by Harper Bliss
Spurred on by the motions of her body and the groans coming from her mouth, I let my tongue dance around her clit. Her hands find my hair again, twisting long strands of it around her fingers. But I feel no pain, only the will to make her come, to do that very thing to her that makes her surrender, give herself up to me.
I suck her clit between my lips, let my tongue swirl over it more. Then I’m overtaken with my own desire. I want to feel her. I take a little breather and while doing so, spread her lips wide with my fingers, take another good look at her, then, slowly, gently, push a finger inside of her.
“Oh, fuck,” Caitlin groans and the sound of her voice shot through with lust and joy like that, with me as the cause for them, adds another layer to my already growing confidence.
My finger is being enveloped by her warm wetness, by the evidence of her lust for me and as I delve deeper, find a rhythm, bring my tongue back into the game, for an instant, I believe that this very moment has undone a lifetime of shame and hating my body. Because look at where I am and what I’m doing. Nothing will ever beat this—except, perhaps, a repeat performance.
Caitlin reacts to my thrusts by bucking up her hips violently and pushing her fingernails into my scalp.
“Oh Christ,” she whispers. “Oh, yes. Oh, yes.”
I add another finger and luxuriate in the feel of her, in the sensation of being as inside of her as any person could ever be, in the exquisite intimacy of the moment. But still, there’s that ever-nagging voice in the back of my mind: will it be enough?
Caitlin climaxes with a loud, syncopated moan, her palms pressing hard against my skull, my fingers clenched together inside of her.
“Oh, fuck,” she says when her body relaxes, setting me free, and she sinks back into the mattress.
I’m looking around for something to wipe my hand with, but she pulls me to her by my arm, and says, “Come here.” She takes the hand I fucked her with in hers and brings my fingers to her lips, then proceeds to suck her own juices from them.
The sight of Caitlin’s lips wrapped around my fingers unleashes something in my core, peels off a layer of inhibition. She seems so free of the thoughts that continuously plague me, so assured in her post-orgasmic glow, it’s infectious. I remember what Caitlin said about seeing something of her past self in me. Right now, I hope I’m looking at my future. Near and distant.
“I guess I needed that,” she says after she lets my fingers slip from her mouth. She turns on her side. “It’s been a while.”
I’m curious to know how long exactly, but this is not the moment to ask.
“Thank you,” she says.
“There’s really no need to thank me,” I stammer.
“Of course there is. I strongly believe if we all thanked our lovers a bit more, the world would be a better place.” She laughs a throaty laugh. “Now.” She runs a finger over my arm. “Tell me what you like, Josephine.”
What I like? There goes the confidence I’d built up while being allowed all over—and inside—her.
“Much the same as you, I think.”
“Hm,” she hums, while her finger scoots from my upper arm to where my breasts spill out of my bra. “You think?”
“I—I’m not really comfortable talking about, er, this,” I manage to say, while I feel my body tensing up under her touch.
“So you’re just going to let me run wild?” She presses her lips against my shoulder. “Are you sure about that?”
I suck my bottom lip into my mouth and just nod.
“Okay.” Her finger has dipped into the tight crevasse between my breasts. It must be so hot and sweaty there. Part of me wants so desperately to take off my bra already, but the other, more prevailing part wants to hide some more.
I need to stop thinking like this. Need to just give myself up to Caitlin and her intention to, basically, do whatever she wants to me. I try to conjure up the state of mind when I’m alone in bed and I can only imagine her doing this to me. Why is that so much more effective?
“Relax, Josephine.” My name is but a whisper on her lips. “Everything will be all right. You’re in good hands.” She chuckles then slips a leg over me. “I’m going to take off your bra now,” she whispers in my ear.
“Okay.” The bra I’m wearing is the closest to an alluring piece of lingerie I can find in my size. Compared to the bra I put on for running, it’s a big step up on the sexiness scale, but next to the flimsy thing I helped Caitlin out of earlier, it still looks more like a stringent corset for my breasts than anything else. I could hardly have them hanging on my belly for this date.
