by Jane Lark
He had blonde curly, unruly hair a couple of inches long, light-blue eyes, and he was shorter and thinner than me––different coloring, but more like Jason.
I let his hand go. It dropped to his side as he shook it out like I’d hurt him.
I was glad.
He looked at Lindy, a half-smile playing on his lips that said I hadn’t put him off. “You gonna come and sit with us?”
“Okay,” she answered without even looking at me for agreement.
Awesome.
The barman slid our drinks across. “There you go.”
I turned around and was gonna get my wallet out, but Lindy laid her hand over mine. “It’s my turn.”
Great, now Nial had more ammunition. He knew she wasn’t letting me look out for her. It opened a door for him. He’d think she didn’t care about me…
But then maybe she didn’t. How the hell did I know? All we’d done was have awesome sex. The sarcastic, bitter pitch in my head made me angrier still. But we hadn’t discussed commitment, and maybe, ‘cause she didn’t know anything about sex, she hadn’t known how awesome it was.
Shit.
I clenched my teeth as I picked up the bottle of beer, then let Nial lead us over to the people Lindy had been playing with today. Lindy walked ahead of me, talking to him, and when we got over there, there was a chorus of greetings and lots of people smiling at her.
She smiled back, full-on mouth-open, with happy sparkling eyes, and a this-is-amazing face.
Well now I felt like shit, ‘cause if this made her happy, when she’d been feeling so down she’d tried to end it all, I really should get over myself and be happy for her.
Everyone talked over one another, making space for us to sit in the ring of three tables they’d clustered together. Lindy talked back, animated and excited. I hadn’t seen her do that for years, not since we’d been at high school.
When she’d chased after Jason at high school, she’d laid in wait for us around corners and come out with the biggest smile, saying, “Hey!” like she was surprised to bump into us and hadn’t been there waiting.
She used to catch up to us on our way home, with a pile of books in her hands, struggling like they were too heavy so Jason would offer to take them. If I had, the answer was, “But Jason goes my way, so he can do it.”
“Billy…” Her palm settled on my thigh, tiny in comparison.
She’d said something. I hadn’t heard. At least she wanted me in the conversation. She hadn’t forgotten me.
I stumbled through some interaction, my gut twisting as her hand stayed on my thigh. I wanted it to be the two of us back at the apartment, exploring bodies and getting to know each other better. I was terrified it wasn’t the same for her.
She was everything to me; I’d been nothing to her. What if we had awesome sex and then I was relegated back to nothing?
Nerves prickled up my spine.
“We’ve got to go play.” Nial and then Sawyer stood up.
I watched them set up and tune their guitars as Lindy carried on talking with the others, mostly the girls. It had been years since she’d had girlfriends. I really should notch my attitude down a level or two.
Lindy laughed at something one of the girls said, a proper laugh. You’d think she didn’t have a care in the world. She wasn’t thinking about the way she looked now, or about Jason. I wished I’d been the one to make her laugh that easily.
When the guys started playing, the bar went silent. They were good. I’d give them that. They could make music, and their group of friends who clearly knew all their songs began joining in with the lyrics as Lindy watched, bright-eyed with happiness. She was enjoying this. I shouldn’t be angry with her.
My fingers beat out the rhythm on my thigh, nervously, the thigh that still had Lindy’s hand on it.
That hand grounded me and occasionally it moved, brushing up and down a little as she talked, or gripping a little when she laughed.
The guys took a break after they’d played four songs. Nial jumped down off the dais and came straight over to us. “Do you all want another drink, we’re getting some beers in.”
The guy came over from the bar with a whole tray of open bottles, and people started grabbing them. “Thanks,” Lindy answered. She’d drunk soda so far.
I looked at her. “Your meds…”
“It’s just one.” Her pitch said, get lost, Billy, and the look she threw over her shoulder was just like the ones my little sister Eva threw when she thought I was being annoying.
Great, now I’d fallen into the fun-spoiler bracket.
