My Number

Well,

thud!

I knew that wasn't the question Amanda had expected – and hoped for? – from Eric. But I had to try to make her feel better about this. "Listen, I know that you were expecting him to ask you to marry him, but maybe this makes more sense, at least right now?"

"Yeah," she answered, in a not-very-enthusiastic tone of voice. "It kind of does make more sense, and I wasn't even sure that I'd have said 'yes' if he had proposed, though it was growing on my mind. It's like we're getting closer all the time, but it's just really slow, not at all the way things happened with you and Dave.

"I mean, you two just plain knew, right from the beginning, or almost right from the beginning, that . . . ."

"Actually," I interrupted her, "I think I did know from the beginning, that very first morning I woke up beside him, even though I was kind of denying it to myself."

"Yeah, well, right, whenever it was, you still knew right away. I didn't know right away with Eric, and I'm still not sure that I know. I don't know, I guess that you're right, living together first ought to answer some of the questions, without getting tied up in a marriage, and then having to get a divorce if it doesn't work out. But that's just not the passionate, romantic question I expected to hear."

I figured out, right then, that telling Amanda that Dave had surprised me with an engagement ring was not the right thing to do, not right now. I'd gotten luckier than she had in the romance department, a lot luckier.

Or did I? I mean, I was just totally in love with Dave, and I knew, absolutely certainly, that he was madly in love with me. We fit together just so perfectly, but really, we've still been together for only five months. Amanda had cheated on Eric that one time, over Thanksgiving, and I'd never cheated on Dave, but heck, we've never really been apart long enough for me to have screwed another guy. How do I know that I wouldn't do what Amanda did if we were apart for a week or so? And how do I know that what Dave and I have is so intense right now that it won't burn itself out too quickly? After all, my parents were in love at the beginning, and I guess so again, but they had problems, my mom cheated, and they got divorced.

Shit, I had to quit beating myself up over this! I'd managed to push my awful 'number' way into the background, where I didn't think about it much at all anymore, and now I was getting myself all worked up about things going too good. That was just nuts.

"Something wrong?"

Uh, oh, Dave spotted that I was worried. I guess it should have been obvious: after I hung up with Amanda, I was just sitting there, kind of staring at my empty plate. I was worried about Amanda, but I was more worried about Dave and me.

"Oh, it's just Amanda. Eric asked her if she'd like to get an apartment with him after the semester is out."

"Isn't that good news?"

"Kind of, but Amanda was half-way expecting a different question from Eric."

"You mean, she was expecting him to propose?"

"Yeah, she was. She wasn't even sure that she'd have said 'yes,' she said, but 'will you move in with me' isn't quite as romantic as a proposal."

"You moved in with me before I proposed."

"Yeah, I couldn't wait, but I knew you were going to propose, I knew it from that first morning when I woke up beside you, and I knew that I'd say 'yes.'"

"Really? You're kidding, right?"

"Nope, not kidding. I kind of pushed that to the back of my mind, denying it even to myself, because it was way too soon, but somehow, maybe subconsciously, I knew. Waking up next to you, that first morning, was just so special, special in a way I never knew it could be. I mean, I just knew, nothing more to be said, I just knew."

We were still at the table, sitting across from each other, so it was kind of awkward, but Dave had to lean across the table to kiss me after that; we'd already been holding hands across the table.

That kind of ended the serious part of the conversation, and we both got up to clear the mess and wash the dishes. Normally, Dave washed and I dried and put up the dishes, but we switched up, not through any conscious decision, but just because I was the one closer to the sink. Then I pushed ahead: "So, when did you decide that you were going to ask me to marry you?"

"Oh, I don't know, for sure, because I wasn't really thinking clearly after I met you. My mind was racing a thousand miles an hour, and I kind of imagined it, but everything was so different, everything was just so new and wonderful to me. I guess that if I had to pick when I absolutely knew, it was when you told me that you loved me as we were getting to my class, and then took off before I had a chance to say a word.

"I was just plain stunned, and trying to process what had happened, because you'd already told me not to say that to you, right from the start . . . ."

"You mean, that first morning?" I remembered shushing Dave before he could get the words out, thinking he couldn't possibly mean them, but maybe that was a defense mechanism on my part.

