Hail Mary

by C. C. Galloway

  ~ * ~ * ~

  As Michael settled himself back on his stool, he thought of how nice this was. Nice and normal. Two single people, a man and a woman, enjoying a meal together in his condo. The Saturday night they’d previously spent together had served as a giant measuring stick that demonstrated how lonely and isolated his life was. Which was his own choosing. Mary’s warmth, her humor, her optimistic outlook on life were beacons to his soul. He yearned for warm, female contact and companionship. Hell, he didn’t even hang out with any buddies because he didn’t have any friends to speak of.

  “Enough about me. How was your week?” Michael asked. He had to get out of his head.

  “My week was good. My kids are somewhat on track and for once, I didn’t have to discipline anyone.”

  “You actually discipline the kids?”

  “No, not me personally, but I occasionally have to send some for after school detention, which feels like discipline to me.”

  “What merits detention these days?”

  “Habitually tardy, disrespect towards me or any of the other students, excessive interruptions, or cheating.”

  “Cheating only gets a detention?” Michael was incredulous.

  “Well, when I can actually prove cheating, both students, if they’re in it together, are expelled. I categorize it in the general area of discipline since I have to deal with cheaters occasionally.”

  Michael nodded his head, chewing thoughtfully as he thought back to his high school days. He couldn’t fathom ever having the balls to cheat, either in high school or at any other time. On anything. But then again, he’d never needed to in order to gain an advantage. Despite everything Don Santiago had drilled into him, Michael discovered he wasn’t stupid, at least not in school. The Jesuits were fucking exacting with their expectations of the students. Michael had met and exceeded most of them. He had an irrational urge to tell Mary he’d graduated fourth in his high school class where 100% of Catholic Central graduates continued on, but promptly disregarded it. She probably wouldn’t believe it considering the circumstances under which they’d met.

  “Doesn’t that piss you off?” he asked, thinking how angry he’d be if some little punks thought they’d pull one over on him.

  “Of course it angers me. But the bigger problem is trying to find out why they feel the need to cheat.” Mary delivered her response in such an even-tempered tone that Michael immediately felt like an overbearing ogre about something that didn’t even affect him.

  “Who cares why they do it? The bottom line is a cheater is a liar and clearly has no respect for you if he’s doing it in your classroom.”

  “Well, it’s kind of like drug addiction. With drug addicts, if we can’t determine why they’re addicted, we can’t help them overcome their addiction. If I, as their teacher, can’t figure out the root of the problem and why I have students who believe the only way they can progress is by cheating, I can’t solve the problem. And if I can’t solve the problem, no one wins. My students lose because they aren’t learning the material they need to know in order to succeed and they are either expelled or suffer other, fairly traumatic consequences. I lose because I’ve failed if I haven’t created an environment for them in which they’re comfortable coming to me for help or with any problems.”

  “So, you assume every student who is cheating is doing it because they don’t understand the material and are afraid they’re not going to pass?” Michael marveled at her naïveté, but was simultaneously charmed by it. How…lovely to go through life believing only the best of people and that when people committed dishonest and wrongful acts, they did so only because they believed such acts were their only options. He knew better.

  “No, not every student does it for those reasons,” Mary responded, picking a non-existent piece of lint off her sweater. “But it’s those kids we need to do the most to work with.”

  “What about the kids who do it for kicks? To see if they can get away with it,” he challenged.

  “Once they’re caught, like I said, they’re expelled. Trust me. That’s not anything a student wants on his record.”

  “Can’t they just enroll somewhere else?”

  “Yes and no. Generally speaking, a lot of other schools, including public schools, won’t accept students who’ve been expelled from other schools. At that point, usually the student’s best and only option is either a school for ‘troubled youth,’” Mary used air quotes to emphasize her point, “or if their family has money, they can occasionally get accepted into private schools.”

  “Good to know money can still buy anything. Including giving cheaters a second chance.” Michael rolled his tongue around his teeth, crumpled up his napkin and threw it down on his plate before turning back towards Mary.

  Mary shrugged and took another sip of her water, now wishing she’d accepted Michael’s earlier offer for another beer. She could tell by his tone that he disapproved of her approach to cheaters and his general attitude indicated he thought she was too lenient. Which she may have been. It was evident he’d had a hard life that had hardened him, both physically and emotionally. Tonight, talking about how hard the week’s practices had been, was the first time since she’d known him that he’d actually opened himself up and shared personal, important details with her. It was great to discuss music and movies and television, even though he didn’t have anything to do with either movies or television, but tonight they were progressing to a different level, one where she wasn’t the only one in this equation putting herself out there, sharing the personal details of her life with him.

  “Honestly? What’s the alternative if they don’t graduate from any high school? You came to Walker to talk to the students about how important it is to go to college. Can you even imagine how difficult it is to make it in this world and have any type of chance at a future without a high school education? If other schools won’t take them, they’re screwed.”

  Michael’s dark eyes looked deep into hers as he nodded his head and smiled his shy, almost bashful half smile. “Okay. I’ll buy that. I still don’t think it’s right that the repercussions from cheating are…inconsequential.”

