Fletch gave me a stack of warm clothes, complete with underwear and socks. I put them on and got back into his bed. Then I told him about what happened with Carver on Sunday night after he dropped me off.

“I got the landlord to change the locks that night, otherwise, I would not have felt comfortable staying there,” I explained as I shook my head. “But truthfully, the place feels gross… tainted. I started looking for a new apartment.”

“Did you have any success?” Fletch asked sympathetically.

“We already live in one of the sketchiest parts of the city. I like how much I pay in rent and I think my building is one of the best ones in the area. Except that guy broke in twice. The first time, he didn’t get inside my apartment. He only got into the hallway, but the second time he did. I still don't know how he got in.”

“Have you thought about moving somewhere bigger and getting a roommate?”

“I’m not sure that that wouldn’t ruin my life more than Carver. If I had a roommate, she’d eventually find out about my little hobbies and then I wouldn’t know if I could trust her. She’d have blackmail on me whenever she wanted. Unless she was up to something pretty shady herself, I’d always be at a disadvantage. I don’t know. I feel really weird about my women friends since Natalie hit me with a brick. I’ve known her for years and I didn’t even know she was seeing Chase.”

Fletch suppressed a smile. “What about living with a man?”

“He’d be trying to get down my pants constantly.”

Fletch nodded. “That sounds legit, but you’re not getting what I’m suggesting. Why don’t you move in with me?”

“Huh?” I gasped, awestruck.

“I already know about your little hobbies and I don’t condemn you for them. I would never blackmail you, although, you’re very right about the pants thing.” He grinned. “I would want down your pants constantly.”

I bit my lip. I had never had the conversation I was about to have with Fletch with anyone, and I hadn’t prepared myself. For some reason, I thought I had more time with Fletch before we had to talk. I swallowed hard. “I have a problem.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m not… what I seem.”

He squinted and looked at me sideways. “Elaborate.”

I swallowed again. “Look, I know what men think when they look at me. I know they see all my curves, beauty everywhere, and the devil-may-care look in my eyes. Those things should mean something… but they don’t.”

Fletch leaned on his elbow. “What should they mean?”

“They should mean that I’m a really good lay. That a woman who looks like me should be great in bed. She should be awesome, a sexual fantasy, the best--”

“But that’s not true?” Fletch interrupted.

I shook my head slowly, no air left in my lungs. I had one hideous moment where I regretted having said that to Fletch. I should never have told him. I should have moved to Kansas and let a tornado take me away rather than explain to the one man I liked what was wrong. I turned to leave when his hand slid across mine. I looked back at him, but he didn’t look horrified. He looked calm and like the news didn’t scare him.

“It’s okay,” he said. “What if you went back to the beginning and told me what happened?”

Slowly, I moved back to my original position and opened my mouth to talk, but nothing came out. I cleared my throat and tried again. I couldn’t bear to be specific, so I decided to be general. “It was a surprise to me too.”

“What happened?” he asked softly.

“I haven’t tried it that many times because it goes so badly. The first time was with my high school boyfriend after graduation. We’d been dating for over a year. I thought we’d get married. He’d waited because my family doesn’t believe that kids should be having sex, so we’d waited until we were eighteen and graduated from high school. I thought he loved me. I thought he loved me more than anything. From the first moment, I screamed. I was not prepared for it to hurt like that. He didn’t try for very long before he jumped up, put his clothes back on, said some incredibly hurtful things that he never took back, and left.”

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Fletch stroked my hand with his fingers. “It scared him off?”

“I saw him around that summer before he left for college. Little glimpses across malls and restaurants. We never spoke. He was supposed to go to college nearby, but after that, he moved to a different city. He didn’t even say goodbye. I can’t even think of how embarrassed the whole thing must have made him.”

“Was the backlash from the breakup hard for you?”

I nodded. “I never told anyone what happened because I didn’t want the news to circle back to him and add to his humiliation. I thought that, at least, I could give that to him. You know, since I loved him so much.”

