Want You

by Jen Frederick

  “You’re taking a vacation.” He rises and pulls something out of his back pocket.

  I turn away. I don’t want to see it. If I ignore the paper, the suitcase, the grim expression on his face, then I can go on living my life here with him.

  As I drain the rest of the beer, a single piece of paper appears in front of me. My name is on it along with a barcode. It’s a ticket of some sort.

  “It’s a two-week trip to Tokyo. I booked you a tour guide so you can visit all the famous ramen shops.”

  My fingers curl around the marble counter. The edge cuts into the skin, but all I can feel is the heat radiating from his body. Yesterday, before the nightmare at Marjory’s, he took me from behind. His arm dug into my waist and the other pressed my shoulder into the mattress, punctuating each thrust with a promise that he’d love me forever.

  That’s the kind of memory I want. Not this one.

  “I hope you enjoy it.” I pull open the sink cabinet and hurl the can into the recycling bin.

  “Bitsy. Listen—”

  I turn on him. “Did the last month mean nothing to you? Do you only keep the promises you want to keep? You promised that you wouldn’t send me away again. You swore that we’d be together forever.”

  His face grows pained. “This is for two weeks, Bit. It’s to keep you safe.”

  “I’m sorry I went to Marjory’s. That was a mistake, but people know I exist. I was there when Mary knifed your chef, Gerry. That scarecrow man knew me instantly. I can’t be your big, bad secret, and you can’t send me away every time there’s the slightest scent of danger!”

  “You think this is easy? You think that me sending you away is easy?”

  “Yeah! I do. It’s a helluva lot easier than being abandoned. I can forgive you for leaving me when I was fourteen. I was a burden then. Dead weight. But I’m not now. I can drive. I can handle a gun.” I weighed the risks. I’d rather stay with Leka and take my chances with whatever’s out there than be constantly sent away whenever there’s danger. Life’s full of danger.

  “You can kill, too?” he cuts in.

  “If I have to.” I stare back at him, trying to appear steady despite my internal flailing.

  “I didn’t take you off the street all those years ago so you could grow up to kill people.” His face twists up in pain that I don’t want to acknowledge because I’m hurting, too. We’re both dying inside at the idea of being apart, but this won’t be the last time. I know I’m right. He will send me away again and again unless I take a stand.

  “Are you saying it would’ve been better if you left me? What were my other choices? Starvation on the street? Being raped by old dirty men when I was barely old enough to pee on my own? You saved me.”

  “And I’m going to keep saving you or that one act all those years ago don’t mean shit.”

  “I’m good enough to fuck, but not good enough to keep around.”

  He flinches at that one, but it’s not enough. No weapon in my arsenal is going to move him from his position. Helplessly, I realize this. I could be the most gifted orator, come up with the best arguments, and I will still lose. He’s convinced himself that there’s only one solution.

  My heart is cracking. It’s so loud it’s a wonder he can’t hear it. Maybe he can and he’s ignoring that, too.

  It’s for my own protection because I can’t keep loving Leka and be abandoned in return. I barely recovered when I was fourteen. There’s still an echo of that heartache that rings whenever we’re separated from each other for any period of time. It’s why I went to Marjory’s tonight. I missed him. I was afraid and so I went to him. Now, he wants me to live with the terrible anticipation that we could be separated at any time and that kind of awful uncertainty would wreck me. I don’t want to be ruined. I want to be happy. I want to be happy with him.

  “If you do this,” I say quietly because it’s hard to speak through the giant rock in my throat. “If you do this, I won’t come back. I forgave you once. I forgave you because it made sense when I was fourteen, but it doesn’t make sense now. If you do this, we’re done forever.”

  I lay it out there. Ultimatums aren’t right, but it’s not really an ultimatum. It’s a promise.

  He exhales. “Maybe that’s for the best.”

  I stagger back, catching myself against the counter. So there it is. He’d rather live apart than keep me close. He must know whatever the threat is today, it isn’t going away.

