“I can’t do this now,” I say.
“Well too bad. This needs to be discussed.”
“You’re not my boss, Marcy.”
“Who said anything about being your boss? I saw him first. He was mine.”
I pause, trying to comprehend her words. She thinks she had a chance with him?
“No, he wasn’t,” I say, my mind wandering back to being in his tattoo parlor chair.
“Of course I did. He came to reception first, didn’t he? We flirted, and I know he wanted me. Besides, he’s not your type at all. You’re a goodie goodie.”
Willing her away, I say, “I knew him before he came here. He only came here to see me.”
Marcy closes her mouth and breathes heavily through her nose. I close my eyes and think of Gabe, and the ways he’s made me feel over the past day.
“Do your parents know about him?” she snaps.
“No,” I say on reflex, my mind still on Gabe.
“I guess you owe me.”
“What?”
“For my silence.”
“You mean you can’t just be a decent human being about this?”
She shrugs, and backs out of the door.
For the second time this morning, I drape myself over my desk. I get the feeling she’s not going to drop this. I should’ve known from the start that Gabe was a bad idea.
But I had so much fun with him last night. I can’t deny that. And I don’t think I can deny myself my feelings for him any longer.
The rest of the morning is painful. At least my patients are all straightforward, and I don’t have to think about what I’m doing. During lunch, I don’t bother eating and hide in my room, avoiding Marcy.
And thinking about Gabe.
All I can do is think about Gabe.
At one o’clock sharp, there’s a light tap on my door, and without opening it, Marcy says, “Your next patient is here.”
“Thanks. Can you send all my patients to my door when they get here?”
At least that way, I won’t run into her or my parents in the hallway.
“Sure, I’ll do you another favor today.”
As if keeping her mouth shut is a favor.
The afternoon is long and drawn out, but at least it gives me time to think.
Gabe’s right, there’s nothing meaningless about the way he makes me feel. Part of me wants to send a text and tell him right away, but that doesn’t seem like enough.
My last patient of the day is a man who sprained his wrist sliding into first base at his softball game. He’s well over six feet tall, and is just as wide. I decide to use him as a shield.
When the session is finished, I grab my backpack and walk out with him. As we pass reception, I walk on the far side of him. I run ahead of him when we reach the entrance hall, and I manage to make it out of the building without Marcy seeing me.
I fall into my car, grateful for not running into either of my parents.
Pushing the button to start the car, I put it into gear and turn left out of the parking lot. There’s a red light, and I stop. It turns green but the next light turns red, and I stop again. It happens three more times. I’m hitting every red light between the medical center and my apartment.
When the light goes green, I swing the car in a massive U-turn and head to Gabe’s. I get all the way to the tattoo parlor without hitting a single red light.
The same parking spot in front of the door is open, and I pull my car into it. My heart is racing faster than it was the first time I came here.
Gabe doesn’t work Thursdays, but I don’t know where the entrance to his upstairs apartment is. I don’t even know if he’s home.
I get out of the car, and half open the door to the tattoo parlor, intending to ask how to find him. But there are five or six big, burly, tattoo-covered guys standing by the counter, and I chicken out.
My feet move fast, and carry me across the front of the building, and down along the side. It’s a solid brick wall, but I keep moving. When I reach the end of it, I skip sideways to avoid a puddle and turn the corner.
Gabe’s truck is parked beside a motorcycle. A solid brown door is at the far corner of the building. A solid black door is beside it.
There’s no sign or number to indicate what door might be what.
I push the doorbell beside the brown door, but don’t hear anything.
I push the doorbell beside the black door, but don’t hear anything.
I try pounding on both of them.
The brown door swings open, and my heart stops.
Gabe fills the doorframe, wearing only his boxers. His legs are also covered in tattoos, something I couldn’t see in the dark last night. His nipple piercings shine in the bright sunlight.
My breath is fast as I survey the man I want.
“Come for more meaningless sex already?” he asks, his voice flat.
Shaking my head, I say, “There’s nothing meaningless about it, we both felt it. I’m done fighting.”
A closed-mouth smile springs across his face. He places his hand on my shoulder, and lightly runs his fingers down my arm. My skin prickles everywhere he touches me.
When he reaches my hand, he grabs hold of it and pulls me into his apartment. I follow him down a narrow hallway and up a flight of stairs. He still hasn’t said anything else, and I’m filled with butterflies.
His living room is large, but sparsely furnished, with a futon couch, a black La-Z-Boy and a coffee table with a few empty beer cans on it. A massive television hangs on the wall, with several types of video game consoles lined up underneath it. A few free weights are in the corner.
“Nice bachelor pad,” I say.
“What were you expecting?”
“This is exactly what I was expecting. Well, maybe I was expecting you to be wearing clothes.”
“I had a shower.”
I bite my bottom lip, suddenly feeling awkward and self-conscious.
The feelings vanish when Gabe wraps his arms around me.
In a low voice, he says, “You’ll be glad you stopped fighting yourself.”
“And you?”
“I’m fucking ecstatic. We belong together, Jewel, I just needed you to see that.”
