by Calia Read
More than anything I wanted to reach out and touch him slowly, but my entire body felt like a live explosive—ready to go off at any second. With shaking hands, I unlatched his buckle and unzipped his pants with impatient jerks. Mathias started to breathe rapidly.
We didn’t stop until we were in a pitch-black room, with only the light from outside creeping in. All that was left of my clothes were my bra and underwear. My eyes adjusted to the dark and I saw the pale outline of Mathias’ body: his wide shoulders, arms hanging at his sides, narrow hips. Most of all, I saw a look of fire in his eyes as he walked closer.
I took a step back and reminded myself to breathe. Everything was moving so fast, and I wanted to make this last. So that months from now, I would still be able to feel the pressure of his hands on my skin.
Mathias walked toward me slowly. He gave me a half-smile that made my skin tingle.
Abruptly, I turned around, facing the windows that revealed the city lights twinkling back at me.
I felt Mathias come up behind me. His hand wrapped around my waist, pulling me flush against the hard wall of his chest. I thought that I could get used to this. This feeling of protection. I knew it was dangerous to think that way, but I couldn’t help it.
“It’s nothing like the view in Garmisch, but it’s still nice,” he murmured in my year.
At the mention of Garmisch, a fresh bout of pain bombarded me. I was going home. Mathias would stay here. History was repeating itself, and yet, I couldn’t put a stop to this even if I tried.
“Has Rebecca been here?”
Mathias toyed with the thin strap of my bra before he slid it down. I felt his cold lips on my warm neck. “My apartment or my bedroom?”
“Bedroom.”
“Never.”
His answer should make me happy, but I wanted to know more.
“Have any other women been here?”
“No.”
Standing so close, I had to tilt my head back against the wall. My body slightly arched, making my breasts rub against him. I shuddered.
“No one has been here. No one except for you.”
I turned in his arms. My nipples hardened, pressing against my bra. My hands reached out, touching his chest, brushing against his six-pack before they curved around his biceps. I’d thought about touching him like this for the past year, even when I knew I shouldn’t. I licked my lower lip, knowing that the chances of me regretting this later were big, but my want for him was even bigger.
I could’ve kept touching him, exploring the body that had haunted me for a year. But Mathias pulled back. His fingers hooked around the edges of my underwear. Back and forth his hand moved, and it was torture.
“I need you,” he said in my ear. “Now.”
In one smooth move he picked me up and dropped me onto the bed. I raised my hips and quickly shed my underwear and unhooked my bra. Mathias watched me with hungry eyes. I splayed my hands behind me and slowly inched up the bed. Mathias reached out, his hands curling around my ankles and stopped me in my tracks.
His pants were still on, barely hanging around his hips. He crawled up my body slowly and when he was above me, my hands curled around his hips. He went in for a kiss, but I dodged his lips at the last second.
“You drive me crazy, Katinka,” he said.
I loved it. Watching him lose control was an aphrodisiac.
“Good,” I replied. My nails dragged up his back. “Remember that,” I whispered against his lips. “Remember that I’m the only one who does this to you.”
He gave me a punishing kiss, trying to take my words away, but that would never work. I grabbed his face in between my hands and kissed him hard on the mouth. Hard enough to take his breath away. If I could, I would give every inch of myself so I was in his bones. In his blood. In his DNA. I wanted myself embedded in him, so no other woman would feel good enough.
Mathias tore himself away, staring at me with a glazed look in his eyes, as if he didn’t know who I was. But didn’t he know that’s what love did to you? Made you go mad. Made you turn into another person.
“What about you?” He challenged as his hand drifted down my body and pushed my underwear to the side.
His fingers brushed against me. I sucked in a sharp breath. I tried to focus. “What about me?”
“Has Lukas taken the place of me?”
My eyes flashed opened. “No.”
He slipped one finger in me. Then another. My breathing became choppy.
“Try to replace me, Katinka. It’ll never work.”
For a blissful second his fingers moved expertly. My nails dug into his skin, leaving marks. And then his hands and body were gone.
I raised myself up on my elbows and watched as his fingers shook as he put on a condom. Then he was back, looming above me. He rubbed the tip of himself in between my legs. Back and forth, so slowly that I started to writhe, hoping that he would slip inside and stop the torment.
But he didn’t just slip inside. He moved with one slow thrust that had me gripping his back and wrapping my legs around his waist. He filled me, stretched me, until all I felt was him. It was ecstasy.
“Fuck!” he shouted.
It had been an entire year since I was in this position with Mathias. But from the way my body moved, my hands gripped his shoulders, and the words that came out of my mouth, you’d never know we had been apart.
“You feel so good,” he groaned.
I glided my hands up my own body. Mathias didn’t look away. I cupped my own breast, brushed my own fingers against my nipples.
He watched me with a half-glazed expression. I tilted my head back, eyes closed, feeling myself getting tighter and tighter around him.
A choked sound escaped him and he started to move even faster. I moved with him. My muscles ached and my heart pounded, but I kept moving.
It wasn’t enough. But when had it ever been?
Together we were dangerous. Ravenous. Tearing at each other until there was nothing left.
