Sex & Relationships

SUPER PREPPY USES ‘L’ WORD

SUPER Preppy and I are on the last night of our long holiday weekend – three days in Newport, R.I., and then three more at a small inn overlooking the ocean in Maine.

It’s been a vacation of falling deeper into That Which Cannot Be Named.

Certain things are better left unsaid right now. And certain things are better said exactly.

“WE HAVE TO LEAVE TONIGHT!!!” I had e-mailed him in a craze on Thursday. “I’M WEARING A SLUTTY FARMGIRL TOP AND EVERYTHING!! ALSO, I DOWNLOADED ‘ME SO HORNY’!!!!”

We left on Thursday.

And now it’s Monday, our last night. After a day spent hiking, we join his mother and aunts for dinner at the inn (Me: “I hope your mother holds me in high enough esteem.” SP: “She did say, ‘You’re having a very modern romance, aren’t you?’ “).

They’re fantastic. It’s a very modern dinner.

But now it’s just the two of us. SP and I are sitting on the wicker chairs of the porch, the beach air is crisp and my legs are on his lap.

“One more drink?” I say.

“One more drink,” he says.

He pulls his aunt’s bottle of vodka out of a cupboard. The One Drink turns into One-Third of a Bottle.

The conversation starts off slow. Such a nice trip. Can’t believe it’s been two months. Looking forward to spending the fall together. I think about you a lot. I’ve never had this kind of chemical attraction before. I always have the best time. You should come to California with me. Let’s go to Italy. Let’s go to MoMA. I hooked up with someone else when I was out of town that one weekend. I hooked up with someone, too.

I couldn’t stop thinking about you.

As we plan trips with the precision of two stoned college kids, he says, “And if we’re still in love -”

I perk up like a lawyer who’s just found the murder weapon.

“Love!” I say. “Did you say love?”

“Lust,” he says, sobering up. “Lust.”

“Right,” I say. “Of course.”

Something has happened on this vacation. After giving him a hard time for introducing me as his “friend,” I watched him choke out “girlfriend” to an old classmate at a party in Newport. Then I noticed the tone of his voice when he repeated it to his aunts in Maine. There is tenderness.

After finally putting the vodka away, we wander upstairs to our room where – because we are not married – we’ve been assigned twin beds.

“Come on,” he says, and leads me to a room where we can spend the night in each other’s arms.

We wake up, and there’s a sense of closeness like I haven’t felt before. The room is filled with the sound of the ocean.

“The problem with us,” he says, as we lie entangled like an interlocking puzzle, “is we don’t have any chemistry.”

In the morning, we take a long walk on the beach, then drive out to another waterfront where I suggest we stretch out near the tide.

He moves over to lie on top of me and a proper Maine woman comes walking past. We both grin, embarrassed.

“Hello,” he says.

“It’s yoga,” I say.

We are side by side in the sand, holding each other. He touches my necklace and points to the small gold charm that sparkles in the sun.

“Love,” he reads aloud.

He kisses me and rests his head on mine.

I don’t dare say a word.

mstadtmiller@nypost.com