Chapter 2
Days and weeks went by, and Memphis kept studying and going to work at her job as the midnight clerk at the gas station across the street from campus. She hated her job, but it kept her in college, and working midnights three times a week allowed her to get her homework done when business was slow.
She tried to tell herself that she hadn’t had time to go back to Second Cup since the day she met Seth , but she knew she just couldn’t bare seeing him again. Her dreams had been filled with their love making. In fact, she woke up one afternoon before dinner to a crowd of Susan and Eddie’s friends staring at her. Eddie, in his most crude voice, said, “You were playing with yourself in your sleep, Memphis. Right in front of all of us.”
Mortified, Memphis, hit him with her pillow and put her head under her covers to drown out their laughter.
Nonetheless, the sex dreams continued and always ended in the same way, with Seth on top of her and inside her. His blue eyes staring into her brown ones. Her hands on his muscular ass. His hands on either side of her head. He is whispering something. She can see his lips, full and soft, saying something, but they climax together, and his words are lost. Sometimes she goes back to sleep for another 15 minutes just to see if she can get back into the dream again. She wants so badly to hear what he is saying, but as hard as she tries, his words remain soundless shapes.
One afternoon around St. Paddy’s Day her friends suggest a mid-term study trip to Second Cup. Memphis agrees excitedly and then panics over what to wear. Her friends, Nichole and Shannon, are dressed in usual study attire, sweatpants, sweatshirts, and pony tails, but Memphis is bent on looking her best, just in case. She dons black jeans and a white sweater. She carefully applies her make-up with extra emphasis on her eyes. With no make-up, they are shiny brown chestnuts set in her wide face, but with a brush of cinnamon shadow and a dab of coal eyeliner, they become entrancing orbs and clearly her best feature.
Memphis’ face falls as they walk into Second Cup that Sunday afternoon, around the time she met Seth. He is nowhere in sight, but she reminds herself that they will be there for hours, so there is still time.
After two cappuccinos, all three of the girls are uncontrollably giggling about everything and nothing. Memphis starts talking in funny accents, and Nicole playfully hits her with her left unicorn slipper. Memphis topples out of her chair in another fit of laughter, only to look up and find Seth standing over her. She immediately stopped laughing, clambered to her feet, and turned to him, stammering out a “H-Hi Seth.”
Nicole and Shannon stop laughing, too, having heard about this knight in pressed Armani that Memphis met last month. They looked over him approvingly as he grinned at Memphis, “Had a bit of a spill, I see,” he said.
“We were, uh, laughing about something, and I guess I just, uh, got carried away,” Memphis managed to spit out.
“Yeah, I guess so,” he said with a thin smile. He strode up to the counter and ordered his usual amaretto cap with three shots of espresso while Nicole and Shannon pleaded with Memphis to go talk to him. After a few minutes of pestering, she smoothed out her sweater and hiked up her pants. (Every damn pair were tight in her hips and thighs and gapped at her back, revealing her butt crack to the world). She sidled up to Seth, who had just picked up his coffee.
He spoke first, “So, what have you been up to Memphis?”
“Studying and working. The usual. Did you finish your internship?” she was standing just a few inches from him, so close that she could smell what she guessed was his shampoo. Clean and masculine. Oh, how she wanted him.
“I have one more week of my internship, and then I write the big assessment paper,” he replied, sipping his cap.
“How long is it?” she asked, immediately blushing as her mind went right into the gutter and her eyes to his crotch.
Either he didn’t get the double entendre, or he chose to ignore it. “It has to be about 50 pages with endnotes and graphs.”
“Oh, that sounds hard.” Damn it, she chuckled to herself, you did it again.
“I am dreading it for sure,” he said, putting his free hand in his khaki pocket, which opened his coat to further reveal his package and the rest of his attire, a black-gray hombre cashmere sweater. Memphis struggled not to fall to her knees and undo his fly right then and there.
Instead, she made a subtler move. “Well, I am an English major with a ton of writing experience, so if you ever need help while writing, let me know.” And then she walked back towards where Nicole and Shannon sat waiting for an update.
Before she could weave her way through the usual student studiers, she heard Seth call, “But wait, I don’t have your number.”
She turned back, her heart soaring in her chest, and said, “Let me give it to you.” Damn, I am at it again, she thought mirthfully. “Do you have a pen?” He rummaged through his interior coat pocket and retrieved a slim day planner and pen, and opened it to a section titled, “Important Numbers.”
“Okay,” he said, “What is it?” She looked at him there with his pen in his hand poised to right down the next words she said. He looked so intelligent and sophisticated. What could she do, she wondered, to make him want her? “Your number?” he said, interrupting her thoughts, which had turned to plotting and planning.
“Oh, its 555-667-1234,” she said in her sweetest voice. “And I mean it. You can call me if you need help with typing it up or formatting or proofreading. I do it all.” How could he not be getting these obvious and ridiculous come-ons?
“Great,” he said, flipping his mini-day planner closed and sliding it back into his coat pocket. “I will call you if I need any help. Enjoy your night,” he added before picking a path through the clumps of students and walking out the door.
Memphis practically ran back to the table. “He asked for my number!” she squealed, and Nichole and Shannon jumped up and started hugging her. Needless to say, none of them got much work done for the rest of that evening as they talked about all of the dirty things Memphis planned to do to Seth once she got him. Even though it was obvious that he was older than Memphis, the friends approved of him because he had a swagger that they could appreciate. He walked with authority, self-confidence, and some else that none of them could quite understand.
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