Chapter Thirty

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Chapter Thirty

TPOV

There was someone in my room.  

Someone that was not Aidan.  

My first thought was to the lockless door that still graced our apartment that offered no protection whatsoever if someone wanted to break in and steal something.  Or, ya know, more extreme, kill us.  

My second thought was that thieves and murderers don’t normally cry when they break and enter.  

That could only mean it was one person.

“Allison?”  Why wasn’t she crawling in bed with me?

I had the window open and the curtains were never totally shut, so some light always spilled in my room along with the sirens and the traffic noises and the random people that yelled at all hours of the day and night.  It was amazing that over all of that, I could make out not only her voice, but the sounds of her crying.  She wasn’t crying hard; it wasn’t like a sobbing kind of crying, but it was enough that I could notice.  

She didn’t answer me and I struggled to wake and sit up.  “Allison?  What’s wrong?  What happened?”

She was standing over the bed so I reached out and grabbed her hand, pulling her closer.  I risked a glance to the clock; the last digit changed from a nine to a zero; it was 3:40am.  She moved easily enough, sort of shuffling forward towards me and I threw back the sheet and the light blanket on the bed.  She still hadn’t said anything.  I pulled a final time when she could have just knelt on the bed and she sort of collapsed into me, her arms wrapping around my neck and her legs shifting under her so she was in a ball in my lap.  

Not how I saw this morning starting.  I held onto her, letting her cry into my neck and moved back so I could sit against the wall and rock her slightly.  “What happened?”  I asked into her hair.  

Nothing.  Not in a talkative mood then.  

That was not good for my imagination.  

“Did something happen at the club?”  I knew she worked tonight; that had been one of the reasons I slept here.  It wasn’t that I hadn’t slept at her place when she wasn’t there; I just didn’t particularly enjoy hanging out with Jordan there.  It was weird to take a shower and come out and have Jordan standing there waiting, or walk out to get coffee and find her reading in the kitchen.  It was slightly less weird because she’d taken a couple of showers at my place, but in the long run, it was just easier to sleep at my place.  We reached an agreement, I think, but we weren’t gonna be hanging around alone together.  

She didn’t say anything, but she shook her head, her hair tickling my chin.  Ok.  Well, that eliminated about half of my worst nightmares.  It wasn’t a topic I brought up a lot, because it was a sore spot and she needed a job, and I had really no right to ask her to stop.  But my imagination was wide, and if I could imagine shit that could happen, so could most of the assholes that came in there.  It wasn’t that they saw her naked; I could actually deal with that.  She was mine when she came home and it didn’t bother me as much as it did at first.  It was what they could get away with and no one would bat an eyelash.  It was the attitude that could come along with a strip club that terrified me some nights.  

So if it wasn’t at the club it had to be something else.  “Is Jordan ok?”

She let out a soft sob but nodded instead into my chin.  Ok.  There really wasn’t anybody else to ask about.  There was that guy and his wife that sent the postcards, but... I doubted she would have gotten a call or anything about them at this hour.  Shit.  “What is it?  What happened?”

She shook her head; I wasn’t getting it out of her right now.  So I resigned myself to the fact that she seemed ok.  She didn’t seem injured, not physically anyway, and not that it was any better, but it gave me a small measure of sanity.  I just didn’t know what would get her this upset.  

She cried until it was nearly light out, her arms eventually getting tired and fisting in my shirt, the material wet under where she’d been crying for so long.  She stayed all bundled in the ball in my lap, like the smaller she was the easier it would be for me to calm her.  I gave up trying to make her quiet or tell me what had happened, trying just to soothe her, and even before she stopped, the tears had lessened and the noises—the sobbing, the breath hitching—had evened out.  Her body kind of gave in then, I think, and she just went limp in my arms, and I adjusted her so she could sleep for a while, stretching her legs out and tipping her head back so her face wasn’t smashed into my shoulder and neck.  

I moved the hair off her face, some of the strands wet and clumped from the tears, and that’s when I noticed the bruising.  Jesus fuck.  Was she mugged or something?  There was a bruise forming on her temple and I tipped her head to see the cheek she was pressing into me was going to be sporting one, too.  Her lip was split and it looked like her chin had a scrape on it, too.  

I had to force myself not to wake her, the rage building now because someone had done this to her.  And if it hadn’t been at the club, then there was the possibility that she hadn’t even known who it was.  There’d be no one for me to take it out on.  No one’s face could pay if she didn’t know who’d done it.  

I’m not sure exactly how I made it through the hours until she woke.  I think I devised every form of punishment for whoever did this several times over and could probably get away with their body being dumped in the Hudson, and not get caught with the detail I put into it by then.  I kept reminding myself that she was upset and she’d come to me, and that meant I couldn’t completely fly off the handle when she explained what happened or else she wasn’t going to tell me.  

She woke groggily, like it was hard for her to surface, and she groaned while she stretched against me.  For a minute, she seemed confused that I was there. “Tyler?”

“Hey.”

“What…”  It dawned on her a second later when the cut on her lip pulled as she was going to ask the rest of that sentence.  Instead her hand came up and traced her lip.

“Happened?” I finished for her.

Her eyes cut to mine and she flexed her hand and I realized that was bruised, too, so she hadn’t gone down without a fight.  That made me inexplicably happy; maybe they looked as bad as she did.

She groaned and sniffed once.  “Nothing.”

“Bullshit,” I said, forcing my voice to stay calm even though my heart was nearly beating out of my chest already.  “Tell me.”

She shook her head.  “I just needed somewhere to go.  So I came to you.”

I nodded. “Yes, you should.  You should always come to me.  I’m glad you did.  But I want to know what happened.  Who did this to you?”

She sighed.  “You have to promise me you won’t do anything.”

“I can’t promise you that.”

“Tyler.”

“Allison.”

She sighed again, heavier this time and pulled away, out of my lap and sat next to me against the wall.

“Who did this to you?”

Her head went back to rest on the wall.  “The fucking landlord, ok?”

“The landlord?” I repeated completely unnecessarily, trying to even come up with a picture of him in my mind.  I think I’d only seen him once.  He was a thin, balding man that always looked rumpled and probably was the kingpin of a kiddie porn ring or something.  

“He was over a few times because of the water, remember?”

I nodded.  Of course I remembered.  That was pretty much the main reason Jordan and I had reached the agreement.  She needed something and I was nice enough to help.  I also attempted a shower there recently, and yes, it was really fucking cold.  

“And why did he decide it was a good night to bruise the shit out of you?”  I was so impressed with my calm tone because that was so not what was going on inside of me at the moment.  

“I dunno.  He just…like…  I can’t explain it.”

“Well, try.”  That was probably less controlled than I wanted it to be.  

More sighing.  

“Start at the beginning.”

“Fuck.  I came home from work and he was there waiting.  Jordan was coming home, but she was a while behind me.  I left first.  I didn’t know he was going to be there but he was waiting by the door.  No fucking idea how he even knew we’d be home then unless he’d been waiting there half the night or something which is even creepier for me to think about.”

I agreed completely.

“So he made some small talk and said he got the part for the hot water heater and wanted to try out the water in our apartment because we had so many problems.  And so I let him in.”

She stopped here.  I have no idea why.  I think she might have been waiting for me to tell her how stupid that was or something, but he was the fucking landlord and should have been able to be trusted and I wasn’t going to rag on her for anything when her face looked like that.  I shuddered to think what the rest of her might look like and then had to take some deep, cleansing breaths when I started to consider what else he might have done that didn’t include her face and I totally had to interrupt.  

