Chapter 45: Celebration

Thursday was the last day of classes for the fall term. Cheryl got up and showered with me, after I had shaved, then made coffee while I got dressed. I had class before she did, so she kissed me goodbye at the apartment door, and I walked to school by myself. The day flew by, as last days often do, and after my last class ended, I met up with Cheryl to walk home. Megan wasn’t with Cheryl - she’d gone to study for an exam with a classmate. We walked home, hand in hand, and then Cheryl told me to pick out some clothes while she showered. When she came out of the bathroom, she went into Megan’s room to get dressed, telling me to get cleaned up and meet her in the livingroom in half an hour.

I was ready before Cheryl was, so I sat down on the couch and caught up on some news on my phone. In the end, she came out so quietly that I almost didn’t hear her until she was right in front of me.

She looked gorgeous, as always. She was wearing a classic little black dress, one that looked vaguely familiar (she has a couple of them), but one that I couldn’t quite place. This particular one was shorter than some, reaching maybe only a third of the way down her thighs. She’d completed the outfit with black stockings, and added a pair of black leather boots that reached almost to her knees. She did a slow twirl in front of me.

“Do I look ok?” she asked, when she was facing me again.

“Ok? Hell, no. You’re way beyond ok. Stunning is a better adjective.”

She came closer and kissed me.

“You say the sweetest things, John. Really, you do.”

“So where are we going for dinner?” I asked, as she pulled a heavy coat out of the closet near the door.

“I felt like something light and different. Thai?”

“Fine with me,” I said, grabbing my coat as well.

We went to this great little place that is near Cheryl and Megan’s apartment. I hadn’t been there in ages, but had always loved the food. We ordered, and got a bottle of chardonnay to share. When the server had filled our glasses and retreated, Cheryl raised hers and waited for me to do the same.

“What are we celebrating?” I asked.

She looked at me, a grin on her face and a twinkle in her eyes. “You don’t know, do you?”

I tried to think, but came up blank. I shook my head. “Sorry, I really don’t.”

“Men,” she said, rolling her eyes, though her tone indicated that she wasn’t really upset. “You’re all the same. And here I was thinking you were different from the rest.” She clinked her glass against mine, took a sip, then set it down on the table. “It’s our anniversary. Two months ago today you brought me to this very restaurant on our first date. That’s why I wore this dress. Two months ago last night, you stripped it off me when you put me into your bed. Remember? Or did seeing me naked for the first time make no impression on you at all?”

That was it. I knew that dress looked familiar, but couldn’t place it. I hadn’t seen it after that night - she’d gotten it cleaned, and hadn’t worn it since.

“Oh, Cheryl,” I apologized. “I’m so sorry. Of course - it’s December 4. How could I have forgotten?”

She smiled. My God, this woman has a dazzling smile.

“It’s ok. I wasn’t trying to make you feel bad. Forgetting our two-month anniversary isn’t a capital offence. And you’ve been so busy that it’s no wonder you didn’t remember it was today.”

“You remembered, though. And you’ve been as busy as I have.”

“Yeah, I guess so. But ... well, that’s why I wanted us to come out tonight, just us. Because I wanted to tell you...”

Her voice trailed off, and she took another mouthful of wine before continuing.

“John, these past two months have been awesome. I love being with you. And yes, it’s been crazy busy - but in a good way. I’ve done more school work this term than ever before. And it’s paid off. Unless I crash and burn in the next 10 days, I’m on track for my best marks ever. I haven’t gotten drunk as much. I’ve eaten better. I’ve gotten more exercise - and no, not just in bed. And I also think I’ve been a nicer person. And that’s all because of you. You make me ... you make me want to be the best me I can be. Does that make sense? I don’t feel like I’m saying what I mean.”

I nodded.

“I know how you feel,” I began. “You make me a better person, too.”

She shook her head.

“You were a good person before I met you,” she said. “I wasn’t. Let’s be honest. You were the kind of guy who’d help a person who was struggling in class. And when that person was nasty to you, after all you did for her, you helped her again, at the moment she most needed it. You worked hard. You didn’t spend your time getting laid or getting drunk ... or getting laid while you were drunk. You’ve changed my life. I don’t think I’ve done anything close to that for you.”

“Now hang on a minute,” I insisted. “You’ve changed my life, too. I used to just sit in my apartment a lot of the time, alone. You’ve helped me become more social. I was nervous around girls, and you’ve helped me get over that.”

Cheryl snorted. “You were nervous around girls because of how girls - like me, for example - treated you. I hardly win any points for helping to build your self-esteem back up, when I was the one who tore it down in the first place.”

“Ok, so I’ll grant you that. You were a bitch to me. But I wasn’t exactly a saint. Remember? I spent months - almost a year - fantasizing about taking my revenge on you. I wanted to break you. And for what? Because you’d turned down a date with me. I dreamed of raping you. Hurting you. And even that night I found you outside the Thistle, I can’t promise you that my intentions were initially entirely noble. I’m glad, as it turned out, that I picked you up and carried you home. But I’ve asked myself over and over why I took you to my place. I justified it, at the time, by telling myself that I didn’t know where you lived. I knew you’d have ID in your purse that would have your address on it. But I decided that to look in your purse would be an invasion of your privacy. So I didn’t do it. I took you home to my place instead.”

