Chronicles of a Serial Dater - Book 4: A New Adult Romantic Comedy (5 page)

Before I continue, I have to clarify that his room had strange light. With one lamp on, it wasn’t very bright and the little light that I could see by was obscured by shadows. Great for seduction, I suppose, but not seeing.

Digging my thumbs down the muscle on each side of his spine, I slipped my way down to his lower back. Lower, lower. His groans intensified and as I pressed my knuckles into his flesh he said, “God, that feels so good.”

“Yeah, baby? You like that?” I purred as I traveled further down.

I rubbed the top of his ass with slow, rolling motions like I was kneading bread. My eyes were closed during most of this massage. Not that he wasn’t sexy in his own way, but my imagination was taking control. In my mind, the little moans of pleasure were coming from a guy named Dante. We weren’t in a six-story walk-up, but on a white beach in Greece. The breeze in my hair, sand between my toes…

My hands dipped lower, sweeping left and right. It was actually quite sensual, touching him without looking. It got the engine purring, so to speak. That is, until the smell hit me. At first it was a faint whiff, but grew in strength so quickly I couldn’t ignore it. He’d farted.
Ugh. Dante wouldn’t have done that,
I thought. I turned my head to the side, found solace in my own greasy scent, and waited for the air to clear.

My nose crinkled when I realized it just wasn’t going away. “Are you feeling okay?” I asked, giving him a chance to excuse himself to the bathroom.

“Yeah baby, that feels amazing.”

Yeah, not what I meant… baby.

Determined to push through despite the room reeking of fries and his large intestine, I kept going. Talia the People Pleaser. With my fantasy completely ruined, I stared off into the distance as I worked the muscles in his lower back. But the smell just wouldn’t fade! It was as if someone had opened a full diaper and left it front of a fan.

I looked down at his back for the first time since I’d begun the massage and started to tell him off for farting so much. “Okay, you really…” The words caught in my throat. At first I thought it was a play of the light… and then I hoped it was.
Does he have something in his… no. No. Definitely not.

My mind refused to acknowledge the obvious explanation, protecting me. I cycled through every excuse in the book. Maybe it was chocolate. Maybe I’d gotten some mud on my hands before I started and… but no. The smell hit me again and I gagged.

That’s shit. This man has literal shit stuck in his ass crack.
This thought zipped through my mind with a horrified, calm acceptance that’s usually reserved for near-death experiences.

A nugget of poo about the size of my thumb was smeared in his crack like semi-melted chocolate. Streaks flared and swirled from the center of his ass, painted on by yours truly. I immediately whipped my hands away with a little choked sound and gagged again when I saw they were covered with his feces. I jumped away from him and the bed like it’d caught fire.

Jay noticed my sudden shift in mood and turned to look at me. “What’s up? I rubbed your back for like, ten minutes longer,” he pouted. I couldn’t meet his eye without scowling in disgust.
Poo. In his crack. On me. Ew. Ew. Ew.

He bucked his hips and said, “Hey could you… it felt so good down there.”

“I… uh… I’m not feeling very well. I need to wash my hands,” I said, trying not to gag. How was I supposed to tell this guy he had shit smeared all over his back?

“No? My bathroom is just down the hall,” he replied, looking at me like I was about to puke. Which I was.

If his ass was that nasty, I didn’t want to see what his bathroom looked like. “No!” I shouted. “I mean, I’ll use the kitchen.”

I was honestly afraid I was going to throw up in his sink, which probably would’ve been an improvement. A stack of dishes speckled with green moldy spots towered above the edge. Glasses filled with cloudy, rank liquid cluttered the counter. I turned on the water with the heel of my hand and tried to concentrate on breathing through my mouth. The water sent a couple roaches scurrying from the sink but I didn’t scream. I was in panic mode.

Thankfully, he had a full bottle of dish soap which I poured all over my hands and arms. With scalding hot water, I scrubbed until all visible shit was gone and then I concentrated on picking it from my fingernails. Does that thought make you queasy? Yeah? How the hell do you think
I
felt?

And to add insult to injury, I noticed an open bottle of vegetable oil on the tiny cluttered counter. Like, the shit you cook chicken breast in. Except this looked like a health violation that’d get a professional kitchen shut down. The half-crumpled bottle was coated with a thick, black grime.
And he just used that on my body as massage oil…

“Everything okay?”

I needed to get the hell out of that apartment before I contracted the plague. Staring at my hands, I decided it was good enough as long as I went straight home and burned the first layer of skin from my body. That might make me feel clean again.

I couldn’t meet his eye as I snapped my bra behind my back. “Yeah, I’m good. I mean, no, I’m okay.” I made a face as I pulled my shirt back on. The sensation of the fabric on my oily skin was revolting.

