Candlelight City

by Jessica Tang Von Harper

  She couldn’t tear her eyes off of Maddy, even as her own body reacted to the unknown boy making love to her. Maddy’s skin shone with sweat. Her eyes were open, staring blankly through the bars of the railing that bordered the walkway, blinking behind the glasses that seemed to be on the verge of falling off with every rough thrust of the deliveryman. The man’s hands played across Maddy’s front, clenching her hips tightly, then sliding over her body to scoop her dangling breasts, his calloused fingers pinching and twisting her nipples. The man was murmuring something to Maddy, but it was too faint to hear.

  The boy who was inside Suzie held a steady rhythm, thrusting into her, and Suzie started counting the strokes. They counted the seconds, ticking away, and the seconds added up to the time that Maddy was out there; naked, exposed for anyone to see, publicly engaged in the most private of acts with a complete stranger. The strokes added up: forty, fifty, sixty, eighty. Suzie prayed for the pizza man to reach his climax, to finally come in Maddy and let the poor girl re-enter the apartment.

  Suzie wondered who would climax first, the boy who was having sex with her, or the man who was having sex with Maddy. She was surprised when it didn’t turn out to be either; Maddy climaxed first, her skin flushing and her body tensing, an orgasm rippling through her. Maddy’s eyes were wide and darting from side to side, and it was clear that even while the pleasure pulsated through her, she was embarrassed to be having an orgasm in front of everyone. It was one thing to let a strange deliveryman have sex with her, but it was even more shameful to have everyone see that she was so aroused by the experience. Maddy fought to regain control of herself when the man on top of her began to climax, thrusting deep into her and filling her with his seed. Maddy lost her battle for self-control at that point as her body convulsed in an even greater orgasm. She cried out, grinding her pelvis against the man, urging his erection deep inside her.

  Suzie stared, stunned by what she was seeing. The boy who was having sex with Suzie also began to climax, and Suzie finally turned to see which boy it was. She had hoped it was Alfred, but instead it was Louis. Peeking back through the blinds, Suzie could see Maddy had gotten to her feet, and now she was embracing the pizza man like a lover, her body pressed against his, her fingers linked behind his head, kissing him while his hands stole one last feel of her breasts. Suzie looked away, back towards Louis. He was finished. He pulled out of her and stood, his penis already slouching into a state of semi-hardness. Without a word, he stepped away, fumbling to pull up his pants.

  The front door opened and a flustered Maddy stumbled back inside, her skin coated in a sheen of sweat. The pizza man had already disappeared, leaving behind only a hot pepperoni pizza and a trickle of semen which slowly oozed down Maddy’s inner thigh. Maddy stared at them silently, lacking the words to speak about what had just happened to her. Alfred stepped forward and his eyes met his girlfriends. She blinked at him, searching his face for some reaction to what she had just done, but Alfred’s face was unreadable. He gazed at her silently while she stood in front of him, naked and ashamed, looking down at her feet, unable to meet his eyes. He reached out and took hold of her hand. He pulled her towards the front door and opened it, leading her outside. Head down, Maddy walked with him as he led her naked towards the stairwell. She didn’t ask if she could put her clothes back on, and Alfred didn’t offer; it seemed as if Maddy was accepting this as her punishment, that she would remain naked for as long as her boyfriend wanted her to be, and maybe then he would forgive her outrageous acts.

  Suzie looked at Louis and Marty, but neither of them could meet her eyes. Both of them seemed ashamed by what had transpired. Suddenly, Suzie wanted to leave as fast as she could. The veil of Jenna with which she had tried to shroud herself was gone, and now she was just Suzie again, shy Suzie who was miserably in love with her co-star. How would she feel if Brad walked in, right then, with Corine, back from their anniversary date? It would be completely humiliating. Suzie saw Maddy’s Einstein t-shirt, still discarded in the corner, and she quickly grabbed it and threw it on. Neither Louis or Marty spoke to her as she headed out the front door.

