Venice Beach Stories: Edward Keeps a Secret
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I wake up in County and Rose is hovering over me, her hair like a curtain around us.
"What the fuck?" I ask, and she tells me how I hit my head skating and conked out. Fuuuck.
"Doc been by?"
"Not yet," Emmett says, and then Jasper pushes off from the wall and heads out to get someone to see me. I feel fine. Sore as shit, but fine.
Then I notice the smell. Strong and antiseptic, with bleach and something sad and sour underneath it, sweat and puke, and there's something tugging at the back of my mind, that says this is wrong, smelling so much. My nose burns.
I lift my head and the pain comes like a fucking tidal wave. For a minute I can't see anything, and then the flashes of light show up, and suddenly my skin is screaming right along with the two fucking nails being driving into my temples.
The pain hits me so hard and so fast I'm panting, and before I know it I'm curled onto my side, puking. Rose is there with the bedpan, and thank fuck for that, but the motion of turning makes the world drop out from under me and I'm puking again, and then dry heaving. I hear Emmett's voice in the hall and he's yelling. It sounds like a jackhammer in my head. Rose has her hands on the back of my neck and in my hair, and she's trying to soothe me but it fucking hurts. I've never had a migraine come on so fast before, but before I can consider why I'm out again.
The next time I wake up Rose is holding my hand. Jasper is looking like a caged cat, kind of feral and nervous, and Emmett's just holding up the wall, eyes closed, head back, probably asleep. Fucker can sleep anywhere.
"Hey," Rosalie says, and she her face hangs above me. It's the weirdest thing, but instead of her, I see someone else. A girl with brown eyes and long brown hair, wearing Rose's same look of concern and her skin is too white for L.A.
I blink hard and it's Rose again. What the fuck was that?
Before I can get too deep into it, a nurse comes in. She's asking me questions about the paperwork and wants to know if I'm insured. I say no and then she asks if I'm indigent. No judgment, just the question. And I could say yeah, but fuck that – I pay my bills. I pull out my wallet and hand her my Mastercard. She bristles and hands it back and tells me to see billing on the way out. Whatever.
Two hours, a bag full of pills and a little under two grand later, we're out the door. As I load myself into Emmett's Jeep, I remember the girl from my head. She was really pretty. But then, I guess fantasies are supposed to be, right?
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Two weeks after the head-crack and I'm up late with Jasper. We've got porn on the big-screen, but it's on mute. We're sampling the latest crop and it's fucking stony as shit. I'm stoked that I'll get a good price for it, and Rose will be stoked because she'll need to use less in her cooking. My whole body feels good, just loose and easy and my head is quieting down to the point where I'm feeling a little bit stupid. I look at Jasper and grin, and he grins and we laugh because we are both really fucking high.
"Gig on Friday," he says. "Gonna come out?"
As high as I am, I feel a little resentful. He knows I hate being out in a crowd, but I feel like a dick not going to see him play.
"You might meet a girl," he says. My head lolls to the side and I look at him. "Or a guy." His voice is quiet and he breaks eye contact.
"Fuck you," I say and punch his arm. He doesn't smile.
"You think I'm gay?"
He shrugs. "That or a fuckin' monk, man. When's the last time you got laid?"
"Just 'cause I don't drag some skank home every night like some people," I say, knowing it's a low blow. I don't think he gets a lot out of his one-night stands, but I get why he does it. I know enough about the macho man bullshit his dad pushed on him to know why he does it.
"Shit. I'm just – I'm not going to meet a good girl at a club." I think about the dark-haired girl in my head and wonder if she's an actress or a model. I couldn't have made her up out of thin air.
We both look over at the screen and there're two girls and two guys and a little more full-on close-up than I really want to see.
"You want the blonde?" he asks. He knows my type.
"Brunette." The word pops out of my mouth without any thought on my part and Jasper stares. "Fuck, changing up?" I shrug and study the screen.
Jasper chuckles. "Guess your Florence Nightingale got to you some."
"What?"
"The girl Edward?" He reaches over and taps on my head with his knuckles. "When you knocked yourself out?
Two minutes later he's telling me about the girl at the skate park who helped me.
It's kind of a relief to hear that there was a girl, but now my mind's in overdrive because I need to see her. I need to know if it's her, the girl from my dream. The one I can't stop thinking about.
