I Love My Hope (Nicole's Erotic Romance) (2 page)

 
“Amber, since we’re talking about things
that will never be talked about again…” I begin cautiously.

Her head
tilts to the side. “Yes?”

“When I
saw she was blonde – his wife - I thought
of course
he chose a white
woman over me
. Isn’t that terrible? Why did I think that?”

Amber
frowns. “I think a lot of those things come into our heads simply out of
habit.”

I think
about it. “Or it’s stuck in my blood cells somewhere…from my ancestors.”

“Could
be. But you know, I was aware you were black when we first met, but then you
were just Nicole and color went away. And now –just now – when you
said
blonde
, it didn’t occur to me
that that meant
white
. I was just
thinking it was a hair color.” She smiles.

“Yeah! I
think things are changing. Because I didn’t even think when I met his wife that
you were blonde and therefore white. To me, you’re just
Amber
,
too.”

“Exactly,”
she says,

“Maybe I
was just looking for a way to make sense of it.”

“Maybe it
was just the anger looking to find more things to be angry about. My brain does
that sometimes. Let me get you a better pillow and another blanket. I’ll loan
you some shorts because my sweats would be floods on you.”

I smile
at her. “I guess I’m staying over?”

“Yes, and
don’t argue.”

“Yes,
sir!”

She
laughs. “Oh shut up.”

I wait as
she goes off to care for me. I know there’ll be no insomnia tonight. The secret
I’ve been hiding has been expunged.

Decisions
have been made.

Plans
set.

Tears
shed.

Now I can
rest… and get ready for a new chapter in my life.

The one where Michael… no longer exists.

The Next Afternoon

SoHo
Art Materials
on Wooster is getting pillaged like
it’s
France and
I’m a Viking. No table is left un-scavenged. I’ve stacked up double the
quantities of everything I need. Eight brushes? Make it sixteen. Twenty-five
yards of canvas needed gets actualized into fifty yards. Hell, make it
seventy-five. Every color of paint is coming with me, two tubes each. Make it
three, no four. I grab yards upon yards of unprimed canvas, inspired with an
idea of what I want to do.

I haven’t
had a cigarette all day. Haven’t even thought about it.

“You
taking a cab?” the guy behind the counter asks, prompted by the surplus. His
voice and eyes are flat and emotionless.

I look at
the pile. “I guess so.”

He rings
up item after item. “Just starting out?”

I pick up
a brush to touch its soft potential. “You could say that.”

“I’ll
call a cab for you,” he offers, dead-toned.

I lay the
brush down, surprised. “You don’t have to do that.”

Still
there is no emotion in his voice. “I want to.”

“Umm…
Okay.”

When the
cabbie arrives, he runs in and – miracles of miracles – helps me
carry my many things to the car. This never happens. Cabbies who go out of their
way to help you are as rare as a cable man showing up on time.

“So,
you’re an artist?” he says, smiling jovially into the rearview as we take off.

I smile
back, excited. “I am.”

He holds
a finger in the air like he’s a cartoon character about to announce an idea. “Looks
like you’re ready!”

I laugh. “From
your mouth to God’s ears, my friend.”

“Yes.
Yes!” His head bobs about twenty times.

“You’re
very sweet.”

He waves
off the compliment and focuses on the road.

I pull my
phone out to answer a text that comes through and when I see
who
it’s from, a digital knife slices my psyche, killing my mood.

“You
okay? Miss?” the cabbie asks, looking from his rearview mirror. I’m too busy
reading Michael’s text to hear him.

Michael: I
want to talk.

“Miss?”
the cabbie asks, louder this time.

“I don’t
know,” I say, above a whisper as I type the one word I could not say if he were
right in front of me
.

I stare
at the phone, caught in suspense, dying to know what he’ll say to the word ‘
no.’
Has
he
ever heard that word before? Have I ever said it to him? Has any woman, ever?

Michael:
Please.

The cab
hits a pothole and my phone flies through the air to land on the floor. Another
text comes through and I scramble to get it, angry at my haste and desperation,
but unable to be strong.

Michael: Don’t
be like this.

Me: You
did this. Not me. Leave me alone.

I shut my
phone off with great difficulty…one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.

I look
up. “I’m fine. Just get me home, please.”

He nods.
I stare out the window – silent.

When we
get to my apartment, he helps me bring my bounty in, but everything feels
heavier to me now, the thrill lessened. He doesn’t mention that there isn’t
much space, but it’s what I’m thinking. I should have bought less. All of this
stuff is making my studio look pitifully insufficient.

When we’re
done, I give him a fat tip.

“You are
very generous. Thank you.”

“It’s the
least I can do. I needed a little help today.” Just as he’s about to close my
front door, I call after him, “Hey!” He turns, eyes wide and waiting. “Thank
you. Really.”

“Why am I
not here on Earth, but to help good people?” He grins, and I see that one of
his back teeth is missing. When he shuts the door it occurs to me that there
are angels walking among us, and he – this humble, earnest human being
– just might be one of them.

Alone now,
I begin to move things around and organize. There is only one antique table remaining
as the only piece of furniture in this room. I push it flush against a wall,
thinking that it will serve as my storage space for the brushes, oils and
acrylics. Piling them onto it, I sort them out into piles.

My couch
was taken away yesterday by the Salvation Army, as was my coffee table, plus a
couple small rugs I’ve never liked. The colors were all wonky. I’ve disliked
them since I bought them, but choosing rugs has never been my strong suit. Nor
is keeping house of any kind, if I’m clearing away the cobwebs of denial
;
literally and figuratively. Watching those rugs get out of
my life felt good.
But the couch?
I second-guessed my
decision to lose the couch, the second it was gone.

