Page 16 of Tap Left
"You're being a prick."
"You better get used to it," he says. "That's the majority of what's out there. And you need to learn to recognize when you're wasting your time."
"Thanks." I stand up and clutch my bag. "But I think I’ve earned my stripes in the school of hard knocks, in case you don’t remember. And the lessons end here."
He looks briefly repentant when he reaches out to grab my arm, but stops himself.
"You can keep the clothes. Thank you for everything, Daire. But this experiment is over."
I leave.
And Daire doesn’t follow.
5
Daire
I’m an asshole.I’ve always been an asshole.Lola shouldn’t expect anything else from me at this point. But it bothers me that I let her get to me. It bothers me that I snapped. This hair-brained scheme of hers is chafing at my already too-thin patience.
Dealing with Lola is always tiresome because she’s the one thing in my life I don’t know how to handle. I need to keep her at arm’s length, but out of loyalty to my brother, I need to watch over her too. My mind is never fully satisfied with any decision I make regarding her, and I never know how far is too far. The boundaries are in place for a reason. But when those boundaries only exist in my head and Lola decides to careen right through them, I can’t stop her.
I ask myself if Ryan would want her to be happy. Probably, no. He sure as fuck wouldn’t want her to settle for some douchebag she meets online. Or maybe that’s just me. I don’t want her to settle for anyone. I hate this guy already, and I don’t even know him. It’s Tom all over again. These are feelings I’m not entitled to have. Not when I pushed her away before. It was the right thing to do then, and it’s still the right thing now.
But she’s single again, and those feelings are there again. She’s relentless in her pursuit of the ever-fabled picture of happiness she is still deluded enough to believe exists. And I am merely a stepping stone along the way. The guy she wrote off a long time ago. When it comes to Lola, I’m a cardboard cutout in a sea of three-dimensional men. The scenery might change, but she’ll only ever see me in one light.
She has every right to her feelings. Over the years, I’ve given her plenty of ammo. But she can return it just as good as she gets, and I revert to a toddler when she flings her poison arrows my way.I hate Lola. But it doesn’t stop me from wanting her too.
I saw her first.
I wanted her first.
But Ryan was the one to claim her. He made her his, and I can’t rewrite history. I can only move forward and try to co-exist with the guilt that lives inside of me. I can only guess that this is what he would have wanted. Me looking after Lola. But then again, maybe he wouldn’t want that since I can only really think about sabotaging her too.
She won’t even return my calls.There’s an unfamiliar urge inside of me insisting I put my bitterness aside and do what’s right. It’s not going to happen, but it does worry me. I’ve allowed my fucked-up feelings to dictate too much already.
Case in point. Her relationship with Tom. This isn’t pre-school, and Lola doesn’t get to play in the sandbox with whoever she feels like. That was a mistake on my part for not interfering earlier, and it won’t happen again.
The problem with LB is that she isn’t like any other woman I know. She’s a chameleon who’s learned to adapt to an ever-changing world. And despite what she may think or even what I might have led her to believe, she’s skilled at hiding her true feelings. She thinks she knows what she wants, but does she really? Like all matters, there is a way to find out.
Market research.
I bring in a focus group of women.Shy, awkward, a little nerdy. They fit the bill perfectly.I’m not attracted to any of them.Not a single one. Especially not the one with the purple framed glasses who stumbles over her words when I address her. Her hair is curly but too dark. Otherwise, she’d be exactly who I’d have chosen any other day to bend over my desk and hate fuck.
She’s like Lola, but she isn’t Lola. And it makes my dick hard thinking about it. It makes me sick that I do this. How many times have I done this? I close my eyes and try to recall their faces, but I can’t. Because when they were bent over and begging for my cock, it was always Lola. When I called them LB, they asked me what it meant. I fucked them harder and told them to shut up.
I’d finish on their face, imagining it was Lola on her knees for me. Licking my dick clean with heavy, sated eyes. It’s been too long since I’ve done this, and there’s a part of me that wants to cave into my baser desires right now. I could call the whole thing off. I could take this nameless, faceless girl into my office and fuck her silly and she would let me too. But it wouldn’t fully satisfy me. They never do. And in the end, I’d only want to turn to the one thing that does.
My lips thirst for a drink now. It isn’t the poison I crave, but the burn. The fuzziness. It makes me not give a fuck. It takes the pain away.
I chug a bottle of water, and my secretary clears her throat. They are all staring at me, waiting. Meek like mice, none of them dare to speak. I crumple the water bottle and toss it into the recycling bin. “Shall we get started then?”
Nods all around, and a few blushing giggles too.
I ask them questions. Loads of fucking questions.So many fucking questions I want to toss myself out of the high-rise window.
What are they looking for in love and a relationship? What is their ideal boyfriend like? Are they receptive to flowers? Chocolates?
What the fuck do they want?
