Sensation, p.22
Sensation, page 22
I stay seated on him, stunned, and in disbelief that despite two orgasms, he’s still mostly hard inside me. I wait for a few moments, wanting to feel him softening inside me before pulling off him and luring him into the shower with me, but he never does.
He smiles up at me. “How about that shower?” he asks.
I nod. “We need it.” We both look down at our bodies, wet and flushed like we’ve been in a sauna. My hair is wet and matted to my neck, and I desperately want to wash it.
It’s not until we’re in the shower together, and Ramiro is massaging my scalp while he washes my hair, his erection still bobbing, heavy and semi-hard between his legs, that I decide to ask two questions that have been bothering me for a while. In the shower, he has nowhere to go until I’m done, and he can’t avoid this conversation.
Manipulative on my part? Perhaps. Maybe I should give him more credit. He has, after all, invested a lot with therapy to work on opening up. He’s done the hard work on himself and earned all of my trust. Then there’s the part of me that can’t risk it, so I choose this moment. “Why do you call me your sky?” I ask.
Ramiro turns me around to face him, then continues massaging my scalp as he answers. “Because you’re my everything.”
A pause.
I think about that for a moment. It’s a pleasant thought, if a bit scary, to be someone’s everything. It’s also natural, though. Ramiro, Oscar, and René are my everything, so I can certainly understand the feeling.
I clear my throat. “How long have I been your cielo?”
His hands freeze in my hair, and he lets out a long breath. “Almost since I met you.”
“Excuse me?”
“I’ve liked you a lot longer than you can imagine, loved you even—”
“But Carolina—”
His dark brow arches. “You, more than anyone, should understand what being in love with two people is like.”
“Wait, what?” I shake my head and wash out the shampoo from my hair quickly so I can straighten when I look at him again. “You loved me?”
Water droplets roll down his face like phantom tears. “I suppressed loving you. It felt like being unfaithful to Carolina—”
“But fucking every woman in sight during that time didn’t feel like being unfaithful?”
“No.”
I scoff. “No?”
“No. I didn’t have feelings for them.”
“Then why, Ramiro? Why, when you finally decided to move on from Carolina, why wasn’t it me? Why was it Francisca?”
He shuts off the water and wraps a towel around my shoulders. “Let’s get dry and comfy, yeah? I’ll tell you everything you want to know.”
Reassured by his promises of truth, I follow his lead in drying and getting under the covers, both of us still naked.
“I was fucked up after Carolina.”
“I remember.”
“When I came back from Florida and had to see her almost daily, I was going insane. The drinking picked up. The endless stream of women—”
“I remember that too,” I say dryly.
“Then one day, I was at a bar close enough to home that I didn’t want to get a ride-share, so I walked home since I couldn’t drive. I must have been more drunk than I thought because I never got home.”
“You blacked out?”
“Yeah. First time in my life. As often as I was drinking then, I’ve never really enjoyed being that drunk. But anyway, that night it went too far, and I passed out on someone’s front lawn on my way home.”
“Francisca’s?”
He nods. “Francisca’s. When she woke me up, I thought about what Carolina would have done in that situation. She would have yelled at me, pulled me up by my ear and shoved me in my shower, clothes on and everything. With cold water. Definitely cold water, then yelled at me some more.”
“Like a big sister,” I say with a smile.
Surprisingly, Ramiro smiles too. “Like a big sister.”
“That’s not what Francisca did, though?”
“No. She was gentle and spoke softly, knowing I likely had a headache. When she grabbed my hand, she was so gentle. She led me into her house, and Oscar, René, and Doña Pancha ate eggs with hotdogs, and Francisca served me pozole for the cruda.”
I smile. Francisca loved to heal with her food. She had that in common with Don Gustavo.
“Weren’t you still in love with me, though?”
