by Sionna Fox
“So you finally developed a case of the fuck-its. Is this your midlife crisis?”
“I prefer to think of it as a reset rather than a crisis. And I’m not middle aged yet. Average life expectancy for a man of my age and health gives me a few more years, thank you.”
That sounded more like the Ian she knew. “Fair.”
“I suppose I should thank you, for giving me the kick in the pants.”
“Oh. You’re welcome, I guess.” They lapsed into silence, walking down a row of houses toward the edge of campus where the gentle slope of the hill looking out over the valley gave the illusion of dropping off into nothing. Looking out into the snow-covered twilight, she searched for something to say. “I can’t believe they’re really getting married tomorrow.”
“They have pulled it off rather quickly.”
“Well—” She wasn’t sure if Ian had been out of the loop and didn’t know. They were all under threat of death for mentioning it in front of Jolene’s family, and especially not her Nana.
“I know. I think everyone has figured it out.”
“Hopefully not everyone.” She bit her lip. “I can’t believe that either.”
“I think it was inevitable for them,” he said quietly, his eyes on the pavement in front of them, the day’s melt glittering under the faint lights from the houses.
It was another one of those things they’d never talked about, except maybe in the far abstract. Kate felt like Jolene; she wasn’t naive enough to bear it. She’d staked her professional life around parenthood and babies, but couldn’t picture it for herself. She’d been too young, and it had never seemed all that pressing.
“Was that something you wanted?” She kept her eyes glued in front of her.
“Maybe. I always thought of it as something for later.”
“And now?”
“Is that something you want?”
“No. I don’t think it is. Maybe I’ll feel differently when I get more settled into life without school, but I don’t know if I will.” And if he wanted that, it was yet another reason to let him go. “But if you do, maybe it’s for the best. You should be with someone who can give you that.”
He huffed a laugh. “The funny thing is, I feel the same way. I’m too young, too unsettled. Even now. Especially now. And I was always afraid that in a few years you’d realize that you wanted it, and I still wouldn’t be able to wrap my brain around it. Or I’d be too old. I don’t want to end up single again because you realized you didn’t want your kids to have the really old dad at school.”
Kate laughed out loud. “They wouldn’t even. It’s not like it’s so far outside the norm for our general peer group to have kids at later ages.” They were at the end of the lane, standing in front of one of the houses, with its giant dormant lilac bushes in front of the windows, a few rooms shining in the gathering dark. She crossed her arms and faced him. “Why didn’t we talk about this stuff?”
“Because I didn’t want to lose you.”
“I know.”
“So what happens now, Kate?”
She didn’t know. There were so many things they’d never said, things he had wanted to let go and sweep under the rug. If that hadn’t changed, if everything else about him was different, but that was still the same? Then it made no difference.
“How much more talking can you do?”
“Whatever it takes.” He took her hand. “I said I would listen before, but I wasn’t hearing you when you said you needed to work things through. I’m sorry for that.”
She lifted her head. “I didn’t give you time to wrap your brain around it either. That was my fault. But it doesn’t change that I have no idea what happens next. I’m applying for positions, but what if the only work I can find is out of state? What if I’m on the other side of the country again?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. We’d figure it out, I hope.” He tentatively wrapped his arms around her. Kate leaned into the embrace despite herself. “I know you’re scared and uncertain about the future, but I love you and I’m here for you, even if we’re only friends.”
She loved him. She was an absolute mess who was trying to finish a dissertation, teach, and unpack years and years of shitty messaging about relationships. But she wanted to love him, even if they were only ever friends again. “I love you too.”
He pushed her away gently and met her gaze. “But?”
She shook her head. “I don’t want to hurt you again. And I’m scared that I will. I’ve left you twice, why would you want to be with me?”
He drew her back into the circle of his arms and kissed the top of her wool-covered head. “Because I believe you’re better than that.”
She pushed off of his chest. “What if I’m not, Ian? Do you have any idea how many hours I’ve spent on an uncomfortable couch in the last month trying to unpack this shit? It’s not going away anytime soon.”
“Same here. The uncomfortable couch bit. And the unpacking. We’ve both got some things to work through. Maybe we can do it together.”
“Do you mean that?”
“Of course I do. I’m not going home and cancelling all my appointments because you and I might try to work things out. Kate, you might have been the catalyst, but I’m in it for myself now. I hope you are, too.”
Kate gawped for a moment. The whole conversation was so surreal she nearly pinched herself. She’d believed so adamantly that Ian could never, would never change. And she’d been so wrong.
She lifted her head and their lips met, gently, then his grip tightened and the kiss turned into something else. A seal on an unspoken promise. They could work this out. Together.
Until a car honked behind them, followed by the voices whooping and hooting. Kate’s cheeks warmed even in the frigid evening. Sarah leaned out of the car, perfectly cut wool jacket framing her bombshell figure in a bright blue that set off her dark skin perfectly. Kate looked like an unwashed schlub by comparison.
