The Pull of Yesterday

by Gabriella West

  “Can’t see much at night, except the lights,” Matt said vaguely, his hands on the wheel. “I love being back here.”

  I couldn’t say the same, I reflected. “What did you think of my mother?” I asked finally.

  He paused. “Wow. She was a surprise. She was quite... sharp.”

  I smiled to myself. “She used to be different.”

  “Well, age changes people. And death. Yeah, my mother used to be different too, very empathetic and caring when I was a kid.”

  So that’s where you got it from, I thought.

  “She knows about us?” Matt said. He sounded slightly confused.

  “Yeah, she asked. She kind of guessed. For the first time, we talked about it. It was weird.”

  “You look knocked out,” he said. “It was a tough visit, I can see.”

  I said nothing, letting the GPS do the talking. I thought about crossing the Golden Gate Bridge to see him the last few times, and now crossing this bridge. We’d taken plenty of trips into Cambridge as students, hadn’t we? It was all a blur, our happy times back then. What we had now was in some ways a pale shadow of it.

  “You need a drink, don’t you,” he said at my side.

  “Something,” I sighed. “I won’t be up for sex tonight.”

  He chuckled. “I figured. Don’t feel bad about it. I didn’t feel up to sex for a long time after my dad died.”

  “It’s not the same.” The words slipped out quickly and hung in the air.

  “Oh?” He glanced at me.

  “You loved your father and he loved you.”

  He said nothing, but I could feel his concern.

  “The man who died yesterday wasn’t my father, it turns out.”

  My voice sounded dry and detached. “Even my mother is calling him Tim and not ‘your father,’ so I suppose I’ll refer to him as Tim from now on, though he’ll be buried soon.”

  “God...” was all Matt said, and then he concentrated on getting us to the Airbnb place.

  I hadn’t known what to expect, and had dreaded having to go into someone’s home and chat to the owner, but it turned out there was a private entrance to an old house on a quiet, leafy street, and Matt had already got the key from the owner and bought groceries, and soon we were inside and I was taking off my clothes. I just wanted to fall into bed.

  “Eat some soup first,” Matt said. He was stirring something on the stove of the charming little studio.

  “I can’t,” I muttered.

  “Dave. Go have a shower and then come and eat a bowl of soup. You can do that.”

  I obeyed, feeling mulish. The idea of Matt ordering me around like this was kind of bizarre. I wasn’t used to it, didn’t like it, but when I was soaping myself in the hot shower, I breathed deeply a few times, allowed some tears to fall, and wondered if I could get away with screaming in the shower stall. Probably not.

  I wrapped a towel around my waist and came out. The place was warming up and Matt smiled at me.

  I forced a smile back and tossed on a sweatshirt and some pants. Sitting at the table with bare feet, I slurped down some clam chowder. It was good. He’d bought a loaf of fresh, crusty bread as well.

  “Nice place,” I muttered, glancing around. It looked like a graduate student’s apartment, which stung in some way. Matt must love it.

  He came and sat beside me, allowing his head to fall onto my shoulder. We sat like that for a moment until it became unbearable. I shifted away.

  “I know you’re upset,” Matt said. “Let me help.”

  “You can’t,” I mumbled.

  “What is this about your father? Who’s your real father, then?”

  “A Jewish lawyer,” I blurted out and was amazed when Matt burst out laughing.

  “Oh God! Wait till I tell my mother...”

  “I see,” I said, getting up restlessly, remembering Mike’s dark words for a moment. “You think it’ll make me more acceptable to her?”

  “Jews are weird like that. It probably will.”

  “Great,” I muttered. I threw myself onto the IKEA bed and Matt joined me, switching on the bedside lamp. He curled up at my side.

  “I know you want to be alone,” he whispered. “I’m sorry I’m getting on your nerves.”

  I buried my face in the pillow, my body rigid as a rock. “It’s not you.”

  He sighed. “I just want to help. But we’ll talk tomorrow; you’ll feel a little more human then. You’re exhausted.”

  His hand caressed my back, moved lower, stroked my ass gently.