“He went into the kitch—”

“Did he do anything else to you?  As in not to your face?”

Her breath hitched and I nearly hit the roof.  As it was, my nail marks might be permanently imbedded in the mattress; that was if I had any nails left by the time she was done with this story.

“Fuck,” I said under my breath.

“No, Tyler.”  She turned to me and started talking quickly.  “I mean, I’ll get to that.  But… He didn’t… I didn’t let him.”  

I breathed out slowly, taking a huge gulp of air.  The anger I felt was completely rational when I thought about the things he could have done to her.  She seemed even more agitated now that I reacted that way.  I looked at her, making sure she was keeping eye contact.  Her eyes were all bloodshot and scared.  Fuck.  I reached a hand out slowly and traced the bruise on her cheek. “It wouldn’t have mattered.  I mean, his death would have been a lot more painful and much more drawn out, but this wasn’t your fault.  You know that right?”

She nodded but I didn’t think she really believed me at this point.  

“Keep going,” I said.

“So he tried the sink in the kitchen and I dunno if I was just tired or just let my guard down or what, but he said since the shower was having so many problems, he should check that, too, and I dunno what I was thinking, Tyler.”  She started to talk faster.  “I mean, it’s all the same fucking water, ya know.  If the water in the kitchen was fine, the water in the shower should have been fine, too, and so I just let him go into the bathroom and I went to my room, and I started changing and when I turned around, he was standing right there in the doorway.

Ok, this man was dying.  There were no two ways about it.  “He what?”

Her eyes flickered to me. “I think he watched me change.  I mean, I shut the door or, ya know, as much as… I didn’t shut it all the way.” She shook her head, ashamed or something.  “I didn’t lock it or close it all the way, but I know I pushed it so it was mostly closed before I started changing.  And then he was just there.”

I started clenching my teeth so hard that I was giving myself a headache.  “And then what?”  How I was even managing these questions, I had no idea.

“Fuck.  I dunno.  Then he was just all over me and telling me I changed for him and that he’d knock some more off of the rent if I gave him a little on the side and we were already getting a good deal because the roof leaked and he’d been more than generous and I was teasing him and I don’t… I hadn’t been teasing him.  I don’t even talk to him unless we have a problem with something and then it’s always really short.  There’s no way I could have been teasing him.  I don’t tease guys.  I mean, that’s just…”  She sort of started rambling here and I think somewhere in the middle of it, I realized she was trying to convince me or something.  Like I needed her to tell me that she didn’t constantly lead guys on or make them think they were gonna get fucked out of the deal when she didn’t even look at them much less interact with them.  “I’ve never seen him in the club so I mean, it’s not like he’s seen me there and I don’t even know how he knows that Jordan and I are strippers but neither of us… I just don’t… I didn’t tell him anything.  I didn’t say it was ok.  I didn’t ask him for more off on rent or tell him that I’d fuck him or blow him or… I had the door closed!”

“Allison.” I grabbed her hand. “I’m sure you didn’t do anything.  He’s just a fucking asshole.  And he saw an opportunity.  What did he do to you?”

She waved me off like that was an unimportant part to this story.  “It doesn’t even matter.  I just.  I don’t get it.  I didn’t do anything.  I didn’t offer him anything.”

I nodded. “I know, baby.  I know.  I know you didn’t offer him anything.  He took advantage of the situation.  I want to know what he did to you.”  She sounded so lost.  And it wasn’t really in my normal repertoire to use terms of endearment like that; it’d kind of just slipped out in reaction to the panic and desperation that was in her voice.  In fact, I could only remember one other time I’d used one at all, and it just slipped out that time, too.  She hadn’t said anything about it then, and I didn’t know if that was because she liked it or hated it, so I hadn’t done it again.  So many were so extremely cheesy or ridiculous or tacky, and the connotations of some of them were far more suspect and just wrong and cheap.  It wasn’t like I expected her to say anything about this one now, either.  

She just looked at me like she was confused.  

“I trust you,” I said.  

She started crying again.

Fuck.  Trust was a good thing!  

I couldn’t hear a lot of what she was saying this time; there were too many hiccups and catches in her breath but there was a lot about ‘not wanting it’ and ‘not again’ and thinking she’d gotten ‘away’ from shit like that and I’m not sure if she was really talking to me or herself or someone else or what, but I just held onto her and tried to keep telling her that she hadn’t done anything wrong and it was all innocent and he was the fucking asshole that did everything.  

When she finally told me, it all just poured out in a rush and I wasn’t sure if she was trying to barrel through it for my sake or she was just trying to get it over with; probably both.  

“He just tried to touch me at first.  Like, he ran his hand up my arm and tried to touch my face but the way he was looking at me was just… It was so disgusting.  And he wasn’t even seeing me.  He kept saying I was always teasing him and he knew I was a stripper and I don’t even fucking talk to the cocksucker unless we have a problem and it’s not like we leave the apartment naked with our tits taped.  And then he started talking about my pussy and how good it was gonna feel and how much he wanted to be with me and he was sure I was good and would feel really good wrapped around him and when I started fighting it, it was like it all just got worse.  He said he liked fighters and I didn’t have to lie still and that made it more fun and I scratched him, like, tried to gouge his fucking eyes out, and he totally fucking gut punched me, and I couldn’t fight then, and he was grabbing my tits and trying to kiss me and take my pants off at the same time, and I kept trying to move him off of me, and I was screaming at him and then he started hitting me because I was screaming and that wasn’t being good and,” she shuddered, “his hands on me were so fucking gross.  Like, all clammy and wet and pushy and he liked hitting me.  I could tell.  I shoulda fucking known he was hitter.  When he got my pants undone, he stopped to move them off and then when he went to undo his pants, I kneed him in the balls and then kicked him in the head for good measure before I ran out and came here.”

I don’t think she taken more than a few breaths through the whole thing.  And I was kind of left reeling from not only flashes of all that fucking internet shit I read about the assholes who think they can get away with anything because someone holds a certain occupation but this wave of helplessness that washed over me; for her, for me, for both of us, and everything, was just monumental.  The thought of what could have happened if she couldn’t have fought him off and he’d fucking beat her up and raped her and then left her for dead, broken and bleeding if he hadn’t killed her; I couldn’t handle it.  I couldn’t even entertain that train of thought.  Ever.  And it was almost worse because I’d already figured out that she’d been a prostitute, and I could only imagine how something like this could compound on the experiences she must have had with that.  And I had no way to know if things like that happened to her before on a regular basis.  I just… No.  

“C’mon,” I said, lifting her up and grabbing her hand once we were standing.  “We’re gonna take a shower.”

She looked at me for a second before nodding.  Once we were in the bathroom, I turned on the water and let it warm before turning to her.  She was just standing there, looking lost and tired and I kept fighting with myself; the wrathful Tyler wanted to just stick her under the spray and make a trip to her apartment building, but the rational Tyler knew she needed me here.  She needed me to take care of her.  But the way she looked, her posture and the defeat radiating off of her made me so fucking furious, I had to bite my tongue until I tasted blood to keep myself on track.  I approached her slowly, hugging her first and holding her for a minute before I gently started taking her clothes off.  She just let me, watching sort of detachedly as I unzipped the navy blue hoodie that she’d stolen from my bedroom a few weeks ago.  We never really talked about it.  She’d given me a raised eyebrow a few times and I’d smiled in return, and that had sufficed as conversation on the matter.  She borrowed shirts and shit all the time, and some never made it back, so her acquisition of this one hadn’t bothered me.  

