One Plus Two Minus One

Chapter Eight

Beth and Ethan went to a hotel for a night. She told Robert she was going out with her poker friends and would stay over where she ended up, and he just nodded, and didn’t ask her anything else. She’d been anticipating another complicated lie, like with the condoms, so she could get out the house without him making a fuss, but he didn’t seem bothered at all. She couldn’t decide if he was confident enough not to care where she was, or worried enough he didn’t want to start a fight. She was pretty sure it wasn’t worry, though. Robert never saw problems until they slapped him in the face.

She felt a little self-conscious checking into the hotel with Ethan, as if everyone knew why they were there, and knew he was her student, and half of them were on their phones right now to all their friends. She looked around at a roomful of strangers ignoring her and told herself she was imagining things. Like the time they’d gone out to the bar, no-one noticed them and no-one cared what they were doing.

They made out in the lift. They made out in the lift so Beth got weak and dizzy and felt like she just wanted to stay where she was until she came. She mumbled a protest into his mouth when they got to their floor, not wanting to stop kissing. Ethan picked her up, over his shoulder, and carried her down the corridor looking for the room. It hurt her tummy a bit, and she gasped that he should put her down, but he ignored her and held onto her by her ass and she didn’t really mind.

Which was odd, since Robert doing anything at all like that would have infuriated her.

The hotel room was what they needed. They had sex on the floor which turned into sex on the bed, and then got mostly undressed and had sex again, while Ethan tried to get a drink of water and Beth kept saying she wasn’t done yet. They lay there a while, panting, then Ethan turned on the air conditioning and they had sex again, and after a third time, they finally seemed done for a while.

At least with the sex.

“I missed you,” Ethan said, and she kissed him for five minutes then said, “Me too.”

“So what now?” Ethan said. “Is this how we do it?”

“I suppose. Is that okay for a few weeks? Just until things sort themselves out.”

He nodded slowly. He was lying on his back, stroking her hand, staring at the ceiling. He seemed to have gotten into a gloomy kind of mood since they’d finished fucking.

“Are you sure?” she said.

He shrugged.

She was sitting cross-legged in the middle of the bed. She moved, deliberately put her knees in front her chest in case that helped him concentrate.

He hadn’t looked, though. She wasn’t sure what that meant. “I don’t know,” he said.

“I’m doing my best,” she said.

“I know.”

“I really do want you. How we were.”

He nodded slowly.

“Just until things get sorted out,” she said. “I promise.”

“I don’t know they will,” he said, still staring at the ceiling. “Unless you make it happen.”

She didn’t know what to say, so she decided to ignore him. She leaned over and got the room service menu and started looking at food.

“Want anything?” she said.

“I’m fine.”

“I’m getting something.”

“Okay.” After a moment. “Can you afford this?”