“And you were right,” she said. “Digging through my purse would have been an invasion of my privacy.”

I laughed. “Right. And putting you in my bed and stripping you naked wasn’t?”

“But you had to do that. I was covered in puke.”

“Yeah. You were. But I could have taken you to your place and let Megan deal with it.”

“Except that you didn’t know Megan even existed. Say you dug through my purse and found my address and my keys. You carried me to my place instead of yours. What if I lived alone? Or if my roommate was out? You’d have been in the same position you were in at your place. You wouldn’t have just dropped me, covered in puke, on the floor of my apartment. And what would you have done when you left? You wouldn’t have locked the door and kept my keys. So what would you have done? Left me passed out on the floor of an unlocked apartment, so anyone could come in and find me?”

“Alright, so in hindsight, what I did was ok. I’ll give you that. But I’m just saying ... I might not have done it for the right reasons. And even helping you with that history class ... did I do that to be nice, or did I do that to score points with a smoking hot girl?”

“Right. Now you’re just full of shit,” she laughed. “I know you well enough to call you out on that one. You’d have helped me if I needed it, even if I’d had greasy, stringy hair, a pockmarked, zit-covered face, a totally flat chest, and a bony ass like a guy’s.”

“Hey!” I protested. “I thought you liked my ass!”

“I do,” she admitted. “Especially in those new jeans. But you’re changing the subject.”

“Why don’t we just agree that each of us is good for the other one, and leave it at that?”

She looked doubtful.

“Seriously, Cheryl. I’m so happy with you. And yes, you make me a better person. I believe you when you say I’m good for you. So why don’t you believe me when I say that you’re also good for me?”

“Alright, when you put it like that...”

“I love you, Cheryl.”

“And I love you, John.”

Our food arrived just at that moment. It was deliciously light, and different from what we’d been eating the past few days. We ate, and finished off the wine, laughing about our first date as we did so.

“I was so nervous that night,” she admitted.

“You were nervous? What did you have to be nervous about?”

“I wanted to impress you. I knew that I’d screwed up, and that I’d lost one chance to be with you. I didn’t want to screw up the second chance, because I doubted you’d give me a third one. And I was still a tad hung over, as well. Why? Were you nervous, too?”

“Shit, yes! My knees were knocking together. We were sitting at that table over there. My first real date with a girl. And you were in that little blue skirt with the pleats, and that sweater was so tight across your chest. I was trying to concentrate on talking, but I couldn’t get my mind off the memory of what your breasts looked like. And I was trying to figure out what to do after dinner. I didn’t want to make you think ... that I expected anything.”

“You mean, you didn’t expect me to invite myself back to your place so that I could have my way with you?”

I shook my head. “No. But I’m glad you did. I mean, I’m glad you had a plan, because I didn’t. It ... it took the pressure off me, to have you take the lead.”

“I’m so glad you didn’t think I was being too ... aggressive,” she said. “I was worried that I was moving too fast. I didn’t want to scare you off. But I also wanted to show you that I was ... interested. I didn’t want to let you get away, again.”

“You showed interest, that’s for sure.”

She laughed. “So when we were here, eating dinner and getting to know each other, you weren’t thinking that you’d be fucking me before the night ended?”

“No! Not at all. I mean, sure, I’d imagined fucking you hundreds of times. But that night - no. I didn’t think that was going to happen. I mean, I hoped that we’d end up dating, and I’d get into your panties eventually. But I didn’t expect it to happen that night. Remember, I’d never done anything like that, with anyone, before you.”

“See, that’s where we were different. I knew, during supper, that you were going to get lucky that night. And you know what?” She lowered her voice, just a bit. “You’re going to get lucky tonight, too. Cause you’re my man, and I want to show you how much I love you. And besides, my period will start tomorrow, so you won’t be getting any pussy for a few days after tonight. So, what do you say?”

I didn’t answer her. Instead, I put down my chopsticks, and waved for the waitress. When she looked my way, I said, in a loud voice, “Can I get the bill, please?”

I thought Cheryl was going to choke. She was actually laughing that hard.

The waitress did bring our bill over, and I gave her my credit card, even though we still had a few bites of dinner left to finish off. But we didn’t waste any time, and soon we were back out on the street outside the restaurant.

“My place or yours?” I asked her.

“Yours. Back to the scene of the crime, so to speak.”

We strolled, hand in hand, through the cold December night. The route from the restaurant to my place took us past the theatre I had been to with the History Club that fateful night, then past the Thistle. Cheryl and I had walked the route from the Thistle to my apartment many times over the past two months. But she paused to kiss me out front.

“Do you want to carry me to your apartment, just to make the re-creation of that night more authentic?”

I shook my head, and moved in to kiss her again. Cheryl pulled away.

“Are you saying I’m too fat to carry now?”

“Nope,” I grinned. “Not at all. But if I carry you home, I’ll be too tired for sex.”