by Tarin Lex
“You’re so fuckin’ wet, Angel.”
“Yes,” she whispers, breathlessly. “Because of you.”
“Good.” I grip my cock and rub the tip in slow circles against her wetness. God I love how she writhes and wiggles beneath me, her eyes fluttering closed for a heartbeat.
“That feels so good,” she whimpers, making me grin. “I want to feel you…inside.” She sears me with her darkened gaze, tugging her bottom lip between her teeth. Too encouraged, I dip the head into her hot syrup and she winces, her thighs squeezing harder against my hips.
“Angel, baby. Are you okay?”
“Don’t stop, Ren. Just…slower.”
I lower my face to kiss her lips again. Gently and slowly, I relax her with a finger first, then two, easing her open until she’s ready, then sliding my cock in one long, smooth thrust. She’s incredibly wet and tight, and I falter, afraid of losing control, of hurting her. Then she starts to rock her hips, moving her body in tandem with mine, arching her back to meet my thrusts. Our eyes lock onto each other’s. Her hands grip me by the nape of my neck. She moans, and mewls, opening to me in every way. I press deeper, her walls clench around my cock, coaxing me to drive into her harder and faster. I near the edge of desire, floating, floating, like I never have before…
When Khadija coats my dick with a flood of wet warmth, she vaults me to higher realms of pleasure. She clings to me with strong, athletic thighs. Dancer’s thighs. I come inside her with a shuddering, rapid-fire pulse.
Weightlessly, we both fall.
#
We wake to the upbeat jingle of DJ’s cell phone. She pats around the nightstand for her glasses, but they’re on my side. I hand them to her as she wipes the fog of sleep from her eyes.
Wrapped in only my bedsheet, she goes to retrieve her phone from the other room, then reappears in my doorway. “It’s Dad.” Her brown eyes are wide as discs. She walks in, paces my room. “Oh no. What if he knows I’m here?” She lets her phone ring and ring as she worries.
“He knew you were coming over to clean, didn’t he?” I peek at the bedside clock. Feels like we slept all afternoon, but she only came over an hour ago. Her phone stops ringing. I shake my head. “That can’t happen again, Deej. You’re not missing calls from your dad because of me. Especially when Hope is almost…”
“I know.”
“Call him back.”
I get dressed for some modicum of decency while the woman I just made love to makes a call to my best friend of ten years. I only hear snippets from her end of the conversation until she hangs up.
“Hope is in labor,” DJ announces. “According to Nana though, it could be a while.”
“We better get going.”
She sits next to me at the foot of the bed, where I’m putting on my Danner boots. “Together?” she asks, with that guilty-but-hopeful look in her eye.
“Yes, together. Or you can take your car, I’ll follow you there. DJ.” I lay my arm over her shoulders, which feels natural and somehow, as intimate as before. “No one will suspect anything’s happening between us.”
She lays her head on me. “You’re right,” she sighs.
“But, Angel, I don’t want this to go on for long.” When she snaps her head up and looks at me with heartache in her eyes, I know she misunderstood those words. “I mean, I don’t want either of us to be feeling guilty. I have enough to feel guilty about already.”
“Ren. You don’t—”
I shake my head. “I can’t live with a guilty conscious, lying to your dad all the time. I definitely don’t want you to endure that. And I’m…” I take a steadying breath. “I’m not just messing around with you, Deej. I realize you’re only eighteen—”
“Almost nineteen.” She smiles.
“Almost nineteen…” I smile back, tucking a feral strand of her brunette hair behind her ear. “…still very young, with a lot of life to discover. I’m thirty-one. I want to be careful, take things slow, not because I’m hesitant but because I might want…a future with you.”
She says without a beat of pause, “I love you, Ren.” My breath stills when she utters that phrase again. Her hand is warm when she presses it to my cheek. “I’m not messing around, either. I realize I’m young, but you know I’ve always felt like an old soul.”
She has. “All that reading you do.”
“Yeah, maybe. And I meant what I said. I want to take things slow with you too. Do this right. But someday…I know I’m going to marry you.”
