Our first fight resolved, my sentence of sitting through the Super Bowl served and all but one slice of my Rice Krispies heart eaten, Slump Buster handed me a take-out menu so I could order the pizza we’d been fantasizing about all evening.
I told him what I usually ordered: “Goat cheese, spinach, and sun-dried tomatoes…plus a protein.”
“A protein?” he gawked. “Just call it ‘meat’!”
“But you can get chicken on pizza,” I said. “Or shrimp.”
“Yeah, but let’s not.”
Come to think of it, I wasn’t crazy about the goat cheese or spinach toppings either. Definitely not date-friendly foods. (Don’t make me elaborate.)
We settled on pepperoni and mushrooms. He made me make the call. When the doorbell rang an hour later, he looked up from his laptop, like, “Are you going to get that?”
I looked at him like, “It’s your house, buddy!”
I waited. He waited. My stomach was more insistent than his, apparently.
“Fine!” I said, hopping out of the recliner huffily. “I suppose I have to pay for the pizza, too?”
He shrugged. It was time to put my foot down!
“I’ll go halfsies with you,” I said, retrieving my wallet. He handed me some cash and I retrieved our pie.
“Wanna eat that in bed?” he asked.
What a yummy idea!
“Your room looks different,” I said as we settled into the bed. Then I realized why. “Hey! I’ve never been in here with the lights on!”
He chuckled, then cued up the movie “Secretary”, a film I’d seen once long ago and vaguely remembered, save for the bondage theme and Maggie Gyllenhal bent over a desk. I was ecstatic to see that the lead male actor was James Spader (who I developed a crush on while binging on “Boston Legal” last year…and is a spitting image of my man…hmm…)
If you haven’t seen “Secretary”, you should. It’s an incredibly sexy--and disturbing--film. I related to the characters and had visceral reactions to the film in ways I didn’t remember from my first viewing (which, I later calculated, must have been when I was…drumroll…twelve years old!).
After the movie, we lay in bed in the dark. Fully clothed, much to my chagrin.
“You can cuddle up against me,” he said, turning on his side.
I did.
“What did you like about that movie, aside from the spanking?” I asked.
“The control,” he said. “No. The illusion of control. Spader thinks he’s in control, but he’s really not. He’s a slave to his impulses.”
“But what about her? She’s certainly not in control,” I said.
“She finds control by abdicating it. He controls her pain.”
It was a very apt analysis. (I wouldn’t expect anything less from Slump Buster. He’s wicked smart.)
“What did you like about the movie?” he asked.
“I’m not sure that I liked it,” I said. The movie was so raw and relatable…up until the Hollywood ending. Can two wounded freaks really find happiness together?
“I guess I like the part where she says that she sees his suffering and wants him to know that he doesn’t have to hide it.”
SB didn’t seem to remember that part. I tried to mumble some sort of coherent quotation, but even I didn’t understand me.
(I’ve since Googled the quote. It was:
“In one way or another I've always suffered. I didn't know why exactly. But I do know that I'm not so scared of suffering now. I feel more than I've ever felt and I've found someone to feel with. To play with. To love in a way that feels right for me. I hope he knows that I can see that he suffers too. And that I want to love him.”
Damn, I wish I had remembered that verbatim! Those are the exact sentiments I’ve been trying to express since this guy and I met.)
We both got quiet. As SB's breathing turned rhythmic, I realized he hadn’t kissed me all evening. Not one kiss! (Don’t you dare blame pepperoni breath. I’d brushed my teeth and he knew it.)
It seemed we were going to have a bonafide sleepover…meaning: just sleeping.
WTF?! No make-up sex? The whole point of having an argument is the angry nookie afterwards. Fighting, sans fucking, is as ridiculous as meatless pizza. Or stocking-less secretaries.
Speaking of which, I took my socks off and tried to initiate footsie. Non-sexual spooning continued.
Next, I removed my sweater, moaning, “I’m so hot!”
“It is warm in here,” he concurred. “I feel like a furnace.”
“You can stoke my furnace anytime,” I purred.
Hint not taken.
