The Debt

by Tyler King

  “I’ll have an attorney contact you Monday morning.”

  “Dad?”

  “And I’m going to find out why Alexei was invited to campus in the first place. You should have told me. You shouldn’t have had—”

  “Simon,” I interjected again.

  He paused.

  “I love you. I’m okay. Hadley took good care of me.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t. I would have told you, but it just slipped my mind the last time we talked.” For obvious reasons. “He’ll be sucking his meals through a straw for the foreseeable future. That makes me feel pretty fucking great.”

  “I love you, son. And, in this particular case, I’m proud of you.”

  What he meant was, I don’t condone violence, but I would have liked to run the bastard over with my car.

  “Thanks.”

  * * *

  “Damn it, man. What the hell?” Trey took note of my cast and then leveled an exasperated look my way when I walked into the greenroom at the Nest thirty minutes before our set.

  I put my guitar cases in the corner at the end of the couch, then took a seat on top of the counter that stretched along the far wall.

  “What, you didn’t hear?” Corey pulled out his phone. He swiped his fingers across the screen, taking a seat on the couch next to Trey. “Shit hit Facebook quick.”

  I had a pretty good idea what was in the video, confirmed by the accompanying background audio.

  “That was a hell of a shot, dude. Wait, wait.” Excited, Corey tapped the screen a couple times. “This is my favorite part. Right...here.”

  He stood and brought the phone over. The video was paused at the point of impact, showing Gregor’s crumpled skin around my fist.

  “That’s one for the highlight reel,” he said.

  “Don’t encourage him,” Trey said. “Can you even play?”

  “I’m good. I spent a few hours practicing in the garage this afternoon. I’m also a little hopped up on painkillers the ER doctor prescribed.”

  “Who was that guy?”

  “Someone I never thought I’d see again. He deserved it.”

  We spent the next several minutes working out our set list, Trey and I tuning our instruments and getting into show mode. I had to take a piss before the show but found the toilet in the greenroom busted.

  Fighting my way through the throbbing crowd, I headed to the restrooms. The mass seemed to inhale and exhale as one being, pulsing forward and back in waves. A cycle that churned people toward the bar counter and spit them back out.

  In the hallway, a hand wrapped around my forearm and spun me around.

  “There you are.” Kate all dolled up in her tempting best.

  I tugged my arm free. “I wasn’t hiding.”

  “No, you weren’t.” She glanced over her shoulder, though we were obstructed from the crowd. “You and your roommate?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Won’t that get messy?” She pressed her back against the wall, a flirtatious smirk on her glossy lips.

  “Things are different now. I’m done with the hookups.”

  “Really?” She eyed me like a predator who found amusement in my discomfort. “I find that hard to believe.”

  “I couldn’t give a shit. We fucked, Kate. Don’t confuse that for knowing anything about me.”

  “I know you enough.”

  I turned to walk away, but she grabbed me by the waistband and pulled me back.

  “Don’t,” I warned her.

  “We’re the same, Josh. That’s why we have fun together. You’re going to get tired of playing house with her.”

  “You’re not the end all, be all of fucks. Get over it. I love her. Period.”

  “You can tell yourself that, but we both know you bore easy.”

  “Maybe we’ve been fucking the wrong people.”

  Chapter 22

  Session 7

  “Were you bothered by that?” Not-Doctor Reid sat in a black office chair that looked more fashion-forward than comfortable.

  I’d had it with the stiff upholstered chair and now made my home on the small sofa. I wondered if that was the plot. Adorn the room with lumbar-killing chairs and eventually the reluctant client would be forced to submit to the cliché of the couch. Fuck that. I’d stand for the hour-long sessions before lying down.

  “Which part?” My eyes drifted from my notebook to my cast, perusing the details of Hadley’s painting.

  “Kate’s suggestion that you couldn’t have a fulfilling sexual relationship with Hadley.”

  “No.”

  I pulled a plastic knife from my pocket and shoved it inside the cast, attacking the infernal itch on the underside of my wrist that wouldn’t go away. There was something comedic or ironic about that, considering my surroundings, but I decided not to speak it aloud.