“Don’t stop,” I told him.
“I won’t. I can’t,” he groaned into my ear.
My eyes flashed open. A flush spread across Mathias’ cheeks. His hair was a mess. Sweat drifted down his chest. He held me like I was a ghost who would disappear on him at any second. His eyes met mine.
“I love you.”
It was the first time I’d said those words aloud. The words slipped out of my mouth, but there was no taking them back. My heart felt a bit free, as though a huge weight had been lifted.
Mathias’ eyes widened. He tried to look away. My thumb and forefinger curled around his jaw, forcing him to look at me.
He continued to move, his thrust turning wild. His left hand curled around my waist and I was pressed up against him so tight I could barely breathe. The whole time I repeated those three words that I knew would change everything.
His eyes closed and I knew he was so close to losing control. I let go of his jaw and curled my hands around his neck, pulling his lips down to mine. His body shuddered against mine. A guttural sound came from his mouth. I ate it up.
K A T J A
I gently ran the tips of my fingers across the scar on his left shoulder. “What happened here?”
Mathias barely glanced at the scar. I straddled his back, touching every part of him that I could.
“On my grandparents’ farm.”
I leaned down, until my lips touched his right ear. My hair grazed his back. “And?”
He looked at me over his shoulder. Our noses brushed. Mathias gently nipped the side of my neck. “You have to know everything, don’t you?”
“I do,” I said solemnly.
“I was cutting sunflowers growing in the cornfields. These things were huge, as tall as the corn. We had to use machetes to remove them. It was in the middle of summer and disgustingly hot. I had my shirt off and was making my way down the rows of corn, and a spider dropped onto my shoulder. It was fucking huge.”
“You’re scared of
spiders.”
“If you saw the damn thing you’d be scared, too.”
I traced the edges of the scar. “That’s a big mark just from a spider.”
“That’s because it’s not just from the spider. I panicked, trying to get it off my shoulder and used the machete.”
I filled in the rest of the blanks.
“Oh, God.” I made a face. “That’s gross.”
“You’re the one that asked.”
Abruptly, he turned around, making me topple backwards. A mischievous gleam was in his eyes. A smile tugged at his lips. I’d never seen him look this happy, and to think that I might’ve had a hand in that happiness made me happier than necessary.
He propped himself up on his elbows and stared down at me. “Any scars on you, Katinka?”
Just the one on my heart, I thought. But I didn’t say that.
“No scars,” I replied softly.
“I think I should check,” he whispered against my lips.
Mathias lifted up my shirt and pretended to thoroughly look me over. His hands joined in, drifting across my skin like I was an instrument. Against my leg I could feel just how hard he was.
He dipped his head down and gently bit my bottom lip. I moaned loudly and when he soothed the burn by dragging his tongue across my lip, I only got louder.
The shrill sound of a phone going off made me pause. I slightly pulled away; who would be calling at this time?
“Ignore it,” he muttered.
But it kept ringing enough to make Mathias shoot a death glare at the phone.
“Fuck.” He hefted himself away. He jerked open a dresser drawer and quickly put on a pair of pajama bottoms. He pointed at me. “Don’t move. Just give me a second.”
I smiled up at the ceiling. Like I would go anywhere? I knew that I should be at the hotel. In my room. But I couldn’t seem to find the energy to move.
Was it too much to ask to always stay this happy? This feeling was infectious, making me feel deliriously good. But could this last? Could Mathias and I actually make things work? For a moment I almost thought we could.
But could I be okay with never hearing him say those three words back?
A noise sounded across the room. I sat up and looked over at the dresser. One of the drawers was wide open. A folder was open, looking ready to crash to the ground. Papers were scattered across the floor.
I got out of bed, bent down and gathered them into a pile. They were old, the once white pages were yellow from time. The first article was the same one I found on the Internet. It was dated all the way back to June 13th, 2000. The headline read: LOCAL BOY WOUNDED IN EXPLOSION.
“What are you doing?”
My body locked up the minute Mathias spoke.
K A T J A
Like a thief caught red handed, I dropped the article and whirled around.
Mathias watched me from the doorway. All the happiness he possessed just minutes before had vanished. His gaze was frigid. Completely closed off.
“This isn’t what it looks like.”
Mathias didn’t reply.
He pushed away from the wall. When he reached me he bent down and collected the papers. I stood perfectly still and watched his bent head.
He stood up; the same cold look in his eyes. He waved the articles in the air and smiled darkly. “New reading material?”
“Mathias. They fell out of the dresser. I was just picking them back up.”
“Didn’t look like it to me. Looked like you were snooping.”
“I wasn’t snooping.”
He turned away from me and started to pace the room. “Have I ever dug through your past, Katja?”
By this point the desire and want for each other had simmered down, barely even a thought. I quickly gathered my clothes.
“No,” I answered as I put my dress on. “But you don’t need to dig. Know why? Because I’m an open book. I tell you everything, and you give me nothing.”
“I give you everything I possibly can. More than I’ve ever given anyone else. You know that.”
“Except for the truth, right?”
“Enough!”
“No!” I pointed a shaking finger at him. “It’s not enough!”