  Once she was back in her car, she made herself drive to the parking lot of a grocery store before she allowed herself to start crying. It was clear what she would need to do. She would fulfill her obligation, play Jenna in “Candlelight City”, even if it required her to have sex with Brad. But afterwards, she was done.

  She would go to college, and she would never talk to Brad again.

  18. The Set-up

  At school, she tried to avoid Brad, but he seemed to keep finding her. “Are you okay, Suzie?” he asked her as they passed each other in the hallway.

  “Just fine,” she lied. “Why?”

  Brad looked troubled. “Marty told me that you came by the apartment the other night. He mentioned you were acting kind of…different.”

  Suzie waved her hand, as if it wasn’t worth talking about. “No, no. Everything’s fine.” She rushed away before he could say anything else.

  She did her best to avoid Brad during the day, but during rehearsal it was impossible. She not only had to talk to him, she had to kiss him and be intimate with him, and it was hard to push down the yearning that circulated within her. She tried to remain in character, but when his lips pressed against hers, she felt like melting into his embrace, and when his lips pulled away, she felt like crying. She worried that her tangled emotions were affecting her performance, but Mr. Belfast didn’t seem to notice.

  Brad tried to chat with her off-stage, but Suzie kept her responses brief and vague. He asked her how her interview with Stanford went. “Fine,” she replied. He was clearly dissatisfied with that answer, but quickly realized that he wasn’t going to get any more out of her.

  When rehearsal ended, Suzie noticed Corine watching from off-stage. Corine smiled as Suzie passed, and raised a hand in greeting. Suzie was surprised at the unexpected friendliness. Surely Corine had also heard the story of Suzie’s wild behavior in Brad’s apartment?

  Suzie found herself at the mall, nursing a Dairy Queen sundae at the food court, becoming melancholy as she listened to love songs playing over the mall’s PA system. She wished there was something she could do to stop thinking about Brad, but it seemed that as long as she was in the play, she was doomed to exist in a turbulent emotional purgatory, unable to detach her emotions from the handsome boy who was obligated to pretend to love her three times a week at rehearsals. Suzie briefly considered trying to start a relationship with Ricardo; he was nice, and she had to be intimate with him in rehearsals as well. But he just didn’t stir up the same emotions in her that Brad did. Besides, Emma was still fixated on Ricardo, and Suzie knew that they made a better couple than she and Ricardo did.

  No matter how she turned it around and around in her head, she always came to the same conclusion: her situation was unfixable until after the play. Until then, she would be in agony, forced to be tantalizingly close to the boy that she loved but couldn’t have.

  She also felt guilty about Maddy. Two days after the incident at the apartment, Suzie waited outside Maddy’s Calculus class, finally catching the small girl as she was leaving. However, when Suzie tried to apologize and explain how things had gotten out of hand, Maddy only smiled.

  “It’s all right, Suzie,” Maddy reassured her. She leaned in close, her eyes darting around nervously. “We had a good talk afterwards, Alfred and me. It turned out that he had always wanted me to be more adventurous, but was too embarrassed to talk to me about it. He thought I was too conservative, that I would get offended if he brought it up. And the whole time he was thinking this, I was wishing he would take charge more in our relationship.” She blushed. “I told him he would be amazed at some of the things I would do, if only he would ask that I do them.”

  “So you and Alfred are okay?” Suzie was relieved that she hadn’t broken up that relationship.

  “We’ve never been better,” Maddy said. “When he lead me outside naked that
day, making me walk down to his car that way, it was such an amazing feeling… to do such a crazy thing, to be completely obedient to him and know I was totally exposed and it was all because he wanted me to be that way. I was so turned on, and he was, too. We had sex as soon as we got to his car.”

  “I didn’t see you when I left,” Suzie said. “I didn’t have anything to wear so I borrowed your t-shirt… I’ll give it back to you as soon as I wash it.”

  “Oh, don’t worry about it.” Maddy’s eyes twinkled. “We already did it again, you know.”

  “Did what?”

