by Vivian Wood
“I hear that,” Penny said. “I think I got three hours of sleep last night, max.”
“Yeah.”
“You get any rest?” Penny asked as she took a bite of taco salad and made a face. “Gross, this isn’t sour cream.”
“I guess.”
Penny put down her fork. “Seriously, what’s wrong with you? Everything okay?”
Poppy sighed. “I guess I’m having some trouble with Will… or, to put it better, trouble with the lack of him.”
Penny smiled knowingly and reached over to pat her shoulder. “It must be hard. Him being gone like this.”
How does she know he’s gone? Poppy was suddenly on high alert. “I didn’t tell you he was gone.”
“No?” Penny asked and stuffed another forkful in her mouth. “Hmm. You must have mentioned it at some point.”
“I don’t remember saying anything.”
Poppy shrugged, “Maybe I saw it on Facebook or Twitter then or something.”
“Maybe.” Poppy rarely posted to social media. She found it too taxing to keep up with. Liking all those posts, retweeting or subtweeting or whatever.
“Anyway, I was just saying, having your boyfriend on the other side of the country can’t be any fun,” Penny said. “Maybe we should plan a girls' night or something.”
The thought of dressing up and hitting the bars with Penny made her roll her eyes. “Ugh, I can’t even think about anything but work and sleep right now.” And Ryan.
“Yeah, I know what you mean. Going out always sounds like a good idea at noon, but by the time six o’clock rolls around I just want to climb into bed with a bottle of wine and watch The Bachelorette.”
Poppy smiled. It had been a long time since she’d indulged in one of her vapid, guilty pleasures. “Now that sounds more like it.”
“Let me know if you want to do it together sometime this week,” Penny said. “I have a date coming up. Maybe you could give me some advice, help me pick out what to wear.”
“A date? Who with?” Penny rarely shared details of her love life, and it was a welcome distraction from being stressed over Ryan.
“Oh, uh, just this guy.”
“Well, I assumed that.”
“Hey now, don’t think you know me so well,” Penny said. She shook her fork toward Poppy playfully. “For all you know, I might swing both ways.”
“Right. You totally strike me as the president of the Ruby Rose fan club.” Poppy rolled her eyes. Penny was the straightest girl she’d ever known.
“Hey now! I happen to think women are totally beautiful. I’m more openminded than you think. Shane, from The L Word? I’d totally go lesbian for her.”
Poppy groaned. “Shush!” she said. “First of all, just because women are beautiful doesn’t mean you want to sleep with them. Second of all, anybody would hook up with Shane. And third, I can’t believe you just said ‘go lesbian.’ You’re about to get your butt kicked for that total lack of PCness.”
Penny giggled. “It’s just the two of us, right? I can’t censor myself all the time. Besides, I can just blame lack of sleep for my complete lack of sensitivity.”
“Yeah,” Poppy said. “Speaking of, we just had the sensitivity training seminar last week. Looks like it did you a lot of good.” She winked at Penny. It was this kind of giddy mindlessness that made her want to be friends with the crazy girl in the first place. When they got into their rhythm, it made the shifts fly by.
“So, back to the important stuff… I’m serious. Were you talking about Ryan?” Penny’s eyes were big as she shoved carnitas in her mouth.
“No! Penny, honestly… it’s just that Will's still in LA.” She forced a laugh and said, “He’s been gone so long other men are starting to distract me!”
Poppy said it like it was a joke, but Penny’s eyes narrowed. “You mean Ryan.”
“Please,” Poppy said as she rolled her eyes. Don’t be stupid, you’re saying way too much. Penny was smarter than she acted.
“Poppy,” Penny said. She reached across the table again and grabbed Poppy’s arm. “Are you holding out on me?”
“I didn’t mean anything by it! I was joking, forget I said anything.” She knew it would look suspicious, but she jumped up from the table and grabbed her tray. “I should be getting back,” she said. Shut up! Penny knows your schedule.
She dumped the flavorless burrito in the compost bin and fished her keys out of her jacket. Forget changing, she’d do it at home.