“I like this on you,” I said quietly as I pushed it off of her shoulders, hoping that it wouldn’t have negative emotions attached to it now.  I could always find her another one though.  We could ceremoniously burn this one if she wanted.  

She brought her gaze up, smiling gently.  

“I have other ones,” I said.  

She nodded and I filed that away to get her one when we were done.  Maybe I’d strangle him with this one or make him eat half of it.  I could use the cord from the hood as a weapon…

I grabbed the bottom of her T-shirt, misshapen and already worn but now grossly overstretched from him.  I bit my tongue again, trying to keep my face emotionless or at least keep the rage off of it.  I pulled it upwards, skimming my fingertips along her sides and watched as her arms went up and the shirt came off over her head.  I didn’t watch where it landed because my eyes were roving over her body, categorizing marks that hadn’t been there the last time I’d seen her.  Her arms came down slowly and I fixed my hands on her hips, my thumbs rubbing gently over the skin there.  Her hands came to rest on my arms and his fingerprints were completely recognizable.  The bruises weren’t bad; but the five-finger marks were indelible for the moment and their positioning was unmistakable.  They were the hands of someone who was forcing and holding her down.  I closed my eyes for a second because the images were just too much and I needed to remain calm for her.  Indelible.  I wondered how many indelible marks she had, but the completely insane thing was how ironic that was because most of her marks were completely permanent but totally unseen.  A thought occurred to me that made my eyes shoot wide open and I bent to grab her eye line, holding her chin gently with one hand and moving the other to rest on her stomach. “Did he hurt you inside?”

She swallowed thickly.  “N-no, he didn’t get inside, Tyler.”

I shook my head, fucking hell he would have been dead already if that would have happened.  There would have been no cap on my revenge then.  I wouldn’t have waited.  “No.” I said that way too harshly because she flinched at my anger and I blew out a breath through my nose before I started again.  “That’s not what I meant.”  There, that as much calmer.  “I meant when he punched you, did he bruise you inside?  Maybe we should take you to the hospital.”  Why hadn’t I thought of that before?  Good God, she could be bleeding internally right now.  

She smiled sadly.  “No, I’m fine.  I’ve taken a punch before.”

That was not exactly reassuring.  “Are you sure?”

She nodded. “It’s fine.  Really.”

I nodded back, pressing a kiss to her forehead but I would also watch her closer than I already was.  I inspected the rest of her upper body, but it seemed that her arms had taken the brunt of his violence.  The raging part reminded me that her face took a lot of the brunt, too, and I wished she would have let me get ice or something last night because her cheek was slightly swollen and her lip looked as painful as I remembered mine being.  When I was satisfied that the upper half wasn’t harboring anything life-threatening, I dropped to my knees and looked up at her.  I’d looked at her like this so many times in the last few weeks, but the difference with this was so clear from the colors on her face, I found it hard to keep eye contact.  Rationally, I knew there was nothing I could have done to prevent this, but there was still a part of me that felt intensely guilty because I hadn’t been there to protect her.  If I’d stayed tonight, if I’d slept there, this wouldn’t have happened, and from now on, I’d just learn to deal with however uncomfortable Jordan’s presence was.  Her hands landed in my hair and stroked through the strands softly and I just pressed my face to her stomach for a minute and reveled in the thought that she was here and while slightly worse for the wear, she was ok.  That brought me up short though and I pulled back too quickly and her hands moved immediately.  

Her face was worried, and I knew from the look it wasn’t concern for me at the moment, she was worried I’d thought of something and was angry at her or some other nonsense that I couldn’t even fathom.  Question lingered in her eyes.  

It was sort of amusing, I suppose, that I found myself apologizing for some other asshole beating her up while kneeling in front of her as the bathroom filled with steam.  “I’m sorry, Allison.”

Question was replaced with confusion and her hands came back to my head, cupping my cheek. “For what?”

“For not being there.  For letting this happen.”

She lowered herself to my lap immediately, like one of those toys that Michael had when he was a baby.  The kind that you pressed the bottom and the figure went all limp like the strings were cut and I wound up half sitting and half kneeling.  “You didn’t let this happen.  You weren’t even there.”

How did this turn into her reassuring me?  There was so much wrong with that.  “If I would have slept there last night, I would have been there.  It wouldn’t have happened.”

She sighed. “Tyler, you couldn’t have known.  You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“You didn’t either.  And I should have protected you.”

“You can’t always protect me.”

Fuck. That.  I met her gaze.  “Watch me.”

She didn’t argue with me and that was wise.  I dropped her gaze and instead she ran her fingers through my hair which was cheating because she knew it calmed me and I really didn’t know if I wanted to be calm.  I let her though, because I did.  I needed to let this go and get back to focusing on her.  I could deal with my own protective inadequacy later.  With my fist in his face.  I cleared my throat and looked at her again.  “C’mon, let’s finished getting undressed and get in the shower.”

She stood wordlessly and I looked up again before I started on her pants, but her hands stayed in my hair and I could only describe the look on her face as fondness, which was just…whatever.  I didn’t want her to look at me with fondness right now.  I wanted to erase all of this for her and then there could be fondness or something.  Fucking hell, I just needed to get her in the shower.  I popped the button and undid the zipper, slowly shimmying the pants down, grabbing her underwear, too.  We were so burning all of this clothing.  I stood quickly after appraising her legs and lifted her out of the pile before she could step out, and she rested her head on my chest for a minute before I set her down.  

I told her all the time that she needed to let me take care of her and it was kinda fucked up that this was the situation that made her allow that, but I was incredibly grateful she was letting me because I think I needed to do it almost as much as she might have needed me to.  I popped the clasp on her bra while she was still resting against me and she backed up to take it off.  She said he’d been rough with her breasts and I was happy that the bra must have lessened the roughness because they looked ok.  I stripped wordlessly and quickly, not letting her help because it wasn’t about that and picked her up again, depositing both of us in tub.  

Once we were under the spray, I leaned her back into me and let the water run over us.  “We’ll wash him away, ok?”

Her head turned toward me but she didn’t say anything.

I ran my hands over her gently, no soap to start, just kissing all the bruises I could find and filing away their positions because that motherfucker was gonna get every one back tenfold.  I couldn’t erase what he did, but I could sure as hell try to erase the association, make a new memory.

I thought it was going pretty damn well.  She was relaxing into me more and she dropped the lost and wounded animal look along with the guilt because there wasn’t anything to be fucking guilty over.  I kept telling her she hadn’t done anything wrong.  

I was being all supportive and shit and then I dunno, like, right in the middle of all of it, I was kissing her neck and then she kind of just went limp again and I had to react really fucking quickly or she would have been a heap on the floor of the tub.  

“Allison?”

She was crying again, but this time like, deep, guttural, couldn’t-catch-her-breath at all kind of weeping and I didn’t know what the fuck to do.  What did I do?  Or didn’t do?  

We wound up a tangled ball on the floor of the shower as I tried to figure out what had happened again.  

It was scary when she stopped.  Because it was just like a switch.  Like something inside her snapped and she just, stopped.  Completely.  “Tyler, I have to tell you something.”