“What’s going on?”

“I’m tired. I have work in the morning and…” I threw on the rest of my clothes, slid my feet into my flip-flops, and bolted for the door. “Nice meeting you.”

As I started back to the apartment, my feet slipping with every step, oil stains growing across my shirt, I blocked everything out but one thought.
I can’t even write about this because Anette will see it.

And it was that reason that finally brought the whole ridiculousness of my dating life into focus. At least the funny dates could be fuel for the funny fire, but now that my cover was blown there, it just felt… sad.

And this is my first walk of shame and I didn’t even get laid.

What is going on with my life? I don’t even recognize the person I’ve become. I’m out trying to spite-screw someone I’ve never met before because I’m fighting with Anette.

I hate fighting with her. We’ve never fought let alone when we’re living together. Maybe she’s right about Zach. Maybe we will screw things up, but that doesn’t mean she gets a say in it. It’s not like I have to ask her permission to mess around with him. He isn’t gonna catch feelings. It’s Zach we’re talking about here…

So, to sum it all up… I’m screwing a good friend because I can’t find any guys who aren’t secret psychopaths. I started a blog to vent about said psychopaths but I was stupid and shared it and now I can’t post anything personal just when it’s starting to get popular. I’m fighting with my roommate and I don’t know how we’re gonna get past it. Oh, and I’m crushing hard on a guy I can’t have and one of my favorite tops was just ruined with freakin’ vegetable oil. Faaaaantastic.

I dried off as best as I could, making a mental note to buy more body wash. I’d ended up using a huge chunk of the bottle just to get the slickness off my skin. At one point, I even considered running out to the kitchen and grabbing the dish soap. It worked on oil-soaked pelicans, right?

With a towel wrapped around my body, I plodded my way to my room. The front door swung open just as I walked past. Anette and a guy I didn’t recognize tumbled in, both a bit drunk and too loud. Anette’s face twisted the second she saw me, a mixture of anger and embarrassment contorting her features.

I couldn’t help my I-told-you-so look. Here she was doing exactly what I was talking about. Our eyes locked for a moment before she turned and guided her oblivious companion down the hall to her room.

I went to bed feeling vindicated, sad, and lost.

Anette and I carried on in silence for an entire week. We came and went, passing each other wordlessly like a couple of ghosts. I nearly cracked after the first few days but her sheer stubbornness would piss me off all over again. She had no reason to be that upset. She should apologize to
me
! I was the one who deserved to be pissed off. But it sucked to fight and I wanted peace again, but damn it why do I have to be the one to fix it!  And round and round we went…

Anyone who’s argued with their roommate knows the fight quickly turns into a battle over turf. If she’s in the living room watching TV, you can’t exactly sit on the sofa beside her. It becomes a strategic struggle to be the first to lay claim to the shared zones in the apartment. She’s in the kitchen, I order delivery. I’m in the bathroom, she skips her shower for the day. It’s exhausting.

At least I had a safe place to run to in the form of Zach’s apartment. I spent most of my time up there with him, only going back downstairs when I knew Anette was either at work or asleep. For nearly a week, we did nothing but hang out, screw, and play video games. It wasn’t until Thursday night Zach finally started asking questions about the fight.

I was reading through some notes Clint had sent me on my phone when Zach looked up from his game. “Not that I mind having you around and all, but when is this whole fight going to be over?”

“When she apologizes,” I replied without looking up.

“What did she do, anyway?”

I bit my lip as I thought of how much to tell him. I really didn’t want him finding out about the blog, even though I’d been forced to put it on hold. “She… it’s complicated.”

“And I’m too thick to understand?”

I dropped the phone to my chest and sighed. “No, I’m not saying that. It’s just…” Zach paused the game and met my eye. I knew I couldn’t hide out up here forever. “She knows about our arrangement.”

“Ah, so that’s why she’s been so weird,” he said putting the pieces together. After a moments’ thought he added, “So?”

“She doesn’t approve.”

“So…”

“Like it has anything to do with her.”

“Well, it kind of does,” he frowned. “I mean, we were keeping it from her for a reason.”

“Are you kidding me right now? You’re actually taking her side with this?”

He shrugged one shoulder. “No. I’m not taking any side, but I can see why she’d be upset.”

In a manipulative effort to get him on my side, I dropped another piece of the puzzle into place. “She thinks we can’t handle this whole friends with benefits thing and that we’re going to tear the group apart.”

“How would that even happen?” he frowned.

Smirking because I knew I’d gotten in, I added, “Because she thinks we’re gonna fall for each other or that one of us will fall for the other and wreck the friend dynamic.”