Like all of my bras, this one opens at the front and it takes a bit of finesse to unhook, but Caitlin takes her time and, ever so slowly, frees my breasts from their cage. They tumble out and I can’t help but sigh a little with relief. There’s never a better moment in my day than coming home and taking off my bra.
Immediately, Caitlin brings her mouth to one of my nipples and takes it between her lips. She takes her time lavishing attention on my breasts, leaving my nipples rock hard peaks by the time she focuses her attention elsewhere.
As enthralling as it is to have her mouth all over me—trailing down my belly right now—I find it impossible to forget about my body. When I look down, it’s there looming like a vast white fleshy mass. Like something not made for this kind of pleasure.
Caitlin spreads my legs and kisses me over the fabric of my panties, which coaxes an involuntary groan from my throat. If only, I keep thinking. If only I wasn’t so me.
I let her take off my undies and let her do all the things I did to her, but despite the insistent flick of her tongue over my clit, and the push of her fingers inside my wet, wet sex, I can’t meld the thought of her making love to me with her actually doing it. There’s a chasm in my mind that makes it impossible for my body to go past that plateau. I make all the right noises and I take as much pleasure as I can get, for Caitlin’s fingers inside of me are definitely a source of delight, but I know, as certain as I know my name is Josephine Greenwood, that I won’t be able to come. I’ve never been able to at the hands of anyone else—only my own. I was a fool to think it would be different with Caitlin.
I try to enjoy a few more strokes of her long, agile fingers inside of me, but then I start preparing for the inevitable moment of shame. Tapping Caitlin on the shoulder and telling her all her efforts were in vain.
I glance down and take in the image of her crouched between my legs one last time—ironically, I know it will serve me well later, when I’m all alone in my own bed.
“Caitlin,” I whisper, putting a hand on her shoulder.
She looks up immediately. “Are you okay?” she asks. Her fingers are still inside of me and are beginning to feel like they don’t belong—like an intrusion.
“Just, er, stop for a second.”
“Okay.” Slowly, she lets her fingers slip from me and unceremoniously wipes them on the sheets. “What’s wrong?” she asks once she has crawled up to me.
“It’s definitely not you.” Oh God, what do I even say? No matter what comes out of my mouth, it will make me sound lame and immature and like a fraud—who am I to write my thesis on body acceptance when being in bed naked with another woman freaks me out to this extent?
“It’s okay, Josephine. Just talk to me. Tell me what you’d like me to do.”
I shake my head. “I don’t want you to do anything, just… er, understand. I’m…” I’m what?
“These things happen for all sorts of reasons. The main thing is that you don’t worry about it too much,” she says. “And don’t you dare worry about me either, my ego is not that fragile that it gets dented when I fail to get a woman off.”
“It’s not you,” I repeat. “I’m in my head too much.”
“I happen to believe that a woman’s climax is her own responsibility, but it doesn’t mean we can’t talk about it so that, perhaps, next time, you can start getting a bit closer.”
Next time? Surely
there will be no next time after this. Caitlin can theorize all she wants. She can give a hundred reasons why this is normal and nothing to be ashamed of, it won’t change how I feel. Mortified. Unworthy. Strengthened in my belief that me in Caitlin’s bed is a farce. I should have stuck with my initial gut instinct and never have let this date happen.
“Talk to me,” she insists.
I don’t want to talk. “I should probably go.” My body remains immovable in her bed.
“Stay.” She slings an arm over my torso. “We don’t have to talk. We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. Just, give me an inkling of how you’re feeling. Just one word. That’s all I ask.”
“I feel like a failure,” I say, fighting back tears. Oh no, I’m not going to cry in Caitlin’s bed. There’s just no way.
