Give Me Something I Can Feel

by B. Love

  How can you love your neighbor as yourself if you don’t love yourself? Right? So, self-love isn’t about being vain or narcissistic. It’s not about being selfish and not caring about others. Self-love isn’t selfish. It’s the act of knowing yourself. Understanding yourself. Knowing your worth. Seeking your value from God, your Creator, instead of men. It’s… accepting yourself and being comfortable in your skin. Just the way you are. Embracing those things about you that you cannot change, improving the things you can, and not giving a damn what anyone has to say otherwise.

  Self-love is the best way to show your love for others because how can you give what you don’t have? You can’t love others if you don’t love yourself. You’ll have nothing to give. Your cup will be empty. Love fills you. You must love God first and let Him fill you with His love, then you pour that love into the hearts and lives us others. Which leads to the last kind of love there is; agape love.

  Selfless love. Unconditional love. It’s the highest and most sought after yet most misunderstood love of all. It’s not conditional. It’s not based on what someone can give you or how they make you feel. It’s not self-centered. It’s focused on action. What you can give to and do for others. It’s focused on the person you’re loving not yourself. It’s not a love that can be earned or one that expects anything in return, but one that must be freely given and received.

  Agape love is Godly love. It is the love of God. It’s pure. It’s gracious and merciful. It doesn’t judge. It doesn’t expect. It doesn’t conform. It’s unconditional – flesh, flaws, and all. It accepts. It’s a choice. What a person does is irrelevant with agape. When you make that choice to love unconditionally… it’s set in stone. It’s forgiveness. It’s humility. It’s our spirit. It’s how we connect with God and receive His love and pour it into others.

  Do any of those types of love describe how you feel about Tage?”

  “No. I guess it started as… what was the playful one? Lupus?”

  “Ludus, Harlem.”

  “Yea that. Now I just can’t stand him. I know that he’s acting the way he is because of his parents. They had big dreams of him playing in the NFL and setting them up for life. Now they think Hayden is going to ruin that. I guess I’m just mad at myself for wanting him to be around. But I know what it feels like to have both parents and what it doesn’t, and if I could do anything to make sure Hayden had both parents in the home I would. I never wanted it to be like this. I wanted to wait until I was married. I just… fucked up.”

  “Well you definitely don’t want to force a relationship with him if you don’t really want to be with him. And you can’t force him to be there for Hayden if he doesn’t want to be. You can put him on child support to make sure he’s there financially, but what you don’t want to do is cause him to resent Hayden. That baby inside of you deserves to be loved unconditionally. He deserves to be surrounded by genuine love and genuine people. If Tage doesn’t want to be around that’s his loss; not yours on Hayden’s, but I’m going to be completely honest with you, Harlem, I think he’s going to come around.”

  “You do?”

  I nodded and grabbed her hand.

  “I do. I think he’s scared now. I think he just needs time to process everything and come from under his father’s thumb. But I definitely think he’s going to come around. Don’t give up, but don’t hold on so hard that you miss out on meeting a good guy. Hayden will have Knight and he’s more than enough. Even after Tage comes to his senses.”

  Harlem hugged my neck and I smiled as I hugged her back.

  “Thanks, Charlie. I love you.”

  “Aww, baby. I love you too.”

  When I walked into my home it was too quiet. I’d gotten used to random giggling and loud cartoons. Surprisingly, the cartoons were being watched by Charlie most of the time. I wasn’t expecting any noise from Harlem because she was spending the night with Princess, but I at least thought Charlie would have on the TV or some music.

  Figuring she was sleep, I made my way up the stairs, down the hall, and into my room as quietly as I could. Charlie was so engrossed in whatever the hell she was looking at on her laptop that she didn’t even feel my presence until I was in the room and walking towards her.

  She immediately slammed her laptop shut and yanked her earbuds out of her ear. Her weirdness… I’d gotten used to… but even this was a little too weird for her. I stopped abruptly and looked at her skeptically. Her mouth was partially open until she closed it and swallowed hard.

  “Charlie… what are you doing?”

  “Nothing,” she almost whispered hesitantly.

  “Then why…”

  “Nothing.”

  “But I didn’t ev–”

  “Nothing.”

  “What’s on the computer, Charlie?”

  “Nothing.”

  She put it behind her back and looked everywhere but at me. There was only one thing that made people react this way – porn. But I just… I just refused to believe my girl… my sweet, silly woman was watching porn. There had to be another reason.

  “Why are you acting so weird?”

  “I’m always weird.”

  That was true, but this was even more weird than usual.

  “I know you’re up to something, Charlie.”

  “Nothing.”

  I nodded and walked over to my closet to put my bag away for the time being, and when I did I saw a pile of food on the bed. Not just normal food. Strange random food to be eating together. Like cucumbers, bananas, and pickles. The hell kind of freaky shit had she gotten into while I was gone?

  “Charlie… what the hell do you have this shit in the bed for? Were you… you were watching porn… weren’t you?”

  “I was not!” she yelled defensively as she stood and tried to run out of the room but I grabbed her.

