[City Limits 01.0] Roots and Wings

by M. Mabie

  “Yeah, so my rubbers won’t be here until Monday. Thank God for next day shipping.”

  My side hurt, but it was amazing watching him joke about the whole thing. Then he winked, and I almost fell again.

  “Bet you never thought when you signed up for that you’d be buying those with it.”

  “I didn’t, but I’m sure glad they sell them. What do people do around here? It’s fucking awkward.”

  It really was, that’s why I was sure to be the first one through the door before anyone else showed up that morning. I had never even thought of ordering them online. That was genius, but it still wouldn’t have helped us that night.

  “Are you really staying?”

  He stopped and looked at me like I was nuts. “Of course I am, if you still want me to.”

  “That was before. You know. I didn’t know if you’d want to go home now or not.” I wasn’t proud of asking that, but I’d rather know sooner than later. What if he wanted to go home?

  “Hannah, are you serious? I wasn’t just saying those things to have sex with you.”

  I felt guilty saying that to him, but in my experience, guys say a lot of things, either just before sex or right after, that may or may not always pan out.

  “I was just checking.” Then as an apology I reached up and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek.

  Sometimes he was just too good to believe. You know?

  “Well, trust me,” he said and put the cooler down on the deck as we got to the sliding back door. “I won’t ever lie to you like that. I won’t manipulate you. And, I’m really sorry, if in the past others have. That’s really wrong. I don’t want you to sleep with me because of something I’ve promised or said I’d do, I want you to be with me because—and only because—it’s what you want. That went for tonight and it goes for every time we have sex—if I should ever get so lucky again.” His face was serious, but kind.

  I hoped that whatever we were doing would last a little while, because the more he said things like that, the more I believed him.

  We went inside and I used the bathroom to wash up. Our adventure on the boat had been a little messy. What I really wanted was another shower, but decided I’d rather get back to him.

  I didn’t want the night to end. Something in my mind always told me I needed to take advantage of the time he was there. Even though, over the past few weeks, whenever I wanted to see him all I had to do was say the words.

  But I was realistic and knew it couldn’t last forever.

  It was only ten o’clock, but after the boat, I was ready to settle down. Ready to crawl up next to him. Ready to listen to him talk to me as I fell asleep.

  I found him sitting on the deck, so I grabbed the blanket off the cooler and wrapped it around my arms. It was still warm, but the breeze was a little stronger and it was cooling off.

  I went to sit on the other chair, but stopped when Vaughn said, “No. Please, come here.” He sat back and opened his arms for me, and I couldn’t deny him.

  Would I ever get used to him wanting to be close to me? Probably about the time he would change his mind.

  Chapter Twenty

  Vaughn

  Hannah climbed on my lap sideways. It was funny, sometimes she seemed so strong and powerful, and then, in times like that, she seemed so fragile and small. She curled into me, laying her head on my chest, and I stroked her thick, wavy hair, enjoying how she let me care for her.

  After a little while of watching the water go by and listening to her breathe, she said, “Vaughn, tell me more stuff about you.”

  I thought and thought. There wasn’t that much to tell, but maybe I could kind of explain what I was looking for in Wynne. Why it was important to me.

  “When I was a kid, I had a best friend named Pete. He lived close to me and we hung out together a lot. In the summer, I’d go with him to his grandparents’ farm. They lived near a small town just like this one. That might be why I like it so much.”

  She lay there quietly as I began speaking about my favorite childhood memories.

  ”We’d ride our bikes all day and build real tree houses and forts with extra wood his grandpa had around. They had dinner every night at five thirty and went to church every Sunday. We were Catholic—or bad Catholics as my mom used to say—so we rarely went.

  “I’m not a really religious guy. I believe what I do, but I always liked going when I was at Pete’s grandparents’. They’d go and then usually everyone would end up at someone’s house and we’d eat and play in town until it got dark.

  “I guess that’s what I wanted my life to look like.” She looked up at me and I could see she was listening—really hearing—what I was telling her. Her eyes roamed my face and a lazy grin bent the corners of her lovely lips.

  “I know times have changed, and life is busier and more complicated than it looked at seven or eight, but they were a real family.

  “My parents got divorced when I was nine. My dad moved to Columbus, and my mom remarried pretty fast to a guy who didn’t have kids. They travelled a lot and left me with sitters. My dad worked too much, so if I spent time there, it was usually by myself. Both my parents were only children, so I didn’t have cousins I could go spend time with.

  “Then in high school Pete moved, his parents got a different job or something—I can’t remember now—and I pretty much just studied and played sports to keep busy.”

  I could tell she didn’t like that part; compassion mired her features. Her bottom lip making an adorable pout.

  “His grandparents still invited me there that next summer, but I think we both had some kind of sports camp we had to attend and the dates didn’t line up. Even after all of those years, I still think of them.”

  I wanted her to understand, that even though she thought her town might not have much to offer, the sense of community and belonging was what I wanted.

  “What happened to Pete?” she asked, with curious eyes before she yawned.

