Ikigai

by Hildred Billings

  Am I less of a woman because of my dysphoria? Reina wouldn’t say she was on the same level as Shio. Not at all. But she could relate to the feeling of inferiority because she wasn’t “woman enough” at times. Or in Aiko’s case, she was too much woman all the time. She’s gonna fuck a man. She tried not to think about it.

  “I’m glad you understand me, Reina-san,” Shio said in a voice Reina had never heard before. “It’s maddening feeling so alone over something that seems so simple.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  More creaking as Shio pushed herself up and straddled Reina’s hips. “All right.”

  She lowered herself slowly, giving Reina ample time to push her off. Is that what I want? Shio’s lips brushed against hers like a butterfly fluttering against a bud. Reina braced herself.

  The moment Shio kissed her, Reina knew she wouldn’t be able to say no again.

  It didn’t help that the woman knew how to kiss. Reina had been with countless women before who, while attractive and willing, thought kissing was merely pushing lips together and holding them there. Not Shio. She put in the right amount of force, the correct level of passion. The kind that said, “I want you. And I want you to want me too.” Her lips lingered on Reina’s before moving to her throat, hands holding Reina’s head while fingers played with her hair.

  Shio sat up, both palms on Reina’s chest as they gazed at one another. I’m nervous. Something Reina hadn’t thought in a million years. It stuck her to the bed. “Well?” she asked, pushing herself up on her elbows so she was closer to her friend.

  Without a word, Shio unzipped her jacket and pulled it off her body. It landed on the floor, and she yanked off her T-shirt. A purple bra grasped her chest. Too small. Reina knew how to eyeball these things, even in the dark. Shio’s breasts were spilling out of it; her skin was red beneath the straps and elastic.

  “Here.” Reina sat up, pulling the young woman into her arms without regard for recourse. I don’t even wear bras and this is making me uncomfortable to look at. She reached around and unsnapped Shio’s bra.

  The girl’s eyes never left Reina’s as the bra straps came down and the fabric hit the bed. Shio looped her arms around Reina’s shoulders and waited for her reaction.

  What was she expecting? I’ve seen fakes before. But whoever had done Shio’s did a nice job preventing a cartoonish caricature from living on her chest. They were round, firm, but sagged a little. Reina ran her finger up the thin ravine of cleavage and watched as one nipple became harder in front of her eyes. Some things never changed.

  Shio tugged on Reina’s shirt and reached beneath it, her hands exploring the outline of her friend’s chest. As her palms brushed over both areolas, Reina fell onto her elbows.

  “I like your body,” Shio said softly, pulling her hands out of Reina’s shirt and looming over her. “Especially how it reacts.”

  Reina managed a wan smile. “You don’t know what it’s capable of yet.”

  “Show me.”

  After conjuring up enough strength to flip the bed, Reina toppled Shio and rolled on top of her.

  Women are beautiful. Reina kissed her lips, her throat, and her shoulders, holding her close while feeling the breadth of her torso. I love them. Nothing reaffirmed this like the scent of Shio’s skin as it filled Reina’s nostrils like musk and smoke. And I want her. She didn’t know what she had been waiting for. Her wife was away, playing with someone else, and now Reina had this beautiful lady in her arms.

  “Reina-san!” Shio gave herself completely, trusting Reina with her body as their limbs wound together and the bed began to squeak against the wall. “Hoshiin desu. I want to feel it.”

  Reina’s libido was on fire, coursing through her loins and to her brain as if her body were a dangerous racetrack. “Feel what?” I’ll give it to you. She sucked the skin of Shio’s throat and grabbed her breast, tipping it up so she could lick its nipple and feel Shio writhe beneath her hips.

  It took another minute for Shio to finish her thought, for in the meantime she was overcome with the pleasure Reina gave her. She groaned, she grabbed, and she lifted herself until Reina had a mouthful of flesh, her tongue lashing against Shio for as long as she would let it.

  “Do it,” she whimpered, as Reina came back up to kiss her lips and caress her throat. “Show me how you make love to a woman.”

