The Dark Side of the Romantic Comedy Ch. 02

When Jason initially called, Gail was cautious and more than a little reticent, surprised, really, that Jason had called her. She vaguely remembered talking with her brother about Jason several months before, but now, confronted with the reality of essentially being asked out by a total stranger, she had developed cold feet and demurred and Jason, who was somewhat relieved he wouldn't have to try and make an impression on a total stranger, took it in stride. But a couple of days later, Gail called back and apologized for her initial refusal, explaining her initial reluctance and that, after talking to her brother again, had changed her mind about going out. They talked for a few minutes on the phone, joking about how uncomfortable blind dates could be, and planned a low pressure lunch date later in the week.

They met at a small, downtown café that specialized in soups and salads. The conversation was awkward at first, passing through the typical introductory comments, job and education descriptions, general information about family life and perfunctory comments about their preferences in chowders and bisques.

Gradually, though, the conversation became easier, more relaxed and spontaneous as they exchanged stories, talked about interests and laughed. When they finished eating and Jason submitted his credit card, he looked at his watch and was stunned to see that he was late over 30 minutes late for his planned return to the office. He rushed through the payment and walked Gail out to the sidewalk where he hailed her a cab before getting his own.

*****

Back at his office, he muddled through the afternoon work absentmindedly, musing about his afternoon lunch with Gail. In keeping with his plan not to seem needy or overanxious with any of the girls he'd had a good time with, Jason had decided to wait a couple of days before contacting Gail again. Within a few hours, he decided he wanted to ask her out to a play that was coming to town in a couple of weeks and thought he'd better call her the next day to give her a chance to reserve the date. By late afternoon, he amended that plan to call her later that night, in order to invite her for dinner that weekend. In the end, he placed the call before he even left work, asking her out for the next night.

She said yes.

They ate at a high end steakhouse with plans to go to a movie, but time got away from them as they talked throughout dinner and they missed the opening of the movie. So they lingered at the table, taking over an hour to consume a dessert they shared and then continuing for quite some time after the check had been processed, until their waiter began dropping gentle hints, and then, finally, a more forceful suggestion that they take their conversation elsewhere if they were done eating as the restaurant could use the table. Gail was mortified, but Jason only laughed and, instead of ending their evening, suggested they move the date to a nearby bar.

They continued to talk about everything and anything from clothing preferences, to favorite sports teams, to travel dreams. They spoke earnestly about important things, lightly about things that were humorous and with great interest when disclosing any little fact about themselves.

Somehow the conversation turned toward the excessive lifestyles of the rich and famous. Jason was making a point about how money and fame likely served to make the problems of associated with poor life style choices worse, listing a few prominent people. When he mentioned Lindsay Lohan, Gail snorted and rolled her eyes in disgust.

"God...Lindsay Lohan...how I loathe her." She said, nearly spitting out the words.

Jason raised his eyebrows and cocked his head in puzzlement.

"Why does she bug you so much? I mean, I know she's out of control and she's beaten herself up, but how is she any different than the others?"

Gail took a deep breath in, bit her lip and looked up at the ceiling before returning her gaze to Jason.

"It's not her drug use or anything. In fact, I don't care about that at all. It's just that she was in a Disney movie that I absolutely hate and somehow I can't help but blame her personally for it."

"Wait...you hate her because she was in a movie you didn't like?"

Gail scrunched her eyes and wrinkled her nose as if the conversation had taken on a distinctly distasteful turn. "No, it's...well...sort of...I mean I really, really hated the movie."

Jason cocked his head to the side, contemplating Gail for a moment.

"Uh...seriously...you've got to explain this to me a little. I mean, how could a movie, a Disney movie at that, be all that bad?"

Gail let out her breath in a long controlled sigh, and leaned forward to rest her cheek in her hand with her elbow resting on the table. "You're going to make me talk about it, aren't you?" She smiled.

"Yes." He said with half a laugh. "Yes, I think I am."

Gail took another deep breath in and let it out slowly before talking again.

"OK. Well, the movie is a remake. "The Parent Trap". The original was with Haley Mills. You know the story?"

