Love in Many Languages

by Jamie Bennett

  She asked me about Cooper, too, and how we had met, and gotten to know each other. She also asked why I thought he had gone running over to my house in the middle of the night.

  I thought for a moment. “Well, Ash, the police officer who we both met through Digger, talked to Cooper last night to let him know about the call I got. I guess Cooper thought that I needed him. He was right, because I did. I didn’t call him last night because I know how hard he works and all the responsibilities he has, but I think that if something happens to me again, I will. Because everything got about a thousand times better when he walked in the door. It’s like someone turns on the light in a dark room, that’s how I feel when Cooper is around.”

  Her eyebrows shot up. “It sounds like you care very deeply about my son.”

  “Well, of course!” I said, surprised now, also. That was what I thought I had been saying this whole time. “You do, too, so I’m sure you can understand it!”

  Then she smiled, the same smile that both her sons got, slow but blooming. “I’m glad. I’m glad he found someone who feels that way about him. I like you, Ione.”

  “Thank you. I feel the same way.” I sat on the bed next to her. “Can I ask you questions now? Cooper says you like to garden and I wish you would help me with mine. I let it all get ruined, and I’m trying to fix things.” She pointed me to a pencil and paper and very carefully, and not very well, I sketched out my yard and explained where things had been.

  “Does it all have to be just the same?” she asked me.

  “Yes.” I drew an ugly little flower over the blobs I had placed on Sania’s side of my yard. “These are the rose bushes, but I don’t know what kind of roses they were. I had no idea there were so many and when I started to look them up, I got overwhelmed.”

  “I have a book that I always use for questions about roses…” Her eyes searched the shelves across the room from her bed but she shook her head. “It must be down in the library. Cooper will be able to find it for you.”

  “I’ll be back.” I stood and went as fast as I could downstairs. I heard him typing, the keys clicking like mad as I walked in, so I went quietly so he could finish his thought, but his head popped right up anyway.

  “Everything ok?”

  “Yes, fine. I’m looking for a book for your mom, a rose book.”

  He stretched his arms over his head and rolled his neck. “I think I know the one she wants. I’ll get it for you.”

  “Hold on. Stay there.” I walked behind him and put my hand on the back of his neck, which was radiating tension. “What have you been working on?”

  Cooper sighed, deeply. “I’m trying to figure out how I can possibly not fire two people I have to fire. I don’t have the budget to keep them on. But Nelson’s wife just had a baby, and…” He sighed again. “I keep going over it and I know I’m going to come to the same conclusion, but I don’t like the conclusion.” His muscles spasmed under my hand. “Why? Could you tell it was something bad?”

  I rubbed his neck gently. “I can feel it, right here.” I dug my fingers in, working out the kinks. He made a noise, kind of a groan.

  “That’s good,” he said, his voice muffled as he rested his face in his hands.

  “I had an idea,” I said as I massaged his back, too. I loved just to touch him, but really, I wanted to feel his skin under my hand. I reached down the neck of his shirt, stretching it a little. “I was thinking the other day about that little drawing that I did, the one of the robot saying that Detroit robots are the best robots. Remember? You made a joke about having bumper stickers made of it. I bet we could, and t-shirts and hats. Tote bags. I have a friend from art school who does graphic design and she would be able to take my drawing and make something really cute with it. It wouldn’t make enough to fund two whole salaries, but it might be something to help you out. I could talk to her if you want. And even if you couldn’t sell them, it would be nice to have some swag to give out to your customers. What do you think?”

  Cooper turned a little in his chair. “I think that’s a very, very good idea. Could you talk to your friend?”

  “Yes, definitely.” I put my cheek against his head for a moment. “I was looking at your website, too. It’s not very good.”

  He laughed. “No, I haven’t gotten around to working on that yet.”

  “I could help you with that. Me, and some of the people at work.”

  “Ione.” He took my hand. “Thank you.”

  “I want to help you back, if I can.”

  “You know what? Sometimes I think about you during the day. I think about you and what you’re doing, something you said or did.”

