by Harper Bliss
My bruised pussy lips are pulsing again and, despite knowing I need some time to recover, I already want her again. I feel it in every bone of my body. Leigh is inventive, she’ll find a way to give me what I need. She always did.
“Can’t wait,” I say, as I feel tears stinging behind my eyes. Because this love of ours is greater than time. It’s greater than the sacrifices we felt we needed to make. The sum of it is more than our separate desires. Maybe we didn’t see it then, but I clearly see it now.
“I’ll stay at the Library Hotel. I love that place,” Leigh says.
“Nuh-uh.” I shake my head. “You’re staying with me.”
“If you insist,” she says.
“I do.” I lean in for another kiss, and I can already see it. Leigh waking up in the bed we used to share. The four of us going for breakfast because Troy will be home from college. Rosie will have a million questions to ask. Leigh will rest her hand on my knee and I will look the three of them over. The three people I love most in the world.
“My other nipple feels neglected,” Leigh says when we come up for air. “And this too.” She takes my hand and guides it between her legs. I know what to do.
* * *
Our goodbye a few hours later is fraught with emotion. Leigh keeps glaring at me, giving the impression she can’t quite believe the night we just had. I have trouble processing it myself, but I need to drag myself out of my current mindset, ignore the sting of my ass cheeks and focus on packing.
“Here.” Leigh hands me her belt. “Something to remember me by.” Before she releases it, she lets the leather slide through her fingers suggestively. Having it presented to me now makes me think back to yesterday’s tears—mine, but especially hers. What is going on behind those eyes of hers?
“I won’t forget you that easily.” It was hard enough the first time.
Leigh’s only half-dressed, but the clock is ticking and I need to see my son at breakfast. I no longer feel the need to admonish him, though it feels odd to have him involved in this. She comes for me and grabs me by the neck again.
“I’ve never forgotten you,” she breathes into my ear, and I know it’s true. Perhaps some people can have several true loves throughout their lives, but for me, there’s only been one. It’s her. I can’t be sure what the future will bring, but I do know that, if we do get back together, it won’t be a repeat of our previous relationship. There’s no tuning back into old habits in the cards for us. I have an eight-year-old at home. And I’m a decade older, and hopefully wiser.
I check the clock again. “I have to go, Leigh.” Instead of pulling away, I let her kiss me, and the touch of our lips swoops through me the way it has always done.
“Say hi to Troy for me.” She chuckles and grabs the rest of her clothes. “And call me when you’re back in New York.” Her gaze lingers, waiting for a confirmation.
“I will.”
One last quick kiss and I’m out the door. Part of me hopes she’ll wait until I return to fetch my luggage after breakfast.
* * *
When he sees me approach his and Gerald’s table Troy rises and opens his arms wide. I can’t wait for him to be back in New York. To spend some proper time with him.
“I’m so sorry about last night, Mom.” He pulls me into a tight, forceful hug. When did my little boy get so tall and strong?
“Sure you are.” I sit across from him and examine his grinning face before saying hello to Gerald. “How was the game?”
“Do you really care?” Troy asks, still with a smirk on his face.
“Just checking if ditching your mother was worth it, Troy-toy.” I send him a knowing smile back.
“How was your evening?” Gerald asks.
The chair feels extra hard against my bruised butt cheeks. “Interesting,” I say. I don’t want to quiz Troy in front of Gerald.
“I’m sorry about that, too, Mom.” Troy is just a barrel of apologies this morning, though he doesn’t come across as very repentant. “I know I should have told you much sooner that Leigh and I were friends. I just… never found the right time to tell you.”
Friends? “I agree.” I’m not letting him off the hook for keeping that a secret from me. “You should have said something.” A waitress comes by and pours me a cup of coffee. “Especially because you’ve become quite… close.”
“I know.” He nods solemnly and I can so easily see he’s not telling me everything.
“So how is Miss Sterling these days?” Gerald asks.
I wonder if she’s still in my hotel room—the one my ex-husband so generously paid for. “Doing quite well for herself.”
