Paper Dolls, Book One

by Emma Chamberlain

  A rush of satisfaction took over me. From the tone of her voice I highly doubted she was looking at him. A face like Mr. Bradford’s? Now that’s saying something.

  She did look at me...

  I tried to calm my inner excitement. She didn’t want him for one. For two, I’d uncovered an illicit affair.

  “You’re not my boyfriend and I don’t owe you anything.”

  I almost spit my coffee out.

  WHAT WAS HAPPENING?! WHAT?!

  Ugg. She was amazing. AH-mazing.

  I basically wanted to clap!

  My fries came and the waitress saw my wide eyes.

  “You okay honey?”

  I just nodded. I wanted her to go. She could blow this for sure.

  She gave me a nod and then disappeared. I probably looked crazy like those girls on Pretty Little Liars always did, far too serious and also too scared.

  Avery’s voice behind me was like smooth melting butter. I liked that it was sort of deep and sometimes squeaky. She was so grounded and serious, and I just never knew.

  You’re not my boyfriend and I don’t owe you anything…

  I smiled to myself.

  I closed my eyes and listened but then she said the saddest thing.

  “Why me?” She asked.

  I felt my heart stutter and I let out a breath. I’d been holding it in. I don’t even know for how long.

  Why me?

  She was so sad...

  He told her she was special. Of course he did. Why wouldn’t he?

  I couldn’t imagine facing her and her asking me that. I’d die and I didn’t even mean anything to her, I’d still die inside. I just couldn’t imagine it.

  “I’m not special,” she said.

  I felt like standing up and confronting her. Of course she was fucking special. And who was he to make her feel this way?!

  I was suddenly enraged.

  I put my coffee down too hard and spilled it. Instead of rushing to clean, I pounded my fist down on the table and clenched my fingers through the pain to keep myself from making any more noise. My sharply filed nails dug hard into my skin and that helped me to calm.

  Meanwhile, they casually talked about meeting up over the weekend. They were too distracted to notice me. Which was good. But the mundane nature of their encounter unnerved me and tore me to pieces inside. I felt like settled soil being churned up and pulled apart. The roots of a tree being severed and individually burned.

  The invasion of words bled into every piece of me.

  The way Ben spoke to her made me ill.

  “You know you want to,” he said. I could just feel his crooked smile creeping up and Avery seeing it.

  That was it. Suddenly he didn’t seem so fucking handsome to me anymore. Suddenly he seemed like pond scum, the kind of offender that should be locked behind bars.

  As lovely as Avery was, a man like that would never have just Avery to quench his appetite and feed his ego. This I knew. Ben had talked about seeing women but he never even hinted at one of them being a student. Avery probably didn’t even know...

  She agreed to meet him for one day. Her voice routinely vacillated between bitterness, amusement, sadness, and defeat. I could tell she wasn’t happy with him.

  They ate in silence. I waited for more words but they didn’t come.

  It got too uncomfortable after that. I couldn’t just listen to her sadly eat while he stared at her.

  I felt sick to my stomach, overwhelmed and upset.

  I threw some cash on the table and snuck out of that place with my book in my hand.

  It was just like before, almost, when I’d upset her and she’d challenged me right back with the channeled fire of a hot burning sun. I felt sick like that again. Sick like I’d been the one to hurt her by not cutting in.

  I dry-heaved a few times by my driver-side door but nothing came out. Ben hurt me. I’d been betrayed.

  My phone rang again so I threw myself back into my car and answered it.

  Now that I was done on my little mission I had all the time in the goddamn world.

  “Livia?”

  “Nat,” I said, trying to calm my rattled nerves. I pulled her hoodie off me and threw it in the back. My heels on the driver’s side floor annoyed me so I threw them back too and peeled the ballet flats off me so my feet would be bare.

  “Where are you? I’ve been trying to reach you for over an hour.”

  “I thought you were done with me,” I spat bitterly.

