Flesh Into Fire

by JA Huss

  I’ll kill myself.

  It’s not any more complicated than that. But that’s not something a person needs to hear. Because it’s selfish, and manipulative, and unfair. So…

  “I don’t fucking know what I’ll do.”

  Sure. That’s close enough.

  MADDIE

  He loves me.

  He just said he loves me. He said it before, but it was desperate, from a place of panic. This is different. He’s not panicked. He’s worried. Because he loves me.

  I smile but turn my head into the couch to hide it.

  It’s not like I planned this. It’s not like I set out to seduce him. It’s not like I’ve been dreaming of a Tyler and Maddie wedding since I was eight. Really.

  But I’ve always loved him. In different ways throughout the years, but love is love.

  He was… the perfect brother’s-best-friend crush when I was a kid. I have always thought him cute. He was skinny once. Lanky and lean, more like a runner or a cyclist. Not bulked up like a soldier. But that was a long time ago.

  Tyler grew up first, it seemed. Before Scotty or Evan. He just… burst into manhood when all the other kids were still boys. He became tall before my eyes. He filled in. Started lifting weights in his garage. He was the first to grow a beard, and that makes me smile even wider. It was a stupid beard. And I made fun of him. But he never took it personally. It was a joke. Something sweet. Like the way he called me Mads and made fun of my temper. Something just between us.

  And even though he looks nothing like the kid I once knew, this is better. He’s even better than he was. Because he’s seen stuff, and done stuff, and learned stuff. And he’s still here. He came back. Not for me, I know that. But he came home. Alive. And that’s better.

  Tyler Morgan is a good man. And I don’t base that off some childhood crush. Everything he’s done since we reconnected tells me all I need to know. Tells me he’s one of the good guys.

  That’s what I’ve been telling you too, Angel says.

  And I wish I had the words to tell him that right now because I have a feeling he doesn’t believe it. But I don’t have the words. And it’s not the time.

  He just said he loves you, Angel says. It’s the perfect time.

  “What?” Tyler asks. “What’s with the face?”

  “Remember that time when I was like six and—”

  “Yes.” Tyler’s face widens with a grin.

  “Liar! You didn’t even let me finish!”

  “My answer is still yes.”

  “I was six,” I say again. “And I was sitting out on the front stoop crying over something, I don’t even remember. And you came out of your garage. You were on your bike. Going somewhere. Wherever boys go on bikes. And you saw me, and you stopped, and you put that bike down, and you sat next to me, and you said—”

  “‘I’m selling smiles. Do you wanna buy one?’”

  I buy one right now. “Yeah, you said that.”

  “And you bought one.”

  “I did. It was a good one too. Lasted me all day.”

  “Your fish,” he says.

  “What?” I ask, pulling myself out of the past.

  “You won that goldfish at the carnival and it died the next day. You were crying over that goldfish.”

  I look at Tyler Morgan. See him for who he was back then. Who he is now. Cherish all the memories and appreciate the fact that he’s been a part of all the most important moments in my life. Even when he wasn’t. Because some people just stay with you, ya know?

  Some people just find a place in your heart and call it home.

  So I ask, “You love me?”

  TYLER

  I’m still rubbing her feet, but sort of absently, looking at her sweet, sweet face, that suddenly looks like it’s about to welcome tears to start falling.

  I shrug one shoulder and say, “Yeah. Sorry. It’s true.”

  She gulps, lets out a huff of air through her nose, and says, “I love you too.”

  And that’s it.

  I grab her wrists and pull her into my lap. The fluffy black material at the bottom of her dress spills out around us. She takes my face in her hands and begins kissing me with a reckless hunger. Which is fine, because I’m starving for her too, and we can both feed the other with what we desire.

  She’s rocking back and forth against my erection, and the feel of her tight pussy rubbing against the light cashmere of the fourteen-thousand-dollar suit pants I’m wearing is like being wrapped in a cloud.