  Not-Doctor Reid was silent too long. I glanced up, reading her patient expression, which called bullshit.

  “Fine. Sure. Yes. It’s a crock of shit, so it doesn’t matter. We have great sex.”

  “How would you describe your relationship with Kate to that point?”

  “Nonexistent.”

  “You carried on a sexual relationship,” she insisted.

  “We fucked. That’s not a relationship. There was no relating. There was penetration and as few words as possible.”

  “But she was the only one you had sex with multiple times, correct?”

  “What’s your point?” I leaned back, rubbing my good hand through my hair. “Let’s clear something up: I hate these leading questions when it feels like you have a particular answer you’re trying to pull out of me. Just ask the question outright. We’ll get along a lot better that way and our time will be far more productive.”

  “Okay, Josh. Why, if there was nothing special about Kate, was she the only one you fucked repeatedly?”

  “Because she was zero maintenance. No hassles.”

  “And not because she fulfilled some specific need?”

  Sitting forward, I leveled my eyes with the short, curvy woman. Reid had explained during our getting-to-know-you period that her area of study was modern sexuality; curious, considering that it was my anger issues that had landed me here. Thus far, our sessions had concentrated more on my exploits between the sheets than the many misdeeds of my fists.

  “What do I need? The vast majority of my orgasms have resulted from the stimulation of my own hand, the exceptions being Hadley. Even a warm body isn’t a need. So, to answer your question: No, Kate did not fulfill a particular need for me that could not have been satisfied by anyone else.”

  “Then why do it at all?” Reid set her iPad aside, signaling we weren’t close to a conclusion on this topic. “Was it only to appease your partner?”

  “You overestimate my desire to please them. For that matter, you overestimate to what extent I gave a fuck. They were a means to an end.”

  “You cared enough to bring them to climax.”

  There was no smart answer for that. “I wanted to be good at it. That’s entirely selfish and vain.”

  “Was it enjoyable? Fun?”

  “Sex isn’t fun.”

  “Not even with Hadley?”

  “No. Making love to her is a lot of things, but I wouldn’t call it fun. Foreplay is fun. Flirting is fun. Teasing and getting her worked up—those moments fall into the fun category.”

  “Then I return to my previous question: Why do it at all?”

  Enduring childhood in a series of overstuffed foster homes taught me something about the nature of want versus need. We fought for toys, we fought for beds, we fought for food, and we fought for enough personal space to breathe. At five years old, the requirement wasn’t much, and yet we still struggled to claim it.

  After my first sexual experience with Hadley, I was terrified of sex. For a brief time, I thought maybe I would never have it again. In theory, I wanted to be balls deep in a girl. That fantasy centered around Hadley most
often. The reality was far less appealing.

  Imagine being a male in his late teens to early twenties. While the hormones went on about their business without any care for emotional sensitivity, I was this paralyzed person unable to act on the most natural instinct. My friends were getting laid. The girl I loved had scratched the itch. I shot loads of frustrated desire down the shower drain. All the while, I was a closeted freak walking among the normals and doing my best to hide the scar I carried.

  Along the way, the want for theoretical sex turned into a need to break down the barrier of fear. I wanted to get past the psychological hurdle because I needed to feel whole again. I fucking required proof that I held absolute command over my body. I did it because I had to. I thought, maybe, I could fix myself.

  “Kate is an emotional cripple. I had no responsibilities to her. She used me, and I used her because I couldn’t hurt her.”

  Chapter 23

  “Damn, sweetheart,” I groaned, mumbling against Hadley’s lips as she grabbed a handful of my cock through my jeans.

  She shoved me up against the front door after it slammed behind us.

  “Don’t you want to lock up first?” I asked.

  The drive home from the Nest had been long and difficult as I processed the evening after our gig, and Hadley did her best to distract me from getting us home in one piece.

  She squeezed my sac, just on the narrow line between unbearable pain and fantastic pleasure. “If you don’t get in the game, I’m going to start without you.”