“How wonderful.” He can’t hide the sarcasm in his voice, not that I expect him to. Gerald has always been courteous with Leigh and any animosity between them always seemed to come more from her side. As though she couldn’t stand the fact that I’d once been Mrs. Dunn. As though that had left a permanent stain on me—one even she couldn’t erase.
“Let’s order some food, shall we?” I say, diplomatically. Although I’m not hungry. My stomach is too aflutter with memories of Leigh. And exciting possibilities for our future.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I take Friday afternoon off in order to arrive in New York at a decent time. I don’t want to knock on Jodie’s door after midnight. Over the phone, I expressed my doubts about staying with her. What would she tell Rosie? Would I sleep on the couch? But Jodie told me not to worry about Rosie just yet. She’d sleep over at Muriel’s and we could all meet for brunch on Saturday. Brunch with Muriel, I thought. What a delightful prospect. But only for a fleeting second because my mind was too hung up on Jodie and having the apartment to ourselves on Friday evening.
When I finally ring her bell an hour later than expected courtesy of ‘mechanical issues’ with the airplane, I’m so amped up, so ready to have her melt in my arms, I’m unprepared for the shock of just standing there. Of waiting for her to open the door for me in the building where I used to live—where, undoubtedly, throughout my life, I have been the happiest.
“Hey stranger,” she says when she does open the door. Everything is treacherously familiar, but it’s also not. The walls are a different color, and the sofa is in a different corner. Toys spill out of a box next to the kitchen door, and a large half-finished puzzle is spread out on the floor next to it. “Come in.”
I drop my bag and take Jodie in my arms. I’m grateful to be able to close my eyes for a few seconds, and while I do so, I consider that arriving here, after all these years, feels much more like coming home than stumbling into my own house in San Francisco after a long day at work.
As I head out of the hallway I spot a picture of me and Troy in front of a huge Lego construction. I feel strangely honored that a minor souvenir of me has remained in Jodie’s home.
“God, it’s odd to be back here.” I unbutton my blazer and glance around. She has a new sofa and a new dining table. I scan the walls for pictures of a person who might be Suzy, but can’t immediately identify one.
“Drink?” Jodie has a silly grin plastered on her face.
“Oh yes.” I sit down. The carpet is still the same one we had that bout of break-up sex on. I hope she had that cleaned.
“Do you still like a good red?” Jodie stands next to the drinks cabinet a few feet away from me. On the plane, I had visions of entering the apartment and slamming her against the door, the way I used to do, but the power of nostalgia seems to have me in its grip and I’m much more emotional than aroused right now.
I nod and look at Jodie. She has slipped into a pair of jeans—definitely after-work attire. Muriel and a good number of Jodie’s colleagues used to wear jeans to work all the time but Jodie is not the type. She’s wearing a baby blue blouse and whereas ten years ago it would have been tucked in tightly, she wears it loose now. But we’ve seen each other naked. I’ve let my eyes wander over the most-hidden parts of her body, and I know the score.
Jodie pours the wine. “A gift
from Dan Mazlowski if you can believe it. Remember your old colleague?” She hands me the bottle, as though I need to read the label before I can drink it. “He’s made quite a career for himself.”
“I’m sure he has.” Uninterested in the origin of the wine, I put the bottle down and raise my glass. “I guess we should drink to Troy,” I say, my voice a bit hesitant, “for bringing us back together.”
Jodie shakes her head. “He’s sticking to his story that it was not a set-up.”
“That boy will make a great lawyer very soon.” I clink the rim of my glass against Jodie’s and look her in the eyes. In all our time apart, I’ve never encountered irises as green as hers.
We fall silent and sip. The thought flits through my mind that the feelings we had for each other in Berkeley might have just been intensified melancholia. That the feeling might be unreproducible now that we’re sitting here, in the same room where the disagreements started. That the magic might be gone. And we can’t just fuck again. I want to ask about Jodie’s exes—I’ve never been good at dealing with those—but right now is not opportune timing. Of all the things I had imagined I’d be doing right now, searching for words was not one of them.