"Yeah, that first morning. So, I was biting my tongue those first few days . . . ."

"You mean like this?" and I looked at him, and actually bit my tongue – not hard, of course – and faked an "Ow!" smiling the whole time. That got me another of Dave's wonderful smiles, and a kiss, which got Dave my wet, soapy hands on the back of his shirt. "I think we're behaving like a Hallmark Channel movie."

"Don't those all have 'happily-ever-after' endings? Sounds OK to me."

That was when I started beating myself up again, and maybe I shouldn't have, but I pushed ahead. "Dave, do you ever worry that we've been moving too fast? I mean, we've been together for five months now, . . . "

"Four months, one week and one day."

"Well," I sputtered, "look who's been counting! But still, we've been together practically every free minute, and everything has been so wonderful, and you're amazing and I love you, but we've been rushing through everything, and sometimes I just get worried that we're getting carried away and not thinking clearly, and . . . ."

"No, I'm not worried in the slightest. This is just what's meant to be, Marcy. I know it, and you know it, too."

"But . . . ."

"No 'buts' about it. I spotted Amanda and you at that party, before you ever came up to me, and I spotted you two laughing at me. I figured, no way, no way I'm getting lucky with those chicks, you two were just way out of my league, and knew it, and then something made you walk up to me and start talking to me. I don't know if it was God or fate or whatever, but somehow something changed. We're together because we were meant to be together."

I was just stunned at that. I never thought of that soulmates stuff as being true, never thought of love at first sight as being anything but romance novel crap, but that's exactly how Dave put things. The old, cynical Marcy in me tried to come up with a good reason why he was wrong, but I couldn't; the way things happened really didn't make sense any other way.

What on earth possessed me, what moved me to push that 'mercy fuck' laughter Amanda and I were sharing, and made me approach Dave the way I did, other than God or fate or Mother Nature? How did I go from having already been half-drunk and on the prowl for some hot stud, to talking calmly and sensibly with a virgin nerd, sobering up, and getting pissed off at the very guys I'd gone to the party to screw being drunk and interrupting Dave and me just talking? What on earth made me ask a nerd to take me to his place, just to get away from the kind of party I'd gone to deliberately? How did old slut Marcy, who laughed and joked and got drunk and screwed around get so taken in by a sober guy while we were talking about foreign trade and the Civil War.

I'm not sure how long I stood there, with those thoughts racing through my head, but then all of my worries vanished, and I started smiling again, because Dave had been absolutely right.

The dishes were abandoned, only half way done, as I practically threw myself on Dave. It's a good thing that he's stronger than he looks, or we'd have fallen in a pile on the kitchen floor. If that part of the kitchen hadn't been so narrow or uncomfortable, I'd have ravished him right there, but we managed to get up long enough to make it to the bedroom.

OMG, this was so wonderful, with everything just washing over me, with Dave's Tom Cruise smile lighting up the room, lighting up my life. We were just together, the way we were meant to be.

But Dave insisted: we had to get back up and finish cleaning the kitchen! The apartment's so crammed full that leaving anything undone or not put away, and the whole place looks like chaos. We got done with that just before eight, and I grabbed the remote and turned on the silly romance network, the Hallmark Channel, and we watched this movie

All Things Valentine

. Yeah, it was corny, and those movies always have a happy ending, but it was still fun, and Dave even sat with me, watching it, too. I wasn't sure how much he'd like it, but there was this really pretty redhead starring in it, so he probably wasn't too bored. Me, I loved it, and I loved just sitting on the couch, cuddled up with my honey, and it wasn't too long before he was showing definite signs of recovery from us making love an hour ago.

In a way, I had to laugh inwardly. Would Amanda be watching this movie? Would I have watched it last Valentine's Day? No, no way, I was too hard-hearted, and I'd have thought it sappy and ridiculous and a waste of time. Of course, it was sappy and ridiculous, but it made me smile now. Heck, last Valentine's Day, if I was going to watch a movie, I'd have probably picked Friday the 13th, part whatever.

It was like everything about me had changed over the past four months and however many days Dave had said it had been.

After the movie, we probably should have done some reading, but neither of us was really in the mood to do homework, and we kind of lazily headed for bed. I wasn't sure if we'd make love again, and it turned out that we didn't, but we just drifted off in each other's arms.