  Maddy blushed furiously. “Last night, we ordered a pizza, from a different restaurant. The guy who came to deliver it was tall… he had a beard and long hair. I opened the door naked, and I told him he could either have the money for the pizza, or he could let me pay for it with sex.” Maddy squirmed, both excited and embarrassed to admit her outrageous behavior to Suzie. “The man said he would get in trouble with his boss if he didn’t bring back the money, so he took the money… but then he had sex with me anyway. He pulled me outside and fucked me on the front hood of his Camaro. Alfred watched the whole thing from the second floor window… it made him super horny.” Maddy smiled, a faraway look in her eyes, and Suzie knew for certain that Alfred had made love to Maddy right after the pizza man left… probably on the sidewalk in front of where the Camaro had been.

  Suzie was glad that Maddy and Alfred’s relationship was still strong, but it made her remember some of her own experiences with Brad. Her sadness must have shown on her face, because Maddy touched her arm lightly.

  “What’s wrong, Suzie?”

  Suzie forced herself to smile. “Sorry… I guess listening to how happy you and Alfred are, it made me wonder if I’ll ever have someone special like that… someone I can trust enough to give myself over to them completely.”

  Maddy smiled reassuringly. “Oh, you will, Suzie! Are you kidding? You’re smart and beautiful, and you like to be naked… what guy could resist that?”

  Suzie laughed. “Thanks.” She was glad she had talked to Maddy. Playing Jenna at Brad’s apartment might have been a bad decision, but at least the results hadn’t been all negative.

  Corine continued to be friendly to Suzie, seemingly oblivious to Suzie’s turmoil, or perhaps Corine understood that she had been the victor in the competition for Brad’s affection. On Thursday, Suzie was eating lunch with Emma when Corine came to their table and sat down.

  “Hi, Suzie… hi, Emma,” Corine smiled cheerfully. “Suzie, I had something I wanted to ask you… do you know Myron Jennings?”

  “Not really. I know he plays football.” Suzie poked at her salad, her appetite lacking.

  “Yeah, that’s him. Do you have any plans for Saturday? Brad and I were planning to go to this restaurant, Benningtons… it’s downtown… we were going with Myron and his sister, but his sister cancelled. Anyways, I was wondering how you felt about a blind date… Brad and I thought you might want to come with us as Myron’s date.”

  “Brad thought that?” Suzie asked.

  “Yeah. We thought you two might hit it off, you and Myron. He really is a nice guy and I think you would like him.”

  The emotional tornado within Suzie whirled and twisted. Part of her wanted to go to the dinner just to be able to spend time with Brad. But another part of her was devastated that he would want to match her with another boy.

  The practical voice in her head was the tie-breaker. She’d been considering meeting someone else as a remedy to get over Brad anyway. Maybe Myron was the solution.

  He wasn’t bad-looking, either. He was tall and dark-haired with a football player’s build.

  “Sure,” she said to Corinne. “I’ll come along… sounds like fun.”

  “Great!” Corinne said. “I’ll let Myron know. Talk to you later!”

  Emma waited to speak until Corrine was out of earshot. “Are you crazy?” she asked Suzie.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re going to go out to dinner with Corine and Brad the happy couple when you’re in love with him?”

  Suzie was startled. “You think I’m in love with Brad?”

  Emma gazed at her frankly. “Show me some respect, Suzie. I’ve been your best friend forever, and I’ve actually watched you having sex with Brad… having a lot of sex. I can tell it’s not all acting with you. You really feel something for him.”

  Suzie looked down at her salad. “So?” Her voice sounded defensive.

  “So how will you feel, sitting across from them at a restaurant, watching them kiss and flirt and act oh-so-disgustingly in love with each other? You’ll feel terrible.”

  She knew Emma was right. Just the thought of seeing Brad and Corinne together was painful. But maybe it was pain that she needed. Maybe that was the other way to get over Brad: see how happy he was with Corinne, how unavailable he was, and maybe that would convince her she should move on.

  “Maybe it’s what I need,” was the only answer she would give Emma, Emma finally gave up.

  19. Myron

  Brad tried to talk with her before rehearsal again, and this time he looked even more troubled. “Suzie, did you really agree to go out with Myron Jennings?”

  “Yeah… why?”

