Pink Ice (12 page)

             
The way he gasped when I touched him made the hotline voice I made worthy. While licking my lips I undid the buttons on his shirt, removed it and went for his pants. He wasn’t moving, just watching me undressing him. He helped me to remove his slacks and I touched him again over his boxer briefs. With my free hand I took his right and put it over my breast. I waited until he started moving and I touched him in the exact same way he was touching me. The distraction of his kisses was a main part during sex, but that night he was just staring at me. When the interaction was starting to be too much for me I gasped. “Dylan, fuck me.” I had never said those words, ok, I’ve said them with other angry meaning, but if there would be a moment when they would be appropriate it was in that second.

             
“No doll, first night in our bed, I’m not fucking you. I’ll make love to you.” His lips crashed against mine. Finally, he removed my bra and went for my knickers, I was already pulling his boxer briefs down. His kisses went to my jaw, and just when he was entering me, he bit my neck. There was pain and pleasure in every spot of my body. “I told you I was going to bite you whenever I wanted to.” That stupid smirk was again on his mouth, but by then I couldn’t care less.

             
Opposite to his roughness, his pace was slow, gentle, soft, just as his tongue against my tongue. I knew it was not time to talk, but I was too curious. “When did we start making love instead of fucking?” I could hardly breathe, so that phrase came out in soft, low gasps.

             
“Since the first time, but it was too soon for you to accept it, doll.” Just to make me stop talking, he grabbed my hips and entered me harder, the pace becoming violent and crazy. The world stopped for a minute, this was the best moment, my world went black and the stars appeared, I screamed his name and just behind, he came inside me. I was thinking about how improper it would be to send my doctor a thank you note for the contraceptives that he prescribed for me since the accident. Feeling Blue Eyes exploding inside me was absolutely perfect. He kissed me hard while emptying himself and then crashed against me over the bed. “I was dying to take you in this bed.” Exhaustion took over us and I started to fall asleep over his chest with him inside me. “You are not going to put your underwear back on?”

             
His question was a little more incisive than I would have liked it to be. Yeah, my pathetic self-esteem always forced me to cover myself after sex. But I was too tired and way too comfortable to move. “What’s the point? You will rip it out in an hour or two, it’s safer on the floor.” He laughed and kissed me before putting both arms around me and went to sleep.

             
We woke up, and after eating Mrs. Danvers’ pancakes, we hurried to the ceremony. We were running late after some shower “activities”. I was no longer my –you are too fat for this town- size 6, but a more –you are almost acceptable- size 4; so my Bottega Veneta light pink dress looked a little big on me. Blue Eyes was looking at his finest, his pristine morning suit was the most perfect thing I had ever laid eyes on. It made me stare at him like a teenage girl the whole ride from home to the church.

             
I was lost in those blue eyes, while Dylan was on the phone, both of us standing by the top of the stairs, outside the church, when I saw Marc walking towards us. Soon I noticed that just behind Marc, Michelle was holding his hand. My eyes couldn’t believe what they were seeing.

             
The red bridesmaid’s dress Chelle was sporting, made more visible that her belly was completely swollen. Her face was rounder and her hand was strategically positioned over her stomach. She was pregnant, the kind of -I am about to explode- pregnant. My legs started shaking, my hands sweating, and soon Dylan was holding me. “Did you know?”

             
He whispered to my ear. “Do you think I wouldn’t have told you? I can’t believe they didn’t tell us.”

             
Michelle was staring at me with dreadful eyes, she knew she was in big trouble. But to her surprise, I just opened my arms and she ran to me. I held my best friend, even when her massive belly was between us. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

             
She started sobbing like a little child. “Katie, I wanted to tell you in person and then you got in that car crash! I am so sorry baby, please, please tell me you forgive me!” Even when I didn’t think it was possible, pregnant hormones made my best friend a little more dramatic than usual, which meant ultra-mega-huge-drama queen.

             
“Don’t cry Chelle. How long?” She looked super pregnant, this was not a sudden event; in fact it seemed as if she was going to deliver during the ceremony. But, then, I was not thaaaat surprised, in fact the only reason this didn’t happen earlier, was because Sixteen and Pregnant didn’t exist while we were sixteen.

             
“I am six months. But before you get angry I learned about it when I was three, and then I wanted to wait until I could see you, and then you had the accident, and I thought it would be better to wait to tell you in person.” She was rambling, trying to spit out the facts and avoid conflict.

             
I tried to make my voice soft to avoid attracting curious stares to us. “How do you feel about this darling?” Suddenly, calling her “bitch” seemed a little inappropriate.

             
“The happiest I’ve ever been Katie!” She was, she had what she always wanted, love, a family, someone to share the amazing person my best friend was. 

             
In a completely uncharacteristically fashion, I took her in my arms and hugged her as I had never hugged her before. “I love you and I am crazy happy for you and Marc.” I wiped one of her tears. “Don’t get used to this, since this is the first and last time I hug you like this. And if you tell Kevin that I softened a little because of a baby, I’ll tell your parents you don’t know who the daddy is.” She laughed between sobs.

             
Marc walked to me, it appeared as if both men were trying to remain distant from the war that they were expecting. “Hey auntie Kate!”
Oh God, this kid is still the cheesiest man I know, and now he’s going to be a parent!
I hugged Marc, while Dylan hugged Michelle. Spencer walked to us, noticing Michelle’s belly and went to grabbed both Michelle and Marc at the same time.

