to be sick. He looked even tanner than I remembered, which was only highlighted by a skintight white T-shirt, flowy white pants, and some of the straightest, brightest teeth I’ve ever seen in a British mouth. He was like Enrique in The Tycoon’s Virgin Bride, his looks utterly begging to be on a dust jacket.
‘Uh, yeah, I guess I was. This, uh, has never really happened to me before. I’m afraid I don’t even remember your name.’
He seemed to remember that I was an actual person and not a bed adornment, and sat down next to me on the pillow.
‘I’m Philip. Philip Weston. And don’t worry about it – I only brought you back here because I couldn’t get two taxis and didn’t want to maneuver to the East Side. Nothing happened. I’m not some rapist. I’m an attorney, actually,’ he said with not a little pride in a thick, upper-crust English accent.
‘Oh, well, thanks so much. I really didn’t think I drank that much, but I don’t remember anything after dancing with you.’
‘Yes, well, it happens. Stressful fucking morning so far, don’t you think? I loathe having my post-yoga calm shattered by rubbish like this.’
‘Yeah.’ He didn’t just wake up in a stranger’s bed, but I wasn’t feeling great about my arguing position.
‘My housekeeper was washing my Pratesi sheets in scalding-hot water. I mean, what bloody good are they if you have to double-check every move they make? Can you imagine what a disaster it would’ve been if I hadn’t spotted it?’
Gay. He was definitely gay. He wasn’t Enrique, but Enrique’s fey friend Emilio. This was a tremendous relief.
‘What would have happened, exactly?’ I washed my own sheets in hot water and dried them on high because it seemed like the best way to make them softer faster. But then again, I’d bought them at Macy’s and admittedly didn’t spend all that much time thinking about it.
‘What would have happened? Are you serious?’ He strode across the room and spritzed some Helmut Lang cologne on his neck. ‘She would’ve burned out the thread count, that’s what! Those sheets cost twenty-eight hundred pounds for a king set, and she would have destroyed them!’ He put the bottle down and began patting what I hoped was aftershave but was more likely moisturizer into his golden skin. I did a quick calculation: four thousand dollars.
‘Oh. I guess I didn’t understand. I, uh, I didn’t know sheets could be that expensive. But I’m sure if I paid that much for them, I’d be concerned, too.’
‘Yes, well, I’m sorry you had to endure all that.’ He pulled the T-shirt over his head to reveal a completely bare, perfectly sculpted chest. It was almost a shame he was gay, considering just how good-looking he was. He closed the bathroom door briefly and turned the shower on, and then a few minutes later he emerged wearing only a towel. Pulling a dress shirt and suit from the oak-paneled walk-in closet, he handed me my clothes in a neatly folded pile and discreetly left the room while I stripped.
‘Will you be all right getting home?’ Philip called from what sounded like a million miles away. ‘I must be off to work. Early meeting.’
Work. Jesus Christ, I’d completely and entirely forgotten that I was currently employed, but a quick check of the bedside clock reassured me that it was only a little after seven. He’d already been to yoga and back, and we couldn’t have possibly gotten home before three in the morning. I had a brief but intense flashback to the one and only time I’d gone to yoga. I’d been fumbling through my first class for thirty minutes when the teacher had announced thirty seconds into our current pose – the half-moon pose, to be precise – that it was equivalent to eight hours of sleep. I’d accidentally snorted and she’d asked me if there was a problem. Luckily I’d been able to restrain myself from asking what was really on my mind: namely, why had no one before enlightened us to the miracle of the half-moon pose? Why, for all these centuries, have humans wasted a third of their lifetimes sleeping when they could’ve just bent at the waist for one half of one minute? Instead, I mumbled something about it being a ‘really cool concept’ and sneaked out when she wasn’t looking.
Philip’s hallway was longer than the entire length of my apartment, and I had to follow the sound of his voice to find the right room. Colorful abstracts hung on the walls and the dark-stained wood floors – real wood, not New York parquet – highlighted the stark, metal-frame furniture. The entire place looked like a Ligne Roset floor sample, as though it had been plucked directly from the showroom and put back together in this guy’s apartment. I counted a total of three full bathrooms, two bedrooms, a living room, and a study (complete with floor-to-ceiling built-in bookcases, two Mac G4 computers, and a wine rack) before I found him leaning against his granite counter-top, feeding blood oranges into a high-tech juicer. I didn’t even own a can opener.
‘You do yoga? I don’t know any guys who do yoga.’ Any straight guys, that is, I thought to myself.
‘Of course. It’s smashing strength training, and I love how it clears your mind as well. Very American, I suppose, but worthwhile nonetheless. You should try it with me.’ And before I knew what was happening, he lifted me up on the counter, pushed my knees apart so he could come closer, and began kissing my neck.
Instinctively, I jumped off the counter, which resulted only in my pushing even farther into him.
‘I thought, well, um, aren’t you …’
Two clear green eyes stared back at me, waiting.
‘It’s just that, uh, considering last night and the whole, you know, Pratesi thing and the yoga class …’
Still waiting. No help here.
‘Aren’t you gay?’ I held my breath, hoping he wasn’t still in the closet or, worse, out but self-hating.
‘Gay?’
‘Yeah, as in, liking guys.’
‘Are you serious?’
‘Well, I don’t know, it just seemed—’
‘Gay? You think I’m a homosexual?’
I felt like I was roaming around on the set of some sort of reality TV show where everyone was in on the secret but me. Clues, so many clues, but no real information. I was trying to piece it all together as quickly as possible, but nothing was quite working out.
‘Well, of course, I don’t know you at all. It’s just that, well, you dress so nicely and seem to care a lot about your apartment and, uh, you have Helmut Lang cologne. My friend Michael wouldn’t even know who Helmut Lang is …’
He flashed those shiny teeth once more and tousled my hair like one would a toddler’s. ‘Perhaps you’re just spending time with the wrong blokes? I assure you, I’m very, very straight. I’ve just learned to appreciate the finer things. Come now, there’s time to give you a lift home if we hurry.’ He shrugged on a cashmere sweater and grabbed his keys.
We didn’t say anything at all in the elevator ride to the lobby, but darling Philip did manage to pin me against the wall and nibble on my lips, which somehow felt utterly disgusting and heart-stoppingly amazing all at once.
‘Mmm, you’re delicious. Come here, let me taste you one last time.’ But before he could once again use my face as his own personal Chupa pop, the doors swept open and two uniformed doormen turned
