Chapter 15: The Invitation
The afternoon sun bled honey-gold through Maria’s sheer curtains, pooling on the worn oak floorboards. She was curled on the sofa, Joe’s grey marathon shirt wadded in a ball against her stomach. She’d picked it up from where it had landed the night before and just held it, breathing in the fading trace of him—sweat, detergent, the cedar note of his skin. It wasn’t a comfort. It was an artifact, proof of the new, terrifying territory they’d charted in the dark.
We’ll give it more.
The words echoed, a vow that felt less like a promise and more like stepping off a cliff. Her body ached in a familiar, delicious way that made the anxiety worse. It was a physiological betrayal. Her skin remembered his hands, even as her mind screamed about the cost.
A sharp rap at the door made her jump.
She’d forgotten. Completely.
“Maria? It’s Sasha. I brought the Thai you like.”
Shit. The plan, made days ago in a moment of brittle loneliness, to have a casual lunch, to prove she had a life, to be normal. She shoved the shirt behind a couch cushion and stood, running her hands through her tangled hair. “Coming!”
She opened the door. Sasha stood there, a paper bag of takeout in one hand, a six-pack of fancy sparkling water in the other. She was dressed in effortless, expensive-looking athleisure, her silver-blonde hair in a perfect messy bun. Her eyes, a pale, clear blue, scanned Maria quickly, taking in the bare feet, the yoga pants, the clearly-just-rolled-out-of-bed vibe.
“Hey,” Sasha said, a slow smile spreading. “Rough morning?”
“Just… slept in,” Maria mumbled, stepping aside to let her in. The smell of lemongrass and chili filled the apartment.
Sasha walked in, her gaze drifting around the room with casual ownership. She set the food and drinks on the coffee table, next to Maria’s half-full, cold cup of chai from that morning. Her eyes snagged on the couch cushion, which was bulging slightly, the faded grey fabric of Joe’s shirt sleeve just visible where Maria had hastily stuffed it.
“Ah,” Sasha said, the sound soft, knowing. She didn’t look at Maria. She kept her eyes on the cushion. “Am I interrupting something?”
“No,” Maria said, too quickly. “Just cleaning up.”
“Right.” Sasha finally turned. Her smile was different now—less friendly, more feline. Curious. “It doesn’t look like yours.”
There was no point denying it. The shirt was massive, clearly a man’s. Maria felt a flush creep up her neck. “It’s not.”
Sasha didn’t ask whose. She didn’t need to. Instead, she closed the small distance between them. She moved with a yogi’s grace, but there was an intent to it that had nothing to do with asanas. She reached out, not for the shirt, but for Maria’s arm. Her fingers were cool. She traced them slowly, deliberately, from the inside of Maria’s wrist up to the crook of her elbow, her fingernails dragging just enough to raise goosebumps.
Maria froze. The touch was a direct current. After the emotional avalanche with Joe, it was simple. Purely physical. A sharp, uncomplicated spark.
“You seem tense,” Sasha purred, her voice low. “Even for someone who just woke up.”
Maria’s brain short-circuited. This was the distraction she’d originally sought. A beautiful woman, offering a clear, passionless exit from her own head. A way to feel something that wasn’t the agonizing complexity of Joe. Sasha’s touch was an offer. A challenge written on skin.
But the ghost of Joe’s hands was still there, imprinted underneath. The memory of his forehead against hers, the terrible surrender in his voice. We stop starving ourselves.
Sasha leaned in, her breath warm against Maria’s ear. “Do you want me to go?”
Maria could feel the heat of her. She could smell her perfume, something clean and ozonic, like crashing waves. It was the opposite of cedar and coconut. It was new.
“I don’t know,” Maria whispered, the truth tumbling out. She was paralyzed, caught between the old poison and the new, terrifying hunger she’d just sworn to feed.
Sasha’s other hand came up, fingertips brushing the sensitive skin just above Maria’s hip bone, where the bruise from weeks ago had fully faded. The touch claimed the same territory. It felt like a replacement. An erasure.
The buzzer from the building’s intercom shattered the moment.
They both jerked back. Maria’s heart hammered against her ribs, a drum of confusion and guilt.
Sasha’s eyes flickered with mild irritation, then cooled into amusement. “Expecting someone else?”
“No,” Maria said, walking to the intercom panel by the door, her legs unsteady. “Probably a delivery for downstairs.” She pressed the talk button. “Hello?”
Static crackled.
Then his voice, strained and tinny through the cheap speaker. “Maria. It’s me. I left… I left my keys.”
Joe.
The world tilted. She saw Sasha’s eyebrow arch, the feline smile returning, wider now. This was a scene. A messy, unbearable scene.
Maria pressed the door release without another word. The lock downstairs clunked open electronically.
She turned to face Sasha. The woman hadn’t moved. She looked like a panther who’d just found the hunt more interesting than she’d anticipated.
“The plot thickens,” Sasha said, her voice light, but her eyes were sharp, taking in every micro-expression on Maria’s face.
“You should go,” Maria said, the words tasting like ash.
“Why? I just got here. The food’s getting cold.” Sasha settled onto the arm of the sofa, right next to the hidden shirt. She was staying. To watch. To see what happened when the source of the shirt came back to claim it.
Heavy footsteps sounded on the stairs, too fast. Joe wasn’t running, but he was taking them two at a time. Maria stood rooted in the middle of the living room, the golden light feeling suddenly exposing, theatrical.
The door, still ajar from Sasha’s entrance, swung open.
Joe filled the doorway, breathing slightly hard. His eyes found Maria first, a flash of something urgent and naked in them. Then they swept past her, landing on Sasha.
Everything stopped.
Joe’s face, already tense, went completely still. His warm brown eyes turned flat, opaque. He saw Sasha’s possessive perch on the arm of his couch. He saw the takeout bag, the intimate tableau of a planned lunch. He saw Maria, flushed and guilty-looking in the center of it all.
His gaze dropped to the couch cushion. The grey sleeve of his shirt was plainly visible now, dislodged by Sasha’s weight.
Maria watched him put it together. The shirt, discarded. The beautiful woman, smirking in his space. Her, caught between them. The narrative wrote itself in the hardening line of his jaw.
“Your keys,” he said, his voice utterly dead. He didn’t enter. He held up his keyring, the metal glinting in the sun, and tossed it underhand. It landed with a soft thud on the rug at her feet. A dismissal.
“Joe, it’s not—” she started.
“Don’t,” he cut her off, the single word a blade. His eyes flicked to Sasha, then back to Maria. The look in them wasn’t just hurt. It was a profound, weary disgust. Disgust at the situation, at her, maybe at himself for believing, even for a second, in their fragile morning truce. “It asks for more, right? Seems like you’re placing your order.”
He turned and left, his footsteps receding down the stairs, slower this time, final.
The apartment echoed with his absence.
Sasha let out a low, appreciative whistle. “Wow. So that’s the source of the shirt.” She stood, picking up her bag. “I’ll take a rain check on the food. This,” she said, gesturing to the charged emptiness Joe had left behind, “is so much better.”
She walked to the door, pausing to give Maria a look that was equal parts pity and intrigue. “Call me when you want the distraction. The real one. No ghosts attached.”
Then she was gone, leaving behind the smell of Thai food and ozone.
Maria stood alone in the sunbeam. The keys dug into the sole of her bare foot. She looked at the shirt, half-exposed, a relic of a war she was losing on all fronts. She had given the hunger more, just like she’d promised. She’d fed it jealousy, misunderstanding, and a fresh, gut-wrenching pain.
The hunger, it seemed, was just getting started.