by Zoey Long
I put my hand on hers. “Believe me, I sound like an ass. I know that. But there’s something between us. Something real. Do you think I would risk my new job just to bang a student? It’s not that. Lana, please. Believe me.”
Lana and I both know how long it’s been since I’ve talked about a woman like this. It’s not something I do lightly. She pulls her hand away from mine swiftly and orders another drink. She’s not looking at me, but her eyes look wet from the side. I don’t know if she’s about to cry or throw her new whiskey in my face.
“I can’t… this is a car wreck waiting to happen. The girl won’t be expelled, you’ll just be fired. And forget me ever recommending you for a job in academia ever again. You’d better spruce up your retail resume, Adam. I’m fucking serious.”
“It doesn’t have to be like that. She can drop the course if things get hard...” Lana scoffs at my poor choice of words. “She’s an amazing actress and model. I have some ideas about revamping the business and I think Carrie would want to be a part of it. She’d be a great spokesmodel for the business.”
“God made man with only enough blood to run one head at a time, I swear. Someone very wise said that to me. I love you, but I think you’re ruining your life.”
Lana stands up and takes one last gulp of her whiskey and kisses me on the cheek. The look on my face makes her say something she doesn’t have to.
“You can count on my silence, of course. I also know I can’t change your mind. Just… God damn it, Adam, don’t be an idiot. Please. You like this job, right? The steady work? It’s not worth it.” She turns on her heel and saunters out of the bar, attracting the attention of several people as she leaves.
“Hey, what happened to your friend?” the thin bartender asks me, appearing once again to take her empty glass and generous five dollar tip. His eyes are frenzied, looking near and far for a glimpse of her. But she’s gone.
I give him a half smile, letting the last drams of booze warm my chest.
I awake in the hotel bed next to Carrie. We’re not cuddling, in fact, her bare back is facing toward me. I can hear church bells out the window, a herald of Sunday morning. I take my finger and trace her back lightly. She stirs. I don’t want to wake her almost as much as I want her see her awakened face.
“Mmmm,” she moans sweetly. Carrie rolls over and opens her eyes, melting me with her gaze. Her eyes are bright green, her skin flushed from sleep.
“Good morning.”
“It’s Sunday,” she says.
I nod. Carrie opens her mouth and yawns, stretching her taut limbs up and over her head, blinking her tired eyes open wider. She rolls over to the end table to look at her phone. She answers some message, I don’t know from whom. I kiss her shoulders and tell her that we have to be out of the room by eleven am. It’s currently nine-thirty.
“Ha! I haven’t seen nine-thirty am on a Sunday since… I don’t know.” She laughs. I forgot how late college kids like to sleep in on the weekends.
“Don’t you make it to weekend brunch?” I ask her, feeling like an utter dork. She gives me a look that confirms my suspicion.
Passion overtakes me and I give her a kiss like it’s the last time our lips will meet. She matches my enthusiasm, and before I know it she’s on top of me, her nipples inches from my mouth. I touch between her legs with my fingers and she falls into me.
“Do you think we have time?” she whispers.
I’m hard underneath her, and before I have a chance to answer or say anything at all, she guides my cock inside her and sits down on it.
“Oh, God…” I exhale, feeling her tight wetness around me. She starts to ride back and forth as I grab her ample breasts in both hands, her pink nipples stiffening immediately. She leans down and whispers “wait” in my ear, takes me out of her and turns around in a reverse cowgirl. She’s facing away from me now, grabbing my slick cock in one hand and guiding it back inside her pussy. I’m hard as ever now, and her round ass descends down in front of me in full view, thrusting back and forth. The sight of her riding me like this makes my cock ache, I feel like I’m about to explode inside of her. As I keep thrusting she gets wetter and wetter, and I run my hand down her bare back.
She's bucking her hips back and forth, riding me with such vigor that I don't know how much longer I can last. I attempt to steady her by taking her hips in my hands, softly slowing her down just a bit. She throws her luxurious red hair back, bucking against my palms, wanting to ride me harder. I have half a mind to just let go and let her take me where she wants me, but I don't want to come too fast. I take my right hand and scratch down her back hard. She inhales sharply, and I think the small addition of pain might make her come because her thighs tense up suddenly and begin to tremble.
