Haruki (Haruki Arima Book 1)

by Laine Watson

  “Is it usually about you?”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  “Selfish!” I giggle.

  But he doesn’t laugh. “Yeah,” he says thoughtfully.

  “Um, Haru… Did I say something wrong? I don’t actually think you’re selfish.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” His haunting eyes leave me. He takes his face from me and shifts himself down to my flower.

  I gasp.

  “You’re so tense. No one’s ever done this before, huh?” he says in an unknown tone of voice. “Enjoy it. Let’s test your limits.”

  Test my limits? As soon as I think that, new sensations come upon my body. Moans of pleasure fall out of my mouth. I can’t help but stretch out my hands against the surface of the bed. I grasp at the covers, balling them up in my fists as the warmth and wetness of Haru’s tongue fluttering between my folds gives my body new sensations, ones I cannot compare to anything in life.

  My eyes roll back in my head. I reach for him, the tenseness leaving me.

  “I want to touch you.” I moan, and he folds his fingers into mine. He pushes his face even deeper into me, the tenseness returning as I squeeze his hands. He inhales all of me, even if I wiggle away from him, he follows me, as if he is hungry to taste me even more. His groans and heavy quiet breaths keep my nerves from getting the best of me. I stay open to him.

  More moans come from me as I squirm around in the bed.

  Time stops. I stop.

  My eyes focus. My mouth opens. For one millisecond my vision is impaired. My eyes close tightly as Haru vacuums me up, almost as if he’s trying to suck me into him. Something is building inside of me. When it’s become too much to bear, I pull at Haru’s hair. My heart pounds as my back arches, and I scream loudly, thinking of nothing else but the massive feeling of release coming from my body.

  Haru holds me down, watching me pant. My voice wavers, speaking gibberish as I am unable to form sentences. My body convulses as Haru slides his fingers across the wet surface of my flower.

  Haru reaches for the remote and turns the lights on. He leans his head down to look right at my middle. “Look at that … that’s contracting hard. Bet that was the best orgasm you’ve ever had, and there wasn’t even penetration.”

  I watch him, as I come down from my high, my cheeks warming. Even though I want to close my legs and disappear, the expression on Haru’s face forces me to leave them open.

  He glances up at me. “Don’t be embarrassed.”

  I’m naked with my vagina out for a man to see, and he is smiling at it like it’s beautiful and precious to him.

  “D-do you like it?” I ask innocently.

  “I do,” he says, looking at me. “I can tell it likes me, too. You respond strangely to me. I really like you. You don’t seem uptight or … I don’t know. I’ve never really had a girl like you.”

  “I’ve never had anyone like you either.” The sensation of running and hiding myself from Haru dissipates. I stare up into the ceiling, flutters of being in love dance around my tummy. “I’m comfortable around you. I don’t know why. I just feel safe.” I look at him, but he is still looking at my lady parts. “Haru, are you listening?”

  “Yeah, I just, I want to keep going,” he says.

  He’s totally not listening.

  “By the way, thanks for rolling the ‘r’. It makes you even sexier.”

  As if my cheeks can’t burn any hotter, he has to say that and set me on fire.

  “Your pretty little pussy isn’t jumping anymore.”

  “What? Haru don’t call it that.”

  “Why? You’re being a dirty little slut, aren’t you?”

  “W-h-a…” I say, immediately getting up and pulling his covers over me. All of the comfort leaves.

  “Oh, come on. You practically pounced on me downstairs. Now you’re acting shy? Bring that pussy back over here. Right now!”

  “No! Who are you? Go back to being Haru. What are you saying? You just said you liked it.”

  “I do. Now give it to me.”

  “I want to go home,” I say.

  “Oh, now you want to go home? You’ve been waiting for me to come home all night to fuck you, and now you want to go home? Fuck! You don’t know what you want?! I thought you knew what you wanted.”

  “Haru…” I say, starting to cry. “I’m sorry. Are you trying to get me back for what I said to you in college?” I bow my teary face into my hands. “I didn’t really want to have sex. I’ve never had sex before. I just didn’t want you to be with other girls because I love you.”