“I’ve never not loved you, Sara. But in that moment, I wanted nothing to do with Carolina or Don Gustavo. I almost didn’t go back to work with him. I couldn’t bring myself to date her little sister and be around her all the time. It wouldn’t have been fair to you. And in front of me was this gentle woman, taking care of me. And for once, I didn’t feel inadequate, or like I didn’t belong, or wasn’t good enough. The way she looked at me Sara, like I’d hung the moon … I needed that after Carolina.”
“I see,” I say, trying to understand.
“If I could go back in time and change things, date you instead, I wouldn’t do it. I’d still be with Francisca because that’s how I got my sons.”
As much as I don’t want to admit it to myself, Ramiro makes a lot of sense. I squeeze his hand in mine. “You’re right. The time had to be right for us.”
It’s then he barks out his laughter. “You think the best time was on your wedding day to another man?”
My face blanches. “Oh god. Don’t remind me. I need to talk to him, to explain—”
Ramiro cups my hand in his. “Not right now. I need this weekend to be just us. I want time to get to know us as a couple. Time to explore your body. Learn what you respond to, what you like. I don’t want to think about anyone outside this room.”
“You want a honeymoon,” I say.
“No. This weekend is not our honeymoon. When I take you on our honeymoon, it will be somewhere beautiful, for several weeks where I can have you naked as often as I want. It won’t be over in just a few days.”
My brain misfires when he says this. He said “when” we have our honeymoon. “When?” I ask in a shaky breath, replaying his words in my head.
“Si, mi cielo,” he says, and kisses me. Tenderly, with his tongue parting my lips in an erotic way that opens my mouth and body to him. “When. One day soon, I’m going to ask you to marry me, and you are going to say yes. And our wedding reception won’t be this stuffy small wedding either. We’ll invite the entire block, and Tavo’s Auto Repair staff. And we’ll wait for Leo to be on leave so he can be my best man. Every person I’ve ever known will be present the day I claim you as mine. And we’ll have Mariachis, an endless taco bar, and we’ll have Sofia bring kegs of beer—”
“I love tacos and beer,” I say with a goofy smile.
Ramiro kisses my temple, pressing a soft chuckle to that tender spot. “I know. And we’ll dance all night and celebrate our new life together. And you won’t run off with anyone else. The boys will stay with my parents for a month, and we’ll go to Mexico.
“Mexico?” I ask excitedly. “I’ve always wanted to go.”
“And you’ll blow them away with your Spanish. Don’t think I haven’t noticed how fluent you’ve become. I’m so proud of you, Sara.”
“One day soon, huh?”
“One day soon.”
I bite my lip thoughtfully. “Can I ask you one more question?”
Ramiro chuckles. “You have a lot of questions.”
“When did you know? That you loved me?”
Without a second of thought, he says, “When you pronounced my name right for the first time.”
I lift a little, resting my elbow on my pillow and propping my head up so I can look down into his eyes. “What?”
“When Carolina introduced you to me, you tried to roll your ‘R’s’ and couldn’t. You tried about twenty times, and I think it got embarrassing for all of us, but you were so determined.”
“I remember,” I say, my cheeks flushing with heat at the memory. “I started taking Spanish lessons with Don Gustavo shortly after that. Carolina was hardly around during med school, and I think my lessons gave us both a purpose.”
Ramiro nods. “Anyway, a few months later, you found me working out at my garage, and Don Gustavo had asked you to drop off some dinner for me because my parents were out of town. When you said my name that time, you rolled your ‘R’s’ perfectly.”
“I was so proud when I finally learned to do that. It took months, Ramiro.”
He brushes a strand of hair from my eyes and pushes it back. “I know. When you rolled those ‘R’s,’ the sounds shot straight through my groin. Remember, I asked if you could put the food in the fridge for me?”
I shake my head. “It was so long ago.”
“Well, I did. I couldn’t stand up, and I had to place my gym towel on my lap because I got so hard.”
“Oh. That’s lust though, not love.”
“It was both, Sara. And it scared the hell out of me.”
“I think I understand.”
