29. The Season
29
THE SEASON
[Bolan]
N othing surprises me more than a short video of Ruthie and Tulane together in our duplex. Both girls are smiling through the screen and waving at me, saying, “Hi Dada.”
My chest pinches. I miss them both and can’t wait to call Ruthie when the game is over. She’s home early and nothing makes me happier.
“What are you doing there?” I chuckle when I eventually lay on my back, staring up at the ceiling of my hotel room. Cyrus and I chose to room together, but he’s down at the bar with a few of the guys.
“I thought I’d surprise you,” she says.
“Best surprise ever.”
We’re both quiet a second.
“It’s good to hear your voice,” Ruthie finally says, hers not more than a whisper. It’s late, and I wasn’t able to see the video until after the game. Now is the first chance I’ve gotten to talk to her today.
“It’s nice hearing yours, too.” I scoot lower on the bed, settling in with my ankles crossed and my hand behind my head.
“Makes me feel like you’re here.”
I hum. “And where are you?”
“In bed.”
I chuckle lightly. “That would be our bed,” I clarify.
While Ruthie and I were eventually sleeping in the same bed back in Arizona, because I finally gave in after hurting my back and her noticing the crick in my hip, we haven’t had another moment like that afternoon after my doubleheader. And as far as I’m concerned, we aren’t going back to sleeping separately. We’ll already have too many nights apart as it is.
This week has been rougher than I thought without her present. I hate sleeping without her. And I especially hate that she came home and I wasn’t there to greet her properly. To welcome her into our new place.
“Our bed,” she whispers, as if convincing herself.
“What’s mine is yours, baby,” I tease.
“But am I yours?” Her voice is still quiet, hesitant.
Does she worry that I’m on the road not being faithful to her? I’m not upset by her concerns. My douchebag cousin did a number on her and she has deep trust issues, but I want Ruthie to trust me.
“Flower,” I groan. “I’m yours, and I wish I was there to show you how much I’m yours.”
“What would you show me?” Her voice shifts, sounding less sleepy and more seductive. Is my wife getting turned on in our bed? Without me? Fuck that.
“Ruthie, what are you wearing? ”
She chuckles, light and carefree, breaking the sudden tension winding around my body, turning it into something not unwelcome. The sound sends shivers over my skin with a need to touch her, to be close to her.
I move my hand to my belly, beneath the waistband of my joggers, but stops short of touching myself despite the sudden hardness of my dick.
“Just my pajamas.”
“The white set?” I ask. She has this pair of silky white shorts and matching tank top. Too often, I’ve imagined her wearing the set without a bra. Nipples peaking against the soft material. The bottoms revealing a sliver of her fine ass.
She giggles. “Actually, no. It’s a bit chilly here for that outfit.”
“Hmm.” I’m already lost in my head with images of her despite what she isn’t wearing.
“Bolan.” She pauses. “What if I told you I was naked with just layers of blankets over me?”
“Are you telling me that sweet body of yours is rubbing against our new sheets and I’m not there to see it?” I choke. “Flower, you’re killing me.”
My hand slides down my stiff length then tugs up my hard cock to thoughts of her naked and writhing against the sheets, turned on and needy for me.
“Let me see,” I moan.
“You want to see me naked in our bed.”
“Absolutely.” My voice stresses, my resolve straining. I squeeze my cock harder, giving it a slow, steady pull.
“I’ve never—” I can almost see her lick her lips, hear it in my head. Her nervous habit. Her innocent eyes. “Clifton didn’t?—”
“Do not speak another man’s name in our bed.” That might have come out a little harsher than it should, but my patience cracks. I need to hear her call my name, knowing she’s in our bed, in our home, waiting for me.
“Flower.” I gentle the demand in my voice. “Let me see you.”
A heavy pause fills the phone before she says, “Give me a minute?”
“I’ve got time.” I’ve waited a long time to see her fully naked, and I’d planned to continue waiting until I was home, but my wife is just too tempting.
The call gets dropped, and for a moment, I think she’s not going to play along. I don’t know if I’ve ever done this either, and suddenly, I’m nervous.
But then a Facetime call comes through, and her face appears on the screen with a dark shadow behind her.
“Hey.”
