couple hours ago to check in and found out that he’s not working tonight. Instead, he’ll be enjoying a relaxing evening at home, but since he’s still on a night schedule, he’ll be up all night binge-watching something on Netflix. I can already feel his body against mine on the couch.
Somewhere in the back of my mind I realize that this could be our night. Sure, I’m exhausted and have to leave at six in the morning tomorrow, but it seems like the perfect story to carry forward.
Our first time was while I was passing through with only six hours on the clock in the middle of the night in Chicago.
Okay, it’s not the best, but it’s something.
And let’s be real. How much longer is Ben going to hold on if I don’t make the move? What if another girl comes along who does? It would be too easy to just get rid of me. I’m already miles away and removed from his daily life.
It has to be tonight.
When we pull up to his apartment complex, my hands won’t stop shaking. It’s a nice complex. Modern and just outside the city center so that it’s not too expensive and not too scary.
“I’ll just go ring the bell. I know he’s awake. You wait here,” I tell Henry. He looks skeptical and very sleepy.
I do a quick fix of my hair and smell my breath before hitting the doorbell to Ben’s apartment. I already have a pretty bad feeling in my gut when it remains unopened after the first minute. I ring it again. I don’t see any light in the windows. Maybe he went to sleep early.
When he doesn’t answer after the third ring and the fourth knock, I know he’s not home.
Where the hell did he go? It’s midnight. He said he had the night off.
I know this is shameless, but I still have his location permission saved on my phone. I mean…we dated for eleven months so it’s not like I was stalking him or anything. It wasn’t a trust thing either. It was just a basic setting that we both agreed to. And I never turned his off.
So, I open up the app and pull up his profile. It takes a moment before his location pin drops somewhere definitely not here. It’s only a few miles away, but the map doesn’t show a name. Just an address. It looks like a warehouse or office building. That must be where he works.
Looks like I’m surprising him at the office then.
Running back to the car, I catch Henry nodding off against the steering wheel.
“Change of plans!” I call. “We’re going to this address.” Quickly, I paste the address from the tracker into my maps app, and it says it’s eight minutes away.
“I’m sorry. Drop me off there, and then you can go to the hotel and sleep. Thank you so much,” I say with a wide smile, hoping it does the trick to convince him.
With a grimace, he pulls out of the parking lot. The drive is quiet, but before long we’re both looking around skeptically. It’s not exactly a nice part of town, and I have myself convinced that it’s just because it’s the city. Boston has areas like this too.
“This is where your boyfriend works?” he asks.
“His office building should be just up there on the left.”
The street is dark, but when we start to approach the pin on the map, my blood pressure spikes. There is no office building here. There’s a scary looking convenience store, a pawn shop, a bar, and a…strip club.
“Your boyfriend works here?” Henry asks as my phone announces that we have arrived at our destination.
“What the…”
“Laila…” Henry says carefully like he’s about to give me bad news. “Why don’t you just come back to the hotel? We could both use a good night’s sleep.”
“There must be some mistake. Ben wouldn’t come here.”
I know how it looks. I know how naive and sad I sound just as the words come out of my mouth, and I probably should take Henry up on his offer to go to the hotel and sleep, but I have to see this through. I have to. Ben is just inside there, and who knows? Maybe it’s a bachelor party and he was obligated. I’m sure he didn’t want to come, he’s miserable, and he’s turning down every chance for a lap dance.
Again…I hear how stupid I sound.
Without answering Henry, I jump out of the car and march up to the strip club in my sweatshirt and black leggings. The security guard checks my ID and lets me pass. The inside is dark and loud. There are a few stages, and one has a tall woman with glitter-covered skin dancing with her bare breasts out and a silver shimmery skirt that does nothing to cover her hoo-ha. It’s so dark, I can barely make out anyone’s faces.
I feel Henry’s presence behind me as I scan the crowd.
“Laila, let’s just go.”
For some reason, having him near only emboldens me more. I probably should listen to him, but why do that when I can cause a scene in a strip club?
