Chapter 21 #2
“And they are where soldiers feel the most alive.”
Atharva dropped to his knees in front of her and pressed his face into her womb.
“I thought…” she trailed.
“What?” Atharva trailed his tongue out and lapped the damp skin under her navel. Her stomach dipped in a hiss as her hands bunched into the hair at the back of his head. “Thought what, myani zuv?” He nipped at the soft, creamy skin.
“I was scared we wouldn’t… you may not… that…”
His head dropped back, eyes snaring hers — “You thought I didn’t want you anymore?”
“I didn’t know how long it would take for you to again look at me like you used to.”
“I can see it from here, but are you looking at me like you used to?”
Her eyes began to tear up.
“Iram?”
“More,” she managed, her hands coming to frame his face, fingers caressing his scar. “I am looking at the father of my children today.”
His chest swelled. His mind whirred. How had he let her feel so disconnected from him? So unwanted?
“I’m sorry…” he confessed. “I did not see left or right in my own bid to come out of this. How many sorries will be enough? How many apologies will begin to make this bearable again to me…”
“Atharva,” she tightened her hands over his skin. “We went over this. No,” she shook her head.
“You are right,” he turned his head and kissed her palm. “We went over this, and this is the last time we circle it.”
His mouth left her palm and landed on the welts lining her lower belly.
Puckered and white, they ran in stripes down the sides and into her thighs, burning red on the edges.
Where he kissed, they reddened more. He nipped one, and the space filled with blood underneath, spreading a ruddy dawn across her stomach with her gasp as its birdsong.
“Once I chased sunrise on your chest,” he nipped the top of her navel, seeing it warm up too. “Now the sun is rising over all of you, myani zuv. You are breathtaking,” he murmured into her damp skin.
“I am not, even if you like it.”
Atharva rose to his feet and swooped her up in his arms.
“No! Arth is there,” she squealed.
“He is five months old and sleeping in a cot with his eyes nowhere close to where I am taking you.”
Atharva carried her to their bed and lay her down on his side. He needed his side of the bed to again smell like her. He needed their entire bed to smell like them again. No demarcation where one ended and the other began.
“But what if he wakes up? The nosies…” she began to pull up but he pushed her down with one hand on her chest. Her wet hair splayed on his pillow and looked like the best part of his dreams. Her lips were round, her eyes darkening. He knew her signs.
“As badly as I want you to scream for me again this first time,” he reached for his belt. “We will keep it down tonight.”
As he stepped back to strip out of his clothes, he saw his wife’s desire burn to life. Atharva gave her this. The moment to stare at him. He unbuttoned his shirt, slow, one by one, letting her see her favourite part of his body. Or, one of them.
“Eyes down now,” he smirked, unbuttoning his pants and tugging the zipper down. She swallowed, her teeth embedding in her lower lip.
“I felt it earlier,” she tried to sass back.
“Then let me show it and prove to you how alive I feel.”
He pushed his pants down and her legs began to squirm on their own accord. How long had it been since he had been inside his wife? He couldn't remember the last time he had even been naked with her in abandon.
“Are you ready, myani zuv?” He pushed his briefs off and climbed up over her, pressing his hips down.
She met them with her own, damp and rippling under him.
He trailed a finger down her breast, down her navel, and dipped it inside her.
Her mouth dropped open in a moan but she held it back in.
He smirked, nipping her nipple just as his finger pushed in some more.
“Gentle!”
“What?”
“My breasts…”
He laved it, pushing another finger in. “Sorry.”
She felt different, more open to him, and still tight. Resistant.
He nuzzled the valley between her ample breasts. That was another haven he had yet to explore. “What is it?”
“It takes time to get used to again, Atharva,” she panted. “It’s like everything is new.”
“You are gasping in pleasure or pain?”
Her hands came to his sides, trailing down until her claws wrapped around him.
“Ooof…” he jerked. “I get it,” he laughed in pain and pleasure. “It has been too long.”
“It has,” she stroked him, leaving him to use her thigh to rock. In tune with his fingers inside her. The rhythm set, this one new. Slow.
“Now,” she closed her hands around his wrist and tried to pull him out.
“Come first.”
“I am ready, can’t you feel?” She panted, rocking against his hand, her dark eyes shutting down then popping open again.