  Now that was a confession.

  The tenseness and the brash and vulgar mood disappears. The heart racing fear of being taken by someone I thought I trusted but suddenly didn’t, fades. I gaze up at Haru; his posture changes as well as the look in his eyes.

  “Oh, my God! You’re virgin? You’re a fucking virgin. I fucked up,” he says with a paranoid look on his face. He uses his hands to pull his hair back. “I’m so sorry. I just thought, you were … kind of … out there.”

  “What?”

  “That bad girl act was all fake, huh? Not just the bitchy attitude. You’ve never been with a guy. I thought you wanted this. This is what girls want. Love me?” He grimaces, “Shit, don’t say that.”

  “Don’t say what? You were just so cool and everything was fine, and then you go and say that stupid stuff about my lady parts … and you called me a slut. I’m not a slut!” A flashback from high school halts me—I hear those girls calling me a slut and man stealer. My eyes water.

  “Summer…” He extends his hand.

  “Don’t touch me.” I get up, snatching the covers.

  He also rises to his feet and follows me. When I’m about to try to leave out of his bedroom, he grabs me by the arm near my elbow.

  “Summer!” he calls with conviction.

  I turn toward him effortlessly. His shoulders are slumped, and I get a glimpse of frown lines. I’m not used to the distressed Haru. He won’t even look at me. “Don’t say you love me.”

  “I do. You’re the first person in the whole world that doesn’t make me feel like I don’t belong. Every time I’m around you and Max, I feel like I belong here, like I matter to both of you. I would never just end up in some guy’s bed.” I sob again. “I’ve never been in any guy’s bed.”

  “Summer, you don’t know me,” he says, looking up at me.

  “I do know you. You’re a loving father. You’re still the same guy who gave me water and tried to help me not be a total spaz. The one who would rather sit and chat with his nanny, than go out and do other stuff and be reckless. You have a good heart and you—”

  “That’s not true, Summer. That is what you see, not who I am. I told you, I’ve never had a real conversation with a woman. You seem so into me; I assumed you wanted to have sex. You came so easily. I gave you a credit card. I thought this would be an easy exchange: we have sex, you keep Max, and then you could have whatever you want.”

  “What?” I say appalled. “I’m not a slut. I’m not a whore! You can’t buy me. What’s all that shit you were talking about before? Money isn’t everything and it’s—”

  “I meant all that shit. But girls? They want to fuck, and they want money.”

  “No! I don’t want that!”

  “I don’t know how to do anything else. I’ve never been in love; never had the desire to be. I can’t even remember having sex with Max’s mom. What do you want from me?”

  “I want you to love me! I want you to be Haru, not this guy who calls me a slut and talks all dirty and stuff.”

  “I don’t know how to do that, Summer. I barely know how to love Max. I don’t know if I love him because I do or because I have to. I’m trying okay. It’s been two years since I’ve said anything remotely sexual to a woman. I tried to just stay away. With us … I thought it’d be a safe way to have sex—no ties, just sex. You love Max, you make some money, I don’t have to go out and look for pussy. It’s fucking right
here when I get home. Good girl pussy. Still sorry about calling you a slut—the good girls are the ones who want to be talked to the dirtiest, but you’re a really good girl. I didn’t expect this.”

  I wipe my tears away as Haru lets go of my arm and sits down on the bed.

  “You knew I liked you? You were manipulating me,” I say, a little annoyed.

  “What? No, I wasn’t.”

  “Yes you were!”

  “How was I supposed to know you had actual feelings for me? I just told you—you fuck, you get money. Easy transaction. Those are the relationships I’ve been in, Summer. And then you came with the sob story about your mom and you; I just thought you were looking for an escape and some good dick, a couple expensive handbags and you’d be good. Your relationship with Max, though… I know that’s genuine, so I should have known you were. Still, I’ve never been in a relationship that goes any deeper than what I’ve explained. I have a lot of money, and I’m pretty good in the sex department.”