             
“Congratulations guys! I can’t believe this!” Apparently Marc kept Michelle hidden in a basement. No one knew about this, and it shocked me how I had been so immersed in my problems that I didn’t suspect something was weird with my best friend. “Guys I need you to come with me, we are about to start.” Spencer took them with him and I entered the church by myself, while they started taking their places to begin.

             
I had always hated weddings. Starting with the dreadful, ‘You don’t need an extra ticket, right? Because I would really use your plus one!’ to the proper conduct of ‘Sit straight, eat properly, say hello to old, boring people, engage in conversation with lame familiars, and be in your best behavior to catch some guy’s attention’, to my own personal hell, ‘You better fight for the bouquet, since you are the one who needs it the most’. But even in the middle of that torture, there was something that had always taken my breath away, the groom’s face when he sees the bride for the first time.

             
I didn’t pay attention to Dylan entering with Chelsea’s sister, or Marc and Michelle showing of their new state. My eyes were glued to Spencer’s face. And when the moment came, he delivered as expected, his eyes got all watery, his jaw clenched and just a tiny smile spread on his face, that reaction could only be classified as true love. Chelsea was a lucky girl.

             
The ceremony was perfect, well, almost, the only awkward moment being when during the vows Dylan stared at me in a creepy way. Well, a hot-creepy way. He gauged all my reactions to the words, and made me more nervous than ever. Who the hell knew where that came from, but I decided to play along so I just winked at him.

             
“We are leaving now!” Just as the ceremony finished, Michelle came to me with Marc and Dylan behind. “I can’t stand this dress any longer and I need to put myself to bed! This”, she pointed to her massive belly, “is killing me!” Marc came behind her and took her weight over him, second display of love that I witnessed in the day.

             
“You can’t leave me! Please!” Without Michelle, this would be a boring and long wedding. People are overemotional during this kind of event, and I was not willing to endure it.

             
“I have to darling, but I am so happy to see you Katie! When are you going back to New York?”

             
“I know, M. I’ll leave tonight.” I was supposed to stay until Sunday, but I have a thousand things to do.

             
“What?” Dylan got closer to me with murderous eyes and ignored Marc who was trying to distract him.

             
I removed my arm from his approach. “I have to work, you know this.” I made myself taller, stood to my full length and waited for his next bitchy comment.

             
“We really have to go, so you better behave!” Michelle and Marc hugged us goodbye and Dylan dragged me to the car without a word. We could barely go more than 24 hours without a stupid argument.

             
We hated each other during the ride, and as was socially expected, we acted as naturally as we could when we arrived to the party. We were pretty cynical, but lots of the vices of our surroundings stuck on us. Not making a scene during a wedding, was kind of a law for us. We could stab each other later.

             
Dylan didn’t direct a word to me for the first 30 minutes of the reception. All that time a parade of women came to our table. All of them trying to catch Berkeley’s attention, who acted as polite as possible. A light touch on his arm, a wink and even a kiss on his cheek, were part of the display, not one of them noticed me, or gave any kind of importance.

             
I decided not to react, I was not going to give him the satisfaction. While I was boring myself to death, I noticed that this place wasn’t that different from home. All the girls had nose jobs since high school and got their first liposuctions for their 25
th
birthday. They were what was expected, perfect, and they deserved perfect men, men like Dylan.

             
My mental analysis was interrupted by Blue Eyes’ hand on my chin pulling my eyes to his. “No.”

             
“What?”

             
“The answer to everything you are thinking is no. No, they are not better than you. No, they are not what I want. No…well…that would be some, I have just slept with some of them.”

             
I fucking hated how he could read my mind so easily, but we had only a few hours before I had to fly to New York to bitch about it. “Oh God! You give yourself too much importance thinking you have all my thoughts. Since I was thinking about the menu and since you appear to know all the answers, can you enlighten me?”

             
“Unless you are part of that menu, I don’t give a damn.”

             
Interrupting our stare duel, the wedding coordinator came to Dylan. “Mr. Berkeley, after the first dance of Mr. and Mrs. Bradley, they want the Best Man and the Maid of Honor to join them.” Chelsea’s sister, Maya’s mother, had been Dylan’s partner during the ceremony.

             
“Sorry but I’m sure Marianne, will feel more comfortable dancing with her husband. And I will definitely feel better dancing with my girlfriend.” He never broke eye contact during his conversation with the poor nice lady who had her plans spoiled. He put a hand over my knee in a popular move well known as “branding”. He wanted to make it a little more obvious,
as if it wasn’t,
that I was the so called “girlfriend”.

             
She was blushing, visibly uncomfortable with our exchange. “Ok Mr. Berkeley, I’ll tell Marianne about the change of plans.” She was really nervous, but she never had a chance with this hot jerk.

             
“You didn’t have to do that Berkeley.”

             
He smiled, that -I will rip your knickers- smile. “I just want to dance with you doll.” And in a world like ours, this man always got what he wanted. Just after the first dance of the newlyweds, we hit the dance floor to the sound of ‘Return to Me’ by Dean Martin. 

             
You would think that being an only child would make you enjoy being the center of attention. But being Berkeley’s date was like being under a fucking microscope. The hands of Blue Eyes resting on my hips, almost erased the uncomfortable feeling of being scrutinized by Chicago’s society, almost. All the girls in the room were judging how I was not good enough to deserve Berkeley, I could feel them staring.

             
“You are perfect.” The voice of my hot dance buddy interrupted my thoughts.

             
“Trying to get lucky Berkeley? I am not sure if I want to sleep with a slut who has slept with half of the room.”