Penny was acting weird, for sure, she thought as she pulled out of the parking lot. Did Penny just disapprove, or was it more than that?
They weren’t really close, but there was a natural camaraderie that unfolded when you shared shift rounds with someone. Normally, Poppy would have been happy to have someone to dismantle this mess with. Now, it felt like all her usual confidantes were tangled up in the same web with her. Ryan, Will, Penny, the whole lot. Even Sarah. Oh, wow, I forgot about Sarah in all this. Sarah would kill her.
You’re in a mess. A real big, sloppy mess. As she pulled up to where the road forked in three directions, she gave a wry smile. Fitting. I’m literally at a fork in the road.
It was time to decide. For her, down one path was the future she'd always thought she’d have. Will would be a decent husband, and there would surely be kids and that white picket fence—or at least a brick privacy fence. It was safe, secure, and she knew what to expect. Maybe their kids would even inherit some of his creativity. Lord knows she didn’t have any.
And down that other path? She didn’t know. It was full of the promise of excitement, seasoned with plenty of uncertainty. Until now, she hadn't even known that path existed. It was wild and not well traveled. What did they call those kinds of trails again? Desire paths. That’s right. The trails blazed from pure desire—even while there are other trails that are obviously marked and cleared.
Will was at the end of one path, and Ryan the other. Well, maybe. Down Will’s path, it was all concrete but the plans were clear. Ryan’s path was full of potential turmoil. She might lose her best friend. Ryan’s path might not even be an option; it might all be a figment of her imagination.
The car behind her honked, and she noticed the light was green.
As she lifted her foot off the brake, she didn’t know if she'd be turning right or left. She always turned right here, since it took her home. However, as Robert Frost’s poem began to recite in her head, dug up from her undergraduate Literary Criticism class, she chose left.
Let’s just see where it goes.
16
Ryan
“Ryan, I haven’t seen you since BUD/S, man.” Ryan slapped Li on the back, and shook hands with Garret. “What you been up to? Besides sipping on those green drinks?” Li nodded to the extra-large protein smoothie in Ryan’s hand.
“Not much,” Ryan said. “I was just discharged not that long ago. Knee,” he said, and nodded to his leg. “You both still active duty?”
“Nah,” replied Li. “Went into the Marshals. We both did,” he said, and nodded at Garret.
“No shit, that’s what I’ve been looking into. The recruiter left me a message yesterday, actually. Seems like they have some kind of fast-track, on-the-job training option.”
“You should do it!” Garret said. He squinted his sky blue eyes and adjusted his hat brim.
“Yeah? You like it?”
“It’s awesome,” Garret said. “Good pay, and you can pretty much cherry-pick your details and location.”
“Yeah,” Li said. “If you’re military, especially SEAL, you’re golden.”
“What have they had you doing?”
Li shrugged. “Actually, we work together,” he said. “Mostly taking care of vehicles seized from criminals. It’s a lot of paperwork, but you get to handle some pretty sweet rides.”
“Last week it was a Bugatti Chiron,” Garret said. “The whole back end was kitted out to transport blow. And, what, six weeks ago? We actually got a Koenigsegg Regera
processed. Unbelievable, I never thought I’d see one of those, let alone drive it.”
“They let you drive it?” Ryan asked, impressed.
“Well, from the pickup site to the processing center. Just a few miles, but it was incredible.”
“Sounds great, man,” Ryan said. Moving around million-dollar cars wasn’t his idea of a dream job, but he saw the appeal. Exotic rides were all Li and Garret had talked about in training.
“You should do it, give ‘em a call back,” Li said. “Actually, who’re you talking to? Lieutenant Dan?”
“Stevens,” Ryan said.
“Yeah man, that’s him. Don’t he look like Lieutenant Dan, though? That’s what we call him.”
“Who the hell is Lieutenant Dan?”
“Man, didn’t you ever see Forrest Gump? Anyway, yeah, it’s the same guy. I can call in an informal rec if you want.”
Ryan sized up Li. For all his arrogance and preening, he’d kept a flawless record in the SEALs. Maybe running into him and Garret on the street was a sign. What could it hurt?
