“Of course he explained!” she barked. “His fucking dick got hard and he put it in her snatch! That’s how these things normally happen, right?”
“Well ... yeah,” Jake agreed. “In my experience, that’s usually how it goes. What I meant, however, is that doing something like that seems ... oh ... out of character for Greg. Or am I wrong about that?”
She sighed again. “I’m sorry, Jake,” she said. “I shouldn’t be yelling at you. None of this is your fault.”
“Hey,” he said with a shrug, “once you’ve had your ass beat in a New York hotel room by a bunch of cops, once you have an article put out that says you rape women and throw them off boats into the river, once you eat a woman’s pussy out and then have her break up with you without even returning the favor, things like that just kind of roll off your shoulders.”
“You ate someone out and then she broke up with you without returning the favor?” Celia asked.
“It’s a long story,” Jake said with a wave of dismissal.
“You’ll have to tell me that one someday,” she said, shaking her head. “Rude! In any case... si, you’re right. It was out of character for him. He tells me that the two of them had a little flirtatious relationship with each other—it seemed harmless at the time—and then, on the night in question, they ran into each other in town after the filming was done for the day. They had dinner together and then some drinks at the bar. He says he had a little too much to drink, was feeling a little too horny from not having been with me for months, and ... one thing just led to another and it happened. They started kissing in the bar. They walked back to the hotel and she came up to his room with him. He didn’t ask her to leave. He said he started to feel guilty pretty much the moment they got undressed.”
“But he didn’t stop,” Jake said.
She shook her head. “He didn’t stop. They did the deed and then she went back to her own room. He says he couldn’t sleep at all that night, that the guilt just kept spinning around in his head. And in the morning, when he was sober again, it just kept getting worse. It started to affect his work. That’s why he called me up and told me about it.”
“Uh huh,” Jake said with a little shake of the head. Even after hearing the whole story, he still thought confession had been a bad move. Who the hell had it helped? “And how’s that guilt been since?”
“I’ve only talked to him a few times since he ratted himself out,” Celia said. “And when I did talk to him, the conversations were brief because I simply can’t stand talking to him about it. I get too angry ... with him and with myself for letting this bother me so much.”
“It should bother you,” Jake said. “He cheated on you.”
“Yeah,” she said. “That does seem to be the topic at hand, doesn’t it? In any case, to answer your question, I think he did drop that guilt when he confessed to me. He’s been able to carry on with work and he even seems excited about the progress they’re making. Maybe confession is good for the soul, huh?”
“I’m sure he is still carrying a pretty heavy load of guilt with him, C,” Jake said.
“Maybe,” she said. “In truth, I’m not sure I even care. I’m not sure what’s going to happen now, Jake. Can I just let this go? Can I just go back to living with him as his wife once that damn film is shot and we’re done with our recordings? I don’t know the answer to any of that.”
“You say you believe him to be sincere when he says it was only that one time and that he felt immediately guilty for it?”
She took another gulp of wine, finishing what was in the glass. She then held it out to Jake for a refill. “Hit me again,” she told him. While he was pouring, she answered his question. “I believe he is sincere. I believe it was only one time and that he will not repeat the mistake.”
“That’s something, isn’t it?” Jake asked, finishing her pour and then freshening up his own glass.
“It’s something,” she agreed. “I just don’t know how big of a something it is. I don’t know if I can go back to my happy little life I was having and just forget about how he betrayed me. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to completely trust him again.”
“Those are valid concerns,” Jake said.
“Yeah,” she said. “And ... well ... there’s another variable in this equation as well.”
“What’s that?”
She turned those dark brown eyes on his, her stare intense. “You really don’t know what I’m talking about?” she asked.
He swallowed nervously under her gaze. “Uh ... no,” he said. “I don’t think I do.”
She reached out and took his hand in hers. He noticed for the first time that she was not wearing her wedding ring. “You are the variable, Jake.”
“Me?” he asked, managing to put an air of surprise in his tone, but it was only his own mediocre acting skills that put it there. He had a pretty good idea of what she was talking about.
“You,” she said. “I’m in love with you, Jake. And I’m pretty sure you’re in love with me as well.”
Jake took a deep breath and let it out slowly, his brain trying to process and qualify what she had just said. “You ... you are in love with me?” he finally said.
“I am in love with you,” she repeated. “I have been for quite some time now.”
“I see,” Jake said. “Well ... I do love you as well, Celia. You’re a very dear friend of mine and we’ve been working very closely together these past two years. I would do anything in the world for you, just like I would do anything for Nerdly, or Pauline.”
“I’ve never seen you look at Nerdly’s boobs with that hungry look you’ve been giving mine all night,” she told him. “Pauline’s either, for that matter.”
“Uh ... well ... no, I never really have,” Jake stammered. “But...”
“I’m not talking about friend love, Jake,” Celia said. “I’m talking about romantic love. I’m talking about the feeling that I want to be with you, to be in an intimate relationship with you, that I want to spend my life with you, that I want to wake up beside you every morning with my naked body pushed up against yours.”
That intense burst of lust that had been buried when the discussion turned serious suddenly reared its head again, this time with a boost of power added to it. “Yeah,” he said softly. “That doesn’t sound like friend love to me.”
“It’s not,” she said, her eyes still staring into his, her ringless hand still grasping his. “Do you feel the same about me, Jake? Do you love me, not as a friend, not as a sister, but as someone you would want to spend your life with, someone you would want to spend an eternity ... you know ... waking up naked next to?”
“Wow,” he said. “That’s quite a question, C.”
“It is,” she agreed. “And you don’t have to answer it if you don’t want to, or if you’re not sure, or if the answer is really no and you don’t want to hurt my feelings and make this goddamn conversation even more awkward than it already is, but...”
“Yes,” Jake interrupted.
“Yes ... uh ... what?” she asked.
He smiled. “Yes, I love you, Celia.”
She looked at him. “In the waking up naked way?”
He nodded. “In the waking up naked way,” he confirmed.
Her smile got bigger. A single tear formed in her right eye and ran down her cheek. “Well now,” she said. “Confession is good for the soul, it seems. I feel like a little bit of the weight has been taken off my shoulders.”
“Yeah,” Jake agreed. “I feel that as well. But now some extra weight has been added in other places, wouldn’t you say?”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“We love each other,” he said, “but we’re both in love with someone else, in committed relationships with someone else. That’s kind of an issue.”