  Reina spared her one last moment of lucidity. “That’s the only thing I know, so that’s exactly what you would get.”

  “Good.”

  Words became unintelligible sounds as Reina consumed her again.

  Why is she so easy to be with? Shio was a good twenty years younger than Reina. Or almost, anyway. They were fun for pure pleasure and adventure in the bedroom, but Reina rarely felt an intimate connection with someone so much younger than her. Not even Haruka and Kaori, who were older than Shio, roused this sort of interest. I’m myself with her. Even Aiko couldn’t make Reina feel so comfortable at times. And Jun didn’t have to understand what went on in Reina’s brain – just reap the benefits from it. Why can’t I help myself? She wanted to make Shio feel good, both inside and out. She did what she knew best: as she kissed the young woman’s lips and licked her ear, Reina slipped her hand between Shio’s legs and went for her heat.

  She gasped in shock as her hand bumped into the last thing she expected.

  They both snapped their eyes open and gaped at one another, Reina frozen in time while Shio held in a cry of destitution. Reina snapped her hand away and let out a famished breath. Shio closed her legs and wiped something from her eyes.

  “I forgot…” Reina swallowed, hard, her brain taking her back to that bathroom in the station, to that night her old coworker tried to force himself on her in an alleyway and bumped himself against her. “I’m sorry; I forgot.”

  Shio sniffed something up. Was she crying? “How could you forget?” she asked, pain in her throat. “How?”

  “I’m sorry! I was doing what I always do…” A rub to the thigh, the omanko, and then Reina would have her fingers in there, getting wet and having fun. “I was going to do to you what I always do…”

  “Well, you can’t.” Shio covered her chest with her arms and looked down into her lap. “I’m not made that way.”

  “I know! I’m sorry.” Reina shook her head. “Why are you crying?”

  “I’m not.”

  “You are.”

  Shio finished wiping away whatever was in her eyes. “Because now you’re disgusted with me. I wanted to be with you, but now you hate me.”

  “Nani sore?” Reina nuzzled against her friend’s cheek, pulling down her hands so she could kiss the tears away for her. “You’re not disgusting. You’re a beautiful woman. I was surprised. It was my fault.”

  “But you can’t be with me like that.” Shio leaned in against Reina’s half-embrace. “Because of your own issues.”

  “So what? We’ll figure something out.”

  Shio held her forehead against Reina’s chin and stroked her through her T-shirt. “Really?”

  “Sure.” Reina kissed her, attempting to renew the passion she disrupted.

  Shio’s words broke through every kiss. “Can I touch you?”

  “I…” Reina had to think about that one. She fell to the bed and pulled Shio on top of her. “Ii yo. Touch me.”

  There weren’t many women she trusted to take control like this. Indeed, she couldn’t think of another woman alive she would trust with such a thing the first time they had sex. Not even her wife got such honors frequently. But when she does, she makes it count. Now Shio, a woman she had yet to experience, was kissing her and fumbling with the zipper on her jeans.

  “Oh God.” Reina braced herself again. She could feel Shio’s nimble fingers pushing beneath denim.

  “It’s okay. If you want me to stop…” Shio waited, and when Reina didn’t say anything, she rubbed the omanko beneath her hand.

  Vulnerability was
not Reina’s strong suit, in bed or elsewhere. She liked control – but she also liked knowing that she could give herself in some fashions. So when Shio slipped her fingers between folds of flesh and dipped inside, Reina panicked, but let it happen. Her legs spread open, and she pulled down Shio’s head to kiss her face.

  “Nureteiru,” Shio said in wonder as she encountered Reina’s habit of getting wetter than the rain. She mumbled the phrase again, this time between Reina’s lips as her fingers slipped in and out below. She’s fucking me. It both elated and horrified her. Yet the horror was more like a panic that made Reina’s insides swell and her desire bubble over for this woman.

  “It feels good,” she muttered. Her fingers dug into Shio’s hair. “Don’t stop.”

  One of Shio’s fingers pressed against Reina’s nub, and all hell broke loose between legs.

  “Fuck!” Reina bucked against Shio’s hand, trembling as another wave of pleasure overcame her.