A year of pent-up pain and frustration I’d been pressing down exploded, making me a prisoner in my own body. “Can you blame me for wanting to read those articles? Here you are, this elusive, closed-off man who keeps his life hidden. Of course I’m going to look.”
“It was none of your business!” he roared.
His tone, his words, they were slowly settling beneath my skin, spreading through my veins like poison. It was becoming harder and harder to breathe. I stabbed a shaking finger at him.
“I just wanted to figure you out, Mathias.”
“Figure me out? You read the articles. You already know everything.”
“I didn’t read them.”
He smiled, but it was anything but kind. “Well, let’s sit down and have story time. Shall we?”
“Mathias.”
He sat at the foot of the bed and patted the space next to him. “Come. Sit.”
This was not the way I wanted to hear the truth. I wanted it to come from a place in his heart that had to share it. Not from a place of hurt.
I walked out of the room, stepping over my shoes and coat. I would walk back in freezing temps if I had to. I just had to get out of here before one of us said something that we would regret.
He followed behind me. I hurried toward the door, but I wasn’t fast enough. Mathias’ voice rang out and I stopped dead in my tracks.
“I was eighteen. It was the summer before I went off to Juilliard. I was at my grandparents’ doing some work around the farm. Before I left that day, I saw one of my car tires was flat. I aired it back up. The air compressor blew up on me.”
He held out his hand and I saw the puckered scar on his palm that ran from his forefinger, curved around his thumb, and stopped at his inner wrists. “It took one second and my future was destroyed.”
Pain squeezed my heart so tight I couldn’t breathe.
“I can’t feel a thing in this hand. But the doctors say I was lucky. I could have lost my entire hand.” He laughed darkly, staring down at the scars. “I wasn’t lucky at all.”
I stared at Mathias, my eyes beseeching for him to stop.
“That’s why I agreed to be your teacher. I thought … I thought if I taught you, this would be my one and only chance to really see a small piece of my dream come true. Then I’d be free from that stupid fucking dream and could move on with my life.”
He dropped to the chair and exhaled loudly. There was silence around us. I stared down at his bent head, wanting to step forward and wrap my arms tightly around him.
“I just wanted to be free.” For a single second, Mathias’ facade crumbled. I saw the pain in his eyes at just the mere mention of his accident. All too soon it was gone, replaced by a cold, frigid gaze. “Happy now?”
“Why would that make me happy?” I whispered.
“You got what you wanted. You know my past.”
Mathias dragged his hands through his hair, none too gently, pulling at the strands.
“God. What do you want from me, Katja? I tell you the truth and that still isn’t enough for you.”
Minutes ticked by. I thought carefully before I spoke up. “I know that you’re private. I get that. But I saw the pain that you try so hard to hide from everyone. And I just wanted to take some of that pain for you.”
“Maybe I don’t want you to,” he replied. His tone was regretful.
The two of us stared at each other. Until I finally took a step back. I wanted to run away, yet at the same time I wanted to sever the distance between us and tell him that I was sorry. For my words and what happened to him.
I only took one step back before Mathias grabbed my wrist. I tried to jerk out of his hold but that only made him hang on tighter.
“Let me go!”
“I can’t.�
�
I jerked away, my shoulders hitting the wall. We’d reached the very end. Two paths were glaring us in the face. One was the two of us together, and the other was us apart. The next few words to come out of my mouth would reveal the outcome.
“Mathias, I love you.”
His grip tightened. He didn’t speak.
“Will you ever love me, like I love you?” I whispered.
Please say yes, I pleaded with my eyes. Please, please, please say yes.
But he stood there, staring down at me.
“Are you afraid you’ll end up like your parents?”
“What? No! My parents were doomed from the beginning. There was no love there.”
“Then tell me what the problem is!” I begged.
“The problem is that sometimes opposites don’t attract. Sometimes people are so different, that instead of complementing each other they ruin one another.” Mathias stared at me sadly. “I don’t want that to happen to you. I want you to stay Katinka, my beautiful, sweet, and hopeful German girl.”
“I’m not the same girl you left behind.”
“I never left you behind,” Mathias said heatedly. “I was trying to save you from me!”
“Maybe I didn’t need saving. Did you think of that?” I shouted. “Maybe I was so blissfully in love with you that I would’ve done anything, anything to stay with you.” I paused. Before I continued, I thought back to our last night in Munich. I didn’t remember what he said. Or how he smiled, or smelled. But how he made me feel would always stay with me.
“You didn’t save me when you left, Mathias … you killed me,” I whispered brokenly. “You killed that beautiful, sweet, and hopeful German girl.”
I sighed, suddenly feeling exhausted. I turned around.
“Where are you going?” His voice turned desperate. Scared.
“I’m going back to my hotel,” I said calmly. I collected my purse and slipped on my heels. I remained composed, when all I wanted was to go collapse onto the floor. “I’m going to pack up my stuff and I’m going back home.”
He stood there, mouth open, but no words came out. For the first time Mathias looked afraid.
Before I walked out of the room and out of Mathias’ life, I turned back around for one last look at him.