The next day we're hanging on the boardwalk. Emmett's chowing like he's never going to see food again, Jasper and Rose are having some kind of twin-type powwow. She looks over at me and Jasper's pushing her on something. I hate getting in the middle of those two – Rose can be a bitch when she wants to be.
They talk and she sighs and says "fine" and huffs off. Emmett's glowering at Jasper because he's going to have to be the one to bring her down later tonight. Whatever. I'm staying out of it. Then Rose walks up with a girl. The girl.
There's introductions and I can't say a fucking word because she's there, and she's prettier than she was in my head, and I need to touch her, find out if her skin is warm and if her hair is soft – it looks really fucking soft – but all I do is say her name and she gets a call and walks away.
I close my eyes against the hiss in my chest at seeing how easily she turned away, when all I want her to do is stay.
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The end of August can be stifling hot, but the Pacific breeze washes enough cool up the street to push a breeze through the house. Beach houses almost never have A/C, and it's too much of a hassle to have someone install it. How would I explain the garage?
I've been cooped up in the house for what feels like weeks, but has probably only been a few days. Well, it's been less than that - I had to go out for smokes yesterday. Rose is being bitchy about buying them for me again. I groan and stretch and head to the kitchen for a Coke. It's already two-thirty, and I have to go out tonight. Jasper's in a new band and it's their first gig. Whatever. I'm driving myself. I'm not getting stuck at some fucking house party all night.
I drag the Coke into the shower with me and stand under the cool stream. I close my eyes and the girl comes to mind. Bella.
Bella with the brown hair and the boys all over her; every fucking time I try to talk to the girl, some guy's jocking her. And she never looks sorry to see them. Still, I see her face the way it was under the fireworks, all lit up and wide-eyed, like a little girl. There's something…clean about her. Like the Noxema girl. It makes me want to hold her hand, and I feel like I'm fourteen again, crushing on a girl for the first time.
I lather up and think about the way she looked that night, the shorts cupping her ass and the t-shirt she wore hugging the sides of her breasts and the little pucker of fabric between them, because the shirt stretched just a little too tight. In my head she turns to me and talks to me, and I bend her over the rail of the pier and kiss her and then we're in my bed and I know that this is only the first time I'll jerk off today, thinking about that girl.
I'm trying to do the right thing. I'm trying to stay away from her. She doesn't belong in my world and it would be fucked up of me to drag her in to it.
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I roll up to the party and see Emmett's already there with Rose and Jasper. Even though I said I'd come, I still catch their surprised looks when I turn off the bike and tug off my helmet. We're walking up the steps when I see her. She's sitting behind some cement lion, hair long around her face and wearing this little skirt but all I can see are legs and bare skin and for the first time ever, there's not a hundred guys swarming her.
I sit and talk to her for a minute, but before I can get anywhere, Rose is there, being a bitch, reminding me of my responsibilities. I think Bella looks a little sad as she walks away, and I want to tell Rose to just fuck off, but she's family, man, practically blood, so I don't.
I walk into the party last night, thinking that I can just keep my distance. But she's everywhere. She's talking to everyone and hugging everyone and kissing cheeks and just fucking giving herself away to everyone but not to me because I never let her get near.
Still, I couldn't stop myself. Not when the night got loud and she was on the dance floor, throwing her body around, just grinding her hips and fuck I'm going to remember her like that, sweaty and flushed, hair all over the place, forever.
Maybe it's because I've spent months watching her, just trying to figure out how to talk to her. Maybe it's because I was halfway to a concussion the first time I saw her and spent two weeks thinking I made her up. Or because when she watches fireworks I can see that she was once a little girl, and when she smiles big, I get this ache in my chest, like I need to be near her. I feel protective of her and that easy smile.
And who could blame me? Seems like every guy in the place is checking her out. I finally can't stay away for one minute more. I slide up to her on the dance floor and start dancing behind her. She eases back into me, and just the feel of her skin under my hands is tripping me out, like I've never touched a girl before. Then I remember that it's been three years since I have touched a girl, at least like that, and it makes sense then that touching her gets me hard like some kid in high school.