  I don’t know why, but I try once again. “There’s no silver bullet that is going to make me safe forever. I could die tomorrow getting run over by a car or falling into a subway station. I could die choking on a nut or being shot by a random burglar.”

  And Leka knows this in his head. It’s his heart that is clouded with fear. Our love will never survive if it’s not strong enough to overcome his fear.

  “I’m sorry,” he says. “I do love you. It’s why I’m doing this.”

  There’s nothing more to say. Not that I have the strength to talk. I pick up my purse, toe my feet into the discarded tennis shoes, not even bothering to pull up the backs. I open the door and walk out. I don’t want the suitcase. I don’t want the passbook full of money. I don’t want memories of him. I want to start a new life. One that doesn’t involve a man who holds his fear closer than his love.

  It’s hard to see through my veil of tears, but I know this path well enough. I walk it slow, aching to hear the door open. Aching to hear my name called. Aching to be back in his arms.

  But the door behind me never opens. His voice never calls out. The only sounds in the hallway are my sniffles and the chime of the elevator that has just arrived to take me away.

  I cast one last long look at the front door of the apartment. It remains closed. I step into the elevator. The doors slide shut and the car begins to descend.

  So…this is how it ends. I stumble to the corner and grope blindly for the railing so I don’t collapse to the floor. My chest is so tight. So very, very tight. I slap my hand over my left breast and squeeze, but that pain doesn’t abate. It only grows with each small chime of the elevator, with each block I get farther from the apartment building, with each smile from the hotel staff until it grows so big that it explodes and pushes me to my knees.

  No one told me that heartbreak was a real, physical thing.

  * * *

  After crying my weight in tears, I drag myself off the hotel bed. In the bathroom, I wet my face with a cold cloth, straighten my silky blue blouse that got twisted around my torso, and internally debate my options. I need to get out of the city because if I don’t, I’ll be tempted to run back to Leka. I need a new start in a new location—somewhere far from here.

  I’m going to survive this. I’m young. The wound is fresh and that’s why it feels like tomorrow is too great of an obstacle to overcome. That’s why I want to lie down in the tub and sink under the water and stay there until there are no more thoughts in my head and no more pain in my heart.

  At the desk, I pull out the hotel stationery and start making a list. I want a place that is big enough that I can get lost if I need to and small enough that I don’t feel overwhelmed.

  I don’t need a warm place. Spending four years in Vermont has gotten me used to the cold. I sort of like snuggling next to a fire and watching the snow blanket the earth. Everything seems fresh at that point. Like you can really start anew.

  I’ll need public transportation since I don’t have a car and I don’t have a lot of money. I don’t want to use the credit cards Leka gave me. I need to cut off all access to him for my own sanity.

  I pull up a map of the US on my tablet and start filtering until I arrive at Minneapolis, one of the Twin Cities. It’s cold up there, but they know how to do it right with ice festivals and snow parties. There’s decent public transportation and dozens of different neighborhoods. I find an apartment that’s within my budget. It’ll be tight and I’ll need to get a job right away. I can clean homes or wait tables or both.
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br />   There are night school classes I can take to get some kind of associate’s degree. Once I get a better job, I can save up and go to college to get a bachelor’s degree. I intend to work in social services. I know it’s a sucky job, but I want to help kids if I can.

  I send in an inquiry about the apartment’s availability and begin my job hunt. There are lots of low-wage jobs available but not one that pays enough to cover the bills. So, two jobs it is. For the next hour, I distract myself by filling out online applications. After the fifteenth one, my tears have dried and I’m no longer feeling sorry for myself.

  Well, not much anyway.

  But I’m cold. I check the thermostat, but it’s broken because the tiny LED screen declares that it’s a temperate 72 degrees. Not likely given the goosebumps on my arms. I grab the comforter off the bed and wrap it around me and fill out five more applications. The fifth one is for a delivery position, and for some reason that makes me think of Leka. The tears start up again.

