CHAPTER 15
OUR HANDS ARE clasped between us on the walk back to my place.
He swings it a little, gives me a little twirl as we pass under the streetlight on the otherwise darkened street.
When he pulls me back, I stumble into him a little, courtesy of the wine, and now we’re chest to chest, his arms catching me at my lower back.
He’s breathing my air, and he looks grateful for the opportunity.
The way he’s looking at me, I think he’s about to kiss me.
For real, this time. A hand brushes against my jaw and tangles in my hair.
He’s leaning in, and I close my eyes. But then I feel his face bypass mine, and his lips are at my ear.
‘Can I just say,’ he whispers. ‘You have a truly spectacular ass.’
I lean back in his arms, the ‘what the fuck?’ entirely clear on my face. One look at my face and he bursts into laughter. ‘I’m sorry!’ he cries, face turning to the sky. ‘I’ve been holding that in for months, and now it feels like I can say it without coming off like a massive creep.’
I just shake my head and pull on his hand to keep us moving.
I’m not speaking, but he fills the space with longing talk of my ass.
Apparently the only bright spot in our adventures on the rock-climbing wall was the fact that from his position below me, he had an unencumbered and uninterrupted view of my behind.
If anything, it was a disincentive to keep climbing up.
I’m so terribly sorry to have thrown another obstacle in his path up the wall. He graciously accepts.
He’s also shocked I wasn’t into Spin, because he assumed I must do something like that to maintain said ass.
I express surprise that so much of his actions revolved around my bum.
He assures me that it was simply a happy by-product.
And he preferred to focus on my ass than my skills at boardgames, because that date involved bulk losses and me sitting on my ass, hiding it from his view.
The apartment is still dark when we walk in, but we go directly to my bedroom. Close the door. Turn to face each other. Now the only thing between us is about two feet of distance.
He takes that away, slips a hand back into my hair, leans close, and I hope to high heaven that he doesn’t have another smartass comment because if he does, I might kick him out.
Forehead to forehead now. Eyes close. He speaks softly even though we’re alone, ‘I hope you know I’m taking it as my personal challenge now to ensure you enjoy yourself, whatever happens next,’ he says, everything earnest.
I get where he’s going with that, but it makes me anxious. ‘That seems like a lot of pressure to put on yourself,’ I whisper back, eyes still closed.
‘It’s not pressure, Gertie. It’s literally the bare minimum.
’ And then he’s kissing me. When it’s not a surprise, it’s actually quite nice.
Not too much saliva after all. His hands don’t last long at my face and journey swiftly to that ass he has so admired.
When I chuckle into his mouth at the absurdity of it all, he just squeezes a few times.
I’ve always thought that sex is a largely silent endeavour.
Frankly, I cringe when a man puts on a soundtrack against which to fuck.
So I am accustomed to the quiet, punctuated only by the slapping of skin against skin, the wet smacking sound of mouths against anything in reach, harsh breaths, maybe a grunt.
I usually have to remind myself to insert a moan or two at various intervals in case they think I’ve fallen asleep. I have actually fallen asleep once or twice.
No chance of that tonight because we can’t seem to shut up.
Slowly, piece by piece, he divests me of my clothing.
My nice top somehow ends up over on the radiator under my window, and I’ve got no clue how.
And now I’m standing here, watching him bend down slightly to pull my undies down my legs, and I’m struck by the fact that I’m stark naked, he’s still fully clothed and he’s staring at me in a way that somehow makes me even more naked.
This should feel weird, the imbalance. I should probably feel an urge to shrink into myself, to cover up or hide. I don’t. If anything, I arch my back a little to give him a proper eyeful. There’s only one word for what I’m feeling.
Safe.
Although it would be nice if he joined me in my nudity, not for the sake of balance, but for the sake of my undying curiosity. Which might also be known as horniness. When I ask, he is happy to oblige, directing me to lie down.
Then he’s half on top of me. Takes his time, touching and tasting, savouring every gasp he can pull from my chest. He calls me beautiful as he kisses along my jaw. Takes a nipple in his mouth and says how good I feel. He can’t wait to fuck me.
If I didn’t have a praise kink before, I think I do now.
Can confirm he knows the location of the clitoris.
