One More Time

by Caitlin Ricci

  I wondered if I should say anything, if it was worth mentioning at all, if I even had a right to question or judge him since I’d known who he was and what he wanted before getting into bed with him. “Do you always carry condoms on you because you plan to have hookups?” I asked bluntly. I did want to have sex with him, and I really didn’t want to screw that up, but I wanted his honesty too. I wanted everything from him.

  He looked almost indecisive as he stood there staring at me and I waited for an answer. As the seconds passed, I considered putting the sheet over me to hide myself from him, or even just getting dressed and going back to my room altogether. I could go to a movie, or I could ask for a new hotel room. I didn’t have to be this for him, not tonight.

  But the more I thought about just leaving him and letting him do whatever he was going to do without me there, the more I wanted to stay right where I was. This wasn’t my smartest choice, but it wasn’t my worst either.

  “I have them on me so that if the possibility of having sex with someone comes up, I’m safe and I don’t risk making a bad choice just because I’m in the moment,” Trent told me.

  I nodded. It was a good reason to have condoms on him.

  “Do you want to stop this?” he asked.

  I sat up on the bed and shook my head as I looked up at him. “No. I want you here with me. I want to help you get through this. I wish we were together, but this is okay.” He didn’t look convinced, and I forced myself to smile. I held out my hand for him, and he came closer to tangle his fingers up with mine.

  “I do want you,” he tried to assure me.

  I nodded. “I know.”

  He looked sad and leaned down to give me a kiss. I reached up and cupped the side of his neck so I could brush my thumb over his jaw. The little stubble running along his cheek tickled the pad of my thumb. He pulled away and lay down next to me on the bed. “Maybe in time….” He shrugged. “I know that someday a relationship could be possible again. But right now….”

  Trent shook his head, and I pressed my fingers against his lips. “I’m not expecting love, or even a relationship from you. I just don’t want to see you meet up with strangers because you can’t handle what’s going on in your life right now. It’s horrible, and I can’t imagine losing someone I loved like you did. I want to be your friend, and I want to be more than that to you too. If you need sex to deal with your life, then… I guess I’m here. If you want me. For tonight.”

  That wasn’t what I wanted from him, not really, but it was the most I was going to be able to get from him, and besides, it was more honest than anything I’d ever had with Paul, and that lasted me for years.

  “I thought you weren’t ready for another relationship so soon after your last,” he said softly as I stretched out next to him with my hand still wrapped up in his.

  “I’m not. And this, what we’re doing right now”—I waved my hand between us—“this is completely different from anything I’ve ever considered doing before. But I can’t stop wanting to be with you, and I don’t want to think about you being with anyone else.”

  He frowned at me, and I got up enough to roll over on top of him so I was sitting on his lap. I leaned down over his chest and cupped his cheeks with my hands while I kissed him. I didn’t want to hear him argue with me, didn’t want to know how bad a decision this was. I didn’t want to think I was letting him use me for sex, even though I knew that was pretty much what I was doing.

  Chapter Ten

  Trent

  “YOU DON’T have to do this,” I said as I put some pressure on Caleb’s shoulders to push him off of me. He rose up, just a little, but it was enough for us to be able to talk again, which I really thought we needed to do.

  He nodded and came back to rest his forehead against mine. I hugged him close and felt his chest rise and fall against mine with his deep breaths. “I know that,” he said quietly.

  “I’ve never cared about what any of the guys I’ve been with recently thought the next day,” I told him as I smoothed my hands down his back. “But it’s not like that with you.” I stopped moving my hands at the base of his spine. I wanted to touch him everywhere, to grab him and fuck him hard into the mattress until we were both sweaty and exhausted. Maybe then I could actually think again without my thoughts getting jumbled with my emotions to the point that I could barely stand to be awake.

