The Proposal

by R. R. Banks

  I parted my lips and accepted the head between them. I let the tip of my tongue glide along the slit, gathering the sweet-salty taste of the crystalline drops that were forming there before dipping inside for a brief instant. I then brought my attention down, concentrating on the taut, sensitive bundle of nerves on the underside. I could feel the blood coursing through the swollen veins along his cock and I licked each of them in turn. Finally, I opened my mouth fully and took him in. Garrett pressed his hips forward so that he slid across my tongue and plunged toward my throat. I relaxed, welcoming him, accepting every inch of him until I felt him sink down into my throat and his hips begin to thrust.

  Rather than trying to control the movements, I gave myself over to him completely. I allowed the movements of Garrett's hips to control how my mouth glided along his cock and the depth that it reached in my throat. I looked up at him, meeting his eyes and feeling my stomach flutter as he watched me without hesitation. We remained that way for only a few moments before he pulled out of my mouth and stepped back to undress the rest of the way. When he was finished, he approached me and grasped me by the sides of my ribs, pulling me up off the floor and to my feet. He reached up and grabbed onto the panties around my wrists again, twisting them so that I faced away from him as I had before. His hands moved swiftly as they brought my hips back toward him and my feet spread far apart so that again I was bent over and vulnerable to him. I heard the unmistakable rip of a condom wrapper opening and I wrapped my hands tightly around the pole, moaning loudly as he filled me with one thrust.

  Garrett pressed deeper and deeper into me until I felt the slight pain that made the ache within me release and filled me with a sense of fulfillment and wholeness. I felt something with him that I never had before, and I wanted more of it. I wanted everything that I could have of him, and to give him all of me that I had to give. Even if it was only the broken pieces. Even if it wasn't all of me. There was some of me that was locked away, kept silenced and untouchable, but what I was capable of offering him, I was willing to give.

  Just when I felt that my body couldn't possibly accommodate any more of him, Garrett began to thrust inside me. His hips moved in a fast, even pace, his silence finally broken with his grunts that accompanied each stroke. My body was still humming with my first orgasm and now I could feel another growing, creeping up through me as it tightened my muscles and made my mind cloudy. Our panting and whimpering groans came out of us with abandon, filling the space around us, echoing off the walls and reverberating through me as I gave myself over to the climax that took me as suddenly and intensely as the first. I felt Garrett swell and throb within me at the same moment and his own animal growl covered even the sound of my cry.

  As our bodies cooled, Garrett released my wrists and lowered me down to sit in his lap as he leaned back against the pole. I tucked my head against the curve of his neck and shoulder, breathing in the musky smell of him, and smiled. He turned and kissed my hair and I nuzzled closer to him.

  "Maybe we should actually schedule a time when we can see each other rather than just finding ourselves here," he finally said.

  "Maybe we should," I murmured.

  "How about this weekend?"

  I sighed and lifted my head, so I could look at him.

  "I can't," I told him. "I have to go to my parents' house."

  "Your parents' house? Is it far?"

  "No. They live in Silver Lake. Well, just outside of Silver Lake. It's about ten minutes from my house."

  He laughed.

  "If they live that close, why is the visit such a big deal?"

  "I'm their only child," I explained. "So, my growing up and moving out of the house was a major thing for them. Besides, they always wanted to be the classic parents and grandparents welcoming the family home for visits. They don't have any grandchildren, so I'm it. I see them all the time, but they insist that every so often I come home and pretend that I'm returning after a long absence and spend the night with them. It's completely ridiculous, but I do it to amuse them."

  "That is pretty ridiculous," he said, but there was still laughter in his voice.

  I shrugged.

  "It makes them happy. What about your parents? Don't they ever ask you to do silly things that you do just to humor them?"

  Garrett's eyes darkened and his smile disappeared. I immediately wished that I hadn't asked that, realizing that I knew nothing about him or his family and that I had obviously just touched on something extremely difficult for him.

  "No," he said.

  That was it. No further explanation. No details.

  I felt suddenly very aware of my nakedness in the open space and I climbed from his lap. I moved around as fast as I could, gathering my clothes and stuffing myself back into them. I was starting for the door when I felt his hand grasp my elbow. He turned me around and held me around my waist, leaning back slightly so that he could look into my face. My eyes explored his, searching for something within him, wanting to find what was hiding from me. After a few silent seconds, he leaned down and touched his lips to mine in a soft kiss.

  That kiss was still on my mind when I arrived at my parents’ house the next evening. As I always did, I had brought several pieces of luggage with me. Though each one only held one or two items, it made it look as though I had made a grand journey to visit them. I hauled the pieces of luggage out of my car and carried them up onto the porch of the house. My mother burst out of the front door and held her arms open, gasping when she saw me as though we hadn't just gone to lunch the week before. I gave a deep sigh and mimicked sagging under the exhaustion of a long drive, and she rushed forward to wrap me in a hug. It was a charade that had played out every month or two for almost two years, and while I knew that it was silly and nonsensical, it also made my heart warm. I enjoyed the playfulness and it made me happy to know that even though I was still close and able to see them frequently, my parents still missed me and enjoyed having any opportunity to spend time with me.