  But since I absolutely do not want to come in Evan’s suit, I lift her to the side and place her on her back on the sofa again. “Hold on,” I say.

  She looks up at me, rubbing her feet together, nibbling at her bottom lip, and every stitch of clothing I remove feels like it takes forever.

  First, I kick off the shoes, taking off the jacket as I do and tossing it on the chair that sits across from the couch. Then I rip the socks off and toss them aside, and unbutton the dress shirt, popping the cuff links loose last, and toss it on the chair as well.

  Me standing in front of her, wearing only the trousers, causes her to say, “You’re so fucking sexy. Do you know that?”

  “Nah,” I say, “You’re just seeing reflected glow.” I wink at her as I unbuckle the belt and let it hang there. I snap open the trouser button, unzip the pants, and then pull them off along with the boxer briefs I put on because I was wearing another dude’s clothes (I am nothing if not courteous. Everybody says so), and toss them to the side with everything else.

  Then I take my cock in my hand and stroke it back and forth, watching her imagine that my hand is her mouth.

  “I don’t know where Caroline and Diane are,” she tells me. “They could be home any minute.”

  “I can’t imagine they’ll be shocked. They are hookers and all.”

  “I don’t know if they’ve ever seen a cock like that one,” she says, tilting her head.

  “You mean that in a good way, right?”

  She giggles and nods. I bend down to my knees.

  “What are you doing?” She asks.

  I don’t answer, just take her feet up with my hands and begin kissing them again and then sucking on them. Placing one big toe in my mouth and swirling my tongue around. Then putting the next in along with the first. Allowing my tongue to slide in the slender, delicate crevices that separate them. She whines with pleasure, and giggles as I lap and tickle the skin that lives here at the base of her amazing body.

  And suddenly, I am reminded of the first night she and I reconnected, without knowing it was a reconnection. That night in the VIP room at Pete’s, which is no more. I remember that when I held her hands, I considered them. Studied them. Wanted to learn and know them. And that’s what I’m doing now.

  I want to start at the bottom of her and work my way up, learning every possible millimeter of her flesh. Every line, curve, angle, perceived imperfection, everything.

  And so, in looking at her feet, as I nip at her toes and she wriggles and moans, I notice a scar running along the back of her heel.

  “Where’d you get that?” I pause to ask.

  “What?”

  “The scar. Here.” I bend her knee so she can see, and she reaches down to touch it, remembering.

  “Oh. You did that.”

  “What?” I ask, like, really surprised at her response.

  “Seriously? You don’t remember?” she asks.

  “Seriously. No.”

  She laughs and says, “You remember the selling-smiles-goldfish thing and you don’t remember how I got the scar?”

  “I really don’t. No. When did it happen?”

  She huffs out another tiny laugh and says, “You know when you and Scotty and Evan all decided that you were gonna be volunteer firefighters?”

  “You mean when we were like ten?”

  “Yeah. And you idiots would ride around on your bikes going, ‘woo-woo-woo’!”

  “In fairness, I think it was only Evan who went
‘woo-woo-woo.”

  She laughs again. She should. That was a good one.

  “And you’d… I feel like I remember that… Didn’t you guys actually set fires so you could go put them out?”

  I put on an overly admonished face, like a kid who’s been busted for doing something he shouldn’t be doing. “Maybe,” I squeak out.

  “Yeah… Well, this was from the time you three were racing around the driveway at our place. Just, like, going in circles for no reason. Knuckleheads. And I came out to tell Scotty it was time for dinner and you didn’t see me, or whatever, and you skidded to a stop, but wound up kind of rolling up the back of my leg. You really don’t remember this?”

  “No, no, I… kinda do? I dunno. I remembered the nice one! Cut me some slack.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Well, whatever, you took a huge chunk of skin off the back of my heel and that’s what that’s from.”

