18. Sawyer
SAWYER
I’ve been doing my best to behave around Raven. All week, I’ve shown up and done my work without more than two words from her the entire time I’m at her house. After the cock ring debacle last week, we agreed to slow down so my balls could rest, but I am dying to taste this woman.
Avoiding her means I’ve had time to focus on some of the secret projects I’ve been working on. And I’ve been able to keep my brain on task more than normal. So that’s a win.
My knees groan in protest as I climb the stairs quickly, but I freeze when I get to the top.
There are two children, roughly the same height, standing in the bathroom doorway at the end of the hallway.
It’s dark, the only light coming from the bathroom behind them, silhouetting them in the creepiest way.
What in The Shining is this shit?
“Uh…hello?” My voice cracks, and I try to tamp down the unease traveling down my spine as they slowly walk toward me.
One of them giggles. “Wanna play with us?”
“Nope. No thanks.” I turn and run smack into Raven.
She looks behind me and erupts in laughter. “Oh my God. Your face. I can’t.”
“I nearly shit my pants,” I hiss, hoping the ghost children don’t hear me.
“It’s just Logan and Lana. They’re here for a playdate. Lucas is probably hiding around here somewhere ready to jump-scare McKenna. It’s kind of his thing.”
“Well, it’s hella creepy,” I murmur. “I thought you said no more pranks?”
She blinks rapidly. “That wasn’t a prank, just a happy coincidence. I didn’t plan that. Besides, you’re still pranking me.”
“I swear, I’m not. I only did the tooth one.”
She looks at me, unconvinced.
I huff a breath. “Sorry, it’s been a busy week at the station. I haven’t gotten a lot of sleep, and I thought I was seeing things.”
“It’s okay.”
Glancing over my shoulder, I’m relieved to see the empty hallway. “I should get back to work. I told Summer I’d have things done before McKenna’s birthday party.”
She pushes past me toward her room, not even looking at me as she speaks. “I have a deadline anyway.”
——————
The next day, I head straight to Jonah’s room. I ended up having to rip out the existing carpet since it was so old, and I couldn’t find anything to match it around the new door to the bathroom.
“What are you doing here?” she asks, poking her head around the doorframe.
“Just finishing up the carpet install. Then I’ll be out of your hair.”
“Oh. Sorry. I heard a noise and wasn’t expecting you today. I thought you were one of the kids.”
“Hardy had everything under control at the station, and I wanted to get this done before the party. RJ just picked up the kids so I could do it without upsetting Jonah.”
“He did?” She pulls her phone out of her pocket. “Shit, my phone’s been on silent. I missed his texts.”
We stare at each other awkwardly. It feels like a game of chicken to see who will make the first move. Then she taps the doorframe. “Well, I’ll let you get to it.”
“Are you mad at me?” I blurt.
“What?”
“It feels like you’ve been avoiding me for the past week. I know we agreed to give the beans time to recover after the cock ring, but you’ve barely said two words to me. You haven’t even called me a moron, and I’m worried I’ve fucked something up.”
She steps into the room. “Never refer to your balls as beans again.”
“Noted.”
“I’ve been trying to finish this book I’m working on. And I’ve been distracted. It’s like I can’t get out of my head, and I’ve never had that happen to me before while writing…” She trails off, picking at her fingers.
I’m struck by her vulnerability. “Sometimes I feel like I’m trapped in my own body too.”
“How so?”
“I’m capable of so many things but motivated to do nothing. I understand so much of what’s happening around me, about the people in my life and what makes them tick, but I can’t explain what’s happening inside myself.”
Her eyes soften, and I muster the courage to continue, hoping my honesty doesn’t scare her off.
“Take this renovation, for example. I have so many amazing ideas that I could make happen. I know how to do it. I have the skills, but I rarely have the patience to follow through. I’m a walking contradiction. ”
“You get bored in the middle?”
“Yeah. I can see exactly what I need to do, but I can’t make myself do it. Even though I want to. I wanted to be a good husband and be capable of everything that was expected of me, but the pressure felt like too much.”
“Especially after such a demanding job all day,” she says knowingly.
“Exactly. It’s like I only have the ability to do what’s necessary when the stakes are high, and even when my marriage was ending, the stakes never felt high enough. The gap between knowing what I needed to do and actually doing it is where my shame lives.”
“How long have you felt this way?”