  When her swift orgasm abated, Shio pulled her fingers out of Reina’s pants and let her aieki trail against her stomach. “Bishonure ne…” Shio hooked her wet fingers around the waist of Reina’s jeans and yanked on them. They gave way easier as Reina eased her legs back together. “I want it…”

  Reina leaned back into the bed, staring at the back of her eyelids. She wanted it too.

  Shio did not disappoint with her mouth and tongue.

  If the amount of women who had touched her with her fingers down there was minimal, then the amount that went down on her was even smaller over the years. Yet it seemed perfectly reasonable to let Shio place her head between Reina’s legs and lick her, suck her, and penetrate her with her tongue. She makes it feel so good. Reina grabbed gobs of blanket in her fists as the room began to spin.

  Before another orgasm could come, however, she thought of Shio in her arms, submissive and vulnerable. The kind of woman Reina usually went for if given the chance.

  I can do that with her… Thought became tricky as Shio hit a tender spot inside Reina’s folds. I can…

  She stopped her lover, lifted her up, and then toppled her over. After all, she wanted to know what it was like when Reina Yamada made love to women.

  Grunts muffled into the blankets as Reina situated herself between Shio’s legs and grinded against her with bare hips and plenty of ardor. Shio whimpered beneath her, smelling of Reina’s sex as they kissed and became awash in one another. Just another woman. No, not “just.” Shio was empathetic and mature beyond her years. She understood Reina, and all she asked from her in return was to be understood as well.

  Reina unbuttoned the top of Shio’s pants.

  “Wait,” she said, grasping onto Reina for dear life. I’m not running away. “Did you forget again already?”

  The zipper came undone. “I didn’t forget a damn thing.” She reached in, as Shio had done minutes before, and grazed her fingers against something she had never felt in her life – and never thought she would feel of her own volition.

  “Oh my God,” Shio muttered, half panic and half excitement as Reina pulled it out. It was small, and only a little firm. “It’s not like it used to be… it’s the hormones…”

  So what? Reina kept one hand around it while she kissed Shio’s throat. “It’s perfect,” she whispered into her lover’s ear. “Your body is perfect however it is.”

  She didn’t know what she intended to do. Make love to Shio; give her pleasure. But how? To what end? Reina wasn’t going to pretend she knew what she was doing with something in her hand like this. She didn’t even think about how it felt or what else it conjured up in her mind. It doesn’t matter. Why not? Because she’s a woman.

  There were some things Reina wasn’t ready for yet. She wouldn’t put her mouth on it, for example, but Shio didn’t seem to mind as she groaned beneath Reina’s touch. She was sensitive all over. Not just on the tip, but the length of her, the base, and the area around it covered in hairs.

  The urge to bring their bodies together swelled inside her. Here was this gorgeous woman, and Reina wanted to be with her like she would be with any other woman.

  “Reina-san,” Shio whimpered as Reina stroked her like she would the length of any woman’s omanko. “Reina!”

  It grew harder in her hand. Shio went from feminine trills to a deeper, gruffer version of herself. It’s coming back to her. Something she missed from a long time ago, when she was in another body. Funny how she was the opposite of Reina in that regard. Women told her that she would go from masculine to feminine in the fit of passion. And here Shio was, embracing the remnants of her masculinity while being wholly and utterly woman.

  “Quickly,” she said, breaking another desperate kiss. “Do something. Because once you let go…”

  Reina could do better to make sure Shio stayed firm and coursing toward the heights of pleasure. She would make them both cry out in the sweet agony of sex.

  What are you doing? The panic returned as Reina pushed her own fingers inside of her, making sure she was still wet. This is insane. No, it wasn’t. How could it be, when Shio was a woman? They both whimpered as Reina opened her thighs and tested the girth of Shio’s appendage. Why in the world did it matter?

  She can’t hurt me like a man would. Because she’s not a man. She’s a woman.

  Reina cried out, in pain and shock, as she sat back and welcomed Shio inside of her.