“That’s all in the past, mi cielo. We’re together now.”
“One last question, I promise.”
Ramiro barks out a laugh. “I don’t believe that for a second.”
“Do you still love her? Carolina?”
He shakes his head. “I would never have proposed to Francisca if I did. It’s true what they say. Time heals all.”
“And Francisca?”
“I’ll always love the memory of her. I loved her. I’m sorry. You think you can share my love just a little bit?”
“Of course. I wouldn’t want it any other way. It will be good for the boys to know that you will honor her memory.”
“They do,” he says, and kisses my temple.
“Thank you for answering my questions.”
He kisses me again, and when I tell him I want to text Carolina to bring us a change of clothes because I can’t walk out of this room in a wedding dress, he takes my phone and shuts it off. “Tomorrow,” he says, and climbs on top of me again.
All day, and all night, all we do is fuck rough, and make love sweet, and we pause to order room service and eat, with a few naps here and there. When we fall asleep, either Ramiro will wake me up, sometimes with his cock inside me, sometimes his fingers, or his tongue, or I’ll wake him up, with my mouth sheathing his hardening erection.
A full weekend of getting to know each other intimately—of eating each other, of pure bliss.
On Sunday morning, when eventually we’re forced to ask Carolina for clothes, and I crack the door to the room open to grab the duffle bag from her, she is grinning like this is the happiest moment of her life, but also mischievous like she’s caught me with las manos en la masa.
I don’t let her crack any jokes because I don’t want her to ruin this perfect weekend of mine and instead shut the door in her face after grabbing the bag. All I hear is her bark of laughter as she walks down the hallway.
We’re getting dressed, planning on checking out of the hotel and returning to our lives, when the weight of our actions crashes down on both of us.
Even so, Ramiro’s jaw is set with resolve and that gives me courage we’ve done the right thing.
“Ramiro, we didn’t—” my voice breaks.
“We didn’t what?”
“We didn’t use protection.”
“Oh, that. No, we didn’t. I haven’t been with anyone since Francisca, and we both got tested before we started seriously dating.”
“Right. And since Brian, I’ve only … with Devyn, and—” I swallow, watching the pain flash across Ramiro’s eyes. “We always used protection, though I’m confident in his past safe sex practices. I’m happy to get tested again, if it makes you feel better.”
The muscle over his left jaw clicks, and his Adam’s apple bobs up and down. He takes slow steps toward me and cups my lower belly in his palm. “I thought you’d be afraid you’re pregnant.”
I shake my head. “I have an IUD.”
He smiles, his eyes glued to my belly. “I wouldn’t mind if you were pregnant.”
Even though I’m standing perfectly still, I stumble somehow and lose my balance enough that I have to hold on to his arms to stay upright.
“You want to have kids?” I ask, but it comes out like a screech.
He nods. “I’d be happy with just the boys and us, but if you ever carry our child, I’ll be very happy about that too.”
His voice is so serious when he speaks, I hate that I’m laughing when I answer. “That would put a significant dent in the vision you have of our wedding and honeymoon, don’t you think? No tacos with beer for me if I’m knocked up in my wedding dress.”
He chuckles and meets my eyes again. “That’s why you’re mi cielo. You make me smile and laugh, even in the most serious of moments. In the darkest of times, you bring the light with you. It’s remarkable, Sara, for someone who came from so much darkness, and who’s been through so much, that you can continue to carry this joy and share it with everyone around you. That you continue to smile, and laugh, and love.”
With that, he grabs my hand, and we open the door of our love bubble and step into the hallway, ready to face the consequences of our actions—and our future.
Together.
EPILOGUE
TWENTY YEARS LATER
Mexico and France are tied with only two minutes left in the second half. In a last-ditch effort to avoid a penalty shootout, number thirteen, the Mexican national team’s most talented striker, gets dangerously close to his target when number four, a French defender, elbows him aggressively to shove him back, earning number thirteen a penalty kick.