  “Yes you were! You were watching porn!” I was trying so hard not to laugh because she was visibly embarrassed, but this shit was funny! “Babe, why didn’t you tell me you were into that? We could’ve been watching it together.”

  “I’m not,” she whined, trying to pull away from me. “I just… I’m not going to tell you if you keep laughing at me!”

  “All right!”

  I turned away from her for a second to try and gather myself. After a few deep breaths I turned to face her and tried my hardest to fight my smile.

  “Knight!”

  “Dammit, Charlie! You at least gotta let me smile!”

  Her eyes closed as she chewed on her cheek.

  “Fine. I was watching it… but…” her head shook as she opened her eyes. “But only because I wanted to learn how to… I wanted to learn how to… you know. For you. So I could do it.”

  “Do what, Charlie?”

  “Suck it,” she mumbled under her breath.

  “Say what?”

  “You heard me!”

  “No I didn’t.”

  I did. I just wanted her to say it louder.

  “Suck. It,” she gritted through her teeth.

  “Suck what?”

  Charlie licked her lips as her eyes lowered. Her embarrassment was quickly being replaced with lust, and I must admit… my dick was growing with each passing second.

  “Your dick.”

  “You actually care that much about pleasing me?”

  She nodded and bit down on her lip as she pulled my shirt over my head.

  “You wanna see what I learned?”

  “Hell yea.”

  I undressed her as she undressed me. The fruit was tossed onto the floor. She stood on the side of the bed and stared at me. Rubbing her chin with her thumb and pointing finger.

  “Charlie, you really don’t have to do this. I get pleasure from pleasing you. I’m flattered that you even thought enough of it to learn… and practice.”

  The smile that was spreading on my face had her clamming up again, so I leaned over and pulled her into the bed.

  “I wanna do it. I wanna taste you. I’ve wanted to si
nce our first time.”

  I couldn’t even speak. I wasn’t sure if I could speak. I just nodded and leaned back on the headboard. She straddled my legs and looked down at my dick like she’d never seen it before. Her lips started on mine. Kissing them slow but with the right amount of pressure to make me want more. She opened my mouth with her tongue and teased me with it. Pulling it out and licking my lips just when I was about to lose myself in her.

  Then she started on my neck. Biting and licking and sucking like this time was her turn to possess me. Like this time was her turn to conquer me. Her hands went down my chest and her lips followed. And when she licked my nipples she introduced me to a pleasure I didn’t think I was capable of feeling. Caught me so off guard I damn near pushed her away, but it felt too good so I let her stay.

  Her eyes met mine as she kissed her way down my stomach. Pulling me even deeper into her web.

  “You’ll stop me if I’m doing it wrong, right?”

  “Right.”

  For someone who wanted to feast, Charlie didn’t dig in right away. No. She continued the torture of making me wait. Getting close yet so far away. She squeezed my thighs as she stared at my dick. Biting down on her lip. Watching as precum oozed out of me. I was so ready for it. Ready for her.

  To resist grabbing her hair and putting her where she needed to be, I put my hands behind my head and closed my eyes. The moment I did I felt her tongue on me. I opened my eyes in time enough to watch her run the tip of her tongue across my head – licking my cum up. Then she closed her mouth around it and sucked.

  Her eyebrows wrinkled and she paused. Like she was thinking of what to do next.

  “Forget what you watched,” I coached pulling her eyes up to me. “Do what feels natural. Just no teeth.”

  With one hand she palmed my balls. The other wrapped around my dick. She took me into her mouth as deep as she could, then ran her tongue over me and sucked her way up with enough pressure to have my thighs clenching.

  She did that again. Using her hand to stroke the part of me that she couldn’t fit into her mouth. I was out of her mouth and her attention was on my balls, but she continued to stroke me as she licked and sucked them.

  “Shit, Charlie.”

  Her tongue licked every inch of me before she took me back into her mouth. Touching the back of her throat with my head as she looked me dead in my eyes. I don’t know if it was what she was doing with her mouth, the fact that she was actually doing it with her mouth, or the combination of both… but I was about to cum quicker than I ever had before.

  I grabbed a handful of her hair and tried to control her movements but that didn’t help.

  “Condom. Now.”

  Charlie crawled across the bed to the nightstand and grabbed a condom while I got on my knees. She tried to turn around and crawl back to me, but I stopped her and kept her just as she was. Positioning myself behind her, I took the condom from her and got it on as quickly as I could.

  I spread her ass cheeks, and the sight of her cream already at her opening made my dick throb. She was ready for me. She was just as turned on by pleasuring me as I get by pleasuring her. I wanted to return the favor, and I definitely would before the night was out, but right now… I just had to feel her.

  Charlie looked back at me when I ran my dick against her clit and I smiled.

  “Put it in,” she ordered softly.

  With her back arched perfectly, I slid inside of her, and her moan was the sound I’d been waiting to hear all weekend. But it didn’t last long. She grew completely silent. Nothing was heard besides her cream coating me and our bodies connecting.

  I felt her walls tightening around me and I pulled out.

  “Give it back,” she pleaded as her hand came between us.

  “If you cum I’ll cum and I’m not trying to cum this soon, Charlie.”

