Beyond the Break

by Kristen Mae

  I laughed, but not with humor; it was an are-you-fucking-kidding-me laugh laced with an almost predatory snarl. Claire bit her lip and lowered her eyes at me, daring me, and I sat up and came at her, snaking my arms around her waist and kissing her again, tasting myself in her mouth. I pulled her to me and rolled us so I was on top, still kissing her hungrily, wanting to give to her what she’d just given to me. Desperate to give it to her.

  But what if I couldn’t? The thought drained the air from the room. I knelt before her as she lay on her back, looking vulnerable with her pale arms flung up over her head, her small, perfect breasts exposed to the cool night air. Her chest rose and fell as she panted in wait for me. No way was I going to chicken out again. Just like in my fantasies, I would make her scream.

  I leaned forward and laid my hands alongside her breasts, dragging my fingers lightly across her nipples, suppressing a smile when they hardened in response to my touch. She arched herself into my hands and exhaled a sweet, tremulous breath. Her cheeks flushed with bright pink circles and little rosy splotches appeared all over her chest and arms. I kissed each of those spots, listening to her gasp beneath me, elated by the sounds I drew from her.

  I slid shaking, nervous hands down her waist, tracing the hourglass shape of her body, then slid further, over her hips, and grabbed her shorts and underwear. She lifted to help me pull them off, and as she did, I saw the gentle angle of her hip bone beneath her skin. The beauty of that piece of her gave me all the courage I needed. I bent and kissed her hips with dry, feathery kisses, brushing my lips softly over her pelvis, her torso, her breasts, while she ran her hands through my hair. The sound of her panting was better than any music I’d ever heard in my life.

  I stole a peek at her face. Her nostrils were flared, and she was gnawing on her bottom lip in a way that made goosebumps rise on my arms. Still kneeling over her, I slid a hand between her legs and rested my palm on the soft bit of hair there, afraid to move, my heart stampeding with fear that I wouldn’t be able to please her.

  She tilted her head to the side and breathed, “Finger me.”

  Christ. I slid my middle finger into her and gasped at her wet heat. She let out a cry and grabbed at her breasts. I pushed another finger inside her, gaining confidence as I listened to her breathing accelerate. I bent between her legs and kissed her then, hesitant at first, but encouraged by her moans, and I licked her the way she’d licked me, with my lips and tongue on her and in her, wholly consumed by the sounds she made. She started with soft sighs, but then, as I went on: “Oh fuck, yes, do that again” and “Oh Jesus god YES,” and the sound of her voice talking dirty to me like that almost gave me an orgasm myself—and then she was doing exactly what I’d been fantasizing about her doing for so long, good god, she was arching, stiffening, clawing. She spasmed around my fingers and exhaled beautiful, shuddering moans as I lost myself in her.

  When she stopped writhing, I removed my mouth from her and sat up. Her hands were knotted in her hair and she was staring at me, her legs splayed open, her body spent, her chest splotched pink and heaving like she’d just run a marathon. I couldn’t help it; I smiled smugly.

  “Hazel,” she said, “you and I are going to be up all night.”

  We did not actually stay up the entire night. After a second round, we were content to twist ourselves into a naked knot and kiss each other to sleep, though sometime in the black of early morning I awoke to Claire’s hand between my legs. I threw my leg over her body so we were lying face to face, her arm reaching down between us and playing with me until I came, and the haziness of her touching me while I was half asleep made me come even harder than before. I drifted back to sleep without repaying the favor, but the next morning in the shower I went down on her and made her orgasm so hard she almost slipped and fell. (“Oh, Jesus fuck yes, Hazel!” she wailed, and I almost screamed with happiness.)

  We did not join the others for breakfast, but showed up to rehearsal on time to coach the sextet. The stark formality of coaching a serious chamber music group made me doubt that the previous night had happened at all. I wanted to gaze into her eyes for confirmation that I hadn’t made the whole thing up, but I was too terrified of drawing attention to us. The two times I did risk a sideways glance, she looked away.

