Must Love Pogs

by Xavier Neal

  “Enjoy your dessert,” I state and give Wyatt one more look. “I’ll see you whenever I see you.”

  “As always.”

  He steps out of my path, and I make my way towards the exit, well aware of Oliver on my heels.

  The minute we’re completely out of the restaurant, he attempts to grab my hand as he pleads, “London wait!”

  My body finally spins towards his. “Why? So you can whine and stomp your feet like a toddler rather than a grown ass man?”

  Embarrassment burrows into his expression, except this time it isn’t cute. It isn’t adorable. It’s deserved and punishing. It also hurts to see.

  “Look, I don’t know much about the whole girlfriend thing, which by the way, I would like to be consulted before you start making decisions for me. Whether it is about what we call each other or what we’re having for dessert or when we’re leaving !” The words run rampant, and I don’t bother trying to stop them. “I am most definitely alright with just riding whatever wave we’re on when we’re on it, but I do not like my entire life being decided for me without my consent. I do not like being forced into margins and post noted like paperwork. I am not some damsel ditz head who needs you to think for her or protect her from ex-flings who are now actually friends, Oliver.”

  “I’m certain you don’t need me at all.”

  His words settle poorly. “I don’t.”

  Oliver nods his understanding, the heartbroken look in his eyes breaking my own.

  Finding myself slightly confused, I ask, “Why does that have to be a bad thing? Just because I don’t need you, doesn’t mean I don’t want you.…” I step towards him. “And just because I don’t need you now doesn’t mean at some point I won’t.” Hope returns a bit to his expression. “Besides, right now, wanting you is by far better than needing you. It means there’s something about you keeping me coming back. It means there’s something here strong enough to pull me to you. Want lacks the confines and negative connotation of need . I need to breathe, but I want the sweet smell of fresh flowers in the air, so I go and find it. I need to eat, but I want French Fries smothered in ketchup, so I hop in the car and find them. I-”

  “I wanna know the little shit like he does, London,” Oliver declares at the same time his pinky links with mine. “I wanna know potatoes are your favorite. I wanna know about all the breath-taking shit you’ve seen and done. I want you to keep calling me at me three A.M. because you heard some tribal band and are recreating its song with pots and spoons.”

  Got really good at it too….Hm. It’s probably best I usually stay in suites on the top floor.

  “My whole life has been spent believing in order to be wanted you have to be needed .”

  “And a huge philosophy for my life is living for what you want not what you’ve been told you need.”

  “Prove that to me.” His finger flexes. “Give me a chance to know the difference….To feel it.”

  The pleading in his tone pummels all remaining defenses. With a sweet smile, I sigh, “Alright, Hot Stuff, I’ll let you off the hook for dick dinner behavior this time. But next time you’re going to be sent outside with a relaxation ball and forced to listen to The Wind Bees until you find your center.”

  Longing lightens his blue eyes. “So, there’ll be a next time?”

  I drag our pinky locked embrace around my waist and playfully say, “Depends on how well dessert goes….”

  A hungry growl seeps into the night air. “Is that offer actually on the table? I completely understand if it’s not. I was out of line earlier.”

  “For making the naughty announcement to your coworkers or for assuming the only way to prove we’re together is with a sexual reminder?”

  There’s a grumble of regret in his voice, “I can’t believe I told the entire table that.”

  My free hand toys with the end of his black tie. “I liked it.…”

  His hand abandons mine to cup my ass. “How about we go back to my apartment and I make you love it?”

  A small whimpered agreement is pulled from my lips.

  Thankfully it’s a short walk over to Oliver’s high-rise apartment. The two of us are barely inside before his mouth is covering mine. In a single swift action, he lifts me up by the hips, and I wrap my legs around him. Our kiss becomes more intense as our tongues tempestuously tangle. Every whirl has my mind freely falling further down to the erotic pit, torn between demanding to hit the bottom and begging we never do.

  With a heavy thud my bare ass lands on a cold hard surface. I squeak and Oliver bites my bottom lip harshly. This time when I drop my jaw to moan, his tongue takes advantage of mine. His large hands wander down my thighs and drag my legs to opposite ends. Afterward, he slips away and sinks down onto his knees. It’s at that moment I notice he’s placed me on top of his dining room table.

  “Do you always eat dessert at the table?”

  Oliver’s fingers curl around my thighs. “I do when I know I’m going to make a mess….”