"Yeah, sure. I think so. Twin girls find out they're sisters and try and get their Mom and Dad back together again. Right?"

"Well...yeah...and the horrible, horrible things they did to the girl that was going to marry their Dad."

Jason raised his eyebrows and Gail sat back before continuing, chewing her lip as if to contemplate what to say next. She shifted uncomfortably in her sit and gave Jason an embarrassed smile.

"Look, everyone loved that movie because they all wanted the parents to get together and nobody liked the girl...that platinum blonde bitch that he was engaged to, so everything they did to her was supposed to be really funny. But...but..."

"But?"

"But...here's' the deal. I really, really relate to the girl. She'd just fallen in love with the guy and was trying to marry him and those girls play all those horrible tricks on her to break her up with her Dad. Now, look, I know the movie makes her out to be a gold digging bitch, but she was just..."

"Wait, so why do you care?"

"You really don't know, do you?" Gail's face carried an unmitigated look of surprise and Jason recognized he was missing something significant about her past.

He shrugged, shook his head and smile while he quietly answered her question. "No. No idea at all."

Gail pressed her lips together and passed a hand through her hair, pausing to rub the back of her scalp before continuing.

"I guess I thought you knew about my history. I thought maybe Brian or my brother told you and that they were trying to fix me up with a nice guy or something."

"Honestly Gail, I have no idea what you are talking about."

"Well, you at least know about my being with Trevor, right? I mean I've mentioned him a couple of times."

"Well, sure." Jason nodded his head. "I got the impression you were pretty serious."

"Well, yeah, we were." Gail paused to clear her throat. "Anyway, he was an older guy, I think I might have mentioned that, in his early 40s. An architect. Divorced. So, we started dating and got very serious and we were talking about marriage. But...but he had a daughter, Amy. She was 14 at the time and she really had it in for me."

"Why?"

"She wanted her parents to get back together pretty bad. The divorce had been hard on her and I guess she never really accepted the fact that the split was permanent. So, when Trevor and I got serious I think she figured that if she got in the way of our relationship, her Mom and Dad might still have a chance."

"So she threw a tantrum?"

Gail took a sip of her drink and shook her head, but a small, embarrassed smile continued to play across her lips.

"No. She did that Parent Trap thing. A lot of pranks. Designed to make me look bad or bitchy."

"Pranks?"

"Yea."

Jason looked at Gail expectantly

"Uh oh, now you're going to make me tell you about the pranks, aren't you?"

Jason was smiling openly as he nodded his head and she gave a short, snorting laugh before shaking her head as though she couldn't believe what she was about to do.

"All right then, buckle up." She took in a deep breath and let it out slowly before starting her story.

"The first prank, that I know of, was the night I was going to meet his business partners. I'd lost my favorite perfume and Amy came running out with it just as Trevor and I were pulling out of the driveway. Well, I didn't get around to putting it on until just before we got to the restaurant, but it turned out that she'd put some horrible smelling thing...like raw sewage...in the perfume. I didn't...didn't even think it was me until Trevor sniffed my neck and nearly gagged just as we entered the restaurant. I wanted to go home and clean up, but it was too late so I went to the restroom and washed up as much as I could, but I still think I stunk to high heaven. It was awful. Every time someone got anywhere near me, they got a look like they'd just swallowed some curdled milk."

"Oh my God, that's horrible." Jason said, barely suppressing a laugh.

"Uh huh. I can just feel the empathy." She said with a sarcastic smile. "But that was just the start. Before our next big date, she washed my underwear in the same shit and put some of it in my douche. She also substituted some garlic capsules into my vitamins, which resulted in atrociously bad breath, as you can guess. I told Trevor what she'd done, but he didn't say much. I honestly began to wonder if he thought I just smelled bad."

Jason leaned forward and made a great show of inhaling deeply through his nose. "Well, I'm not picking anything up right now, but it I'll take another sniff outside just in case the odors in here are masking it."

"Funny." She said with a fake scowl that melted into a smile before resuming her story.