She’d got happier. I was pissed off.
Nial took the vacant seat the other side of her. The girl had gone to the restroom. He started talking, leaning forward to just speak to Lindy. I couldn’t hear because of the noise in the busy bar and then Lindy’s hand lifted off my thigh and she turned to face him.
Bullshit.
Fighting an urge to grab Nial by the throat and shove him up against a wall, I put my beer down, stood up and headed for the restroom myself, curling my hands into fists and then forcing them open again.
I looked myself in the eye in the mirror as I washed my hands after. “What the fuck are you doing? Get a grip, Billy. Let the girl enjoy herself, there’s no harm in it.”
That was what my brain thought––but my body and my instinct screamed to tell the guy to get the fuck away from her and just drag her out of here.
When I went back in the bar the guys were playing another song and Lindy was up in front of the stage dancing with their friends.
Nial’s gaze followed Lindy’s movement. He hadn’t seen me come back in.
I watched her too, as I walked across the room. Lindy wasn’t used to dancing like they were. For years we’d line-danced; it was the thing back home. Jason’s mom had got her into it, and Jason had never been any good at it. It had been my one in with her for the last few years. She’d always chosen to dance with me over Jason. When I got close, she spotted me. She hadn’t seen Nial watching her.
“Billy! Come and dance.” She held her hand out, the other one still gripping her bottle of beer, that was already half-empty.
Awesome, this night was gonna end on the bathroom floor.
“Come on,” she urged, her hand reaching further out to me as she smiled wide.
There was no point in not. I wasn’t gonna be the killjoy.
Leaving my beer where it stood on the table, knowing it was likely I’d have to pick her up later and be the sober one, I went to her. Her arms settled up on my shoulders, one of her hands still holding her beer bottle. It bumped against my back as she moved.
She was so much shorter than me, with just her flats on she only came up to my chest.
My hands gently gripped her waist as she rocked and bounced to the rhythm of the music.
“You okay?” I bent to her ear to ask.
“Yeah, fine.”
“Good.” The smell of beer mixed up with the mint gum she’d been chewing earlier and her perfume. My nose brushed her brow. She looked up and met my gaze, hers cloudy from the beer.
I kissed her, forgetting Nial and everyone else in the bar, and her fingers ran into my hair as she played chase with my tongue.
She hadn’t forgotten me.
The song changed, and I came up breathless, as she did. We stared into each other’s eyes then as we kept moving. She was not thinking about anyone but me. I knew it. A light switched on in my heart, and something gripped it sharp and tight, just like she’d had a hold of it for the last several years.
I was pathetic for a big guy, really…
Lindy
“Am I sleeping in your room?” The question was uncertain as Billy’s eyes shone dark grey and black in the electric light of the hall.
“If you want?”
His big hand cupped my cheek. “No, Lind, if you want?”
Yes, I wanted. Just the thought of him coming into my room stirred up memories and a deep, sweet, pain, gripp
ed low in my belly. “I want…” You. The last word wouldn’t come out. It still felt disloyal to Jason to want someone else––his best friend.
When my card key slid out of the door Billy’s mouth came down on mine and his fingers pushed the door open, drawing me in.
Last night we’d prepared for bed. Tonight was different. Tonight it was like he’d been hungry and wanting me for hours. I’d never felt any hunger in Jason. But then he’d probably held it back because if he’d been like this, he’d have scared me.
It scared me with Billy, but in a way that made my heart race, like going on a rollercoaster. I wanted to be scared. I didn’t want him to stop.
He pulled the sweater I had on over my head, then gripped my dress. But before he could take it off I yanked his shirt, pulling it more out than up. I wasn’t used to Billy’s way of doing things, but I didn’t want to be vulnerable––the only one naked.
He got the hint and with a twisted smile, and heat burning in his eyes, he undid a couple of buttons, then pulled it up and off, the muscle in his chest and arms moving.