I dance with her until that blond kid comes and cockblocks me – same one from the Fourth of July. So I do what I did that night. I get lost. I walk out of the party, down the front steps and down to the ocean. Sit and listen to the ocean smack the shore, and it sounds gentle and soothing and not like the ocean is pounding sand and shells and rocks into bits of powder with its strength. I want to smoke a bowl, but I don't want the ticket, so I sit and think about the girl. Think about her helping a stranger, passed out on the cement, not even worried about getting some guy's blood all over her. Think about her shopping at the farmer's market, seeing her at the grocery store, and the way she looks, sitting on the grass with her head in a book, the breeze catching all that hair, how it shines.
I wish I was just lonely. I wish I was lonely or horny or bored. I can deal with that – any of it. But I'm not any of those things. And what I can't deal with, for one more day, is how much I want her. I want to – fuck. I want to make her come and make her smile and hear the thoughts in her head and fucking just…touch her again.
So I go back into the party and I find a quiet room where I can smoke a bowl and she's there, and she talks to me and touches me and lets me kiss her with my smoky mouth. When I offer to shotgun her I just want her to not be nervous and I want to be inside of her, even if it's just smoke from my lungs. I want to be inside of her.
She takes me in, into her mouth and her body, she takes me in and when I wake up the next morning with the blue light all around us, she looks fragile and delicate and it's stupid to fall in love with someone overnight but I've never lied to myself much and I don't see why I'd start now. For the first time in years I'm pissed about my job because I have to leave her, and I won't get to see her sleepy, morning smile. And I know I can make her smile.
I find a Sharpie on the desk and I dress her in my shirt, gentle with her, but she's passed out cold. I'm a selfish prick, so I kiss her cheek, her hair, her mouth, until her eyes squint and her face bunches as she presses it against my chest.
I get back to my place and I'm wired fucking tight. I'm pissed that I had to leave Bella, pissed that I couldn't stay in that awful fucking bed and hold her in my arms and bury my face in her hair to get the reek of that other guy out of my nose. She says Paul's just a friend and maybe he is and maybe he isn't, but some part of me really liked fucking her in his bed.
I hope to fuck she calls me, but if she doesn't, it doesn't matter. I see her on the street almost every day. I'll find her again. I have to.
I walk into my office and pack a bowl and smoke it. And then another. I tip my head back against the chair and remember last night, and every graphic detail and my cock is hard in a second and a half. I run my palm against it and remember how it felt, the music like a cradle, stony hot and liquid in my head, in my veins. She shocked me, the touch of her hand and the press of her body and the way she gave herself up to me, awkward and honest and real. There was nothing staged about her, from the mismatched underwear to the way she'd fumbled, moving my hands where she wanted them. She meant all of it. She was sincere in a way that made my heart…hurt? Something.
At ten Rosalie walks in, all bluster and shopping bags full of Rice Crispies and marshmallows and chocolate chips. Four pounds of butter thunk onto the table, and she goes about her business. She'll be here for eight hours, give or take, which is fine. It's all fine, always. From the moment we met, years ago in school, I'd felt something for Rosalie. Granted, first it was revulsion, but when I found her that day, crying behind the new theatre, things changed between us. I couldn't just let her sit there and cry, and when I found out about the guy she'd been seeing, and the maybe pregnancy, and all the shit that went with it, I couldn't just let her be alone.
I pulled her into my world, and three months later along came Jasper, and after we took care of Royce and the maybe baby was…resolved, Emmett came along. At the time, I thought this life was the best thing for her. I thought it was a good solution, and so did she. Now though, it feels a little bit like a trap, and we're all working the cube, trying to solve it.
At 10:48, my phone rings. It's an unknown number with a weird area code, but I answer because it might be Bella. I'm crawling out of my skin not to just bail on Rose and run back to that guy's house and pound on the door until she lets me in. I want to get back inside of her, back in her arms, back in her mouth, just back.
It is Bella, and five minutes later we've had an awkward conversation. I'm picking her up at seven for a date and I hope to fuck I don't mess it up. I can't help how good it feels, just to talk to this girl, even if she's shy and nervous by the light of day.
