Let Us Eat Cake by Destiny Moon Page A

sneak cake into my room late at night.
    “You’re bad,” I said.
    “Very,” he agreed.
    “Some things never change.”
    “Oh yeah? What do you mean by that?”
    Whoa. Did he really not remember?
    “You and me. Senior year. The beach party?”
    He smiled. “I haven’t forgotten. Do you still know all the lyrics to every Bob Dylan song ever recorded?”
    “I do,” I said. But the sing-a-long was not what I was referring to. We made out all night. I wanted to go all the way but he stopped me since I’d been drinking, and he said he wasn’t the kind of guy who could take advantage. I always appreciated that intellectually, but I was so bummed he’d never asked me out. I found out shortly after the beach party that he went out with Chloe Sanderson and I was heartbroken.
    “What are you thinking?” he asked, as though he could tell that my mind was elsewhere, piecing together the history of longing I had for him.
    “Me?” I snapped back into the moment. “Why, I was thinking about cake, of course.”
    “I’m thinking you should offer me a piece of this deliciousness.” The way he eyed me made me feel naked.
    “You mean carrot cake?”
    “Sure, if that’s what you want to offer.”
    I stared at him for a moment, trying to glean the meaning of his bold words.
    “You’re really bad,” I said. “It’s a school night. I have a paper due tomorrow. I had no idea I’d be meeting…” A tall, dark and handsome ghost from my past.
    “I’m an exceedingly bad influence,” he agreed. He took the lid off the cake I was holding and pierced the perfect frosting with his finger. Then he brought his cream cheese-laden forefinger to my mouth. What could I do?
    I took his digit into my mouth, right there beneath the florescent lights of the bakery section.
    “How is it?”
    “Mmmm,” I moaned, my taste buds in overload.
    “I like that sound you’re making.” He grinned. “I want to hear more of that.”
    “This icing is so good,” I said, trying to cling to what little innocence was left.
    “You want more, don’t you?” he asked.
    “More frosting?” I was confused.
    “More everything,” he said. Then he plunged his finger into the cake again and pushed his way into my reluctant mouth. I didn’t want to be fed this way in public, but I couldn’t help it. My mouth was agape.
    He filled it with creamy goodness and I moaned louder. I sucked on his finger, keeping it in my mouth longer than necessary for licking it clean.
    “You have beautiful lips,” he said.
    I raised my eyebrows and licked my lips. “Thank you.”
    “I want to watch you eat more. I bet you look even sexier eating cake.”
    “Maybe,” I said. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
    “Yeah, I would.”
    There was a tingle deep inside me that told me sexy Jeff—whom I’d never gotten over—was my reward for venturing out into the cold, and for the entire last semester of hard work. It had been ages since I’d had any fun at all, let alone fun in the company of a guy. My long-term fellow and I had ended it—badly—almost a year earlier. Since then, my friends had started to call me cynical and I’d begun to think of myself as hopeless in the love department. I didn’t even trust guys enough to have simple hook-ups, like Savannah did. That seemed too emotionally unsatisfying. But Jeff…
    “So what’s your deal now? Do you hang out at the store a lot?” I asked.
    “As a matter of fact, no. This is my first time here.”
    “Weird that we should happen to cross paths then.”
    “Or fate,” he said. He grinned. “What do you study?”
    “Anthropology.”
    He nodded. “So are you going to analyze the flirtation techniques of old flames then?”
    “So you are flirting,” I said. “I wasn’t sure. I didn’t know if you really remembered me from… Well, you know.”
    “Of course I remember.”
    “But you chose Chloe Sanderson instead of me.”
    I couldn’t believe I had blurted it out like that. All those years of