For the first time I let my urge to touch run. My fingertips brushed his skin, following the lines of muscle. He had an awesome body. I preferred it to Jason’s. Was it wrong to say that?
Billy was a granite force of strength, and I needed that to stand on; the foundations of my life were so frickin’ rocky.
I flicked his belt from the buckle. He chuckled, a deep, heavy sound and then his fingers settled back on my dress and fisted.
I looked up and met his gaze a moment before he lifted it. Humor or rather pleasure––happiness––sparkled in his eyes. Soul-deep happiness.
I couldn’t even remember what that felt like. But I could remember the pleasure he’d taught me last night… I wanted it. Desperately.
I let him take my dress off over my head. No. I wanted him to.
Fight.
I got his button, freeing his pants.
He unhooked my bra, leaning around me.
My hands slipped into the back of his pants, cupping his butt, forcing the zipper down. His fingers slid into my hair and we kissed. I got lost in it, my tongue chasing his. My hands gripping at the muscle of his ass.
He broke the kiss. “Lay down, Lind.”
The pace of my heartbeat ratcheted up a dozen notches and tingles did a line-dance through my nerves as I stepped back, slipping off my sandals and sitting on the bed.
He pushed down his pants, and boxers, taking everything off and straightened up naked.
I scrabbled backwards across the mattress, lying down before him, sacrificing everything for the moments of freedom I knew were coming as he bent to get a condom out of his wallet. I didn’t care that I only had on my panties, I didn’t care about anything except what was coming next. A beautiful freedom.
The thin leather bracelet he wore stood out on his thick wrist as he slid a condom on, making this tough guy look subtly vulnerable, dispelling the threat of the leopard climbing his chest.
When his knee came down on the bed, dipping the mattress, he didn’t come to me, instead his hands gripped my panties and slid them off. I shivered as he did it. Reality, awareness and fear kicking in. But then his hands caught hold of my thighs and pulled my legs open.
I cried out, half-moan, half-shock. A rush of something, something addictive and terrible all at the same time, tore through me. But before I could react, his mouth was on me, down there. I was a little drunk. My brain didn’t have chance to catch up with the idea of it, but oh! It didn’t matter. I didn’t care. My fingers gripped in his wax-spiked hair, fisting and pulling at it as his tongue played games.
Race him!
The tips of his big fingers pressed into my thighs as I pushed up against his mouth, following the movement of his tongue. I thought of the things I’d thought of when I’d touched myself. Only this was beyond anything I could imagine.
Oh shit. Billy.
Next time I did it to myself I was gonna think of this.
A battle. A race.
I pressed up against his mouth over and over, searching out the movements that delivered the best shocks of pleasure, sparking small explosions under my skin.
It was no hardship to focus on what he did… What he did was crazy, his tongue licking, pressing in and then his lips closing around me, and––sucking…
“Ahhh…” The sound slipped from my lips.
His teeth caught my sensitive spot with a little tug.
I laughed, my fingers clasping even tighter in his hair.
Why didn’t I feel self-conscious with him anymore? Because he showed no sign I had to be self-conscious.
Had I always sensed I might lose Jason? That he’d never really loved me. Was that why things had never been right?
But then Billy didn’t love me. This was just sex. Maybe that was it, maybe he gave me permission to just have sex and enjoy it, and not worry about what I was, or wasn’t, or what life would become.
His lips settled over the sore spot he’d bitten and sucked with a stupid gentleness as his fingers slipped inside me. I came undone, breaking in half. Splintering. Shattering. Swamped. My breath only shallow, short panting…
“Billy.” His name slipped from my lips as he came up over me, his thick thighs between my legs, and then he pumped into me with a pace and skill that had my nails cutting into his back.
I raced––fought to make him lose control and come too. To make him want the hell out of me, like I wanted the hell out of him.
I was so drunk on sex. I didn’t care about anything but this.