“I told Muriel about, erm, our night in Berkeley.” Jodie eyes me over the rim of her glass.
“Good old Muriel.” Did she ever tell Jodie I ran into her not long after we broke up? And that she advised me to make contact? “What did she have to say?” Nerves tumble down my stomach. It still feels like most subjects should be carefully danced around.
“She gave me an eye-roll or two.” Jodie chuckles. “You know what she’s like.”
“Look…” I feel agitated like a teenager on her first date. Insecure. “I’ve been thinking about moving back to New York for a while.” I just blurt out the words. I haven’t particularly spent more time considering coming back of late than at any other time over the years I went West. I also realize this is the wrong thing to say at this time. I just hope Jodie can see that I’m ill at ease. And that I’m sorry.
“Oh.” She drinks, shifting uneasily in her seat. An image pops into my head of how she would look with her back against the wall and the button of her jeans flipped open. I’m all over the place. I have no idea what to say to Jodie Whitehouse. Being here is undoing me.
“I shouldn’t have said that.” I try a smile.
“I’m glad Troy did what he did,” Jodie says, her gaze on me. “I’m glad I saw you again, Leigh. And I felt it too. That pull. All those memories. It was a crazy night, but a few hours in bed together can hardly erase all that has happened.” She sighs. “Granted, it would be easy to just fall into bed”—an image of Jodie with her wrists tied to the headboard drifts through my mind—“but, I don’t know if that’s such a good idea. Eleven years is a long time.”
I nod but still don’t know what to say, until it comes to me. The truth that has been building in my subconscious for over a decade. The truth I was always too afraid to face. “I should have stayed.” I put my glass down. “In the back of my mind, you were always there, Jodie. Even when I was with another woman, I was always silently comparing. I mean, I had to leave the city to get over you… and still I didn’t see. I should have stayed. I should have been there when you had Rosie. I should have been there for everything because now, I sit here, and I want you so much it’s nearly paralyzing me, but there’s this huge gap between us. Not just caused by the years we’ve spent apart, but by the completely different lives we’ve led. I should have done it for you, Jodie. Gotten over myself and the pursuit of my precious career.” I can’t hold back a tear from sliding down my cheek. It’s just the one though, like a dramatic metaphor for all the years I’ve spent alone.
“I disagree.”
A jolt of hurt makes my head spin. She might as well have punched me in the stomach.
“You’ve changed,” Jodie continues. “I can easily see that. What happened between us has changed you. And it’s easy to sit here and think it could have worked if you’d stayed, but we were so miserable by the end. I would never have wanted a child to grow up in that atmosphere.” Jodie deposits her wine glass on the table as well. “But how many people get a second chance? I, for one, had never expected you to sit in my apartment ever again. Our split hurt me so much, but I realize it was necessary. We wouldn’t be who we are now if we hadn’t broken up.”
“Clearly you’ve been happier than I’ve been.” Self-pity doesn’t really suit me, so I straighten my spine and attempt a grin.
“I had a child, Leigh.” She shuffles closer. “Here’s my proposition.” Her thigh is nearly touching mine. “Let’s look to the future instead of at the past. What happened did so for a reason.”
“Yeah.” In response, I inch closer to Jodie. I’m not sure how serious she was about not falling into bed. My entire week has been consumed with images of her under my control. Of her bottom striped pink by my hand.
“I’m glad you came all this way.” Jodie leans her head against my shoulder. “It feels like I missed you more during this week than I did the past eleven years combined.”
Warmth spreads in my belly, and not just because of her touch. I brush her hair away from her ear so she can clearly hear what I’m about to say. “I want to fuck you.” Because, before we can calm down and really assess this situation, I will need to possess her many more times. I will need to see her face scrunch up with ecstasy and hear her voice grow hoarse with pleasure.