  If only I could stop wanting him. Maybe I could see a heart surgeon and he could cut out all the Leka pieces in that worthless organ. No. I’d have to take my whole heart out because there isn’t a part that doesn’t have Leka in it.

  Feeling helpless, I drop my head to the desk. The faux leather pad covering the work surface feels sticky and gross against my tear-soaked cheek, but I’m too emotionally spent to move.

  You’re going to be okay, I tell myself. It’ll be okay.

  I’m going to keep saying this until I believe it.

  A knock at the door interrupts my chanting. I didn’t order room service and no one knows I'm here. I glance warily at the door. “Who is it?”

  “It’s me.”

  I jump to my feet. Leka? How could he find me? I just picked a random hotel. My gaze drops to my phone. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. I shouldn’t have turned it on. What a rookie mistake! I’d used cash to check in but didn’t think to get a burner phone.

  "You have the wrong room,” I say. “Please leave or I’ll be forced to call security.”

  Leka’s response is to unlock the door and walk in.

  “Hey!” I wave my arms as if I can magic him out of my room like some wand-wielding wizard. “Get out. You’re trespassing.”

  Since I don’t have a wand and am not a wizard, I fail.

  “How mad are you?”

  “I’m furious.” I glare. “My rage is incandescent, and it will remain at that alarming level for a very long time.”

  “Okay.” He leans in and kisses me. I let him because I’m angry but also very much in love and I can’t turn him away. But I only allow the kiss to last a few minutes before breaking away. No amount of kissing is going to reduce my anger.

  “Only time—” He interrupts me with another kiss. I try again. “Only time will make it”—kiss—“I really mean it”—kiss—“I’m serious—”

  He tongues my lips apart and dives in. My righteous anger dissolves like chocolate under a flame as he tugs on the belt loops of my jeans until my body is flush against his. He parts his legs and fits me into the notch between them. The hard, stiff length of him juts against my stomach—the flimsy fabric no barrier against his desire.

  My head spins and I lose track of exactly why I was mad until he releases me and then it all comes flooding back.

  I push out of his arms and put a few feet between us so I can catch my breath. “You don’t get to kick me out and then waltz back in like nothing happened.”

  “I agree. I’m sorry. I’m scared shitless of you staying, but you leaving forever is my biggest fear. If you stay, you could get hurt and that will kill me. I don’t think our relationship would ever be the same.”

  “Of course, it wouldn’t,” I reply impatiently.

  He frowns. “What do you mean?”

  “Our relationship will change all the time. It already has, from guardian and ward to lovers. Tomorrow, maybe we will be parents. I’ve grown; you've grown and so our relationship changes. What doesn’t change is our love. As long as we have love, we can weather all the changes. If I get hurt, then we deal with that hurt and our guilt and our pain and we move the fuck on together.”

  He gives me his quirky smile. “All right then, my love. We’ll fight this battle together.”

  “Fine,” I reply stiffly, but my lip quivers.

  “You done being mad at me?” His voice is so tender that it sends my heart flying, and because I have zero control over my emotions, the tears start to flow.

  Leka panics. “Shit. What’s wrong? What did I say?” His rough hands come up to cup my cheeks, as if by force he can stem the tide.

  “N-n-nothing,” I blubber. “You called me my love.”

  “I’ll never say it again,” he vows.

  “If you don’t say it every day until I die, we’re going to fight.” I hit him on the arm.

  He doesn’t flinch. I don’t know if he even feels it. His biceps are like rocks. “We good?” he says, a mite impatient.

  “Why?” I cock my head. “Are we going somewhere?”

  “Hopefully, five feet to your left.”

  “Five feet to my—” I look over my shoulder and see the bed. “Oh.”

  “Yeah. Oh.”

  38

  Leka

  I’m a criminal. I break the law. I kill people. I steal. I work for people who traffic in guns and drugs. But none of those misdeeds compare to the sin I’m committing now. But I can’t let her go.

  I’ve had a taste of heaven and am too damn selfish not to want a repeat.