There is a table of rowdy guys laughing around a pile of empty beer bottles as they holler for the girl on stage. A couple strippers sit on their laps and even though I don’t see Ben with them or recognize any of them, I know he’s here with them. I just know. The rest of the room is full of older men by themselves and couples. I march right over to the table and stand there, looking at each face.
“Can we help you?” one of them says with a slur to his voice.
“Where’s Ben?” I snap, gritting my teeth.
Their jaws all drop in unison. “Oh shit,” I hear one of them mutter.
Then, a couple lift their hands and point sheepishly toward the back where there is a curtained off area. They are each smacked by the guys next to them who clearly think it was against “bro code” or something to out my cheating boyfriend. Suddenly, I feel like I could vomit. Just before I reach the first curtain, Henry steps in front of me.
“I don’t think this is a good idea, love.”
“Move out of my way, Henry.”
Looking up into his eyes, those light blue orbs shining down in the black light, I wish for a second that he could stop me. I wish he would be bossy enough to scoop me up and carry my ass out of here, but I know he won’t. So, I push him aside and tear open the black curtain just in time to hear a familiar voice bark a command in a low tone.
“Turn around and touch your toes.”
“What the fuck.” My voice barely overpowers the music as the girl’s head snaps up to stare at me like a deer in headlights.
“Laila!” Ben shouts, quickly jumping up.
I just stare at him for a moment. I don’t know what to say. It’s Ben, the boy I’ve shared meals with and curled up on the couch with for the past eleven months. We’ve talked about our feelings and said we loved each other. I told him my future kids’ names and cried into his arms about my worst memories, and all the time I thought I knew him.
But as I stare at him, with a pretty obvious tent pitched in his black slacks, I realize that I don’t know this man at all. I want to punch him, but I don’t. Instead, I spin on my heels and dash out the door. Henry is behind me every step until we reach the parking lot.
Standing by the car, my chest is heaving with rage and anger. I can’t get in the car.
“You okay?” Henry asks, looking at me like I’m a wild animal that might strike at any moment.
“No, fuck this,” I snap, turning back toward the club. I don’t get far before Ben comes out meeting me in the doorway.
“What are you doing here?” he asks, approaching me.
“I wanted to surprise you! What are you doing here?”
“I was out with the guys. A strip club isn’t cheating, Laila.”
“It is when you won’t even touch me! I didn’t know you liked…this kind of stuff.”
His head tilts to the side as he stares at me. “I’m a guy, Laila. Of course, I like strip clubs.”
I’m growing more frustrated, not with his answers but with how little I have to be mad about, but I’m still so mad. “You lied to me,” I mumble weakly.
“I wasn’t going to tell you this is where I was coming.”
Suddenly, Ben looks toward the car, noticing Henry standing there awkwardly. “Who is that?” he asks in an aggressive manner like I should be ashamed or something.
“He’s Kirsten’s dad,” I answer. Ben only squints his eyes and looks at me with scrutiny, as if I’m lying and brought my secret lover to this strip club rendezvous.
“I was going to surprise you. Stay at your place tonight,” I continue, trying to salvage any of this evening.
He shuffles his feet. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea, Laila.”
“Why? Because you want to go back in there and watch that stripper touch her toes? When you don’t even have the balls to try and fuck me?”
His eyes widen, and I barely register the awkward way Henry tries to turn away like he can’t hear us.
Then, Ben unleashes everything on me like he has been holding it in for months.
“Why would I try to fuck you, Laila? You haven’t sent me one fucking sign that you wanted to be fucked. I’ve just been trying to find ways to break it off with you because this past eleven months has been the most boring eleven months of my life!”
My mouth falls open and I clench my fists.
“That’s quite enough,” a booming British voice says as he stalks toward us, putting a hand between me and Ben.
“Why wouldn’t you just tell me? Why did you have to lie?”
“I’m sorry, Laila. You’re hot, but you’re nothing but a boring ass prude.”