“Get in, losers, we’re late for dinner.” She looked them up and down. “But we’re taking you back to the house to change first. We will not embarrass Jolene tonight.” She glanced at Ian. “Please tell me you’re going to make her start dressing like less of a slob again?”
“Dammit, Sarah.” Kate glared at her.
“Oh please, like any of us thought you weren’t getting back together. You’re like peas in a pod, even when your shit’s a mess.”
Ian squeezed her hand. “Sarah, I would appreciate if we all kept this to ourselves this weekend. Let Jolene and Matt have everyone’s attention.”
“Yeah, yeah. She’ll have more of it than she wants. But fine.”
Kate caught Ian’s eye and they both shrugged. This is our family, the gossipy bastards we chose.
Epilogue
They flopped on the couch as soon as everyone was out of the apartment. Housewarmings were nice, but being alone in their new place was better. Ian had extended the closing date on the house as far as he could, so they could move into a new home together when her sublet ended. He’d wanted her there, directing the placement of furniture, making it their own. He never wanted her to live in a space that she didn’t feel ownership of again.
“Ian?”
“Yes, Doctor Baird?”
He suspected it gave her a tiny thrill every time he used her new honorific. She’d successfully defended her dissertation, to no one’s surprise, and no one had a louder cheering section than she did when the panel had welcomed her back into the room as Doctor for the first time. She was teaching summer school while she wended her way through the interview process at one of the hospitals, but Ian didn’t doubt for a moment that she would be hired. His heart nearly burst with pride every time he called her Doctor Baird. He did it often.
“Let’s break in the bedroom.”
“You’re not too tired?”
“No. Are you up for it?”
“That all depends. How do you want to do it?”
She pulled her lower lip betwee
n her teeth and blushed. “You know what game we haven’t played in a while?”
Ian could think of several, but she was leading this conversation. “What, my love?”
“Pick a number.”
Ian vividly recalled the last time they had played that game, the night she’d left home. It had been his final send-off for her, a final cleansing, something to remember him by. They hadn’t done it since.
“Are you sure you’re up for that?”
“I wouldn’t ask if I wasn’t.”
“To the bedroom you get, then.”
She scampered down the hall.
“First rule, kitten. You’re not allowed to pick five; choose a new number.”
She fake pouted. “Fine.”
“Good girl. Now strip and tell me your safewords.”
She recited them while she shimmied out of her summer dress, throwing it in the general direction of the laundry basket along with her bra and underwear. The canvas of her freckled skin never failed to appeal. He spun her around and ran his hands down her back, over the flare of her hips, the curve of her ass.
“Pick a number.”
“Ninety-seven.”
He spanked her once. “Between one and five, smart-ass. Or you can put your clothes back on and go to bed without coming.”
“Three.”
“Thank you.” They were still feeling out the boundaries. How silly and sarcastic could she be, and what was she asking from him when she was? And she was learning how clear he needed her to be, how he prodded her to ask for what she needed, because he never wanted to make assumptions based on the past.
He attached cuffs to her ankles and wrists, and spread her out into an X at the foot of the bed, making use of the four-poster she’d insisted on keeping even though it barely fit in the new room.
“How are your shoulders?”
“A little high.”
He loosened the tension, allowing her upper body to relax. If he was going to keep her here for a bit, he needed her comfortable. He laid his tools on the bed, a fat suede flogger to warm her up, and a long, thin whip with a single tassel on the end that could be used two ways. With only the tassel, it would leave little bee-sting marks all over her skin. With the shaft, it acted like a cane, with the extra bite of the tassel wrapping around a hip or a thigh as it landed.
She smiled wide and nodded, more than familiar with each object.
“Say the words, Kate.”
“Nice choice. Green for go.”
He picked up the flogger. With its fat mop head, it wouldn’t hurt, but it would land with a solid thud and flush up her skin. But first he would tease her, running the soft tails up and down her legs, across her back, over her shoulders, until she was loose-kneed and breathless, waiting for the first hit to come.
He moved in closer, pressed her body to his, and slid his fingers between her legs to play with her clit. She arched into the touch, rising up on her toes and rocking her hips back against his erection, trapped behind his zipper for now. She still loved having him fully dressed when she was naked and vulnerable.
He pushed her away, and as soon as her heels hit the floor and she steadied, he struck. She still had a love-hate relationship with being taken by surprise too. So many things to learn and unlearn, to reaffirm or rewrite. All of them worth it to have her in his life, in their bedroom, naked and moaning as he worked her over with the flogger from her shoulders all the way down to her calves.
He sank into the rhythm of it with her, letting the falls concentrate in wide arcs over her shoulders and the curve of her ass. He could do this until his arm fell off, but he’d promised her three things, and three things she would get. He set the flogger down, cradled her against his chest again, and dipped his fingers between her thighs. She was wet and swollen now, his fingers sliding easily along her labia, applying pressure to those spots that would drive her arousal up, without letting it reach its peak by touching her clit directly.
“Did that feel good? Do you like that?”
She rested her head on his shoulder and gave a strangled, “Yes.”
“Your back is beautiful right now. My very favorite shade of pink. Shall we add some polka dots?”