  We met up with some of the festival members at the Anfiteatro for lunch. Though Claire and I sat next to each other, we made a point of talking to other festival goers and not looking at one another. But I felt so sweet and swollen and wet that I was sure I was radiating a hot, lusty scent to anyone within six feet. I kept my knees pressed together, just in case.

  Again, that night, I went jogging instead of going to dinner. It was as if all my cells had regenerated overnight and given me superhuman powers. I improved my pace by a full thirty seconds per mile because every time I thought of Claire I sprang off down the path like a cheetah.

  After my run, I took a shower and met up with our group for quartet rehearsal. Claire was an effective actress, even more so than she had been when we coached the students—in fact, she was so effective, so nonchalant, so apparently unfazed by my presence, that again I feared I might have imagined everything that had happened with her. Several times I caught myself staring at her, waiting for some glance, some shred of acknowledgement that I existed, but every time, I had to force my eyes back to my music with nothing more than a renewed confirmation of her calm, unflappable character.

  And she was lighthearted, too, slapping Raymond on the arm once when he screwed up a passage that ought to have been easy for him. I startled myself by almost flying out of my chair with rage at seeing her touch him. I managed to keep my butt in my chair and immediately began the process of tearing myself down inside. I had agreed to a temporary fling. I had no right to be jealous. I loved Oren. Poor Oren! Claire was not, and never would be, mine, and her slapping Raymond’s arm was no threat to the paltry little affair we were having.

  As we packed up our instruments, Raymond asked if anyone wanted to go grab a dessert at one of the nearby cafés. Katrina said she would, and I waited, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible, until Claire finally said, “Actually, I’m exhausted. I stayed up really late last night reading, so I’m just going to head home.”

  My heart throbbed in my ears. “Yeah, me too. I jogged earlier, and I’m beat.” My words felt like they had fallen out too quickly, too awkwardly, screaming every detail of our night together. Claire edged her eyes at me so slightly that I could only hope I wasn’t imagining what I thought I saw, that she really was telling me she was coming to my apartment again that night. Neither Katrina nor Raymond seemed to notice.

  When I returned home, I found the bed still torn up from the night before. My stomach flipped with overwhelming, ravenous desire. I paced the apartment, breathing too loudly and wringing my hands. Had I overdone it? Been too eager? Too needy? So obvious over the course of the day that she thought I couldn’t handle keeping the secret?

  I checked my email in an effort to distract myself. There was an email from Oren, professing a love too distant and vague to acknowledge. I slammed the laptop shut.

  I went to the bathroom and looked in the mirror. The knit of my brow was so intense that it scared me, made me sick. I retched and threw up in the toilet. As I flushed, a little alarm bell went off in the back of the mind—This isn’t healthy, it said—and I silenced it by vigorously brushing my teeth.

  When Claire finally appeared at my door, I yanked her inside by the wrist, twisting my anxious energy into need. I pulled her to the bedroom without preamble, ripped her clothes off, and pushed her down naked on the bed. She smiled at this, meowed like a cat, mocking me and inviting me at the same time, and I came to her, pushing her legs apart and positioning my hips between them, stretching my clothed body over her naked one and nuzzling my face in her curls. She smelled like water lilies, so clean and pure and sweet. It made me dizzy.

  “Kiss me, Hazel.”

  And I did. Everywhere.

 
TWENTY-THREE

  “I wasn’t sure you would come.” My words were a hesitant, shy confession.

  “Oh, I came all right.” Her limbs were all around me, still spasming a little from what I’d just done to her.

  Goosebumps prickled the skin of my arms, and I nestled my face in her hair to make them go away. I was calmer now that she was here, now that I’d had every bit of her in my hands. But that little voice—that quiet warning—still echoed in my head.

  “Hey,” she said suddenly, pulling back so she could face me, though we could only see shapes of each other’s features in the darkened room. “You’ll tell me if it’s too much, right?”

