12. Friday, May 25, 2012
FRIDAY, MAY 25, 2012
T he next week went by much as the previous one had, with one glaring exception – Kevin’s looming return from the Galapagos.
All week, an electric current pulsed through Paige and Robert as they counted down the days. And an anxious energy thrummed through Julia and William when he came over in the evenings.
To William’s credit, he kept his cool each time Robert mentioned his excitement that “Daddy” was coming home. Maybe William, like Julia, found some small measure of consolation knowing that at least they would enjoy an entire holiday weekend alone.
As for Paige, her answering scowl each time Robert mentioned Kevin spoke volumes without words. Julia made sure to email Clio with plenty of heads-up for her Thursday evening session with Paige. Julia had sacrificed her usual appointment time in anticipation of Paige and Kevin’s Friday reunion.
On Friday, Julia trudged through work in a thick fog of anticipatory lust. She closed shop early that day to pick the kids up from school, so why did it feel like the longest workday of her life? The kids’ bags were packed and waiting at home, and Julia’s was in the trunk of her Subaru. She had a few non-perishable groceries in her trunk already, and she would run by the m arket in the Mission before letting herself into William’s apartment with the key he had given her. She planned to surprise him – not only with herself, but with dinner already cooked and waiting.
Still, it was with almost crippling trepidation that Julia answered the front door. Julia and the kids had not seen Kevin in the flesh in almost a year – certainly not since Julia’s reconciliation with William. She had no idea what kind of greeting awaited her.
Kevin’s wary eyes flickered briefly over her as he pushed his heavy black-rimmed glasses up the bridge of his nose. He had lost some weight, and a hint of scalp peeked through the thinning curls on the crown of his head. New flecks of gray stippled his dark beard and hair.
Julia nodded in greeting and held the door open. Kevin cleared his throat, but said nothing as he crossed into the foyer. Julia had barely closed the door before Robert surged out of the in-law unit with an exuberant shout. Beaming, Kevin hoisted him in the air, and Robert wrapped his arms and legs around Kevin’s torso with a whoop of glee: “Daddy!”
Julia’s heart gave a poignant squeeze at the reminder that this man was, after all, the only daddy Robert had known. And Kevin positively glowed to be holding his son again.
“I missed you so much, Tadpole,” Kevin said, burying his nose in Robert’s hair. Setting Robert back on his feet, he added, “Look how much you’ve grown!
“I’m not a tadpole anymore,” Robert agreed, and Kevin’s laugh was unadulterated joy.
Paige appeared in the doorway to the den, where she had been waiting with Robert. Looking a bit uncertain with her arms crossed, she leaned against the door frame, staring, unfocused, at the umbrella stand by the front door.
“Paige,” Kevin breathed out, taking a tentative step toward her. “Look at you! You’ve grown so much, too.”
“Too bad you weren’t here to see it happen.” Paige pinned her father with a defiant glare, but behind the challenge, Paige’s pain was clear to see.
Kevin’s smile evaporated, and he swallowed thickly. “I was planning to take you guys f or dumplings before we head to the airport. Does that sound good?”
Dumplings were Paige’s favorite. She gave a noncommittal shrug, but she bolted upstairs to fetch her shoes and jacket. With that, Kevin offered Julia a sheepish smile, which Julia returned with an encouraging one of her own. Kevin may have been flawed in many ways, but until now, he was the only father figure the kids had; and he was trying.
After her mother came downstairs to offer a polite greeting, Kevin left with both kids. Now with a one-track mind, Julia drove across the city and parked around the corner from William’s apartment, stopping at the small Mexican grocery to buy the perishable ingredients for dinner.
Two hours later, chicken tinga was keeping warm on the stove, the fresh ingredients for tacos were prepped and ready to go, and Julia herself had showered and changed into a fresh slip of a dress. She curled up on William’s couch, trying in vain to read a book pulled from his shelf. After re-reading the first page over and over without absorbing a single word, she realized that she had forgotten what book she had chosen. She closed the cover and examined the title – East of Eden.
It was useless – an electric current pulsed through every inch of her skin and every hyper-aware nerve ending.
And that’s when she finally heard Williams’s key turning in the front door.