  Just as he always did, my father stepped out of the porch and eyed my luggage.

  "Do you think you brought enough?" he asked.

  "I think I have everything that I need," I told him.

  He nodded and reached for two of my suitcases. Neither one of them could have weighed more than two pounds, but he put on a dramatic show of hauling them up off the ground and lugging them into the house. My mother and I laughed as she wrapped her arm around my waist to guide me into the house. It smelled just like it had when I was a little girl. In the background, it was clean like fresh linens with a wisp of flowers from somewhere, but the first thing that I smelled was dough and cinnamon. Every time that I came home I was welcomed by my mother's baking and the smell was always enough to soothe any hurt and make me feel safe and secure again.

  I curled up on the couch while my father carried my luggage up to my childhood bedroom. They hadn't changed it since I moved out, but I found that comforting each time that I returned. It was as though if I were feeling out of control or like I had veered away from myself, I could come home and hit a reset button, anchoring myself back into who I was so that I could find myself again.

  "How is the vacation planning going?" I asked.

  My mother came back into the room carrying a tray overflowing with cinnamon buns and mugs of coffee. She settled it onto the table between the couch and her favorite chair and I mused that she was still the only person I knew who actually used a coffee table for coffee. I reached forward and grabbed a mug with one hand and a roll with the other, happy to feel that both of them were warm enough to start thawing me out from the chill outside.

  "Wonderfully!" my mother gushed. "You are going to love the place we chose this year!"

  Every year of my life my parents had planned a big trip for the three of us for spring break, and each year they strove to keep it a surprise until the day that we left. They had only managed to achieve that a few times. Usually, they ended up spilling all of the plans at least three weeks be
fore leaving, which I always preferred. As much as they tried to convince me that I did, I didn't enjoy not knowing where we were going or what we would be doing. Not only did it present a packing dilemma, but it made me feel queasy knowing that I had absolutely no control.

  That thought reminded me of Garrett tying my hands to the pole and I felt a rush of heat across my cheeks. I took a sip of my coffee to try to cover it and focused back on the conversation with my mother.

  "I hope that you two haven't come up with anything crazy," I said.

  "Oh, don't you worry about us. We can handle anything!"

  That sentiment was exactly why I spent so much time worrying about them. My mother and father might have looked like a sweet, quiet little couple, gliding on toward retirement age, but there were times when they certainly didn't act like it. Our family vacations were usually those times and I frequently found them engaging in behaviors that better befitted someone my age, or younger than it did them. Case in point, last year I nearly had a heart attack watching my father zip-line through a forest canopy while the year before found my mother submerging herself in a cage so that she could feed sharks.

  "I sure hope you brought along everything you need," my father said as he came back down the steps and made a beeline for the coffee and cinnamon rolls. "But don't worry, even if you forgot something, we can always go up to the store and get it."

  Yes, the store that was three minutes closer to my house than it was to my parents'.

  That night I was tucked into my lace-edged sheets, staring at the inspirational poster I had hung on my wall during my junior year when I heard my phone chime from beneath my pillow. I had taken to keeping it there in the early days of college when my dorm roommate insisted that my alarm clock was archaic and produced too much light during the night to allow her to get sufficient REM sleep, so I would have to unplug it. An eight AM class necessitated me waking up reliably and using my phone alarm from directly beneath my head proved the only effective way of getting that done. The roommate didn't last beyond the semester, but the phone-pillow habit survived to this day.

  I pulled my phone out and looked at the screen. It held a text message from Garrett.

  'How was the road trip to your folks'?'

  'Strenuous as always, but I got to listen to the top four greatest hits of the 80s, so that made it go by faster.'

  '80s music doesn't make anything go faster.'

  'Don't besmirch my 80s music.'

  'Besmirch? Is that actually a word that is still used?'

  'Oh, hush your mouth.'

  'I'm not using my mouth. I'm using my fingers.'

  'Hush your...fingers.'

  'Maybe you should come over and I'll find something better to do with my fingers.'

  I wriggled in my bed, squeezing my thighs together against the desire already growing there.

  'I told you. I can't. I'm at my parents' house.'

  'So, sneak out and come see me. I'll wait outside your window.'

  I muffled a laugh against my pillow. I loved that he was playing along, but even more amusing was that he was suggesting something that I would have never even considered in high school. Leaving for my dates when I was a teenager happened strictly through the front door, the exact same way that I returned, always on time and with my goodnight kiss occurring no less than 30 seconds before curfew so that the front door was closed and locked before I could be considered late.

  I was boring as hell.

  I thought about my response for a few seconds, wondering if I should go along with his request, then thought better of it.

  'Sorry. You're just going to have to miss me.'

