by Ellie Wade
He kisses down my body until his face hovers between my legs. He plunges two fingers into me as he starts licking me in long, slow strides.
“Oh my God.” I sob into the lust-filled air, and I reach for Amos’s head, holding it as he moves against me. “Amos,” I cry as his tongue picks up speed.
His fingers fuck me, rubbing toward my front wall as his tongue assaults me with pleasure. It’s too much. Too amazing.
My nerves light, burning through every cell of my body. The build is intense, bordering on painful. I need this release more than I need my next breath. It hurts…so good. His tongue moves faster, and his fingers pump harder. I cry out, and my body begins to shake with anticipation as the release builds. He moves his free hand to my breast and tugs on my nipple.
And I explode. Lightning ignites and burns through my body from my toes to my head. I lose all sense of reality and get lost in the feeling and sensations encompassing me. A strangled moan leaves my lips, and my body quivers its release.
Amos kisses me as the final tremors leave me. “That was fucking amazing. Better than I could’ve imagined, Alma. So good. You are everything. Fuck, I need you so much.”
“Take me.” I sigh, still weak and sated from one of the best orgasms I’ve had. “Take me,” I repeat.
“Do you have a condom?” Amos asks.
I shake my head. “We don’t need one. I don’t want anything between us.”
Neither of us has been sexually active in years, and we’ve both been tested since then. Right now, I need to experience all of Amos with nothing between us.
He groans at my response and kisses me once again before lifting me onto him. His back against the sofa, I straddle him. We both watch as he pulls me over him. The connection is beautiful and so incredibly hot. We look good together.
“I love you,” he says, looking up from our connection.
“I love you,” I answer.
Our eyes stay locked as he begins to move. He grasps my hips, lifting me up and down onto him. In this position, he’s so deep. I chew on my bottom lip and focus on his beautiful face. I’m drowning in love and lust, and pure satisfaction. I want to live in this feeling. I want Amos inside me all day long. God, it’s incredible.
“Fuck, this is amazing, Alma.” he groans, his thoughts mirroring my own.
“It is,” I say on an exhale.
I start bouncing onto him, aided by his hold on me. We make love harder and faster. Our skin slaps against one another, the sound echoing throughout the space. He takes my nipple into his mouth and sucks. I kiss his neck and suck on his earlobe. We whisper words of adoration, and it’s perfect.
“I’m gonna come. Hop off,” he grunts.
“Wait,” I plead. “Touch me.”
He strokes my bundle of nerves, and with a bit of pressure and a couple of flicks of his fingers, I’m screaming out a release. He pumps harder against me and moans as his body shakes against mine.
I fall against him, our skin slick with sweat, our breaths heavy.
“We could live a thousand years, and I still wouldn’t get enough of you.” Amos kisses me softly, his arms holding me tight.
I know exactly how he feels.
We remain connected and kiss softly amidst the candlelight. Skin on skin, we make out until my lips ache, and then we kiss some more. Our skin is still slick with sweat, warm from the heat in the room and our frenzied lovemaking. I can feel Amos hardening again inside me.
Amos breaks the kiss and lifts me off him. “Come on,” he says gently. Grabbing my hand, he leads me upstairs and into the bathroom. He doesn’t let go of my hand as he turns on the shower. He pulls me into the shower, and I stand beneath the spray of the warm water.
Squirting some body wash on my loofah, he lightly runs it along my skin, cleaning me. I squirt soap in my hand and run the suds over the ridges of his muscles. We kiss beneath the water and caress each other’s skin. He makes me feel cherished and loved.
His soapy fingers reach between my legs and start rubbing my spot. It’s sensitive from my two previous orgasms, but with some gentle coaxing, it starts to accept Amos’s touch. I lean back onto the tiled wall and close my eyes. The hot water hits my side as Amos’s hand moves between my legs. He sucks my breast into his mouth, and I take in all the sensations, the collection of movements enchanting. He teases my nipple, pulling it harder into his mouth, and his hand picks up speed while the fingers on his free hand enter me. I’m spiraling into an orgasm in seconds, moaning into the steamy air.
He pushes me flush against the back of the shower and hikes one of my legs around his hip to enter me. I lean into his chest and lick his taut nipples as he enters me again and again. Hard and fast, my back hits the wall as he pounds into me. He pulls my clit between his fingers, and I explode along with Amos. We let out a collective moan as he empties himself inside me once more.
“You’re so perfect.” He kisses my neck. “Fucking perfect.”
“That was amazing,” I respond.
“We don’t ever have to go away. Work can have your days, and Love can have all your free time—just promise me your nights.”
“You have my nights.” I pull his tongue into my mouth. “Take them all.”
He plays with my breasts, tugging and pulling. “We fit so well together, Alma,” he says between kisses. “It’s like your body was made for me and mine for you. I’ve never had this.” His tongue dances with mine. “I don’t want to ever be without you. Now that I know how we are together, there will never be anyone else for me.”
The steam from the shower blankets me in warmth while Amos blankets me in love. It’s been so long since I’ve had this—this feeling. Hope. Love. Physical satisfaction. I forgot what it felt like to be sated and adored.