  It helped somehow, so I didn’t tell him to stop. I calmed, bit by bit. My breathing evened out.

  Sex would help, I thought. Especially with him, the way he would do it. It would help, but I was terrified of my own reaction to his touch. I felt unpredictable.

  “Goodnight, Matt,” I said, turning on my side, away from him.

  “Goodnight, hon,” he murmured. “Sleep as long as you want.”

  ***

  In the end, I did sleep, though Matt fell asleep before I did. I lay there, listening to the distant sounds of Cambridge. It hurt to come back here to the East Coast, confront my family, see the ghosts of our past. Although Matt was being positive and helpful, I felt my identity was being sucked away. Being Tim Madden’s son hadn’t been much, but at least I had had a father. Now all I had were two ghosts, one a man who had just died, and the other an elderly man who was lurking somewhere out there, perhaps dead, but more likely living with his family and not wanting to be bothered by me. And I had no desire to meet him. He could have saved my mother, I thought, but seduced her and let her go, let her fester in her bad marriage because he didn’t have the courage to leave his.

  Bastard.

  He was the love of her life, probably.

  Bastard. Bastard.

  My last thought was that if I’d known the truth, I would have had an excuse not to come home for the funeral. I wanted to share this irony with Matt, hear his laugh, but he was slumbering gently. He didn’t snore. We were spending the night together after all, I thought. My throat was tight with unshed tears, sadness, and anger. God, I was a mess.

  And then, somehow, I slept.

  ***

  Morning brought some clarity. I woke quietly on Thursday, looking around. A clock on the wall in the kitchen area said 9:30. The bed was warm, the room still dim. Matt was on his side, shirtless, his shoulders shaking slightly. I watched him for a moment, the powerful muscles of his back moving, turning me on.

  He was jerking off, I thought groggily, amused. Did he know I was awake? I didn’t think so.

  I didn’t want to stop him, so I put my hand gently on his back. He gasped.

  “It’s OK,” I whispered.

  He was so warm. I slipped my hand between his legs and grasped his cock. He turned over on his back, looking sleepy, not saying anything. I leaned down and kissed his full lips. Stroking him. He was slick.

  I watched as he came into my hand. It was unbearably hot, and I pulled my shirt off, my pants. At least I would lie naked with him, I thought. We huddled together, Matt kissing me now, apologizing for his bad breath, his stubble. I couldn’t have cared less about that. He straddled me. I stared up at him, noticing his pupils flare.

  “I brought lube, but stupidly not condoms,” Matt said, staring down. “I can go out and get some if you... if you want.”

  My chest rose and fell, my face and chest flushing. I was awake and hard, and I wanted him. He was hard too.

  “No condoms. Doesn’t matter,” I muttered. “Just use lube. Do it now.”

  I turned over, pushing my face into the pillow. I couldn’t wait for it, suddenly.

  He used a couple fingers first, but not for long. I felt him pushing slowly into me. The initial burn and pressure was replaced, quite soon, with those sensations that I could never get enough of, embers of pleasure that flared up into long, shooting flames.

  He lay atop me, his hair brushing against my sensitive scalp, my neck. I arched
against him.

  “Matt,” I gasped.

  He was quiet, intent and methodical, as I shuddered and groaned. He reached a hand under me and cupped my balls.

  “Oh, Matt.... right there. Yes!”

  He kissed the back of my neck, pushing me down onto the bed, moving still, biting my shoulder blade. I began to get hard again, a second wave building inside me.

  “Oh fuck, Matt! How long can you go?” I groaned.

  I felt him laughing. “I don’t know why you expect me to only last ten minutes,” he teased.

  How could he even speak? He pulled out slowly and whispered, “Turn over.” I did, dazedly, and faced him. He lowered down on me again, kissing me deeply now, pushing inside me, my legs falling to the side, sweat covering both of us, our hearts pounding.

  “Don’t stop,” I whispered. It was a vain command, I knew it, we both knew it, but there was something so hot and wild about this.