Not since the eighties has Mexico gotten so much as close to the quarterfinals at the International Cup, and not once has the nationally beloved team won. And here we are. At the final match. The weight of the world—not to mention the eyes—are all on number thirteen as he readies himself for the most important moment of his life.
His agent, and the entire world it seems, begged him not to play for the team that was thought of as doomed never to win an International Cup. Especially not when he had lucrative offers to play from both Germany and Argentina.
But to number thirteen, there was only ever one option. His mother would put on the green jersey and use face-paint to meticulously draw the Mexican flag onto the apples of her cheeks for every single televised game. She only ever rooted for one team, and number thirteen wanted to gift her the International Cup win she never got to see in her lifetime.
He cut his hair before the season started, and it’s a bit hard to pick him out without his signature low man-bun he used to roll at the nape of his head. Luckily, the number thirteen is easy enough to spot, and so is the hyphenated name above the number: Garcia-Jimenez.
Half a world away, I know Don Gustavo is glued to the screen despite the time difference. I can picture them all: him, Carolina, Hector, and their daughter Marisela, likely all in pajamas, holding hands and readying themselves to jump up in triumph.
Don Gustavo is likely sending a quiet prayer up to the heavens.
I smile at the thought and wish our entire family could have joined us for this once-in-a-lifetime experience. On one side of me, Ramiro is squeezing my hand a bit too firmly, but I’m sure I’m squeezing back with equal force. To my left, an eighteen-year-old Astrid is holding my other hand as she holds in a breath, her cheeks puffy and turning a shade red with the strain of the air inside them.
I whisper in my only daughter’s ear. “Breathe—I don’t want to be stuck with all boys.”
Astrid, with golden-brown skin, a shade somewhere between mine and Ramiro’s, and his dark brown eyes and inky black hair, giggles next to me and gulps for air. Everyone in our row is just as tense as we are, and this is the quietest the massive stadium has been for the entire game.
Number thirteen’s brother couldn’t be here today. As much as our workaholic son wanted to, he couldn’t pry himself away from work, and gave up his ticket for the International Cup final’s game to his baby sister.
We watch as René takes several steps behind the ball, puffs up his chest with a gulp of air, and on the exhale, he breaks into a jog. His right leg swings back, then forward, aiming right, but at the last second, aims toward the upper left corner of the net instead.
Believing his initial aim, the goalie throws himself right—leaving his left entirely open.
The ball swooshes against the net, and the crowd explodes with its collective roar.
Ramiro jumps, screaming “Goooooooooaaaaaaaaal” on one side of me, while Astrid does the same on my other side.
“That’s my son! That’s my son!” I scream at everyone around us who will hear me past their own shouting, pointing at René, though really, I’m just pointing at the field.
The man standing behind me taps my shoulder, and I turn to face him.
“Number thirteen? That’s your son?” He asks in Spanish, pointing to the field himself.
I beam at the stranger. “¡Sí!”
The stranger leans forward and offers me his hand. I take it, shaking it, and he cups it in the other.
“Thank you,” he says, “for giving us the gift that is your son.”
I laugh a watery laugh through my tears of joy. “I’ll tell him a fan said that.”
The man smiles, then turns to take one of his buddies into a hug, the celebration continuing.
The penalty kick tilted the balance of the game in our favor, and with only two minutes left in the game, there’s no way the opposing team will manage to turn the score again before the game is over.
Tequila is poured all night at the hotel bar, and this time, the celebratory shot doesn’t taste bitter. The shot goes down smooth as butter.
And since the drinking age in this country is eighteen, even Astrid is allowed a shot of tequila.
Her dad pours two shots in front of them. They salt their limes, and she follows his lead. Then he bites the lime, and shortly after, slams the shot back.
Astrid does the same and Ramiro’s daughter … well, she doesn’t make a face. Doesn’t wince. Doesn’t clear her throat. Advice from her aunt Sofia, no doubt, on what to expect, and how to behave during her first-ever tequila shot.