It was so quiet in the apartment, I felt like the only thing I could hear was the sound of my lips smacking as I spoke. Not even the sounds of my words were as loud as the smacking of my lips.

“Did you see a doctor?”

“No. I had bled like virgins are supposed to. I thought that boy had done the important bit and I hoped my next experience would be better.”

“It wasn’t?”

“If anything, it was worse. I was twenty-one and I’d been dating him for five months, he was getting impatient, and so was I. I really wanted my life to start, and everyone talks about how sex is the best thing all the time. I clenched my jaw and didn’t scream, but it still hurt so bad, I can’t explain. It hurt so bad I couldn’t stop myself from crying. He noticed. Go up, told me he wasn’t a rapist and was so embarrassed that he too walked out.”

“Just for that?”

“He tried harder than Mr.-Teenage-Boyfriend, but he wasn’t invested in me. The girl he left me for was nothing compared to me. She was dumpy, she laughed at stupid things, she applied her lipstick wrong, and the message I got is that sexual satisfaction is more important than looks, intelligence, or class. It trumped everything. I did go see a doctor, and he thinks he got my problem worked out. But he told me when I left his office that he might not have taken care of it completely and the only way for me to test it was to have sex. Except, I had no partner and I wasn’t sure if I could have one. What if it went as badly as it had the first two times?”

“It’s been a while since then, eh?”

“Yeah, it has been. And I’m tired. So tired,” I admitted, leaning back. “I haven’t felt like I could trust any of the men I’ve dated since then. Sure, they go off in raptures about how beautiful I am but I know that it isn’t going to matter how beautiful I am if I can’t give them a good time. I’ve been trying to find someone I could feel safe with. Someone who wouldn’t get scared off by my imperfection.”

His expression was thoughtful. “You still don’t think that person is me, do you?”

I dropped one of my shoulders. “I think it could be. Otherwise, I would have left already.”

He nodded. “Good. Your experience is so interesting because I’ve had the opposite experience.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m a terrific lay. I’m the best they’ve ever had, but they don’t stay. They want someone with money, power, a respectable place to live, a serious job, and not just honorariums. I’m an artist and they want to lick chocolate sauce off my abs and come here when life treats them unkindly, but they don’t want to be my wife. Live life side by side? Live life with me? I’ve asked women to live with me before as a stepping stone toward marriage, but the second they hear the word marriage, they freak out. You can see the panic rising behind their eyes. They don’t want to marry me. They want to fool around with me… sometimes after they’ve already married someone else.” He put up a hand. “I don’t put up with that. I hope that explains why I thought I had the right to be so annoyed at you over Simon. I thought you should have told him sooner if you weren’t interested. I didn’t know he’d never asked if he could hold your hand.”

I paused, looked at him, and asked quietly, “You want to get married?”

“I don’t want to be single all my life,” he replied.

“No… I mean. Do you want to marry me?” I whispered, but he heard me.

“What are you saying?”

I couldn’t be more embarrassed than I already was. I might as well tell him the heart of what I wanted. “Look, after what has happened to me, what I really want is to get married. What I want is to get married, and instead of having an embarrassing evening together where I feel stripped, stupid, unloved, and unloveable, I have a honeymoon, where my new husband takes his time. And if the doctor didn’t do a good enough job, my new husband will patiently wait for me…” I started tearing up. “And not be angry with me if things don’t go so well at first. The doctor said I should be able to have a normal sex life, it just probably won’t be amazing immediately.”

Fletch put both his hands on mine, but I didn’t dare look up into his face.

I had more to say. “But I don’t want you to think that I am asking this because I think you would treat me right. Well, I do, but I love you. I love you and your little triangle, and your apartment that has no privacy, and the way you look at me when I suggest something crazy… and the sound of your voice, and the sight of your neck, and you have the most amazing--”

He kissed me.

“Of course, I’ll marry you,” he said when the kiss was over.

I nodded, clutching his hands. “Let’s get married soon.”

He put his forehead to mine. “Really soon.”