14. Gretchen
Gretchen
Iregretted the words the instant they were out of my mouth. Why was I going on about multiple orgasms when we couldn’t have them right now?
“Are you offering?” Zoe’s smile was pure sin. “Because you know I’d be up for a little test if you want to prove me wrong.”
I shook my head hard enough to scramble my brain. “No, we’ve been over this. It’s a bad idea.”
Or at least I was pretty sure it was. To be honest I couldn’t remember exactly why right now.
“So you said. But that kiss earlier didn’t feel like a bad idea.”
She had me there.
Before I realized what she was doing, Zoe was moving closer, throwing one leg over me to straddle my lap. She settled her slight weight on my thighs but didn’t otherwise touch me. Her eyes were amused as she watched my reaction.
“Zoe…”
“Yeah?”
She wiggled on my lap, and suddenly I couldn’t remember what I’d been about to say. Her scent filled my nostrils, bodywash, pizza, and some lotion I’d seen her slathering on her arms earlier.
We stared at each other, neither of us moving.
“Damn it,” I mumbled before giving into the temptation of cupping the back of Zoe’s head and pulling her towards me.
This time there was no hesitation. Our lips crashed together and she immediately pressed the tip of her tongue against the seam of my lips. When I opened for her, Zoe’s tongue swooped in, exploring my mouth like it was the only thing she needed in the world.
I kissed her back. Of course I did. I couldn’t resist this woman, not when just this one kiss had my panties damp and my heart pounding like it was trying to escape my chest.
How could this kiss be even hotter than the last one we’d shared? It didn’t seem possible.
Giving in to impulse, I slid one hand up between us, finding the hem of her tank top and slowly trailed my fingers over the soft skin of her belly and up to her bra.
I cupped one breast in my hand, and when I gave it a little squeeze Zoe moaned against my mouth.
I did it again, a little harder this time.
“Fuck.”
Zoe gasped the word as she slid her lips away from my mouth, trailing little kisses along my jaw and down to my neck. I tilted my head to the side, giving her access as she suckled my skin, not hard enough to mark me, but enough to let me know she could.
When she returned to my mouth the kiss turned languid, both of us kissing the other like we had all the time in the world. And maybe we did. She was here for at least two weeks, but that didn’t change my fundamental concerns with doing anything more with this woman.
It was that thought that made me pull back.
“We need to stop now before this goes too far,” I said, my voice shaky.
Zoe looked disappointed but she didn’t argue. She started to move, then stopped again.
“If you want to stop you’ll need to release my boob,” she said drily.
I startled as I realized I was still holding onto her, my fingers curled into her flesh through her bra.
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” she said as she slid off me. “That was super hot.”
I opened my mouth to respond, and she placed one finger over my lips. “Don’t say it was a mistake. Please.”
When I nodded, she lowered her hand and sat back down on the couch.
We both faced forward, watching as Harry tried to get Sally back after their disastrous one night stand.
We were sitting closer now. Before we’d had an entire cushion between us, but Zoe settled right next to me, pressed against me from shoulder to knee, my skin buzzing everywhere we touched. I didn’t mind.
Neither of us spoke again while we watched the rest of the movie.
“I’m going to go to bed,” she said when the credits started to roll.
“Thanks for the pizza,” I said lamely.
“No problem. Thanks for everything else.”
She grabbed both of our plates and headed into the kitchen.
I picked up the pizza box and our empty drink bottles and followed her, my eyes pinned to her ass like some kind of pervert.
What was wrong with me? I’d spent years moving away from the me who was impetuous and engaged in risky behaviors.
Kissing Zoe was a different kind of risky, but it still was a terrible idea.
But it didn’t feel like it in the heat of the moment.
“Good night.”
“Good night.”
I sat in bed for a long time staring at my iPad and pretending to read a book while I obsessed about Zoe like a lovesick teenager.
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d obsessed about a girl.
Or anyone. I didn’t like it. I didn’t like it at all.
I’d spent years learning to control my emotions and keeping my life orderly and controlled.
Somehow in two days my neighbor’s quirky granddaughter had blown through way too many of my defenses.