  “That’s horrible. So, you don’t have any feelings toward me?”

  “Summer, I like you. I do. You’d do so much better with a different type of guy. I don’t know how to fucking love you. I don’t even love myself. I’m working on loving Max and not fucking his life up.”

  I gulp and walk over to him, the covers straggling around me and on the floor.

  “But Haru, I don’t know how to love you either. Do you know how hard it was trying to figure out how to tell you? I just couldn’t keep it in anymore.”

  “I don’t want you to take off. Max still needs you.”

  “Do you need me?”

  “Summer, what do you want me to say? I don’t need anyone. I can do everything for myself. I can do everything for you, except love you. I’m just not that type of guy.”

  “I don’t want you to do anything else, Haru!”

  “Okay, stop yelling. What do you want? Tell me.”

  “And you’re going to do it?”

  “I’ll try. I do like you. I’ve never been close to a woman. I talk to you like I talk to my buddies, except you and I flirt like crazy. I never meant to hurt you. I just said all that freaky shit because I thought that’s what you wanted, and honestly, it’s a big turn on for me.”

  “It turns you on to call me a slut and stuff?”

  “Well not you specifically … any girl. I’m not saying I couldn’t fuck you without it; I’m just saying it makes it more intense.”

  “But do you really think all girls are sluts?”

  “Summer…”

  “No, answer the question!”

  “Up until this scenario, where there’s actually someone who wants me to love them and wants to love me for some reason, yes. I’m going to be real honest with you—I’d probably fuck you and your mom.”

  “That is so gross!”

  “Your mom was all over me.”

  “Ew…” I already knew that, but still, ew.

  “Summer, every woman I have come across in a sexual way, were sluts, and if they weren’t, I could make them into one for me. I probably wasn’t the only guy they were sleeping with, but I didn’t care. It is what it is. Back in college, I did nothing just work and go to school. I got tired of that shit.”

  I sit down beside him on the bed. “What does that even mean?” I ask, as he gets up and slips on some pants.

  He sits back down. “When I was growing up, the most important thing was to have good grades, so that’s what I focused on. When other kids were out playing and doing kid stuff, I was studying and trying really hard to be number one in my class. That’s how I was from grade school to college.”

  “Really? I suck at school, honestly. The work isn’t hard, I just don’t want to. The only reason I kept up my grades is so I didn’t have to deal with my mother—same is true now.”

  He smiles. “I couldn’t not try. Being successful was so important to my parents. I didn’t have a choice.”

  Wow, his parents are just like my mom, sort of. I rebelled, he didn’t—well, later on he did.

  He continues, “I got scholarships, I worked, and paid my own way. While other guys were out joining fraternities and getting wasted, I was pulling eighteen-credit hour semesters, double majoring, working, and tutoring. I graduated with my first degree in like two years. When you met me, I was twenty-one and on my masters. I saved up and did everything I was supposed to.”

  “Were you sad or lonely?”

  “Looking back now, I guess so. But back then it didn’t seem like it.” He pauses, “After our little encounter—okay so, I guess I was a little turned on by you, but I also hated you. I sort wished I could be as free as you. I got so stressed out with having no life. That was my last semester, I couldn’t walk until May but I was out of school at the end of the year. On my twenty-second birthday, I decided I was done. When I graduated in December, I was going to live however I wanted to; and I did.”

  “I changed your life?”

  “Yeah, I guess.” He shrugs.

  “That next semester while I was waiting to walk in May, my buddy got me a job, a really good job.” He stops, his lips parting dramatically, a look of fear comes across his face as he stares blankly ahead.

  “Haru?” I call.

  He shakes off his intense, thoughtful gaze. “Like I said, I was homeless for a while. I had a fucking butt load of money in the bank, and before I quit my job, a butt load coming in. I didn’t have to be homeless, I could have bought a house easily, but I spent my life having so much responsibility that I wanted none. I just wanted to have fun, you know?”

  “Wow.”

