Always & Forever, Vive Read online

  “All good things do come in threes,” I repeated.

  That’s me. I’m a party girl. Doing as Mama had suggested, I continued to date both men at the same time. They didn’t mind, so why should I?

  Drumroll, please…

  Boyfriend one: Jay Austin Johnston was a teacher’s assistant in the undergrad program, while working his way toward a Masters of Journalism in graduate school. We’d been seeing each other since the start of the semester.

  Was it an issue that he was the aide for my toughest professor, Dr. Henry?

  Nope.

  According to the school’s handbook, it wasn’t a violation of sorts. Technically speaking, we were both students and had the right to screw. And boy, did we ever.

  With sandy blond hair, a high forehead, and broad shoulders, there wasn’t one thing I disliked physically about that man. Think male supermodel Jason Lewis meets pop singer Nick Carter. That’s my Jay Austin Johnson.

  Even his hands, big and strong, made my sparkly lip-gloss drool down my face every time he touched me. Oh, and the way he played with my clit, causing me to orgasm with every touch.

  He looooved fingering me with those thick, skilled fingers. And I sure as shit wasn’t complaining. At the movies the week before, while we were watching an early screening of Finding Nemo, he’d used his coat to conceal the fact that he was indeed burying his hands deep between my legs. My heartbeat quickened and I became breathless.

  Go, Nemo. Go!

  Thank Gawd I’d gotten myself a Brazilian. Smooth, clean and ready for him night or day, I was always good to go for Jay Austin.

  After class, on Dr. Henry’s desk, he’d force my legs apart, raising my body’s temperature, and spread my folds wide, before tongue-fuckin’ the stress of studying out of me. Every nerve-ending on my body tingled.

  Ahhh, boy, could Jay Austin make me come buckets. The dude was on a mission, every single time, to make me shoot a geyser. It was the craziest thing ever, like major cray-cray. And he desired a commitment. He wanted to own me as I did the year’s latest Louis Vuitton handbag. Oh, how I love my French leather accessories.

  Wonderful, totally and utterly orgasmic, Jay Austin was almost perfect in every way. I supposed if I’d met him say a year or so before, I probably would’ve been completely obsessed with him, fantasizing about walking off into the sunset together.

  While I looked fabulous on his juicy beefcake arms, there was just one teensy-weensy problem...

  Ahem. To be honest (and don’t judge me now) he just wasn’t that in touch with his emotions. It was as if he was a Stepford boyfriend. You know, as in too perfect. He never raised his voice or got passionate about anything—except for my pussy.

  Sure, he was nice to think about when I was charging up my toy—getting myself off—and I loved the way my body felt alongside his. But his emotional intelligence to ‘go deep’ on a subject just wasn’t there. It was as if his feelings switch had been flipped permanently to the off position. We talked about the weather, sex, school, sports, and more sex. He kept it superficial.

  Yawn-O-Rama!

  Does that make me sound shallow? I hope not. I’d like to think I’m a deep intense person looking for a ‘connection’.

  When I’d told this to Mama, she’d explained, “My little angel, men generally aren’t emotionally in-tune with their feelings, let alone all that smart. Not compared to us women. That’s why you have your friends to keep your mind stimulated and your emotions in check with reality.”

  “Well, why have a lover then?” I’d asked Mama.

  “To keep your body motivated.”

  Hmm…I wasn’t sure I agreed. I wanted a man who made both my mind and body come alive.

  That was the reason I’d started hanging out (getting private tutoring lessons) with the school’s bad boy, who’d later go on to become boyfriend number two: Seneca Seminole.

  Another drumroll, please…

  He’s a Native American Indian and a PhD student in Sociology. Inked from head to toe with a lean body and a freak-of-nature ginormous dick, his brain was even bigger than his penis. I’m totally serious here, people.

  Seneca was the smartest guy on campus. For reals.

  He got a full scholarship to attend Manhattan’s only Ivy League institution, Columbia University. My college, too! And not because he was a minority. Heck, the guy didn’t even check off his ethnicity on his college application. Leaving that box blank, he got in on merit.

  Don’t you just love that?