When I leaned forward to kiss her, I didn't mean for things to go so far. But she wasn't backing down and fuck if I was either. I was nervous as fuck, too. I hadn't been with someone in years, so to go from zero to sixty in the space of a night was fucking with my head a little. But god I'd been watching her for fucking weeks and months and every time I got close there was some other guy staking a claim and why not? The girl is fuckall beautiful. Not like Rosalie, where it's just obvious even when she tries to hide it. Bella is beautiful in the girl-next-door kind of way. In the bakes pies from scratch kind of way. I just didn't realize she was also beautiful in the "oh, yes, fuck me," kind of way, and shit, who knew miracles were real?
She is real.
When I leave the office Rosalie stops stirring her pan full of marshmallows and green butter and gives me a hard look. "Don't do this, Edward."
"Do what?" I know goddamned well what she means, but I'm going to make her say it out loud. If she can be this selfish, I want us both to hear what it sounds like.
"Don't get involved with her. You don't know her. We don't need the hassle."
I stare at her for a long time as years of resentment bubble up inside of me. She owes me fucking…everything. And still she would begrudge me this.
"I'm not marrying her, Rose. I'm taking her for a movie and dinner. This isn't your business."
"Fuck you, Edward. Look around you. This is all my business. Don't fuck us all over because you want to get laid."
"You're incredible." I walk back to my office, laughing, but inside, I'm disgusted with us both. Her for her unrelenting selfishness, and me for the way my temper spiked at hearing her talk about Bella like that. But god dammit last night was not a lay. Last night was…. I sigh as dozens of different erotic images flash behind my eyes. I can't believe the things she did, let me do. The image of her touching herself stutters and then my head turns it into her touching herself a dozen different ways, bent over, on her back, on her knees and my dick is so fucking hard I have to reach down and adjust it so that I can sit down.
Two minutes later Rose is standing in the door of my office. What I really want is to close the door, turn on some music and jerk off, but instead I swivel in the chair and face Rose.
"Don't start," I say. I've had it with her bullshit. I watch as she struggles to get herself under control, and her face softens.
"You just met her is all. If things go wrong, they'll go really, really wrong. I need to know that you're thinking straight."
"Who owns this place, Rose? Who's name is on the electric bill and the water bill and everyfuckingthing else?"
She has the good grace to look abashed.
"I'm not stupid, Rose. I know the risks." I stare her down and she looks away. "She's not a narc."
"Be sure," she says, and then turns away.
"I am," I whisper, surprising myself.
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I'm sitting on the shore and the ocean's crashing hard. It's dark and quiet, the world's asleep, but not me, and not the stray dogs that creep out here, late at night. My back pockets are probably full of sand, and what I want is a hit of Bella, but I'm not going to get that tonight, so I'm settling for a hit of Kush instead. I watch the moon shine on the water and cuss her friend Paul and their plans, and cuss her Lit professor for giving her such a heavy load and cuss anything that keeps me away from her.
I suck in the smoke and after a few minutes the buzz hits me, but I can't really call it a buzz. Instead, it's an anti-buzz, it's the thing that keeps my head from spinning too fast, getting too full. I have to make a fucking decision about Bella and I can't do it with my head screaming at me.
I relax into my anti-buzz and stretch my legs out. My head's spinning a little less, at least, it's not trying to think five different things at once, which is how it usually is in there. I breathe deep, cool, salty air, and notice that we're getting a little bit of fog. I'm glad that the weather's cooling off. It's better for the plants than the stark heat of summer. I sigh and think again about giving it up.
It's my life. It's what I've known for the last six years, and more than that, this decision will impact the people I love. Rose depends on me, and I guess in a measure so does Emmett. I shake my head again, trying to figure out how I got here. I wish I could say it was hard, but it wasn't; it was the opposite. And I don't regret it. Not a minute of it.
But now there's Bella and I don't know what to do. I can do what I want, which is be honest with her, but I don't know if I can trust her. Her dad's a cop. Or I can do what's safe and let her go but every time I even think about not seeing her again my chest gets tight and it just…it fucking hurts.
I stretch out onto the sand and close my eyes. Since that first time she called me, I've been trying to do this right. I took her out for a date that night – dinner and a movie – and that girl, that ridiculous girl – she insisted on watching the new political thriller even though I was more than willing to see the latest chick flick. She tried to pay for half of dinner. And then we stood on her doorstep and – the girl lives in a converted garage – so not okay – she started stuttering and mumbling about how she really wants to invite me in but that she's not sure and then she gets all flustered and says what are your sexpectations, Edward?