  I felt myself blush as I sent the message and chastised myself for the reaction that brought me just a bit too close to being an actual teenager. I was feeling completely wrapped up in Garrett, my thoughts drifting to him every few minutes and my dreams filling with replays of our encounters and fantasies of what more could come. Even as I felt myself floating when I thought of him, there was a voice in the back of my mind that told me to be cautious. It reminded me that I didn't really know him and that I couldn't truly trust him. I had to protect myself.

  'Missing you will just make me want you more.'

  I bit my bottom lip and tucked my phone back under my pillow, trying to will myself to go to sleep.

  Chapter Nine

  Garrett

  "Are you kidding me, Jason? Are you seriously freaking kidding me?"

  "I'm sorry, Dad."

  "I thought that we had this conversation. I thought that I made it clear to you that you needed to straighten up."

  "You did."

  "Apparently I didn't because you just waltzed in here with a letter from your teacher."

  I was furious that this is the way that my week was beginning. After a weekend of flirting and sexy banter with Gwendolyn, my Monday had started with the first fire call that I received since taking my position. An apparent case of arson triggered by a long-standing feud between two families. The blaze had destroyed several generations-old buildings on a farm just outside of town and started a brush fire that nearly got out of control. If it hadn't been for some dampness remaining in the ground from the melting snow, many more buildings and homes could have been obliterated. The team had spent hours fighting back the flames, rescuing livestock, and trying to cooperate with the investigation of the arson without compromising the safety of the area and everyone in it. I had come home exhausted and wanting nothing more than just to take a shower, eat something, and go to bed. Instead, I had found an envelope sitting on the kitchen counter. There was no name on it, but the top corner held a printed return address for the school.

  "It's Miss Martin again," Jason said. "I told you, she won't get off my back. I don't know what it is about her. She just doesn't like me. She hasn't liked me since the first day that she saw me, and she won't give me a break."

  "Somehow, I doubt that," I said.

  I tore open the envelope and pulled out the folded letter. When I opened it, all anger that I had toward my son disappeared and instead shifted so that it was directed right at the teacher.

  "Mr. and Mrs. Baxter," I said. She addressed the letter to Mr. and Mrs. Baxter.

  I saw Jason nodding and suddenly I felt like I understood what he was going through. Seeing that salutation on the letter made me intensely angry and my hands shook as I looked at it. I had moved us here to Silver Lake not because of any memories that I had of it, not because this is where I had been born, not because of any ties that I had to it, but despite those things. I had moved us here because of the small community and the opportunities that I hoped that it would hold for my son. I thought that if we lived in a smaller area with a tighter community that he would have more of an opportunity to feel supported and encouraged, and build meaningful relationships that might help him to experience a greater sense of value and accountability. Instead, it seemed like he had disappeared. He was suddenly someone nobody understood, and who apparently no one was willing to take the time to understand. This letter was enough for me to see that this Miss Martin didn't even care enough about her students to take the time to get to know them or learn anything about them. If she did, then she would know that not only did Jason have a different last name than me, but there was no Mrs. in the house to read the letter along with me.

  I skimmed the rest of the letter. It requested that I come in for a conference with her so that we could discuss Jason's behavioral issues. I looked up at Jason who had stayed standing a few feet from me, watching me as I read the letter.

  "What is it that you're doing in her class that has made her so angry at you?" I asked.

  He shrugged.

  "I'm not really doing anything," he said. "I might tease her a little bit. Sometimes I don't really get along with the other students that are in the class. But it's not like I'm throwing things at her or inciting riots or anything."

  I nodded. I folded up the letter and shoved it back into the envelope, slamming i
t down onto the counter. The last thing that I wanted to do was go up to the school and face this miserable woman. It seems like an absolute waste of my time and energy to go listen to her ramble on about Jason when I felt like I had gotten plenty of information from him and from that letter. At the same time, I did want to confront her. I wanted to tell her that she needed to back off and stop being so hard on him just because he was acting like a teenage boy. I knew that he was rebellious and could be difficult. He was my son and I had lived with him every day of his life. I had seen him at his worst, at least the worst that I hoped that he would ever achieve, but I also knew that he was a decent kid. Being as hard on him as she was being wasn't going to help. If anything, it was going to push him further into acting out. I grabbed the phone and called the firehouse, letting them know that I needed to shift my hours the next day. When I hung up I looked at Jason.

  "I'm going up to the school tomorrow and I'm going to have a talk with Miss Martin," I said.

  He nodded again. Not feeling hungry anymore, I stomped down the hallway toward the shower, ready for the day to be over.

  The next afternoon I strode into the front office of the high school just a few moments after the final bell rang. I wanted to give any students in Miss Martin's last class the opportunity to get out of the classroom before I got into it. The secretary looked up at me with an expression that was somewhere between intimidation and attraction. It was something that I was accustomed to seeing in women, but at that moment I didn't care how anyone was reacting to me. I was getting ready to ask the secretary where to find Miss Martin when I saw the principal coming down the short hallway that led to his office.

  "Garrett," he said, sounding happy to see me. "This is certainly a surprise. What can I do for you?"