  Brad grimaced. “I don’t think you should, Suzie. He has a bad reputation… they say he’s always grabbing at the girls he dates. They say he has his hands all over them.”

  This was news that made her uneasy, but Suzie kept it from showing on her face. “I’ll be okay,” she said shortly. “It was your girlfriend who set it up, you know.”

  “Yeah…” Brad frowned. He seemed like he wanted to say something else, but Mr. Belfast called them into rehearsal before he could speak.

  The night of the double-date soon arrived, and Suzie nervously applied her lipstick while Emma hovered over her.

  “You’re not going on a date with Brad, you know,” Emma repeated for the hundredth time.

  “I know!” Suzie snapped. But she had to admit that Emma was right. The tight black dress she was wearing, the heels, the lacy panties… they weren’t for Myron. She had dressed thinking about how Brad would be seeing her. She had even gone to the salon and gotten her hair done. Who went out to this much effort on a first date, a blind date?

  “I hope you’re not setting yourself up for a crash to reality.” Emma had said this a hundred times as well.

  “Just stop, Emma.” Suzie was worried enough about what would happen without her friend’s constant commentary.

  Thankfully, Emma stopped.

  Myron was on time to pick her up, and he looked nice in a dark blue shirt and black jeans. He grinned when he saw her. “You look amazing,” he said and held out his arm for her to take. Suzie was flattered by the gentlemanly gesture, and pleased when he opened the car door for her.

  Maybe the evening would turn out all right after all. Myron was charming as they drove to the restaurant, making her laugh with his stories. She caught him ogling her legs a few times, but it didn’t bother her. He also made a teasing comment that indicated he was familiar with her actions the day of her Stanford interview, when she’d walked naked across the school to have sex on the front steps. Suzie took the teasing in stride; she knew the story had gotten around the school, and most people were aware that she’d done it for the theater.

  When they arrived at the restaurant, Brad and Corinne were already sitting, and waved them over to the table. That was when Suzie began to realize she was in trouble. When she saw how handsome Brad looked, and the way he smiled and said hello to her, she knew she felt a connection to him that was going to be difficult to hide. Corinne also said hello, but her smile seemed strained.

  They made some small talk as they waited for the waiter. Suzie felt flustered, worried that her feelings for Brad were obvious to everyone at the table. When Brad spoke, it frequently seemed like he was talking directly to her, and Suzie had no idea how to react. If she responded in kind, talking directly ba
ck, it seemed like they would start to have an intimate conversation to the exclusion of both their dates. But if she was evasive, and tried to throw the conversation to Myron or Corinne, it came across like Brad was making her nervous. Suzie kept glancing at Corinne, searching for a sign that Corinne was suspicious, and just those frequent glances seemed suspicious.

  Myron was teasing Corinne about the size of her purse. It was a large leather bag, and Corinne pulled it onto the table.

  “I need something big,” she said. “I carry a lot of stuff with me.” She opened her bag and rummaged in it, finally pulling out a roll of white yarn.

  “You carry yarn with you?” Myron laughed.

  “I’ve been getting into knitting lately. Do you knit, Suzie?”

  “No.”

  “You should try it. It’s a great way to get rid of stress.”

  “Can I see that yarn?” Myron asked. Corinne passed it over to him. Myron wound some of it around his finger, then grinned, looking at Suzie.

  “Hey, Suzie… let’s try something. Put your hands behind your back.”

  “Why?”

  “Just do it. Come on.”

  Suzie was wary. “Are you going to tie my hands?”

  “Yeah. I won’t tie you tight. It’s just for fun… I want to see if I can.”

  Suzie looked around the table, and everyone was looking at her expectantly. Reluctantly, she put her hands behind her back. She felt Myron wrapping yarn around her wrist for a minute.

  “Okay.” He grinned. “Can you get free?”

  The yarn wasn’t tight around her wrists, but he had wrapped enough yarn that she couldn’t get her hands loose. “No,” she admitted. “I’m stuck.”

  Myron laughed. He took a sip of his coke.

  “Well?” Suzie asked. “Are you going to untie me?”