I wrestled her between my legs, holding her against my chest because I was worried otherwise she was going to hurt herself but she stayed perfectly still.  It didn’t even feel like she was breathing against me.  “Ok.”  

She tried to pull away but I held her to me.  She shook her head, “No, I have… I want to see you.”

I let go immediately, my hands resting on my knees but she didn’t move at all.

Whatever this was, it felt…huge.  Maybe she wanted to look at me, but she wasn’t gonna be able to.  She didn’t move at all.  “Tell me,” I urged.

She sighed heavily, the fog from the water rising around us.  It was sort of ethereal, the whole atmosphere.  There was resignation when she started, she pulled her legs up to her chest and held onto her knees.  So she was with me, but, not.  This set her apart from us.  I was still there, behind her, but she’d pulled away, almost like she was protecting herself.  “I haven’t told you because…well, because I figured that’d be like the last straw.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well I mean with the stripping and all the slowness with the dating and the sex and everything.  I didn’t want that last thing.  I liked this.”

Past tense was not good.  Not good at all.  “What do you mean liked?”  I wasn’t letting that one go.

“I mean, after I tell you this, it won’t…” She sighed. “You won’t…”

“Try me.”  I knew what this was already.  And in a way, it was really good that I did.  Because being blindsided with it after someone had tried to rape her, probably wouldn’t have been a good combination.  It still wouldn’t have changed anything between us, but it just would have been a lot to take in in one night.  

There was a hint of a smile at the edge of her mouth, but she didn’t turn to me at all, still huddled around herself.  “I… I… Fuck.  I knew this was gonna be hard, but…” She trailed off and I just let her, giving her the space or whatever she needed to get this out.  She took another deep breath.  “Tyler, I used to be a hooker.”

Yep.  

She expected me to react badly to this.  And I wasn’t going to.  It probably would have taken more effort if I hadn’t already figured it out, but I already had time to reconcile this with myself.  I had time to try to better understand her with that bit of information.  So it wasn’t nearly the big reveal she thought it was.  She craned back to look at me.  I raised my eyebrows.  “Yeah.  And?”

She shrugged, turning back. “And nothing.  I was a whore.  I fucked for money.  Whatever.  I sold my body.”

“Ok.”

“Ok?  Did you not just hear me?”

“Yes, I did.”

“Right.  And you heard the part about the whore.  Sold my pussy for money.  Got paid to give blowjobs.”

“I heard you, Allison,” I said quietly. 

“And…”

“And what?”  I shook my head. “That doesn’t change anything between us.”

Her eyebrows pulled down.  This was so not the way she saw this going.  “But…”

“What did you think I’d say?”

“I dunno.” She shrugged.  “I thought you’d be pissed.  Dump me.  Throw me out.  Yell.  Tell me what a dirty, horrible, awful, disgusting person I am, and you’d never want to be with me now.”

I let out a breath. “I really hope you don’t think that.  About yourself, I mean.”

I really kind of wanted to laugh at her confusion.  “Tyler… I really don’t think you understand.”

“No, I understand perfectly.  It makes a lot of sense and I already figured it out.  So, it’s not really a big shock.”

“Not really a big shock?”

“No.  I mean, I think you’ve been sort of leading me there the entire time.  It all just kinda added up.  I just didn’t have the definite answer and I was never gonna ask.  The hadn’t dated thing.  Only dated assholes and then it wasn’t really dating.  Didn’t need to get off.  Didn’t have experience with a relationship.  Always one sided.  Never had a guy get you off.  Never gotten off during sex.  No boyfriends.  Knew what it was like for people to sell themselves, true greed.  I mean… I’m not the brightest bulb in the box, but the light goes on sometimes.”

She snorted and I smiled. 

There was apprehension, but a little bit of hope mixed in there, too, when she said slowly, “So… you’re…ok?  With this?”

“It’s your past, right?”

“Yes.”

I shrugged. “Everyone has one.  I’m not going to hold that against you.”  I stopped and then added, “I have some questions, though.”

“Of course.”

“And, I mean, I want you to tell me whatever you want, but… I’d like to understand that part of your life.”

“Ok.”

“Can I ask you one right now?”

“Yeah.”

“Why did you decide to tell me now?”

She shrugged, relieved that was my question, I think.  “I dunno.  I think because the landlord thing just kinda brought it all back.  I’ll never be a normal girl, Tyler.”

“You look pretty normal to me.”

“No, I mean.  Other people will never see me as normal.  I must give off some used-to-be-a-whore vibe or something.  That won’t go away.  For whatever reason, men think they can take what they want from me.  They think because I was one, I’ll always be one.  And maybe they’re right.  Maybe I’ll always be a whore because I was one.”

“I don’t think that.  I didn’t immediately think when I first saw you that ‘Oh, she must have been a whore.’  And that isn’t true.  You are who you think you are.  You’re only a whore if you still think you’re one.  I don’t think that.  I don’t think that because you were one, you’ll always be one.”

“You’re different.”  She shrugged.

“Maybe you just meet all the people that are different.  Maybe I’m normal and all the ones you come across are just the lowest scum of the earth.”

“And what does that say about me then?  If that’s who comes around me?”

“It means that you attract undesirable men but once in a while, you get a decent one.  Not all the guys you meet are like that.”

She shrugged again. “I dunno, Tyler.  Men just always seem to think I’m usable.”

“Well I’m a man.  And I don’t think that.  This thing with the landlord was a fluke.  You just happened to be there and he was like the other guys that think that way.  It wouldn’t have mattered if it’d been you or Jordan or anyone else.  Some guys are just like that.”

She shook her head, resting her head on her knees.  “I don’t think so.”

I put my arms around her and I was happy she didn’t pull away.  I just held her for a minute and then started talking.  “This is what I think.  And I don’t know everything, but I can guess.  And I think because you were really young when this started, your entire worldview is made up of the worst possible scenarios because that’s what happened to you.  But it’s not your fault.  None of it is your fault.  It’s not your fault that the landlord wanted to fuck you tonight any more than it’s your fault you got dragged into prostitution.  And none of that changes how I feel about you.  You’re still the same person you were this morning.”  I stopped and sighed. “And I realize that you probably think that’s all bullshit right now, but I’ll just make it another one of my missions to make you see things my way.”

She chuckled and I smiled, squeezing her. 

Her voice was small when she talked again. “I just think at some point, you’re going to realize that I’m just not worth all of that.  That it is me, that I’m just some…damaged girl that you can’t fix, Tyler.”

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly.  I was gonna need to read more psychology shit.  “I don’t think you’re damaged.  Why would you think you’re damaged?”

She scoffed, but she didn’t change her tone or raise her voice.  It was all resigned, like it was just fact.  No emotion behind it.  “Tyler, c’mon.  I mean, the things that I’ve done or things that have been done to me, it’s not… I’m not… It takes something from you.”

I realized she was probably going to tell me the things she’d done and the things that had been done to her and I was going to have to listen to that and just be supportive and understanding and try not to put my fists through walls because they couldn’t do it anymore.  So. Much. Psychology.  Deep breaths were becoming the norm here. “Then we’ll figure out how to get it back.”

“I don’t think you can get it back.”

“Well you got me, right?  And you think I’m normal.  Why would I be here with you if I didn’t think you weren’t worth it?”

She faltered for a minute. “I… I dunno.  I don’t think it’ll last.  I think eventually you’ll leave.”

