The Topsail Accord

by J T Kalnay

  But she will return from time to time, as part of her ritual, as part of her routine. She will be here every July, and every January. It will be difficult in July, with her family in the house. It will not be difficult in January. So it may be another year. But I will wait for her. Because when she is here, she is completely here like no-one has ever been completely here for me before. Is it the finiteness of the time we have together that allows the full extent of her presence? Is she only here now in this unrestrained way because it is another separate part of her world? I should not question it. I should let it alone, let it be. This unexamined moment of life is more than worth living. However many of these moments there will be.

  I have forgotten to discuss the bargain. I will bring it up later. Now is not the time. Not so freshly after discovering an entire realm and plane of intensity that I did not know existed. Not now. Later. When there is a normal moment, neither sunrise nor sunset, but a moment when we are just Joe and Shannon and not transcendent in some way, not the sated lovers reveling in the newfound brilliance of an unimagined and undreamt of coupling.

  She shifts slightly, her ass brushes against the tip of me, and I begin to feel the arousal.

  Shannon and Joe

  Their days blend together into a menagerie of ocean, sand, sky, and sex. They are naked as often as they are dressed, and they are ravenous for each other. They go from beach to bed and back time after time every day. They are unaware that their cycle merges with the tides, flowing from high to low every six hours and thirty seven minutes. For these hours and weeks they become part of Topsail Island and the sea that dominates it, as much a part as the dunes and sea oats and ever present Atlantic.

  Shannon has only spoken to her sister once during this whole time. She called her to let her know she had arrived safely and then mentioned that she was having a “nice” time. She has never been one to talk on the phone except to report an arrival at some remote location or to ask a specific question of a specific listener.

  Joe has abandoned his coffee shop for the weeks she has been here, and has only seen his sister once. His business and Foundation are running without him, though they both run less smoothly, with less direction and passion.

  During the day they are cocooned in each other, ignorant of anything or anyone else in the world. So few words pass between them that entire hours, and once an entire day passes without a word being spoken. Their understanding is on some level that mute yet sentient primal beings must understand. It is felt, breathed, internalized, un-described, and indescribable.

  And yet each night she kisses him good-bye and he goes to his house. After she is sure he is gone she leaves her beach house and returns to her cottage. To her refuge. Sometimes she takes a circuitous route, doubles back on herself, goes over the bridge and comes back, goes up to the end of the island and quickly ducks into a driveway to make sure she is not being followed. She does not think Joe would follow her, and she does not think her ex is here. But she obsessively pretends to be a secret agent who has to slip a tail before she can relax into her cottage.

  He has not been to her cottage, and he has not asked to visit. He knows she leaves the beach house, and he knows she goes to the cottage. He accepts that she will give only the time she arrives at the beach house until the time she leaves the beach house.

  Part of him longs for more, longs to visit her in her cottage, to make love to her in her cottage. To feel every part of him inside every part of her and to take up their rhythm and to put that spirit and that result into her cottage. But another part of him knows that the cottage exists behind a barrier that no person can cross. Not even all of Shannon crosses the barrier. There is some other Shannon that resides in that cottage behind the barrier.

  He knows and accepts that the cottage is not and never will be part of the bargain. He rationalizes that her refuge is part of what makes her who and what she is, part of why she can give herself without reservation in the way that she does. He knows that to intrude on that refuge, to cross that barrier, would be to destroy the power that creates her life force and her love force.

  He does not try to follow her, he does not try to locate her cottage. He keeps it as a separate abstraction in his mind, while she maintains it as a tangible rest and refuge.

  Shannon

  He is coming over again this morning. Is this the sixteenth or seventeenth morning in a row? I have lost count. But it is more than half of my month here. This is my month to recharge, to think and plan the entire year. To review my data from the past year and to think about what it all means. In the late evenings and early mornings I still do this. But during the day there is only Joe, and me, and us, in my bed in the beach house, on the beach, us, together.

  My sister would say I have been “fucked silly”, but she would be wrong. I am as much myself now as I ever have been. And for once I have something that a woman should have, that a woman needs, that makes a woman a woman. I have a man who is a skilled and patient lover, who asks nothing but takes everything. A man who cannot get enough of me but who will leave me alone.

  I give him everything, and this morning I will give him something different. I will take him in a way that I have never taken a man before. I will make him unique to me. I will make a memory with him that can only be him in my memory. That when I am old and all of this fucking is over I will think back and though some things may be confused there will only be the one man with whom I have done what I will do this morning.

  I actually got on the internet and did some research on how other women do it, or how gay men do it to each other. I can’t believe that am I planning oral sex. That I had to research it. But I have. I want to experiment. I want to try everything, because my time here in North Carolina is passing more quickly than ever. The days, especially the mornings when we make love, are a coital blur.