  “He lives in Houston. Has a wife and a couple of kids. We still talk every once in a while. I was in his wedding.” I think the fact that we were still friends made her smile.

  She said, “Good,” as she lay her head back down. And then she wrapped an arm around my back and covered both of us with the blanket.

  “That’s really why you moved here. The job worked out, but I’m sure you had other options.”

  I had, but she was right. I’d been waiting until there was a little town, where I could move. Fix up a house and start a real family.

  One that I could hold together.

  One that was mine.

  “I think you’re right.”

  She fell asleep in my arms, and I sat awake in the chair on the deck for a long time and let her rest. The soft rise and fall of her chest and the way her hold on me never weakened gave me a new feeling. Something peaceful and something worth working hard to keep.

  I realized I wanted her to love me, and I wanted to love her back, but also knew we had some time to kill between now and then.

  In just those few short weeks, she’d already become someone I cared about. Someone who made time go faster together, and slower when we were apart.

  I had a desire to give her things, show her places she’d never been, make her laugh and hear her say my name thousands of times, like she had on the boat.

  The hunger to build something with this woman was powerful and new to me. I didn’t want the idea of the perfect life, I really wanted it, and it was so easy inserting Hannah into all of those future thoughts. It was the most natural thing picturing her by my side.

  I wasn’t going to come on strong, even if everything in my being told me to hold on to her. What we had was new and exciting and fun. Completely unexpected, but so welcomed at the same time.

  There was no place I’d rather be. I wasn’t going anywhere, and, I thought, neither was she.

  ⟡⟡⟡

  I woke up early in the cabin in my boxers, still holding her, just as I’d fallen asleep
the night before.

  I didn’t want to let go, but I wanted to stretch out. Careful I didn’t wake her, I tried to pull my arm out from under her, not realizing she was already awake, too.

  “Remember that day you asked me why do you keep coming over here? And I asked you why don’t you ever tell me to leave?”

  I did remember. I was frustrated and annoyed, and there she was. The only person who was trying to help me and the only one around to take it out on. It wasn’t that I missed Rachelle, because I didn’t. It was that all along I was trying to force something that wasn’t right. Then, when she showed up, it made me question why it never felt wrong with her there. It was confusing.

  “I’m sorry I was so rude that day.”

  “I’m not.”

  She rolled around in my arms, looking sleepy and fresh faced. Her hair wild and messy. I took a moment to memorize exactly the way she looked. A mental snapshot, knowing there would be a time when I’d think back to this second and be thankful for the clarity.

  She’d been half asleep when I set her in the bed last night. I didn’t want to wake her, but when I sat her on the bed, she stirred. Then she kicked off her flip-flops and pulled her jeans off, choosing to sleep in her underwear and tank top. Her bra never found its way back on after the boat.

  “Want to know why?” She quirked a conspiratorial eyebrow and puckered her lips to hold her secret in a little longer.

  “Why?”

  “When I was little I remember asking my grandpa if my mom and dad fought a lot. I always knew she left, but I never really understood why until I was older.” She propped herself up on her hand, her elbow pressing into the bed.

  “Anyway, from time to time I’d ask my grandpa if it had been this or that which had caused my mom and dad to split. On this day, it was fighting. I wanted to know if they fought all the time and I was shocked when he said no so fast.

  “He said, ‘Never, Mutt. Not one time did I ever see them fight and that’s not good.’ Now I was probably ten or eleven when I asked. So his answer confused me. I thought that people fighting was bad in a relationship, not the other way around, so I asked him to explain. He told me that when I grew up I’d understand it a little more. Then he told me the key to having a long happy life with someone was finding someone you liked fighting with.

  “That day, after you asked that, and I said what I said back, on the way home it made me smile. Don’t get me wrong—I don’t want to fight with you—but I don’t think I’d mind it either.”

  I wanted to kiss her, but held off for her to continue.

  “You’re hot when you’re pissed. And, for those first few weeks, even though you didn’t say anything else that was rude, there were days when you were working things out in your head, and you had every right to. It was your home. You were going through some changes. But being around you like that, if that was what you were like when you didn’t feel at your best, I knew you were worth hanging around a little more. I knew you were special.”

  Where had she been my whole life? Here. She’d been here, as if she were waiting for me.

  Hannah shrugged as I watched her grin like she was confessing something scandalous.

  “And the hot thing. One time I saw you get so mad you clenched your teeth, balled your fists, and looked like you were going to scream, but then you scanned around for me, and didn’t make a sound. Pissed and fine as they come.”

  I had to agree with her grandpa. Rachelle and I never fought. And at the very end, when we did a little, I didn’t like it. I didn’t like that side of her.

  That morning when Hannah fired back, then kept right on working on my house—in her free time no less—even when I wasn’t the best company, said a lot about the kind of person she was.

  Also, I really liked hearing that she thought I was hot.

  I couldn’t hold back anymore. If there was more to the story, it could wait. I kissed her, because that’s what you do when someone looks as sexy as she did lying in that bed.

  While she kissed me back, I thought about the night before and how it had been exactly what I’d wanted. What I’d needed.