  “Trust me. When you’re sixteen and you get expelled and, at best will have to find another school where you don’t know anyone, with other kids who are often there for violent crimes or far worse transgressions, it’s pretty shitty from the student’s perspective.”

  “Oh, I trust you, Mary. I trust you a lot,” he growled, reaching to envelop her smaller hands in his larger ones.

  “You trust me?” he asked, still holding her hands and beginning to back away, all the time pulling Mary with him through the hallway and towards the condo’s sole bedroom.

  “Yes,” she breathed as he stopped at the bedroom’s threshold.

  “Good,” he purred. Then he leaned in and placed his lips on hers.

  Chapter 11

  Michael’s lips were even softer than Mary remembered. Smooth and supple. He cradled her head in his wide hands and tilted her head to the right leading to a better, deeper angle for their kiss. Gone were the tentative forays that had marked their first night together. Tonight, Michael was confident and firm. She snaked her hands around his waist, gripping his t-shirt, feeling the flex and play of his strong back muscles through the thin cotton underneath her fingertips.

  “You know what I love?” Michael murmured, drawing away from her lips to plant soft, feather-light kisses all along her neck, moving up and down as corresponding shivers danced up and down her spine.

  “What?” she whispered back, lost to the sensations coursing through her.

  “I love how soft your skin is.” He’d moved to the other side of her neck to lavish it with equal treatment. “And how terrific you smell,” he continued, moving his hands underneath her sweater so he could reach the skin on her back. She started mimicking his actions, tunneling her hands up under his shirt to caress the warm skin underneath, while leaning her head even further to the side, allowing him
better access to her throat and neck. He could kiss her there forever.

  Mary sensed she could ease him, that her body could banish the shadows constantly blanketing his dark eyes. The man was all rough, jagged edges, physically and emotionally. Everything about him was hard. The hard angles of his prominent cheekbones could have cut glass. His hard pecs. The hard biceps could bench press her on a second’s notice. His hard attitude. His hard life. She wanted her body to soothe and comfort him in a way that words couldn’t. Smoothing and softening his hard edges.

  Well, not all of his hard edges.

  A lone table sat on the right side of his plain bed that was graced with a simple, mission-style headboard at the top and dark comforter. A dresser sat off to the left. Pulling up from her collarbone, Michael whispered against her lips, “Are you okay with keeping the lights off?”

  Immediately, she stiffened.

  He must be ashamed of me, Mary thought, wishing there was some light so she could read his eyes. If she could only look into them, she could determine if her knee jerk reaction was correct, or if she was overreacting.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. Michael stroked both of his hands up and down the length of her stiff back while they stood at the foot of the bed, not moving, not kissing. Just standing there, gazing at each other in the dark.

  “Nothing. I, ah, nothing,” she answered, averting her eyes.

  “Mary, talk to me. What’s wrong?”

  She let out a short puff of air followed by a harsh, shallow imitation of a laugh. “Look, nothing’s wrong. If I were you, I wouldn’t want to see me completely naked either. Let’s get this show on the road, shall we,” she said, moving her hands up to the edges of his t-shirt to lift it up and over his head.

  ~ * ~ * ~

  Michael placed his hands over hers and willed her eyes to return to his in the quiet, opaque darkness. Fuck. He’d never considered his simple request could lead to this. He was ashamed his own head fuck had somehow led Mary to think he thought she was anything short of perfect. The fact that his careless words altered her perception of herself shamed him.

  “Mary, that’s not it at all. It has nothing to do with you and everything to do with me. You said you trusted me before we came in here, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Trust in me when I tell you I want to keep it like this in here tonight, with you, for reasons that have nothing to do with your body. Your body is perfect,” he reassured her, hoping like hell she recognized the sincere truth in his plain and simple words. But if she wanted it, he’d turn the one light by his bed on and do his best to shelter her.

  When she remained quiet, he leaned in again against her lips, and pleaded, “Please?”

  “Okay.”

  ~ * ~ * ~

  Mary sensed Michael’s smile and tried to focus again on the beautiful man in front of her. He was the most gorgeous man she’d ever had the luck to lay her eyes on. She couldn’t wait to get him naked, the sooner the better. Putting her thoughts to action, she returned to the bottom of his t-shirt and lifted it up over his head while he stood there and let her learn all about him by feel. Mary placed her hands along his narrow waist, moving them from his flat abdomen to his heavily carved pecs. A light dusting of hair surrounded his nipples and traced a happy trail down his stomach before disappearing into his jeans.

  His arms were thickly, leanly muscled. His forearms were well-defined, looking like the bars of a piano moving up and down.

  “Turn about’s fair play, Mary,” he whispered as he lifted her sweater over her head as well. “And would you look at that? I think your chest wants to look exactly like mine. Naked.” His fingertips traveled north from the back of her waist and unhooked her bra, peeling the straps down her arms and freeing her breasts. She looked down as each of his hands gripped one of her breasts and began tweaking her nipples. Her hands gripped his waist as she leaned in for another long, slow kiss while he maintained his light manipulation of her tight buds.

