Short Story: Arguments

Short Story: Arguments

Sucking his teeth, he gave me a sidelong glance.

Maybe I hated him before, but this really confirmed it, and to think I thought I was ever in love with him, what was it, - three months ago?

The charm offensive. I mean, I don't think I'm that naive; he's just such a good actor, tears, the lot, but I'm seeing a new side to him now, aren't I? I genuinely believed in his love for me. Now my own devotion is like the ash from nuclear fall-out; - it's eating away at my vitals.

"You fairy!" he sneered, "What's with the stupid bandanna?"

I lowered my eyes and blushed.

"Red and yellow? I mean talk about tasteless!" he continued, "You look like a flag! - Is that the idea; put an 'l' in fag?"

I wasn't going to cry, but I couldn't help my cheeks and neck flaming. "What did I ever do to you?" I wavered at last, wishing I could've sounded stronger.

"Do?" he laughed, "That's just it, you don't 'do' anything!"

"...and you do I suppose..." somehow I don't think he was talking about work... How handsome he looked in his open-necked shirt; a couple of thilck gold chains garnishing his dark hairy chest; - chains which I put there, along with heavy duty rings and other bling. I fingered the ones he'd given me.

His head tilted slightly with a falsely amused grin, "What I do, dear boy, is give you a good seeing to every night," the grin became a suggestive and ugly leer which cheapened what we'd had, "don't tell me that's nothing!"

"At least I bring money into the house," I protested, knowing I wasn't being fair, "You're more like a paid whore!" He raised his eyebrows and looked away, flicking an imaginary speck from his black shirt-sleeve, "You always wear red and black; devil colours!" I continued, "I've never seen you in anything else!"

"So, what would you like, pretty boy? Turquiose? Salmon? - A nice lilac, or burgundy?"

"I'd like you to get out of my house!" I said passionately, before I could stop myself.

He sucked his teeth again, very deliberately. I've told him how I hate that; there's something foreboding about it... "Y'know..." he said at length, "Your chicken was over-cooked today," he shot a severe look my way, then eased his neat little bum off the end of the table, and I felt a now familiar frisson of fear.

Trouble is, that's what turns me on, and he knows it... He stood sideways on to me, allowing me to take in all 6'3" of his profile, the elegant neck, deep chest, athletic 6-pack, powerful bulges and sinuous arms and legs. He turned towards me and beckoned.

I trembled, but felt I had to stick to my decision. "Please leave!" I said, turning my back.

I don't know what I expected; fingers caressing my neck? An arm around my waist? I was shocked he wasn't there when I looked again. Fingering the silk around my neck I considered removing it, then a flash of defiance had me parading in front of the hall mirror. It looked good to me, with my tangerine shirt.

I have to keep a birth-certificate on me when I go into pubs and clubs. I sometimes wonder if dyeing my hair darker, or growing a beard would make me look older than my twenty-four years, but I don't like beards. Disconsolately I wandered through to gaze out of the kitchen window, then through the sitting room 'nets'. "I'll find someone else," I told myself, with a catch in my throat.

I kept hearing his deep, purring voice saying, "You stir me with your beauty." That one sentence, with the sonorous vibration of his special sound... how can I explain what that does to me?

How big and empty open-plan feels. I gazed through the lace at the street-lights again, and caught my breath, He was out there! Blow me if the insolent S.O.B. wasn't sitting on a wall watching the house! "Ooooh! How I detest him!" I exploded, "Well, he can stay there!" and I closed the curtains, imagining the suck of his teeth, - then I switched on the TV to drown it out of my thoughts.

During the night I peeked out several times to see if he was there, but of course he'd gone. If he had been there I know I'd've taken pity on him and asked him back in...

Splashing my face didn't seem to help the next morning. My imagination painted a picture of him with someone else. I was at the window again and again, I didn't want to go out, didn't want to eat, didn't even want to get dressed. I 'phoned work and said I was ill...

Well after lunch-time I heard his key in the door. One side of me wanted to rush into his arms, the other felt indignant that he assumed it was all right to come back without knocking. I stayed curled up on the 'queen-size', pretending to be asleep, though I was more like a coiled spring. When his voice wrapped its vibrations around me I got goose-pimples, "I'm sorry..." he breathed against my back.

When I looked I saw he'd been crying, or maybe he'd just rubbed his eyes to make it look as though he had? Then I noticed he was wearing sky-blue from top to bottom, and there were rose-petals all over the bed. "They gave me my job back," he rumbled, "please can I stay now? I promise I won't suck my teeth at you again, and I hope you haven't eaten yet; - I brought us an 'Indian'..."