Sweet. Sweeter.

by Kyoko Church

  I dash into the family room and fish my special little helper out of my purse. Its smooth egg shape and shiny contours calm me, knowing that blissful satisfaction is near. I don’t lie on my back. I need to be fast, and the fastest way is when I can hump down on it in my hand while lying on my front. Quickly I slip it inside my bikini bottoms and settle it between my labia, just over my clit. Even the cool hardness of it feels intensely good and when I ease myself down to lie flat on the sofa with my face buried in a pillow. I click the button on the attached remote and the vibrations purr into action. My hungry body convulses and I stifle a cry.

  Oh yes. Ohhh yesss. This is what I need. I won’t be long now. I feel my body winding tighter with glorious sensations and my release is imminent. Oh fuck…yes. I shove two fingers inside me too, because I just can’t help it. I rock the vibrating egg against me with my palm and I cum hard, my sex clenching my fingers, my hips thrusting into my arm, into the sofa as I hump, not caring about anything now but ringing every last bit of satisfaction out of this sweet release.

  Sated I stand up quickly. I have to clean up fast before Jack walks in the front door. But when I do, I immediately see Mason outside, standing on the pool deck and turning away from the sliding glass doors of the family room.

  Oh fuck. Oh holy fuck. Mason? What did he see?

  “Laur?” I hear the door, Jack coming in the front. I stash my vibrator back into my purse, wipe my juices on my thigh, adjust my bikini and smooth back my hair.

  “I’m here,” I call out, clearing my throat as I hear the shakiness rise in it.

  We both walk into the kitchen from opposite ends of the house.

  “You okay?” he says. “You look flushed.” He looks out the window. “Oh, Mason’s here.” Then back at me, eyes narrowing. “Did something happen?”

  “What?” I say. Did it? “No, I— I didn’t even realise he was here.” Obviously, or I wouldn’t have been going for it on the sofa. “He must have just gotten here.” Just in time to watch me acting like a bitch in heat.

  My brain will not shut up from its ranting in my head. Did he see? How long was he there?

  ♦♦♦♦

  It’s only when I’m lying in my own bed back in my own apartment that night that I truly begin to calm down. The rest of the time at Jack’s, before he left for racket ball, was an uncomfortable nightmare. I kept catching glimpses of Mason through the office window, as I tried vainly and hastily finish up Jack’s accounts; or I’d see him out of the kitchen window, when I’d pad in there to grab a cold drink. But each time I managed a glimpse of Mason, he was staring intently at the pool, apparently focused on his work.

  Maybe he didn’t see.

  But deep down I know he did.

  Was he shocked? Disgusted?

  Certainly a guy his age, with all of today’s access to porn and live web cams, he would have seen much more attractive women masturbating in ways that were sexy, alluring, enticing. But what I did. Desperately humping a toy on the sofa. God. So embarrassing! I think I never want to go back to Jack’s again, as long as Mason’s going to be there.

  Except.

  Except there’s just one thing that makes me sure in my head that I will go back, will go the very next day, in fact, in the hopes that he might be there again. There’s one thing that makes me do it again, masturbate again, this time leisurely, slowly, deliciously slowly with all the time and privacy my own bed allows.

  That is the memory of his eyes, just as he was turning away from the sliding glass doors. Our eyes met. For a split second we were staring at each other. I stroke myself, run my fingers up and down and all around my clit over and over, tease myself, shove my fingers into my sopping heat and back up to my clit again, thinking about what I saw in the depths of that stare, in that solitary moment.

  Not disgust. Not embarrassment. No.

  Lust.

  And not lust in a knowing way, like in the way Jack used to look at me when the mood would strike him and he’d bind me up in his bed and then stand back to admire his handiwork.

  Can lust and innocence reside in the same place?

  Oh yes, they can. Powerfully so, I suddenly realise. I saw it in that fleeting moment reflected in his eyes. All the carnal things he wanted to know, but didn’t know yet.