  I examine it again, more closely. Really favoring it and kissing it. Trying to go back in time twenty years and make it not happen.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “That’s probably why I don’t remember.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it caused you pain.” She gives me a look like you give someone when you care about them but can’t believe what an idiot they are. “I’m so sorry. I was an asshole.”

  “You still are,” she says, smirking. “But don’t feel bad. I loved that injury. Seriously. I loved it so much. Probably why the scar is even there.”

  “What? What do you mean? Why?”

  “Every time it would start to heal over and scab, I’d pull it off.”

  I study her face and ask, “How come?”

  She closes her eyes, kind of like she’s embarrassed, and then says, “Because. You gave it to me.”

  That’s it. Good night, fucking Irene.

  Starting at her ankle, I begin licking. My head is hidden from her view by the flowy canopy of black that is her dress, but I can see every part of her. And waiting, at the top of my journey, are the black, lace panties she has on. The smell of her skin and her moist pussy swirls all around me, filling up my nostrils and making me fight back the urge to press my cock inside of her right this second. But, if I can hold out, there’ll be time for that after I’ve let my tongue taste what it wants.

  I lick my way up to behind her knee and start kissing her there. I swear, the sound she makes when I do causes me to think that she’s coming right now. Which can’t be possible. Or I suppose it could, and that would be wonderful and a nice trick to have up my sleeve, to know that I can make her come by just touching her there, but I don’t have long to think about it because suddenly I can feel her hand on the top of my head, through the skirt, pushing my face up towards her pussy.

  OK. That’s no problem. Happy to oblige.

  I work my hands up the outside of her thighs, reach the lace with my fingertips, and draw her panties down around her ankles. She kicks at them with her feet, kneeing me in the face in the process.

  “Sorry!” I hear from somewhere out there in the air above my joy.

  “All good!” I call back, and keep doing my duty.

  She drops one leg off the sofa and onto the floor, and now I have a full view of what has quickly become one of my favorite sights in the world. I have seen the Taj Mahal, the Roman Colosseum, Machu Picchu, all that Seven Wonders shit. None of it holds a candle to the wonder that is Maddie Clayton.

  I place my palms on the inside of her thighs, so that I can spread her wider with my thumbs and allow my tongue to burrow itself inside her. And just as I’m about to place my mouth on her tender, bare pussy, I hear a riiiiiiip.

  And before I can ask, ‘What was that?’ her hand comes shooting down into view, her index and middle fingers landing on her clit.

  “Did you just rip your dress open?” I ask.

  She ignores the question and her hand pushes my head forward before landing back on her clitoris again. I decide the only decent thing to do is to help her out, so I let my tongue stroke against the swollen flesh in time with her rubbing, alternately sliding it inside the pink walls of her pussy, lapping up the wetness that’s starting to spill from her in torrents now.

  MADDIE

  His beard tickles my inner thighs. “That feels so good,” I moan. I pull my hand away, giving his mouth better access, and slide my fingertips through his hair as his tongue flicks against my clit. And just when I think this moment could not feel any better, he places his whole mouth against me and sucks.

  “Jesus,” I whisper. “Don’t ever stop.”

  A breath of air tells me he’s laughing and happy about pleasing me. Which makes me want to please him.

  “I want your cock in my mouth,” I say.

  He tsks his tongue, probably not meaning to drive me wild, but it does. I arch my back and fist his hair just as he says, “Plenty of time for that later.”

  So I lie back and enjoy it. I have no choice. Because Tyler Morgan has taken a masterclass in eating pussy or something. Every lick, every sweep of his tongue, every movement of his chin… all of it has me on the edge.

  And then his fingers join in. My eyes roll back into my head. I lose time, I’m sure of it. I float somewhere unreal. Somewhere between then and now. Somewhere dreamy, and beautiful, and—

  “Don’t come yet,” he murmurs, making my clit vibrate with his words.

  And I want to say, Don’t worry. You can just make me come again. And be selfish. And take everything he’s offering.

  But I hold back. I hold it in because if I come now it will upset the perfect balance of ecstasy he’s created.

