Claimed Harder by Em Brown
Chapter 2
BRIDGET
Past
The door swings open, slamming against the wall, leaving a dent where the doorknob hit it.
“Amy!” Simone admonishes my roommate from where she and I sit at the table having leftover pizza for breakfast.
“You won’t believe this!” Amy squeals.
“I’ll put door stop on our shopping list,” I tell Simone.
“You guys! You will not believe where I just got invited to next weekend!”
I have a feeling her invitation resembles the one I received from Darren last night. Part of me doesn’t believe Darren was serious.
“The John Legend concert?” Simone guesses.
“He plays the following weekend,” I tell her.
Amy hops up and down. “No, it’s not John Legend. It’s Thailand!”
“Like the country Thailand?” Simone asks.
“Yesssss!” Amy hops in circles now.
“Cool. When would you be going?”
“Next weekend. Luckily, my passport’s in order since I went to France with my family last summer. But can you believe it? Thailand!”
“Is this with the JD Lee you’ve been talking about?”
“Of course!!” Amy’s eyes widen with a realization. “I’ve got to go shopping!”
She grabs a slice from the open box of pizza between me and Simone before rushing off to our room.
Simone looks at me in some disbelief. “Thailand? Next weekend? That’s short notice, but this guy must be serious about Amy. By the way, how did it go with your guy?”
My cheeks become warm. After Darren left, unable to focus on my paper, I went to see if Simone was up for watching The Wire and found she had fallen asleep. I channel flipped for a while, eventually dozing off on the sofa with CNN playing in the background.
“Good, I think,” I respond. “I got invited to Thailand, too.”
Simone’s bottom lip dropped. “I am so missing out! Are you guys for real?”
“I don’t know how serious Darren’s invitation was.”
“Darren is the cousin of Amy’s guy?”
I nod and take a sip of my morning orange juice. Not the best beverage pairing with pizza.
“Damn,” Simone sighs. “These guys must be loaded if their idea of a next date is Thailand! Is there another cousin I can date?”
“Julie okay with that?” I tease, referring to a woman whom Simone, who’s bi, has been seeing.
“I think she’d understand if I get to jet off to Thailand at a moment’s notice,” Simone joked. “These guys must be serious about you and Amy.”
I shake my head. “Just because they can afford to take someone to Thailand doesn’t mean a thing.”
I suddenly wonder what costs Darren expects me to cover. I certainly can’t afford the plane ticket.
“I bet guys with money like to show off to anyone and everyone,” I add. I think about the designer clothes Darren wears, the fancy nightclub he owns, and the Porsche Pana-whatever car he drives that he and I joked about as a penis extension.
Simone reaches for another slice of pizza topped with mushroom and pineapple. I had thought it an odd combination at first, but to my surprise, it works. “So you don’t see it as serious?”
“Definitely not. We don’t know each other that well. He’s not even my type.”
“What’s your type?”
“Someone non-glamorous who wouldn’t be caught dead at a fundraiser for Drumm.”
“You were at one.”
“I didn’t know it was a fundraiser for him! Did I tell you Darren’s ex is dating Drumm’s son, Eric?”
“She sounds like a bitch.”
I reach for a second slice of pizza for myself. “She’s not wrong when she says that Darren is ‘slumming’ it—”
“Bitch.”
“—but I’m not his type in other ways, too. I’m opinionated, politically progressive, not a lingerie model…”
“Opposites attract all the time.”
“But those attractions don’t last, or they make for a rocky relationship.”
“So the sex is good, then.”
Recalling how Darren made me climax through a foot massage, I don’t respond right away.
Simone grins. “Yeah, I knew it. It has to be something if all that you said is true.”
“It’s good,” I mumble into a bite of pizza.
“Well, enjoy it. I bet Thailand is a great place to have sex.”
“Even if Darren is serious about it, I can’t go. I don’t have a passport, I have classes—”
“Get the class notes from someone, and Amy can help you with stats.”
“—and my job and my current internship.”
“How long are you going to be gone?”
“I don’t even know. Thailand seems so…so random. I thought Darren was joking.”
“You’re going to turn down an all-expenses-paid trip to Thailand?”
“I don’t know that it’s ‘all-expenses-paid,’” I continue to protest.
“Well, if you’re not going, I’ll go in your place.”
The conversation turns to a different topic after that. After we clear the table, I head back into the room I share with Amy, ready to attack the paper I was trying to work on yesterday before Darren showed up.
Amy’s clothes cover the floor.
“Sorry,” she says as she digs through a drawer. “I could have sworn I had brought my bikini back here from home, though a new one would be more fun. But the stores aren’t likely to have a great selection of swimwear this time of year. I’m going to have to order something online, which isn’t as fun as trying things on. Plus, I’m going to need a dress for the wedding.”
“Wedding?” I ask as I perch on the bed and watch as Amy holds up a short-sleeve sweater in front of a mirror.