I gaped at her because she's amazing, just strong and confident and fearless. And her turn of phrase was kind of hilarious. But then I got what she's asking me, and what she was trying to say. So I tipped her head up and I touched my mouth to hers and I pulled back and looked her in the eyes.
"I don't expect you to do anything you're not comfortable with," I said, because it was true. As amazing as it was with her, the last thing I wanted was her touching me out of some kind of obligation. "Last night was…fucking…I really want to do that again. But not if you don't want it too."
She flushed at my words and smiled at me, this big, open smile, and I could see then that she'd been thinking about it all night. She'd been nervous about the sex part all night, and it broke my heart a little because, fuck, I'd wanted to just talk to this girl for so long, and she thought I might not want her because of sex? I didn't even know what to do with that.
So she opened the front door and we walked inside. It was a little one-room place that smelled like vanilla and coffee. I sat down on the futon and noticed that she had a computer desk set up, a half-fridge and the world's smallest stove in the corner, and I thought about the huge kitchen in my house and how Rose was the only one using it. And the king-size bed in my bedroom and how I sleep on the couch most nights, falling asleep to Charlie Rose and waking up to Elmo.
She asked if I wanted the tour, so I stood and she held my hand and pointed to the kitchen, the bedroom, her office and, finally, behind a small white door, the bathroom. She walked to the fridge and asked if I wanted water or Coke, and so I said Coke, hoping to see her do that thing with the lighter again, but she pulled a church key off the side of the fridge, and we sat, awkward in the quiet.
I wasn't really sure what was going on, so I looked over at her bookcase and was surprised by what I found. She had classics and plays and politics, all mixed together. I pulled out an Ibsen play and an hour later, we were both just absorbed in conversation and she had a dozen other books out, showing me passages that related, making all of these crazy connections, and then she pulled down this novella and she started reading it to me, from the first chapter. I sat down next to her and then she patted her thigh and I laid my head in her lap and it felt so good, having her read to me, her fingers stroking my scalp and playing with my hair.
I was asleep before I knew it, and Bella, she must have stretched out a little because somehow I woke up hours later all wrapped around her, both of us in danger of falling off the damn futon. She woke up and folded down the bed, and we climbed under the covers. I brought my hand up under her shirt and found that she'd taken off her bra at some point. She sighed as I wrapped my hand around her bare flesh, and I got hard and pressed against her, but before anything could happen, we were both asleep again.
I don't sleep well. I mean, I catch a few hours here and there, but that night, tangled up in that girl, I slept like a baby. The next night too, again on her crummy little futon, with a slat digging into my back and my feet and wrists hanging over the sides. She'd had dinner with Paul that night and I really wanted to tag along, wanted to meet this guy proper and find out just what he thought was going on between them, but I'm a smart motherfucker so I didn't press it. Instead I waited like a bitch for her to call, and when she did I went over and we made out on her bed and dry humped like we were fifteen. She put on a movie, that French one that everyone loves, and I watched her smile at the television in the dark, her face beautiful in the shadows.
"What?" she asked, catching me staring.
"You're so pretty," I answered, because it was the truth and I don't want lie to this girl. Maybe I should be playing it cool or playing some game, but I feel like a gushing kid around her, and it's weird, being so unguarded, but I like it too. She flushed and then looked down at her fingers and then looked back at me and what I saw was that she wanted me.
At least, that's what I hoped I saw, because I moved to touch her then, to kiss her and lick her and maybe bite a little, someplace that would make her moan. She got up and pulled out the futon, and then sat on her knees at the edge of the bed and I could feel how nervous and scared she was. I sat up and pulled my legs under me and reached for her hand.
"C'mere," I said, and pulled her onto my lap. I couldn't help how hard I was, and I hoped she knew I didn't expect anything, even with the bed made, even with us on it. I needed to touch her though, so we sat until I shifted and put my forehead on her shoulder. Then I leaned and kissed her neck, just one small kiss. I asked if it was okay, or if maybe I should leave. She shook her head and dug her hands into my shoulders.
"We don't have to do anything," I said.
She nodded and then kissed me and an hour later she put my hand down her pants, making herself come against my fingers. She was rubbing me through my shorts, sort of stopping and starting and when she tensed, right before she came, she let go of me and fisted the comforter hard. I was sorry she'd let me go. I wanted to feel that, even if it hurt.
