Bedroom Egocentrics

thethemeis: Selfishness

theauthoris: Aaron Twentythree

   If you watched us tussle among the sheets, her yelping her girlish screams and me letting out extremely occasional grunts and moans at a low volume, you’d see a pair of lust-drunk friends wrapped in a selfless quest for mutual gratification. You’d see how we explore every square centimetre of each other’s skin, wanting only to please each other. You’d see what looked like a pair of lovers, kissing and licking and nibbling and gyrating their way to synchronised orgasms, muscles quivering and beads of sweat meeting to trickle through hairs-on-end to soak into the bedcovers. Get close enough, and you’d smell the vodka on our breath. 

   But when we’re done, and we lay breathless and naked and used beside each other, we are exposed as the two most selfish people on Earth. She, the woman who knew from the very start that this would amount to nothing more than a friendship with certain other never-to-be-mentioned-in-public benefits, and who agreed to those terms without hesitation, has the audacity to hope for - no - expect it to blossom into something beautiful, like love. She wishes with all her heart that I could open my eyes and see that the chemistry we share in the bedroom extends to our lives outside of it, that we would be perfect together. She knows full well that I never want to go there, but still every time it runs through her head, and she selfishly does nothing to prevent it. If she were such a good friend, would she not keep these feelings to herself, knowing that I will never return them, and wince at the prospect?

   I, on the other hand, am the one who greedily expects this woman to carry on spending nights with me without ever yearning for any more commitment than I’ve already promised. I am the one who wants this woman to stay true to a verbal agreement we made at the start to never let it get too serious, even though I know that sexual relations complicate even the most airtight of contracts. I want this glorious paradigm of womankind to fulfil my sexual needs whenever I deem it necessary, to never look around for alternatives who could love her more; and I have the gall to expect her to suppress any emotional attachment she feels towards me, because I never want to love again. 

   We made the worst agreement two people who are sexually attracted to one another can make. And in our own ways, we’re both of us the most egocentric people in the world because of it.

   So after tonight’s particularly rigorous session, drops of my bodily fluid on her chest and a smile on her face as she runs a finger up and down my arm, she says the most selfish thing she could say. 

   ‘Aaron, we’d be so good together, why won’t you consider it?’

   And I reply with the most selfish response I could possibly think of. 

   ‘Fern, drop it, okay? We agreed this would be fine, we don’t need labels, responsibilities and commitments ruining such a good thing.’