Total pages in book: 184
Estimated words: 186756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 934(@200wpm)___ 747(@250wpm)___ 623(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 186756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 934(@200wpm)___ 747(@250wpm)___ 623(@300wpm)
My phone pinging breaks my thoughts—thankfully—and I grab it with both hands, trying to stay in the moment.
Shepard
So then you gotta pay your dues.
Isadora
Tell me how.
Shepard
That’s a very good question, isn’t it? How do you pay your dues?
How do you pay for a year worth of torture.
For a year worth of stringing me along. For making me watch you from afar. Forcing me to fucking watch.
I couldn’t respond to him even if I wanted to.
And he doesn’t seem to need any as another one of his texts arrives on the screen. But I can’t decide if it’s a good thing or not, him not needing a response from me just yet because every word he says hits me like a sharp dart.
Shepard
As you smiled at other men with that cherry pink mouth of yours. As you forced me to listen to your throaty fucking laughter.
Shepard
Do you know what your laughter does to men?
It’s hard, but I pull myself together enough to fire off a reply.
Isadora
What?
Shepard
It makes them go insane.
It makes them go feral.
It chips away at their control, slowly, piece by piece until all what remains is that feral instinct. To possess it. To gorge on it, to eat it up. To kill every man who’s ever heard it. Your laughter, Cherry Lips, turns men into murderers.
Isadora
Did you just give me a nickname?
Shepard
Seemed appropriate for a girl whose mouth is the color of ripe cherries.
And God help me, I can’t stop thinking about how he calls me by his own name too. How Dora, even though derived from my own name, sounds so new and unique. How I like it more than…
Okay, no.
I’m not going to think about that. I’m not going to compare stupid nicknames.
Isadora
I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
I’m not sure what I’m saying sorry about, though. The fact that I immediately thought of his twin brother and the name he gave me or because of all the ways I’ve tortured my best friend because of him.
Shepard
Well sorry isn’t enough, is it? When not only have I had to hear your laughter and watch you strut around in your frilly skirts and skimpy dresses, but I’ve had to watch you dance in them too.
Isadora
But you know that I like to dance.
Shepard
That’s the thing though, you don’t dance, do you. You put on a show.
Isadora
What’s the difference?
Shepard
The difference is that when you dance it looks like you’re getting paid to do it. It looks like you’re a cam girl and your only job is to make all the men who’ve been eye-fucking you on their screen, blow in their pants in under two minutes.
When you dance it looks like you want something between those honey-colored thighs of yours. You’re aching for something to dance against and I’m not talking about a pole. Or not the kind that you’ll be dancing against if I have a say about it.
I jolt in surprise.
My thighs clenching. My belly clenching too.
And I have a very strong urge to lie. A very strong urge to tell him that no, I don’t dance like that. When in fact I do. I have. Like I’m putting on a show. Like I’m getting paid to do it. Only I’ve done it for his twin brother.
Shepard
You know that you do, don’t you? You know you dance like that.
You dance like you want someone to watch.
Isadora
Yes.
And as always, in the quest of this, I never paid any mind to my best friend. I never paid any mind to what he must be feeling, watching me put myself out there like that.
In my defense, though—if there could ever be any—I never thought Shepard had any feelings toward it. He’s not the jealous type. He’s just not. In all the time I’ve known him, he’s never, not once, said or expressed anything to this effect and…
Well, I’m lying about this too, aren’t I?
Because he did once.
We were at this bar with his team for a victory party. There were drinks and dancing and revelry. And until that night, Shepard had never cared about what I wore or how I danced. So when he gave me his jacket to put on in the middle of the dance floor, I was taken aback. I didn’t even think he was wearing a jacket—he’s not a suit jacket wearing kind of guy. But apparently, he was and when he draped it over my shoulders, I looked at him in confusion. He said something about some guys watching me and that it was better if I covered myself up. And since he’d never made a demand like that, I agreed and did what he said.
But even back then, I didn’t get the jealous vibe from him.
I thought he was being protective like a good friend. And I don’t have siblings, but it felt… brotherly, for the lack of a better word.