  “I distract you?”

  “No. It’s like my mind takes a vacation, thinking about you. You help me just because of that. You don’t need to do anything to make things even between us. All right?”

  I nodded.

  He still held my hand between his and now he studied at my fingers. “I was looking at your hands, and I realized that I hadn’t ever seen them without ink stains or paint before.”

  “I can’t do those things. I tried to draw with my left hand but it’s useless.” I felt my mouth turn down as I looked at my fingers too, wishing that I could. But then I thought of my studio, and that made me frown more.

  “This hand isn’t useless. It just helped me to feel a lot better.” He turned his chair so that we were facing each other, and I watched him examine my fingers. Then he brought my hand to his lips, and kissed it, first my knuckles, then each finger, and last he turned it over and kissed my palm. He rubbed his face gently against it, then just as slowly and gently, he drew me down to sit on his lap and his arms went around my waist. I put my arm around his neck. “You’ll get your other hand, your arm, back soon.” He rested my injured arm on his chest. “It will be better, soon,” he murmured. Cooper leaned forward just a little and softly put his lips to mine. He drew back and looked into my eyes. “Ione.”

  I kissed him now, first his forehead and his temples that he rubbed when he was worried. I kissed both his cheeks, but he cupped the back of my head then and moved my mouth to his, and I parted my lips for him. He kissed me deeper and his other hand went to my thigh, his fingers moving up and down against my skin as his tongue twirled in my mouth.

  Cooper broke away from me and rubbed his cheek against mine. “Is it ok? Does this hurt you?”

  I was trying to get closer to him. I turned my face to find his lips again. “No, just kiss me. Kiss me more.”

  His hand slid farther up, up under my cutoffs as he did kiss me again, and I sighed in happiness. Then my breath caught when his hand moved to my ass and squeezed. I pushed myself against him and he deepened our kiss even more, holding me firmly with his arms, then picking me up and laying me down on his desk so he could lay over me, pressed to me. Carefully, he moved my right arm onto the desk next to us. “Ok?” he asked me. To answer, I wrapped both my legs around him then and thrust my hips to his and we both gasped.

  Cooper moved up and down against me, rubbing against my breasts and my core with his body, and it felt so good that my toes curled in my flipflops. I moaned his name into his mouth and his eyes opened, meeting mine.

  “Are you watching me?” he murmured, placing light kisses on the corners of my lips.

  “I want to see you. I love seeing you.” He moved against me, and I moaned again. His mouth opened slightly in pleasure. “Did you ever think about this, when you thought of me?” I asked him, my voice breathy and shaking.

  He buried his face in my neck, kissing, then biting tenderly. “Yes. Many, many times.”

  I took his hand and brought it to my breast, where my nipple was hard and aching, needing him. “I thought about this, too,” I said. My voice shook. He circled his palm and my hips mimicked the movement, until both of us were panting hard.

  “Cooper? Coop?” a voice called.

  Cooper picked up his head from where he had been exploring my ear and throat with his tongue. “
That’s my brother,” he said quietly. He removed his hand from under my shorts, where it had been gripping my butt. Carefully, he pulled me to sit up on the desk, then reached and ran his thumb over my lips. “Io…Jesus. Jesus H. Christ.”

  “I think you should kiss me, one more time,” I said, and I sucked his thumb into my mouth.

  “I agree with that,” Cooper nodded, and lifted me to him. I was breathless when he finished.

  “Mom is asking where the book is.” Tanner stuck his head into the room, where Cooper had returned me to the desk, kissed into happy confusion. Cooper had his back to the door and was trying to adjust his clothes. And himself in his pants. “Oh.” Tanner got a huge smile on his face. “What’s going on in here?”

  “I’ll get the book,” Cooper told him. “Tell her Ione is on her way up. Get out, please.”

  “Cooper, I thought—” his brother started, still grinning widely.

  “Out!”

  Tanner left, looking over his shoulder and smiling.