  He knows every fact about everything. From the American Revolution to both World Wars and more, he’d recite the dates, the political leaders, and even the philosophical thoughts popular at the time.

  For the first time in my eighteen—soon to be nineteen—years, I was hot and heavy over a guy’s intelligence. It sorta freaked me the fudge out. I’d make chance encounters on campus so I could bump into him. The mere thought of him kept me awake at night. You should’ve seen the dark circles under my eyes when we first started dating. No eye cream or concealer could get rid of ‘em.

  Just as Jay Austin’s body and desire to get me off turned me on, so did Seneca’s smarts. The dude could easily win on Jeopardy.

  Don’t tell him I told you this, but last week, my besties and I filled out an application for him to audition to be on the show. He’d totally clean Alex Trebek up in one fell swoop. Cha-frickin’-ching.

  There was just one, teensy-weensy problem with Seneca…

  I know.

  He didn’t want a relationship.

  Please. Just shoot me.

  Any normal girl, I suppose, would just stick with the tried-and-true, devoting themselves to Jay Austin. Right? That was what Mama told me to do, too.

  Well, I am not normal, people. Hello! I crave challenges. I conquer things, places, and people. Once at Avon Porter, I’d even tried to flip my gay best friend to come back to the straight team. For reals. More about that later. Much later.

  Mama says I’m just like her mother, my grandmamma, Greta Ann, the founder of Farnworth Firewater. Brilliant in business, the woman had boyfriends on every continent. Lord love her, may she rest in peace.

  I was starting to think maybe I just wasn’t that type of girl. You know: relationship material. I hadn’t had love—true, endearing, everlasting l-o-v-e—since my boarding school days at Avon Porter with my first, and only, real heartthrob, Sanderloo Konjik. I miss that boy so much. He’s in Heaven with Grandmamma, Greta Ann. I’d like to think she’s watching over him.

  Jay Austin, you know, boyfriend number one, sometimes will say or do something that’ll remind me of Sanderloo. Maybe I look for him in all the boys I date. Usually, my eyes always prickle with tears when I think about him. Hearing his name, to this day, causes an excited flutter in my stomach. My breathing always slows and it’s as if I’m going into some type of trance thinking about, and memorializing, the good days I’d had with him. Wouldn’t it be great if I could go back in time and be with him just once more?

  Anyways…Seneca had told me straight-out when we first met, in a deep baritone voice which sent an erotic shiver straight to my vajayjay, “Vive, you’re a beautiful girl who has the whole world ahead of you. I want to keep seeing you, but I’m not looking for a serious relationship. I’m focused on my studies, as you should be, too. Would you be okay with us just having something physical?”

  “Hell to the no,” was my first response in a wavering voice of frustration. Followed by, “What kind of girl do you think I am, Seneca Seminole? I’m a Farnworth. My parents own the number one liquor company in the world. I could have any man on campus. Heck, I could take any man on the Upper West Side to be my boyfriend, such as Jay Austin, for example, and I am picking y-o-u.” The little hairs on the back of my neck had stiffened with annoyance. I wanted to knee him one in the nuts.

  He’d smiled at me with those black eyes which sparkled, and attested, “I don’t want you to stop seeing Jay Austin. He’s good for you. He cares about you, and yo
u deserve to have someone like him in your life.”

  “Damn straight.” However, it had made me want Seneca that much more.

  “You’re not exclusive, are you?”

  I’d shaken my head, hoping he’d give in and be mine. All mine.

  “Why don’t you date both of us?”

  “At the same frickin’ time?” I’d huffed, thinking he had to be kidding. I mean…really.

  “Yes. Sounds good, doesn’t it?”

  “No. That sounds exhausting.” I tried to make a joke to lighten the mood, because otherwise I’d break down and cry. “You’ve got some serious donkey balls to come back at me with this malarkey.”

  “Come on, whaddya say?” He’d persisted with an eager affection I wasn’t used to.

  Annoyed for not getting exactly what I wanted, and the way I’d intended, I stuck my nearly manicured-to-perfection middle finger—lacquered with the season’s hottest polish trend and my favorite color, gold—way up in the air and shouted, “Honey, you can take your PhD and shove it where the sun don’t shine. Fuuuck you!”