Enchanting words, indeed. Now I’m more curious about the story she’s writing, but she’ll tell me when she’s ready.
“I love you, Angel,” I whisper. I curl a hand over the back of her head to slowly close the distance between us, and kiss her lips.
“We’ll tell Dad,” Khadija says when we pull apart, “after the baby is born. And we’ll take things slow, for everyone’s sake.”
Sounds like a plan.
“Your nana said it could be a while, huh?” I ask, mournful when she wiggles away and stands up. Warmth spiraled downward from her soft touch and sweet kiss, lingering—there. “Enough time for…”
She smiles down at me, provokingly, letting the bedsheet fall over each of her silken curves like water sluicing over a brook. It’s the answer to my question, and everything I need.
Eight
Khadija – Two weeks later
My whole body feels hot and clammy as slicing pains slash my lower abdomen like little sharp, serrated knives. Half a dozen pregnancy tests nullified my initial fear. I’ve been trying to veil the extreme nausea, cramps, and overall malaise for the last nine hours, even as the piercing pain and my fever intensify. Hope has enough to worry about, and tonight’s the night Ren plans to tell Dad about…us. I wanted to come, but Ren insisted it’s better he do it man to man.
We meant to break the news to Dad weeks ago, but life with a newborn has proven to be sheer madness on a whole new level. Dad and Hope’s world revolves around the adorable, wiggling screamer, and by proxy, so does mine. I’m happy to help, cooking meals, changing diapers, sanitizing bottles, and my favorite, holding baby Zackary while Hope pumps breastmilk. I want to have a baby someday—I adore his little coos and the tight grip he holds on my finger and my heartstrings—but I’m not looking forward to doing that.
Christmas and New Year’s came and went with little notice or ceremony. The days mostly become a blur. Dad and Hope are too nice to me, considering the giant secret I’m keeping from them. Each time they express gratitude for my help with Zackary, my lungs cinch a little bit tighter. Ren was right, this guilty conscious totally sucks. Is that what’s coming over me? Can guilt make me physically ill?
Ren and I steal little moments together when we can, but we draw the line at him sleeping over. It was fine before, not that Dad will see it that way, even though nothing was happening then. Now it would be wrong on every level. Not to mention it’s a madhouse here at all hours of day and night, and Ren wouldn’t likely catch a wink of sleep.
At the exact moment the baby wakes up from his last nap before midnight, a scream rips from my throat before I can even try to subdue it. I double over on the kitchen tile. A dark cloud envelops the cabin. Twin visions of Hope appear, looking panicked and confused. I’m also confused. Who turned down all the lights in here? Why is my stomach trying to cut me open and come out of me?
“I’m calling an ambulance!” Hope announces, resolutely. I don’t object; there’s no stopping that woman when she’s made a decision. It’s a good idea, and it’s hard to breathe anyway, let alone speak.
“My phone,” I manage to squeak out. “I need to call Ren.”
Ren
I take Hale to the Irish pub in downtown Stanbery. I shouldn’t ruin my best friend’s first night out of the house post-baby with news that I’m in love with his daughter. I doubt he’d see it that way anyway—that it’s love in the purest, deepest form, love that warms my heart and grips my soul. As if he wants to hear me wax poetic a
bout Khadija. But what’s the other option? Tell him that I’m “seeing” her? There’s no meaning conveyed in “seeing.” Or worse, that I’m “sleeping with” her? No thanks, I’d rather not destroy the man’s evening, or mine, with a pulmonary.
Hale and I order a couple of Smithwicks and settle at a table near the window. He’s still got baby on the brain, and I’ve got half a mind to keep my mouth shut tonight, regardless my initial intent, and just listen, and drink.
According to Hale, baby Zackary sleeps almost eighteen hours a day, breaks free of his swaddle in minutes, is looking more human and growing like gangbusters every day, and just yesterday, finally lost his umbilical cord.
I respond with well-timed head-nods and hums of interest. I’m not disinterested—anything that makes my buddy look simultaneously near death and over the moon, is a very intriguing force indeed. I look forward to watching the little man grow up and break more hearts than Hale’s. But I admit to being a tad distracted.