  “I don’t care we’ll go again. Just give it back.”

  I slid back inside and looked from me disappearing inside of her and returning to her gripping the sheets and burying her head in the bed. The tightening started again. Her moans started again. Then she was coming. Loud. And long. And hard. And so was I.

  I don’t know what the hell I was thinking when I agreed to meet Knight’s family. It was one thing for him to meet mine… but the idea of meeting his father literally turned my stomach. I was so nervous I didn’t know what to do with myself! The silver lining was the fact that I wouldn’t have to meet his sister Carmen until she returned to Memphis, and I’d been talking to a couple of his closest cousins already, so I kind of felt like I knew them a little.

  They were helping me put together a surprise party for his birthday next month, so Harlem linked us up and we’ve been bouncing ideas off each other for the past few days. With my birthday being this month, I already had my plans for myself made. I felt like Knight had something up his sleeve because he’d been asking a lot of random questions lately, but he hadn’t said anything to me about it.

  To be honest, the only thing I needed to celebrate another year of life was him. I was just that grateful to have him. Which is the only thing that kept me from getting up and running out of his house before his father arrived. That and the fact that Harlem would never let me live it down if I wasn’t involved in her belly casting. Harlem was only in her seventh month, but we messed around and watched a video on belly casting on YouTube while Knight was in New York and she’d been obsessing over it ever since.

  When Knight told his father that he wanted him to meet me, he wasn’t expecting Princeton to offer to come to his place and try to smooth things out with Harlem, but Knight agreed. I was hoping that worked in my favor. I was hoping we’d do a quick hi nice to meet ya then his attention would be on his daughter.

  In an attempt to calm my nerves, I went out to the back porch to get some fresh air. Knight was already there. I sat next to him and laid my head on his shoulder, and he wasted no time wrapping his arm around me.

  “Knight?”

  “Yea, babe?”

  “You OK?”

  Knight removed his arm from around me, giving me the freedom to turn slightly and face him. His eyes remained forward as he shook his head.

  “I just don’t want him coming here and messing up the good we got going. It’s hard enough keeping her spirits high because of Tage. I don’t want him sending her into an even deeper state of sadness.”

  “Do you think he would really come here and do that? I mean… he basically put her out because she refused to give up her baby. Do you think he would actually come to where she is just to give her a hard time about it?”

  “Maybe not intentionally, but he knows what buttons to push, man. His intention might be to come over and try to work things out, but there’s no telling what he’s going to say in the process. That’s what I’m worried about.”

  “Well, you know you’re not going to let him or anyone else hurt her, so it’ll work out.”

  His eyes met mine finally, but they weren’t filled with the peace I was hoping for.

  “What if it works out too good?”

  “What do you mean?”

  Knight shrugged and returned his attention to his basketball court.

  “What if she goes back with him?”

  “You don’t want her to?”

  He shrugged again and ran his hand over his hair.

  “It’s not that I don’t want her to. I want her to be where she wants to be. It’s just… it’s been so long since I’ve had my baby around me like this. And it’s my own fault for not being around. It’s just… I like her being with me. If she’s here I know she’s being looked after and well taken care of. I know she’s getting the attention she needs. I know she’s not getting into anything else she doesn’t need to be. This is her home now. She belongs here.”

  I took his cheek into my hand and ran my thumb across his scruffy beard a few times before turning his face to mine and pecking his lips.

  “That is the sweetest thing in life, Knight. I thi
nk it’s pretty amazing the way you cherish your baby sister. And even though you all have your moments where you butt heads she’s just as crazy about you as you are her. She’s not going anywhere.”

  “But it might be best for her to go. When the season starts I’ll be gone. Who’s going to be here to help her with the baby?”

  “Knight, you know I’ll be here to help her with whatever she needs.”

  “You already do enough for us, Charlie. You spend more time here than you do your own place. I’m not complaining at all. I prefer it that way. I just would never put that weight on you. Harlem and Hayden are not your responsibility. I appreciate you helping me carry the load, but I don’t know. Maybe it’ll be best if she left.”

  Knight stood and walked towards the door, completely shutting down on me. I wasn’t used to this with him. He hadn’t closed me out emotionally since the first time he tried to kiss me and I ran away.

  “So that’s it,” I asked as I stood, “You’re just going to let her go? You know it’s better for her and Hayden here, Knight.”

  He stopped walking but he didn’t turn to face me. I walked over to him and placed my hand in the center of his back.

  “I get that you’re saying this because you think it’ll make her leaving easier, but do not go in this house suggesting that she leave just to avoid her not staying. Don’t put her out before he even asks her to come back. If you say anything to her about leaving she’s going to assume that you don’t want her here and she’s going to leave. I know it might hurt you if she decides to leave, but let whatever happens happen naturally. Don’t bring it up and make the decision for her, Knight.”

  Losing her. I could see it in his eyes. He was afraid of losing her and Hayden before he even arrived. Knight nodded and grabbed my hand. He pulled me into his chest and kissed my forehead.

  “It’s times like this when you make me want to make sure you never leave me. Ever.”

  There was still a trace of darkness in his eyes, but he smiled. That was good enough for now.