  “I’d love to fuck you forever,” Matt murmured. I could feel him close to coming now, working to restrain himself yet thrusting deeper. “Like this... baby... I love you.”

  “I love you,” I said out loud.

  Our orgasms hit at about the same time. I closed my eyes as I felt the pulse of his ejaculation, the come shooting into me in spurts for the first time. Good, good, I thought. If it ends, at least I let him do this. I wanted him this much.

  Looking up, he was smiling, his clear eyes looking down into my face. More green today than brown, his eyes were, I noted.

  “Holy shit!” he announced. I couldn’t help laughing weakly.

  “Sorry, but that was insane.” He leapt up and grabbed a hand towel from the foot of the bed, then came back to bed with it.

  “I put it there last night, just in case.”

  “Didn’t even notice,” I murmured, sinking back down into the sheets. I could lie here forever, I thought. In the sheets that were now permeated with our sweat, our smell.

  “Go back to sleep, Dave. It’s fine,” Matt said. He rested beside me but I could tell he was energized, wanting to get up, eat, get out onto the street.

  “You can go out if you want,” I mumbled. “I just want to stay here. I’m tired.”

  “That’s fine,” was the last thing I remember him saying before I blanked out.

  15.

  “Guess what? It’s snowing!” Matt announced, coming back in around noon and shedding his scarf and coat. I groaned from the bed. “Haven’t experienced snow since 2001,” he added.

  He set some more bags of food down on the table. This looked like Chinese.

  “This’ll be yummy, I think,” he said. “It’s a joint we used to go to. Still there.”

  He looked great: refreshed, rested, flushed from the street.

  I yawned, hoping he would come join me in bed.

  “You need to eat. Get up,” he said instead in a friendly tone. To my amazement, I slid out of bed and walked over to him. He wrapped his arms around me and I kissed his cold face, lips.

  “Matt, is this for real?”

  I don’t know why I asked it then. He looked at me, puzzled.

  “Us, you mean? Of course it is.”

  “You won’t drift away when we get back to California?”

  “Do I seem like the drifting type?” he asked, his back to me at the sink now. My questions seemed to bother him, though. Of course they would, I thought. Who likes being asked about their intentions?

  “I thought you might be doing this for me out of pity,” I said bleakly. He shot me an odd look, almost angry.

  “Does anything I say get through to you at all?” he asked.

  I shrugged.

  “You’ve got to stop this. Yes, it’s real. You seem to be fighting me every step of the way, though.”

  I gulped. “I can’t help it.”

  “Well, stop it. Enjoy this, because it’s real and I’m certainly enjoying it.”

  He busied himself putting food into bowls. There were two sets of chopsticks, which we wouldn’t use, I supposed. Or maybe he would. I waited to see. He sat down and tore the paper off the chopstick set. He glanced at me.

  “What?”

  “I’ve never seen anyone actually use the chopsticks.”

  He put a mouthful to his lips and swallowed, watching me. His eyes were bright. I felt like he was going to say something that would shock me, something coarse, but he restrained himself. His energy pulsed over the table. I could tell he wanted me again, and I would let him fuck me.

  “You can fuck me again after,” I said. He didn’t say anything, but I saw a flare of something in his eyes.

  “Is that what you want?” he asked.

  “Yes. It is.”

  He smiled slightly. “Well, we’ll see.”

  I continued eating automatically, wondering what he meant.

  “Will you come see the snow with me later?” he asked.

  “I’m sure we’ll see plenty of it in the next few days. But yeah, all right.”

  His smile looked more genuine.

  “We have to be at the viewing at three, though,” I said. “I suppose we’ll have to allow an hour to get there.”

  “Two hours to waste, then,” Matt said. He finished eating and pushed his bowl away. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to get you too tired.”

  “Let me be the judge,” I said, shrugging.

  “We should talk, too.”

  I shrugged again. “I’m not sure what’s to say. You’re saying everything’s fine...”

  “It is.” Matt leaned back in his chair. “But you’re not. Are you?”

  “Not really.” I sighed and rubbed my eyes. “But I’m hanging in there. I don’t know what else to do.”

