“This is the very ecstasy of love…”
—HAMLET, ACT 2, SCENE 1
For the record: my life has officially begun.
I just had sex with Mick Horton, who is thirty-one and the hottest, sweetest guy ever. What’s even more amazing is that Mick Horton had sex with me, Iris Wagner. Only I’m not the same Iris Wagner I was four hours ago. I’m new and totally one hundred percent improved. How couldn’t I be? Of all the girls in Montreal, Mick Horton picked me. Mick Horton wants me. Really wants me.
We’re stretched out on his bed now. Mick has dozed off, his back facing me. He has a great back, tanned and sinewy, with ripples of muscle in the right places. I’m lying on my side, admiring him and replaying every second of our night together.
We had dinner at this trendy sushi place on Saint Laurent Boulevard—the kind of place with dim lighting and beautiful waitresses in tight black dresses. Not that he was looking at them. I swear he never took his eyes off me. Mick makes me feel seen.
He ordered for both of us. We shared a platter with sashimi and California-style kamikaze rolls. Mick knows all about sushi. I swear he knows all about everything. We drank sake, which is hot wine that comes in a ceramic carafe.
I didn’t get drunk or anything, just a bit buzzed. Besides, Mick didn’t let me drink too much. He put his hand over my sake cup when the waiter wanted to refill it. I love how Mick wants to protect me.
He showed me how to use chopsticks. I’d tried using them before, but I’d always given up because it took too long. I loved the feeling of Mick’s fingers pressing down on mine, showing me what to do.
We talked nonstop—about Hamlet, my career, even about my father. Mick thinks I need to answer the Facebook message. “Whatever happened between him and your mother is their business. You have your own relationship with him.”
“But that’s just it,” I told Mick. “I’ve never had a relationship with him. Not one I can remember.”
“Write back to him.”
As soon as Mick said it, I knew it was the right thing to do.
“But what about my mom? Do you think I should tell her?”
Mick ran his finger back and forth over his soul patch. “From what you’ve told me, I’d say your mother doesn’t want to know.”
Afterward, Mick wanted me to see his loft. “We can work on your lines, Joey.”
I laughed when he called me Joey.
“Are you calling me a baby kangaroo?”
Mick explained how Australians are big on nicknames.
I knew from the feeling I got when Mick put his hand on the small of my back and left it there that we weren’t just going to his loft to work on my lines. I could’ve told him no. Part of me knew I shouldn’t be going to see the loft of a guy I’d only just met, whose age I still didn’t know and whom I couldn’t tell anyone about. Not Katie, not my mom. But the sense that I was doing something wrong… well, it was another feeling I’m not used to, as if I were playing with fire—and it only made me want to do it more.
Mick has the coolest loft. It’s in a high-rise on Cavendish Boulevard, where the street comes to an end. Mick says most of the other tenants in the building are seniors. Mick’s renting a corner unit on the ninth floor. It’s basically one room with high ceilings and giant floor-to-ceiling windows. When we looked out, we could see past Saint Joseph’s Oratory to the lights on the top of Mount Royal. The furniture’s cool too, though Mick didn’t pick it. Everything’s chrome and glass—and there’s a great black leather couch with zebra cushions.
In the end, I was glad I’d already had sex with Tommy. I didn’t want Mick thinking I was just some kid.
We did work on my lines, like Mick said we would. He wanted to focus on Act II, Scene I. He said he’d read Polonius’s part. “I’d never cast you as Polonius,” I told him.
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Polonius is a bore. You’re…you’re totally interesting.”
“I’ve been accused of lots of things,” Mick said. “Boring isn’t one of them.”
I closed my eyes as I prepared to become Ophelia.
“ ‘My lord,’ ” I whispered, “ ‘as I was sewing in my closet…’ ”
That’s when he kissed me. I knew it was coming, but that kiss still took me a little by surprise. For the tiniest second, I thought of backing away, of saying I shouldn’t have come upstairs, but it was already too late for that. Besides, Mick’s kiss was like no kiss I ever had before or ever even imagined. He slipped his hand behind my head (I could tell right away he knew exactly what he was doing) and brought my lips to his. The kiss started soft and gentle, but then it turned more…well, more urgent. Hungrier. A little rough, but not in a hurting way. More an exciting way. “Go on,” Mick whispered. His voice was hoarse.
I knew what he wanted—for me to go on with my lines. “ ‘As I was sewing in my closet, Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbraced…’ ”
That’s when Mick unbuckled his jeans. His eyes were shining, playful. I felt like we were being childlike and grown up at the same time. "You mean unbraced like this?" he asked, unzipping himself.
“Uh-huh.” I was too excited to keep saying my lines.
“Or did you mean embraced—like this?”
He kissed me again. I could feel the stubble over his lips chafing my chin, my cheeks. Then he took off my clothes—and looked at me like I was the eighth wonder of the world. I’d have thought being naked like that would make me feel shy or embarrassed, but it didn’t.
It was totally different than with Tommy. Tommy had been nervous and jumpy, like a puppy. Mick was more like a lynx, agile and in charge. He slid his hands all over me. Then he carried me from the leather couch to his bed. I couldn’t have told him no even if I’d tried to.
Mick said he loves everything about me. My face, my body, my hair (now that I wear it off my face), even the way I sometimes cackle when I laugh.
“Joey, touch some part of me that begins with an…h.”
I touched his head.
“Your turn,” he said.
“I like this game. Touch some part of me that begins with an…e.”
Mick touched my eyelid. No one’s ever touched my eyelid before.
We went through practically the whole alphabet. We got stuck on x and z and q.
Maybe I should’ve waited to have sex with Mick till I knew him better. Katie says there’s a five-date rule, that you need to go out with a guy five times before you do it. And two dates on the same day don’t count. But Katie’s never been with Mick.
The thing is, I feel like I’ve known Mick forever. More dates wouldn’t have made a difference.
The other thing is, I can’t resist him.