  I would never tell her that. She would make us stop. “Of course.”

  She snuggled back into me, set her cheek against mine. “I have to admit, this is more…intense than I expected. You are more intense than I expected.”

  My throat knotted.

  “Have you ever been attracted to another woman?” Her voice was a soft, sweet breeze in my ear.

  I shook my head.

  “Then why me?”

  “Because…” I cleared my throat. At first I thought the words weren’t going to come out, but then there they were, spilling into the room as if Claire’s curiosity was a magnet for my secrets. “Because you’re fearless. And smart. And playful. And kind.” My skin heated. A selfish part of me didn’t like the idea of her knowing how I saw her. It gave too big a chunk of me away.

  “Oh.” She lay quiet, her fingers lazily stroking my spine.

  “Why did you…” But I stopped because I realized I was about to ask a question to which I did not want to know the answer.

  “Why did I what?”

  I shook my head in her curls. The knot was blocking my throat again.

  “Why did I want to do this with you?” she asked.

  I hesitated, then nodded. Might as well let her say it: Because I was available. Because it was an adventure. Because she could finally get even with Mike.

  “Because when you kissed me on the wall, I almost lost my mind.” I wasn’t looking at her, but I could hear the smile in her voice. “Also, because—and please don’t take this the wrong way, though I think you’ll understand—you’re so…broken.”

  My chest caved in.

  “I mean, you’re normally so cold and detached—you know this about yourself, I know I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know—but the way you looked at me on the wall, the way you’ve been with me these last few nights, you said it yourself, even—it’s like you’ve been set on fire, and you’re raging out of control and consuming everything in your path…including me. It’s the most incredible thing.”

  I felt as flattened as if a building had just tipped over on me. I wanted to be angry with her for seeing right through me like that, wanted to hate her for getting gratification out of this idea of repairing me. I ached desperately for her to be attracted to me for something more than my brokenness.

  “And”—her fingers had found their way between my legs—”that it could be me who would bring that out in you…I’d have to be made of stone to be immune to that kind of flattery.”

  She pushed me on my back and lifted herself so that she hovered over me as she toyed with me, her hair draped around my face blocking out the world like a golden curtain.

  I lay still, arms and legs splayed limp and unmoving on the bed. I didn’t reach for her as I had before, didn’t tangle my fingers in her hair or wrap my legs around her. But the rise and fall of my chest, the racket of my breathing, were enough invitation, enough demand that she not stop. Though I couldn’t see her expression, I sensed her delight at me giving myself over. She made a sound like “Hahhh” that came out like an exclamation of triumph, and when I heard it, I came suddenly, grabbed at the sheets and dug my heels into the bed, and she giggled and rubbed me until I had to screech and push her away because it was too much. I turned my back to her and hugged my arms around myself, trembling violently.

  She pressed herself against my back and wrapped her arms around me, cupped her hands over my breasts and pinched my nipples between her fingers. Her teeth scraped the skin of my neck. “Hazel,” she said, and she pulled at me, circled a leg around me and rubbed herself against my backside.

  I let her turn me so we faced each other, let her take my shaking hand and put it between her legs. She was sopping wet. “See?” she said. I wasn’t sure what she wanted me to “see”— if she was trying to show me exactly how flattered she was or if she meant to say something else. But then she whispered, “Fuck me again,” and I didn’t care one way or another. I just did as she asked.

  Overnight, as if sleep could take words and imprint them on my brain, I changed. I showered with Claire that morning, kissed her under the running water and washed her pale back with gentle hands, all in a sexless haze. I’d retreated into my shell like a frightened crab. Her carelessly flung words—broken, cold, detached—had cut me deeper than I wanted to let them. I knew what she meant. Of course I knew. But I’d hoped I was more than a charity case to her.

  Broken.

  My disappointment with Claire stirred up my guilt over Oren. She shouldn’t mean so much to me. How in the world would I be able to go back to him and return to normalcy? The thought made my lungs seize up.