  I could hear Avery’s self-deprecating tone in my own familiar voice and it stole my words from out my throat. My entire body felt sore and shaky.

  “Livia, I was kidding. I just wanted to see what you’d say.”

  “Ha. Nice joke,” I pretended not to care but she knew I did. “How did I do? Did your sad puppet perform?”

  “Come on baby, I miss you. Come get me.”

  I could easily say no. But saying no would mean going home alone and feeling like this for the rest of the night.

  “Be ready,” I said. I saw them in my rearview walking back to Mr. Bradford’s car.

  Seeing them made me so angry. I couldn’t function knowing that he and Avery were really a thing. My heart was a little bruised by the whole situation. I couldn’t really say why, I just knew she deserved so much better. All this time I never thought she could be some older man’s secret.

  There was no denying Ben had let me down. I guess I was being unreasonable. I somehow thought he was above humanity. Who was I to even judge?

  It still hurt...

  I started my car up loudly and revved the engine, speeding off toward Natalie’s house.

  The way I drove now, without Mr. Bradford’s car to force me to slow, getting there took less than two minutes. Nat was waiting on the curb. She got in and I sped off.

  “Whoa. What’s gotten into you?” I could smell her right next to me, that shampoo she used, that lotion she liked, that perfume she sometimes wore instead of that other perfume. My mouth hung open just a bit. I was addicted to her. For me, Nat meant sex and Nat would always mean sex. It was Pavlovian; her voice, her smell. Anything she could say. Any move she could possibly make.

  “I saw something disturbing,” I said. “Something I never wanted to see.”

  “Is that why you wouldn’t answer your phone?” She wondered. Her hand reached over and tried to grab at my phone. I fought with her, had the advantage of being closer. I threw my phone in the back so she’d have to crawl on the ground if she wanted to find it. “Baby, don’t be like that. You know I was just playing with you.”

  “I don’t know that. How would I know that?” I snapped.

  I looked over at her with anger. Soon as I saw her though, I saw she was smiling and watching me, that certain look in her eye, that look that meant soon. I saw it and I softened. After the day I had, I wanted any little physical thing she could give.

  Her hand wiggled its way to my leg, fingers drifting over the top my thigh as they slid down and in toward my center.

  “You know I like touching you,” she said, caressing me and teasing with how close she knew she was.

  Her other hand slowly pulled my hair away from my neck on the side nearest her. I felt a muscle twitch in my neck like a rope pulled tight or a lightning bolt just struck.

  She was so close it was now criminal. I felt her lips lean in and touch lightly down on the skin over my pulse point. And then her wet tongue touched down and grazed teasingly as she used her roaming hand to rub me right up my center.

  The feeling of instant sex sent a shock through my system. She was so automatically good, my eyelids fluttered to a close and my body was ready to shut down and just feel.

  Remembering the road, I jerked the wheel and snapped my eyes open again to keep myself from crashing into something.

  Up ahead there was a parking lot for an apartment complex. I pulled in quick and parked in the spot, in the back, right by the trees.

  “You really wanna make it up to me?
” I asked.

  “Mmmhmm,” she hummed, knowing full well that I was too easy to please. The way she looked at me, she was dazed and filled with lust.

  “Get in the back,” I said, parking the car and getting out to do the same.

  As soon as we got back in I locked the doors.

  Just like every other time, as soon as I let her, she was undressing me with pure relish. She didn’t ask permission. She wasn’t nice in what she did. When I said go she was on. She handled me in such a way I actually felt like a doll or a toy or a thing she could play with.

  Somehow, to me, that made it better. I thought about Avery with him. Maybe this was what he did for her. Maybe she liked it too.

  “Where were you baby?” She was laying ontop of me and licking at my neck. Little bites she placed scared me every time. I couldn’t have bruises or hickies. Purple love bites were impossible to hide. Natalie was punishing me for ignoring her. Punishing me for treating her like I always did.

  Still, in the moment, the small pains felt too good. The way she dragged her bare skin on mine.