Amos turns me around and pulls me to him, my back to his chest. He steps under the spray and kisses my neck as water cascades over my skin. He slides his hand down my waist.
“You’re so beautiful, Alma.”
He lowers his fingers until they’re once again between my legs. I physically can’t do this again. Every inch of my body aches with sated sensation, and my muscles burn from use. I don’t have energy for another orgasm, yet as Amos strokes me, my body comes alive once more. I arch my back, turning my face to the side, my cheek against his muscled chest, my breaths quicken.
“You’re so responsive, Alma. You and I are going to have so much fun.” He nibbles my neck.
I freeze at his words. A cold blast of déjà vu hits me as echoes of another voice whisper the same thing. I push Amos’s hand from me and step away.
“Alma? What is it?” Concern lines his voice, his eyes wide.
The tiled walls of the shower blur as tears come to my eyes. Visions of me naked, here, blood trickling down my legs invade my memories, and with them come the pain I felt at that moment.
So much pain.
I press my palms to my chest, hoping to relieve the ache.
“Alma?” Amos holds my arms. “What is it?”
He was there too.
A broken mirror.
A lost message.
Pain and loss and despair.
And Amos.
He was there, but he was helping me survive the misery, and now he’s trying to make me forget the love.
I love Leo.
Lust-filled visions of the past hour flash through my mind on a reel, and I clutch my stomach, the urge to vomit strong. I moved on. Leo is no longer the only man I’ve ever loved or the only man I’ve slept with. I forgot him. During my time with Amos and the lust-fueled ecstasy we shared, I completely forgot him.
Guilt consumes me, and I fall to my knees against the tiled shower floor. The blood is absent, but the agony is the same as it was that day.
Devastating.
All-consuming grief.
He’s gone, and I’m forgetting him and enjoying it. It’s not right.
“Alma.” Amos lowers to his knees. “Talk to me.”
I raise my face, soaked
with tears and shame. “Please go,” I beg.
“Alma.”
“Go! Please. I need to be alone. Just go, Amos!” I cry.
His face is filled with indecision. “Let me help—”
I cut him off. “Go, now!”
His chest deflates, and the pain on his face is visceral, but he nods once and stands before stepping out of the shower.
I huddle in a ball and let the hot water pelt my back.
I don’t know what to do.
It can’t always be like this. How can I move on when it hurts this much? Grief, shame, and sorrow are my enemies. They can’t give me Leo back, and they make any attempt at closure so incredibly painful that I’m bound to be alone forever.
I know Leo wouldn’t want that for me. But I don’t know what else to do.
19
Amos
It went against everything in me to leave her, crying alone in the shower, but she told me to. I had to listen. I knew it wouldn’t be easy dating Alma. Though knowing something and living through it is very different.
Last night went from the best night of my life to one of my worst.
I can’t stop thinking about us together. We were perfection. I’ve had sex plenty of times with several women, but it never came close to that. What I experienced with Alma was more than sex. It was an out-of-body experience with more satisfaction and love than I’ve ever felt. Nothing will ever top that connection, and I believe that wholeheartedly, deep within my soul.
At twenty-seven years old, I felt true love for the first time.
I’m mad, though I have no right to be.
I’m hurt, though I know her rejection isn’t personal.
I’m angry with a man who’s dead for holding Alma captive when I simply want to love her. Nothing about this is fair or easy.
She texted me this morning and told me that she needed time.
Time? For what?
To convince herself that a lonely widow is all she’s meant to be? I can fight with everything in me, but I can’t make her love me the way I love her. I can’t make her forget him if her heart won’t allow it. I can’t make her move on or be happy if she’s not ready. It’s out of my hands.
I love her more than any man has loved a woman. I’ve protected her my whole life. I was her stability in a childhood that was anything but stable. I loved her unconditionally with my entire soul when no one else, not even her parents, did. I loved her until she felt strong, confident, and ready to take on the world. And she did. She’s done amazing things for so many children.
She’s been my other half before I knew what that meant. She stole my heart decades ago and never gave it back.
And I don’t want it back.
I want her.
I need her to love me, and as pathetic as I may sound, not even in the same way in which I love her. If she can’t love me with as much depth as I do her, I’d be okay, as long as she loved me enough to let me in. To be a real part of her life. To share a bed and a future with. I don’t need all of her love. I just need enough of it.
Just a fraction of Alma’s heart is a gift.
I’ve been lying here all day, in my lonely ass apartment, thinking about what I should do next. What’s my next move? The truth is, I don’t think I have one. I’ve shown her my love for years. I’ve put that love into words and laid it all out on the table as of late. I made love to her with my body, heart, and soul—and she was affected by it just as much as I was.
She knows.
She knows the entirety of my heart and intentions. There’s nothing else I could do or say that would make it more clear. It’s her move. She’s either in or out, and only she knows which one.
I’ve always been a strong man, and very little has rattled me in life. Nothing really, save for Alma. Yet when something bothers me, it’s Alma I talk to. She’s always been my confidant. Ironically, I’m hurting more than I’ve ever hurt, and I can’t talk to the one person I need to.