Her heart in her windpipe, she stopped herself just short of leaping to her feet. Instead, to channel her nervous energy, she went to fidget with the place settings at his little table until the front door swung open.
He pulled up short at the sight of her. Shock had apparently stolen his voice, too, because all he could do was gape.
She gestured theatrically at the table, like a housewife in a campy fifties commercial. “Welcome home, honey!”
He shifted his sunglasses to the top of his head. He was a god in nothing more than a three-button maroon henley with the sleeves hitched up, and a pair of worn jeans.
Swallowing hard, he finally blinked. “You’re here!”
She made cheesy jazz hands, and then he stared long and hard at the table, laid out with candles and placemats and cloth napkins and good tableware and scrumptious-smelling food. His forehead creased; his eyes wore a conflicted, pained expression.
Her pulse accelerated, and she swallowed hard. “Are you hungry?”
He lifted his eyes to hers again, then raked them down her tiny dress with its spaghetti straps, and her bare legs that stretched beneath its hem.
“Am I hungry?” His jaw ticking, he dropped his bag on the floor with a thud, then crossed the room in a handful of resolute strides. “Yes.”
“Thank God,” she breathed the second before he snatched her up; and his ravenous growls as his mouth took hers matched his wolfish leer a moment ago.
Her dress roughly parted ways with her body as he yanked it up over her head. She answered by ripping his shirt over his head just as aggressively; and then he jerked her strapless bra down.
His aqua irises darkening to cobalt, he stared at her bare breasts for one reverent second before dipping to devour them, grunting like she was the best thing he had ever tasted. Holding his head against her, she closed her eyes on a moan and turned her face up to the ceiling. Tenderly he traced the margins of her nipples with his tongue; then she hissed in satisfaction as he sucked their hardened peaks between his lips.
Falling to his knees, he kissed his way down the underside of her breasts and her stomach, tapping his tongue into her navel before trailing it to the waistband of her panties. With his teeth, he dragged them to the floor.
And then, without warning, he tossed her thigh over his shoulder and buried his face between her legs. She groaned so loudly that the whole neighborhood would have heard, had he not reached up with one long arm to cover her mouth.
But more than anything on the planet, she needed to feel him filling her, the ragged edges o f his breath skittering across her skin. She needed that more than she needed oxygen itself.
So she snatched his hand and tugged him to his feet. He gazed down at her, his eyes a question she answered by fumbling with his belt, her hands shaking uncontrollably with need. He quickly lost patience and flicked it open himself. She jerked his zipper so roughly that the tab broke off. Grunting in approval, he seized the fabric of his fly with both hands and ripped it open the rest of the way.
Dropping to her knees, she yanked his pants and boxers down in one movement, and took him into her mouth with a greedy, guttural sound. He swore and tangled his fingers through her hair; and as her mouth and hands took the measure of him, he groaned out a string of profanities so long and loud, she was positive the whole neighborhood heard this time.
After only a few seconds, he murmured, “No, no, no,” and his fingers gently nudged the underside of her chin; so she released him with a final swirl of her tongue and a parting kiss. Before she could get to her feet, he swept her up, wrapped her legs around his waist, and walked her backward.
“I need it,” she moaned, so out of her mind that she didn’t even know what she was saying.
“What do you need, Julie?” he rasped out against her lips, still walking her backward.
“You,” she pleaded. “Inside.”
He granted her wish as soon as her back hit the wall. “Tell me how,” he gasped against her cheek as he thrust into her. “How do you need me?”
“ Hard , Will.”
He delivered in spades. “Tell me you need it as bad as I do.”
“I need it,” she practically sobbed, her fingers curling at the sensation of him hitting so deep. “I need you .”
As she dug her nails into his sweat-slickened back, he drew a shaky breath and hissed the word yes. If it was possible for him to pound into her even faster, he did.
“Tell me you’ve been thinking about me all day,” he ground out.
“God, yes, Will; you’re all I can think about. ”
His warning sounds stuttered against her cheek, along with his breaths. His whole body tensed and trembled.
He shouted her name just before unleashing a volley of near-screams, and she arched her hips, making herself concave. She wanted to absorb everything he gave her, as much as possible, for as long as possible. She wanted to absorb his entire body inside of hers.