I sit back on my ass, my knees tired of kneeling. “My whole life. Sorry, I know you have a deadline, and I’m distracting you. You don’t need to hear about my issues.”
She smiles, and fuck if it doesn’t instantly fill me with warmth. “What you’re describing, none of that is your fault. It’s not some character flaw. It’s the way your brain works, especially when you have ADHD. And trust me, I know a lot about neurodivergent brains.”
Holy shit. I think she’s right. Part of me has known this could be a possibility, but hearing her label it has something clicking into place in my brain. She gets it.
“I spent most of my life knowing I was different and not being able to explain it. So I masked to fit in. I’m super intuitive and notice things most people don’t.
I pick up on patterns and figured out who I needed to be to fit into any group.
Few people saw the real me, only Summer and RJ for years.
When I married Kris, it was one of the best things for me, as weird as it sounds.
I didn’t have to fit into a box to make someone love me.
It was an arrangement that became the deepest friendship.
He saw the real me and still wanted me to be the mother of his children. And I warned him that I was weird.”
“You’re not weird.”
“Oh, I am, and that’s okay. Everyone is weird to someone else—you just have to find your own group of weirdos. Kris was my kind of weirdo. You’re my kind of weirdo.”
I stare at her like a lovestruck fool, thrilled by her claiming words.
“It wasn’t until Jonah was diagnosed that I realized I’m autistic too.
My weirdness suddenly made sense. The emotional dysregulation, struggling to control my impulses, the repetitive movements I did that were the only thing that would calm me down.
I could never operate in the shades of gray that most people are comfortable navigating.
I still struggle with that sometimes. I need logic to calm my brain.
And I want to clarify, I’m not saying having autism makes me weird.
Weirdness is beautiful. It’s another way of highlighting what makes us different, or unique.
It’s just a word like fat. We can choose to use it as a label with a negative connotation, or we can embrace it as a badge of honor.
I’m weird. I’m autistic. I’m wonderful.”
I push up from the floor, needing to be close to her, needing to touch her. It takes seconds to cross the room to her. “You’re incredible.”
“So are you. You’re wonderful just the way you are.
Passionate. Messy. Scattered. Loud. Witty.
You love hard. You show up for people even when you’re drained.
You care even in the quiet of routine. You’re consistently inconsistent.
But that’s who you are. And you will thrive with the right people around you.
When I found Bella and Lucy, they accepted my weirdness just like Summer.
And we seem to all balance each other out.
They like my Raven logic, never judging me for seeing the world differently than they do. But I feel like you never had that.”
“I didn’t.” I blink slowly, processing her words. That’s what she’s been doing for me.
“You do now. Because I see you and your weirdness.”
“I like you.” I lean down, pressing a tentative kiss to her forehead.
“I like you too.” She kisses my cheek.
“I want to watch you fuck yourself with my dick.”
Fuck, why did I say that and ruin this sweet moment?
“You want to have sex with me?”
“Well, yeah, obviously, but that’s not what I meant.”
She crosses her arms, and I mentally kick myself for my ineptitude. “I want to watch you with my toy.”
“You already watched me.”
“True, but I only caught the tail end. I want to see it all. How you warm up. How you tease and play. How you build up to the end.”
Her breath hitches, causing her tits to heave and strain against her blouse. All it’d take is a quick flick of my wrist, and I could pop open the buttons of her top. And now that’s all I want to do.
“I don’t understand why you want to watch that.”
“Why wouldn’t I want to watch that? You’re sexy as fuck.”
She bites her lip, her gaze dropping to the floor. “Why would you want to watch me do that when you could do it yourself?”
The disappointment in her voice does something for my ego.
This is new, this vulnerability. As much as I’d love to revel in this moment, I don’t want to scare her off, so I opt for our typical teasing.
“Admit it, you wanna ride the real thing.” She shoves my chest, and I catch her hand, pulling her body flush with mine.
“There’s nothing I want more than to feel your snug little cunt sink down on my length while you ride me. ”
“So what’s stopping you? Need to pop a blue pill first?” The fire in her eyes as she spits her venom at me only makes my dick harder, and I thrust it against her in response.
“Does it feel like I need help in that department?”
“No,” she rasps.
I release her wrist and hook my finger under her chin, tilting her head toward mine. “I want to watch you because I’m man enough to admit that I don’t know how to make you come yet, and who better to learn from than the master? Also, I may be a bit of a masochist.”