“JD’s sister is getting married in Thailand.”
So Thailand wasn’t as random a destination as I’d thought.
Amy whirls around, her eyes bright with stars. “Can you believe how fast things are moving with JD? I mean, I’m going to be meeting his family.”
“That’s usually a significant step,” I acknowledge with hesitation.
I still have questions about JD. I can’t quite put my finger on why I have reservations. Maybe because he comes across so cool and smooth. Amy’s falling hard for the guy, and I don’t want her to get hurt.
To offer my way of looking at things, I share, “Darren actually invited me, too, but I doubt he considers us a serious relationship.”
Amy stares at me agog. “What?”
“He came by yesterday. Asked if I wanted to go to Phuket.”
“No way! He’s got to be into you, Bridget! And to think, you threw soda in his face when you first met!”
I chuckle now, though the dominant feelings that night had been anger and hurt, followed by mortification, remorse and sheepishness. Darren had approached me and disparaged the sweater I was wearing at his swanky club. Apparently he had thought I was part of some prank being pulled on him, but I didn’t know that. So, yeah, I threw my Coke at him for being so mean. I also didn’t know at the time he was the club owner andJD Lee’s cousin.
“How can he not consider you guys as serious if he’s introducing you to his family?” Amy asks.
“Because we haven’t even gone on an official date.”
Amy waves a dismissive hand. “What makes a date ‘official’ anyway? Like it has to be over dinner at a restaurant or a movie? Honestly, I think that’s old-fashioned. Did you guys have sex?”
I nod. It was unlike any sex I had ever had before. Since Simone was just across the hall in her room, I was worried that we’d make too much noise. Darren had covered my mouth and nose with his hand. I remember the panic of not being able to breathe. Somehow, it had led me to the most intense orgasm I had ever experienced.
“Did JD mention how long the trip’s going to be?” I inquire.
“A week, maybe week and a half.”
I balk. “That’s a long trip.”
“If you’re going to fly all the way to Asian, you don’t want to have to turn around a few days later.”
“You’re not worried about missing that much school?”
Amy stares at me like she can’t believe I would even ask such a thing. “How often does one get invited to Thailand? Thailand!”
We both start at the sound of a chirping beep.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“Oh, it’s a monoxide detector,” Amy says with a roll of her eyes. “My mom freaked out when she read in the newspaper that a family of four passed away in their sleep at a local motel because of a faulty heater or something, so she sent me one. It must be low on batteries. I should just plug it into the wall.”
While she tries to find a free outlet, my cellphone buzzes with a text. It’s from Darren, though I don’t remember ever giving him my number.
For your passport, send me your headshot.
You can be smiling but no teeth can show.
Did I actually say I was going to go? As I replay my exchange with him, I don’t recall saying definitively that I would go. I didn’t say I wouldn’t, but Darren has these instances where it seems he just expects me to do what he says. And I have because, so far, they’ve been minor things, like getting into his car after he’s offered to drive me to the grocery store. But I’d better assert myself more before he thinks he’ll always get his way.
I text back:
We should talk more about this.
Seconds later, I get a text:
Come over to the club tonight.
I debate spending another night with Darren when I still have my outline for my health policy paper to finish. I text Darren:
I’ll let you know later if I can make it.
Have a paper to work on.
He responds:
Don’t play hard to get.
A little miffed, I type back:
I’m not! I really do have classwork.
FYI, I’m a college student.
He texts:
Then go get it done instead of texting me.
I’ll expect you at ten o’clock.
I purse my lips, then text:
Anyone ever tell you how bossy you are?
His answer:
You haven’t seen the half of it.
I blink several times. How is that supposed to attract me to go to Phuket with him? A childish part of me wants to tell him I’m not coming tonight, so he knows I’m not about to go over to his club just because he says so.
Instead, I write:
I’ll update you later.
That leaves it open for me to decide to go or not. I’m about to put my phone down when I receive a final text:
No need. Just come at ten.
Is he trying to annoy me on purpose? I wonder.
“Hey, you wanna go shopping with me?” Amy asks. “We can either hit up Union Square or go to a mall in the ’burbs.”
“I should get to working on these grant applications for my internship,” I reply. “Plus, I don’t know that I’m going to Thailand.”
Amy looks at me as if I’ve said something sacrilegious. “Why would you not?”
“Between classes, my job and internship, I don’t know that I can get away. Don’t you have your first set of midterms in two weeks?”
“I’ll tell my professor I had to go be with family. It’s not that big a deal.”
I haven’t kept track of how many classes or shifts Amy has missed at the restaurant where she works, but her priorities seem to have shifted even though she usually stresses over her grades because she wants to make it into a med school like Stanford or Johns Hopkins. But maybe Amy will settle back to her old self once some of JD’s luster starts to fade.
Getting off the bed, I sit at my desk and turn on my computer. Time to make headway on my paper. Truth is, I want to see Darren tonight.