Gradually his cries subsided into helpless moans, but he continued to pulse into her rhythmically until his grip loosened. As he slipped out of her with a grunt, he summoned the last of his energy to carry her to the bed.
He laid her down on the mattress, gently cradling the back of her head with his hand until it sank into the pillow. Then he lowered himself on top of her, kissing her tenderly, gazing into her eyes with something akin to awe.
“I love you,” he said in a whisper.
“Will,” she whispered back, stroking his hair, her eyes flickering back and forth between his. “I love you so much.”
He kissed her once more; then, with an enormous sigh of relief, his eyes rolled shut and he lowered his forehead onto the pillow beside her head. She heard him whisper, “Julie.... nothing has ever felt this good.”
Melting, she turned her head just enough to brush her lips against his cheek and the shell of his ear. “Same.”
“I don’t want to stop for anything.”
“Not even for dinner?” she teased.
“I’m sorry; you were so sweet to cook for me.” He was already kissing down her jaw, her neck. Her breasts. “And I certainly don’t want all of your hard work to go to waste.” He licked and gently nibbled his way down her stomach, past her navel. Shifted himself between her legs as she squirmed in anticipation, and lifted his eyes to hers. “But right now, I want you for dinner.”
She arched her back with an ecstatic moan as his tongue zigzagged up the center of her, parting her. Tasting. Flickering. Gradually circling in on the most sensitive part of her, the part that screamed most insistently for its attention. Occasionally it strayed a bit lower, the tip of his tongue swirling her arousal with his own release, smearing it around her tender nub. It was erotic, and a little filthy, and he always remembered that she loved it.
She was panting now, the sweat beading on her flushed skin, her hips rocking in sync with his attentions. She reached down to fist some of his hair in her hands like she always used to, but it was too short now; so with a groan, she seized his whole head and ground herself into his face. She didn’t even care anymore that she was probably suffocating him.
And then, finally – finally – his mouth zeroed in on its target, sucking, humming; and he slid two fingers inside of her, then three, curling them.
“Oh my God, Will – yes… Yes! ”
She went blind as the ecstasy spiraled through the core of her and came blazing out through her fingertips, her toes, the top of her head. While her whole body convulsed, she dug her heels in and slid them along the mattress and fisted the bedsheets and screamed oh my God, yes, over and over again.
Some tiny corner of her consciousness marveled at how long the shockwaves surged through her, with no sign of slowing. But as the intervals between inevitably lengthened and their intensity ebbed, she savored every precious pulse and shudder, in case it was the last.
Then she lay there a long while, utterly paralyzed, her neck still craned backward in its orgasm reflex. Her eyes were still closed, her mouth open and breathing.
William still lay between her legs, his entire head moving in slow circles, caressing all of her with his whole face. She whimpered in appreciation at the erotic sounds his mouth made as he kissed and gently sucked where she was still so tender. At first, that was all her brain could process – pure sensation.
But after a geologic age, she became aware again of her surroundings – the buzz of his refrigerator; car engines zooming past on the street; dogs barking in the neighborhood.
The slow, rhythmic breathing of the best lover in the galaxy.
She peeled open her eyes and lifted her head to peer down at him. He pressed one last soft kiss between her legs, then grinned up at her, clearly very pleased with himself .
“Welcome back to Earth,” he said, his voice deeper than usual – huskier. He climbed back over her and sealed his mouth over hers, offering her a taste of her own pleasure. She lazily wrapped her arm around the back of his head, pressing his mouth and tongue into hers. She felt him twitch against her hip and realized he was already hard again.
“I can’t move,” she offered by way of apology, her voice hoarse from screaming. “That was by far the best orgasm I have ever had.”
“That’s okay; I don’t want your dinner to get any colder than it already is.” He pressed another sensuous kiss to her mouth, then grinned. “But I have plans for you later, so don’t even bother getting dressed.”
“As long as you’re willing to abide by those terms, yourself.”
Over dinner, they fielded all sorts of grand possibilities for the next two evenings after William got off work. But Julia already sensed that none of those would happen. Instead, they would grab some takeout and end up right back in William’s bed, both nights, for the entire night. And that was just fine with her.