I dropped trou to show off my Victoria’s Secret Very Sexy panties. He didn’t even try to sneak a peek.
I gyrated my hips. No reaction.
Finally, I just grabbed his crotch. That got his attention.
“You really can’t sleep, can you?” he asked.
I could, I suppose, but I can do that just fine on my own. If I drove all the way to Uptown, it was so that we could get down! It took more convincing than I would have liked, but in the end, I got my just desserts.
I basked in the post-coital glow, a belly full of pepperoni pizza, and my man's body pressed up against mine. I felt cozy and safe and satisfied…until I realized I hadn’t uttered a mea culpa for my mini freak-out earlier. I was about to apologize when…
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…
Hello Milestone #2.
“Fuck. I overslept,” SB said the next morning as he rolled out of bed.
“Fuck,” I echoed. “I slept over!”
I never did apologize for my part of the argument…
…so the next day, I made pizza instead.
In Man Eater’s world, the sincerest apologies are edible. I prepared the dough by hand and purchased pepperoni and mushroom slices, plus herbed cheese. I was planning to make a circular pizza, but as I rolled out the dough, it took on a heart shape all by itself. Aww! That’s when the name “Apology Pizza” came to me.
A few notes for the pizza-making virgins out there:
1) Your oven has to be hot. Ideally, 525 degrees. That’s as high as some oven temps go.
2) Pizza making, unlike bread baking, must be fast. Once you start, you can’t stop or that beautiful crust will get soggy.
3) Your pie is delicate. Transfer it from countertop to baking stone accordingly, or it will fall apart.
4) Pizza making is noisy. If your smoke detectors are sensitive like mine, the fire alarm will go off every time you open the door to check on your bubbling pie.
In less than half-an-hour on that sunny morning, I’d made a pizza almost identical to the one Slump Buster and I shared on the night of our first sleepover. I admit the heart shape morphed a bit in the oven and it wasn’t symmetrical. But you know what? It tasted just as good. And isn’t that true of human hearts as well? No matter how imperfect, they’re still capable of delicious lovin’.
Confession: I meant to bring this pizza to my man's place. The idea was that he could eat it for breakfast on the morning of his departure to New York…but it smelled so freakin’ amazing, I ate a couple slices when it came out of the oven, and another two for breakfast the next day. Then my 7-year-old saw me stuffing my face and asked for a big slice for her lunch. By the time my next date with my guy arrived, there was barely a couple squares left…
Whoops! So much for my "Apology Pizza." It appears I owe someone another "I'm Sorry"...and a pepperoni-mushroom pie!
NO APOLOGIES PIZZA
Ingredients
For crust:
3 ¼ cups flour
¾ tablespoon (1 packet) granulated yeast
¾ tablespoon salt
1 ½ cups water
For toppings:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 ¾ cup Sargento bistro shredded mozzarella with sun-dried tomato and basil (or any other herbed cheese blend)
½ package pepperoni slices
1 jar (6 ounces) sliced mushrooms, drained
Method
• Whisk dry dough ingredients together in large bowl.
• Add water; stir with wooden spoon just until dough forms.
• Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let rise for 2 hours.
• After initial rise, chill dough in fridge at least 2 hours for easier handling.
• When ready to bake, place pizza stone in oven. (A pizza stone ensures the crispiest crust. If you don’t have a pizza stone, a greased baking sheet will suffice.)
• Preheat oven to 525 degrees.
• Roll dough out on floured surface, shaping into heart shape (use pizza wheel to cut dough into heart shape if necessary). Transfer onto large sheet of parchment paper (so dough does not stick to stone. If you are using a baking sheet, no parchment paper is necessary.)
• With pastry brush, coat surface of dough with olive oil.
• Top with half of cheese, followed by pepperoni and mushrooms. Top with remaining cheese.
• Gently transfer pizza, on parchment paper, to baking stone.
• Bake 8 minutes; slide parchment paper out from under pizza. Bake additional 4-5 minutes or until crust is browned and cheese is bubbly.
• With oven mitts, remove pizza and stone from oven. Cool slightly, then slice.
• Serve with sincere apology, followed by hot & angry make-up sex!
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