I gasp, and actual tears spring to my eyes.
“I said enough!” Henry shouts, and I watch as he snatches up a fistful of Ben’s shirt and shoves him toward the door.
“Hey man!” Ben calls, shrugging out of his hold. “This is between Laila and me.”
“You’ve been drinking, and that’s no way to talk to her. I’ll let you apologize and find your way back to your friends.” Henry’s voice is deep and intimidating, and I can’t help but watch, my eyes drawn to him. There’s a little thrill building in my belly just watching him defend me.
Ben finally makes the right choice to back off, holding up his hands. “Sorry, geez.”
Then, I move toward the car, ready to get out of here so I can get somewhere private and let these tears go. Ben’s words echo in my ear—boring ass prude. I’m not a prude. I’m not.
“Let’s go,” Henry says, as he rounds the front of the car toward the door.
But there’s a rage boiling under my skin. The words just keep repeating in my head, and I hate that Ben called me that. I hate that I spent the last year of my life with a guy thinking the right moment was coming or that he had to be the one to initiate. I’ve been waiting all this time to be swept off my feet by someone who cared about me, and this is what I get? A jerk calling me a prude in a strip club parking lot?!
“No, wait,” I shout, stepping toward Ben.
“Laila,” Henry calls to me like a warning. But I’m too upset. Too angry. My boyfriend—no, ex-boyfriend—just stares at me confused as I argue. “I am not a prude. I just had a shitty fucking boyfriend.”
Then I rear back my arm and slam my fist right into his cheek.
“Holy shit,” Henry mutters from behind me, but the pain from the punch is immediate and mixes all the signals in my brain.
“Oh my God!” Ben cries as he bows over, holding his face and howling.
Henry grabs my shoulders and steers me toward the car. It all happens so fast, it’s a blur.
“Not so boring anymore,” I say, then immediately regret it because of how cliché and ridiculous it sounds.
Before I know it, we’re driving to the hotel and my hand is still hot and stealing my attention, but I have a feeling the hurting hasn’t even begun. At least the urge to cry went away. Now it’s just raw adrenaline.
When we pull up to the Holiday Inn, Henry tells me to stay in the car as he runs in to get us our rooms. Rooms or room? I don’t even know. Is he getting one or two? Should I go get my own? We didn’t exactly work this part out, and my brain is so foggy from exhaustion and coffee and adrenaline that I can’t think straight. But two hotel rooms for six hours of sleep feels excessive. Still, he’s so proper and conservative I bet he gets two. Something about that is disappointing.
He runs out a few minutes later with a sour look on his face. “They only have one room tonight. Want me to look somewhere else?”
“Umm…” I stammer. “I don’t mind. I mean…it’s just one night. If that’s okay with you…”
“It’s two beds,” he replies. There are heavy circles under his bloodshot eyes, and I know he’s exhausted.
“Yeah, it’s fine. Let’s take it.”
With a nod, he runs back in to get our keys. A moment later, we’re taking our overnight bags out of the back and heading up to the second floor. The room is large with two double beds, and it’s clean which is all that really matters. My knuckles are starting to throb, but I try to hide it in my sweatshirt, so he doesn’t notice.
“I need a shower,” I say quickly, hoping to be by myself so I can just cry and not have to do it in front of him.
“No, you don’t,” he says, grabbing the ice bucket from the counter. “Stay here.” He then disappears out the door, returning a moment later with ice.
“Sit,” he commands, and I land against the corner of the bed with a defeated sigh.
“I’m fine.”
“Let me see it.” I watch as he drops a handful of ice in the middle of a hand towel and bunches it up into a ball before placing it on the back of my knuckles. That’s when it really starts to hurt, and I have to bite my lower lip to keep from whimpering.
He holds it there for a moment without speaking, and I shut my mind off so I don’t get myself worked up again. But of course, the thoughts won’t go away.
Tears spring to my eyes.
“Are you okay?”
I nod my head.
“You’re crying, Laila. Does it hurt?”