Sunday passed quickly and uneventfully. I tried to get all my chores and errands done on Saturdays so I could relax on Sundays. I slept in later than I usually did, shared coffee with my house guest, then puttered around the house.
Zoe spent the morning searching for and applying for jobs. I could see that she was struggling with using the iPad so I set her up on my laptop so she could at least use the regular keyboard.
“Oh! I got an email from my grandmother!”
I looked over from where I was doing a new jigsaw puzzle on the other side of the table.
It was a hobby I’d picked up when I used to visit the drop-in centers for homeless youth.
A group of us would gather around a table putting the pieces together, something that took our minds off our life on the street and no doubt was intended to teach us patience.
This one was difficult, a complicated nature scene with over a thousand pieces.
“That’s great, what does she say?”
She was silent for a minute or two while she processed the email. I waited patiently.
“She says she’s sorry she wasn’t here when I arrived, but she hopes I’ll stay until she gets back. Because she really wants to see me.”
“That’s sweet.”
“Yeah.” Zoe’s eyes widened. “She also says she’s been spending time with a handsome older Italian gentleman who’s great in the sack – her words not mine.”
Her cheeks turned red like she was embarrassed to even say that out loud.
I laughed. “Yeah, that’s your grandmother. She’s not afraid to embrace joy in life, including her sexuality. We should probably go over to her house today and make sure everything’s okay. I usually pop over every other day just to check on things.”
“Sounds good, I’ll go with you.”
We went next door after lunch, walking side by side across the lawn that separated our two houses.
Jan’s house was almost identical to mine but reversed.
There were a few differences, like she didn’t have a wooden deck in the back and at some point someone had converted her fireplace from wood to gas, but otherwise the layout was the same.
As soon as we entered the living room Zoe went to the fireplace, her eyes catching on the photos lined up on the mantle. When we were here the other day we’d gone in and out through the back door, so she hadn’t been in this part of the house.
“This is my mom,” Zoe said softly, picking up a photo of Jan and her husband flanking a girl who looked to be about sixteen.
Like Zoe, she was tall with long curly hair and a thin frame.
Looking at the picture, it was clear that Zoe’s mom had taken after her father.
Jan was more petite, with dark blonde hair and a curvier figure.
I’d seen the picture before but not thought too much of it.
Since Jan never mentioned having a daughter, I assumed she’d died as well.
I never wanted to ask and bring up bad memories.
She set down the family photo and picked up one of Jan’s husband in his military uniform. He looked young in the picture, probably not even twenty-one.
“My grandfather was so handsome,” Zoe said, her finger tracing his face through the glass. “I wish I would have known him.”
“I never met him,” I said. “He died before I bought my house, but it sounds like he and your grandmother had a good relationship and were very much in love. She talks about him often.”
Leaving her in the living room, I walked around the house, going from room to room, looking for any broken windows, leaks, or other issues.
Fortunately everything looked fine. When I came back to the living room Zoe was sitting on the couch looking sad.
I sat next to her, quietly giving support but not prompting her to talk. I waited for her to be ready.
“I don’t know what could have been so bad that my mom cut off her parents,” she said.
“And I’m really mad, you know? I could have, I don’t know, come here on summer vacations and visited.
I’d hear my friends talking about how their grandparents sent them birthday cards or came for holidays and I was always jealous, wishing I had someone besides my mom. ”
She took a shuddering breath. “My mom loved me, and I know she tried to be a good mom. I know that her addiction was an illness. But it seems like our lives were way harder than they needed to be because she’d made the choice to not be in contact. I should have been allowed to make my own choices.”
I knocked my shoulder against hers gently.
“Well, you can now, at least with your grandmother. You never really know what’s going in a family.
It sounds like your mom was a little wild and your grandfather put his foot down with her.
But I think you also have to give your mom the benefit of the doubt that maybe something else was going on that we don’t know about that made a total separation a better choice for her. ”
“You’re right,” Zoe said. “For all I know her dad was abusive or a creep or something. And I’ve been around enough to know that sometimes the other parent is clueless, either deliberately or because the abuser is so manipulative.”
“You can ask your grandmother about it when she gets back, but you need to be prepared that every story has a villain and in Jan’s, that might be your mom.”