“Yeah, sure, why not?” he said.
“Cool. I’ll call him in a few. I'll let him know you’ll call him this afternoon?”
Ryan felt the pressure already start to build. Li had always moved fast, but seemed so laidback nobody saw it coming.
“Uh, yeah. Will do.”
“Alright, cool. See you later, brother.” Li went in for one of his complicated handshake-fist bump combinations, and Ryan was surprised to see he remembered it even after all these years.
“Lieutenant Stevens.” Ryan clutched his phone. Why are you nervous?
“Lieutenant, this is PO Scott,” he said.
“Scott. Yeah, PO Li said you’d be calling. What can I do for you? I’m assuming you got my message yesterday.”
“Yes, sir. I’m curious where you have work available. For the on-the-job fast-track.”
“Pretty much everywhere,” the lieutenant said with a laugh. “Like I said, US Marshals aren’t suffering from an overabundance of qualified applicants.”
“What about locally?”
“Locally, nationwide, anywhere. You can fill out the paperwork today if you’d like, it’s all online. A lot of new hires start out with small projects locally, then build up to more national positions—or even international.”
“That sounds perfect, sir. Thank you. I’ll fill out the forms now.”
“Good, son. Just click on the link in the initial email from a few weeks ago. It has the PIN and everything you need. The only thing I’ll need from you in person is biometric data and a few ink signatures. Can you come in this week?”
“Yes, sir. Whatever day and time works for you.”
“I’ll send you a calendar invitation in a few minutes. Isn’t technology something?”
Ryan smiled. “Yes, sir.”
He hung up and rubbed the back of his neck. What now? His mind wandered to Poppy, the way she'd looked in that parking lot when she was half seated on his lap. The warmth of her mouth. Stop it, he told himself, and pushed her out of his mind.
That was crazy, the other day. Kissing her like that. He stood on the precipice of lighting a lifetime of friendship on fire. Not just friendship, the best friendship he’d ever had. By a long shot. He couldn’t figure out why he’d never seen how perfect she was—not just on the inside. That was something he’d always known. But on the outside, too.
In high school, he’d lucked onto the varsity football team as a sophomore. He was just a running back, but the coach had seen his potential and wanted to groom him with the star players. By his junior year he was the quarterback, which pissed Evan off something fierce. Evan was the senior who'd been most likely to earn the position, and when the coach gave it to Ryan tension on the team mounted.
“Yo, Ryan,” Evan had said after one of the first practices of the season. He’d cornered him in the locker room. None of the other guys dared to look up. “What’s up with you and that Poppy girl?”
Poppy? Ryan had been expecting some shit about the practice. Maybe even a little scuffle. Evan’s approach threw him off guard.
“Poppy? Not much,” Ryan said. Poppy had managed the first half of high school going largely unnoticed. She had her own little group of friends, a hodgepodge collection of girls who didn’t really fit into any cliques.
“C’mon, that’s not what I heard,” Evan said. He pulled either end of the towel that hung around his neck, and flexed so Ryan could see just how much bigger the senior was.
“Don’t know what you heard,” Ryan said as he pulled on his jeans. No matter how often he changed in the locker room, there was always a feeling of vulnerability.
“I heard you were fucking her six ways from Sunday,” Evan said. Ryan’s ears went red. “Not that I blame you, dude! That’s a hot piece of ass right there. Doesn’t say much, sure. But the quiet ones are always the freaks in bed. Ain’t I right?”
Fucking her? Even as he went into his junior year, Ryan was still getting used to the enormous social pressure to engage in locker room talk—but he just couldn’t. He had to stick to the truth, especially when it came to Poppy.
“It’s not like that,” Ryan said as he buckled his fly.
“Oh yeah? I guess not. Not with you at least. Me? If I was up near that good-good like you, she wouldn’t be walking straight for a week.”
Ryan had clenched his fist to still the full-body shaking. The last thing he needed was a fight with Evan, but he couldn’t let him talk about Poppy like that.