“Hi, beautiful.” My entire face lights up just seeing her. I feel my cheeks heat and my smile grow. “Let me see all of you, baby.”
She flips the image, giving me a shocking, but stunning view of her body from breasts to toes. Those fucking red painted ones.
“Ruthie,” I choke again, knowing she’s giving me something special here. Not just a view of that luscious body of hers but her trust. There’s something intimate about visual phone sex or watching another person self-love. A level of vulnerability involved.
I’m vulnerable in a lot of ways with Ruthie but this is not going to be an area I hesitate. I want her to feel confident, respected, desired.
“Show me how you pleasure yourself, flower. Let me see those petals.”
She giggles again, most likely at what she considers my ridiculous name for a sacred spot on her, but she has no idea how pretty and pink she is down there, how she swells and drips, blossoming like a dewy flower.
I watch as her fingers skitter down her midsection and disappear between her legs. Her breath hitches, and I squeeze my dick harder, tugging a little quicker.
“That’s it, Ruthie. Show me those fingers touching you.”
Ruthie sits up and positions the phone between her raised knees, propped against blankets rolled to her feet.
“Fuck, baby,” I groan, a little surprised how easily she followed my instructions, but also loving how the woman who hasn’t done a few things, easily does them with me. I never want to break Ruthie. I want to help her mend her fractured parts. I want her to give me the broken places and trust that I’ll hold them together. Like the Japanese art of Kintsugi, Ruthie and I form something beautifully imperfect and rare.
With heavy lids, I watch as she slides her fingers up and down her seam, stilling on her clit before rubbing in slow, delicious circles around that tender nub.
“Right there, baby. Feels good, doesn’t it? You’re turned on, knowing I’m watching you give me this little show, this precious display.”
“Bolan.” Her voice quietly squeaks.
“I’m between your legs, baby,” I remind her. “And just look at that pussy. So ripe. So needy.” I lick my lips although she isn’t watching me. “I want to lick that slit. I want to taste you again.”
Her back arches a bit. The phone jostling just the slightest, but I still have a clear view of my wife pleasuring herself to the sound of my voice. My own arousal builds. My dick tight. The tip seeping.
Ruthie purrs, the sound salacious and greedy.
“Would you like that, baby? My tongue back on that pussy. Slicing you open and drinking that sweet honey.” My mouth falls open like I can taste her. That nectar on my tongue. Her musky scent at my nose .
My dick is so hard, it almost hurts. My balls tighten, my back pinching. “Flower,” I grunt.
And then I hear the soft, sweet cry of her calling my name, and I watch as she releases around her fingers, spilling down toward her fine ass, marking our sheets.
“Watching you, I’m going to come,” I announce, ready to burst myself knowing she’s safe in our home, tucked into our bed, there for our daughter.
Her phone is moved, and suddenly, I can see her face. Her eyes bright despite the darkness. “Let me watch you.”
Quickly, I angle the phone in a way she can see me fisting myself, thinking of her, feeling those eyes on me, and I spill over, bursting like a fountain opened in spring, coating my hand in sticky substance and falling back at the relief.
“That was hot,” Ruthie states, her voice full of awe and innocence.
Oh, the ways I could corrupt her . But there are so many ways she’s changing me.
A family man. Thinking about home. Wanting to be with my wife.
The next night, I’m eager to get to the hotel room and have a repeat of the night before, but Ruthie sounds tired. Again, it’s late. But she also sounds serious when she says, “I need to talk to you about something.”
I’d called my girls in the morning, where Ruthie made the video time more about Tulane, so I could see my bubbly redhead and listen to her babble about her plastic farm animals.
“Okay.” I’m lying on my back, similar to last night’s starting position. Ankles crossed. Hand behind my head, but I’ve settled in to listen. “Let’s switch to Facetime. ”
I need to see her if we’re going to discuss something serious.
Within seconds, we flip over to the video call and Ruthie offers me a soft smile. She’s so beautiful, it’s like I haven’t seen her in days, when it was only this morning.
“So, Tulane called me Mama.”
My lips slowly start to curl.
“And I don’t know what to do about it. We haven’t really discussed my position. With her.”
My smile instantly drops. “Sounds like Tulane has determined your relation to her.”
