I wondered for a moment if he was going to try to kiss me. We were so close; all I could think about was tasting him. He would only have to lean in a few inches. I would succumb willingly… My hands slowed in their movements as I tried to be precise with removing the wood shards. My eyes were fixed on tracing the texture and contours of his shirt, since I couldn’t look him directly in the eyes.

I thought about what his full lips might feel like on mine, how the skin on his muscular chest might feel under my hands. For a moment I could understand why those sick fans wanted to pull his shirt off. Now I thought about pulling his shirt off too and right after that, his shoes, his belt, his jeans...

I had to banish those thoughts from my head. That line of thinking was way too dangerous.

“You should be able to get the rest,” I muttered, quickly turning on my heels to hurry back into the cabin. Don’t do this to yourself, Taryn. You can’t have him.

I washed my hands thoroughly at the sink and unpacked some of the food from the cooler.

“What are you up to?” he asked when he joined me in the kitchen. I was rinsing the two enormous lobster tails I picked up at the seafood store under the water.

Ryan peeked over my shoulder. “Mmm, lobster!” He grinned, smacking his lips together. “Need help?”

I noticed when he stood next to me, he was careful not to let our bodies touch. He kept a small, but safe distance between us. I wondered if he did that on purpose.

Ryan sat down at the dinner table, in the same chair that my father always sat in. The memory of that made me smile. I imagined my father being pleased with the man who now took his place at the table. Ryan and my father would have gotten along very well.

We had a lovely dinner together as the fire crackled behind us; the radio was playing soft music in the background. It was actually quite romantic.

A tinge of nervousness crept into my gut from being alone with him in a secluded cabin in the middle of the woods. All alone… with him, my mind repeated. Bottle of wine… fireplace… bedroom just down the hallway. I swallowed hard. Would he be expecting more? After all, I did bring him here. I pretty much set the stage for a convenient tryst.

“That was delicious, Taryn.” Ryan stretched back in his chair, patting his stomach. “I’m stuffed!”

I was glad he enjoyed it, but now the flow of panic was surging in like the tide. What’s next? I had just started to smile at him when I felt queasy again. He helped me clear the table and I began washing the dishes when the wave of nausea hit.

“I don’t feel so good.” I rubbed my stomach and dashed for the bathroom.

I was gone for so long that Ryan had washed all the dishes and was kicked back on the couch by the fire.

“Are you all right?” he asked. I could hear the concern in his tone.

“No. I feel really sick.”

“My stomach isn’t feeling so hot either.”

I looked at him, surprised that his stomach was in knots too. Apparently I wasn’t the only one who was nervous.

I had just sat down on the couch when I felt like I could vomit. I ran back to the bathroom just in time to make it to the toilet as dinner came back up… several times.

Ryan was pale when I came out of the bathroom; he hurried right past me and shut the door. I trudged down the hallway to the master bedroom so I could lie down; I was really feeling lousy. I turned the television on to drown out the sounds of Ryan getting sick.

“Whatever you do, don’t go in there,” he groaned as he lay down on the bed next to me. Even though he warned me, I couldn’t wait. I darted for the bathroom again for round two of violent vomiting.

For the next several hours we took turns violating the bathroom. I hadn’t been that sick in years.

“I just threw up air,” I said as I curled back down on the bed next to him.

Ryan softly chuckled. “I threw up food I haven’t even eaten yet.”

His comment made me laugh.

“Do you think it was the lobster?” he asked, pulling the blanket up higher on his shoulder.

“I was wondering that myself,” I said, knowing now that it wasn’t just my nerves that made me ill. When I spoke, the words that came up my sore throat made me cough.

“But it was still partially frozen and I rinsed it. I was trying to think of what else I ate today. Maybe it was that breakfast sandwich? The sausage?”

“Could be. But we both got sick right away. I’m thinking tainted lobster – either that or it was the salad.”

“My ribs are killing me.” I winced as I rubbed my stomach. “But I don’t feel like I need to be sick anymore, so that’s a good thing.”

“Me neither. I’m starting to feel a little better actually.”

“I’m so sorry,” I pleaded with him. “Don’t hate me.”

“I don’t hate you,” he whispered sweetly, his fingers drifted across my forehead. He pulled the blanket up higher on my back to cover me up.

“We’re never buying any seafood again from wherever you bought that lobster though, I can tell you that!”

For as lousy as I felt and how sick I just was, the fact that he just said “we” sent a wave of elation through my soul.

Ryan was curled up in a ball and I could hear him start to breathe heavier. He had fallen asleep, so I turned the television off and closed my eyes.

After that marathon session of nastiness, it wouldn’t take me long to fall asleep either.

I knew I was dreaming when I couldn’t see the ground that my feet were supposedly running on. I was trying to get through one of those mazes that are made out of tall hedges that you see sometimes in movies, and every turn I took was a dead end. I’d have to turn around and run down the same path that I just came from, all the while hearing Ryan calling my name and asking me to “come here, come here.” I had to find him.

I ran down a long row of hedges and turned to the left where I thought his voice was coming from. As soon as I turned the corner, there was a mob of women, all wearing a picture of his face on their shirts, blocking my path. They started to laugh at me; some of them were cackling like witches.

Photographers stepped out of the shrubs and were taking pictures of me as I started to cry. I felt the twang of terror set in as one girl in the front row morphed into the likeness of Suzanne Strass. She grabbed me by the hair and pulled fiercely, bending me backwards.

“He’s mine, bitch!” she screamed in my face. “Not even in your dreams.”