“Good luck with that.” It was all he could manage. Luckily, Evan just laughed and walked away.
Most of high school was like that, and Ryan never understood. Evan wasn’t the first on the team to ask him about Poppy. For Ryan, it was a badge of honor just to have a female friend. And yeah, as it turned out, Evan was right. A really hot female friend.
He pinched his nose and logged into his tablet to fill out the forms. He really couldn’t afford to think about Poppy, not like that.
As he started to fill in the information, his phone buzzed.
Hey, stranger. Drinks later? Sarah. She’d been slipping from his mind more and more. He watched the ellipses roll across his phone. Live game show at Three Sheets tonight. Prob stupid fun.
A game show. That was exactly what he needed. He used to race back to his place with Poppy after school to suck down Otter Pops and binge on Supermarket Sweep. Sure, see you there, he replied.
He didn’t feel much for Sarah, but didn’t feel badly about it, either. It felt like the casual thing between them was mutual. Besides, that could change. Couldn’t it? She was a nice girl, a pretty girl. Maybe something would grow between them. Everyone always talked about taking it slow, but nobody did. What was wrong with avoiding a crash and burn?
Sarah was growing on him, too. Slowly. He’d found out she wasn’t so much annoying as blessed with a strange sense of humor. Plus, few things really bothered her. She was the ultimate low-key, go with the flow type of girl.
Ryan undressed, dropped his clothes to the floor in the bathroom, and turned on the shower water as hot as it would go. As the water fell over him, he couldn’t stop thinking about Poppy. His cock hardened, and he willed himself to think about Sarah instead. But he couldn’t even remember her face.
Screw it. He gripped his cock at the base and squeezed gently. Images of Poppy flashed in his mind. He pictured her in that skimpy white bikini by the pool—but this time, it was just the two of them.
“Do me now,” she said, and flipped onto her stomach. Ryan’s hand worked up his shaft to the tip as he remembered how her skin had felt against his. Soft, warm and buttery smooth.
But this time, he didn’t have to be careful. He rubbed his hands over her shoulders, down her shoulder blades and untied the back of her bikini with a single pull. His hands brushed against the fullness of the sides of her breasts, and the curves of her body demanded he move quickly to her small waist. He grabbed the bar of soap to slicken
his hand, and began to stroke himself faster.
Her bikini bottoms were tied neatly with a bow on either side, a present to unwrap. He tore into her like a kid at Christmas, untying both sides simultaneously. When he whipped the bottoms off of her, pulled them with one hand from beneath her, she looked over her shoulder and smiled. But still, she didn’t turn over. And he couldn’t make out the details of her face. Besides that smile, she could be anyone.
Ryan clutched her ass cheeks and spread them apart with his thumb. Slightly, she lifted her hips and gave him a better view. From her perfect, pink rosebud to her swollen lips, juicy entry and engorged clit, the entirety of her was incredible. “Do me now,” she said again.
He moved into the rhythm he knew would make him come soon. Even in his fantasy, he didn’t want anything to happen too fast. He wanted to take his time and explore every part of her.
With one hand, he slid his fingers between her legs and toyed with her lips. Already, they were slick with her wetness. He moved a finger between her folds and flicked lightly at her clit. She shuddered and raised her hips higher, her body begging for him.
As he continued to play with her clit, she started to move against his hand. His balls began to tighten as he imagined slipping one finger into her while his thumb circled the rim of her ass. Even just imagining her tightness and wetness was enough to make him come.
He steadied himself against the wall in the shower and thought about the roundness of her ass cheeks as she rode his hand and came hard, drenching him all the way to the wrist.
Ryan groaned and closed his eyes. He had an hour before he was meeting Sarah, but was still watching the last of his come spiral down the drain.
17
Ryan
Fourteen years ago
Ryan took a deep breath and knocked on Poppy’s door. The rented tuxedo felt strange and itchy. He couldn’t help but wonder how many boys had worn it before—boys going to their first prom, or even men on their wedding day. He’d never been the school dance type, but Poppy had begged him to take her. He never could tell her no.