I didn’t stop holding her but I did move a hand and pinch between my eyes for a second.  “Allison, I’m not going anywhere.  If you just told me this really huge thing that you thought was gonna send me running, and I’m still here, that must mean I’m in it for the long haul, right?”

She shrugged.

“Well I’m not going anywhere, am I?  I haven’t run yet.”

“I know.”

“So, logically, it would seem then that I’m not going to.”

More shrugging.  It was incredibly frustrating when she shrugged.  “Did someone tell you that?  That you weren’t worth it?”

She chuckled humorlessly. “Yeah, all the time.”

“Have I ever said that?”

“No.”

“And if they were all assholes and I’m normal, then who’s right?”

“Maybe you just can’t see it.”

“Ugh.  I see you.  I can see you.”  I ran my hands up and down her arms.  “There’s nothing here that I see that I don’t like or I don’t think is worth it.”

“I don’t know what it is about you.  That confuses me, too.  That you’d wait.  That you’d want to for me.”

I thought about telling her about love.  About how I didn’t really know what that meant.  I mean, I knew what it meant to love family and to lose that, and that I hadn’t really ever felt that for another person.  Or how you can hate someone you love and then that just got my train of thought on a whole tangent that she didn’t need to hear right now because she’d probably think I was referencing her or something, and in reality I meant my father, and holy fucking Christ, I needed more. psychology.  Love.  Stick with love.  I’d thought about that a lot in the last few weeks.  If I was being hopelessly romantic, I could easily admit I’d loved her from the first moment she blew me off in the bar and challenged everything I said, making it incredibly difficult and infuriating to talk to her.  If I was being realistic, I could still easily admit that I loved her.  I wouldn’t have done all this shit if I didn’t care and if that wasn’t some type of love, then I didn’t know what it was at all.  It was so much more than just patiently waiting to get laid.  I cared about what it would do to her.  That it was something she needed time to work up to or be comfortable with.  I just cared about her.  Everything else was window dressing.  So I could tell her that I loved her but that seemed almost cliché to do right now.  Maybe I could tell her instead what I loved about her without telling her that I loved her directly.  Telling her directly right now would probably confuse her more if she couldn’t even see why I’d want to wait to have sex with her.  That was just decency, really.  Anyone decent enough should want to wait for their significant other to be ready.  The alternative would have made me her goddamn landlord.  It would have made me not only a dickhead, but basically a rapist as well.  But telling her what I loved about her would at least give her examples that would help frame the picture for her. 

“Allison, none of this may sink in at the moment because you’re stubborn.”  She let out a soft chuckle.  “But I’m still going to tell you.”  I tightened my grip on her.  “First of all, normal, decent men will wait.  It actually has nothing to do with their girl’s personality or their past or anything.  The fact is that a nice guy won’t even need to know why you want to wait.  That’s just what’s right.  If the girl says no, the guy stops.  Flat out decency.  If I didn’t want to wait for you, that would make me shallow and selfish and I would obviously only be after sex and nothing else.  I’d be like your landlord.”

I waited a few minutes, letting that soak in before I continued and reached around us to turn the water hotter.  It was sort of fitting I suppose, that this entire conversation was taking place in my shitty bathtub with the water droplets falling around us like we were out in the rain.  Blessedly, my building didn’t have hot water heater issues and because the tanks serviced the entire building, we rarely ran out of hot water. 

I placed my mouth right next to her ear, maybe then the words would filter in through the stubborn web of denial and self-esteem issues.  What was weird was that she was an incredibly self-assured person normally.  She didn’t take any shit from anyone and she didn’t have a problem speaking up or speaking her mind or telling someone to fuck off.  She really didn’t present as a person that had self-esteem problems.  It was just when something like this, when something like the landlord brought her back to a time before she was self-assured or before it really mattered, that things like this came about.  I’d seen glimpses of course, times when her confusion over something I did made it evident that her life had been so much different than mine.  Evident because they were normal, everyday things to me; things that didn’t need reasons or descriptions behind them.  She hid a lot.  She hid her insecurities because showing them had always meant disaster before. 

“I think you’re worth it and you don’t have to understand or see why I think so.  A lot of times, I can’t understand why you’d want to be with me.”  She was going to speak up here, but I made her button that shit up for the moment. “Shut up.  This isn’t about me.”  I smiled when she clamped her mouth shut and smiled against her knees.  “I’m not looking for you to stroke my ego.  I know I’m patient.  I try to be a decent guy, but I come with enough baggage, too. And it’s always easier to understand something outside of yourself than see it in the mirror.  But whenever I look at you, you’re worth it.”

I cupped my hands over hers on her knees.  “You’re beautiful.”  I quickly added because there was going to be protest or rebuttal, “Shut up.”  There was a smile again.  “You’re beautiful.”  And I paused, letting the water beat down for a few seconds before I kept going.  “You’re smart.”  Pause.  “You’re funny.”  Pause.  “You’re an excellent cook.”  She chuckled.  “I love your body.”  I pressed a kiss to her shoulder.  “You have a great ass.” That one got me another chuckle.  “You have the most beautiful green eyes I’ve ever seen.”  I felt her sigh.  “I love to hear you laugh and I love when you laugh and it’s because of me.”

She still had the smile on her face so I knew she was listening, but her eyes were closed.  She looked incredibly peaceful and it was such a rare thing that I had to stop for a few seconds.  I squeezed her gently before I continued.  “I love your smile and I love the feel of your lips when you kiss me.  I love when you’re sleeping and your hand fists in my T-shirt.  I love feeling your breath over my chest.  I love how warm you are and how half of your body is always thrown over mine when we sleep.  I love the way you eat a sandwich.”

“What?” she chuckled, her eyes opening. 

“You eat your sandwiches outside in.  You eat the crust first and save the middle for last, but not if it’s a burger. If it’s a burger, you just eat it all the way through.”

“You’re so fucking weird.”

“Yep,” I agreed.  I sighed. “I love that if I’ve had a shit day, all I have to do is see you and I feel better.” 

“I love when you yank on my hair when you’re coming and I hate when I’m so into it that I miss watching your face.  I love that you trust me because most people assume I’m not capable.”

“I love the way you take care of me and don’t even realize you’re doing it but I’m grateful you do and that you try to let me, too, even though I’m shit at it.”

“I love the feeling of being with you.”

“I could keep going, but it really doesn’t matter how many things I come up with.  They’re all real and true to me, and the only one that can make them true for you, is you.  But I’m not wasting my time and I wouldn’t if I didn’t think you weren’t worth everything.”  I let that just hang there for a little bit and I knew she was crying, but they were the silent kind of tears. 

“I really could have gone on for a bit longer, but my ass is numb and I really want to stand up.”

She burst out laughing, picking her head up from her knees and looking back at me.  That one smile was monumental. 

“Can I wash him away?”

She nodded slowly. 

We stood up and I started with her hair, working the shampoo in until she was sighing against me.  I loved the feel of her skin under my hands, the way it was even slipperier with the soap.  The way the white suds would cling to her skin and my hands and the way the water would wash away all evidence that the soap had been there.  I wished I could do that with the bruises, too.  Even if I couldn’t erase the physical traces, this seemed like a cleansing anyway, making things fresh for her, some sort of renewal by water. 

I ran my hands down her arms, slick with soap, my thumbs lingering in the bends of her elbows before moving down the rest of her forearm.  Her left arm had a scar on it, a rather large X right below the elbow on the inside.  I’d come across it before of course, many times, and I’d lingered there before, but I only asked her about it once, and it’d been on a night when she’d told me a few other pieces of her past and I didn’t push it.  It was an ugly scar.  Misshapen but so distinct that it had to be deliberate.  It was older, but still very visible.  