  Cooper walked to the bookshelf and pulled out a volume, then came back to the desk and put it in my hand. “Here you go.” He tilted his head and peered at me. “Ione? Are you going back upstairs?”

  “I will in a minute.” I dropped the book, pulled him to me, and he kissed me again. We had wasted too much time before to stop now.

  ∞

  I ended up going that night to Augusta’s, just for the night, because I could see how much it meant to Cooper that I was somewhere other than in my own house. I didn’t want to put more pressure on him. “I think you should come over, and we should sleep together, but I feel like you don’t want to rush things,” I explained.

  He blew out a breath. “Yes. That’s right, I don’t want to. No, that’s not right—I want to, but you’ve been through too much for us to…to jump into…”

  “Sex. And I know you want to be here with your mom, especially since you weren’t last night.”

  “Yes, also correct. But if you’re insisting on going home alone—”

  And I had told him that I would call Augusta, even though I had to swallow hard to make myself do it. She said it was no problem, that she would put me on the schedule to get up with Phoebe in the morning.

  “I’m kidding, unless you’re interested?” Augusta asked me. “It’s pretty fun at five AM. You get a great jump on the day.”

  “No, thanks, and this kind of offer may be why you don’t have houseguests,” I said. She laughed. “But I really appreciate you letting me stay over for the night.”

  “Are you kidding? I’ve been inviting you to since you came home from the hospital. I’m glad that you’re coming, but you’re going to have to tell me the reason, ok?”

  “I will. And it’s just for tonight. Thank you.”

  Cooper and I had cooked dinner together, while Tanner sat at the kitchen table and made jokes about kissing, sex, love, and his brother, which he personally found hilarious and made Cooper want to kill him. They both made me laugh, because I felt a little high, myself. Maybe Cooper was quiet, and seemed subdued, but when he kissed me, I just about went up in flames. The man also knew how to use his hands. We made out in his car in his driveway after I said goodbye to his mother and as we drove, I thought a lot about what Augusta had said to me before, things about what she and Shane had done at red lights. I looked at Cooper’s crotch and considered.

  As we waited for the green, he followed my eyes in the direction of his penis. “Io, the way you’re looking at me right now is going to make it hard for me to drive.” He shifted in the seat.

  “I was just thinking about licking—”

  “Ok, yeah. We can’t do that. Not right now.”

  “Safety,” I agreed, knowing how it was very important to him.

  “Safety.” He leaned over the seat and kissed me until the car behind us honked because the light had changed. “There’s a time and a place for safety,” Cooper commented, and I laughed. I felt like bouncing, but also a lot more like unzipping his pants. The way he kissed…I looked at him more closely, how he was drumming his thumbs on the wheel, and frowning intermittently.

  “What?” I asked him.

  “Hm?”

  “What do you need to say? It’s better to get it out,” I reminded him.

  “Jesus H. Christ, I forgot that you can read my mind.” Cooper cleared his throat. “I haven’t been telling you, I mean, I haven’t wanted to mention, I, uh, I’m going on a business trip.”

  “Oh. Where are you going?”

  “Japan. I’m going to see the facility we’re supplying in person. And also, I have meetings with two other companies that may want to buy from us.”

  “Cooper! That’s amazing! Why didn’t you say this before?” I was so happy for him! Then I thought of how much I would miss him. I took his hand and pressed it to my cheek. Then I started to bite his wrist. I dropped my hand to his thigh.

  He breathed harder as I moved my fingers, rubbing up and down his hard quad, up and down, up and down. “As good as it feels, I’m going to run off the road if you keep that up.” He replaced my hand on my lap. “I didn’t tell you because I’m worried about leaving you. More, after what happened last night.”

  “No, you don’t need to worry. I’m going to be fine. Tell more about the trip!”

  He did and it was obvious that he was really excited too. “I could expand, rather than firing people,” he said, looking out at the road. I didn’t think he was really seeing it.

  “I think it’s wonderful. So many good things are happening for you, Cooper. It makes me so glad.”

  His eyes refocused and he glanced over and smiled at me. “Thank you.”