  Oh god. I rub my clit hard, harder, finally thinking the thought that has lingered around the edges of my consciousness since I saw his face through the glass that afternoon.

  I want to teach him.

  I thrust two fingers inside myself and cum hard on my hand, harder than I did that afternoon as I gasp out under my sheets, all twisted around me from my writhing.

  Shit. What the hell am I thinking?

  ♦♦♦♦

  “Well, hello there.’

  I jump even though, truth be told, part of me is waiting for him.

  “Hi,” I say, but it comes out like a squeak and I’m seized by terror and regret over my decision to come back to Jack’s today.

  But the summer heat wave continued and it really was unbearably hot in my apartment. So hot that when Jack saw they were forecasting another scorcher with heat alerts and the whole bit, he called me and told me to just start work from his place in the morning. He said he wouldn’t be home till late, had a dinner meeting, but that I might as well just plan to stay the night.

  Just go, I told myself, he won’t be there. How much work does a pool need? It’s brand new and he’s spent two days on it already.

  And somehow in the light of a new day, when I thought about yesterday and the memory of our eyes meeting, suddenly I was certain I’d imagined it. He probably just walked by and saw me getting up from what looked like a little cat nap on the couch. And why am I giving so much thought to some kid anyway? I have work to do and I won’t be able to get it done at my apartment.

  But as soon as I see him standing there in the backyard, hardly any pool equipment this time, just a skimmer net, that’s all, I know. He saw. He definitely saw. And what’s more, it’s the reason he’s back. It’s written all over his face.

  His eyes pan down my body, again clad in a swimsuit after the day’s work, a one piece this time. I’m at once irritated by his suddenly brazen staring, and infused with a sense of power. My embarrassment vanishes.

  “My eyes are up here,” I say and am rewarded when he flushes a deep red and meekly looks me in the eye.

  “Oh my god, I’m sorry,” he mumbles.

  “Did you get a good look?” I say with an iciness in my voice I’ve never heard before.

  “Yes. I mean, no!” he corrects himself, and now his “well hello there” swagger is all gone. He’s blushing and nervous and shifting around. Mmm, yes. I like him better this way.

  “Is there something bothering you?” I say. “Something you saw yesterday you’d like to talk about?” God, where did I get the nerve to say that?

  He nearly drops the long skimmer pole, grabbing at it as it slips and catching it at the last moment. “Um, I dunno, maybe,” he says, now really not knowing where to look or what to do with himself.

  “Well, if you’re not sure…” I say, with all the feigned boredom I can muster and pretend to go back to my book. But I’m really using my book as a shield to hide the fact that I’m perusing his person, taking in that too long, unkempt hair, his pale body that’s just recently gone from skinny boy to the beginnings of muscle of the man he’ll soon be, those insanely full, red lips that are almost feminine and those deer in headlight eyes.

  I imagine the girls at his school probably dismiss him as geeky. I would have, when I was in high school. I always fell secretly in love with the stereotypes. The student council president. The star of the hockey team. I aimed high, but only ever pursued them in my dreams. When Jack, with his cool charm, dashing, rugged handsome face and the body he keeps so well sculpted at the gym five mornings a week, made his feelings abou
t me known I could scarcely believe it. But the truth is if I were back in high school today it would be Mason I’d peruse, and not the equivalent of the hockey star at his school. The pretty package is nice but right now the naked insecurity, the slightly hard edge borne of rejection, the turmoil that appears to go on in his head seems infinitely more interesting and alluring to me.

  “I just,” he says, shuffling around, staring at the ground. “I didn’t think girls really needed to do that,” he finishes, sounding as young as he is.

  “Needed to do what, hon?” I say. I know I’m toying with the kid but I can hardly help it. I feel like a cat with a mouse.

  He swallows hard. “Make themselves…or um, you know, do what you did.”

  “Masturbate?” I say, and I can’t believe the calmness I manage to press into my voice as I articulate each syllable. “It sounds like perhaps you don’t know a lot about what girls need.”