  I simmered all day for Claire, lost a little piece of myself every time I thought of our conversation from the night before, and worse, how I’d continued on with her in spite of it. I’d even liked it, even enjoyed letting her manipulate me while I crumbled and fell apart beneath her. I couldn’t get the sound of that “Hahhh” out of my head, how it had made me explode like that first hit of the showerhead. She’d conquered me, utterly and devastatingly. I was hers, yet she only found me interesting because I was a broken thing to be fixed. I felt like I’d been left standing out in the snow with no clothes on—too exposed, too vulnerable.

  Somehow I made it through the morning’s rehearsal without screaming from the pent-up frustration that was keeping a tight squeeze on my chest. At lunch, when it was only the two of us, Claire looked at me pointedly. “Are you okay?”

  I nodded. She had no idea she’d hurt me with her words, and I couldn’t make her feel bad just to get it off my chest. I told myself to be a better actress.

  I gave Ryan a private lesson in the afternoon because he was behind the other students in learning the Brahms. His innocent crush radiated out at me, and during the lesson I annihilated him with harsh criticism of his playing, ignoring the stung look in his eyes. Better not to lead him on—I understood how painful hope could be.

  That evening was the night the traveling orchestra was to play in the Anfiteatro. A surprise cold front blew in though, and none of us from the festival had come prepared with anything but light sweaters. I almost went back to the apartment to see if I could find some clothes to layer up in, but then I saw Claire, with a blanket rolled under her arm, standing in front of the orchestra platform where the musicians were warming up. We located two free chairs away from the other festival participants and snuggled up under the blanket together. “Won’t people suspect?” I whispered. I wanted to be able to remove myself from her, sit alone, but I would freeze without the blanket. And besides, it was Claire. I could not pull away from her.

  She shrugged. “We’re just friends. And we aren’t the only ones sharing a blanket, either.”

  I looked around at the other audience members and saw she was right: many had pushed chairs together and were huddled under blankets in groups of two or three. Still, I winced at Claire’s casual words. Did she mean “just friends” in the eyes of our students and colleagues, or was that all the last few nights had meant to her? This isn’t healthy. My temples pulsed as if shouting my own unrest at me.

  The concert master stepped onto the podium to tune the orchestra, and the murmuring crowd slowly fell into a hush as the orchestra began with the Tchaikovsky Serenade for Strings. It took the entire length of the work for my heart to return
to a tolerable rhythm.

  For the second half, the orchestra played Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, one of my favorite pieces of music ever composed. As the slow-moving chords shifted and layered one on top of the other, Claire put a hand on my knee under the blanket and crept it up my leg. I turned my head to look at her and found her smoldering at me. I mouthed, “Are you fucking crazy?” and slapped her hand away. She shrugged like it was no big deal and returned her hand to her own lap. But as the orchestra played on, spinning the gathering crescendo, building the ethereal harmonies with ever-fluid chords, I wished she’d put her hand back on my leg. I wished she’d crawl her fingers all the way up and into me until I cried out over the music and drew the attention of the audience, wished I had the courage to take her into one of the nearby alleys and drop to my knees and put my face between her legs with no regard for passersby. Instead, I sat like a stone letting the music wash over me while trying to gulp down the lump in my throat.

  Later, as soon as my apartment door was closed, Claire shoved me against the wall and pinned my wrists over my head. I had only a second to gape at her in shock before she pressed the length of her body against mine and buried her tongue in my mouth. I’d never seen her so hungry before. My head swam with confusion; she was treating me like I meant something to her, but all I could think was broken, cold, detached, and I couldn’t make myself react to anything. I stood frozen against the wall, unable to return her kiss.

  She pressed her leg hard between mine, rubbed her thigh against my crotch and waited for me to gasp, but I was still too stunned to respond. “Hazel! Jesus, what the fuck? Please.” Her voice had a shrill, desperate quality. She stopped suddenly then, released my hands and stared at me, shoulders heaving, her expression a fiery mix of frustration and desire. I shook my head at her.