  I stopped because he wasn’t some nameless guy with a horrible username that I didn’t remember the next day. He was Caleb, someone who had been there for me today and sat beside me while I said good-bye to a man I’d loved more than I ever thought possible. And here he was, telling me he wanted to be with me, that he was okay waiting, that he just didn’t want me going out there and finding someone else to waste myself with. It was too much, and I felt bad for wanting him too but knowing I couldn’t give him what he wanted. I would happily give him great sex. But more than that just wasn’t going to happen right now. I wasn’t going to say never, because I didn’t know what would happen in the future, but tonight, in my hotel room, I couldn’t give him anything more than my honesty and sex.

  “Tell me you can handle this, that you won’t hate yourself in the morning, that you won’t regret spending the night with me,” I demanded.

  “Or what?”

  I didn’t have a way to back up my threat. I needed to go out, but I wasn’t enough of an asshole to tell him that if he didn’t have sex with me, I would go find someone else. I just needed him to be okay after this.

  I shook my head and brought my mouth up to kiss him at the base of his throat. “Or nothing. I just want to still have you as my friend in the morning.”

  He looked a little relieved at that, and I moved my hands from his lower back to his shoulders so I could hug him again. I wasn’t used to just touching people, to being naked with them, without having sex with them. It was nice, in a way, but I still wanted to be inside him.

  “I’ll be okay,” he promised. I didn’t know if he was sure of himself or not, or if he could really predict that, but I didn’t question him any more as I moved my hands back to his hips, then brought them around to cup his ass. He ground against me as I moved my finger around his entrance, teasing him until he was gasping against my neck.

  I turned him over so that I was on top again and pressed my hips against his until I felt him tremble under me. He spread his thighs, letting me rub against him as much as I wanted to as I moved my hand back to his entrance. When I bit his neck, he moaned softly and I hoped it was enough of a distraction for him as I began to slowly stretch him open. He dug his fingers into my shoulders when I thought he was nearly there, and by the time I pressed the tip of my hard cock against him, I had to hold him down with my free hand to keep him from moving around so much.

  I laughed as he grabbed at me, seeming eager, and kissed him as I pushed my way in. He was tighter than I was used to and squeezed around me hard enough that I gasped out against his lips. I didn’t have sex with guys like this, hadn’t even looked one of my partners in the eyes while I was with them since Simon. Thinking about Simon in that moment hurt, and I tried not to let myself go there while I was with Caleb. But what I was doing with Caleb was a far cry from the fucking I normally did with people, and every second I spent being nice to Caleb reminded me of being with Simon. Things were done there; our time was past. It had been over five years ago, but now he was completely gone, and there was nothing I could do about it.

  We rolled so that Caleb was above me again, and I didn’t fight him as he began moving on top of me. I was still in him, but I didn’t have the control I was used to having, that I was accustomed to needing. I pressed my hands against the tops of his thighs, holding on to him as he found a pace that worked for him. I watched him as he sought his pleasure, as he ground himself against me, as he gasped each time he took me all the way into himself.

  He was beautiful in a way the guys I was normally with weren’t, and I doubted if they could ever hope to be. I was used to hear
ing the foulest language from the loudest voices as I screwed them. That was normal for me. Sex was dirty and fast, and it was the most fun when I had all the power and control and the person under me could only hope to beg.

  Caleb wasn’t anything like those men. He was gentle with me and I knew I would have none of the usual scratch marks across my chest and back. I didn’t know if this was his normal way or not, but I knew as he rested his face against my neck and told me how good I felt inside him that he was far too good for me.

  And yet, as he held on to me and I gripped him as hard as I could, I knew he didn’t see things that way at all. I could have shown him, and I was tempted to. I could have pulled out of him, turned him onto his stomach and fucked him as hard as possible from behind. He would have come; I know he would have, but it wouldn’t have been as good for him as this was. And I didn’t want to be cruel and treat him like just another hole for me to fuck, like everyone else was.