  It took them a few moments to find a rhythm that made them both happy. Reina sat up straight, her hips grinding against Shio’s as the latter declared in the midst of her moans that the former was too good to be true. I know. Reina leaned back on her arms between Shio’s legs and thrust upon her that way.

  She couldn’t explain how it felt, physically. It was like riding her wife when Aiko wore a strap-on, and yet completely different. Every movement zipped through Shio as well, who lifted her hips in time to Reina’s thrusts while clutching her breasts and moaning into the back of her hand. Even I can’t feel mine like that. Reina teetered between fascination and the demands of sex. Luckily she was wet enough, as always, to take whatever Shio offered. But I’m the one in control.

  “Keep going, please…” Shio arched her back, her breasts pushing toward Reina like a Sapphic offering. “Just a bit more… I can… oh God, you feel so good!”

  Reina stilled, although Shio continued to thrust into her from that angle. “I know,” she muttered again, rolling forward so she could bend down and kiss her lover while they did it.

  “Fuck me,” Shio whined into Reina’s ear, their thrusts increasing as two hands came together above their hands.

  “I am.” Reina covered her lover in not-so-gentle kisses. “You better fuck me too.”

  “I am!”

  “I know.” Reina could feel it sliding into her with her every thrust, filling her up enough to make her shudder – but not so big that it frightened her. I’m not the other women in my life. They liked it big, hard, fast and strong. Reina preferred them more realistic – apparently.

  They continued to move like that, Reina’s body filling with more good feelings as the seconds went by. If she were a man, she’d be done by now. But no, Shio was not a man. She was a woman, and she was giving her womanhood to Reina the only way she could.

  “I’m ready.” Reina focused on the fine sensations of their lovemaking between her legs. “Please tell me you are too.” She only had one more in her.

  Shio stilled, pushing herself deeply into Reina. I can feel her all the way up there. It didn’t frighten her. Neither did what she knew was coming.

  “Just a bit.” Shio sounded like she was about to lose it, thank God. “I can do it.”

  “Is it hurting you?”

  They kissed once more, Shio holding herself inside Reina as the latter reached between her legs and began stroking her folds for more stimulation. She thought nothing as her fingertips touched the stiff appendage breaking into her, covered in her aieki as her body craved its presence. “I’m not hu
rt.” Shio was weak, her energy concentrated on one point of being. “But I need you to…”

  “To what?”

  This was their final kiss – Reina knew it. “Just go for it and I’ll follow.”

  That’s what I wanted to hear. Reina sat up, Shio’s waist nestled snugly between her legs. I’m going for it. She ripped off her T-shirt, leaned forward enough to leverage herself against Shio’s breasts, and thrust.

  Silence claimed the room, aside from the quiet grunts in their throats and the squeak of the bed. They both put in the same amount of effort to their lovemaking, although Reina’s thighs were becoming sore, and her omanko struggled to keep Shio inside of her as more wetness came. I’m going to… Shio wrapped her hands around Reina’s rear, pushing her flesh up so it created a more auspicious angle for them to share. She’s getting harder. Reina didn’t worry about it falling out now. She dropped and lifted herself every second, her breaths increasing as sweat trickled down her head and chest.

  “Iku,” she whispered, before her body completely shut down.

  How long her orgasm lasted, or what sound she made in the process… she could never say. It seemed that time stood still, her body desperate to flush out her release before it claimed her in a grave way. She concentrated her pleasure around her loins. One after another the hits of orgasm came, slamming into the small of her back and jerking her legs out as her voice echoed and her arms shuddered.

  Unlike other women she had been with, Shio had her own means to achieve. She continued to thrust up into Reina, her face twisting as her nails dug into her lover’s legs.

  Reina felt her lover’s orgasm before it was announced. Warm. I feel warm. Maybe it was all in her head. Maybe it was impossible to feel that happening inside of her. Maybe Shio was faking it, although she doubted it.

  Whether it was real or not, Reina felt it. Her omanko filled with one last, satisfying surge of rigidity before warmth trickled out of her. When she released the sensation, she realized that Shio was groaning in a way she had never heard a woman utter before – short, sharp cries of relief laced in insurmountable pleasure.