I'm wrong. Instead, she lies her body down on my legs, reaches around behind her with one hand,, and withdraws me from her pussy. Before I have a chance to stop her, she straddling me and taking my cock in her mouth. I look up at the white ceiling and close my eyes letting this intense pleasure wash over me from the tip of my cock to the bottom of my feet. Her lips work me hard up and down, not stopping.
“Yes, yes, that's so good," I say, gripping her hair full in my hand and bobbing her up and down completely on my slick hard cock. I feel pressure steadily building in my pelvis and she's moaning so loudly now that I know I can't hold on for much longer.
"I want to come in your mouth," I hear myself say, watching her glorious tits bounce up and down, her nipples erect, grazing my thighs. She moans affirmatively and sucks me even harder. My orgasm begins sharply and I shoot my come into her mouth strongly, spurting over and over so that she has to swallow but she keeps sucking me. It feels so good, I never want her to take that delectable mouth from my cock. She swallows one more time, withdrawing me from her mouth, resting her face on my thigh, catching her breath.
She looks up at me, her pillowy lips even puffier now, her eyes are wet green pools. She smiles before lowering her mouth to me again, kissing my thighs and torso gently.
"I think we should pack," she whispers, listlessly, obviously in no rush to move. I can hardly feel my legs at the moment, so lying here with her like this is just fine by me. Anything to prolong our fantasy world where no one knows where we are, where no one can find us.
Except Lana, that is. I don't let the thought of her at the bar the previous evening even enter my mind. Carrie slides herself up my body like a snake, slithering from my pelvis over my chest and up to my mouth. She kisses me gently before nuzzling her face in the crook of my neck. I fill my nostrils with the scent of her, closing my eyes, inhaling to my full capacity, hoping to imprint the code of her scent in my brain. Unadulterated by perfume or shampoo or makeup or fabric, the scent of her skin shines through. Vanilla creme brulée.
"Do you know you smell like fresh dessert?" I ask her, laughing slightly. She nuzzles her face one more time in my neck before turning to look up at me.
"Okay, but what kind of dessert? Are we talking a tart? A macaron? Mille feuille? Profiterole?" She goes on, listing more French desserts. My laughter stops her, she's ironically forgotten the most obvious choice.
"No, my love, warm vanilla. Sweetness, a bit caramelized. Crème brûlée?" She's smiling from ear to ear but rolls her eyes at me. She kisses me on the cheek before telling me how silly I am.
"I think that may be the loveliest compliment I've ever received."
In a flash, she's standing up, naked except for the hotel sheet wrapped around her waist, looking for her clothes. This means, of course, that I'm left in bed naked with no sheet and nothing to cover myself. She finds this amusing, making eye contact with me and giggling.
Suddenly, I think about Earnsley, about the work I need to do before classes tomorrow, how that seems an entire world away from right now and from the weekend I've had entirely alone with the beautiful Carrie Desmond. My stomach lurches in response. Carrie is mostly dressed at this point, scattering around the carpe
t barefoot, looking for her shoes.
"It'll be nice to get out of these clothes, pretty as they are," she says, playing with the skirt on the dress. I get up and pass her the black and white heels she wore on Saturday and she slips them on. Once dressed, I walk over to the stark white armoire doors and open it, revealing the blood red vintage screen siren gown, hanging like its own announcement against the white back wall of the closet. I take it out and hold it up dramatically.
"Even this?" I ask Carrie with a sly smile. Her eyes soften as if she's gazing upon a loved one she'd forgotten was there. She walks over to it and lovingly floats her hand above the fabric.
"No," she says calmly. "Not this. I'll never be glad to get out of this." Our eyes lock and she knows I'm thinking about when I fucked her against the wall the night before, when I tried so hard to smoothly remove her from this very garment. "Okay, sometimes I am. But only under very specific circumstances,” she whispers, and I’m nearly hard again.
I put the dress in a garment bag provided by the hotel, zip it up in one go and have a thought.
“Do you think I should keep the dress at my place?”
She whips around, looking offended at first, brows furrowed that I’d even suggest such a thing, but then quickly understands my logic. She sighs.