  “We should practice your Japanese,” I said. “We also could learn some new things.” I put my hand back on his leg.

  “Ione…Jesus,” he gasped, as I moved my fingers much, much higher.

  “Like how you would say, ‘I want to lick you, right here.’”

  “I’m not going to be saying that to anyone in Japan.” He pulled into a restaurant parking lot and stopped. “But I will need to know that, to say it to you about here.” He massaged my breast, then reached under my shirt, my bra getting in the way. Why, of all days, had I remembered to wear it? “Also, here,” he remarked, and his hand went between my legs now, and I couldn’t help but rub myself against him. “‘I want to lick you, right here.’ Would you say yes?”

  “Yes!”

  It took a long time because we had to go to my house first to get a bag for me, and it was hard for me to leave. But then Cooper made it easier when he made another unplanned stop along the way to cheer me up, and we did finally get to Augusta’s house. We made out again on her front porch while we waited for her to answer the doorbell and not considering where I was, I started to unzip his pants. I wanted in them, immediately, and I told him that.

  He stopped my questing fingers. “When you say these things to me, I want to take you up against the wall. Of your friend’s house, Ione. Look where we are.”

  We were laughing, foreheads together, when Augusta opened the door. “Well, finally!” she announced loudly. “Cooper, I’m so glad to see that you came to your senses.” It was hard to say goodbye to him, but he had work the next day, and I remembered that I did, too. I watched his car pull out of her driveway then turned to find Augusta smiling hugely at me.

  “What happened? Tell me, immediately,” she ordered, and we went into her big, gleaming kitchen to discuss.

  “I understand perfectly what you were saying before, about wanting to be in your husband’s pants all the time,” I started saying. “Hi, Shane.”

  Augusta’s husband jerked his head up. “What about my pants?”

  “I’ll show you later, when I come up to bed. Not too much longer,” she said to him, and still looking confused, but now pretty happy, he waved to me, kissed his wife, and left us.

  “Tell me!” she repeated, so I did, but starting with what had happened the night before.

  “Why d
idn’t you call me?” Augusta demanded.

  “There was nothing you could have done. Cooper came, and it’s all right.”

  “No, it’s not. We have to do something. We will do something, ok?”

  It made tears come to my eyes, how fiercely she said it. “Don’t tell Karis,” I said. “I’ll talk to her tomorrow at work.”

  “She’s going to freak out.”

  I nodded. “But things got better, because Cooper stayed over, and then, things changed. I think I finally flipped his switch.”

  “It looked like you had on my porch,” Augusta said. “Details.”

  We stayed up a little longer while I filled her in, but when I started yawning, she stood and gestured to me. “Let’s go to bed. I’ve made Shane wait long enough.”

  “Augusta, are you pregnant again?”

  She stopped dead. “How in the hell did you know that?”

  “Yes?” I hugged her as hard as one arm would allow. “I’m so excited! I’m so happy for you and Shane.”

  “You’re some kind of mind reader, Ione,” she said, shaking her head when I let her go. “I’m not very far along, so we haven’t even told my parents.”

  “I’m not a mind reader. I don’t know anything more than anybody else, but when you got up from your chair like this,” I mimicked her movements, “it was pretty obvious. I’m sure other people will notice it soon, too.”

  “I’m sure they won’t,” she responded. “You do see things.”

  No. Not anymore, and I didn’t think that I ever had.

  “I guess I won’t worry about losing those last seven pounds before Karis’ wedding,” she said, sighing a little.

  “You’ll have a baby,” I said, and smiled and kissed her cheek. “Seven pounds of wonderful baby.” She hugged me again, and went off to make her husband’s night, and I went off to think more about babies, sweet, dark-haired babies with grey eyes.

  Chapter 14

  “I can’t believe the difference.” Karis looked around my living room, eyes wide. “Wow. It’s like…”

  “Just like my mother’s house!” her mom, Mette, said happily. “It takes me right back. Now, show me where you want to hang the curtains.”