I touched her until she pulled my hand away and shivered, and then pushed me onto my back. My cock was tenting my shorts out pretty good, and I hoped she would do something about that, but it didn't really matter if she didn't because since the first time I saw her I'd been jerking it a half dozen times a day, and it only got worse since the other night.
She palmed me through my shorts and then stopped.
"Can I just touch?" she asked.
I swallowed and nodded because the thought of her hand wrapped around my cock made my brain stop working.
She unbuttoned and unzipped the shorts and then her fingers were there, light and soft and my cock was just twitching up, trying to get into her hand. She pulled my shorts down my legs and trailed her fingers back up, scratching a little on my thighs and then she started stroking me, soft and slow, and watching me. God, it was so fucking sexy, the way she watched her hand on my cock. I was trying really hard to keep my hips still and not just fuck her hand, but then she leaned down and licked me, just the tip, and I let out a groan and my cock jumped, and then she sucked me into her mouth and I'd never been so close, so fast. She looked up at me and everything sort of short circuited, because I wasn't thinking, just feeling, and I wanted to ball my fists into her hair, and push her down hard, but what I really wanted to do was bury myself between her legs but what I did instead was moan and twist and I was close, so close, so fucking close and then I was pushing her away and she looked up and was startled and I put my hand where her mouth was and it was sticky and wet and then I was done, coming all over my stomach because she pushed up my shirt at the last minute.
"I didn't want you to get it in your mouth," I said, because she was looking at me funny. Then she gets this little half smile and bites her bottom lip and blushing hard she says "I did."
Before I could react she was gone, behind the little white door to her bathroom and I heard the water running. I was halfway to hard again, thinking of coming inside of her mouth, and I felt dirty because I really liked this girl. I was looking around for a Kleenex or something to wipe myself off with when she came out of the bathroom with a warm, wet washcloth. She cleaned me up and I said thank you and then I kissed her for an hour because thank you wasn't enough.
A breeze blows up, sharp from the water and pulls me back to the present. She asked to come to my house, to cook me dinner and when I said we'll see, something closed up in her eyes and I felt sad and then pissed about it. So I went home and asked Rose to help me clean up, because, fuck, I've been living alone for six years and it shows. Rose is still pissed about the Bella situation, so she's not helping me, and it's not like I can call a fucking maid service so I spent the whole day cleaning my house and washing my sheets and I fucking scrubbed the kitchen floor on my hands and knees. Rose laughed at me and called me a chump and Emmett looked sympathetic and offered to wash the windows, and this isn't going to work because I didn't even realize they were dirty.
I get that not having a girlfriend, let alone sex, for the last few years has put me at a disadvantage. But it hit a point where I didn't want to waste anyone's time, and as much as they said they were okay with a one-time lay, they weren't, and I got sick of being the asshole. I stopped going out almost entirely about two years ago. I could never be what those girls wanted.
But this doesn't have anything to do with that.
It has to do with thinking about that girl, about seeing her everywhere for months and just fucking trying to stay away from her because I know I'm not good for her, I know she doesn't belong in my world, but when she puts her tongue in my mouth or when she's talking and her voice gets high because she's excited, I want to touch her, and hold her, and hear more.
I know I don't know what the fuck I'm doing, and three years of fucking my hand makes me wonder if I can still please her, if that night was a fluke. And I'm relying on dating protocols from high school and I hope she's willing to give me more than one shot, because I know I'm going to fuck up somewhere, but god damn, this girl was made for me.
I watch a handful of cold sand shift from one hand into the other and back again. The wind carries some of it away and I'm jealous because I want to be carried away too. I want something easy and I don't want to have to think about what I'm doing because it's probably not right and I just don't care and that makes me not the guy I'm supposed to be. I want her. I don't care about the risk and I know that if she'll let me, I'll love her and not ruin her. Despite it all, I'm a decent guy. I wonder if she'll see that.
.
We're at her house, in her bed, and she's letting me touch her everywhere. She's putting my hands where she wants them and then sliding hers under my clothes, then taking them off of me. We still haven't had sex, and I know she wants to, but is holding out. For the first time in my life, that's okay.