“I guess it wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense for me to show up back at my dorm with a huge black garment bag in my hands. I can just imagine Michelle’s face if I were to walk in our room with that. She’s a fucking stage manager, she knows the school doesn’t have that kind of budget.”
“Until we meet again, then?” I say to her, jokingly, slinging the garment bag over my arm. “Now you have to see me again.”
The instant I say that, I regret it. She looks hurt, holding my gaze.
“You think I only care for you because you bought me a dress?”
It’s the first time I hear any hint of anger in her voice. I know it’s not the dress or the hotel or the lingerie, but as I list the items in my head, I can’t help but worry that all this flash has played a factor.
“All of this was your idea. You’re the crazy one, throwing stars in my eyes that you don’t even have to give. You’re a teacher, for goodness sake! No offense, but if I was with you for your money, I seriously messed up.”
I belly laugh at that because I sure as hell can’t argue with her there. “No. I don’t think that. Good point.”
“Seriously, Adam. The gifts are nice, but it’s not about that. I’m not like that. Please don’t ask me that again.”
“I wasn’t trying to insinuate that you only wanted to be with me because… I’m sorry.” I smile genuinely, moving a stray hair from her face. She smiles and kisses my palm before we turn to go.
Downstairs at the checkout desk, the spell is nearly broken. Carrie is rummaging through her bag to make sure she didn’t leave anything behind in the room and feverishly checking the train schedule on her phone, to see when she can get back to campus. The woman behind the hotel checkout counter has her long jet black hair in a high ponytail, her big mouth is painted with dark purple matte lipstick. I'm glad Carrie is distracted for the moment because I have a feeling that once this very chipper hotel concierge is finished rapping her nails against the keyboard to give me my final bill, I might faint.
"There's a 3:30 train, a 4:30 train, a 5:30…I think it's just every hour on the half-hour?" Carrie says, looking at me.
"Whichever one is best for you, I can take you to the train station or you can just head there on your own," I say, staring intently at the woman.
"Did you have anything out of the mini fridge?" the woman asks me, looking up, doe-eyed, her long lashes almost reaching to her perfectly arched brows.
"We did not, no." Thank god for small victories.
"The 4:30 sounds good to me," Carrie begins. "That way, I'll have a chance to get back to my room and ready myself for classes tomorrow."
Hearing her talk like a student creates quite a bit of dissonance in my brain. I think about my own Monday morning classes and my gut gives a lurch. The dark-haired woman looks up with a big smile. I'm fiddling with a pen on the counter, it's black and smooth, branded with gold letters that say SPADE HOTEL. "So that's just one night in a medium suite with a king sized bed…"
That's right…list my sins. One night in a king sized bed with a twenty year old girl, several counts of coitus including one particularly satisfying encounter against our freshly painted white wall.
"Five hundred twenty-six dollars and thirty-two cents," she says, smiling. I drop the pen in my hand and it rolls toward her, dropping near her black keyboard. She picks it up and places it back where it was, still smiling.
"Can I get a printout of the charges?" I ask her, trying not to have a conniption on the spot. Carrie must have gone to the coffee shop or the ladies’ room because she's no longer next to me. I'm glad for it. The printout crinkles in my hands as I tried to figure out what the fuck just happened. All of the charges are correct, $400 for the night, and the rest in tax. I take out my credit card and hand it to her begrudgingly, the sight of which makes her snatch it from my fingers in a flash.
Carrie returns, her heels clicking delicately as she walks across the marble floor toward me, a huge smile stretched across her beautiful face. She's carrying two coffees. I wish I could slow down time to savor the sight of this beauty walking toward me so happy, so light, so wonderful. When she reaches me she hands me one of the coffees, it's warm but not too hot against my inner palm.
"Thank you, love," I say with a smile, not breaking eye contact with her as I take my first sip.
"They're brewing a Burundi today, it's a medium bodied, bright roast with notes of caramel and brown sugar and a syrupy finish.”
"You said that with a straight face, I'm very proud of you," I laugh. "I didn't know you were such a coffee aficionado." I wink at her and she explains that she was just reading the handwritten description off the chalkboard sign above the front counter.
