These Battered Hands

by Laurel Ulen Curtis

  “One day after practice, I finally got up the nerve to talk to her, and we ended up making out in the locker room. It was great.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh at his boyish frankness.

  “That is until I got a little overly worked up, and she pointed it out to the entirety of the gym, my parents included.”

  “Ouch! Jennifer sounds like a total bitch.”

  “Nah,” he denied. “Just fourteen and female.”

  I shook my head at his generalization and bumped him in the inner thigh with the back of our hands. He scrambled to defend against a potential blow to the jewels.

  “Well, that was fun,” I redirected, hoping he’d move on and let me off the hook. No such luck.

  “Nuh uh uh. It’s your turn. Come on, Cal. Feed my soul. Give me some redemption. Prove to me that I’m not alone,” he fake pleaded, widening his eyes comically and making it impossible to resist.

  The only thing I could think of was the one thing I didn’t want to say, but eager to get it over with, I blurted it all out at once anyway. “I lost my virginity to a guy who used to do gymnastics at the gym right after my first Olympics. I thought he really liked me, but he really just wanted to say that he’d been with the un-fuckable. And to make matters worse it happened in the basement of a high school house party with “Touch My Body” by Mariah Carey playing in the background. To this day, I skeeve out anytime I see her on TV.”

  Across from me, Nik sat frozen, his body a statue and his face a bland mask of discomfort.

  “You’re not laughing,” I pointed out.

  He scoffed. “Because it isn’t fucking funny. Why is that women always think fucked up situations like that are embarrassing for them? That fucking asshole douche of a kid should be ashamed of himself. Not you.”

  “I—”

  “I bet he didn’t even give you an orgasm.”

  The air left my lungs in such a hurry, I nearly choked.

  Unable to speak, I settled for a shake of my head.

  “What a fucking cocksucker.”

  “Nik—”

  “The next guy treated you right, right?”

  At this point, the conversation had turned laughable, so I didn’t even pause before my admission. “What next guy?”

  In one fast tug he had me up off the couch and headed down the hall.

  “What are you doing?”

  He stopped so fast, I nearly ran into him, looking directly at me and barking his answer.

  “Treating you goddamn right.”

  My face jerked back and warmed as his words washed over me.

  “The romance is ripe,” I poked in jest as he started speed walking again and pulled me directly into his bedroom and onto the bed.

  The gray cotton cover felt soft under my thighs as his baggy loaner shorts road up, but the sound of his gravelly voice roughened the moment just enough. “Right now isn’t about romance. It’s about pleasure and lust and teaching you the bare minimum you should ever settle for physically.”

  I gulped an angry swallow down my tightening throat and curled into the growing ache in my abdomen. His words felt alive in a way that caressed each and every one of my senses.

  His face pushed closer to mine.

  “And I can guarantee when it comes to the minimum for you, there’s nothing mini about it.”

  His earnest eyes met mine deliberately, and with the way he said the words, the way his eyes spoke as he did, there wasn’t a thing in the world that could convince me that when Nik said those words to me, there was a single one that didn’t breathe romance.

  “Nik.”

  “Let me make you feel good, Cal. Just you tonight.” His body trapped mine, pushing me gently back onto the bed until he hovered right above me, his lips inches from mine and affection in his crystal blue eyes. He smoothed the still damp hair from my face and kissed the skin he uncovered by doing it. Slowly, deliberately, worshipping. “Just you coming apart in my arms and you trusting me to be the one to make it happen.”

  Goosebumps emblazoned my arms like a finely crafted textile as his words and movements swept over me. My eyes closed of their own accord.

  Tender fingers pried the hem of his baggy t-shirt away from my body languidly, skimming the skin as they went and making my hips sink into the bed even further. Air tunneled under my back as it arched slightly, the feeling of his skin on mine even more electrifying without the aid of sight.

  His lips touched each eyelid individually. I felt his breath caress my face when he spoke in a need-roughened whisper. “Trust me to make you feel good, Callie.”

  “I do,” I admitted easily because I did. I didn’t know what that meant precisely or how he intended to achieve it, but I knew he’d do his best to take care of me.

  Wide hands slid up the smooth muscle of my belly, and his lips moved slowly from the curve of my ear to my collarbone. The neck of my shirt impeded his progress.

  Asking silent permission, he lifted and tugged at it, bringing it to the line just beneath my bare breasts and stopping. The material bunched and billowed, and the halt in progress made me itchy with need.

  Knowing he wouldn’t go any further without my okay, I lifted my arms and granted him the room he needed to remove the barrier of cotton.

  I opened my eyes when it cleared my face so I could watch his as he took in all of my exposed skin.

  Eager and unfocused his eyes ate up every square inch of surface area, dilating at the sight of my chest. There wasn’t much there to see as far as I was concerned, but he didn’t look like a man unfulfilled. He looked like a man starved for the exact meal I was offering.

  Lowering his head slowly, he rested his lips in the hollow of my throat and breathed. I could feel them move against my skin like a hundred tiny kisses as he spoke. “You’re beautiful, Calia.”