I nod again.
He inspects my knuckles again like a doctor would. “It’s not broken.”
As a tear falls, I wish the room would just swallow me whole. When he looks up at me again, I want to punch him with the other hand. I hate crying in front of others, and with the curious expression he’s giving me now, he’s probably wondering why I’m sniveling like a child, and it only makes me feel more aggressive.
“Let it out, darling. That boy was a wanker.”
My eyes dart up to meet his. A laugh escapes my lips, and it actually makes the tears fall a little bit more. “I’ve never heard anyone say wanker in person before.”
At that, he laughs too. “You’re welcome.” Then he puts my other hand on top of the bundle of ice and gets up, returning a moment later with a tissue. Instead of handing it to me, he uses it to wipe my tears which aren’t stopping.
There is something strangely intimate about this, and while this is definitely a dad move, I’m also finding it very attractive. His doting attention is such a contrast to the brooding man in the car all day who treated me like a pest.
For a while, he doesn’t pry or make me talk, and I realize he probably wants to get some sleep. It’s after one in the morning and we’ve had a very long day.
But he doesn’t move away, just sits with me for a moment. And I don’t know why I say it, but I just feel like getting the words off my chest.
“I’m not a prude.”
Without looking up at me, he says, “Okay.”
“Is it so bad that I want my first time to be perfect?”
A small chuckle escapes his lips.
“What was that for?” I ask.
Shrugging his shoulders and avoiding my eyes, I can see him trying to mentally decide if he wants to say what’s on his mind. Finally, he sits back on his heels and looks up at me. “Your first time isn’t supposed to be perfect, Laila.”
My eyes widen, and I stare at him in shock. “Yes, it is. It’s my first time…something I’ll remember for the rest of my life.”
His eyes narrow as he shifts side to side. “That’s debatable. Your first time is supposed to be awkward and uncomfortable, probably a little painful, and statistically speaking, not likely going to check all the boxes for you, if you know what I mean.”
“I disagree. I’m not going to just screw some random dude and pretend my first time doesn’t matter. I want it to be with someone I love and someone who will actually stick around the next day.”
The tears keep falling, and I know there’s no stopping them now. “I’m not a prude,” I say again, this time trying to convince myself.
“Listen, Laila,” he says, touching my knee. “If you don’t want to be a prude, then don’t be a prude.”
A whole second goes by as his words sink in before his eyes pop wide, and he pulls his hand away. “That’s not what I mean.”
Laughter bubbles up from my chest as he fumbles with his words.
“I just meant… You call the shots, Laila. You do what you want to do. Stop waiting for him to make the move. If you want it, then you have to ask for it.”
“Okay,” I reply finally, my face fighting between sobs and laughter.
When I do finally get in the shower, I don’t feel so much like crying anymore. In fact, I’m still so hung up on that conversation with Henry that I’m not even thinking about Ben anymore. What he said about going for what I want keeps repeating in my head, sending a certain thrill down to my belly.
Why have I been spending so much of my life waiting for a man to call the shots?
What if I did just ask for what I want? I’m a pretty bold, outgoing person in every other facet of my life. I’m not afraid to stand up to someone when they need it, and I always speak up when I have to. So, why am I so afraid to make the moves in the bedroom?
Probably because I have no idea what I’m doing. I mean…I’ve seen a few pornos, but I found them dry and uninspiring.
Then for some reason I start thinking about Henry in the bedroom. I bet he knows what he’s doing. He’s so confident, and those surgeon hands probably know their ways around a woman’s body. I need to find a man like that. Someone who knows what he’s doing and isn’t afraid to let me experiment a little. Who lets me call the shots but leads the way when I need them to.
By the time I get out of the shower, Henry is gently snoring in the far bed, so I crawl carefully over to mine, sliding under the covers and nursing my swollen hand against my chest. It hurts, but it feels like a trophy too.
I’m not going to be that girl anymore. Things are going to change for me, and instead of feeling sad, I’m actually excited now.