  Talk about annoying.

  However, days passed, then weeks, and I missed hearing stories about his Native American people.

  Did you know his father was from the Mohegan tribe and in the late ‘90’s designed the largest casino in the United States? Isn’t that cool?

  One night, I broke down and called him. I had to. I couldn’t sleep. I’d lost ten pounds from the stress of it all, which was about ten percent of my total body weight. I know.

  After he’d profusely apologized for offending me with his open relationship crap-on-a-stick bullshit, we’d agreed to meet up again and hang out as friends. We had a few drinks. He told me a story about his family and life on the Thames River. We might’ve smoked a ‘lil weed. Okay. Sometimes I smoke pot to take the edge off. Don’t get all judgy, puh-lease. I smoke for medical reasons. I get it from a doctor over on Madison Avenue. At least, I think he’s a doctor.

  Anyway…I took a hit of pot and then bam! My top came off. With the second inhale, much deeper than the first, going straight to my toes, bam! My pants came down. And ya’ll already know that I never wear any underwear. So we started to fool around.

  When he shoved his dark-skinned face between my peachy legs, he snarled as if he were some type of shape-shifting wolf from the wild. It was the freakiest thing. Like ever! He made me say his name in bed over and over again, as if he was channeling his Indian spirits from another tribe. And right before I came, he’d demanded that I “beg.”

  Shocked into a state of total freaky-deaky-ness, I asked, “Huh?”

  “If you want to come on my dick, and in my bed, you need to ask for permission.” His large hand took the side of my face. Holding me gently, sweetness in his eyes, he licked his lips and demanded, “Beg, woman, beg!”

  Well, that right there, that very display of alpha perversion? Oh, Lawdy, it turned my insides out with a lightness in my chest, my mouth went dry, my senses heightened, and I had to be with him in whatever capacity he’d have me.

  “Please, Seneca, may…I…come now?” I’d gotten all into it.

  He’d growled in my ear as he planted himself firmly between my legs and started to drill deep inside me.

  Whoever said that smart men were bad in bed clearly hadn’t been banged by Seneca Seminole. I swear on my Chanel handbag that we broke the bedframe, not to mention had my roomies up snickering from down the hall—until the wee hours of the morning. It was the best sex I’d ever had.

  I’m not kidding when I say that I seriously heard the song “Final Countdown” by ‘80s’ Swedish glam metal band Europe in my head the entire time the man was inside me. My body felt as if it had left ground, I’d said goodbye to planet Earth and was headed for Venus. Like seriously.

  After we had sex, we lay in bed for a minute, catching our breath. My mind raced a gazillion miles an hour trying to keep up with my pulse, which felt as if I were about to have a heart attack. It was as if a controlled, reformed, once-incarcerated part of me had finally been set free to fly in the wind. I’d tried to stand, to go take a shower, but my legs were too weak to walk. No kidding. Euphoria saturating every fiber of my being, instead, I crawled over and lay on top of him.

  It was then that he’d given me the nickname. “Vive, I’ll call you, Luyu.”

  With my face planted firmly on his hard chest, still seeing stars, I pressed my lips down on his hot skin before asking, “What does Luyu mean?”

  “Wild dove…”

  Right then. Right there. My heart, sometimes viewed by others as being cold and prickly, melted into a warm pool of love.

  I’d thought back to his question about having a physical-only relationship and realized with Seneca it wasn’t just sex. No, honey. It was a spiritual awakening. One which I’d never known. With my skin flushed to near fire, I thought…Hell to the yes. Yes! Dear God up above, thank you for bringing him to me and Y-E-S!!

  Just then, my bathroom phone rang, jolting me back to the present.

  Still on the bidet, leaning forward, I took the phone off the wall, and answered, “Hello.”

  “Hallå, Viveca! This is your mama.”

  “Morning…”

  Getting ready to be bored out of my mind by her long-winded stories of grandeur, I flipped the switch on my bidet to pulse and let the water do its thing.

  Ohhhh. Heaven.

  “Don’t you dare morgon me, young lady,” she hissed into the phone.

  “What now?” I asked, hating when she’d get like that. I was always in trouble.

