08.14.08
It had all gone predictably the night before...until it hadn't.
Megan had driven them back to his parents' place, and Auggie had invited her up to his apartment for a beer. He'd purchased a mini-fridge a few weeks earlier to keep some things on hand at his place; it had gotten annoying to have to cross the driveway every time he wanted something to eat or drink.
They'd had small talk for an hour or so, sharing what each knew about mutual friends they'd gone to school with. As it had gotten late, they'd ordered a pizza, had a few more beers, and continued talking. Only then they'd begun sharing what they'd been up to for the past ten years. As always, it had been tricky for Auggie, but he thought he'd done a good job fibbing his way through a reasonable semblance of his actual life.
As for Megan, she'd moved to Champaign the middle of their senior year, so her dad could take a professorship at U of I. She'd only lived there a few months before she'd left for college at Dartmouth. Her freshman year at Dartmouth, she'd met the man who would later become her husband. Nate was a blue blood - a privileged white kid from a WASP-y Massachusetts family. She'd described how dazzled she'd been by his worldliness, and Auggie had to stifle the urge to roll his eyes at what a cliche the guy was. I mean, the dude played squash. Who plays squash? He didn't want to be rude, though, and he had to admit he was intrigued that she'd moved on from Auggie to someone so very unlike himself.
Everything had gone swimmingly with them, she'd explained, until the first time he'd hit her, 18 months into their relationship. Auggie had sat up straight, his spine suddenly a ramrod, when she'd dropped that bombshell. "Shit, Megan," had been his only comment. He didn't know what else to say.
"I know, I'm an idiot," she'd replied, with obvious shame in her voice.
"No, Megan, that's not what I meant," he'd avowed, horrified that she'd thought he was chastising her. He'd instinctively placed his arm around her shoulders, and she'd leaned into him from where she sat next to him on the small sofa he'd recently borrowed from his mother's extensive collection of unused furniture.
"No, it's okay. I am. I'm a freaking Lifetime Movie: Good Midwestern girl from a nice family falls for the sweet-talking rich boy who swears he only hits her because he loves her so much. And she believes him. It's pathetic."
Auggie had been at a loss. And here he'd thought he was the only one with a complicated backstory. He'd opened his mouth to reassure her, but only got as far as her name. As he formed the word, "Megan," her lips had brushed against his. Lightly, at first, and then suddenly she was all over him. Auggie had been too shocked to do anything but meet her kiss for the first few seconds, during which time she'd already undone his belt. She'd stood then, grabbing his hands and pulling him to his bed. Auggie had tried to tell himself that this hadn't been what he'd expected would happen...but who was he kidding?
They'd fallen onto the bed together and Auggie had been suddenly grateful that this - whatever this was - was happening with Megan. He didn't think of himself as a particularly insecure person, even now, even after his injury. But nowadays the thought of sleeping with a stranger made him nervous, for a couple of reasons. One, he was still as shallow as any other guy, as shallow as he'd been before, and he wanted to know what the woman he was with looked like. On that front, he felt safe with Megan, who'd always been a knockout. He understood that ten years could change a person, sure, but her body under his hands still felt as firm as it had been when they were in high school. As her hair had fallen over his chest, he'd remembered the pale blonde color of it, remembered running his fingers through it a thousand times, the strands as fine and soft as cornsilk. She was the only blonde he'd ever dated.
But the other reason he'd been glad it was Megan pressed against him at that moment was the sense of familiarity they shared, even now after all these years. He and Megan had been together off and on for all 4 years of high school. It had never been an explosive breakup that tore them apart, just immaturity, and bullshit high school drama, and a desire for new experiences. But they'd always seemed to make their way back to each other, and there'd never been any acrimony when they did.
These two factors had turned what could have been a scary or stressful experience into something that Auggie felt himself genuinely enjoying. They rolled across his bed, making out like the teenagers they'd been when last they'd done this. But as they'd found themselves wearing fewer and fewer items of clothing, Auggie had found himself thinking about Tash. Tash, who was almost certainly in a federal prison right now. Tash, who was the last woman he'd been with. Tash, who'd trusted him. Tash, whom he'd failed to protect. He'd forcefully pushed back the memories, but found he'd overshot the mark when Helen's face flashed across his mind's eye. His wife. His dead wife. I'm not ready for this, he'd thought, and made a move to pull away. But Megan's mouth against his, her body against his, were insistent. He didn't want to let her down.
So he'd squeezed his eyes shut and concentrated on the moment he was in. As he did so, his body had obliged. He'd been worried that being with a woman blind would be different, less satisfying perhaps, because of the lack of visual stimuli. But it turned out he hadn't needed to worry. His 4 remaining senses had caught fire, delivering a rapid stream of sensory details that he'd never imagined would be so arousing. Touch, hearing, smell, taste - they'd all jumped at the chance to fill in for sight, if anything overwhelming Auggie in a way he'd never experienced relying only on his eyes. Besides, it'd dawned on him that bed partners weren't usually staring at one another. If the lights weren't off, their eyes were closed for much of the experience. It was a little creepy not to close your eyes, in fact. Auggie had known it must've gotten dark by that point, and Megan hadn't to his knowledge turned on a light in the apartment. With Megan's eyes almost certainly closed, they'd been practically on equal footing.
But just as Auggie had turned the corner on his own doubts, Megan had pulled away and he'd heard her try to muffle a sob. His hand rose gently to her cheek, which he'd discovered was wet with tears. How long had she been crying? "Megan..." he'd called softly, lifting himself off her and lying on the pillow facing what was now her back turned to him.
He hadn't been sure what she wanted in that moment, what she needed. So he'd just placed his palm in the valley between her shoulder blades and listened to her cry.