He pulls me onto the futon, and I collapse onto his lap. I’m in the comfort of his arms, and the butterflies vanish.
“You’re mine. You realize that, right?” Gabe says, and nips my neck.
I don’t even bother trying to fight the massive grin on my face.
“I do, and you’re all mine,” I say.
“Absofuckinglutely. I think I’ve been yours for as long as I can remember.”
“You think? How you did you go from the little boy who sat behind me, to a man looking the way you do, anyway?” I drag my finger over the ridges of his abs as I speak.
Gabe
Eloise fills my arms perfectly. All the tension in my body vanishes, and I sink into the couch.
It’s like this is the moment I’ve been waiting for twenty years.
“I grew up,” I say, answering her question.
She laughs, it’s the sweetest sound I’ve ever heard in my apartment. Her body jiggles on my lap. My dick twitches, but I ignore it.
I could fuck Eloise all day and night, but right now I want to enjoy this moment.
The moment she said she’s mine.
“That’s not an answer,” she says, starting to giggle. She playfully pushes against my chest.
“What you want to know?”
“Everything.”
It’s probably fair enough, but I can’t ruin this moment by telling her everything.
“Fine, you ask a question, I’ll answer it.” I press my lips against hers, and cup the back of her head. She whimpers, and I pull away before I end up fucking her.
“Start with the last time I saw you. Why did you move away? You said your parents split, but why was your sister crying all the time in my sister’s class, saying your mom was sick?”
I
suddenly feel heavy again, but I’m going to have to tell her. Once she knows, the past can go back where it belongs, in the past.
“In seventh grade, my mom got cancer. My father was a trucker, so it was hard. Real hard. Neither of them dealt with it very well. We ended up moving to Pittsburgh to live with my mother’s sister.”
Eloise smoothes my hair, she’s frowning and her eyes are watery. She doesn’t say anything, and I continue.
“After my mom died, we barely saw my father anymore. My aunt always said he was working on a long run, but my sister and I both knew he was drinking somewhere. Anywhere and everywhere. My father dealt with the grief by drowning himself in booze. So my aunt ended up being the adult responsible for raising us.”
A tear escapes Eloise’s eye, and weaves a crooked path down her cheek.
I wipe the tear away with my thumb. Pulling her head to mine, I nuzzle against her. “You poor little things. How did you cope?”
These are things I never talk about, and my throat is tight.
“I drew a lot. And started getting in lots of fights. By the time I started high school, I had a reputation and no one messed with me. At least no one my own age. So I started hanging with the older kids. A group of them let me in with them, and I started hanging with them.”
“I’m going to assume they weren’t the nerdy kids.”
I laugh through my nose, and say, “Not exactly.”
Frowning, she asks, “What was your aunt like?”
“She’s a nice lady.”
“Do you still see her?”
It’s the inquisition. Why did I ever say I’d answer all her questions? I should’ve given her three questions, max.
“I go down for Thanksgiving and sometimes Christmas. My sister’s still in Pittsburgh. She’s married with a couple of kids, so I visit them.”
Eloise tilts her head, her cheeks twitching and a half smile. “That’s nice of you.”
“What? You think I don’t want a relationship with my family?”
“Do you ever see your dad?”
“No. And if I did, I’d beat the shit out of him.”
Her eyebrows knit together, and her face freezes.
“I wouldn’t really hit him. I’d just really like to, for abandoning us when we’d already lost one parent.”
She smiles again, the softness returning to her face. I kiss her, and Eloise shifts her body so that she’s straddling my lap. In this position, I’m not sure how long I’ll be able to keep my dick under control.
It hardens against her, and I grind it into her.
Eloise pulls away laughing, and says, “Not yet, you still haven’t told me about all these pictures on your body.”
She swings her leg over mine, and sits beside me. She angles herself toward me, and traces the pattern of roses on my chest.
“Roses were my mom’s favorite,” I volunteer.
She runs her fingertips lower, and asks, “Did she like skulls too?”
“No, the skulls are all me.”
“And the rest of the stuff, is that you?”
“Mostly.”
“I’ve spent a lot of time looking at the ones on your back, but I haven’t had much chance to see your front.” She shifts her eyes down. “And I didn’t see your legs until now. Why so many?”
“The stuff on my thighs was me practicing when I was first learning.”
“Get out.”
“How else could I learn? Would you want to be my guinea pig?”
“No, but that’s because I don’t want any tattoos.”
Fuck, I’d love to decorate her. Her skin is as smooth and clear as porcelain, begging to be drawn on. I’d color her in lilies and lilacs.
“Not even one little one?”
Eloise laughs, and says, “No. not even one little itty bitty tiny one.”
“Not a little daisy on your hip?”
“Nope.”
We both laugh.
“Any more questions before I rip your clothes off?”
“Didn’t you already do that today?”
“That was hours ago.” I run my hand up her thigh.
She playfully slaps my hand away and asks, “Why did you come back to Rochester?”
“To open my own place. My mother had a life insurance policy, and I got some money when I turned twenty-five. I wanted my own parlor, but when Jack took me on as an apprentice, I promised him I’d never open a rival shop in Pittsburgh. Rochester seemed to make sense.”
