To Say I Love You

by Anna Martin

  “Yes,” she said immediately. “Oh God, yes. I’ve got piles of things that need to be done. It’s not the most glamorous work, Jess, but we’re busy at the moment, and it’s just not getting looked at.”

  I nodded. “That would be great.”

  “I’ll e-mail you,” she said.

  Leaning back in the chair, I navigated to my e-mails, reading through and deleting things I didn’t need until Serena’s message came through.

  She was right on one thing—it wasn’t glamorous. I had piles of numbers and statistics and figures to go through and transfer into spreadsheets. The fact that the figures went back a few months told me no one had had time to look at it since I’d gone.

  The chance to look at it all was a surprising opportunity to catch up; I could interpret the visitor numbers to figure out how well we were doing and how successful certain pieces of work had been. I quickly fell into the task and found a scrap of paper to make notes on as I worked. Serena hadn’t asked for any analysis, probably not wanting to trouble me with it. I’d always liked doing this, though, and found myself pulling that information together as I worked.

  That night, I went for dinner with Jennifer. Dad had gone out with some of his hunting friends and her boyfriend was working, so it was a good opportunity for the two of us to hang out. Even if we did only go to Taco Bell.

  The next morning, I took Baby out for a run, pushing us both hard and covering several miles before I reached home. The puppy had grown and she was strong, but well-behaved. I was confident in taking her off the leash these days, knowing she wouldn’t run off.

  Chores around the house were piling up, and I ignored them in favor of getting back into the work Serena had sent me. Stretching my mind was as satisfying as stretching my body, and I reveled in the opportunity to do some real work again. It all came back surprisingly quickly.

  By the end of the afternoon, I’d finished typing up my analysis, proofreading it, and sending my spreadsheets back to Serena. For the first time in ages, I felt satisfied, accomplished, like I was achieving something.

  As I shut down the computer, I heard Will’s car pull up outside. I took my dirty plate to the kitchen, wincing when I noticed the dishes I hadn’t gotten round to doing—a few days’ worth.

  “Honey, I’m home,” Will called from the front door. I laughed and walked through to kiss him.

  “Hi,” I said, my lips pressed against his, distorting the sound.

  “You okay?”

  “Mm.”

  He ran his hand down my back and pressed another kiss to my cheek, then wandered off to the bedroom to dump his bag. I followed him and noticed there were piles of laundry on the floor. I’d sorted them, but forgot to put them through the machine while I was working.

  Will let out the tiniest sigh. It was almost inaudible, but I knew him too well. I huffed.

  “What?” I demanded.

  “Nothing.”

  “No, say it.”

  “Fine. Would it kill you to clean up around here?”

  I narrowed my eyes at him and was about to snap when he turned on his heel and stalked off to his office, muttering under his breath as he went. His dismissal made me see red.

  “I’m not your housewife,” I said, taking long strides to follow him. “I know I’m not working at the moment, but that doesn’t mean I exist to cater to your every whim!”

  “I don’t think that.” He stood with arms folded across his chest, a picture of challenging defiance.

  “Maybe not consciously you don’t. But when I leave this place a mess, you get home from work and think, ‘What the fuck has he been doing all day? Surely he doesn’t have anything better to do with his time.’”

  That’s all I wanted. For him to ask about my day. To tell me about his. We didn’t often fight about stuff like this, but when we rubbed each other up the wrong way, the results were usually explosive.

  “You’re wrong,” he said stubbornly. “I don’t expect anything. If the place is a mess, I’ll tidy up, so what?”

  “You don’t get it!” I shouted. “This isn’t about who does what chores. It’s you expecting me to do it, like I’m your slave. I’m not your slave, Will.”

  “And I don’t want you to be!” he yelled back. “Do what the fuck you want, Jess. I don’t care.”

  “No,” I said acidly. “I didn’t think so.”