  He’s never asked me for this. Never tried anything that I wasn’t willing to give. But today, after we run, and after we have showered, I will bring him to my bed and I will make him lie down first. Then I will kiss him like he kisses me and take him in my mouth like he takes me in his. And after I have kissed him I will slide him into me and then ride him until the spasms take him and he screams out in Paleolithic utterances that echo around my empty beach house.

  He has taken me and I have surrendered. Today I will take him and he will surrender.

  I will not criticize myself for the knowledge that this will be the final thread that I unravel from his tapestry of independence. He is mine, and he will always be mine, though I will be gone for months at a time. It is unfair. And I don’t care. I want him this way, and I will have him this way, and after this he will never think of another.

  Joe

  I will be seeing her for the eighteenth day in a row. She arrived back here on the 3, and we made love on the 4, and on every day since. Sometimes several times in a day. My back hurts, my hips hurt, my knees hurt, everything hurts, and yet I cannot stay away, nor do I want to stay away. Her days here are numbered, though I am unaware of the exact number. But I know they are numbered. I will rest and heal after she is gone. Perhaps I will be healed by July, or by next January, when I will be with her again.

  She is neither praying mantis nor black widow. She has not lured me in this way so that she can decapitate me or eat me. But she has bewitched me. I know she will return to Ohio, to her digs and drills, to her assays and papers and science and family. I know she will forget me until she returns. Her worlds are separate and distinct and well defined. There is beach house July and cottage January and digging September and cataloguing October and Christmas December and on and on in her progression. The order is part of who she is. And now I suppose that I am part of that order.

  I still haven’t talked about the bargain I am going to propose. ‘Propose’, now there’s a word. I am going to ‘propose’ a bargain to her, not marriage, never marriage, she is clear on that. But I am going to propose an arrangement where we will see each other here, and where we will ta
ke vacations together. I will propose surfing and lighthouses, maybe surfing at lighthouses. But it is what I will propose. A new routine, a new separate world that she can separate and integrate into her current world. I know she can amend her plans, because she has amended cottage January to include a lover. Or has she had a lover every January? Am I just the next in a series? Will someone else fill her next January?

  No. It cannot be. I know the island and I know the men and families here. If there was a woman conducting serial affairs every January on the island I would know. I think this is new to her. It is new to me. But I did not know that it was her that funded the clinic and the lifeguards. I had no idea that it was her who paid for the park. So the island clearly does have secrets about which even I am unaware. Could she be a secret January lover?

  I tie my shoe incorrectly for the third time, I am so distracted with lust and longing for her. I finally tie my shoe correctly. She has told me today will be a longer run. I hope I can keep up, because she is ten years younger, more than a decade fitter, and she is not, like I am, wearing down close to exhaustion from sex. I am almost looking forward to her time of the month. After eighteen days in a row it has to come soon. Unless she is pregnant. But even this thought does not stop me.

  I wouldn’t stop even if I could.

  I jog to the car to drive to her house to run on the beach and then to be with her. Again, and again, and again, no matter what the cost.

  Shannon and Joe

  “So let’s jog to the pier, then I’m going to go hard for fifteen minutes, and you can take it easy, and then I’ll pick you up on the way back and we can jog it in?” she says.

  “Works for me,” he says.

  “You alright?” she asks.

  “I hurt in all the right places,” he answers.

  “Oh really,” she says. “And where would that be?”

  “My lower back, my butt, my knees, my johnson.”

  “Your dick hurts?” she asks.

  “It’s worth it,” he answers. “Trust me, it’s worth it.”

  “Glad to hear it,” she says.

  They set off towards the pier at a leisurely pace. A conversational pace.

  “I love fucking you,” she blurts out.

  He cannot believe his ears.

  “Ditto,” he answers.

  “Because that’s what we’re doing. We’re fucking. And I like it.”

  “Yes. We’re fucking. But I’m also falling in love with you,” he says.

  “Don’t confuse fucking with love,” she says.

  “I’m not. I’ve never felt this way before.”

  She does not answer.

  “I don’t need you to be in love with me,” he says. “It’s enough that you let me love you.”

  They continue their jog to the pier. She looks over at him, winks, and then is gone in what she calls “going hard.” Instantly he slows to a walk and watches her perfect lithe form pull away from him. Tired and sore as he is, he responds. “My God,” he says. “Is there no end to what this woman can do to me?”

  She returns to him twenty five minutes later. She is sweating freely and obviously pleased with her effort.

  “I might enter a race,” she says. “Just to see what it feels like to compete at forty.”

  “A race?” he asks.

  “Yes. A race. I’m thinking a 5k first time out, then maybe a 10k in the fall.”

  “There’s a 5k in Wilmington next weekend,” he says. “We could go down there, do some work for the Foundation, do the race, eat at a few nice restaurants, make a nice weekend out of it,” he says.

  She has not thought about spending the night with him. She always sends him home. A weekend in Wilmington would be different though. It would be neither her place nor his. It would be a place they might never have to visit again. It would not move any boundary, not destroy any routine or tradition or custom. And, if it works out, she thinks she could accommodate this new custom of a weekend in Wilmington before she returns home.