When Lauren and I broke up, she told me that the thing she hated most was how pushy I was about sex. And of course I was. I was still a kid and I wanted it. It was…fuck. The first time I had sex something in my head just clicked. That was what I'd been waiting for, my whole life. I was a greedy little prick about it.
Now it's different. I'm different. Now I want to know what it's like to be wanted, and not just given in to. I want to know what it's like have someone burn for me, and not because of how I make their body feel, but because of how I make them feel inside and out. I know that the girls at the bars will never be that. For them, I'm a prize, something unattainable. I want more.
Bella groans and I push her onto her back. I ask if I can take off her underwear and she nods, then tries to get them off herself. I sit back and look at her once they're gone. I run my hands up her legs, squeezing at the top of her thighs. I know if I keep this up that she'll start touching herself and it's a special kind of torture, her doing that in front of me. My mouth is full of dirty things to say, things she likes to hear, whispered low, into her ear.
I don't lean forward and say them. Her hands have drifted to her breasts and I'm surprised at how rough she handles herself. Her whole body is tight now and making her come will be easy, which means I'll get to do it at least once more tonight. Getting her off is my new favorite thing to do. I bring her leg up to my shoulder and kiss her calf, and then stretch her so that I can kiss behind her knee. She giggles and gasps, then jerks her leg back. I set it down beside me and continue to kiss up, licking, sucking, and Christ her skin is so soft, like butter under my tongue.
I nuzzle my way up, I just catch the scent of her and then she jerks back and away and has her legs closed tight and a pillow over them. What the fuck just happened?
"Bella?" I feel strangely vulnerable then, my cock softening, naked in front of her, and she's staring down at the pillow, trying to do origami with just her fingers. Her face has flushed a dark red, like she's been exercising for an hour on a hot day, and she's shaken her hair out so that she's almost hidden.
I pull the other pillow onto my lap and reach for her hands. "What did I do wrong?" I ask, and she shakes her head. "I thought you wanted-"
"It's just…."
"Go ahead," I say.
"Oh, god." If possible, her skin turns darker red. "I just…I don't think I can do that."
"Oh," I say. "Oh!" The light bulb comes on and I get what she's shy about and it confuses the hell out of me. "Why not?" I ask. I mean, we've had sex. She's had my fingers in her mouth.
"I just…." She's breathing heavy. "It just seems really intimate, and…I don't know, like, what if you don't like it or I smell bad or taste bad and you'll feel like you have to because I do it to you."
"Bella, stop." She does and looks up at me, her face like a shy little girl's and I can't help but smirk at her. "Come here," I say, patting the pillow on my lap, and after a moment, she does. I hold onto her, nuzzling her neck and her cheek, kissing her face, petting her hair; not sexual, just affectionate.
"If you're uncomfortable, we don't have to do that. Have you ever before?"
She nods.
"You didn't like it?" I ask, surprised.
"It was weird," she answers. "It was over fast."
I want to track down this loser and punch him in the face. Instead, I sigh and hold her closer, and she slips around on the pillow. I'm glad now that I'm covered, because naked Bella in my arms and thinking about licking her is getting me hard again. I kiss her ear, then suck the lobe between my teeth and pull a little. Her little studs clack against my teeth.
"Well, this is kind of a bummer," I say, and then lick and suck on her neck. "Because I really, really like doing that." She sighs and twists in my arms, tilting her head back. I run my thumb against her lips and then press. She sucks it in and I whisper in her ear.
"I've tasted you, Bella." I suck and scrape my teeth over her shoulder. "You taste delicious. Didn't you think so?" I lay her back on the bed and kiss her hard. She offers no resistance and before long, she's clutching at my hair and groaning. I move my hands over her body, touching, teasing and as one tension leaves her body, another begins to build. That's good. I want her like this, open and needy. I want to show her the things I can do with my tongue.
My hand drifts between her legs and she opens them for me. She's hot, soft and wet. She welcomes my touch because we both know how I can make her feel, and we both want it. That first night is still sharp in my mind, every detail, like it downloaded to my brain and I'm hitting the pause, fast-forward and rewind buttons at will.
I touch her and she feels perfect. I want everything, and all of it, right now.
"Will you let me try?" I ask.