She nodded and flashed her hands between moans.
“Good girl.” He set her on her feet and stepped back, flicker whip in hand. He tested it a few times, letting her anticipation build with the sound of it slicing through the air. He swung it, landing a perfect, tiny bee sting on the fleshiest part of her ass. She huffed and groaned, and his cock swelled along with the welt on her butt.
He struck at random intervals, all over her body, leaving marks dotting her skin, red against the brown and white. She giggled and hissed as he flicked his wrist more sharply, the whistle of the shaft through the air getting higher in pitch before each one landed.
When she started squealing, he stopped and traced the unknown constellations he’d made on her back with a fingertip, dipped it down between her cheeks, and through the wet heat of her. “Are you ready for more?”
“Yes.”
He paused, adjusted himself in his pants, and fixed his grip. He stood to her side, rolled the braided nylon shaft of the whip over her butt, assessing his target. Three strikes. Three long, red welts, then he would release her.
He swished the whip through the air and landed it across her ass. Her knees wobbled, but she held strong, breathing hard through her nose, stifling the scream that wanted to come out. The building was newer construction, with supposedly high-end soundproofing between units, but they didn’t need calls from the neighbors.
“Good girl. Keep breathing. Two more.”
She flashed her hands and nodded. He lined up and struck her again. He was reminded painfully of the last time they had done this. He’d given her a five-bar gate that had probably left bruises for at least a week, knowing her. He’d thought he was never going to have a chance to make it up to her. He almost dropped the whip and untied her to cradle her in his arms and whisper how much he loved her, how grateful he was that she came back, that she gave him a chance to change, to get out from under the weight of the expectations that had kept him stuck in a mire for so long.
And he would, when they were done. But giving her what she’d asked for was still part of his job, and he wouldn’t fail her if it was in his power to give it to her. Getting maudlin didn’t render him incapable of laying a final stripe across her butt.
She pulled at the ties on her wrists and rose up on her toes, squealing in pain as it landed. She shifted her weight from foot to foot, moving through the pain until her hips were undulating with it. Amazing what a flick of the wrist could do.
He wrapped an arm around her ribs to hold her steady, bringing her to rest on flat feet before he let go and uncuffed her wrists and ankles. “Good girl. Keep breathing. Lean forward.”
He brought her to rest over the edge of the bed, her ass in the air, with its bright-red welts, the wet pink of her pussy barely exposed. He shucked his clothes and retrieved a condom while she caught her breath.
“Stay where you are.”
“Mm-hmm.”
He gripped her thighs and spread her apart, exposing her completely. He sank a finger into her, stroking her front wall, finding the spot that made her buck into the bed while his other hand cupped her ass, the skin hot, the welts firm against his palm.
“So beautiful. You are so, so beautiful, and I am so lucky.”
She pushed back against his fingers inside her and moaned, an unsubtle plea for him to shut up and get on with it.
“Do you want me inside you? Is that what you want right now?”
She clenched around his fingers.
“Answer me.” Sometimes she didn’t want to be fucked afterward. Sometimes she wanted to come, but with his hands or mouth, or her own fingers, and not with him inside her.
“Fuck me. Please, god, fuck me already.”
“Good girl.”
He rolled the condom on and slid inside her, engu
lfed in her slippery heat. She canted her hips up to take him deeper.
“You keep doing that, I’m not going to last, kitten.”
“S’okay.”
“I want you to come, Kate. Can you do that? Are you close?”
“Close enough.” She snaked an arm underneath herself and her fingers brushed his cock as she started to stroke her clit.
“Good girl. Do what you need to do. Tell me how you want it.”
She rose up on her toes and arched her back, pulling him in deeper as she rolled her clit under her fingers. “Fast, hard.”
He gripped her hips and thrust into her, her grip on his cock tightening as he did what she asked. He held back, waiting for her to cry out, to squeeze his cock as she came. She started to shiver around him, to shudder and quake and rock on her toes as she moaned into the mattress. Her fingers worked faster, losing their rhythm as she came apart underneath him, around him, lifting her chest off the bed with a sharp wail.
Ian lost it then, thrusting deep into her as his vision blurred, pleasure climbing from his balls, up his spine, until he spilled inside her and collapsed on her tender back, his breath ruffling the hair growing in at her nape.
He pulled out gingerly and slumped awkwardly across the mattress, half-on, half-off, his face nestled in her neck. She lifted her head and started to giggle. They looked ridiculous. So fucked out they couldn’t even land on a bed properly. He laughed with her, the giggles turning into a full-blown laughing fit when she started loudly snorting with each inhale. Every look at each other made the other laugh harder in a vicious circle until his stomach was sore and tears were streaming down their faces. They’d never had this part before, these hysterical fits of joy.
“Oh my god, turn over; I can’t look at your face.” She pushed his arm between snorts.
He rolled away and settled himself on the bed properly. “Come here.”
She snuggled up alongside him, resting her head on his chest, still giggling a little, wiping her eyes on the back of her hand.