  “Sounds good,” she says. “Now let’s get back to the beach house. I want to shower and I want you inside me.”

  “Deal,” he answers.

  They emerge from the shower and towel off then head towards the bed, as has become their morning routine, their morning ritual. Still fresh, not yet a repetitive task, still a luxury and exploration. He kisses her and waits for her to sit on the bed so that he can lay atop her.

  “You first,” she says.

  He raises an eyebrow, wondering what this newness is. He complies, lays down, reaches out his hands for her.

  She is unsure how to begin, no amount of Internet research could prepare her for this.

  “I want to have you like you have me,” she says. “But I’ve never done this before. I hope it’s okay.”

  “I’m sure it will be fine,” he says. He smiles, puts his hands behind his head, closes his eyes, and accepts this new gift.

  She kisses all round him, on the front, the back, the sides. She slides her tongue in little circles. She feels his hardness intensify. Can feel his heart beating through his dick. She takes the end of him in her mouth and works her tongue. He groans. She decides she must be doing it right. She begins to bob up and down slowly, unsure how far into her mouth she can take him. He picks up the rhythm, tries to not force himself.

  She wraps her tiny hand around him and begins to use her hand in time with her mouth. He raises up his hips, ready to convulse.

  She stops.

  He opens his eyes in amazement.

  “Not yet,” she says.

  He takes several deep breaths, retreats from the edge, wonders what she will do next.

  She straddles him, takes him in her hand, and guides him into her. Once again she starts to bob up and down. Just a half an inch at first, and very slowly. Then the urgency comes on her and she takes him as deeply as she can. She feels him touch her bottom and feels his entire body tensing, readying for the release. She is far from coming but hurries and hurries until he bucks and rocks and empties himself and screams and screams and screams while she continues to ride even while he blows and blows in great wracking jerks and contractions.

  She feels him start to soften and so she slows and then stops. She has not come. She is not close to coming. But she feels a different release, a different satisfaction. She has made him surrender like he has made her surrender day after day during their January of sex.

  She keeps him inside her while he pants and tries to recover his heart rate.

  “You are amazing,” he says.

  She does not answer. She feels him beginning to shrink inside her. After a few minutes she reaches down, begins touching his sack while he is still inside her. Feels him respond, feels him start to get more firm, start to expand to his full size while still inside her. She feels a power like she has never felt. This is her first time being in control. She has always submitted to sex. In all the years with her ex, though there were some enjoyable fucks at the start, she has always submitted. Never sought it out, and never controlled or dominated. The power is very erotic to her. She continues to stroke his balls.

  He cannot take it any longer. He rolls her over and gives himself over to abandon and desire that he has never experienced. He rides and thrusts and pulses powerfully and in control in the way a man can only do in the first moments after the minutes it takes to refresh from coming the first time in a day.

  She takes him, all of him, arches her hips up and now begins to moan herself. Her moans turn to yells that turn to shrieks as she rolls through one then another and then a third release. Finally he comes again and rolls off her, exhausted, raw, unable to move, barely able to breath, feeling his heart trying to bust out of his chest.

  For the longest time neither can speak, neither can move. They have topped everything that has come before. He falls asleep, and she soon follows.

  Shannon and Joe

  It is unusually warm for January. Especially because it is also unusually clear and still. The
Atlantic is at peace this afternoon, as though Shannon and Joe absorbed all of its energy in their run and released all the absorbed energy in their lovemaking in the morning.

  They are sitting on the upper back porch of her beach house. The deck rises ten feet above the dunes, twenty feet above the ocean. He has made coffee and they are drinking it while they watch dolphins cruise along the sandbar fishing the gentle swells. Pelicans drift along the small swell and then angle up, tip over, and plunge down into the ocean, a ritual usually reserved for warmer spring and summer and fall days.

  They know this is a magical January day that needs to be absorbed in every way possible and stored up for the colder winter days that will undoubtedly arrive here on the island, and for the inevitable ice and snow and wind to which she will return in just a few days in Ohio.

  “What was she like?” Shannon asks.

  “Who?” Joe answers.

  “Caitlin.”

  “Oh,” he says. He drinks from his coffee, drinks again. Watches the ocean.

  She waits while he collects his thoughts and decides how to answer. He understands how hard it was for her to ask, and he will honor her request with a complete telling.

  “I am convinced she was an angel. From the moment I first saw her in the hospital, when she was just hours old, I knew she was something special. She was bright. Not brilliant, but bright. Inquisitive. Always asking questions, not always understanding the answer the first time, but asking again and again until she would understand. So she was relentless.”

  “She was pretty. Not beautiful, I know that’s hard to believe that a father would say his daughter was pretty and not beautiful. But she was pretty. I think she was always going to be pretty. And her prettiness would grow on you, especially here on the beach.”