“I don’t want you to think I’ve been coaching her to call me that or?—”
“I’m going to stop you right there.” I sit up, propping myself against the headboard with pillows at my back, realizing this conversation needs better attention. “You are coaching Tulane. That’s how I view parenting. You’re teaching through repetition, guiding her to discover things, and helping her develop her skills for life. That’s what a parent does. What a mom should do.”
Ruthie and I once had a talk about all the learning phases of a child and while I didn’t know the first thing about rearing a kid, Ruthie knew a lot of technical jargon and science behind development.
Basically, it’s like coaching , I’d said and got one of her approving smiles, like I’m the only kid in the class with the correct answer.
“But you also love her. I see it in the way you look at her. Unconditional. Unfiltered. Just love. And I’m okay with that. Who doesn’t want their kid to be loved by as many people as possible?”
We’re both quiet a second as I recall neither of us had parents who came across as loving.
“You never talk about your parents. ”
“There isn’t much to say. They aren’t really in my life.” Ruthie shrugs. “My dad called me when we were in Arizona.”
I sit up straighter. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“There isn’t much to tell.” She gives me that look that suggests she isn’t telling me the whole truth. She’s been elusive about her folks, and I don’t need to know the people who haven’t cared enough about her. Still, I’m here for her if she needs to vent.
“Want to talk about it?”
“Not really.”
I watch as her lids lower. Her head shakes slowly side to side. She’s quiet another second. I want her to open up to me, but I don’t want to push her either.
“I’m here when you’re ready,” I remind her. But I want her to know I’m beside her every step of the way forward.
The promise is returned by the corner of her mouth ticking upward.
“Well, I like to think having shitty parents makes us . . . you and me . . . realize how we don’t want to behave as parents. Thus, making us work harder to not be like those negative experiences in our lives.”
“Yeah,” Ruthie softly replies.
“So, I’m honored if Tulane calls you Mama. I think you’re amazing, and I’ve already told you I think you’d make a great mother. You are a great mother, to her.” My throat thickens, because holy shit, Ruthie really is a good mom, and this little arrangement we have isn’t just between us but the three of us.
Although, I’m no longer thinking of our situation as an agreement, or a contract, but a life. For all of us.
“You don’t think it might be confusing for her?”
“While I’d like to think she has some memory of her mother, I just don’t believe it’s a memory she’ll retain. For the longest time I worried she was missing her mom, definitely confused about how the big oaf was suddenly in charge of her. ”
“Don’t call yourself that,” she chides.
I scoff. “I’m sure it was strange that she was suddenly being watched by an older Japanese woman who didn’t speak much English. I’d be gone a few days, but I’d always come back, and that’s the thing I want to instill in her the most. I’m here for her whether she sees me or not. And I’ll always return home to be with her. Always.”
I’m not running off like my mom. Not disappearing into alcohol like my dad. And not putting my daughter in the hands of others until I can leave her alone as a teenager or whatever the hell happened with Ruthie and her parents.
“We’re a family, flower. The three of us.”
Ruth sniffles through the phone and I’m afraid I’ve made her cry.
“Tell me those are happy tears, baby.” My voice lowers, fear lacing it. Maybe she doesn’t like the idea of the three of us as a unit.
“Happier than I feel like I have a right to be.”
“Aw, flower. You have the same rights as everyone else. We all deserve to be happy. But happy is so hard to define. I just want you to find joy in each day and love on us. Tulane and me.”
I hold my breath thinking I’ve gone too far, asking her to love me.
Ruthie chuckles, soggy and rough. “I do love you guys.”
Not exactly a declaration for me directly, but close enough for now. “I love you guys, too,” I snark, snorting to cover what I really want to say.
I love her.
I love my wife.
“So, let’s circle back to Tulane. If she calls you Mama, and you’re comfortable with that, I’m comfortable with that. I think Tulane has made the right call. You’re her mom.” The only one I ever intend for Tulane to know .
Ruthie is definitely crying harder. “Thank you, Bolan.”
“Baby, you do not have to thank me. I’m the one so grateful for you in our lives.” I lift the omamori around my neck and press a kiss to the medal. Thanking the stars or the Universe or the mysteries of the unknown that brought Ruthie to me.
“I’m grateful for you, too. So thankful.”
Grinning wide, I accept that this night turned out pretty great after all.