  He cursed at me under his breath but I was beyond caring. His keys were on the side table next to the door, only a few feet away from where we were yelling. I grabbed them and my flip-flops, which were by the door, and stalked out, making sure to slam the door behind me.

  It was only when I got a few hundred yards away from the house I realized I didn’t have anywhere to go. I had no friends here beyond Will and my sister, and there wasn’t much to do unless I wanted to catch a movie or eat something, which I didn’t. The mall had too many people.

  I drove around for a while, passing a drive-through and getting fries and a Coke because I knew Will hated when I ate in the car.

  Eventually, I rounded back to my dad’s. He was on the front porch with a pitcher of tea and a newspaper.

  “Will called,” he said as I approached, swinging the keys around my index finger.

  I rolled my eyes.

  “Don’t think you can give me that look and get away with it. I don’t care how old you are, I’ll still tan your ass.”

  “Dad,” I said on a whine.

  “Sit down. Have some tea.”

  There was a spare glass next to him, almost like he’d been expecting me. The tea was sharp and sweet, as I liked it, and I sat down in one of the rockers.

  “I swear, I’ve learned more about your relationship in these past few weeks than I ever knew before.”

  “Sorry about that.”

  “What are you apologizing for? You already know it don’t make no difference to me, Jesse.”

  “I know,” I said, not without a little affection. “You said.”

  “What happened?”

  “Just a stupid fight,” I said with a sigh. “Will works really hard, but I don’t like that he still expects me to do all the work around the house.”

  Dad hummed. “Does he? Or is that just what you think he thinks?”

  “He doesn’t actually bitch at me about it. He just… sort of expects those things to be done. Like fixing his damn lunch and making the bed. If it’s not done, he gets this funny look, like he’s wondering what the hell I’ve been doing with my day if I haven’t been cleaning up after him.”

  “What are you doing at the moment, though? The house is all fixed up now….”

  “Don’t you start,” I said, only partly joking. “I spoke to my supervisor at the museum a couple days ago. Said I wanted to help out with stuff if I could. She sent me some reports… it’s not a lot, but it’s a way into things again. I’m reading up on what’s been going on and doing some data analysis for them.”

  “Sounds great. What does Will think?”

  I was silent.

  “So you haven’t told him?”

  “I don’t need his approval for every damn thing,” I said, knowing I sounded like a petulant child. “I have a life outside him, you know. Or I used to, at least.”

  “No, you don’t need his approval, but you might maybe need his support,” Dad said easily. “You might even need his help with things around the house, since you don’t have the time to spend doing that anymore.”

  I looked over at him, where he was wearing a serene expression. He sipped his tea.

  “Go on,” he said, shooing me away. “Go make up.”

  I drained my tea, then stood. “You said he called?”

  “He was worried about you,” Dad said. “Apparently you don’t storm off much these days, and he can’t exactly follow you.”

  I nodded. “Thanks, Dad.”

  “Go on,” he repeated on a mumble. “Git.”

  It only took a few minutes to drive home, and I made sure to pick up my empty foo
d wrappers before heading inside. I let myself in, went to the kitchen to dump them in the trash, rolled my eyes because it was full, and took the bag out.

  Will was in his office. I stood in the doorway, thankful he hadn’t shut or locked it, and stared at him until he looked up.

  “I’m working for the museum again,” I said defiantly.

  He blinked. “Oh.”

  “For the past couple days. Not much, just doing some reports and stuff, but I wanted to get back into doing something again. I miss my job.”

  “Okay.”

  “So that’s why I’ve been tired and things haven’t been done that usually are.”

  He was quiet for a few moments. Then: “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  The one question I didn’t have an answer for. I sighed. “I don’t know,” I said honestly. “I think I just want something that’s mine again, you know? You have your job, which is yours, and the only things I’ve got here are your things too.”

  “I didn’t know that bothered you.”

  “Neither did I.”

  He stood and came over to me, gently touching my arm. I folded him into a hug. With his head on my shoulder, I could feel him sigh deeply.

