by Kelly Myers
“I was still considering when I saw you last month at the 7-Eleven.” Zach pushes his hair away from his face. “As soon as I caught a glimpse of you, I wanted you. It was as if ten years of wanting you just hit me all in one second. So I told Claire I would see what I could do.”
Hearing him state his attraction makes me yearn to press my body against his, but I still want to clarify a few things.
“I understand if you were using me for sex,” I say. “I was using you for that too at first.”
I twist my hands up in the bottom of my jacket. It’s difficult to find the words when I just want to press my lips against his smooth skin, but I force myself to focus. “But the other stuff, what happened after the soccer game. That meant something to me, I felt something.”
I look him straight in the eyes. I need to see his face when I tell him.
“When I thought that maybe it wasn’t real for you,” I say. “It hurt so bad.”
I see the moment his restraint snaps clean in two. One second he is a good foot away from me, the next I’m in his arms. His face is pressed against mine, and I gasp as he kisses my forehead, my cheeks, my neck.
“It was real for me,” he says. “I promise it was all real.”
I collapse against him and start to unzip my jacket. I’m unbearably heated.
Zach kisses me full on the lips the moment my coat falls to the floor. He flicks his tongue into my mouth, and I let him taste in full.
I situate my legs on either side of him and let my bottom sink into his lap.
“I’ve wanted to barge into your apartment all week,” Zach says. “And beg you to give me another shot.”
I giggle, thinking of Marianne’s words about how he had better beg. “Why didn’t you?”
“Because I wanted you to want me.” Zach places his hand on my cheek. “I know how much you struggle with the past, and I wanted you to be ready for this.”
“I’m still not sure if I’m ready,” I admit.
“But you’re here.” Zach buries his face against my neck and licks a tender spot below my ear. “So I’m not letting you go. And I’m never going to lie to you ever again.”
“Wait, before anything else.” I push back and look at him. “I’m sorry about what I said in the truck about you not being good enough, I was so just so angry, but it was an awful thing to say and it’s not true.”
Zach cuts off my apology by kissing me.
“Forget it,” he says. “It’s alright, I forgave you as soon as you said it.”
And that’s why I fall into his arms. Because he forgives with such ease. Without even thinking, he can do that one thing I will always struggle with.
Zach undresses me with such skill, that I barely notice he’s unbuttoned my jeans until he’s sliding them down my thighs. I gasp as he shifts to the floor so he can skim kisses over my legs as he pulls off my shoes.
I crave his touch on my bare skin, so I pull my shirt over my head. His hands move over me, as if he’s determined to claim every inch. I moan as he grips my breast.
As if responding to my sound, he moves over me, pushing me so I’m laying against the cushions. In a rare display of clumsiness, he fumbles with the bra clasp.
“Here.” I smile. “I got it.”
As soon as I’ve unhooked it, he tears it off and takes my nipple in his mouth. I arch my back to press my stomach against his bare chest and cry out as he sucks and licks my nipple until it’s pert with desire.
I lift my knees and wrap my legs around his waist, pulling him flush against me.
He slips a finger under my panties and slides it through my wetness. I buck with anticipation as he moves it over my clit, and he pops his head up to watch my reaction with a smile.
“I want to make you feel like this over and over, every day,” he whispers in my ear, right as he slides a finger inside me. I move for him, eagerly grasping for whatever he gives me.
“Zach, I want you.” I grip his broad shoulders and whimper. “I want all of you.”
He drops to the ground, taking my underpants with him. Then he situates himself between my legs, and pushes my thighs wide apart. He licks me once, and I shudder with anticipation. It’s not going to take long for me to come, not when I’m so desperate for his touch.
Before, we had physical chemistry. We were undeniably attracted to each other.
Now there’s that, but it’s compounded by something deeper. Something we stumbled into during that night where he held me while I cried, and I let him.
It’s special, what we have. It had to be for me to come back to him after he lied. I understand why he did it though. He didn’t want to lose me. And Zach is always going to be a kid who grew up fast and rough. He wanted me, and he was willing to beg, borrow, cheat or steal to have me. The truth is, I would have done the same for him.
It may be messed up, but in this moment, I don’t care. It feels too good when he begins to suck at my throbbing clit while plunging two fingers inside me.
I move against his mouth and cry out for more. I can feel the pleasure rising in me in great waves radiating from my center.
All of a sudden, he pulls away, and I yelp in distress at the sudden coldness in me.
“One sec, one sec, one sec.” He bounds across the room and returns a second later with a condom.
“Hurry,” I whisper. “Oh God, I’m gonna come.”
In a few swift movements, he’s removed his pants and put on the condom. Then he’s over me again, and stroking me with his fingers until I feel my climax resurging.
The hard length of his erection presses into me, and I reach down to grip it.
“Beatrice,” he murmurs. “I won’t last long, I want you so bad.”
Then he plunges into me, his cock filling me and pushing me over the edge. I scream as my orgasm radiates through me, and I arch my hips up to feel him as much as I can.
His back shakes beneath my hand as he climaxes inside me. He buries his shouts of pleasure in my neck, and I groan and sigh as the final aftershocks of ecstacy pulse through me.