  The proclamation barely has time to process. His hot mouth roughly captures my clit and my hands fly to his hair for leverage. Unlike the other aspects of his life, there is no order to his licking. No predictable pattern. No pre-mediated plan to pursue. It’s as if his tongue has no rulebook, only one single purpose. Oliver sucks harshly again, this time groaning as a rush of wetness whispers to be tasted. The added vibrations are met with a loud moan. He buries his face deeper. Grazes his teeth in tandem with his tongue. Relentlessly, guides the wild appendage around every inch of my pussy he can access. He sucks the first orgasm out of me with minimal effort and uses my shudders as encouragement to continue. The grip on my thighs tightens once more, tethering not only my pussy to him but my ability to have pleasure. My fingers tug at the strands they’re wound around while I whimper his name in rapid succession. Every part of his mouth recklessly continues to crash between my thighs, erasing all assumptions of him being incapable of letting loose. Incapable of him willing to jump over the edge with me. Incapable of loving me just the way I am….

  Another orgasm tears through me yanking a harsh scream from my system. “Oliver!”

  His satisfied rumbles amplify the ripples causing my body to collapse backwards. I see a mad rush of reds and yellows spiraling together from behind my shut eyes. He suddenly slows down the speed yet laps at the earned reward. When Oliver finally draws himself upward, I open my eyes to him leaned over my splayed body exposing to me his very wet complexion.

  I smirk proudly. “You um…you’ve got a little something on your face.”

  He chortles and uses the edge of his thumb to swipe away the corner of his lip. “Did I get it?”

  We exchange a sweet laugh before his lips find mine all over again. The combination of my flavor on his tongue and the feeling of his body climbing onto the table to blanket mine has me melting all over again.

  Maybe doing the ‘girlfriend’ thing won’t be so off-putting. Maybe our dates won’t reach a point of predictable cycles. Maybe we’ll defy the relationship overlords and find ways to keep the fun as we progress into something more. Maybe he’ll learn to focus less on the words and more on the incredible sensation that soars between us. Maybe just maybe he’ll realize it’s okay to have a balance of want and need. Maybe I’ll accept it too.

  “You have to be cheating!” London shouts at me from the other side of the blanket.

  I collect the milk carton pieces, also known as POGs, that landed face up. “That doesn’t sound like good sportsman like dictation.”

  “Conduct,” she corrects on a huff. “It’s un-sportsman like conduct , Hot Stuff.”

  My mistaken nomenclature should make me feel embarrassed, but it doesn’t. Unlike when I’m forcing myself to sit through a football game with my brothers as some sort of reminder that I am a member of the family, there is no pain attached for not knowing the right terms. No memories of being mocked or teased. Instead London giggles, gives me a chaste kiss, and tells me the actual term. Over t
he past few weeks, it’s gotten so bad I’ve contemplated studying for when she returns back to town and starts telling me about her work. The only reason I haven’t is because she constantly reassures me she doesn’t need me to be anyone other than me. It’s an unusual and remarkable feeling. However, I haven’t completely accepted it as the whole truth just yet.

  After restacking the pile of milk carton caps, I cockily state, “It’s all in the wrist.”

  “No, free throw shots are all in the wrist . A perfect spira l down the middle of the field is all in the wrist . A BMX bar spin is all in the wrist .” She motions her hand at the now neat pile. “This is just shitty luck.”

  I bend my legs to allow my arms to rest over them. “ Very un-sportsman like.”

  London childishly mocks me and tosses the slammer piece at the pile. Unfortunately for her not a single piece lands face up. “I hate this game!”

  Between chuckles, I ask, “Then why do you play it?”

  “Because I like you ,” she absentmindedly reminds me. Our eyes lock, and she saunters away from the heavy commitment that stating such things seems to make. “Primarily naked.”

  During our time of being together without officially tacking on labels she’s deemed shouldn’t be important, I’ve taken note of the way she has a tendency to back away from ‘normal’ couple behaviors. We don’t typically make dates in advance. She simply arrives into town and we just do whatever is available that we want to. Sometimes it’s dinner at a new restaurant. Last week it was a carriage ride around downtown. Today it’s eating cold pizza, naked in the middle of my living room with our phones silenced, and my favorite television show on in the background. She refuses to have us fall into a “comfortable cycle” or “society specified social expectations”. I took her explanation for not wanting to define our relationship with “out of date” terminology to heart. She had a few valid points. People should be able to emotionally invest themselves without worrying every minute of every day what it means and where it “has to go” more than where they want it to. Problem is for me, I want it to go down the stereotypical path of love, marriage, and kids someday. London on the other hand has never been “linked” to another male as long as she has been to me, and I think that’s what has her constantly in the flight position. The only thing she’s truly tied herself to, outside of her family and eccentric spiritual beliefs, is her job. I think the thought of connecting to anything else on a more permanent level without her permission secretly terrifies her. I think as much as she trusts the universe or the Sun Goddess or whatever it is she has her faith in for the time being, she’s still skeptical about giving herself over to the notion of love . Sometimes I wish there was a candle I could light or Saturn prayer I could give her to prove I have no intention of ever hurting her…or letting her go if she doesn’t force me to.

  I give her a warm smile. “Wanna quit?”

  There’s no hesitation in her nodding.

  With another laugh, I begin collecting the pieces to put back in the old white box for safe keeping.