"Good thing I'm an actress, I remembered all of the flavor notes exactly as written. Otherwise, how would you know to taste the caramel? I can taste it." She smirks at me with a devilish air that makes me want to ravish her right then and there on the cold marble floor of the Spade Hotel lobby.
"Here's a summary of all of your charges again, Mr. Clark, along with the receipt for what we ran this morning. It's been an absolute pleasure serving you both and we hope you'll decide to stay with us at The Spade again very soon." This woman should be a toothpaste model, her teeth are so white that they almost sparkle. She hands me my credit card back, but it might as well be smoking I’ve used it so much in the last couple days. I put it back in my wallet and close it up.
“Thanks very much, we had a wonderful time.” I say, grabbing Carrie's hand and laughing slightly in a way that lets her know we probably won't be staying here, at least not at this particular hotel again for a very long time.
Carrie kisses me on the street, right outside The Spade, in front of the two men in slacks and vests holding the doors open for guest traffic.
“That was the most romantic weekend of my whole life,” she says brightly.
My heart warms at the sentiment, but I also know that her life hasn’t been that long. It makes me chuckle until she holds my face in her hands and kisses me again.
“I’ll see you at school?’ she smiles, grabbing my hand and squeezing it one last time.
Chapter 15: Carrie
Back on campus I feel like there’s a red scarlet A, the same shade as the satin gown he bought be, emblazoned on my chest. Instead of Adultery, though, my A stands for Adam. Campus looks exactly the same, not that I truly thought it wouldn’t, but people are smiling at me as though nothing has happened, as though I never left at all.
In order to get back to my dorm I need to pass the theater building, and I hope I’m not immediately accosted. The only reason I was even able to get away for three days in a row is because
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof just wrapped. If we were in the middle of a show, I’d never be able to stop rehearsing for that long.
The thought takes me out of my Adam-induced haze for a moment. What kind of relationship can I have with him if I’m in the middle of a show?
“Carrie, hey!” It’s Bret, one of the directors for the last show. He’s got foppish curly black hair and wears floor-length embroidered smoking jackets even though it’s smack dab in the middle of spring. He speaks a mile a minute, as though he’s on a 24/7 intravenous caffeine drip, and he probably is. I love him.
“Hi!” I say, almost too enthusiastically. I’m wearing the black cocktail dress I wore Friday night. I gave Adam back the navy A line dress and of course the vampy gown. I look just like I did Friday night, but if anyone won’t notice and think black lace is perfectly acceptable for day, it’s Brett.
“So. We have auditions coming up for a show I think you’ll be perfect for. You’ll never guess what it is. Guess. Okay don’t. You’ll never be able to guess. But I think I need Queen Carrie for this one, if you know what I’m saying.” Brett looks at me for a moment, his large black eyes taking in my face. I can almost see his skin vibrating with energy.
“Girl, you look amazing, has anyone told you that recently? You’re like, glowing or something. Not that you don’t normally, but whatever you’re doing, keep that shit up. Seriously, you’re like luminous.”
Thanks, I’ve been riding Adam Clark’s cock nonstop all weekend. You know, the six-foot-tall Vikingesque GQ model who teaches pinup photography? Yeah. It’s done wonders. I think to myself as I thank him, all smiles. He kisses both of my cheeks twice and then he’s on his way.
“Drinks soon? Drinks soon. Bye, love.”
Someone should figure out how to bottle that man’s energy.
I turn toward my dorm, make my way inside, and head down the long hallway to my room. The door is closed, and I don’t hear any noise coming from inside when I press my ear to the door. Is this what I’ve become now? I never pause before entering a place. My insides are fluttering, I feel light like I am anticipating having to lie in a moment. I fumble for my keys in my bag, balancing it on my hip. I put the worn gold key in the lock and it scratches open. I slowly push the door, the slightly musty smell of dorm room meets my nostrils, but the room itself is dark. I step inside and the only light is coming in from the windows. Michelle’s bed is made and I’m the only one in the room. I breathe a deep sigh of relief, enjoying the enveloping quiet of the room, of my neatly made bed with the bedspread that was a present from my parents.