“Do you have any family here?”
“No.”
“So why come back? You could’ve gone somewhere warm and more exciting.”
I turn my body to face her, and rest my arm on the back of the couch.
“Because you were here.”
Her cheeks redden, she shifts her eyes around. “You did not.”
“I did. You’re the only person from grade school I ever cared about, or ever wanted to see again.”
“What do you mean?”
I shake my head and purse my lips, not believing I’m about to admit this to her.
“When we lived in Rochester, life was good. My mom was the best mom. But I didn’t have many friends at school.”
“I remember you having lots of friends. You were always with Jason Miller, and Tom Hillary and that red-headed guy. What was his name?”
“Davey McFadden.”
“Yeah, him. You had friends.”
“No, I had guys I hung around with. I didn’t have people I liked. There was only one person I ever liked in our elementary school. You.”
As I expected, Eloise blushes. I’m not going to tell her the anger I had for her when I left. Or how I ripped up every drawing I’d ever made of her.
“I didn’t realize.”
“Don’t worry, I’m teasing. I didn’t move back here to find you. But I’m glad I did.”
“You were just saying that stuff?”
I shrug, wondering what the real truth is. Why did I move back to Rochester? Because my early childhood here was so good? Because I feel closer to my mother here? But this place is the reason it all went so wrong. How much did Eloise have to do with my decision?
My eyes run up Eloise’s body, for a fleeting moment I feel the anger and pain I felt when I left our school at the end of seventh grade. When my eyes reach hers, everything inside of me settles, and I feel the same lack of tension I’d felt when she first got here.
Only this time, I’m not even going to try to control my dick.
Eloise
“Try toothpaste,” Gabe says.
He reaches out from behind the shower curtain, water runs down his arm and drips onto the floor. He grabs a tube of Colgate from his sink, and holds it up in front of me as the water runs down our bodies.
“That’s crazy, that won’t work.”
“Nothing else is either. If it doesn’t work, I’ll go downstairs and get my Ink-Out. If it gets tattoo ink off, it’ll easily work for pen.”
For some reason, last night I let Gabe draw on me. He started my collarbones and worked his way down to my toes. It was amazing how quickly he worked, and how high quality the drawings are.
One side of my body is a vine covered in all sorts of flowers. The other side is naughty. He drew the two of us in all the positions he wants us to have sex in.
My entire right hip is a close-up of his face between my legs. My right breast is a three-dimensional picture of his face, with his mouth open and his tongue licking my nipple. On my thigh, he drew my face, thrown back in ecstasy as he makes me climax.
“It’s not really doing anything,” I say, rubbing the toothpaste into my arm and trying to scrub off the picture of me on my knees, sucking his dick.
We didn’t get much sleep, and I’m tired. It’s Friday, and I have to work. But that didn’t stop me from spending the night.
“It’s fine, I have to go home to get clean clothes anyway, I’ll wear a long-sleeve top today. No one will be able to see it.”
“Don’t go
home first,” Gabe says, pushing his pelvis against mine.
“I have to. I need clean panties.”
“Screw panties. What do you need those for?”
I laugh, and shake my head. “You’re funny.”
“I wasn’t being funny. I’m serious. While I’m at work today, I want to be able to think about you walking around with no panties on. I’m going to spend the day thinking about all the things I’m going to do to you tonight.”
Gabe grabs hold of me, the spray from the shower splashing over both of us. My skin tingles, even though we had sex right before getting in the shower.
The bottom of the tub is slippery, and my feet slide around as he hugs me. But Gabe is a solid wall of muscle, and I hold him tight to stop myself from falling.
He kisses my cheek, and says, “Besides, if you don’t go home, I get to have you for another thirty minutes this morning. I’ll even make you an omelet for breakfast.”
“You’re corrupting me. But I can’t resist a good omelet.”
“If not wearing panties is corrupting you, I’ve got a long way to go.”
“Are you kidding me? Look what you’ve drawn all over me. It seems like I’m going to be walking around work with smutty pictures all over me.”
“I told you I was going to use my tattoo ink cleaner to get them off. But now that you’ve brought it up, I definitely like the idea of you walking around with these on you.”
My eyes flare as I imagine myself talking to my mother and father with only a thin piece of fabric between their eyes and the pictures of Gabe ravaging me.
“You should show them to Marcy. I bet she’d appreciate them.”
“She doesn’t need drawings, she’s seen the real thing. Remember?”
“I bet she rubbed herself raw last night thinking about us.”
“Oh God, don’t say that. I’ll have to quit right now and never show my face at my parents’ medical practice again.”
Gabe turns off the faucet and pushes open the shower curtain.
“Let’s eat,” he says.
We both step out of the tub. He pulls a towel off the vanity counter, and uses it to pat me dry.
“There, the ink is smudged a bit but not too bad.”
“What about my arms?”
“Don’t worry about them, I’ll use my cleaner on them. But the rest of these pictures are staying.”
Pierce Me: Satisfied by the Bad Boy Page 10