  My full name felt strange and wonderful at once. I expected him to move quickly, but he didn’t. Instead he rested there for long moments breathing along with the rhythm moving in and out of my own throat. But I didn’t feel awkward in the least.

  “Nikolai,” I called back, testing out the feel of his full name on my lips and producing a smile on his. They dragged along my skin as they curved, leaving a damp trail and accompanying chill in their wake.

  Tweaking my ear briefly with his nose, his hands trailed up the lean line of my sides and settled on the span of my rib cage. My upper body was bigger in base than my middle and my thighs held equally disproportional mass. That was the body of a gymnast.

  Traveling lips ghosted the line of my neck and down my chest, zeroing in on my nipple and sucking before I had time to prepare. Sparks flew in a direct line from there to the ache between my legs and deepened it. I expected relief in his pursuits but didn’t find it, instead feeling myself build higher and higher into a frenzy with each thoughtful lave of his tongue.

  His fingers toyed at the waistband of my shorts playfully before diving underneath to stroke the skin. I found myself wanting his hand to travel further, wanting his fingers to toy with me rather than the waistband. I didn’t have a ton of experience, and part of that had always ashamed me. It had always felt like a disadvantage to make it to twenty-six years old with only one crappy sexual experience to count, but it didn’t feel that way anymore.

  This man and place were right. I wasn’t fully convinced about the timing, but the more he did and the closer he got to my sex, the more I came around to that thinking.

  His lips came back to mine at the exact moment his fingers found my clit, and the combination made me feel like I’d go blind.

  Stars and blackness alternated behind my lids at random, and the caress of his tongue on mine made the time needed comically short.

  With a moan I hadn’t known was possible, I came apart just as one of his long fingers settled inside me. It didn’t feel invasive or foreign. It felt welcome.

  And my body reacted accordingly. Sucking and milking it in an effort to pull it deeper, my sex sought to keep his finger there, pro
bably forever if possible, and clenched at the girth of it with release. Fire burned through my body and all voluntary function ceased to exist. Only Nik and my pleasure could change the way I acted in that moment.

  “God, Cal,” he breathed into the skin at my neck, tucking his face there and inhaling my scent. His body shook on top of mine and his hand made no effort to retreat.

  When my hands found the will to move again, I put them to his back, scooting his t-shirt up and smoothing them over his slick skin in an effort to get closer.

  I cringed at the rough and ragged feel of my touch, immediately withdrawing my hands in embarrassment.

  He noticed the retreat and made an accompanying one of his own, but only as to position himself so he could see my face.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Callie,” he protested, putting one gentle finger to the curve of my chin.

  “Something changed. What is it? Did I make you uncomfortable—” he surveyed with worry, breaking me nearly immediately with guilt.

  “No. Nik, it’s not that. I…that was wonderful.” I closed my eyes tight against the shame before opening them to my admission at once. “It’s just my hands.”

  “Your hands?”

  I searched for the words to explain, and he waited patiently until they formed. “I’ve been fighting for this. Fighting and clawing and scratching for nearly my entire life.”

  He nodded along, confirming that he’d followed me along my nonsensical path from hands to gymnastics. The best part was that he wasn’t just appeasing me. It seemed to make sense to him too. I lifted one hand in front of our faces and studied it.

  “And sometimes I feel like all I have to show for it are these battered hands.”

  “Your hands aren’t battered,” he denied in a whisper.

  “They’re not?”

  He shook his head and reached out to rub his thumb over the brutalized skin of my rips.

  “They’re beautiful.” His eyes left the motion of this caress and lifted to meet mine. “Mental and physical toughness. Determination. Dedication. Hard work. Someone I want to know. Those are the things your hands say to me.”

  Drugged on the high of my night with Nik, I didn’t think about what would be waiting for me at home after I dropped him back at the gym to get his motorcycle, gave him one last kiss, and headed there.

  I moved with the invincible mindset of a teenager for the first time, and it had only taken me seven extra years to get there.

  The time was late but not obscene at a quarter past ten, and the lights were largely extinguished on the interior of our house as I pulled in the driveway.

  I guess that’s why the harsh sound of my father’s voice calling out to me as I walked in the door nearly sent me into cardiac arrest.

  “Where’ve you been, Calia?”

  The question itself was preposterous for a twenty-six year old woman to have to answer without protest, but I understood the concept of respect. I’d stormed out of the gym without thought or explanation early that day—something that was highly unlike me—and disappeared without a reachable trace for nearly the rest of the day. He had a right to ask as a concerned loved one whether I thought he was in the position to be fatherly or not.

  I tried for vague, knowing I absolutely couldn’t go with the truth. “I just needed to clear my head.”

  His eyes narrowed. “What’s going on with Nik?”

  My chest seized and I nearly ingested my tongue. A couple of forced, rough swallows made it possible to speak again.

  “We fought,” I admitted, largely leaving out the details and hoping he’d take it at face value.

  He shook his head in exasperation. “What else is new?”

  “I apologized.”

  Understatement.

  “Well, that’s definitely different.”

  I fought the instinct to roll my eyes. Now was not the time to egg my father on and instigate more questions than necessary. Now was the time to contain the blast and get out with minimal damage.