It was a good thing I'd recharged my smartphone, 'cause Amanda wanted to talk in the morning. She called, after my first class, asking what I thought about her moving in with Eric for the summer. Actually, I thought it was a decent idea, because that way they might be able to figure out what was best for them. She was getting more and more hung up on Eric, and it was my guess that him not asking her to marry him had made her want to get married more, and that was kind of nuts.

"You know, Amanda, you could just ask Eric yourself."

"Oh, Hell no, I'd never do that! It's the man's place to ask that question, and . . . ."

"Don't give me any of that 'it's the man's place' crap! If that's what you want, then ask him."

"Nope, no, no way. If he is thinking about that, he needs to have the balls to ask me. Hell, I'm still not sure that I'll say yes to sharing a place. I'm still not sure, and I'm still worried that I'll screw it up by cheating on him again."

"You're still beating yourself up about that?"

"Yeah, kind of a lot."

"Is that what's keeping you from getting over the hump on deciding?"

"I don't know, maybe. Probably."

"Then maybe you should tell him, and get it over with. If that causes you to break up, then it does, but it's better to get it over with now than just drift into living together with that in the background."

"Marcy, you were the one who told me not to tell him!"

"No, I said if you could live with it as a secret, then go ahead. Seems obvious that you can't live with keeping it a secret." Silence. "Listen, do you want me to ask Dave what he'd do? He doesn't know about this yet."

"You think that'd help?"

"Oh, who knows? But Dave's a man, and a pretty mature man for his age, and I think he'll tell me just how he feels about this kind of thing."

"Will he keep his mouth shut if I just can't tell Eric?"

"Dave's a man of his word: if he says that he'll keep a secret, he'll keep the secret, even if he doesn't think it's right."

"Don't you ask Dave. Oh, man, this is hard, but I'll ask Dave myself. If I can't work up the nerve to ask Dave, I'll never have the courage to tell Eric."

"Well, we usually grab lunch at the Student Center Cafeteria at eleven. Want to meet us there?"

"That soon? Oh, wow, but yeah, I'll find you guys there."

Dave and I didn't have any classes together, but we both had the 11:00 hour free. I had the 9:00 classes free, but a miserable accounting for financial planners class at 10:00. I'd usually grab one of the grad students carrels in the library and read or finish homework during my break, but I couldn't concentrate during that break, and didn't pay as much attention as I should have in class, and it was a tough class. I was really happy when it was over, and I scurried over to the cafeteria to find Dave.

It turned out that Amanda had beat me there, and she was sitting at a table with Dave when I got to the cafeteria. Neither of them had gotten lunch yet, so we all headed up to grab some food. I usually got a salad – the cafeteria has surprisingly good salads – and coffee, while Dave grabbed an egg salad sandwich and some green beans. I guess that Amanda was pretty nervous, because even though she had a meal card, she just grabbed a tuna sandwich and a diet soda.

Dave could see that something was up; he gets these full-attention, wary looks on his face. I've seen them before, and sometimes they're kind of comical. Right now, he looked like he did when those two girls caught us in the gorge last fall. I felt like telling him that Amanda didn't have a rifle!

"Listen, Dave," she began, "there's something that I've got to talk to you about, but you've got to promise me that you'll never tell another soul." Dave glanced over at me, and could tell instantly that I already knew about whatever it was Amanda was going to say.

"Go ahead, I'm listening," he said.

"Do you promise?"

"Yes, I promise." Dave was not smiling.

At that, Amanda started to tell Dave about her cheating on Eric over Thanksgiving, and once she got the basic admission out of the way, the words just started pouring out. How could she tell Eric, did she need to tell Eric, what would Eric say or do, what would Dave do in Eric's place, just everything imaginable. When she finally finished, Amanda had an almost pleading look on her face, and for a second, I thought she might start to cry.

Dave looked at me and said, "I suppose that you knew about this?"

"Yeah, from right after Thanksgiving, but I promised not to say anything, and I didn't." For a second, Dave had a harsh look on his face, but once I said that I had made a promise and kept it, I could tell he understood.