  “So, I went out and got tattoo after tattoo, and whenever I could, I went out with guys from my old job. Hayden came a long, and then the women started to approach me. Girls from school kept telling me how much they liked me. It just became this thing: you want something from me, and I want something from you. Let’s trade.”

  “And you thought that I was like that?”

  “Yeah, definitely. We’ve only known each other for a few months. You were all sweet and innocent at first, but I don’t know, we flirt all the time. I always say inappropriate shit, and you just shrug it off. I thought you were just waiting for your window … and here you are in my bed.”

  “Yeah, I guess I kind of do seem like a slut.”

  “I would’ve never thought you were a virgin. You’re so hot and you took control. You just kissed me—that’s balls.”

  “That was because I didn’t know what else to do. Saying how I feel seems dumb, when I don’t know how you feel, exactly.”

  He sighs. “Well, I don’t want you to leave or be awkward. Tell me what you want me to do.”

  “I just want you to love me.”

  “Summer…”

  “Try, Haru. We’re still getting to know each other.”

  “Summer, you don’t want to be in a real relationship with me. I have kid, and I work all the time. You know this.”

  “So, I love Max. I don’t want to only come over on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I want to see you guys whenever I want to. Don’t you ever want to see me, Haru?”

  “Yeah, I guess. Today I did. They ask me all the time to go out on Fridays. I thought it was a good excuse.”

  I smile, scooting closer to him. “So, yes?”

  “I don’t know what I’m doing, Summer. I’m still trying to figure out my life.”

  “Haru,” I say, lying down on the bed.

  He lies down next to me. “Max has never seen me with a woman. I don’t know what he’s going to think.”

  “I don’t either.”

  “What do you want from this?”

  “I don’t want your money. I can take care of myself. So, I’m going to give you back your credit card, and you just pay me for keeping Max.”

  “I…”

  “Wait, no! I don’t want you to pay me for being with someone I love. I love Max. He’s such a good kid. I’m going to find a different job.”

  “Can I just pay you
less? It’s only two days a week. Any other time you’re here, it’s fine.”

  “Well, you can do that until I find another job. I don’t want you thinking you have to take care of me, or that I can be bought, or that you can rule me with your money.”

  “Whoa, whoa! Calm down. Not a gold-digging slut—got ya.”

  “Good. We understand each other.” I smile. “Is it too late to be romantic again?”

  He smiles. “Are you going to freak out if I call your vagina a pussy again?”

  “Mm? Let’s compromise. You can call it a pussy if you make sure not to call me a slut.”

  “I think I can deal with those terms.” Haru brings me closer to him and kisses me. “This is what I mean, Summer. Everything about you is so different. You could have made a huge scene. You could have completely hurt Max. He’d be destroyed if you weren’t around anymore because he loves you. You could’ve blackmailed me—I’ve been blackmailed before.” He laughs. “You could have even ignored stuff, but you always just go for it. Whatever the consequence, you let your feelings out, and I always know they are genuine.”

  I grin. “I know you say we’ve only known each other for a few months, and that’s true, but it feels like so much longer.”

  “It does. It’s kind of hard to imagine what life was like for me and Max before you came along.”

  “Me too.” I beam, and then kiss him. His warm lips feel nice upon mine. We kiss a while longer. “I’m staying here tonight; I don’t want to go home.”

  “That’s fine.”

  Haru sits up to turn the lights off. I glance back at him. His eyes linger over my body. He squints up at me with a thoughtful smile. He wraps up in the covers with me and turns out the lights. “Hey, Summer. My dick sometimes has a mind of its own. If we’re not going to have sex, can you please put some clothes on? So I don’t accidently fuck you in my sleep.”

  Chapter Sixteen: Finals

  A few weeks pass. Haru’s more playful now than he used to be. That’s probably not true. He’s probably the same amount of playful, he’s just dirtier about it. We haven’t had sex, and he hasn’t hassled me about it. It’s finals week, something that through all the love confessing and time spending, I had completely forgotten about.