  “I drove him home since he’s only got the motorcycle and the rain was so bad.” I gestured gallantly outside for added effect. Cleared my throat. “I think one of his friends was going to run him back later to get his motorcycle or something. Then I just drove around for a while to visualize my routines and get back in the right mindset.”

  Unbelievably, he nodded with approval, and I sighed a huge breath of relief. I hadn’t been too bad at lying for not having tried my hand at it much in the past. I wasn’t sure that was a good thing, but tonight, I was thankful. I’d sell my soul to just about any devil to keep my night with Nik, and this was a small price to pay comparatively.

  Tonight had been happiness, fulfillment, and fantasy.

  Tonight had been—

  Harmony.

  I could hear it, I could feel it, we were it today. As poorly as yesterday had gone in the gym, today had gone equally, but well. The intensity and passion were largely the same, but the vibe behind them was shockingly positive.

  I’d half expected her to retreat into her shell after last night, but instead she shone from the inside out.

  It was one of the best things I’d ever seen.

  Her toes pointed with extra flex and her arms extended even taller over the top of her head. Her eyes were shiny with amusement, and the curve of her lips made her that much more enjoyable to watch.

  Having just finished the second tumbling pass in her floor routine—a tumbling pass in which she very much pushed all the way through her toes and into the floor like an explosion—she gave me a sly look of mischief and mystery that had my heart beating faster.

  She was flirting with me as she worked, using each movement to remind me of an intimate encounter that had been beyond all of my wildest dreams. She’d been sensational last night, preening and succumbing to all of my ministrations without inhibition. Her body moved with just as much fluidity now, dancing from one skill to the next with precision and beauty that vibrated out from her body and encompassed the large room.

  I could feel the eyes of everyone else, pulled in to her routine by her talent alone. I watched for that and more.

  Careful to keep my leering to a fairly discreet minimum, I harnessed my focus and straightened my coaching hat. There was a time to watch her body, her reactions to my touch, and the way her breath left her mouth in her most pleasure filled moments.

  This wasn’t it.

  The music reached a crescendo and struck the last note just as she struck her final pose—one hand to her chest and the other to the ceiling, her head thrown back in a flourish of brilliance. She held it briefly before coming directly to me with a smile on her face.

  “Well?” she prompted on gloat, knowing she’d been on point, that her execution had been what I’d been demanding of her the whole time.

  After weeks of criticism she wanted to feel my praise rain down over her to the point that she could roll around in it like a pig in mud.

  “You were peacocking,” I accused, catching her off guard.

  “Peacocking?” she questioned, pulling the band of her ponytail looser, adjusting the fit with a shake, and then pulling it tight again.

  “Yep,” I confirmed with a wag of my brows and a chuckle. “Showing off your feathers in an illustrious display of dominance and seduction. Reeling me in with your beauty with each turn and presentation.”

  She thought about it for two beats before laughing. “Well, damn. That sounds like exactly what I was doing.” She shrugged and stretched the line of her face with acceptance. “Did it work?”

  I shook my head in false denial and gave her my most meaningful eyes. “Like you wouldn’t believe.”

  She wiped a hand down each arm and followed it up with a shove to my shoulder. “Well, feel free to stroke my feathers and call me Peacock, baby.”

  A loud bark of laughter burst from my mouth unexpectedly and pulled the attention of several surrounding girls. I saw it as the perfect oppo
rtunity to move Callie’s social issues in the right direction.

  I didn’t want to change her. But she wanted the change herself. It was in the way she talked about her place in the gym, the loneliness she felt in her isolation.

  Callie was a warm, kind-hearted, often funny woman all on her own. I just had to give her the opportunity to realize I wasn’t the only one who saw it.

  “Hey, girls!” I greeted with a lift of my hand.

  “Hey, Coach Nik!” they yelled back enthusiastically.

  Callie’s mouth moved in a silent mock. “Coach Nik?”

  “Yep, that’s right,” I confirmed before instructing, “Say hi.”

  “Say hi?”

  “To the girls. Come on, do it before it’s weird,” I urged in a whisper.

  Confused, she turned back toward the girls stiffly but followed direction. “Hi, girls,” she greeted with a wave.

  All of them immediately fluttered and tittered with excitement.

  “She said hi!”

  “Oh my God!”

  “Calia Nickleson knows who we are!”

  All at once and on top of one another they giggled and spewed their excitement through harsh whispers.

  Finally, they got it together, reciting, “Hi, Calia!” in enthusiastic unison.

  Callie turned back to me with wide-eyed shock.

  I couldn’t help but gloat a little. “Enlightening, huh?”

  She agreed, but admitting that to me just wasn’t her style. “Proud of yourself, are you?”

  “You bet your sweet ass,” I agreed with a wink and a smile.

  She rolled her eyes as I plotted my next strategic move in our game of verbal chess.

  “You have to admit that I’m good. I mean, come on. Before I got here, those girls hated you, right? Resented you for your successes and everything that meant about you?”

  She narrowed her eyes in suspicion.

  “You told me that yourself.” I pointed at her and then brought the palm of my hand flat against my chest. “So, yeah, I’m proud of myself for turning it around.”