  “I’m upset you didn’t tell me,” he said, the words muffled by my T-shirt.

  “I know. I’m sorry.”

  He went and turned off the computer, which surprised me, and we made more tea and sat on our front porch to drink it.

  We so rarely had petty arguments it took a while to remember how to solve them. I still felt weird about telling Will I’d started work again, like it was something I wasn’t supposed to do. Which was stupid, of course; we shared nearly everything with each other.

  Working was a step back toward my own independence, something I’d lost since we moved here. I’d existed to do things for everyone else, and I’d done a lot of that.

  Guilt, I realized. I felt guilty for not doing things. Which was stupid.

  I sighed.

  “Jesse?” he asked, reaching for my hand across the rockers.

  “Yeah?”

  He just smiled.

  Chapter 12

  SINCE IT was his birthday, I decided to wake him up with a blowjob. Not any old birthday, either—he was thirty.

  My own thirtieth wasn’t for another six months, so there was a part of me that wanted to set a standard, and I knew the few surprises I had up my sleeve were going to blow him away. Doing nice things for Will was one of my favorite activities.

  A good blowjob was the perfect way to start the day, especially since he was still almost asleep, lying on his back and snoring. I wriggled down the bed, licked a stripe over his hip bone, and nibbled down his inner thigh while his cock started to pay attention.

  I felt the moment he woke up properly, a hum of confusion, then a delighted chuckle. I pulled more of his cock into my mouth and wrapped my hand around the rest of it, jerking him softly, then harder to bring him to one of those delightfully satisfying early-morning orgasms.

  “Happy birthday to me,” he sang, only a bit out of tune. “That was one hell of a present. Thank you.”

  “You have lots more presents,” I said, trailing my fingers over his belly to make him squirm as I shuffled up the bed. “You’re a very spoiled boy.”

  “You’re a very spoiled boy,” he said grimly, then smiled hopefully. “Presents?”

  I rolled my eyes, then leaned over the side of the bed where I’d hidden two gifts the night before. As expected, Will took the opportunity to grope my ass before sitting up against the pillows.

  “Here. Happy birthday. I love you.”

  He accepted my kiss, then dug into the wrapping paper.

  The first was nothing particularly special—a box set of a TV show he’d been wanting to watch for ages. We were hardly ever in at the same time every week, so we ended up missing episodes all over the place. Box sets were a good way of getting over that.

  The second gift was more special.

  “Are these your collars?” he asked as he set the DVDs aside.

  “Yeah.”

  When I’d officially become Will’s sub, with some degree of permanence rather than just two people who played together, he’d offered me a collar. Some people in D/s relationships took that literally, and the sub wore a collar around their neck to symbolize their commitment to their Master or Mistress. Instead of something made of metal, for my first collar, Will had braided thread and wrapped it around my wrist. It meant something different to us: we accepted our relationship would change over time, that in a few years we wouldn’t be in the same place we were when we’d made that original vow to each other. The collar was designed to wear and break, and when it did, Master would give me a new one, and we’d renew that commitment we’d made to each other.

  Our relationship, both the romantic side and the D/s side, was fluid. We accepted that we’d change as people, and that our roles would need to adapt to be suitable to the people we would become.

  In the life of our relationship, I’d had three collars so far. Two were pinned in the display box my dad had helped me make. It was shallow, with a glass front, and the wood matched the furniture in our room. The third was still on my wrist.

  “I didn’t like how they were shoved in a drawer somewhere,” I said, fiddling with my current collar. It was a habit. “I want them out, on display.”

  “That’s awesome,” Will said. “Thank you.”

  When he leaned in for another kiss, I pushed my fingers through his hair, relishing the feel of him next to me.

  Breakfast was made while we were both almost naked, carefully dodging the heat on the stove as Will fried bacon and I made pancakes. I liked cooking with him. It was the sort of easy, day-to-day domesticity that had been missing from this house so far. It had been difficult to find that connection while we were staying at my dad’s.

