He pulled away and disposed of the condom before coming back, cuddling up behind me, and arranging the covers over us. I heard a car horn beep and a few cars pass underneath our apartment window during the silence between us. "That was great, right?" Mike asked, his warm breathing hitting the back of my neck. I absolutely abhorred the feeling of breath on my back and I constantly told him that, but he always assumed that I'd get over it. "Hmm," I said, noncommittally. I didn't have to be worried about him catching anything from my reactions or tone of voice because he barely even knew when I was happy; I always had to tell him when something happened, be it good or bad. "Love you," he mumbled, half asleep and rubbing his chin stubble on …show more content…
I knew that if I told him that it bothered me, he'd either cut it off and be perpetually late to work or he'd deliberately leave it on so that I could go through any of his morning routine with him. This is why I usually pretended to be asleep, although I didn't have any objection to eating breakfast with him, it was the morning sex. If I happened to be awake in the morning, he'd want to have sex. I knew that he wouldn't make me if I didn't want to, but I felt bad whenever I denied sex to him. Later that morning, after Mike had left, I slowly followed through my morning routine, not dreading going into work, but not necessarily wanting to go in. Although I was now the assistant photographer at R. James Art and Design, my dream job, I didn't enjoy going in on Mondays any more than I had when I was a busser at an all-day breakfast place when I was in college. But, at least I had the consolation of being able to boss around the interns (not that I did) and not being bossed around by Abe, the executive photographer. When I got in, Abe's face was a dusky red color and a vein was popping out in the side of his neck while he was yelling at some cowering intern that I'm pretty sure was Irene, an aspiring graphic