The small
blue toolbox gets grabbed from the closet. My father got me this toolbox for my
twenty-second birthday. I thought was a very odd gift, but it’s turned out to
be the most useful thing he’s ever given me. I guess somewhere inside him he
knew I’d be single, huh?
 
That I’d
need to take care of my own handiwork around the house? Nice, Dad. Truth though?
It’s surprising how often I’ve needed a screwdriver, a hammer, or measuring
tape in the years I’ve lived on my own. Everything he’d put in it has come in
handy.

Four
thick nails and a hammer will do the trick, today.
And fabric
scissors, nice and sharp.
I place them on the table and start unrolling
the canvas to cut off about two yards, which I then nail onto the largest wall
I’ve got. When I center and hang it, I take great pleasure in pounding the
nails hard into the wall. It’s cathartic
;
a place to
put my anger.

Stepping
back – the blood rushing in my veins, my heart pumping – adrenaline
springs into action and I feel like I’m flying again, my excitement back on
track.

What do I
need next? Candles. Digging them out from wherever I can find them, I bring
every candle I own into the living room, lighting them all. Squeezing tubes of
paint onto a shiny, virgin palette, I follow my heart towards the colors of purple
and red with hints of black. My feelings splash onto the canvas, a release that
has waited a lifetime for a home that won’t hurt other people. The fury, hurt
and betrayal, the loss and the love – spring out of me without
reservation or control. Time rushes to keep up until it finally quits trying,
ignored and dejected. Food is not eaten. Water is not drunk. Cigarettes not
needed. My soul has opened and I am free.

5:05 A.M.

 
The
Next Morning

Where am
I? I feel the ache of cold cramped sleeping on a hard wood floor. I squint
around me. It’s dark, all the candles long since burnt down. I fell asleep
here, on the floor. I don’t remember lying down. Did I pass out? Was I
drinking? No, memory tells me I wasn’t. From the dryness in my throat, I don’t
think I’ve had any water, either, for way too long.

I lift
myself up with both hands. One of my legs comes painfully alive, poked with
invisible needles. “Ouch!” I give it a good shake, but really, you can’t rush
waking it.

I’m
scared to look up on the wall to see what I did. I’m really terrified.

“Come on
Nicole, put on your big-girl pants and look up.”

I draw my
head up slowly; my eyes are used to the darkness now, enough to where I can see
my painting. As I take it in, I start to sob the type of wracking sobs that
don’t want an audience, because they aren’t pretty. The tears are of disbelief,
joy and a sublime fulfillment I have never before known. My heart feels like
it’s expanding, like it’s bursting through my ribcage and will fill up the
whole room. I finally did it. I finally painted something worth looking at. I
finally painted from my soul and not my mind.

I’m
kneeling, staring at it.
 
My
tear-streamed vision is foggy and blurred, but still I can see that it’s the
most beautiful piece of art I have ever hoped to produce. It’s exactly what
I’ve been blocked against. Exactly what I was afraid to do. Exactly what I
fought to break through to. Because it is a painting that has come from the
very deepest part of myself that is only mine – my soul.

But I
cannot take credit for this painting, just as I cannot take credit for my soul.
This painting came from someplace else, through me. It came to express the
human condition that is unrequited love and unmitigated heartbreak.

I know
exactly what I’m going to do with it. I’m going to slice it into two jagged pieces
and frame them, held up and spread open by pins, inside shadow-boxes, to be
hung next to each other… always separate… always apart.

I will
call them:
Two Halves That Can Never Be
One.

Months Later, On a Tuesday Early in
Summer

The Night David Smashed Jess’s Heart

“Zach! Be
careful!!”

“Sorry! I
got a little too excited.” He adjusts the position. “That better?”

I wiggle
around and think on it. But I can still feel him pushing against my cervix.
Some men are too big.

“Hold on.
I’ll take off my heels. Then you won’t have such a level playing field.” I kick
them off, holding onto the couch I’m bent over, in his apartment. He bends his
knees, pants fallen around his ankles like floppy, cotton boots.

“That’s
better,” I say. “Now you have to reach for it.”

He
chuckles, holding onto my hips. “
Mmmm
, Nicole –
your ass is incredible.” He gives it a light swat.

I throw a
wicked smile over my shoulder at him. “Like you haven’t seen it fifty times
before?”

He grins
and growls, grabbing on and squeezing tight. “I’ll never get used to it.” Then
he presses that glorious cock of his into me at a much better angle this time,
the height adjustment definitely helping.

I purr, “
Sooooo
much better. Keep going.”

“Nice and
slow, like you like it, right?” He asks.

I face
forward, bending against his thrusts, and the feelings are all pleasure now. I
nod my head, but I don’t add,
this is how
I like it from you.
From my others, I
like other things.
 

They all
have their purpose, my casual fuck buddies Zach, Jason, and a new guy named
Tom. That purpose is to entertain me with no complications. No one is getting
close to my heart. Not if I can help it. Just slow, sweet penetration from Zach
and his enormous cock and not-too-complex mind, and the world is a beautiful
place.
Easy
peasy
, pumpkin
squeezy
.

He pushes
in and holds it there a suspenseful second, then pulls out almost past the tip,
then back in, luxuriously slow, sending shivers of fun all over me. I purr like
a satisfied cat and he takes it up a notch in speed, bends so he can reach
around and fondle me at the same time.