  Do you have any idea what it’s like to have parents who believe you to be a constant fuck-up? Debilitating.

  Sure, I had a bad past. A horrific last few years that entailed the worst thing one could ever go through. Regardless, I didn’t want to talk about it. Not then. Hello! I’m on the bidet.

  “Your father and I are packing for a weekend trip to Gothenburg this morning to go visit your Aunt Birgitta, who’s hosting a charity dinner for the Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society.”

  “Ah-huh.” I rolled my eyes. My parents might own a liquor company, but they hadn’t worked in years. Living off Grandmamma Greta Ann’s fortunes, they jetted around the globe, bouncing from one party to another, while their minions ran their enterprises.

  “Well, your aunt called this morning to see what time we’d be getting in and while she had me on the phone, she told me that last night at a soirée she bumped into the Whites.”

  Yuck-o-nasty.

  The Whites had spawned my number one frenemy of all time: Poppy-freakin’-White, or as my besties and I had called her behind her back, Miss Poopy Wipe.

  We hated, loathed, and detested Poppy. And for good reason!

  The previous semester, her talk show broke the story on my besties and me sneaking into a club and getting roofied. It was all a big mistake and none of it was our fault. Well, except for the fact that we’d paid for some fake identification cards showing that we were over the age of twenty-one.

  Clearly, we weren’t.

  That girl could destroy ‘ya in a blink. Therefore, we’d done our best to keep her happy, which meant being her ‘friend’.

  Before the roofie incident, my parents had even gone as far as running Farnworth Firewater advertisements on TV. When she’d aired that nasty segment on us, they pulled their ad dollars quicker than you could say kackerlacka! (That’s Swedish for cockroach.)

  Regardless, it was too late. Poppy White’s once-regional Manhattan-only talk show had gone national that semester, picked up by every major network from Whynot, Mississippi to Pie Town, New Mexico.

  Her success (at my expense) was enough to make anyone puke.

  Especially me!

  To be honest, I had other reasons for not liking Poppy besides the fact that she wouldn’t stay out of my life. I mean, who has a full-on-balls-to-the-wall career in television as the host of their own talk show, while attending freshman college classes full-time? The g
irl never slept. It was as if she snorted Adderall all day long to keep herself running around campus in fifth gear. She made all of us appear lazy and unmotivated.

  I hated her for that, too.

  Another reason I couldn’t stand Poppy was I couldn’t keep up with her schedule for success. For example, my stressed body requires a nap every day at 4 p.m. Also, when I was out late dancing on Thursday nights, I usually skipped Friday classes and spent the entire day on the sofa watching my favorite soap, The Bold & the Beautiful. Not to mention, on Monday mornings—which was usually when Pucci and Dior had their sample sales—I was always first in line. Always! Now I ask you, knowing my hectic schedule, when would I have the time to hold down a job?

  Exactly!

  I didn’t think that Poppy chick had ever watched a soap opera, gone clubbing or bought couture. The girl was no fun.

  “Nice to see they’re on the same jet-set schedule as you and Papa.” I tried to hide my annoyance. “How are Mr. and Mrs. White?”

  “Fine. Elated, in fact. They were bragging, going on and on about how their daughter had just secured a book deal with one of those top New York publishers.”

  I knew where Mama was going with this conversation, and it was draining every fiber I had to get sober. So, I upped the pulse on the bidet to a firm stream of fabulousness, picked up a half-filled bottle of bubbly, left over from the night before, from the floor near the tub, took a few swigs, and tried to drown out her jabbering.

  Yesss. Right there.

  See, my parents may not ‘work’ but they sure took the family money and started a cow load of companies. From restaurant chains to cattle ranches, my folks had created dozens of enterprises. Don’t get all impressed, though. They didn’t roll up their sleeves and bust a sweat, or anything. They hired people to work their companies while they golfed, spa’d and lived the lifestyle People magazine had said they deserved.

  Spare me!

  However, they felt that as soon as a teenager could land a job, they should. And I never did. They reasoned that if a person had the resources available, one should start their own company. And again, I had millions left to me in a trust by my Grandmamma Greta Ann, but I hadn’t started much in my life…except trouble.