“What’s this from?” I asked gently.  

Her gaze followed mine, and she answered quickly with little emotion.  “Last foster dad I had before the group home.”

I ran my thumb over the bumpy mark. “Why?”

She shrugged. “Not sure really.  I don’t remember doing anything.”

I shook my head and pulled her closer. “Allison, nothing you did should have warranted this.  Ever.”

She turned to look at me. “Things in foster homes don’t always go the same way they do in a normal one.”

“Well, things in normal homes don’t always go that way either, but that’s not an excuse.”

“I’m not excusing it.  I’m just telling you.”

“That’s awful.”

She shrugged again.  “Wasn’t the first time.  It was the last though.  I was labeled problematic after that home.  That’s why I went to the group home.”

“Problematic?” I chuckled, turning that word around in my head for a while and wondering what she was like as a kid.  “How old were you?” I asked, my thumb still rolling over the mark.

“About fourteen I think.”

“I’m sorry.” I leaned down and pressed a kiss there.

“Why are you sorry?” she asked, her hand curling around my neck as I let her arm go.

“I’m sorry it happened to you.  I’m sorry everything happened to you.”

“You don’t have to be sorry.  I’ve told you that before.”

“Well, I am.  And I want you to tell me about every one.  All the scars.  I want to know all the bad things, too, because then you don’t have to carry them alone.”

“How can you carry them for me?  They’re mine.”

“You remember when I told you about Michael?”

“Of course.”

“I hadn’t felt that…” I sighed, struggling for the right word, “light.  I hadn’t felt that light in six years.  People know about it, sure.  But they don’t know what I feel about it.  They don’t know that I still have nightmares about it.  Telling you, knowing that you knew, even if you couldn’t do something about it, it made me feel better because I wasn’t alone anymore.  You couldn’t fix it for me, but I shared it with you.  And I knew that you cared about me enough to do whatever I needed you to.  This is the same thing.”  

She took a deep breath.  

“And, I have a new memory to go with those now, too.  So if I have a day where I’m thinking about Michael a lot and they’re not fond memories, I think about you holding me that night and then it’s better,” I shrugged.  I had no idea if that would make sense to anyone else, but it was all I had.  

She nodded. “Ok.”

I ran my thumb over her cheek gently. “So today, I’m going to carry these.  Everything he did to you.  Those are mine today.  So if you start to think about them, or him, remember the shower and remember me holding you last night and then let me know if it works.”

She nodded, and I finished washing her in silence, letting my hands move over her skin and talk for me.  There wasn’t really anything else for me to say anyway.  I held her for a while after the washing was done and she always seemed so small when I held her.  The way she fit under my chin and took up literally half the space I did.  

I turned the water off and lifted her out of the tub, wrapping her in a towel and rubbing her dry.  I let her wrap up her own hair cause that shit just wasn’t happening if she wanted in any sort of orderly fashion.  I’d tried that with Caroline one time and had to listen to her scream for an hour while my mother combed out the knots.  Never again.  While she finished I grabbed a towel for myself and dried off quickly.  I ran it completely haphazardly over my hair before tying it around my waist and picking her up again.  

“Tyler, I can walk.  There’s nothing wrong with my legs.”

I smirked.  “I’m taking care of you.  That includes delivery service.”

I carried her into my bedroom and kicked the door shut before depositing her on the bed.  I leaned over her, resting my body over her and kissed her gently.  “I’ll get you something to wear.”

Her hands darted out to grab onto my shoulders.  “Tyler?”

“Yeah?”

“Can I ask you for something?”

“You can ask me for anything.  Anything.  Whatever you want.  Whatever you need.”

“I want you to fuck me.”

Honestly, not what I was expecting.  “Now?”

“Yeah.”

“Right now?”

There was a small smile.  “Yeah.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure this is the right time?”  The strictly selfish part of myself really didn’t want to ask questions like this, but it was completely necessary.  

“Yes.”

“Can I ask why you think it is?”  

She touched my cheek. “I know it is.”

“I’m not trying to tell you it’s not.  I just want you to be sure.  And for the right reasons.  I don’t want it to be as a reaction to what happened.  That wouldn’t be right.”  And I told the selfish part to shut the fuck up.  

She nodded, her fingertips playing at my jaw.  “No, it’s not because of that.  I mean, I’m sure that has something to do with it but it’s not the reason.”  She paused and looked up at me.  “It’s because it’s my choice.  Because I want it.  For me.  I haven’t wanted that before.  I’ve never wanted it for me.  I want to feel you.  I want that.  With you.”

Jesus.  I mean, I had so many conflicting emotions here.  Of course I wanted to have sex with her.  Now.  Before.  Whenever.  I think I reached a point where not having sex with her seemed impractical—that’s what had happened on the Fourth of July.  She asked me what I wanted, and I couldn’t articulate a scenario that didn’t include wanting sex with her.  I wanted it in the scope of our relationship; I was completely happy with her, but it didn’t change me wanting that.  I wanted the one thing I couldn’t have—and she came up with a great solution.  She also solidified that she wasn’t ready then.  Now it was here, and I was… I didn’t know what word to even use.  Honored?  That she wanted that with me.  That she came to that decision.  And in some odd way, I wanted to make sure I was worthy of that, too, before we agreed to just barrel into it.  Not that we would have in any way been barreling into anything; we’d been doing other shit for months.  Everything but.  I just didn’t want her to make this decision and regret it later.  Something had to be different now.  And instead of talking to myself, I should have just been asking her all of that shit.  

“I just… I don’t want you to have any regrets and realize later that this was the wrong time.”

She touched my face. “It’s not the wrong time.”

I had another thought.  “You don’t think that because you told me about the hooker shit that it means you have to do anything, right?  Because I don’t care about that.  And I’ll wait for however long you want.  It’s not an acceptance thing.  That’s not what this is.”

“No, I mean… I guess if you wouldn’t want to have sex with me now, I’d wonder if it was about that, but… No.  I mean, I just… I know I want it now.  And everything is good with us, I think, and I mean, I’ve been tested and… Please, Tyler?”

I shook my head.  Christ there was a lot in that those few sentences.  “You don’t ever have to beg me, ok?  Never.  But I’m not going to fuck you.”

Her face fell.  She looked crushed.  “What?  Why not?  You said anything.”

I ran my hand over her cheek and kissed her once. “Fucking is for later.  I don’t want that for your first time.”

She was confused.  Her brows pulled down and she was going to say something else.  

“I’ll make love to you though.  Would that be ok?”

She let out a huge breath, like she’d been holding it all night.  “Fuck.”  She let her hand fall from where it had been digging into my neck.  I suspected there would be nail indents there but I hadn’t stopped her.  She kicked me.  Completely ineffectively because I was lying over her, but she kicked me.  “Fuck, Tyler.  I thought you meant you were turning me down.”

And it probably all rushed forward.  I probably should have handled that a little differently.  Or less cheesy.  I smiled.  “I wouldn’t do that.  But I’ll fuck you some other time.”

“Ok.  That’s a promise then.”

“Oh, hell yeah it is.”

She giggled.

“But not this time.  I want to take my time.  Show you what it’s supposed to be like.  Make it good for you.”