Zach rolls off me so that he’s reclining on the couch, and he pulls me atop his chest. I rest my head above his heart as he strokes my hair as if I’m a kitten. My body goes limp against him.
I move my fingers through his chest hair and let out a breath of contentment.
“I hope you don’t have any plans for the rest of the evening,” Zach says. “Because I’m not letting you leave from here until we do that over and over again.”
I tip my head back and prop my chin on my hand so I can look at him with a mischievous glint in my eyes. “Was me sobbing in your arms the other night not satisfying enough for you?”
To my surprise, he doesn’t joke back. His dark eyes soften, and he squeezes me tighter against him.
“You can cry in my arms anytime you need to,” he says. “I just don’t want to be the one making you cry anymore.”
I bury my face back in his chest and clench my eyes shut and open them again, just to convince myself that this is real. It’s actually happening.
We spend the next few hours cuddling and kissing. Then Zach makes grilled cheese and soup, and then he carries me to his bedroom and makes love to me, slow and steady this time. He touches and kisses me all over until I’m a quivering jumble of sensitive nerve endings in his hands.
At long last, we fall asleep, our legs tangled up together.
It’s the first time in ten years that I’ve been in Torrins after eight at night. When I visit my grandma, I always leave soon after sunset.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
This time, I’m the one who sneaks away in the middle of the night. I take a car back to my apartment. I want to stay in Zach’s cozy bed. It takes all my willpower to extricate myself from his limbs, heavy and warm from slumber.
I leave him a note saying that I had to get back for work in the morning. I almost sign it with “love,” but I refrain. The first time I use that word, I want to say it out loud. I want to s
ee the reaction on his face.
I also leave because I know I need some time alone to contemplate. It’s clear that our feelings for each other are real. My gut tells me to trust him. Even so, I want to take things slow so that my head can learn to trust him as well.
I text the group message with all my friends. They supported me and Zach even though they have no reason to, except for my strong feelings. They deserve to know.
I tell them that we talked and made up, and I assure them that there was plenty of begging on his part. Elena responded with a long text gushing about how she was so happy for me, and she hoped this worked out, and she would never forgive him if he betrayed me again. Zoe said that as long as I was happy, she was happy. But the minute he upset me again, she was going to be out for blood. Marianne just sent an eggplant emoji.
By the time I’m back in my apartment, I’ve made one last decision. It’s a big one, but I decide to tell my friends this as well. I’m no longer feeling so adamant that my mother remains a massive secret. She doesn’t have to be my blindspot.
So I text them: I’m going to call my mom tomorrow.
Once again, they support me no matter what, but Elena wants to know why. She asks if Zach told me to do it.
I assure her I’m not doing it for him. I’m doing it for myself. I don’t want to be scared anymore, not when there’s no reason for it.
I get ready for bed and fall into a deep and dreamless sleep.
When I wake up, all the emotional turmoil of last week has vanished. And there’s a text on my phone from Zach asking if he can visit tonight. I smile and write back an affirmative answer.
I’ve decided that I’ll call my mother at lunch time. It will allow me enough time to work up my courage, but it’s not so much time that I just sit there dithering until I chicken out. And I want to do it today. No more putting it off.
As usual, I’m able to throw myself into my work for the morning. I go through the motions and schedule pitches.
I feel like every aspect of my life has changed in the last few weeks except for my job. It’s a comfort, but now I’m thinking a little change is a good thing.
Besides, switching careers isn’t so scary when I have people I can rely on.
When lunch rolls around, I find the same quiet corner that I used to confront Zach when I found out he ran in the same circle as my mother. I was so furious and filled with doubt in regards to him. I had grown so used to believing that nothing good could come from my past, that no promising thing grew in Torrins, that I couldn’t believe Zach might actually be alright.
I sit on the bench for a while, just holding my phone.
It’s been almost ten years. I feel like there should be more pomp and circumstance to this moment. Maybe I should be crying. I’ve been doing that a lot lately anyway.
Then again, my mother was always this distant and difficult woman. It’s not like this one phone call can be any worse than the time she left my birthday cake in the oven to burn because a boyfriend needed her to go pick him up from the auto shop. Or the time when she dropped me off for the first day of seventh grade while nursing a huge hangover.
I’m not going to blame her though. I refuse to waste anger on her. It won’t get me anywhere.
I don’t know if she deserves this. After everything she’s done and failed to do, I don’t know if she has the right to my time. I don’t know if she should get to demand my attention.
A month ago, I would say that all she deserved is an eternity in hell.
The thing is, I no longer think that life is just about what people deserve. Zach has shown me that it can be about what people are willing to give.
He couldn’t change much about our situations when we were younger, but he was willing to make one phone call for my sake. And I was willing to give him my trust, even though he made mistakes. I was willing to give him another chance. And it felt good to give him that.
I scroll through my past calls until I reach my mother’s number. I don’t breathe while it rings. Once. Twice.
“Sweetheart?”
I hiss through my teeth, but I quickly recover. “It’s Beatrice.”