  He flushes really hard and I think I’ve gone too far. Oh shit. Then he looks up at me and the look in his eyes make me realise one thing for certain.

  He’s a virgin.

  “You’re probably right about that,” he whispers.

  All the cat and mouse play goes out of me. All the irritation and false bravado. In that moment I see rejection and pain in his eyes and god do I want to wrap my arms around him. Or maybe my legs.

  “That’s okay,” I say, putting my book down. I sit up on the lounger, swing my legs down so my feet are flat on the deck. I pat the space beside me and he sits down, staring straight ahead. “You can ask me things,” I say, gently now. “If you want.”

  He stares into his lap. “I kind of do that a lot,” he breathes. He lets out a “ha” like he is trying to lighten the tone of the confession but it doesn’t really work. I’m surprised. I didn’t think someone his age would have this worry. I’d thought all that hairy palm and going blind nonsense was way behind us. But who knows where he’s grown up?

  “Oh yeah?” I say. I want to smile but he looks so serious. “Like, how much is a lot.”

  “Like, a couple times a day.”

  I don’t say anything.

  “Okay, more like five or six.”

  I do smile then, let out a chuckle. But the poor thing just cringes and shrinks down.

  “Aw, it’s okay,” I say and put my hand on his back. I feel him tense. “Really,” I say with as much sincerity as I can. “It’s just your body exercising its biological imperative.”

  He looks up at me. “Yeah?” And he even manages a weak smile. “Biological?”

  “Yeah,” I say, taking my hand off his back and tucking both hands under my thighs, suddenly aware how close to me he’s sitting. “You know, procreate or die? You’re healthy.”

  “Healthy,” he says. “Guess you are too.” And I get a big, flirty grin, I can’t help myself. “I like talking to you,” he says, and I feel simultaneously flattered and extremely nervous. He’s looking at me in a way no one has before, boy or man. I start to say something but he looks away. He reaches in his pocket and pulls out a phone. “Would you put yourself in my contacts?” he asks, passing it to me. He looks so casual now and I guess this is what all kids must do, add people, follow people, request people, collect people.

  “Sure,” I say, all awkward, trying not to feel ancient. I punch my number in, hit Save and hand it back.

  He stands up and looks toward the gate. “Well I’m going to get going,” he says, still holding the skimmer.

  “What about the pool?” I ask, trying to suppress the feeling of disappointment that he’s leaving. So what? So the kid is leaving.

  “Oh,” he says and a little smile creeps onto his face. “I— I think it’s fine today.”

  So that’s how I become his confidante.

  Or that’s how I put it to myself.

  I’m just an older friend he can come to when he has questions. Secrets he needs to share. The fact that I don’t tell Jack is down to the personal nature of this. I don’t want to betray his trust, I want him to know he can come to me, confide in me, that I wouldn’t be blabbing it all to his dad’s friend.

  So he opens up. He emails me and a torrent of pent up passion rolls out. All of his fantasies, his sweet, sweet fantasies that surprise me with their romance. Aren’t boys his age supposed to be surly and jaded? Aren’t they supposed to be tainted by video games and porn and reduced to taking all vowels out of words from texting? He is not. He spells out words, uses complete sentences and those sentences describe elaborate dreams of passionate unions. He’s never had it before and he’s desperate to know how it will look, feel, sound, smell, taste when he melds his body into another’s, when he “becomes one,” as he says, with the girl of his dreams. I have an angel on one shoulder who is moony eyed over the beautiful innocence of his words while the devil on my other rubs her hands together with glee.

  And pretty soon Mason puts me in the starring role.

  “Let me watch you again,” he says.

  It’s Friday and Jack’s not coming home for dinner, what’s new. I haven’t been back to my apartment all week. I tell myself it’s because of the heat.