"But then, another time, she somehow got some of that fly pheromone and got it on me before a picnic with some of our friends. It wasn't long before I was crawling with the little black bastards. You can imagine what a great impression I made as the fly lady. I was livid and asked Trevor to talk to Amy, but he just sort of let it go."

"And that killed the relationship?"

"Close, but not quite. It stressed me out, made me a little paranoid. And, of course, made it impossible to trust Amy or get to be her friend at all. So, it made things a lot harder. But the final straw came when we held this big dinner party, invited his mom and dad and a few of his important clients. Well, she managed to get some sedative, I think it might have been Ativan or something, and got it in my wine. By the time dinner was half over; I was slurring my words and could barely keep my eyes open. By the end of dinner, I was totally passed out, head first in my chicken. Somehow Amy managed to get the back of my dress wet, so it looked like I'd peed myself when Trevor and another guy essentially picked me up and shuffled off into the bedroom."

"You're shitting me." Jason said incredulously.

"Not at all. The God's honest truth. So we had a fight and he told me how embarrassed he was with my behavior and only got more upset when I blamed Amy. I couldn't take the lack of support and he couldn't take the conflict, so we broke up." Gail paused and then laughed. "Right out of Disney, huh?"

"Sort of a sick, twisted, Disney, maybe."

"Well, anyway, that's my sad tale of woe." She paused and cocked her head to the side, examining Jason with a curious smile. "How about yours?" She probed gently.

Jason sat back

"Well," he started. "Mine's not Disney, but it is sort of a movie. More like the Runaway Bride I guess."

"Ah...she got cold feet at the last minute?"

"No...more like she got the hots for an old flame."

"Just before you were going to get married?"

"No. Right at the wedding. I was in my tux, all ready to go, humming the wedding march. Didn't think anything could go wrong and she walks in, in her wedding dress, and tells me it's over. Tells me that she loves this other guy and that we aren't getting married."

"God, that's horrible."

"Yeah, it was." Jason's incongruous smile broadened slightly. "I've told you about my Dad, how he's pretty rough around the edges. Well, he just about started a rumble in the church. Called her a bitch, shouted at all the guests. It was chaos."

"What did you do?"

"What could I do? I just walked out like some sort of a zombie." He laughed briefly. "I was a mess, honestly. Just a mess. I think...I think this is the first time I've laughed while telling the story, or even while thinking about it. It just feels so...so far away all now. Almost like it happened to somebody else."

"Well, time does that."

"Time? Sure that helps. But mostly I think you're the difference."

They left the bar holding hands, quietly walking along the sidewalk to the restaurant parking lot and to the car, Jason opening the door and helping Gail in. He slid into the driver's side and fiddled awkwardly with his seat-belt and the ignition before turning to Gail nervously.

"I...I don't want to seem forward at all, but I've really had a good time tonight and I was wondering if, maybe...you'd like to spend some more time together. Not much is open right now, but we could go to my apartment. It's not all that far from here."

Gail looked away and gazed out the window without saying anything, Jason's invitation pressing down on the atmosphere like a gigantic, disconcerting weight. After a few moments, Jason broke the silence stiffly.

"Look, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable. We haven't known each other long, I know that. So, again, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."

While he was speaking, Gail turned to face Jason and stared him in the eyes, a direct, searching look. "Yes." She said simply, interrupting his apology abruptly.

"Yes?"

"Yes, we haven't known each other long and, yes I would like to go back to your apartment."

*****

Fifteen minutes later, Jason stood in front of his apartment door and opened it widely for Gail, blandly announcing "here it is", wishing he had something with a bit more wit to offer.

She entered the apartment slowly, and stopped in the entryway, letting Jason take her coat as he passed her by.

"Come in and sit down on the couch if you'd like."

She took two small steps forward and hesitated, her head swiveling slowly as she took in the apartment, giving off an air of cautious uncertainty.

Jason continued. "Well, the kitchen is obviously right there and I can get you a drink or something if you'd like and the bathroom is right down the hall there if you want to use it." He gestured toward the bathroom, anxiously waiting for a response from Gail who continued to hold her position just outside the living room, still looking around the apartment, from the kitchen to the living room to the hallway and finally back to Jason, giving him the same, intense look she'd flashed in the car when she'd accepted his invitation.