Breathy noises filled the room. Sweat leaked over my skin and glimmered on his and the air held a musky scent. Sex. My thighs wrapped about his waist. I curled the soles of my feet on the back of his buttocks as he worked harder, growling at me as I pushed up against him.
This was sex. What Jason and I had done had been nothing. I could understand why he’d gone now. Of course he would have been tempted away by this. I got it.
Billy plummeted into an orgasm with a hard thrust. I fell right along with him––free-falling through space as the weight of his hips pressed me deeper into the mattress.
I escaped to heaven. Maybe in a few months I could escape here and meet Mom again, as she used to be…
I wished I had discovered this long ago. Maybe then I wouldn’t be in so much pain.
I could get addicted to sex.
As he went off to the bathroom to get rid of the condom, I slid under the comforter, too exhausted to even bother with finding my clothes, or going to check my makeup.
I few moments later the lights went out, and Billy came under the covers next to me and pulled me against him with a hand splayed over my belly.
We fell asleep spooning.
Lindy
My cell buzzed. It was in my purse on the floor, near the door.
The bedroom looked like a warzone, with our clothes everywhere.
I chucked the covers back and got up to get it.
Billy didn’t wake.
Mom. My heart pounded at the sight of her image smiling at me on the screen. My hand shook. I really shouldn’t drink with my meds, my belly was a queasy hole today.
The things Billy and I had done played through my head. I hadn’t cared. I still didn’t. I’d escaped.
“Hey. Mom?”
“Sweetheart––”
“Is everything okay?”
I carried the cell into the bathroom, shut and locked the door, pressing the thing up tight to my ear.
“Yes, there’s nothing to worry over, darling. I called to check you are okay, that’s all. Are you?”
With my back against the door, I slid down onto the cold floor tiles. “Yeah, Mom. Better than I’ve been in a while. I needed this vacation. Billy was right. It’s good for me.”
“And you two are getting along?”
“Yeah…” A huge question hung inside me and it sounded in my voice. What was happening? What was Billy? What were we? We weren’t
just friends anymore. But what then? I wasn’t ready for anything complex, and painful… I hurt enough.
“You’re sure?”
“Billy has been really good to me.”
“You remember your counselor is calling today?”
“I know.”
“Good, honey. Well I want you to know I’m okay, and you keep enjoying yourself. You deserve to be happy.”
But how can I be?
The hole inside me filled up with love––for her. “I love you.”
“I love you too, honey. We’ll see you next week.”
“Okay.”
“Goodbye.” She blew a kiss down the cell.
“Bye.” Pain cut into my heart as the call went dead. I swiped the tears off my cheek.
Shit my makeup.
When I stood up, my reflection in the mirror showed mascara and eyeliner smeared around my eyes and my foundation looked like a mask. Then I looked at my body.
I reached for my robe hanging on the back of the door and slipped it on, I didn’t want to look at myself. I picked up the cleanser to wipe my makeup off.
In half an hour I’d showered, reapplied makeup and the girl in the mirror looked more like the person I knew.
When I went back into the bedroom, Billy was still asleep, lying on his side, his long, thick black lashes resting on his cheeks, the leopard rising and falling on his pecs as he breathed.
I sat on the end of the bed, with my knees tucked up and clasped in my hands.
His arm rested on top of the comforter.
The stupid leather bracelet wrapped around his wrist beckoned me to look out the scissors from my makeup purse and cut the thing off. It held too many memories of a time my life had been unrestrained… Everything had been sparkly, glittery, fun and expectation then. I got up and went into the bathroom to get them.
I’d wanted to give the bracelet to Jason, but Jason hadn’t wanted it, Billy had stretched out his arm. “Tie it on me. I like it.” I’d done it and smiled smugly at Jason to make him jealous.
He hadn’t been jealous. He was always too laid back to bother about mistrust, or anger… I wished he’d argued with me when we’d been together if he didn’t like the stuff I’d said, or done. Maybe then we’d have fallen apart earlier and I’d have understood that we weren’t right.