She got this look in her eyes sometimes, like she’d reached her limit and couldn’t handle any more and she had it now.  It was like she could only take me being really decent for so long before the bar got pushed too far and then she couldn’t believe anything else.  So I needed to just show her the rest and stop talking.  

Then she started giggling.  

“What?”  This warranted no giggling.  This was serious shit.  Serious love-making about to occur.  No giggling!

She waved me off, which was amusing because I had most of her trapped beneath me and it was sort of just a hand flap.  “I’m sorry.  You just look so fucking serious.”

I chuckled and I’m sure my face lost most of the seriousness.  “Well, it is serious.  I’m being serious.”

She giggled. “I know.  I’m sorry.  I just…”  More hand flapping and giggling.  

I snorted and backed up a little, giving her some space so she could turn her hand flapping into real waving.  She looked completely ridiculous, laughing her head off on my bed all wrapped up like a taco in a towel that did not match the one turban-ing her head and I couldn’t stop the smile that broke out, or my own chuckling because…just because.  It was a very her thing.  To be all serious about everything and completely bust up laughing.  

She wiped tears from laughing away and pulled me back to her, clearing her throat.  “I’m sorry. Don’t be mad.”

“I’m not mad.”  I think I said that slightly more petulantly than I wanted to.

“It was just your face,” she tried to explain.

“Oh, that’s just what a guy wants to hear before sex.  It’s just your face made me bust up laughing.”

She burst out laughing again. “That’s not what I meant!”

I smiled and covered her mouth with mine and she abruptly lost the laughing, a single surprised sound lost in my mouth and then she moaned when I rested more of my weight on her.  That was one of my favorite sounds already; it had been since we started messing around.  Just the simple sound of her moan and knowing that it was something she liked, something that made her feel good.  Her arms went around my neck and I spent quite a long time reinvestigating her mouth.

None of this was new.  There was really only a small part, well not small, but in the grand scope of all things sexual, the part we hadn’t done was pretty small, but kissing her and everything up to it; that wasn’t new.  But this felt completely different.  Maybe it was just the significance of what I knew we were going to do.  Or that I wanted it to be different and special for her, but it all felt different.  

I broke away from her mouth, trailing kisses over to her bruised cheek and let my hands start wandering as I backed off of her.  I couldn’t keep kissing what I couldn’t see.  I hadn’t really been on the bed all the way, so I just dropped to my knees on the floor and slowly unwrapped her from the towel.  Her skin was still pink and flushed from all the time in the shower and she put her arms up and out so I could unwrap her completely, her breasts shifting with the movement.  I let my eyes roam over her body first, smiling gently and I kind of felt like this was the sexual lottery or something.  Because she was all for me.  And this was sort of backwards because I wanted it to be for her and it all seemed to be very much me in the winner’s circle.  

I moved back up the bed and her legs parted to give me access and when I tore my gaze away from her body long enough to look up at her face, she was watching me intently.

“You’re beautiful.”

I don’t think she believed me a lot of times when I said that to her, but it wasn’t a statement she’d never heard.  It was just one of those mirror things—you never saw what someone looking outside-in did.  

I moved up until I could kiss her again, her skin pressing into my chest as I descended.  “You’re beautiful.”

She nodded this time.  “You are, too.”

Her voice was kind of shaky and I smiled.  “Thank you.”

I reached up to the towel on her head and shook her hair loose before starting up the kissing again.  Her neck, her collarbone—I made sure I traced both ways while her hands landed on my shoulders and kneaded up to my head.  Her fingers fisted and her chest rose when my mouth landed on a breast, sucking the nipple to a hard peak while I let my other hand palm over the roundness of the other.  Her breathing was spotty and labored, and I don’t think she knew she did it, but every time I paid particular attention to her breasts, her lower half was constantly squirming against me like the sensations were just too much for her not to make some movement.  I loved her breasts and I made sure she knew just how much, making sure my mouth switched and gave each of them ample attention, the other hand always palming or kneading or twisting her nipple until she’d buck her hips up against me.  Finding what she liked in bed wasn’t any different than finding what she liked anywhere else.  She liked when I sucked on her nipples but wasn’t particularly fond of me pinching them.  Rolling was good and if I nipped at her with my teeth, she’d tug on my hair.  

I licked my way down the valley between her breasts and back up again while still kneading them with my hands.  I loved when her hands would fall on top of mine and we’d knead together.  I moved my hands lower, running my thumbs over her ribs and settling them on her hips while I blew air over her nipples and loved the way her back arched and her eyes squeezed shut.  I kissed my way down, swirling my tongue around her navel and dipping it inside.  Once I was that close, I sort of skipped the rest, her legs were squeezing against me, hips rocking and she blew out a breath when my hands kneaded her thighs and my mouth closed on her clit. 

“Aw, fuck, Tyler,” rolled off of her tongue before her whole body shuddered and her hands went up to her own hair, combing roughly through the strands until she pressed her hands against the wall.  Maybe that was the alternative to yanking on my hair. 

Her chest was still heaving, breathless and she hadn’t really finished the first one when I started tracing her folds with a finger.  Wetness.  Pure wetness that was just for me.  Her clit was completely swollen, her lips puffy and flushed, legs falling more open for me before I even asked, like she was unconscious of it.  I would never get tired of seeing her like this. 

I traced around her clit, but not over it, and her body squirmed wanting me there.  A long moan slipped out of her mouth when she realized a little too late that I wasn’t going to stop.  Her hips were still undulating from the last orgasm as I pushed two fingers easily inside her heat and curled them up, knowing the rubbing would get her there again quickly.  Her legs trembled with another orgasm, her body jerking and her hands moved to her breasts, kneading and teasing the nipples for something to hold onto and more sensation. 

I became keenly aware but refused to acknowledge the hardness that was throbbing against the uselessly flimsy towel, begging to bury itself in that wetness.  I groaned imaging sinking into her while her muscles were still contracting and wondered a little late if I shouldn’t have jerked off first because I refused to have her first real sexual experience end in a few thrusts.  I wondered how fast I could do that and not have her notice.  Or I could just indulge the fantasy and let the towel take the orgasm.  Good plan! 

So I would just make her come again.

Orgasm three didn’t really require anything else; I just combined everything, lowering my mouth to her and lapping at the flowing wetness, loving her fingers as they started to dig into my hair.  I licked up to her clit, sucking it the same way I had her nipples, while pushing two fingers in her first, and then adding a third, twisting them and opening her up.  If she hadn’t had sex in a while, I wanted her to be as ready as possible.  

All the while, I let my dick throb along with her motions, not attempting to staunch the release I felt building.  When she fell over the third time, her thighs compressing against my head; I just let it happen, the groans from my own release just ramping her release more, and I had enough time to wipe away the release before she was through.  

Her orgasms always seemed to last longer the more she came.  Now her face was completely flushed and she had a satisfied and lazy, happy smile.  She reached for me, pulling me up with her fingertips under my jaw when I was close enough for her to touch me.  

“Please,” was all she said, her voice gravely and still laced with shakiness.  

“You’re sure?”  One last check.

She nodded, tracing her thumb over my cheek.  The clarity in her eyes was completely undeniable.  She wanted this and I really wanted to give it to her.  I nodded back, moving us up on the bed so we were both actually on it and had enough brain power to roll over and grab a condom from the nightstand drawer.   