  Her body was made for me. Every soft curve. Every corner and bend, I wanted to touch and claim for my own. I wanted it all. The freckles and scars, the whimpers and moans as she fell apart in my arms. The look of wonder in her eyes when I tasted her, and knowing that I’d been the only man to please her in that way.

  I’d had sex, and I’d done my share of fucking, but it had never been like we were together.

  Never that powerful. Never that intense. I’d never craved for more as bad as I did in that moment with her.

  ⟡⟡⟡

  That morning was the first of dozens.

  Well rested. Satisfied from the night before, but ready to go again.

  I learned she was very affectionate as soon as she woke up, and often that was when she was the sweetest with her words. She was always pleasant, but catching her as soon as she woke up was like she hadn’t turned her sarcasm on yet.

  It wasn’t that I didn’t like the smart-ass side of her, but I especially loved the mornings.

  Sometimes we were at her cabin, other times we were in my bed. I liked both, but there was an element of having her in my bed with me that made it feel more like home.

  She got into a habit of leaving me notes in my SUV if she had to leave earlier than I did, to go home, or to open the shop.

  Some were sweet, because she’d just been asleep and was still only partially awake.

  Things like:

  V-

  I’m so glad I was running late for dinner the night you moved to Wynne.

  H

  Or...

  V-

  I’m thinking about a sunset boat ride, but the boat is out of gas. Don’t buy any. I’ll get the wine. ;)

  H

  That was the day she’d gone shopping with Sunny in Browning. That night I found her waiting for me on her boat wearing a pale pink silk thing that made me ask her where she’d bought it, in case I was just too careless and ruined it completely on purpose.

  The sex got better and better. She was bossy, and totally in control in everyday life, and so beautifully and confidently submissive to my every wish, my every move. Which only fueled me to please her more. Making her come harder. Louder. And over and over again, even when she swore she was wrung dry. When she’d say she could barely handle it, I pushed just a little further and she’d melt into my mouth, or my fingers, or my cock.

  Our conversations were just as fun as they’d always been. She’d argue with me, or I’d argue with her, and then she’d wink, mouthing the words, “You’re so hot.”

  She said she didn’t want to label us, and I didn’t push it, but she ended up being the one to call me her boyfriend in public first.

  Sunny had a friend in town, from a different radio station, and we ran into them at the summer carnival.

  “Hey, this is Julia, the friend I told you guys about,” Sunny had said as she walked up to us just as we’d finished eating our second corndogs.

  Julia was petite and cute, but she had nothing on Hannah. And even though I hated that she was insecure at that moment, I also liked how she’d needed Julia to know I was hers.

  “Nice to meet you, Julia. This is my boyfriend, Vaughn.” Then she grabbed my hand and didn’t let go for the rest of the night.

  That evening, up against the shower wall in my bathroom—which she’d helped me tile—when I asked her whose boyfriend I was, she said, “You’re all mine, Vaughn, and I’m all yours.”

  I lost it right then, pushing harder and harder into her until she said it over and over again. “I’m yours. I’m yours.”

  Things changed after that night.

  Up until then, we laid kind of low. We didn’t go up to the bar together on the weekends, not that either of us really wanted to. We tended to stick to ourselves.

  We’d never talked about it, but it was fun and there wasn’t anything wrong with spending ti
me getting to know each other in private. And as fast as our sex life took off, it was important that we spent just as much time out of bed as we did in it.

  The weeks passed in a blink.

  The days were hot; the nights were blistering.

  We boated, and like it was the most natural thing, we began spending time with other people.

  Together.

  As a couple.

  It was almost like she finally realized I really was hers, and it was safe to share. Safe to let people know she cared about me and brave enough to show people that she let someone care about her.

  I was learning that in a small town, you protect what you hold sacred. For Hannah, what she protected the most was her feelings.

  We’d been to Browning a few times with Sunny and it was great watching her interact with someone who was so completely different. At the same time, Hannah was changing a little, but enjoying all the new things she’d never tried.

  Her dad still called me Astro, but he came fishing with us on a few occasions and we’d had a good time.

  Dean still wasn’t warming up to me, but I couldn’t blame him. It was easy to see he was in love with her and was realizing that he’d lost his chance.

  Hannah cared for him like a brother, so I made an effort to pretend I didn’t notice. I never thought it would ever come up, and, honestly, if he was kind to her, what did it hurt me? He wasn’t making her uncomfortable, from what I could tell, and he wasn’t a dick to me. He just didn’t say much of anything.

  So when I’d asked Aaron to help me with the roof, and Hannah said Dean would help too, it caught me off guard.

  The work went quickly that morning. Dean and I scraped off the old shingles without much trouble. And after catching up on some sleep, Aaron came around noon.

  The roof didn’t have too much going on, which made it a pretty straightforward job.

  The three of us worked, talked about baseball, and then the conversation turned to women.

  Well, one woman.

  My woman.

  Hannah.

  She’d just pulled away, heading back down her road to get caught up on some flies for orders she always said she was behind on. So it was just us three, sitting on my porch eating the sandwiches and drinking the tea she brought us.