  “Can we sit out on the deck?” Will asked.

  “Mm.”

  It was warm and bright, but not hot yet, and there was a slight breeze taking the edge off the day. We sat shoulder-to-shoulder on the top step, gently nudging each other while we ate, relishing the time spent together.

  “Do we have plans for today?” he asked when I set my plate aside.

  Yes, I thought. Big ones.

  “Not really,” I said casually. “I thought we could go out for a few hours this afternoon, once you’re done with work. I’m going to keep digging stuff up out here this morning.”

  “Okay.” Will kissed me on the head when he stood to take our plates inside. “Sounds good to me. I’m going to take a shower.”

  “’Kay.”

  “Hey, Jesse?”

  “Mm?”

  I looked over my shoulder at him and raised an eyebrow.

  “Do you have your hoops here? For your piercings?”

  I’d taken the silver hoops out of my nipples and replaced them with bars. It was less noticeable under a thin T-shirt that way, and when I went shirtless around my dad or sister, it didn’t look quite so ostentatious.

  “Yeah. I think so.”

  He grinned. “You should put them back in.”

  I laughed at that, and he disappeared into the house to wash up. I took the plates into the kitchen and started the dishwasher. When I got to the bedroom, the display box with my collars was on top of the dresser, right there for anyone to see. I wasn’t ashamed of serving him, of being his submissive.

  It turned out I did have the hoops, stored in a small Ziploc bag. There was alcohol solution in the bathroom, and I used that to clean them while my boyfriend was still singing in the shower, steaming up the mirror.

  “Does it hurt when you change the piercings?” Will asked, sticking his head out around the shower curtain.

  “Not really,” I said. It was a fiddly job, changing them over, but the bar and the hoop were the same size, so it didn’t stretch the hole through my nipple at all. Since I already had the alcohol out, I gave the piercings a quick swipe, which stung. “There,” I
said, thrusting my chest forward for his inspection. “All done.”

  “Much better,” he said with a very dirty grin.

  As promised, I worked like a madman through the morning to get the backyard cleared up and fix the parts of the deck that were broken or unstable. He was on a conference call when I was done so I just waved, then ducked into the shower to wash the sweat and dirt off.

  “I’m just going to the supermarket,” I said, leaning against the door to Will’s office. He was done with his call and frantically typing an e-mail.

  “Okay, baby,” he said, his voice calm, at odds with his frazzled appearance. “Can you get me some soda, please?”

  “It’ll rot your teeth,” I told him affectionately.

  “And some toothpaste?”

  I laughed, blew him a kiss, then had to hunt down the keys to his car before I could head out.

  After the incident at the grocery store, I did all our shopping at the supermarket. It wasn’t what I wanted, we’d made a point of shopping locally at home, but I had no intention of getting into arguments with small-minded people. The last thing I wanted was to invite anything more upon us.

  Will’s parents and sisters were flying in for his birthday, along with a handful of nieces and nephews. He didn’t know anything about it. Due to how long it would take me to get to the airport and back, they were renting cars (with GPS) to get them down to the house. My family was going to come over too, and it would be the first time a lot of them would meet each other.

  Needless to say, I was nervous about the whole event.

  I’d been planning behind Will’s back for some time, ever since I tried to convince him to go home and see his folks for the weekend and he’d refused, saying he wanted to spend it with me. Since he’d given me no other choice, I’d arranged the party.

  It was going to be more of a cookout, really. Jennifer had steaks marinating for me back at Dad’s house, and she was making big bowls of salad and coleslaw too. All that was left to get was burgers and hotdogs, some beer and buns.

  It had been slightly humbling to realize I was older now than my dad was when I was born. My children would always have a father older than mine had been to me. The idea of having a Mini-Me was playing more on my mind these days. Things were still so up in the air at the moment, and I couldn’t help but think if Mama were still alive, we’d be seriously considering our options.