She surprised me when she grabbed it from me and basically tore the foil and had it on my cock before I even knew it.  She smiled at me and she didn’t look scared or nervous and I couldn’t believe that in this moment, it wasn’t completely right.  

“Nimble fingers,” I said, smirking as she lay back against the pillow and I moved back between her legs.   

She grabbed for me as I leaned over her, and I rested some of my weight on her while I pressed my forehead against hers, and enjoyed the feeling of her hand around me.   

“You ready?” I whispered, my own voice getting close to completely fucked because what I’d been thinking about for months was literally just about to happen.  

She nodded, letting me take over and I lined myself up before coming back to watch her.  I needed to see her eyes because that was the only thing that was going to tell me I needed to stop.  And if stop wasn’t going to be there, I wanted to watch her face more than I wanted to watch myself enter her.  No contest.  

Her legs were open and framing my hips as I eased between her folds and pushed the head inside.  The minute I started to push forward, her legs started hitching higher and her head pushed down into the pillow as more of me disappeared inside her.  

I can’t accurately describe the feeling.  The heat that surrounded me instantly and the warmth my whole body felt were two completely different concepts—the pressure of her walls, the feeling of her muscles on my dick, fluttering and squeezing me and stretching all at the same time to allow me in until there was nowhere else for me to go.  

Her eyes never left mine, and her mouth was open on a breath the entire time, but my breathing didn’t restart either until I was fully sheathed inside her.  It seemed like only a second, and yet a million had passed, too.  And all I wanted to do was do it again.  Part her lips and feel her body shift to accept me, and close around me again and keep me there. 

I gave her a minute to adjust before I pulled back, both of us groaning at the withdrawal.  I pushed forward again, just as deep and instantly loved that she seemed to like that most, too.  I started a slow rhythm, and dropped down to my elbows so I could kiss her, finding it hard to know what to focus on.  The minute I dropped, her hands that had been pressing against my chest hugged around my neck and back instead, and then I didn’t want to pull back anymore.  I shifted her legs so I could stay in that position, and made sure there was no part of her mouth and neck that wasn’t covered with mine.  Her legs wrapped around me and the deeper I thrust, the more her hands scrambled all over my back and I never wanted it to stop.  I never wanted this feeling to stop.  

Part of me wanted to be talking to her; telling her how beautiful she looked, and how good she felt completely wrapped around me, how much I liked the heat of her all around me, and loved the way she kept repeating my name, how wrongly adorable I found it when my name became synonymous with half the swear words in the English language, how I wanted to do this to her all the time, and how I’d pictured it being just like this, how I couldn’t imagine how people wouldn’t have wanted to treat her this way, to share this with her, and how I’d never make that mistake.  But the more I pushed inside her and the more she clung to me, the more I realized that we’d never really needed those words anyway.  I think she knew I loved her, or had some kind of concept.  Even if I’d never uttered the words because I thought it’d freak her out.  And I think, if nothing else, being with me had shown her what love could be like, what it was supposed to be about.  Because words didn’t always make things right for her, but I could usually show her, and this was no different.

I was eternally grateful to whichever part of my body had thought of the whole jerking off thing, because the sounds she was making were enough to fill masturbatory fantasies for several lifetimes.  And every time she grunted when I bottomed out, or she started squeezing my dick while raking her nails over my back, I wanted to let go, but I was determined that she was either going to come first or we’d come together, so I kept pushing it back.  

I wasn’t exactly going for slow, I just wanted her to have a full experience.  One that wasn’t about fucking right to climax or getting off as quickly as possible.  I wanted something that would build until she broke.  I didn’t really think I could get much closer, but I shifted a bit more weight on her and she moaned like taking it on was the best fucking idea I’d had yet, and I realized it was because when I thrust, she could push her hips up and get friction for her clit.  So I stayed there, her head resting on one of my hands while the other curled under her shoulder and it felt a lot like I was holding her.  

I was really glad that she found the friction because I could feel her body starting to tense and that was an awesome thing because I was not going to be able to hold on much longer.  

Coming with her was nearly inexpressible, ineffable, incommunicable, incredible, and completely indefinable.  I’ve never felt anything like it with anyone before in my entire life.  And it felt transcendent and sacred watching her come, watching and knowing that it was the first time she’d ever come while having sex just made everything else pale in comparison, even if I was aware of my own.  

There was genuine surprise on her face when I could tell it started.  Her whole body went completely rigid for a second, her head pushed back into my hand and her nails dug into my shoulders and then it was like watching the floodgates open, and her muscles clamped on me and then started contracting and releasing.  The tremors going through her and the full-body experience of the orgasm was amazing.  

Her emotions were predictably (to me, anyway) all over the place.  Along with the surprise, there was confusion and anger as well, and I figured that she’d come to realization that this vital part of her other sexual experiences—literally every single other one she’d ever fucking had—had been lacking, and it was sort of the whole point to everything.  I couldn’t imagine how incredibly frustrating that would have been, but I suppose at an early point that just became standard and accepted, and if you’re not anticipating it at all, then you’re not really missing out.  Mostly though, there was just bliss and satisfaction, and she looked pretty fucking happy.  I was happy about that because having her think about her past during this was counter-productive (probably for both of us).

I felt like some sort of empyrean fire had ignited in me when she kept clinging to me like her orgasm was somehow directly connected to her hold on me, or mine on hers, or she just needed grounding.  She looked beautiful; her face flushed and her hair damp, afternoon was just breaking and it was sunny out; it looked like a nice day.  The room wasn’t intensely bright, but there was enough of the sunlight filtering in to make the marks on her face seem even darker and more prominent.  They looked worse during the day.  She still looked just as beautiful—maybe even more so.  She looked kind of scared as everything lessened and the waves were slower and less intense.  I was already curled around her, but I tightened my grip and leaned to kiss her gently.  Something on her face made me want to tell her again about love and that I thought that’s what this was, but it would’ve been too much right now, probably even worse to say it now.  

Instead I kissed her again and whispered, “You’re so beautiful.”  

Her breath hitched and she pulled me down to her, not concerned with my weight, her arms around my neck.  Her breathing had slowed but it was more ragged than it had been and I added, still whispering, but this time in her ear, “I’ve got you.”

Her grip tightened and I think everything just kind of broke, and I’d sort of anticipated this.  I pulled out of her gently and rolled us, holding her while she cried.  I kept whispering to her, and I can’t even remember what I said anymore, but it was enough to calm her until she was just resting on my chest.  

Her head bent up, her chin digging into my sternum and I moved the hair out of her face while smiling at her gently. “You ok?”

She nodded, her chin digging back and forth.  

“You hurt?”

She shook her head.

“You wanna talk?”

Another headshake.  She watched me for a minute; I wasn’t sure what she was looking for, so I didn’t say anything.

She bit her lip for a second and then brought her hands up to rest her chin on.  “Can we do it again?”

I snorted; not exactly what I thought would come out, but it was ten times better than anything I was imagining.  I nodded. “Yeah, of course.  You stay on top this time.”

Famous last words.  

One (Part One) (Part Two) (Part Three) | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Seven | Eight | Nine | Ten | Eleven | Twelve | Thirteen | Fourteen | Fifteen | Sixteen | Seventeen | Eighteen | Nineteen | Twenty | Twenty-One | Twenty-Two | Twenty-Three | Twenty-Four | Twenty-Five | Twenty-Six | Twenty-Seven | Twenty-Eight | Twenty-Nine |  Thirty  |  Thirty-One  |