“Oh, Josephine.” She kisses me on the cheek. “You’re nothing of the sort. You’re still so young. Don’t for a second think that not being able to have an orgasm when you sleep with someone, for the very first time I may add, is not normal. Ask ten random women and you’ll quickly know how common it is. It’s nothing to be ashamed of or to feel like a failure about.”
“That’s just the thing. I should know better. I shouldn’t beat myself up over it. It’s not as if I didn’t know it was going to be like this, but still. I can’t help how I feel.”
“But you tried. You plucked up the courage to ask me out again and to come home with me. There’s a lot to be said for that.”
“Is there?”
“Of course.” She presses herself closer to me. “Please don’t go.”
The thought of having to make my way home is, in fact, more daunting than staying in Caitlin’s warm bed, listening to her soothing words.
“Okay, I’ll stay.” There’s not much chance of me catching any sleep at all—I haven’t slept in the same bed with anyone in quite a few years.
“Good.” She rests her head in the crook of my arm, then lets a finger linger over my breast. “We can try again in a while, if you like,”
“No.” My tone is too snappy and curt and I regret it instantly. “I’m sorry.” I pull her a little closer. “I just wish things could have been different.”
“They will be. Trust me.”
What does that mean? Does she mean with her? Or in the future, with someone else? And how would she know?
“Can I get you anything? Some water? A night cap?” Her voice sounds sleepy.
“I’m fine.” I kiss her on the top of her head. I think of my clothes strewn across the room—and of the audacity I had when I was getting ready for this date, when I slipped a clean pair of knickers into my purse.
“Will you be able to sleep?” she mumbles.
“Sure,” I lie.
“Good night.” A few minutes later, Caitlin’s breathing slows and she breaks out into the lightest of purrs.
Chapter Fifteen
I must have dozed off at some point in the night, because I wake up lying on my stomach with my leg hanging halfway out of Caitlin’s bed. There’s an alarm clock on her side so I push myself up to see the time. It’s 5:45 a.m. I’m relieved I got some sleep and conclude it must have been sheer emotional exhaustion that knocked me out in the end.
I try not to move too much so as not to wake up Caitlin. I wish I had found a way to sneak my running shoes into my purse so I could go for a jog, to run all the negative feelings that still bloom inside my chest off me. I briefly consider making my way back to Camperdown and get a set of clean clothes and just be by myself for a little while, but dinner last night was expensive and a return bus fare, when I have to come back to Darlinghurst for my shift at the Pink Bean anyway, seems like a silly expense.
I glance over at Caitlin and remember how her body felt in my hands. So willing, so much along the line of expectations. She’s lying on her back, the covers pulled all the way up to her chin, as though she’s protecting me from her nakedness—or herself from my prying eyes.
Ironically, a surge of lust sweeps through me at the sight of her sleeping, relaxed face. Her lipstick is smudged and her mascara has left black flecks on her temples.
She was so sweet last night, said all the right things, but I can’t imagine a woman like Caitlin not being a little bit offended by my failure to climax. Though I’m not sure what I actually mean by a woman like Caitlin. A woman who has had many lovers? A woman who believes sexual pleasure should not be contained within the confines of a relationship? Again, as I lie next to her in bed, the thought strikes me that we couldn’t be more different.
I roll onto my back, careful not to stir the mattress too much, and I get a tickle in my throat. My mouth is dry as an aftereffect of all that wine last night and I decide to fetch some water.
I walk through Caitlin’s apartment naked. I could have scurried for my dress in the darkness of the bedroom, but Caitlin’s apartment is so high up, no one could possibly look inside and see me.
I head to the kitchen, fill a glass with water, and drink greedily. I can still smell her on me as I bring the glass to my mouth. I walk to the bookshelves that impressed me so much the first time I came here—did she already want to sleep with me then?—and run a finger over the spines. All these works on feminism, body acceptance, and the role of women throughout history, and here I am, feeling so diminished by my inability to come at Caitlin’s hands.