Does not require a map. Makes good on his personal challenge, makes me come with fingers and tongue, because ‘a gentleman always allows a lady to come first’.
Head thrown back, his name on my lips, I can only hate that I settled for less than this before, and pray it never ends because then I’ll always know what I’m missing.
Now he’s digging through his pants pocket, discarded on the floor, in search of his wallet, which houses a condom. He says I’m a bad host for not having any on hand; I retort that I wouldn’t want to make him feel bad if the ones I provided were too loose.
When he stands up, foil packet clutched in his hands, I appreciate the full-frontal view, from the sweat in his hair, to the smug grin on his face to his ankle-sock tan. He laughs and gets back on top of me, hands caging my face. The condom sits in my peripheral vision.
‘You know, I read somewhere once that the friction of movement for a condom kept in a wallet can cause miniature holes to form in the latex. Is that true?’
‘This is so the wrong time to ask that question!’ he exclaims. He has torn open the packet now, rolled the latex down his length. Before he enters me he says, totally serious, ‘I very much look forward to my dick making you feel full.’
I didn’t even know it was possible to laugh this much during sex.
‘Is there normally this much talking during sex?’ I ask. ‘If so, I’ve definitely been doing it wrong.’
‘Only during the best kind,’ he replies, voice raspy.
I like it better than the quiet.
His hips snap against mine. He hooks an arm under my leg and pulls it up, and the angle is delicious. Not a single one of my moans is perfunctory—he earns each and every one.
But it occurs to me as we’re getting into it, and honestly I’m shocked that I’m still capable of coherent thought at this point in time, but I’m wondering what I’m adding to the whole scenario.
And I take stock: he stripped me. He stripped himself.
He made me come. He got the condom. He put on the condom.
He’s currently fucking me while I lie on my back and take what he gives.
That’s not to say that I’m not clearly enjoying our current activity. There’s no doubt there. He’s getting plenty of positive reinforcement.
But really, he could be fucking anyone right now.
It’s a short hop, step and jump down an anxiety spiral from that little thought nugget.
Yes, he very much could be fucking anybody. There’s nothing about me in this scenario making it a different or enjoyable experience for him; I just happen to have my body parts in close proximity to his.
You know what? It’s probably just his unhealthy competitive streak driving him to do this, to prove he can make the impossible woman come.
So, it’s not about me at all.
It’s just about my body.
There doesn’t need to be a person inside the body for it to matter.
Which is lucky, because all this has proven to me is that for all my efforts, I’m still just a shell. A void. A mirror. A projection screen. Whatever the person in front of me (or on top of me) needs me to be.
Arthur suddenly stops moving and looks down at me, concerned. Because of course he has noticed my distraction. Fucking emotionally available man. ‘Hey, where did you go?’ he asks.
I shake my head, trying to set my anxiety free. ‘Nowhere.’ It’s clearly a lie that he doesn’t dignify with a response.
‘Do you want to stop?’ I don’t get a chance to answer, but my pause is enough for him to pull out and move to lie next to me. ‘What do you need?’ he asks, kissing my shoulder and cautiously draping an arm across my waist.
I clutch it with both hands to ground myself.
A deep breath. A pause to collect myself. ‘Why are you doing this?’ I ask. And my voice sounds so small.
Concern bleeds into confusion. Turns into panic. ‘Why am I…? Wait, what? Did I completely misread this, because I thought you were very enthusiastically consenting to this, but if I was wrong…’ I place a hand on his chest to stop him.
‘No, you weren’t wrong.’ He breathes a sigh of relief.
Now I feel guilty for distressing him. Just add it to the list. ‘I just mean, doesn’t it bother you, having to do all the work?
Or is the challenge you set for yourself enough for you right now?
’ I turn my face away from his to hide the single, solitary tear making its way down my cheek.
I’ve dug up the grave of the mood I just killed only to kill it a second time.
‘Hey. Hey.’ He pulls my face back towards him, wipes the tear from my cheek, forces me to really look at him. His face is a proper open book, and it’s heartbroken, torn up by my words. ‘I hope that you’re here with me because you want to be, because that’s how I feel too.’
I place my hand over his on my cheek. ‘I do want to be here.’