And I actually know almost all of his baby milestone news already…because DJ told me.
“Man you’ve got to be bored to tears.” He chuckles, then tips back a drink from his longneck. “Enough about me. You didn’t invite me out for drinks to know what color my kid’s poop is nowadays. What’s new with you?”
I take my opening like a razorblade to bone. “I met someone.” No…that isn’t exactly right. “I love her,” I confess, my heart binding to my throat already like Hale knows intuitively who the her is.
“Fantastic news!” Hale cheers, raising his beer to mine. We click glasses while I inwardly cringe. “Tell me about her.”
“She’s…lovely…” Silence lays over us as he waits for me to say more. I can feel my smile take over my face, even if words alone could never do her justice. I try like hell anyway. “…the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known, inside and out. She’s interesting, and smart…”
The ‘old’ Hale might’ve injected an off-color comment or gesture right about now, but he’s a changed man since love and new fatherhood found and reformed him. He asks, “How does she make you feel?”
How do I tell him that just picturing her face imbues me with a calm strength? “She grounds me…and makes me feel like I could fly. She inspires me. Provokes me”—we both chuckle at that—“and overwhelms me with her love.” I can’t look in his eyes as I say it. He looks too damn happy for me.
I swallow the rest of my Irish ale. She makes me feel nothing, and everything, all at once.
“Khadija,” Hale says evenly, in a low, concerned voice, and I’m certain my pulse flatlines as my face turns ash.
How the hell did he just—
“She’s calling your cell.” He ticks his chin at the lit-up screen next to my elbow on the table.
I answer it. “Deej?” Her voice comes frantic over the line. I can hear the baby warbling and Hope in the background, talking to…paramedics? What the fuck? Logic yields to primal instincts. “Angel, baby, please try to calm down,” I utter before I realize what I’ve just announced, “tell me where they’re taking you.”
DJ offers enough mumbled detail through coarse shrieks of pain that I can decipher where she’s headed. My gaze travels over to Hale’s face, suicidally, as I take mental note of her words. Judging by his clenched jaw and fists tightened so hard his hands glow red…
I’m fucked.
“We’re on our way.”
Nine
Khadija
I hear Ren say, we’re on our way, with zero indication whether or not Dad knows about us yet. Then I’m hoisted in big strong arms. I’m not even sure I hang up first. I can’t find the strength to care what Dad knows, or what he thinks. Is the baby crying?
I’ve never been in an ambulance before now. It’s cold. It smells acidic. Least the paramedic has a nice, soothing voice. “Pain level?” I think he asks. God the stretcher cot is so uncomfortable.
What’s the number for “blinding”? Probably ten. Pretty sure I say that. Either that or twenty or “kill me now.” Pretty sure he’s capable of putting me out of my misery.
I hate needles but if what he’s got will help with the pain, I want it. Now. I offer both arms for him to choose. He bellyaches—nicely, I’ll give him that—something about “dehydrated” and making it difficult to find the vein. I scream at him. I feel the needle prick my skin. The pain doesn’t go away as waves of black wobble my world.
Everything wavers in and out. Lights, voices, even the pain, eventually. Am I in a hospital room, now? Where is everyone? The baby. Zackary’s hungry, needs milk. Hope will need to pump soon. The baby…who is going to hold the baby?
‘Fuckin’ impeccable timing, dick!’
‘Can’t do this now…’ Ren? ‘I’m sorry man. I love her.’
Love.
Love.
I love someone too.
‘The fuck were you thinking?’ … ‘How did this happen?’ … ‘Should fuckin’ kill you.’ … ‘How could you?’ … ‘How long?’
How.
How.
HOW?
Black yields to blinding light. The pain returns. All the pain.
‘Deej, I’m here. I’m right here baby.’ Warm hands encasing my own.
“Ren?”
‘Lot of pain…’ A female voice, do I know her? ‘high fever from the infection… ruptured… prep for emergency surgery…’
Hands on me. Dad? Ren? Don’t fight, please don’t fight… I pray to God I say that aloud. Stay here with me. I need you.
I need you both.