“Okay,” Jodie says, as if she, too, feels that we need to fuck this tension between us out of our system. As if it’s the only way. It probably is. But it feels wrong to order her to go into the bedroom because it’s not my bedroom anymore. She’s slept with other people in that bed. Or perhaps, those ghosts need to be exorcized as well. It doesn’t take me as long to find my bearings as it did in Berkeley when I was still too stunned by the shock of seeing her. First fully clothed, then naked, then with her hands tied to the bed.
I tune back into the fantasy that has dominated my nights—and days—since last weekend. “I brought something.” Jodie slips off me when I get up. I head toward my bag and grab it. “Wait for me in the bedroom. Get naked. I need to use the bathroom.”
Then I see it, what I’ve been waiting for since I arrived. That spark in her eyes. That upturned corner of her mouth. She’s so beautiful, and so Jodie—every inch the woman from my memories. I can’t wait to look into those eyes when I fuck her.
Silently, Jodie goes into the bedroom and leaves the door open. I enter the bathroom and peer at my reflection for a second. I’m back, I think, and for an instant, it feels as if I never left. Then I quickly disrobe and strap on. I paid a visit to my favorite shop in the Castro last Wednesday and picked this one out especially for our New York reunion. Just the feel of the dildo, as I maneuver it through the ring with my hands, leaves me weak at the knees.
Jodie’s eyes widen when I walk into the bedroom. Then her lips stretch into a grin. “On your knees,” I say. “Here.” I point to the spot right in front of where I’m standing. “Now.”
Jodie hurries off the bed and kneels before me. “You’d better make it nice and wet because I didn’t bring any lube.” I did, of course, but she doesn’t have to know that. In my fantasy, I added, “And I’ll be damned if I’m going to use any of the stuff Suzy used on you,” but I decide against that particular line. It’s not necessary. Jodie’s open mouth is hovering over the tip of my silicone cock already. “Eyes on me.”
I didn’t pick the smallest model, and that’s an understatement. Jodie has to strain to wrap her lips around it and keep looking at me at the same time. I give her some time to find a rhythm and to get used to the action, but not too much, before grabbing a fistful of her hair and giving it a good tug. I yank at it until she stops. “You can do better.” Her eyes are coated in tears already. She must be severely out of practice. When she sucks the dildo between her lips next, I give a little thrust, just to let her know I mean business. “Deeper,” I growl.
And she lets it slide further into her mouth until her eyes are bulging, and the sight unhinges something inside of me. No one has done this for me in such a long time. Her eyelids flicker open and shut as she works on my cock, until I say, “Enough.” She lets it slip from her lips. Her mascara is smudged, a look I’ve always loved on Jodie. I give her a second to catch her breath.
“On the bed on all fours.” I need to spend some time with her ass first. This was not part of my fantasy scenario either, but I can’t help myself.
I wait until she’s in position and then crawl behind her and let the dildo dangle between her legs. It’s shiny with her spit and I need to stop myself from shoving it into her there and then, but that would just be giving her what she wants, and I do have some restraint left. I slither it against her pussy lips, let the tip graze against her clit, before pointing it at her ass cheeks and smearing them with saliva and her own wetness. My finger follows the dildo, meeting her flesh, and my own clit swells against the fabric of the harness. I could quite possibly come while fucking her. I spread her cheeks, just because I can, and because the sight never fails to arouse me, just to give the impression I’ll be fucking her ass. I want to, but I want to look into her eyes more. I knead her ass cheeks, my fingertips leaving marks, and then let my fingers wander down to her cunt. I spread her lips and gather moisture. I just brought the lube as a precaution—because after so many years you just never know—but Jodie is sufficiently wet. I transport some of her juices to the dildo and rub it in my hand, lubricating it for entrance.
“Turn around,” I hiss. I move to the side so Jodie can flip onto her back. “Legs wide.”
Her teeth sink into her bottom lip. Whatever anyone else has done to Jodie in this bed and in this room, I’m ready to make it disappear. I’m ready to fuck the Suzy out of her—although I hardly think that’s still necessary. It’s more for me than for her. And even more than earlier, I feel as though I’m coming home.