  It’s just that I can’t hold on much longer. So I wiggle my hips a little and his tongue finds its way inside my pussy again as my fingertips wander down between my legs like they’re in charge of what happens next. Which is me, playing with myself, as Tyler pushes his tongue in deeper, as my fingers find their rhythm on my clit, and all I can think of is… I never want this to end.

  TYLER

  She rubs harder and I stretch my tongue as far as I can, almost separating it from the inside of my mouth, straining as I swirl it around inside her. And on cue, her thighs come crashing together against my head, pinning me there, forcing me to stop moving, but allowing me to stay bound to her with my mouth. Which is all I want.

  The vibration of her quivering thighs against my cheeks has me rubbing my dick into the sofa, unconsciously emulating the gyrating muscles in her legs. Suddenly, she pulls herself back from my lips, drawing the skirt up as she does, exposing my head to the room.

  She presses her foot into my shoulder, forcing me to a kneeling position on the floor, and before I know it, she’s pushed me all the way onto my back, picked her skirt up, and is mounting my throbbing cock. I can now see the rip she made in the top of her dress, and it makes my cock throb harder. It’s torn down to her stomach, exposing her taut muscles and her magnificent tits, still wrapped in the black bra she’s wearing.

  I reach behind her and, with a trick I learned back in high school and have never gotten sick of pulling out of my bag, in a snap of my fingers, I’ve unfastened the latch and freed her breasts from their confinement. She gasps and her eyes get wide for a second before she smiles and plants her mouth on mine.

  “Is that what I taste like?” she asks, sucking at my lips with hers.

  “Does it taste better than anything you’ve ever had in your mouth before? Then yes.”

  She bends her legs back, locking her calves to the inside of mine, allowing her the anchor she needs to grind my cock back and forth, back and forth, pulling her ass down my thighs until I’m almost out of her, and then rolling her hips forward and consuming me again. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth.

  MADDIE

  I reach up, grab both my breasts, and squeeze. Tyler watches me, stupid grin on his face, which just makes me happy in ways I can’t describe. “You like that?” I ask. “Do you like when I play with myself?”

  “I like it better
when it’s me.” He winks.

  I lock eyes with him. Stare into him as I raise one breast up towards my chin. He tilts his head to the side as if to say, You gonna go there?

  And I do. I go there. I lower my mouth to my nipple and swirl my tongue around, mimicking the way his tongue was swirling between my legs just moments ago. And when my lips descend, and I pull the hard nub into my mouth, we start fucking again. Hard. Like I made him forget for just a second what he was doing, but now he’s remembered.

  His hands grip my hips, pushing me back and pulling me forward as I continue to make my tongue dance over the peaked tip of my nipple… and I love it.

  I want him to leave marks on my skin. I want to look down later tonight, or tomorrow, or next week and see bruises that bring it all back fresh in my head. I want to cherish those marks the way I cherished that scar on my ankle.

  I want to make memories with him.

  This makes me stop what I’m doing.

  Not because anything’s wrong. Not because there’s so much to be worried about right now and we’re here at my house having sex.

  But because I just want to… look at him.

  I place my palms flat on his cheeks. Study the colors in his eyes.

  “What?” he asks. “What’s wrong?”

  I shake my head and smile. “Nothing,” I say. “Nothing at all.”

  And it’s true. It’s perfect.

  I take a mental picture for myself. To go with the possibility of bruises on my hips. Then I tuck it away for another day and resume our rhythm.

  TYLER

  On the next surge forward, I grab her around the waist and stop her moving. I put my mouth on her breasts and nibble at her pert, puckered nipples, making her struggle to get free. But I won’t let her go free. I will insist on keeping her here. Because I know that I won’t be able to keep her forever. I know that ultimately, she will do what it is she wants, and while I will be there for her always, she is not mine to keep. So I savor this moment when she is. For this brief parcel of time, she is all mine. No one else’s.