  I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, holding him close, as I looked up at the ceiling and wished there could be another way for us. I couldn’t give him what he wanted, but he didn’t deserve the stain of what I could. And yet it seemed as if neither of us could stop being attracted to the other. I was hard just being around him, just sitting next to him, just hearing him laugh. That was new for me, and not entirely unwelcome.

  He leaned back and I let him go to be able to run my hands down his damp chest and stomach until I circled my hand around his cock.

  “Do you like this?” he asked.

  I didn’t like the uncertainty in his voice. I was hard and I was pretty close, but he must have been able to tell something was off about me. I nodded and hoped he didn’t press me for more of an answer than that. To keep him from going down that train of thought, though, I began stroking him just the way he liked.

  He leaned back again and braced himself on the bed by my knees. His stomach sank, his body shook, and then he bucked against my hand as he came over my chest. I licked my hand clean before I pulled him back down against me. I kissed him roughly as I shoved my tongue into his mouth. It was my turn, and I wanted to take him. I got him under me again and wrapped his arms around my waist as I slammed into him hard enough that I heard him gasp. I groaned as I felt his body clamp down around me. He felt great, and I knew I would want him again, but also that this couldn’t happen again for us. Caleb was too good for me, too nice, too clean, for what I needed from him.

  I leaned back and gripped his hips. He’d have bruises there in the morning, but I wasn’t too sure he cared. His face was flushed, and he rocked against me each time I thrust into him. I wasn’t used to being looked at, watched like he was doing to me, and having his eyes on me left me feeling vulnerable. I didn’t enjoy feeling like that, and so I fucked him harder until he was crying out and dragging his fingers over my skin like he was in a frenzy. I buried my face against his shoulder and didn’t look back at him again until I’d come.

  I expected to see regret in his eyes, maybe even a bit of disgust, but he only looked exhausted. I slid out of him and took off the condom, tossing it into the trash can nearby. I wanted a shower, needed to feel the hot spray of water against my skin, but Caleb stopped me with a hand around my wrist. He stood up while I was looking down at him; then he kissed me, and I hesitated to put my arms around him, but it did happen eventually.

  “Do you feel any better?” he asked when the kiss was over. He didn’t pull away, though, and I didn’t let him go.

  I nodded slowly. “Yeah. Thanks.” I didn’t know what else to say in that moment. Normally I didn’t have to say anything. It was enough that I’d come, that he’d come, that we’d had sex at all. I wasn’t good at the after parts.

  He gave me a little smile. “Good. I’m glad. So… a shower comes next, then?” Caleb moved away, and I followed him into the shower, still feeling completely out of my element. “How does this normally work with the guys you’re with?” he asked lightly. I could hear the pain there, the hurt in his voice, and I shook my head.

  “Don’t do that. You’re not one of them. And this wasn’t like that.” I turned on the hot water, as hot as it would go, then remembered I wasn’t just going in for me, and I didn’t need to scrub someone else off my skin. So I turned it down and checked the temperature before stepping under the spray.

  “Then what was it like?” Caleb asked as he followed me in.

  I shrugged, because I didn’t have a good answer for him. What we’d done had been more intimate, more loving, than anything I’d done with anyone else in the five years since Simon’s accident. I was hurting, and a bit scared, because I didn’t know what to do next. I couldn’t kick him out, and I didn’t lie down next to the people I was with. But I was pretty sure that’s what would be happening after the shower, and I realized I wasn’t as against that idea as I might have thought.

  “Thank you for not going out,” Caleb said as he unwrapped the paper from a tiny bar of soap and handed it to me. He had one for himself too and together we began cleaning ourselves off under the hot spray.

  “You don’t have to thank me for that,” I mumbled.

  “What was this like if it wasn’t how you are with them?” Caleb asked again once he’d moved on to washing his short blond hair.

  If he wasn’t going to let it drop, I supposed I had to come up with a decent answer for him. Only I didn’t have one. “More like making love, or what I remember of it at least.” I didn’t know if he’d heard me over the spray of the shower since I wasn’t talking very loudly, and he might have had shampoo in his ears, but maybe, since he stopped washing his hair and just looked at me, maybe he did hear me.