  “Watch me?” I ask, even though I’m pretty sure I know what he means. This is the third time Mason’s come to the house without doing anything to the pool. But that’s mostly because I’ve been inviting him inside where we’ll be comfortable in the air conditioning in t-shirts and shorts. If we’re outside by the pool, we’ll be in swimwear. I will feel his eyes on me again. And with all the knowledge of his fantasies now, I don’t trust what I’d do.

  But today it’s just too nice and we are out by the pool and I’m wearing a bikini and he hasn’t been able to peel his eyes off me. And now he’s asking to watch.

  “Like before,” he whispers.

  “Mason, I…”

  “Come on,” he urges. “It’s not like I haven’t already seen you do it. Please.”

  “Mason, this isn’t right. I can’t do that. You should be spending time with a girl your own age. You can do all your experimenting together.

  “I don’t care about our ages. I’m an adult and so are you. I don’t want to experiment. I want someone who knows to show me. Laura—” he says, and I’m alarmed by the sudden urgency in his voice. “I want to know how you pleasure yourself.” The fact that he says it like that, uses those words, I feel something loosen inside me. “I want to know,” and his voice gets so soft I have to strain to hear, “so that I can be the one to do it for you.”

  I can tell how badly he wants to look down at my body again but he doesn’t. He keeps his gaze on mine. I feel hot and it’s not from the sun. My angel is chirping away about Jack, about this being his friend’s son, that I should leave him to have the experiences he is supposed to with some nice little girl he knows from school named Brittany who has posters in her locker of the latest boy band and has a part time job as a lifeguard after school. But the devil. Oh the devil in me has things to say too.

  “Please, Laura,” he says. “Why won’t you show me how to please you?”

  How do I explain it to him? How do I say, your innocence, your naïveté, that look you give me — all filled with naked, untapped lust — it awakens something in me. Something scary. Something I don’t know if I want to acknowledge. It feels like a beast slumbering beneath the surface of my calm exterior.

  I want to do things to you, I imagine telling him. All your little comments and charming self-deprecations about your inexperience coupled with your open-mindedness. Your obvious willingness to learn. To please. God, how it makes my brain whir and stew and conjure. I want to take you. To make you. Make you my own.

  Wouldn’t he run screaming if he knew the depraved things that the alluring combination of innocence and eager curiosity invoke in me? All the lurid fantasies I’ve had. Not just making. Forcing. Restraining. Making him beg. Making him suffer. And then denying
him over and over. The idea of pitting his neediness against him makes me burn bright with evil, carnal plans.

  His wide eyes blink back at me from behind his glasses and it’s all I can do not to grab him and shove his face exactly where it can pleasure me most.

  But I don’t.

  “Mason, I’m sorry,” I say, rising and trying to avoid seeing the hurt that springs into his eyes. “I can’t. This is just wrong. I’ve got to go.”

  I grab my things and race back to the sanctuary of my stuffy apartment.

  On Saturday the weather breaks and it rains.

  It rains all morning and I stay in bed. I think thoughts of Mason, of being his first, of teaching him things, of going beyond anything he’s thought of in those sweet fantasies he’s emailed, of going somewhere dark. First I use my fingers and then I use my bullet vibe. By the time I’m finally sated, I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve brought myself over the edge thinking about a boy who — when I said my favourite singer in high school was Huey Lewis — said, “Who’s Huey Lewis?”

  And it seems anything but healthy.

  Around noon Jack calls me and asks when I’m coming over, what do I want to do for dinner. I tell him I’m not feeling well.

  “I could come over there,” Jack says. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in a long time.”

  “I was there all week.”

  “I know. But my mind was so involved with the case. I’m sorry.” I don’t want to hear Jack apologise. “Let me make it up to you,” he says, then he lowers his voice. “I could do more of what you liked the last time.”

  Oh god.

  I tell Jack I really think I’m coming down with something. And get off the phone as soon as possible.

  When does the switch in my brain flip? When do I give up denying the inevitability of giving in to what I want, regardless of what my sane self tells me is right for the kid?