  “If I take you now. That’s it. You can’t leave again.”

  “A threat is something that I should be afraid of. I’m not afraid of you.”

  “You should be.” I thread a finger inside the waistband of her jeans. “You should be afraid of me. Of my world.”

  “Leka, don’t you know? I’m your world.” Boldly, she steps forward and rises on her tiptoes to place a kiss on my chin. My cock pulses against her stomach.

  “That’s even more terrifying.”

  “But you’ve never been afraid of anything.”

  I wasn’t before you came into my life, but that’s because I didn’t have anything to live for. I cup the back of her neck and tilt her head with my thumb until her eyes meet mine. “Last chance.” Last chance to escape before I tie you to me with binding so secure and tight that not even death will keep us apart.

  She leans forward and presses her cheek against my thudding heart. “I was once afraid. Back in that dark alley, running away from the bad man that wanted to hurt me. I was afraid of everything. The shadows in the apartment. The noises as the springs bounced above my head. The smells of sweat and vomit in the bathroom. But most of all I was afraid of being alone and forgotten. You drove that all away, Leka. I don’t care what happens to me so long as it happens when you are with me. This world is shit. I know this. I know that there are probably lots of people out there that would say you and I are wrong, but they don’t matter. Only you matter. I only want you.”

  I tried. I tried hard to be a good person and to send her away. I did the right thing and now…well, now, I grab the lapels of her robe and whip it open. Now it’s time to claim her.

  I sweep a hand under her ass and lift her. Her legs automatically wrap around my waist, her ankles locking at the notch of my lower back. As I cross the small distance to the mattress, her ass brushes the head of my straining cock. The wispy contact makes my dick ache. I clench my teeth.

  Every time we have sex, I’m fighting the battle of not coming too soon. She makes me so fucking hot that just looking at her eviscerates my self-control. But I want to go slow this time. I really want to make love to her, to bring her to heights she hasn’t known before, so that if there ever is a time she has to choose, her body will remember me.

  Gently, I lay her onto the mattress. The white terry cloth falls to frame her perfect, beautiful body. She gestures that she wants me in her arms. I shake my head.

  “No. Not yet.” I pull a fin
ger between her legs and hold it up so she can see her arousal coating the tip. “I’m need my daily ration of this.” I suck the finger into my mouth, tasting her salty essence.

  Her eyes widen in anticipation.

  I don’t make her wait. I drop to my knees and press her legs open wide—wider than she prefers, but I like to see her fully on display. Her sex is beautiful. It’s soft and suckable, glistening with a need that makes me humble.

  “Are you gonna stare at your food or do something about it?” she chirps, half challenge, half irritation.

  I laugh. “Maybe I’ll take a picture.”

  “Do it and I’ll kill you.”

  “This is fucking gorgeous. It’s art.” I frame her pussy with my fingers, pressing my thumbs against the puckered, forbidden skin. She tries to scoot away, but I drag her back.

  “Well, it’s the only art you’re going to see.”

  My fingers dig into her thighs. “I better be the only one seeing it.”

  “Or what?” she teases.

  I’m deadly serious. “Or I’ll be keeping a collection of eyeballs in a jar in the fridge.” I lean forward and give her one long lick from back to front. “You’re mine now. I’m the only one that gets to look at this pussy. I’m the only one that gets to touch this pussy. I’m the only one that gets to eat this pussy.”

  I lock my mouth over her sex, tongue her folds apart and fuck her with my fingers and teeth and tongue until the only thing that comes out of her pert mouth are screams of pleasure. She writhes below me—both wanting more and afraid of the sensations. I have to hold her down to make her take all of the ecstasy that her body and I want to give her. I hold her in place to my mouth until she unravels with a high keening scream.

  And while she’s hurtling down from the top of that one peak, I tear at my fastenings, pull out my heavy, soaked cock and thrust into her. She cries out again, but I show her no mercy.

  I stretch her with the broad width of my cockhead. I drive forward until I’m fully seated, from tip to root.