"Jason." She said in a quiet but clear voice. "Just take me to the bedroom."

Jason swallowed hard twice, taking in a deep breath before nodding his head. He raised his hand slightly, offering it to Gail, who took it as he led her down the hallway. Once in the bedroom Jason turned toward her and gently insinuated his fingers along the back of her neck and searched her face as if he was trying to be certain of her sincerity. Then, slowly, he leaned into her as she raised her face, cheeks flushed, lips parted, her eyes hooded and starting to close. He hovered began to kiss, slow and light at first, but inexorably increasing in strength and passion until their arms were wrapped tightly around each other and their lips were pressing and moving rhythmically.

After a few moments, she pulled back, moving her hands to his chest and, while looking directly into his eyes, began to unbutton his shirt in a slow, methodically sensual dance of her fingers until the skin of his torso was shining dully in the dim light. Nostrils flared, eyes hooded, a look of lust on her face, she admired his chest briefly before she took a sharp breath through gritted teeth and suddenly and roughly tore his shirt off and threw it to the floor.

Breathing like she'd just run a race, she moved her hands to his waist and unbuttoned his pants , taking them to the ground around his ankles as she sank to her knees in front of him. Then, more slowly, like she was unwrapping a present, she pulled his briefs down on top of his pants, fully exposing his erection. She took it in her hands, stroking it slowly, moving his developing secretions up and down the shaft until it was shiny slick. She kissed it and then took it into her mouth, eliciting a long, low moan from Jason who began in a nearly imperceptible motion to rock his hips back and forth.

After only a few moments, Jason's breathing roughened and he whispered softly "Oh...Oh God Gail." As he put his hands on her head and pushed her away gently. She gave him a puzzled look, but he just shook his head and she understood that he didn't want to finish that way or that early. He tugged gently at the sides of her face and he bent down to kiss her as she stood, letting his hands slip to her sides and then to the buttons on the front of her blouse.

Jason, with slightly more nervous fingers than Gail had used, copied her motions from a few minutes before, unbuttoning her blouse, and disposing of it on the bed before removing her bra and unzipping her skirt. He admired her briefly, taking in the smooth, rounded curves that flowed from her neck to her shoulders, over her breasts and down to her waist, her clear, pale skin with a smattering of freckles, accented with the vermilion of her lips and the reddish brown color of her erect nipples.. He bit his lip and smiled shyly and then cautiously began running his hands down her flanks to her hips, where he grasped her panties before continuing the movement of his hands over her thighs and to her calves, slowly kneeling to the floor as the motion reached her ankles.

He began kissing up the inside of her thighs, one then the other, moving closer and closer to her center, which Gail made available by inching her feet apart with the same, slow, delicious rhythm that Jason was using. Finally he pushed his mouth into her soft, wet folds; licking, kissing and sucking, his hands on her hips, Gail with her eyes closed, swaying slightly, like long grass on a breezy day.

Her breathing gradually increased until, suddenly, her eyes popped open as though something unexpected had happened. Her arms, which had been hanging limply at her sides reached up and she took the back of Jason's head and pulled it firmly into her, pushing forward with her pelvis in pulses timed with the movements of Jason's tongue.

And then she started to gasp and then moan and her legs gave way, Jason managing to catch her before she collapsed to the floor. He slowly stood, and pressed a hand into the small of her back, arching her backward and then slowly, gently lowered her to the bed.

He moved over her, taking his weight on his elbows set at either side of her chest, his forearms under her shoulders, her head cradled in his hands. He kissed her gently and then watched her face as he entered her, her eyelids fluttering, her nostrils flaring as she gently bit her lip.

They began to push their hips together in a slow, uncoordinated dance, the rhythm driven both by a desperate urge to consume everything the other had to offer and the need to experience and express the rapidly developing affection that the act reflected. It was at once intense and tender, moving and liberating and for Jason, the feeling generated by the dance was exquisitely intense, both physically and emotionally and it took every last bit of his self control to avoid finishing within moments after they began.