LOVE TO HATE YOU

I Googled you...

"So..." Ben said once we'd settled into the bath together and had adequately stuffed ourselves with food. We were facing each other, our outstretched legs intertwined. I'd had the pleasure of watching him undress, again. It was definitely not something I could ever get tired of. His entire torso was covered in intricate tattoos that ran all the way up his neck on one side, stopping just behind his ear. One arm was completely covered, all the way down to his hand, even some of his fingers. Looking at him like that, you could dismiss him as nothing more than a total bad boy, but he wasn't. He was so much more than that.

"Do you realize I know nothing about you, Sera?" he said, lifting my legs out of the bath and resting my feet on his shoulders. The move caught me off guard.

"What do you mean?" It was hard to concentrate as he started moving his hands up and down my legs, from my calves to my knees, giving me an impromptu leg massage. His touch always had the power to render me totally speechless, right from the very first time he'd touched me in the club.

"I mean just that. I know nothing about you."

"That's crap. Of course you do. You know a lot."

Ben shook his head. "All I know is that you work for me. You have a serious sweet tooth and you live next door with JJ and Bruce. Who are super protective over you, by the way—there must be a story there. You also never talk about your family, ever. I suspect there's a story there, too. You work at a restaurant at night, and I know how much I pay you, so .... I suspect you have a whole other life I know nothing about."

"Wow! That was blunt." I pulled my legs off his shoulders and brought them up to my chest, clutching them and getting into a sitting position. Suddenly I felt more naked than I really was. He was asking me to talk about the things I never spoke about—Things I didn't want to speak about.

"Sera..." He sat up, climbed behind me again, and scooped me in his arms. 

He turned my head and kissed me. 

Then he looked up at me. "There's nothing you could tell me that would make me think, or feel, anything less for you."

I felt backed into a corner. In the back of my mind I knew this conversation was inevitable. I'd just been hoping that if I ignored it for long enough, it might magically go away—Like my car. But now I was expected to talk about my woe-is-me childhood, my crappy life, my dysfunctional family and ...everything.

"Your life can't be more fucked up than mine," he said and smiled at me as if it was meant to reassure me—I wasn't reassured.

"I...I..." I tried to start, but the words seemed to get caught in my throat.

Ben sat up further and moved even closer. "I think I know." His voice was soft, almost a whisper.

"Know what?"

"Well, I Googled you and an article about your father came up..." His voice tapered off. It sounded like a question rather than a statement. I knew immediately which article he was referring to. The delightful one about my fraudster father being arrested for ripping off his company—my family's proud heritage—leading to our very public eviction that gave the entire neighborhood something to watch that Sunday—I half expected people to grab lawn chairs and make popcorn. My shouting, crying mother, my drunken father, my terrified sister watching her room being packed away—and me, trying to calm everyone down and be the sixteen-year-old adult that I should never have had to be—Should I tell him all that?

Should I tell him about life in the trailer park? My dad's gambling and the prostitutes, my mother's complete pathetic devotion, depression and co-dependence. Is that what I was meant to tell him? Was I meant to tell him that my sole purpose in life was to give my sister a better future, a responsibility I would have for years to come?

I was lost in thought and barely noticed that Ben had been watching me.

He moved closer. "Why are you so afraid of telling me?" he asked. He was so close to me now that it left me nowhere to go unless I could miraculously melt my way into the water. "Can I tell you what I think?" Ben said. Then he jumped out of the bath with a splash and, before I could react, I felt him get in behind me. He slid me forward a little and then pulled my body back so I was leaning against his chest. Then he wrapped his arms around me and I let my head fall all the way back against him—It felt good.

"I think that our pasts, and our circumstances shape us and make us who we are. Especially the bad parts. Having Li taken away actually made me become a better father to her now that she's back in my life. The bad parts are building blocks. And from where I'm standing, you're just about the best person I've ever met, so whatever happened, I think you turned out pretty well. Perfect really."

I titled my head up to look at him and felt myself getting sucked into some kind of magical bubble.

His lips came down and grazed my forehead. "You don't have to tell me right now if you don't want to. But just know that whatever you do say won't change the fact that I'm still totally in love with you."

I felt dizzy. His words had that effect on me. I rolled around so that we were face to face, our naked bodies pressing into each other as the warm water lapped against our skin. And then he smiled at me.

"Okay, here's the deal. You can tell me tomorrow night while we lie in bed together after I've made love to you because you've confessed your undying love to me." He took me under my arms and pulled me higher, and the feel of my naked body sliding over his was almost too much to bear.

"You're pretty sure of yourself." I said, smiling at him, our noses touching.

Ben nodded. "Yup! By this time tomorrow night, you're going to be totally in love with me, Sera."

"And how do you know that?"

Ben's hands roamed down my naked back and he cupped my bum. He pulled me firmly towards him and the water around us rippled. I let out a breathy moan as he slid one of his legs between mine. If he was trying not to have sex with me tonight, this wasn't exactly the right thing to be doing.

"Trust me. I know these things." And then he leaned in and kissed me so slowly and gently, that I was pretty sure that, yes, I was probably going to be in love with him in the morning- if I wasn't already.