“Show me,” he slammed right at her spot and she let out her moans in half-gasps — “No, no, no…” Her eyes rolled back, her neck arching for his mouth.
Atharva pushed his teeth into the soft skin and pounded until she had tightened to her fullest around him and pulsed her way to her orgasm.
It was ethereal. The feel of her, all around his fingers, pulsing but in a new rhythm, squeezing him just as hard.
“Ooh, Atharva, this is…” she began to come back to him when he felt another slow pulse begin to pump. He braced up and rode it, this time at leisure. “Oh no! No!” She arched again, her mouth opening in a soundless scream.
“Way to go with the silent moan,” he managed with a grin, even as he was painfully hard, ready to go.
Iram’s eyes opened and she stared at him, breathing long and hard, through her mouth.
“I have never felt it like that. It has never been like that.”
“Care to show me?” He asked, pushing himself half into her and then trailing back out. Her legs wrapped around his waist and pulled him in with both her arms.
“Oh, it’s going to be exactly how I felt for you, Janab,” she opened herself for him and let him in. In one fell swoop. She arched up and the squeeze was unbearable.
“Aaah,” his eyes snapped shut. His head fell down and into her neck — “One moment, myani zuv. Just let me stay here, please. Hold still.”
Her legs tightened around him and he jolted. The feeling. That feeling of not only being there, not only being welcomed back there, but being embraced there. A lone tear trailed out of his closed eye and down his nose. Thank god for her damp hair.
“Atharva,” Iram’s soft voice echoed on the shell of his ear. He came up on his knees, stroking down her milky thighs and pushing her knees wider to see how well they connected.
“That silent moan ready now?” He asked, finding anchor on her sides. After two consecutive orgasms, she was a little too smug.
“You have held well, Janab. Are you straining to finish now?”
Atharva smirked, pulled back, grabbed the round of her hips and slammed her down on himself.
“Aaa… oh!” She slapped a hand over her mouth, glaring and laughing all at once.
He pulled her half atop his thighs and the angle changed.
Snug and perfect. He dug into their bed for grip and pounded into her.
She took it, gave him the leeway to go harder, and even wept for more.
Atharva went on, thrusting to the sounds of her silent moans, letting his strokes turn maniacal.
He came without warning, even to himself, spiralling all over her.
And even as he was riding his own wave, his fingers found her and began to stroke, urging her to follow. A few twists and she did, her hips bucking and making his orgasm tighter, like it would go on forever.
He forgot everything and came harder. Didn’t even realise if he made any loud noises. Just collapsed on top of her.
“Condom!” He shot up as if struck.
But he was buried deep inside her, the damage done. Iram was panting, eyes closed, mouth open.
“I am feeding.”
“Still.”
“I haven’t had my first period yet.”
“Oh yes…” he recollected, his brain a mesh of misfired wiring. He clawed his hair back and finally let himself collapse back on top of her.
Stillness. Loud breaths, both his and hers. And nothing else.
“I never thought it would be so good the first time after giving birth…” she whispered in his ear, awed.
“You are right. I have never felt it like this either,” Atharva pulled out and rolled to his side, pushing his arm under her and hauling her close. Her eyes were still closed, her mouth curled in the most serene smile he had ever seen on her face.
“Is it because we snapped apart as different people and slammed back as more one than we were?” She asked, her voice suddenly so soft, so low, a featherlight whisper.
“Look at me.”
Brown ecstatic eyes popped open.
“I never want to do this snapping apart and back business ever again.”
“Even if it is this good after?” She asked tongue-in-cheek, knowing his answer.
“I would choose celibacy and a life with you over sex this good with experiences like the last year.”
Her eyes filled up.
“Don’t cry,” he warned, biting back a smile.
“Don’t say things like that then!”
Atharva laughed, full-bellied, not caring if Yathaarth woke up.
He was in too good a mood. So what? Their son would celebrate the renewal of their life with them.
He would dress, bring their baby between them, and they would now be more than two, learn to get used to spending their post-coital bliss with a third wheel sputtering and trying to turn on his stomach between them.
Her warm head landed on his chest and something that had been free-floating inside finally tamped down in place. Atharva let out the longest breath of his life. Lying still. Savouring the weight of her on him.
“Myani zuv.”
“Mmm?”
He stared up at the ceiling, unable to look at her for this conversation.
“I have been selfish in dealing with this.”