She’s probably right that many women suffer the same fate, but I bet that most of these women don’t have the other problem that I have. The very thing I walk around in, that I see with every glimpse in the mirror or reflection of a shop window. Of course, the problem lies with me; the me in relation to the others. All the others who see me as lazy and morally depraved because of how I look.
My legs are restless. I already miss not being able to go for my run. It’s the only thing that can reset me when I’m in a negative thought spiral. Those dreadful moments when I sincerely believe that it is all my own fault, that I should have more character, should go on yet another diet—as if I haven’t tried them all and every last one of them hasn’t failed me more than the previous one. That I should just become a better version of myself already—as if it were that easy.
Maybe I can call Bea early today, but she won’t like it. She’s such a stickler for routine.
Caitlin’s place is air-conditioned and a shiver runs up my spine. Either I crawl back under the covers with her or I take a shower and surprise Kristin by showing up at the Pink Bean an hour early for my shift.
“Hey.” Caitlin’s voice comes from the end of the hallway. “For a minute there, I thought you’d left.”
“Nowhere to go,” I say, rather dramatically.
“Is it so bad here?” Caitlin is as naked as I am.
“No.” I swallow a hint of tightness out of my throat.
“Come back to bed for a bit?” She looks angelic in the burgeoning light.
I nod and follow her back to the bedroom.
“Hey,” she says again and shuffles close to me under the covers. My hands are cold and she takes them in hers, warming them. “Did you get some sleep?”
“I did. I’m sorry if I woke you.”
“I’m an early riser, no matter what I did the night before.” She chuckles.
“Must be your age,” I joke.
“Watch it.” She squeezes my fingers between her hands. “I had a great time last night,” she says.
“Me too.”
“Would you like to do it again some time?” Caitlin looks so unlike her when she asks it. So defenseless and vulnerable. Almost endearing enough to make me blindly say yes.
“I—I’m not sure that would be a good idea.” I look away.
“Don’t blow me off a second time, Josephine. I can kind of tell that you like me.” She brings my hands to her mouth, kisses a knuckle. “Is this about your lost climax?”
Lost climax? Is that what we’re calling it now?
“No, well, yes, a bit.” If only more and more sunlight wasn’t streaming in
to Caitlin’s bedroom, I could hide better.
“Do you think it’s the first time I’ve slept with someone who wasn’t able to come? Or that it has never happened to me? Female sexuality is complex.”
I know Caitlin means well, but I can’t have this conversation again. She may think that, in time, everything will be all right, but she doesn’t know why my two previous relationships ended.
“Can we talk about something else, please?”
“If you answer my question first.” She presses my hands against her warm chest. “Will you go out with me again?”
“Am I some sort of pity project for you? Or do you get a weird kick out of dating a fat girl?” I pull my hands from hers. “I think I’ll take a shower now.”
I look at her flabbergasted face for an instant, then turn around and sit at the edge of the bed with my back to her. I could not be dealing with this in a worse manner.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t meant to snap,” I mumble. I look around for something to wrap my body in, to hide myself away with.
“We’ll talk later,” Caitlin says. “I’ll stop by the Pink Bean.”
I remain seated for a few seconds longer, hoping to feel a reconciliatory hand on my back, but I remain untouched. I’m well aware that it’s not Caitlin who has amends to make. But she doesn’t know what it’s like to be trapped in my body, this extra-padded shell I have to go through life with. She doesn’t know that not a day goes by that I don’t get a stare or a comment or, worst of all, a look of pity.
To her, it might be about me not being able to reach the level of surrender to have an orgasm at her hand, but to me, it’s about so much more.
I can’t find anything to wrap myself in for my walk of shame to the bathroom, but there’s just no way I’m walking out of her bedroom naked. My legs won’t function unless I have camouflage. Without looking behind me, I pull the sheet that’s under the quilt off the bed and use it to cover myself up.