  “This is going to take so much out of you, and then going right back to work afterward seems insane.”

  “It’s what people like me do, Matt.” A little hardness crept into my voice. “We don’t have any real vacation time. We go right back to work. It’s expected. I may have already lost my job.”

  He shook his head. “Come on now. I’m sure you’re overreacting.”

  “Vic didn’t get back to me yesterday. Maybe he has now.”

  My phone was lying on the table, powered off. I looked at it with dread and turned it on.

  There were no new messages.

  “Looks like everyone’s forgotten about me,” I said with a shaky laugh.

  “Call them or email them,” Matt said quietly. “You want to keep the job, don’t you? They can’t fire you because of this, there’s family and medical leave now. But you have to make an effort.”

  “I’m too tired,” I said, shrugging. “OK, I suppose I’ll email.”

  I did it on my phone. Matt watched me from across the table. I apologized to Elena for not emailing her before, told her my father’s funeral was on Friday, told her I would be back to work on Tuesday. I had a bad feeling as I was doing it.

  “This isn’t going to fly,” I said. “It’s a full week off work.”

  “You’re not giving them much credit,” Matt said gently. He got up and came around to me. “Come back to bed, let’s rest a little more.”

  I smiled. “Sounds good.”

  ***

  I rested against him and he kissed me gently, but I knew he wasn’t likely to fool around. I sighed, allowing myself to relax into his warmth.

  “I’m dreading the viewing,” I murmured. “Have you ever been to one? I don’t know why you want to go with me. You don’t have to.”

  “I want to go with you,” Matt said. “This is why I’m here.” His arms tightened around me. “And no, I’ve never been to one. It’s not a Marin thing.”

  “We’re ten, twenty years behind the times here in some ways.”

  “Mmm,” Matt whispered. “Well, you’re good in the sack.”

  I burst out laughing. “I’m not sure I learned that here.”

  “I think you did. You were good right from the beginning, as I recall,” Matt murmured.

 
I couldn’t see the snow, but I could feel it somehow, mounting up around us outside.

  “God, I wish we didn’t have to go out,” I sighed.

  Matt was silent. Then: “Dave, I was thinking, after the funeral tomorrow, let’s just take off. Let’s go away for a couple of days.”

  “Where?” I was half asleep. “It’s winter. There’s nowhere to go.”

  “Martha’s Vineyard. I went there after my dad died to decompress, and I always wanted to go back. We can take the ferry. It’s year-round. It might even be warmer there.”

  He tweaked my nipple gently. “That’s a crazy idea, Matt,” I murmured. “You said you didn’t want me to get fired.”

  “It’s just a few more days,” he said. “We can fly back together on Tuesday. You can go in to work one day later.”

  My mind was too tired to figure it out. I tried to think of why it was a bad idea, but came up with nothing. “You’re spending too much money,” I said finally.

  He chuckled. “Yeah, but I’m enjoying this. And why rush it? This is supposed to be the honeymoon phase.”

  I didn’t know the phrase, but I stiffened up. “Are we ... are we in a relationship now?”

  “Yes, you fool,” he said gently. “Don’t you think so? You keep telling me you love me. Am I supposed to take that with a grain of salt?”

  “I do love you, Matt,” I said, staring up at him. “But let’s face it... how can this work back home? You’re totally out of my league, your mother dislikes me, I’d feel weird around your friends...”

  He shook his head. “I have some old friends that count, and they’d be perfectly nice to you. My old co-workers and stuff, who cares about them. My mother disliked Taylor a lot more.”

  “You’d have to be out,” I said.

  “Don’t you think I want to?” he asked. “I’ve never felt closeted, or straight, as a matter of fact. Even before I got married I was open with Taylor about that. She’s bi too, so it helped.”

  “But nobody knew that, I bet,” I pointed out.

  He chuckled slightly. “Dave, I think I see the lawyer coming out in you. It’s true I’ve never talked about it with my mother. I will now. I’ll tell her we’re in a serious relationship when we get back.”