#
Before I realize I’ve fallen asleep, I wake up.
I hear a steady beep, beep, beep as I open my eyes. The room manifests slowly. A window, the curtains drawn. A television. A sink. It must be a different hospital room. The lighting in here is much more pleasant.
Dad is lying on a couch to the right of me, his eyes closed. Does he know I’m awake, that I’m okay? I blink, clearing my vision a little more, but I can’t even try to speak. My eyelids feel too heavy to keep them open.
I fall asleep.
Beep, beep, beep.
I wake up. Dad is gone. In the chair to my left, Ren is resting while sitting up. There’s a bandage over his cheek. He’s got his hand on my bed. I take it and give it a little squeeze. At least I think I squeeze it. Is Ren okay? Did he see Dad?
I fall asleep.
Beep, beep, beep.
I wake up. I’m getting of tired of laying here. I blink, rapidly, forcing my body to come to. The couch is vacant again. I turn my face to see if Ren’s still here. Soft gray eyes meet mine. A friendly smile. “Welcome back to the land of the living.”
“Uncle Asher?”
“Hey, kiddo.”
“Hey…” My voice drifts. Where’s Ren and Dad? “What happened to me?”
“Ruptured appendix,” Asher says. “Do you know how that happens?”
I shake my head.
“The surgeon suspects you had appendicitis for multiple days. Left untreated, eventually the appendix can rupture.” Asher leans a little closer to take my hand in both of his. His wife, Ariel, just had their second baby the same week as Hope, and he looks as tired as Dad. “Khadija, why didn’t you tell anyone you were in pain?”
“It wasn’t that bad until…yesterday?” I ask, not sure how long I’ve been in the hospital, and Asher nods confirmation. “Everyone has their hands full already. I didn’t want them to worry about me.”
He laughs, softly. “Mission not accomplished.” His smile makes me feel only slightly less terrible about that. Now I’ve burdened Uncle Asher’s family, too.
“Where is everyone else?”
“Hope and your dad took shifts checking on you. She’s home with Zackary now, Hale’s downstairs for a cup of coffee. Ren…”
“Is he okay?”
Asher stifles a wide grin. “Yeah, he’s all right. Good thing he was already here, your dad knocked him pretty good. They got him fixed up though. He’s at the pharmacy, filling a script
for pain meds.”
“Oh my god! Dad hurt him?”
“They had it out for a while. Least Ren didn’t swing back, I’ll give him that. And the man’s got quite a chin on him. Deej, why didn’t you guys tell anyone?”
“We wanted to. It’s…still new. And with the baby…”
“I get it.” He nods, giving my hand a little squeeze. “The guys had words, but Ren came to your side as often as he could. I’m surprised your dad let him anywhere near you, but under the circumstances…I guess I understand. The guy loves you, there’s no denying that. They both do.”
“I know.”
Asher tilts his head to one side, narrowing his gaze ever so slightly. “Do you remember waking up in the middle of the night, calling out for him?”
“I did that?”
He nods, releasing my hand. He leans back with a little shrug. “However it happened between you two, it happened. Your dad will adjust to the idea.”
“You think so?”
“It’ll take time,” Asher says. “He says he’s done trying to kill him, at least.”
“That’s a step in the right direction.”
“Sure is, kiddo. Baby steps.”
We both go quiet for a moment. I didn’t wake up with any pain, but it’s definitely starting to ache now. I press a hand to my abdomen.
“Mind the stitches,” Asher says.
“Can they give me something for pain?”
“I’ll call the nurse.” He uses the little remote by my bed to notify the nurse and ask about breakfast for me. I wasn’t even hungry till he mentioned it, but the nurse says I’ll have to wait.
“Thank you,” I tell him.
“Anytime.” Asher smiles. “You really love him, huh?”
“Yes. I really do. I love him.”
He leans forward again, close enough to swipe away some of my matted hair and press a kiss to my forehead. He whispers, “Then everything is going to be just fine.”
In spite of the chaos of the last twenty-four hours, the family drama and lingering pain, I know he’s right. Dad will come around. My wound, and Ren’s, will heal.