Looking back at Amanda, he opened up. "Well, OK, yeah, I think you have to tell Eric; you can't take the next step, by moving in together, with that hanging over your head. If you're asking me, that means this has been eating at you for a while now, and it's going to come out, whether now or later. What if you two do move in together, maybe even get married down the road, and then Eric finds out about it? Eric can either accept this, and live with it, or not."

"What would you do?"

"Me?" Dave glanced my way. "I wouldn't be happy, but I'd stay with Marcy, at least I think I would. I guess that there's really no way to know until it actually happens."

"What do you think Eric will do?"

"Have you seen the way he looks at you? He'll stay." Oh, my God, did Dave actually say that? I hadn't really noticed Eric looking at Amanda the way Dave just said he did, but a guy did? That was just crazy.

"What can we do to help?" I asked. "I don't know how to make it any easier, but if you want, we can all have dinner at our place, and you can plan to tell him there. I just don't know if that'd make things any easier."

Amanda just sat there, nibbling at her tuna sandwich, thinking it over, and then she finally said that no, she'd have to tell Eric, but she had to do it on her own, alone. She'd just tell Naomi to get lost for a while, and tell him this evening in her dorm room.

It was a quiet evening for Dave and me. Everything went pretty much normally, but Dave was quieter than usual. Finally, I asked him, "Dave, you didn't think that Amanda was somehow trying to ease the way for me to tell you something, did you?"

"Maybe for half a second, 'cause it all seemed so weird, but I only needed to glance at your face to tell that it wasn't."

At that, I got up and went over to my wonderful boyfriend. He was sitting on the couch, and I got up on his lap, facing him, with my legs to each side of him, and put my arms around his neck. "So, you'd really stay with me if I'd been a bad girl?" I kind of teased him.

"I wouldn't like it, but I'd stay." He was sort of smiling, because it was obvious to him that I hadn't cheated. "Still, I'd probably have to spank you for it."

Oh, wow! We'd done a lot, but Dave had never said the first thing about wanting to spank me. That was so different, and so hot. I kissed him quickly, then stood up, pulled my jeans down, and then laid right down over his knees. "I'm a very naughty girl, Dave," I said, smiling up at him, "and you should spank me."

Well, that got his motor running, and he swatted my bare butt a couple of times, but not really hard. I was so turned on, and all I said was, "Harder." Dave smacked my bare ass a couple more times, but was still holding back, when I looked at him and said, "Harder, make it hurt."

That did the trick! Dave swatted my ass, hard, a few times, and it stung, and I'm sure that my butt was red, when I got up and said, "You had better fuck me hard now, as hard as you can."

OMG, I was so turned on, and I practically ripped Dave's clothes off him. We didn't go into the bedroom, we stayed right there, on the couch, with me kneeling down and Dave behind me, just plain slamming it home. I was climaxing in like no time at all, and Dave didn't hold back much either. It was just plain awesome. When I looked out the window, I saw that our naughty neighbor had turned out her lights, but was standing behind her Venetian blinds, watching us.

After we were done, Dave and I started cuddling and kissing, and I reassured him that just because I said I was a very naughty girl, I wasn't confessing to anything and hadn't cheated on him, that I had just gotten turned on when he said he'd have to spank me. Dave said that he knew that, but he'd kind of fantasized that I had been naughty, just to get in the mood to really slam me hard. "Ooh, you naughty little boy, you," I teased him. "Did you like fantasizing about that?"

"Well, kind of," he admitted, a bit reluctantly.

"You do know that we had an audience, don't you?" I grinned at him.

"Yeah, I spotted her, but I was too turned on to close the blinds."

"Did that make it more fun for you?"

"It was fun," he admitted, but he wouldn't go as far as saying that it had made it more fun.

We headed for bed, and wound up cuddling ourselves to sleep.

Since we'd gone to bed a bit early, I woke up early. It was always so nice, waking up next to Dave, and seeing him there, still sleeping, his chest slowly rising and falling as he breathed. Sometimes I still thought back, to that first morning I woke up with Dave, watching him as he slept with a smile on his face. Dave must have been having good dreams, because he was smiling this morning as well, not that huge Tom Cruise smile he has, but just a slight one, one of inner happiness. I wondered if I looked that way when I slept.

I love this man, I'll always love this man, I thought to myself. Dave was right: whatever crazy force it was that brought us together, it knew what it was doing.