  “Did that still work for you, then? Or do you have to go out?”

  I hated that he asked that. “I’m staying in.” I washed myself as quickly as I could and wasn’t even sure if I had all the shampoo out of my hair before I stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel to wrap around myself. Once I was dry, I lay back on the bed, completely naked and not caring one bit. There wasn’t a reason to hide myself, not now that we’d had sex.

  Caleb came out a few minutes later with a towel wrapped around his waist and his hair still dripping wet. He lay down next to me, on his stomach so that he was looking at me while I lay on my back, and I looked at him.

  “You don’t seem okay.”

  I shook my head. I really wasn’t. “I forgot what it was like to care about someone I was with,” I whispered to him. I reached out and touched his arm with my knuckles. “It hurts in a way that being with random people doesn’t.”

  He looked confused by that. “Why?”

  I licked my lips and hoped he didn’t hate my answer. “Because it reminds me of what I lost.”

  Nodding, Caleb sighed softly. “I’m sorry.”

  “Me too.” I wished I could have given him everything he seemed to want from me. For whatever reason, this sweet, nice person actually wanted me to be with him. And I couldn’t stop thinking about someone I’d lost five years before. I rolled over onto my side, put my arms around him, and then laid my head on the back of his shoulder.

  I’m not sure how long I lay like that with him, but I must have fallen asleep. He was asleep too, with his soft snores coming against my arm in front of his face. As quietly as I could, so that I didn’t disturb him, I got off the bed and went to the window. I didn’t hide myself as I pulled the curtain a bit aside and looked up at the sky. I wanted to see the stars, the moon, the tall aspens around my townhouse. But all I saw were buildings and so much light that it seemed as if there were no stars anywhere in the sky above me. I shook my head and turned out the lights in the hotel room. Sitting in the darkness felt better.

  Talking to my dad might have helped, but I dismissed that idea. I wanted to talk to Simon, but that was impossible. What I needed to do was get my head on straight and stop hurting Caleb, because it was pretty obvious to me that I was. Having random guys be mine for an hour or two was one thing, but I’d used Caleb for not only a
stand-in for one of them, but also for Simon. As much of an asshole as I knew I could be, I was positive that treating him like that had been wrong.

  I stayed up the rest of the night looking out the window and watching over Caleb as I thought things over. I was sure I shouldn’t see him again, not like this. Being with him had been wonderful, and reminded me of what I’d been missing, but it had been a mistake. I was sure of it. Thornwood was too small to really avoid him, but I’d do my best. I’d be friendly, I decided, but being friends wasn’t going to be possible. Not after the night we’d shared. He wanted more from me and maybe I did from him as well. But I wasn’t ready for that and asking him to hang around and wait for me wasn’t going to work either. I couldn’t do that to him.

  “Hey. Good morning,” Caleb said as he sat up and stretched in bed. “You’re already up?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. I couldn’t sleep.”

  “And you got dressed.”

  “You’re very observant at eight in the morning,” I joked. I’d been dressed since four, hoping he’d wake up early. I wasn’t a morning person, but I supposed that changed when I hadn’t really been to sleep.

  He got out of bed and gave me a kiss. I let his mouth linger over mine and savored him for as long as I could before he straightened up again and headed toward the sink. “Want to go out for breakfast?” he asked before he started brushing his teeth.

  “Sounds good. There’s a diner not far from here.”

  “Give me ten minutes to shower and get dressed.”

  He sounded so excited, and I didn’t want to discourage him. So I nodded, plastered on a smile, and waited for him to get out. I got another kiss on his way out of the shower and before he got dressed. He ran his tongue over the seam of my lips and fisted my shirt in his hand. If he wanted more, I didn’t let him have it.

  “Hurry up. I’m hungry.”