  Shit.

  She tasted of pineapple and coconut rum, her skin warm and salty. Punky dragged her teeth over my bottom lip and tugged; that was about all I could endure. I hoisted her off the ground and moved to pin her against the opposite wall. She wrapped her legs around my hips, using her thighs as leverage as she ground herself on my cock. My cast-wrapped hand held her ass while my left grabbed a handful of her tit.

  Pulling Hadley from the wall, I carried her to the living room and sat on the couch with her straddling my lap. First, she was relieved of her shirt and bra. Right away, her hands roamed up my chest to my nipple piercings, where she rolled and flicked them between her fingers. Fucking hell, this woman knew how to touch me.

  My shirt followed hers to the floor. Though I was enjoying her attention, I had to grab her wrists to restrain her hands behind her back so I could remove the obstacle between my lips and her tits.

  “Shit,” she hissed as I flicked my tongue over one tight peak. “Your tongue piercing. It’s cold.”

  I did it again, flicking the ball on the end of the barbell back and forth.

  “I want you,” she demanded. “Now.”

  “I want your mouth.”

  I spoke without reserve or forethought. Hadley stared at me longer than was comfortable in this context.

  “Or not,” I offered instead. Really, it wasn’t a deal breaker.

  She blinked. A slow smile crossed her lips. Fuck, those lips and the many lewd ways I wanted to use them.

  “No, I like the idea,” she answered after what was perhaps the longest silence to follow a request for head in the history of fellatio. “I’m not morally opposed to it or anything.”

  “Morally opposed,” I repeated as I wrapped my mind around the concept. “Interesting.”

  “That’s a thing,” she insisted.

  “I’ll take your word for it.” Not like I was going to argue with her now. I needed her cooperation, and I wanted to get back to the part where she liked this idea.

  “It’s just that…” Her eyes dropped from mine.

  I released her arms, her fingers wandering over my shoulders. I gave her that, not pushing too hard if she felt the need to retreat.

  “I haven’t before,” she said.

  “Good.” What other answer was there?

  She looked up and rolled her eyes. “You’re such a guy.”

  “That can’t be helped.”

  Yeah, it was a shitty double standard to want to claim the territory first or beat the living shit out of anyone who had gotten there before me. So what?

  Hadley smirked. Her fingers traveled up and down my spine just at the base of my neck. I was damn near shivering.

  “Is there a trick to it?” she asked.

  “Just like a Popsicle.”

  Hadley’s smirk grew menacing.

  “Forget that. You chew your Popsicles. Do not bite it off,” I scolded her.

  Punky’s answering pout was both adorable and frightening. “Just a nibble?”

  “You have no levels between gentle and vicious—your elevator only stops at one and one hundred. No, sweetheart. You can’t be trusted with teeth.”

  “You’re no fun.”

  “And you’re convincing me that I don’t want my dick sucked.”

  She glared, perhaps taking my words as a challenge. “Well, what do you like?”

  “There’s no such thing as a bad blow job. Suck and use lots of tongue.”

  Okay, I had heard plenty of tales of poor performances. Short of throwing up while going down on a guy, how bad could those experiences have been? Something about a woman swallowing my cock just struck me as a fucking miracle every time it happened. Divine goddamn intervention.

  “So...” Hadley’s eyes roamed. “What, like now?”

  “Do I need to make an appointment?”

  “That would be handy. Gives me time to prepare.”

  “Prepare? Fuck, Punky. You know what? Forget I mentioned it.” I moved to lift her off me.

  “No, no.” She pushed my shoulders back to the couch, insisting I stay put. “Now’s good. I don’t have plans. Well, I do, but I figure the one naturally leads to the other, so this is good.”

  “This is more than stupid. And you’re drunk. I think you might be killing my wood.”

  “Is that like reverse psychology? ‘Don’t suck my dick.’ And then I’m all like, ‘No, I’m going to blow you and you’re going to sit there and love it.’”