  London pulls a piece of Canadian bacon off my slice of pizza. “How often do you play this game?”

  “Haven’t played it in years.”

  “Years?” She quickly questions. “Not decades, but years ?”

  Continuing to properly organize the pieces in their holder, I nod. “Yeah. Every once in a while when Pop would swing by my old apartment, he’d crack open a beer and we’d play like we did when I was a kid.”

  “Wait. You didn’t play this game with your brothers?”

  I shake my head admiring the round cardboard disks that have managed to remain pristine for years. “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Wasn’t their type of game.”

  Her greasy hand lands on top of mine, lifting my attention upward.

  “My brothers were typical boys. They loved to roll around in the mud and kick up dirt and chase the animals around. The dirtier they were the happier they were. They liked to play games where they had to catch worms or tried to catch frogs. They liked to toss around the football or chase the kickball and play with pretty much any other ball they could get their hands on.”

  “And you didn’t like to get dirty.”

  “No. Which isn’t ideal when you’re raised in a family of farmers and ranchers and it is what’s expected of you.” I teeter on the indecision to continue until her hand slides so our pinkies can lock together. Our nonverbal expression of trust reassures me it’s alright to go on. “I have the world’s most amazing, most understanding parents. Pop didn’t punish me for not wanting to help feed the horses or hogs. He let me stay in the house with Mama. Learn to cook.”

  “Which is why you can make an orgasmic chicken fried steak and double buttered mashed potatoes.”

  “Precisely.”

  Made that for her the weekend of the Wyatt incident. Proved he’s not the only asshole in the city who knows a thing or two about food.

  “I replaced door handles. Light bulbs. I learned to fix the little shit around our home like a leaky faucet, which is when I got dirty, but it wasn’t the same level. Back to the story, one day at school, I think I was eleven, I saw these kids playing POGs. I didn’t initially have any of my own, so I just watched because at the time they were playing for keeps. Couple days later another group was just playing to play, and I got a chance to give it a shot. I was really good.”

  “ Still really good.”

  I let myself grin. “Truth is, the only other thing I had ever been good at up to that point was Nintendo, which we didn’t have. I played it for the first time when Mickey Morehouse invited Blake over to hang out one Saturday afternoon. I had to go because Mama refused to let Blake go by himself. She didn’t trust Mickey’s older brother not to bother them without another older kid around. Every time he’d go over there, I’d tag along, and play Nintendo with them. Eventually, Mickey just started inviting me over to play it, and Blake moved onto other friends as he always did. From birth he’s been the easiest Shaw to love.”

  And me the hardest.

  “Anyway, I eventually traded some of Mama’s homemade brownies for playing pieces. Within two days I collected more pieces from games than anyone else who was playing. I was sorting them that weekend-”

  “Because every object has its home and every home has its objects.”

  The way she mocks my mantra to help remind her to put things away when she’s done with them makes me clear my throat.

  London sweetly snickers at my changed expression.

  “I was sorting them while my brothers were outside doing whatever it was they did on the weekends. I would’ve done it sooner, but I shared a room with Blake and didn’t want him to see, so I waited. Pop ended up catching me. Asked me a million questions about it and then sat down demanding we play.” The memory expands the smile. “He made a habit at least once a week to play with me. Didn’t matter how tired he was. How long or hard the week had been. Once a week, every week, he put aside that time for me and only me.” I swallow the emotions clogging my throat. “I got older and it became once every couple of months. Then eventually a couple times a year. We had stopped playing in secret by that point, but he never invited my brothers to join us.”

  “He wanted you to always have something that was just yours .”

  I nod my agreement. “Which is nice when you have four brothers and nothing else is.”

  We shared everything from food, to books, to clean boxers when someone forgot to do their own laundry. As much as I love my brothers, it was nice to eventually get the hell away and have real independence. Space. Sometimes I wonder if maybe it was too much space and that’s why I’m treated more like a spectator than a family member.

  “Why’d you two stop all together?”

  “My nephews,” I answer and return to putting away the last of the pieces.

  London flicks away the piece of pineapple blocking the piece of meat she wants. “He plays the game with them instead?”
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  “No, Messyrella. He just spends the free time he would’ve with me trying to be a good grandpa to them .” Once I secure the lid on the box I scold, “Do you have to throw food around? Could you at least put the pineapple chunks into a small pile on the side of the plate, Sunshine?”

  She stares at me dead in the eyes and sends another piece flying.

  Torn between wanting to throw her down and fuck her as punishment for her defiance and grabbing a wet rag to clean the hardwood before it gets sticky, I let out a heavy sigh.

  “I love when you make that sound.”

  The corner of my lip fights to curl upward.

  “And when your forehead crinkles.” London crawls across the empty blanket space between us and into my lap. “And when your face gets all red because you’re worried the rest of the world can see us.…”