  “I followed that girl,” I said, feeling hot, as my back crawled into the scratchy seams in the seat leather and I kept on remembering Avery. I was already panting so loudly. We’d gone from 0 to 60 just like we’d always done before, never a slow moment, never a hesitance. We started in flames and we’d end that way sure. I tried to stop myself panting but it only made me need to pant twice as hard.

  I needed air but I couldn’t contain it. Nat’s hand was quick down my pants and she was touching me. I had to try hard not to be loud. The way she touched I always whined and gasped.

  “Was she pretty?” Nat asked. “I bet she was pretty.” She pulled open my shirt, breaking a button before biting at my breast and squeezing it with her hand. The force she used there was much harder than the teasing she had done at my neck.

  “Uhh!” I screamed in pain. Clutching her head to try and minimize the intense pressure. It was too hard. It usually was. But she had trapped me. “No,” I lied, sounding pathetic like I was whining again. Avery was more than pretty. She was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen. But I couldn’t exactly say that now could I? Not to Natalie. I don’t think she’d be kind.

  “Don’t lie to me,” Natalie warned.

  She was so quick. I felt her fingers inside me, pushing into me as she bit me again.

  She put her other fingers over my mouth to stop me from whining or crying out. She knew I’d be loud. I was always bad at hiding how it felt when she touched me.

  “I bet she was sexy. That’s the only way you’d be so wet like this so fast,” Natalie whispered so cruelly into my ear. I felt her whole body over mine. Anger burned within me at the accusation. Last time I checked, for Natalie, I was always wet. It was a by-product of feeling constantly on edge and like I could be attacked at any moment. “I bet you wanted to fuck her,” she teased, pushing inside me and feeling my walls tighten as I moaned into her hand, trying to keep myself from screaming as my eyes rolled. I felt somewhat dazed. If my mouth hadn't been out of service I know I'd be whining, saying no, no, no, no, no every time she pushed into me. I’d be crying out. It made no sense but I did that sometimes.

  I needed this. I needed this so much. “Yup,” she said, staring down at me and seeing. I squinted my eyes shut and tried not to think of Avery but that was too hard. Avery at the pool. Avery at the house. Avery at the diner agreeing to fuck Ben again. Avery Avery Avery.

  Nat took her hand away from my mouth. Maybe she wanted me to scream? I tried to move a little and sit up.

  I felt her hand cup up under my chin and push me back down firmly against the seat. Then she rest her strong fingers menacingly around my neck, pressed just enough, right there, to let me know that she could probably choke me if she wanted to and cut off my air. She could end my life, leave me dead, no one would piece it together, no one knew about us. My eyes went wide, suddenly all I could see was her. It was intoxicating.

  “Do you like this?” She asked, staring down at me, a sick smile on her face. She was so beautiful it wounded me. Why did I need all this extra play? Why did I keep her aggressive and push for these things to be less than right?

  Her hair fell around her face all dark and glorious and I saw such fire in her eyes, such intrigue, such danger.

  Most of all, I could see how she only saw me. Looking down, cheeks flushed, that smile indefinite, she worshipped the sight of me and I saw it, I saw it all.

  For a second I was with her again. All thoughts about Avery had flown rightly away. “Yes,” I nearly gasped in relief. Nat had found me and brought me to Earth, brought me back home.

  “Good,” she panted cockily. Pushing her hand down hard against my neck. She must’ve noticed the change. Hovering there an extra second and an extra second. She waited for me to be ready, to remember how I loved what she did and how she was. She waited before doing a thing I would want, before fucking me harder with her other hand, knowing that it would drive me out of my skin if she truly had me.

  No time at all, no trying, no waiting. All of a sudden, I was a rocket speeding out into space with nothing but pressure and speed and that feeling of flying and black all around me.

  I saw nothing, heard nothing. She brought me to space and my mind was swiped clean.

  I clutched her hand at my neck with both of mine out of fear. I couldn’t breathe or see or speak.

