“It was really nice, wasn’t it?”
“I’m on Twitter, you know,” Simon admits a bit shyly. “I didn’t know if I should follow you or not.”
I laugh. “But I gather you follow Esben? Of course you should follow me. You’re my father.”
There is a long silence, and I think both of us are slightly taken aback. While I may refer to Simon as my adoptive father when I speak about him to other people, I have never directly addressed him as my father.
“Yes, I am,” he finally says softly. “I am. So, I’ll follow you as soon as we hang up. And I’ll be sure to tweet reminders about calling home, eating your veggies, and getting plenty of rest.”
“Esben taught me how to block people,” I inform him with a giggle, “so you’d better be careful.”
“I will behave! I will behave!”
“Okay. I’ll see you online. Bye, Simon.”
“Bye, kiddo.”
I check Twitter, and, within only a few minutes, Simon has followed me. So, I follow him back and then go check out what exactly Simon tweets about. Gardening, cooking, lots of tweets to Bravo about various reality shows . . . then I see something from last week that stops my scrolling.
Simon has retweeted Esben’s video, and he also replied with his own short video. I click on it. Simon, dressed in a formal shirt and tie, is sitting at the kitchen table. “Hi, everyone,” he says nervously. “My name is Simon, and, uh . . . what makes me happy is . . .” He reaches for a piece of paper and holds it up. Allison, it says. “My daughter, Allison. I waited a long time for her to come into my life, and it was worth it. She,” he says, swallowing hard, “she lights up my life.” He sets down the paper and stops the video.
I poise my finger over the heart symbol below his video. It takes me a few seconds, but I tap it. Then I retweet his video and caption it with, How awesome is my father?
I text Simon. Would it be okay if we had Esben over for dinner during break?
He’s never texted back so quickly. Any night or every night.
Every night might be excessive, I reply.
I’m a very good cook, Simon points out. He may never want to leave.
I laugh. Fair enough.
Esben’s gravelly morning voice booms from my bedroom. “Where is my human pillow? Where are my clothes? Why am I alone in this bed? Do I smell coffee? Do I have a headache because I drank too much tequila or because someone hit me over the head while I was sleeping when I got frisky?”
His morning voice is even cuter than his fully awake voice. I go into my bedroom and stand on the mattress. “So, I take it you don’t want me to jump up and down?”
He groans. “Oh God, please don’t.” Then he moves his head a bit. “Although I could see up your robe if you did . . .”
I drop to sit. “We’d skip a step on the spectrum if that happened.”
He tugs me down to his chest and hugs me. “And I am quite enjoying the spectrum.”
I stay against him, enjoying the heat that emanates from his body and the way he holds me so firmly and yet so tenderly at the same time.
“Want coffee?” I murmur.
“In a minute. Let’s just stay like this for a little while.” He lifts the covers. “Don’t worry. I ate, like, forty mints I pulled out of my pants pocket because I don’t have a toothbrush here.”
“Thank you for your thoughtfulness.” Because it seems idiotic to keep my robe on after I didn’t have it on all of last night, I take it off and tuck myself under the sheets, and he rolls over so that he’s spooning me.
“How are you feeling?” I ask.
“A little rough, but I’ll be okay.” Esben runs a hand through my hair, and we lie together quietly for a while. “Especially with you here like this.”
As difficult as it was to see Esben so upset, I do feel that our relationship has better balance now that I have been able to do something for him. From the day we met, I have been the fragile one, the one leaning on him constantly. Now, I understand that I am capable of letting him lean on me. I’m stronger than I knew.
Later, I bring him a cup of coffee, then another, and I wait until he’s awake enough to talk.
“Esben?”
“Yeah, baby?”
“What happened to Kerry . . . it’s why you haven’t had sex yet. And why you’re so careful with me.”
“Partly, yes. Look . . . I know that what happened to her was rape, not sex. Two very, very different things. Drastically different.” He drinks a little more coffee and gathers his thoughts. “I may be dying for us to have sex, sure, but I am going to be very attentive about what we’re doing together. It’s easy for girls, especially, to feel pressure to move faster than they want, because they think the guy will leave otherwise. I’m not that guy.” He sets down his cup and puts an arm around me.
“I know that. I really do. You’ve been so good and made me so comfortable. What Kerry went through? It’s horrible, Esben. It’s horrible. But, as you said, what happened to her and what’s happening with us are two entirely different things. I’m asking you, very directly, for something. I’m asking you for intimacy.” I turn in to face him, and I place my hand over his and move it under my top, guiding him across my stomach so that his touch radiates over my skin.
Esben begins kissing my shoulder, and I know he’s smiling when he says, “You are comfortable, aren’t you?”
I inch his hand a little higher. “I am.” So much so that I push him back onto the bed and tease my hand up his chest. “I want you out of this shirt.”
“You do?” he asks hesitantly.
I begin to lift up the fabric. My breathing has picked up, and I want to stop talking now. “Waist up, okay?” I manage to say. “No fabric between us. Just you and me.”
Immediately, Esben rolls me onto my back, his hand now caressing my skin. “Yes,” he says with heat and promise. “Yes.”
I tug up on his shirt. Hard. “Take this off. I want to see you.”
So, he does. And, later, mine comes off.
And then, even later, when Esben’s bare chest is pressed against mine and when his mouth is still exploring my skin, he whispers to me. “Allison,” he says, “you’re wonderful. You know that? Everything about you is wonderful.”
I ease his hand to my underwear, and, before he can say anything, I nod. “Yes, I’m sure.”
Despite our move up the spectrum, we both manage to make it to class. Somehow.
CHAPTER 21