  “Okay, seriously. This is the dumbest conversation I’ve ever had.”

  “No way,” the crazy girl in my lap argued. “I can get way dumber.”

  “Damn, woman. I swear I’m not baiting you. Stop turning everything into a fight.”

  “So does that mean you want me to argue?” Hadley huffed, tossing her hair over her bare shoulder. “Honestly, Josh. I can’t keep up with deciphering all of your mixed signals.”

  That was quite enough. Overpowering her, I laid Hadley over my lap and ripped her jeans and underwear down her ass in one swift movement. Her beautiful, soft flesh looked so inviting.

  “Punky, shut the fuck up.”

  “Hey. That’s not—”

  I bit her ass cheek. Hard.

  She yelped but didn’t try to escape. “You’re an animal, you know that?”

  Holding her in place with one arm over her lower back, I reached down to free my cock from my jeans. I exhaled, the pressure finally relieved and yet not nearly gone. My dick lay against my abdomen.

  Since my broken right hand was useless when it came to touching her in a pleasurable way, I used my left to slide two fingers through her slit. She was wet, her muscles pulsing as she clenched with need. One finger brushed over her clit and her entire body seized with anticipation. I worked my fingers back and forth, massaging her. Hadley whimpered.

  I rubbed her pussy, increasing the pressure against her clit. She muffled a moan and pushed back against my hand. I leaned forward and dragged my teeth over her delicate flesh. I didn’t bite hard, just a little tug. My dick twitched and I reached down to rub myself against her thigh. Hadley’s back rose and fell on her deep, heavy breaths. I liked her this way: riled, needy, longing for my touch to get her off. No sense torturing her.

  Palming her ass, I moved my fingers back to her cunt. I was gentle at first, priming her. But my intention wasn’t tenderness. No, I wanted to see her leave claw marks in the leather.

  With my right arm holding her still over her lower back,
I plunged two fingers to the last knuckle with increasing severity. The harder I pumped, the more she tried to push back, fucking herself against my hand. I watched, enthralled by the sight of her ass bouncing across my lap, her thigh nudging at my cock.

  “Faster,” she whimpered. “So close.”

  Determined to get her there, I worked my fingers inside her, finding the spots that made her jump and her entire body seize and quiver. Her back bowed. I held her as she writhed through her orgasm.

  “Lie down,” she told me. Her hair was stuck to her face, a trickle of sweat down her spine, and her cheeks flushed red. “Lie down.”

  The goddess of blow jobs did exist and I saw her in that moment. I was her faithful fucking disciple.

  I shifted around to rest lengthwise with my head toward one end of the couch. I didn’t say a word or move a muscle as she pulled my jeans and boxers down to fully expose my cock. She took it in one hand, stroking me, then licked across the tip, dipping the end of her tongue along the slit. My hips bucked of their own accord. My cock knew where it wanted to be, but I told myself to hold back and let her get comfortable.

  Hadley ran her tongue over the crown, along my piercing, and up the length of my dick from root to tip, tracing the thick vein. Without hesitation, she softly sucked the head, pumping me in her fist. Little by little, she took me deeper.

  I had my first mild heart attack when Hadley lightly dragged her teeth over the head of my cock. I was so done for. She owned me. I was her eager man-slave. I was also about to come all over her if she didn’t cut that out.

  “You’re too good at this.” I held the side of her face, urging her to stop. “I might have a damn stroke, so let me fuck you one last time before I die.”

  Hadley crawled down the couch and pulled my pants from my legs. Undressed, she sat atop me, facing away. I gripped my cock in my left hand as I dragged the head through her swollen sex. I held myself in place and guided her with my other hand. She slid down, engulfing me in liquid heat and silky softness.

  She was so damn tight, already squeezing my dick as she adjusted. I held her hips while she rose up and descended again—slow at first, rocking back and forth, and finding all the places I could touch buried inside her. I watched, enraptured, as her ass bounced on my cock. Content to let Hadley do as she pleased, I relaxed and enjoyed, gripping her round bottom to see my handprints emerge and fade.