  I wasn’t sure how long she held me down like that, pushing into me over and over and feeling me weakly try to fight her. All I know was some time later I came really hard, my whole body convulsing. She let go of me and I finally gasped.

  I couldn’t even catch my breath before she got out of the car. Faint sounds of her light laughter played on my eardrums like a soothing song. When she slammed the door that music changed into my own animalistic panting. I was reminded again of who I was and what I did.

  Last thing I heard were Nat’s heels on the solid asphalt as they quickly drew her body away.

  So much for romance.

  I lay there a long time, completely compromised and panting haphazardly.

  It was a good thing no one was following me. Nat would sure make it easy for them to find a few of my flaws. Even through tinted windows a person could tell that someone was cumming and nearly dying inside my car. Noises like these ones aren’t very difficult to decipher.

  As my mind finally slowed and I began to level out, all I could think was: What did Avery like? Would Mr. Bradford do this to her? Was she this twisted? What the hell is wrong with me?

  Nat hadn’t even allowed me kiss her… She was probably mad at me for something. Always mad and pretending she wasn’t.

  I tried to think, to regain my composure, but Natalie had been too good at her only job.

  All I could do was lay there and breathe. I found myself missing her hand at my neck, her body over mine, her words in my ear. The way her smile made her even more beautiful.

  Her laugh came back to me and I echoed it’s memory, with my own, wanting to keep it.

  Moments like these I didn’t feel much like a failure or a loner. Moments like these I felt entirely free.

  The sad thing about that?

  Moments like these, in my life, they’re super rare.

  Plus, I’m always alone when I have them...

  After a while of thinking on that, I got back into the front seat, buckled up, and drove myself home. I lied to my parents and told them I’d been working on some fictitious group project. They seemed to believe it. Or maybe they just didn’t care. My money was always on door number two. I confused them too much growing up. Now I was just this person who was always there.

  As I walked through the house and found my way upstairs I focused my thoughts on the feel of my body.

  The places where Natalie touched? They all ached in a good way. I felt them in my silences, felt them pulsing and trying to heal.

  I took the longest bath of my life remembering Natalie’s hands and Avery�
��s eyes, Mr. Bradford’s creepy smile, the way Avery bit back and said my name even though we’d never met.

  Ask me if I’m sad...

  That voice… Avery’s voice.

  I thought of so many things while the steam encircled my brain, I nearly drown in all my musings. I kept sighing out loud. Good sex always did that to me. Always turned me into a bit of an animal.

  It was the oddest thing. I actually found myself smiling after that day.

  When I finally got in bed I played with my phone and went on Facebook. I had a new friend add, not that I even care about that shit. My heart nearly dropped though when I saw who it was. Avery Lockhart had added me as a friend. She probably knew I wanted to snoop. I mean, that is the precise reason I went on Facebook to begin with on this night.

  I added her request, a strange feeling coming over me.

  All her pictures were beautiful. I may as well have been a baby with the way I quietly stared at her in complete and total awe.

  Most importantly, I pondered on when she was thinking of me. Was it before she saw Ben? Was it after? Was it right at the time when Natalie had me contained in her grip?

  I couldn’t think on it any more. Avery’s eyes were so intense in her pictures. Even through the phone screen, I got the sneaking suspicion she could read my mind. Like somewhere in the city she was seeing me through walls and buildings and bushes and trees.

  Her lips were so perfect. I rolled over and touched my lips with my fingertips, feeling jealousy and longing, as I thought about hers.

  No amount of time could mend my current rift inside. That unsteady feeling I often got when I felt needy and achy and far too human to slip away.

  Eventually I nodded off anyway, ignoring the unsettled state of loneliness inside. I’d felt certain, in the end, that I’d had the best actual day of my life. Things with Natalie had finally resulted in a somewhat-welcome attack and I’d actually met someone whom I liked, someone I didn’t just want to have sex with and avoid. That hadn’t happened to me. That never happened.