Her face flushes and she nods, her eyes closed. I feel her tense and I don't want that, so I go back to touching her with my hand, pressing against her with my body. I'm dry humping her leg and trying not to, and her hips are starting to do that shaking thing, like she wants to move them but is afraid the good feeling will stop if she does. I've been lost, my mouth on her tits, and I almost forgot what I was trying to do.
I slowly make my way down her body. Her hips stop shaking and I feel her tense again. I ease her thighs apart and slide between them, then lick and bite at her belly, her sides. She's tickled and giggles, arching off the mattress in surprise. When she comes back down I lick and suck the insides of her thighs. She's tense again, and not the right kind, so I slip my fingers back inside of her, relaxing her with a now-familiar rhythm.
She's still a little tense when I go in. There are no soft kisses, no teasing touches. If I give her the chance to freeze up, she will. Instead I lick. I lick from where my fingers disappear inside of her right up to the top, right to the spot and as my tongue slides over it her hips arch up at me. Her flesh under my tongue is the smoothest, softest thing I've ever felt – just hot and almost liquid. Silk doesn't begin to describe it. I do it again and again and I feel her fighting it, fighting me, and so I take her clit in my mouth and soft, so soft, suck.
She arches off the bed and moans, and then there is no going back for either of us. I press my face into her, my tongue and my fingers working in tandem, and all I can think is yes, more, more. Before long, maybe minutes, she's pressing herself against me, her hips flicking up and down, fucking my face and I love it, I want it, love tasting her, love feeling the slick-hot insides of her as they twitch and then grab at my fingers, love feeling her clit throb under my tongue as she comes and comes and comes.
When she's done I slide my fingers out and lay gentle kisses up her body. I wipe my mouth on the inside of my elbow and then kiss against her neck and ear. I don't know if she'll kiss me now, but then she does, surprising me, pushing her tongue into my mouth and holding me there, fingers tight in my hair.
What I want more than anything is to pin her down and push my cock right up inside of her, but instead I pull my hips away and let her kiss me until she's done.
"Amazing," she pants. "Amazing. Thank you." She doesn't ask if I minded the smell or the taste, and I like that. I've shown her that it's good, and she lets me be responsible for deciding what I like and don't. She doesn't try to make decisions for me. And she trusted me. It makes me feel good, big, inside.
She rolls me over and reciprocates. She puts her mouth on me and then she puts my hands in her hair and she lets me fuck her mouth like that, her eyes on me the entire time. I want to tell her that it's not about reciprocity. It's not about getting something because I gave, because I didn't. She's the one who gives, her mouth and her body; her mind is an open door for me to walk through and she never turns me away.
It's too much, her mouth on me, bringing me off, while I can still smell her all over me, still taste her on my tongue and I start to push her off of me but then remember that she wants me in her mouth and so I let go and she takes me in, giving me more, and it feels like it goes on forever, because it's not just sex, it's something more than coming, it's something more, and when she nestles herself into my side and throws one of her legs over both of mine, I hold her, tight, and press hard kisses into her hair and swallow the words that I know I shouldn't say, but that are true, nonetheless.
.
It's been nine days of good. Nine days of seeing Bella every chance I get, of making her laugh and hearing her stories and feeding her dinner at a different restaurant almost every night. Nine days of skating up to her on the boardwalk, plucking the book out of her hands before dropping a kiss on her cheek and giving it back. Once she let me take her to class on the back of my bike, and it was thirty minutes up the 405, with her clinging to me, arms tight around my waist, her thighs gripping mine.
Nine days of her tongue in my mouth, her hands on my skin, her mouth tasting me everywhere, turning me inside out.
Nine days of feeling like shit, because I am such a fucking liar.
.
.
Another Paul/Rachel snippet in 2-4 weeks, then the 2nd part of epov in 4-6 weeks.
Thanks and praise go to both Krismom and Danke George for their mad beta skills. This would have sucked without them.
Love and gratitude to HeBelongstoMe, who pre-read and reassured. Also to FarDareisMai2. I'ma miss you, girl. :'(
I am so blown away by those of you reading and tweeting this. I thought I'd lose you all with that Paul/Rachel bit…but you…wonderful people – you stuck it out. I love you, I really, really do.
This week, I'm in love with: The Velveteen Mother, Boys Wanna Be Her, Finger Painting, Bourbon and Tea, and Disappear Here. They can be found in my favorites, and are SO worth your time.