“Oh, Bea, sweetie, how are you?” I can hear some tears catching in her throat. My mother always did have all her emotions bubbling right near her surface.
“I’m fine.” I clear my throat. I feel no need to impress her with my charm or wit, but now I’m wondering why I didn’t at least prepare a rough outline of what I wanted to say. “I know you’ve been trying to reach me, and I’m still not sure if I want to talk to you.”
“That’s alright.” She’s quick to appease me. She’s scrambling to find some footing. “You don’t owe me anything, but I owe you an apology. A million apologies.”
“Right.” I suppose the polite thing to say would be, Oh no worries, don’t worry about it. But she and I are probably a bit past that.
“I’ve been trying so hard to make amends.” She’s talking fast, and it occurs to me that she’s nervous. She’s acting like she’s talking to a stranger. After 10 years, a college education and a new life in the city, maybe I am a stranger to her. “I’ve been really putting the work in, but it’s been so hard knowing that the one person I really need to make amends with, or rather the one person I should have hurt the least, I’ve ended up hurting the most.”
She’s babbling now, but I let her because it’s easier. I forgot about how she talked, all her words pouring out in rapid succession. She starts one sentence before she finishes the last. For some reason, I’m surprised she doesn’t talk like me. We look so alike, I thought maybe we would talk alike too. Then again, I probably put every effort into creating a speech pattern that was polar opposite to hers. I opt for short and pithy sentences, words that are quick, sharp and concise.
“Did – I mean, it doesn’t matter, but I am curious – what made you call today?” I can picture her blinking her large green eyes as she asks the questions. Like me, she has long eyelashes. Men always found them enchanting, but I could see the dangerous spark of anger deep in her irises. I have the same spark, I think. Only, she let her impulses get her in trouble and pick fights, and I forced my instinctive anger to go on the defensive. I wanted to keep myself safe from everything she had run into with arms outstretched.
“Did Zach talk to you? I just heard that you two had been catching up, and he is such a sweet boy, and you always did have a thing for him, didn’t you?”
“I decided to call you on my own,” I say.
I leave it at that. The entire backstory of how I ended up sitting on this bench making this call is far too complicated to go into over the phone. Besides, I don’t fully understand it yet.
“Oh, that’s good.” She lets out a long sigh. “I’m so happy, and I’ve got so much to tell you about what I’ve been working on and how I’m doing, and of course I’m sober, it’s been almost two years.”
“That’s nice.”
I bite my lip and hunch my shoulders in a cringe. A woman who has struggled with addiction most of her life has managed to stay sober for over a year (which I know is no easy feat), and all I can say is that it’s nice?
Well. I never said I was perfect. And I get a few free passes when it comes to my mother.
“I was hoping we could meet.” For the first time, Claire’s words slow down. She’s not sure how to phrase this. She doesn’t know if she’s even allowed to ask for this. As far as she knows, I’ve got my finger hovering over the End Call button, just waiting for her to cross a line and give me a reason to hang up.
“Yeah, that might be nice,” I say.
“Oh, amazing!” She’s back to her former energy, buzzing with ideas. “We could have lunch, or maybe dinner. I’m still in Torrins, but I could come over to you –- well, I guess you’re in the city, I always forget, it seems so different there, but maybe we could meet somewhere in between. Oh, sweetheart, I’m so glad you called today!”
One thing about my mother, she’s an optimist. She always ha
s hope, against all odds, that this time, things might work out. This will be the guy who stays. This will be the job she can stick with. Next time she won’t mess up.
I appreciate her hope. I really do. I know how hard it must be to maintain hope after what she’s struggled through. I’m not a kid anymore. I know she struggled as I did. She just brought the struggles on herself.
Regardless of where the blame lies, I think she’s being a touch ambitious with her grand plans for a full meal. If I have to sit through an entree, I don’t know if I’ll be able to keep my composure. There are too many landmines buried between me and my mother.
“I could do coffee,” I say. “I can come down to Torrins this weekend.”
“Oh, coffee, yes, that would be great!” I can hear her smile, and despite myself, my own lips twitch. “I know this one place, I think you’ll like it, or at least, it seems like a place that you’ll like.”
“And maybe Grandma can come.” I say it like it’s a suggestion, but I’m bringing Deborah. I’ll need the buffer.
“Well, I thought it could be just me and you,” my mom says, a slight whine underlying her tone.
I grit my teeth. I used to hate it when she whined. I always wanted to scream at her that she was an adult, she needed to stop acting like a child.
I force my jaw to relax.
“I’d like grandma to be there,” I say.
“Oh, well, whatever you prefer. I’m just so excited and happy.”
“Ok, I’ve gotta go, my lunch is almost over,” I say. We’ve made plans for coffee, and she mentioned the word “amends” a few times so that will make her sponsor happy. That’s certainly enough for one conversation.
“You’re on lunch? In the Merch mart, right? So exciting, but I’m not exactly sure what you do, but you can tell me that this weekend maybe.”
“Mom, I’ll text you details, ok?”
“Yes, of course, text me!”
“Alright, bye.”
She’s still blurting out effusive comments when I hang up, but at least I said an official goodbye.
