Smirnoff Shags

Friends with Privileges …

I’d said before how I didn’t believe in sex without love. But I’ve grown up now, and am no longer viewing life through my rosy-tinted shades. Where I was once naïve and idealistic with hopes and dreams of a Forever Love, my “relationship” with Dr. Dish has changed all that. We’re involved, in the biblical sense … and yet, there have been no declarations as such, nor do I even think there might be some in the future(!).

I don’t deny I hope, however, I am realistic enough not to expect.

But while I may not be in love with him, I’m certainly in lust with him. I do genuinely like him - and not just for that stunning exterior alone! Because he is an inherently kind, decent human being, and in this day and age, one really can’t ask for more than that. (Yes, I do realise I deserve MORE, however, MORE isn’t at my doorstep at the moment.)

Plus, he’s got these huge dreamy eyes that a girl could just drown in. They go really big when he’s thoughtful, half closed when he’s turned on, and almost sly when he’s just about to make his move. (Hah, and he tells me he’s shy. I’ve got his number on this one … except I’m not one to look a gift horse in the mouth!)

I can still remember the first day I saw him. In a school full of geeks and bookworms (yours truly being one of the latter) and completely deprived of hot totty, the sight of this tall dark and handsome young boy stuck out like a sore thumb.

I remember that devastating smile – what I once thought of as mysteriously sexy, I know now was just awkward shyness. When he found out I wouldn’t bite, and would actually talk to him like a person, not an object, how he had relaxed and started laughing with me. When we sat next to each other at chemistry and wrote each other notes the whole time to make the lesson go quicker. When he first scribbled down his number for me to ring him... ah, if we only knew then what that would culminate in!

We became buddies. Not great mates, but two people who could always laugh at the world. We didn’t have deep meaningful conversations. While I could follow sport better than the average girl, I didn’t truly understand his passion or commitment to it. To be fair, I don’t think he recognised or understood my passion for words either (he being a man of NO words ...). We didn’t really have much in common … and honestly, we still don’t. However, in those days, we shared a lot of laughs.

I miss that part. I miss how he’d tease me mercilessly, yet always look on worriedly, wondering if he took things too far. How much easily he laughed with me than with anyone else. How he looked for me whenever he came to join a group I was with. I felt he liked me then, even if he won’t tell me now.

I remember that night when we sat together on my porch fence, alone in the world, those big eyes looking down at me, all innocent nerves. It could have been the perfect setting, but I hadn’t a clue he wanted me then. This popular, handsome, sports star … and me … sure, I was popular, but everyone only ever wanted to be my friend, not to be my boyfriend. It took me a further 8 years to do what I wanted to do that night.

8 years on, the day I turned 25, I gathered up the courage I didn’t have at 17, fuelled, of course, by the alcohol intake (it was my birthday!) and planted one on him. Of course, he’d been giving me signals the whole night, but nevertheless, I was still shocked when he responded … and much more! Almost 2 years on, here we are, still doing what we do!

In retrospect, I have to wonder did I lose him at 17 by my lack of confidence and low self-esteem? He started going out with the school siren the very next week. They stayed together, went off to university together and pretty much, everybody thought they’d have their happily ever after. Dr. Dish and the Siren – no one name was ever said without the other. In fact, the sight of him following her around like a devoted puppy would not easily leave me.

Perhaps he’d never love again, not that purely. Maybe she’s sucked all the remnants of feeling and emotion from him. Whatever devotion and affection he had then, he’s lost the will to conjure up again. She was a fool that was never good enough for him. She broke my Dr. Dish, and I wonder if I could ever make him whole again.

I don’t deny I’ve come with scars of my own … and perhaps now is the time we were meant to be with each other, not back then. I don’t know what we’re doing with each other now, but I don’t want to be without him either.

That shy young awkward star is now a Dishy Doctor. He is still rather awkward and shy, but is more self-assured than I remember. And that chatty bookworm has become a chatty Professional Butterfly. I’ve discovered style, I’ve discovered men … and I have a clue. Dr. Dish didn’t know what hit him!

However all that conversation we used to have is gone. Those easy laughs and drunken mirth. By crossing over to the greyness of a “Friends with Privileges” arrangement, our friendship is gone, and we don’t even have a relationship to make up for it. But we do enjoy each other, physically. Is this good enough for the long haul? Probably not. But only time will tell if there is more to our future than just a physical attraction.

We’ve been at it for nearly a year now. Surely a fling ought to be flung by now? However, if we’re just with each other until our Ones come, so be it … life’s too short to close the door on opportunity.

Particularly when that opportunity has those big dreamy eyes and hot body, full of promise I know he can deliver. Why spend Saturday nights alone on earth, when a phone call away is someone who can make the earth move. Again … and again …. and again!

Whatever my head tells me; my friends tell me, whatever common sense dictates, Dr. Dish is just something I have to … er, do.