It’s a bleak position to be in.
My cell rings, and I look to see that it’s my mother. I send the call to voicemail, not in the mood to talk to her right now. She immediately rings back.
I release a sigh, and this time, I answer.
She’s frantic. Her sentences are practically incoherent, but the words—Dad, heart attack, and hospital—are pretty clear.
“I’m on my way, Mom,” I reassure her.
Five minutes later, I’m in my car and on my way home. The drive is a little over an hour from Ann Arbor, which gives me time to think. Dad, heart attack, and hospital. One would think those three words would elicit some sort of reaction in me.
Yet they don’t.
My dad loves me in his own way, or at least I think he does. Yet he’s never once showed an ounce of affection toward me. He’s been cold, distant, and hard my whole life. Visiting my parents has never been an enjoyable experience. I wish things were different, but my dad is who he is, and I don’t see that changing anytime soon.
I do feel sadness for my mother. The fear of losing my dad was tangible over the phone. For whatever reason, she loves him—in her own way.
I stopped going home a couple of years ago. I visited for years out of obligation, but it dawned on me that, as an adult, it’s my choice as to what behavior I accept. I couldn’t change the way my father treated me, but I could stop putting myself in the position to be treated that way.
My mother has driven to Ann Arbor a few times to see me over the years, but the relationship I have with my parents is anything but ideal.
My mom throws her arms around me and bursts into tears the moment I see her at the hospital. I rub her back as she cries into my chest in the hall outside my father’s room. He’s visible through the glass windows of the hospital door. He’s lying in bed, in a hospital gown, with wires and tubes connected to his chest and arms.
“What did the doctor say?” I ask when her sobbing abates.
“They think he’ll be okay. They want him to have surgery to clear the blockage from his artery. They say he needs to eat better and have less stress. You know your dad. I don’t know how that is going to work. He only wants steaks, fried foods, and fatty carbs, and he hasn’t had a non-stressful day in his life. I don’t know what I’m going to do.” Her voice is desperate.
“Mom, only Dad can make the choices to live a better life. You can’t force him. The doctor can tell him the facts, and you can support him in healthier decisions, but ultimately, it’s on him.”
“I know. I’m just afraid that he won’t change. He’s always been so stubborn.”
“If he wants to hold on to a toxic life because he’s stubborn, then that’s his choice. He knows the consequences. You can’t change people, Mom. You can only support them.”
“I won’t be able to live without him if he doesn’t get better.” Her voice becomes frantic again.
“First of all,” I say, rubbing her back, “he’s still here now. But if you lose him someday, you’ll be okay because you’re strong, Mom. You don’t give yourself enough credit, but you are.”
“Thank you for coming home.” She sniffles. “I know he’s not your favorite person.”
“He’s still my dad, and I came for you.”
My comments result in a small grin from my mother. “You’re the best son a mother could ask for.”
We stand side by side. My arm wraps around her back and holds her shoulder as we look in at my father. “It’s weird seeing him so fragile, isn’t it? Doesn’t even look like him,” she says.
“It doesn’t.”
“His surgery is tomorrow. Would you be able to stay with me? Maybe until he comes home in a few days. I don’t want to be alone right now.”
“Sure. Of course, I can do that.” I kiss my mom’s temple. “Let me just tell work that I’ll be out this week.”
“Okay,” she responds as I step away and pull out my phone.
Calling Alma, work, doesn’t feel right. Yet I do work for her, so it’s accurate.
I haven’t told my mother about Alma and me yet, and I’m not rushing to tell her anytime soon. At least, not until I know we’re going to work. I couldn’t bear the condolences from my mother if we didn’t.
I pull out my phone and text Alma.
Hey, I need to take a few days off work this week. Maybe most of the week. My father had a heart attack, so I’m home helping my mom.
Her response comes quickly.
What? OMG. I’m so sorry. I can come and see you today or tomorrow? Yes, I’m coming. I can help you with whatever you need.
I don’t know what to feel about her text. She was screaming at me to leave her alone last night, and now she wants to come help. I’m sure it’s the best friend in her, and I appreciate it, but it’s not needed.
No. Don’t come. We’re fine. Enjoy your weekend with Love. I’ll text you when I know when I’m coming back.
Are you sure?
I’m sure.
Okay. Please let me know if you need anything. Xo
I stare at her last text. Xo? We’re not xo type people. We’re Love you type people. Always have been.
I shake my head. I can’t worry about it now. My mother is literally shaking.
“Mom, when’s the last time you ate?”
She moves her head from side to side. “I don’t remember.”
I hold out my hand. “Come on. Let’s go get some food.”
The next morning, Dad goes into surgery without a kind word coming out of his mouth. Can’t say I’m surprised. He is who he is, and if a near-death experience isn’t going to change him, nothing is.
“How long do you think the surgery will last?” I ask my mom.
“The surgeon said three to four hours if all goes well. But it will be some time after that before we can see him,” she responds.
“Do you want to go do something?”
“I think I’ll just wait here. I don’t want to be too far away from your father.”
“Okay, then we wait. Let me at least get us some good magazines.” I tap my mother’s knee and promise to return soon.