  Pulling back from his lips, she unbuckled the snap of his jeans and started drawing his zipper down, baring his white briefs. Impatient, he kicked his jeans away while she returned to the task at hand of unburdening him of his briefs. She hooked her hands on each side and drew them down, revealing his huge, heavy cock to her hungry eyes. Twin sacks at the base anchored him. His cock was long and thick with a proud, ridged head, heavily and thickly veined, and tilted upwards towards his stomach.

  “Get up here,” he crooned, extending his warm hand to her to pull her with him towards the bed. As she settled back against his pillows, he nuzzled her neck as he rested his body between her thighs. “Mary, we have to stop this. You still have too many clothes.” He looked up in the shadowed room and she wished she could see his eyes. She thought if she could, they would be twinkling.

  “Let’s change that.”

  “Yeah. Let’s change that,” he agreed, removing her jeans and panties in a couple of quick sweeps of his warm hands. “Much, much better,” he said, returning to ply her breasts with kisses while his hand moved down towards her center, wet and waiting for him. First one, then a second finger found its way to her core and started moving in and out, drawing circles around and around and driving her crazy. Her nipples had peaked and Michael’s attention to detail was keeping her on edge as he continued flicking her nipples and driving his fingers all around her core. She couldn’t wait to return the favor and give him some of the pleasure he was flooding her with.

  After she orgasmed, she laid back and watched him from under her eyelids as he continued his assault on her senses by planting a series of kisses all along her stomach and down to her center. “That was a pre-game sampler of what’s to come. We’ve still got the main event coming up,” he purred as he placed his mouth directly on her. Her back lifted up and off the bed as Michael’s tongue repeatedly circled her clit, alternating between nips and licks until she didn’t know how much longer she could stand it. As he drove her towards her second orgasm of the night, she was flushed with excitement as well as utterly loose and complacent.

  ~ * ~ * ~

  Instead of preparing to enter her, Michael rolled over on to his side and tried to calm his own heavy breathing. God. He loved going down on Mary. She was delicious. And what a fucking turn-on it was for her to completely trust him with her body. It was even better this time with both of them on a comfortable bed and the entire night ahead of them.

  Mary turned on her side and faced Michael as he continued to caress her body, from hip to stomach. “You don’t look like you need a time out,” she teased, noting that his prominent erection was still popping on his stomach, the tip looking ready to weep, and wondering why he’d pulled back when she was completely ready for him.

  “This is perfect for me, Mary,” he responded, leaning in and planting another kiss, soft and quick, on her lips.

  “You mean you don’t want to, you know,” she responded, now grateful for the cover of night that camouflaged her flaming cheeks. Always so direct, and tonight her straightforward approach decided to abandon her.

  “Pleasing you is enjoyable enough for me,” he responded, rolling back over and placing himself between her thighs.

  She put her hand up in the universal sign of “stop.” “Hold it right there. Either this is a two way street or I’m out of here.” It wouldn’t be easy to leave when satisfaction was so close, but this couldn’t continue. If they were going to have a shot at continuing this relationship, and this resembled a relationship, she had to begin establishing some guidelines.

  “What do you mean?” he questioned. His heavy, labored breathing communicated that he was far from stable.

  “I mean, I want to touch you in the same way you’ve been touching me. Completely. I want to be as close to you as I can be. I want you inside me. As deep inside as you can possibly get.”

  His internal struggle was evident with the hitched breaths leaving his body in waves.

  “Michael? Is there a reason you don’t want to
be with me?”

  “It’s not you, Mary. Trust me.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “What’s wrong with what we’ve been doing?”

  “It’s not enough for me, Michael. Being together involves reciprocity. It’s not sexy or fun for me when I’m the only one coming. Look, if you don’t want to have sex, we don’t have to have sex. You need to let me touch you. I need to touch you. I want to touch you. I want to be with you in any way we can be together. But this whole one-way ticket that you want to continue? Not working for me.” Mary stroked his thick biceps to take any sting out of her words. Lying in bed with him was nice, one of the nicest ways to spend a night, but it wasn’t enough.

  Not. Even. Close.

  When he remained quiet, she continued. “It’s up to you. What we do and where we go from here. I won’t push you to do anything you’re not comfortable with, but I’m not going to lie here either and let you have your wicked way with me and not return the favor. The ball’s in your court. We’re either in this together, or I’m leaving. Your choice.”

  Michael’s soft sigh was the only sound in the room. Mary waited and waited until finally he reached his hand out to hers and laced their fingers together.

  “I guess we’re in this together, then,” he answered, wishing he hadn’t insisted on the lights being off so he could look into her pretty green eyes and revel in this moment. This sweet, sublime moment that was the two of them. No past. No present. No family history to deal with. Simply two people lying on his bed together.

  For the second time that night, he was ashamed and embarrassed he’d made Mary doubt herself, doubt her attractiveness, or even question that what was happening here wasn’t the best thing that had ever happened to him in his godforsaken life.

  “Good. That’s good. Because I’ve been dying to do this all night,” she said as she rolled over on top of him and planted herself on his pelvis. His penis insistently nudged against her while she leaned down and started kissing him all over.