by Ruby Dixon
A faint scratch at the door interrupts us, followed by a jingle of the seashell chimes.
Our eyes meet.
"Who is it?" Br'chit calls, sounding far more composed than she was moments ago.
"It's me, Steph. Is this a bad time?"
I fight back a groan and pull the furs over my cock. It aches, but when does it not? Resonance makes it determined to stand at the slightest stirring of the air. I can wait to enjoy my mate again, much as my cock will not like that. This is important to Br'chit, and thus it is important to me. "I will dress," I whisper to my mate. "Give me a moment."
"Just a sec," Br'chit calls out to her friend. "Let us get dressed!" She leaps to her feet and I am treated to a fine view of her enticing bottom. This is not so bad after all, then.
I drag on a pair of leggings and a loincloth while Br'chit tugs a tunic over her head and then fusses with her mane. We scramble to clean up a bit, and then I cross my legs and sit in front of the fire, stirring the coals. I pull the edge of one of the furs over my lap to hide my erection as well. The unmated human females are skittish enough as it is.
S'teph enters as Br'chit holds the flap to the hut open. She is all smiles, and if she smells the scent of mating in the air, she does not comment on it. Her gaze falls instead to the missing portion of the floor. "Did something break?"
"A'tam is fixing it," Br'chit says, and she sounds so proud of me that it makes me feel…strange. Pleased, yes, but protective, too. Like I would do anything for her as long as she always talks about me in that tone of voice. My khui hums loudly, and I rub my chest as I turn over the coals.
"Well," S'teph says brightly. "Shall we begin?"
"Tea?" Br'chit asks, moving to sit next to me. Her hand goes to my knee, and she gives me a little squeeze of affection.
"Tea would be lovely," the female answers. "How was last night for you both?"
"Excellent," I say immediately. "Very pleasurable."
"Uh…" Br'chit gives me an odd look, her cheeks stained with color. "I think she means our whole 'reflecting on what we talked about’ thing."
"Ah." I grin. "That was excellent, too."
My mate just shakes her head at me, a tiny smile playing on her mouth.
"So you two were able to communicate a little? To meet in the middle?" S'teph smiles at us. "What did you talk about in particular? Should we start with that?"
Br'chit turns to me, her eyes wide. "Um…"
"We used the stick to communicate," I say helpfully, and I love that Br'chit's face flushes even more. She looks so delightfully shy and flustered this morning, as if we are not mates. As if we did not just touch like mates do. What is there to be embarrassed about?
"That's great," S'teph enthuses. "Do you have it? Shall we bring it out for our therapy session?"
Br'chit turns and digs through the furs, looking for the wand. She picks it up—and immediately drops it again. "It's…ah, out of commission."
"I don't understand—"
"It's sticky," Br'chit barks out. She looks at me with a mixture of awkwardness and laughter brimming on her face, and she puts her sleeve to her mouth to hide her smile. "You don't want to know, Steph."
I cannot stop grinning.
"Actually, if you guys are having sex, that's fantastic," S'teph gushes, her expression warm. "You made a ton of progress."
Br'chit touches my knee again in that possessive way. "No sex yet. We're waiting until I'm ready. I know resonance is going to speed up that timeline, but A'tam has agreed to wait for a bit, and it just makes me…really happy." The look she gives me is shy.
"You have to figure out what works for you," S'teph says. "I'm not here to judge. Let's talk about communication a bit more, then. A'tam, do you want to start? Tell me your thoughts."
I take my mate's hand and lace my fingers with hers. "I am thinking we do not need this talk space if we are happy in the furs now."
S'teph is not offended by my words. "That's great and I understand where you're coming from, A'tam, but therapy isn't a one-off situation. What happens the next time you argue? You might not remember to use the tools that we talk about here. This is an open space to help you both communicate. What's the harm in talking more?"
Br'chit looks over at me. "I'd like to continue, if that's all right. She's got a point. The next time we argue—and you know there will be a next time—I don't want us to lash out at each other. My issues didn't come up overnight. They won't be solved overnight." Her expression turns uneasy. "Are you willing to keep going?"
I do not think it is necessary, but I shrug. "If you wish to have talk space every day, we will."
Her beaming, happy smile tells me that my answer is the right one. For that, I will let S'teph talk in my ear every day for the rest of my life, if need be.
36
BRIDGET
I wonder if it's possible to be blissfully happy and incredibly frustrated at the same time? It must be, because I'm living it.
Life for the next week is absolutely wonderful. We meet with Steph every morning and have our “talk space” as A'tam likes to call it. We discuss ways we can communicate with each other, things in our past that have frustrated us, and how to approach these things in the future. I'm trying to get better about opening up, and I even confess my big pottery secret in therapy. Steph doesn't look surprised when I mention it. It's still me acting to be someone that my mother would be proud of, she says, and it's to be expected.
I learn a lot about A'tam, too. He's exactly as stubborn as I thought he was, and can be incredibly obtuse at times. I learn that some of his stubborn insistence stems from him refusing to acknowledge bad things so they don't hurt him. He confesses to me one night that after the Great Smoking Mountain decimated their tribe, he did not talk about the loss of his family for months. That if he did not acknowledge it, it did not happen. That he and I'rec would get into fights because A'tam would pretend that his family was merely out hunting. That it took him a very very long time to come to terms with their death.
I hold him extra tight that night while we sleep after learning that. I'm not the only one with issues. I'm not the only one fucked up by life. In a way, it's good to hear, even though it makes me ache for him.
We're communicating better, too. There's the occasional short-tempered spat—resonance is messing with our minds—but we resolve it without tearing each other's throats out, and talk reasonably afterward, so I consider it a win.
And we touch.
All the fucking time.
We wake up in the morning, touching. We go to bed at night wrapped around each other. A'tam figures out that if I go down on him, he can go down on me, and the night we first try this, he doesn't come up for air until I've screamed his name. Twice. As for me, I'm getting more and more comfortable with Goliath. Now, I get excited when A'tam is hard, imagining all the ways we'll touch and pleasure each other. I no longer look at his cock as an issue. It's just another part of the man I love, and a part that I love to touch because I see how much pleasure it gives him. My life involves a lot of blowjobs now, but it's…fun. A lot of fun.
No one in the tribe seems to realize we're holding off on resonance. They know we're all over each other, and they know the reason. I'm pretty sure I'rec blabbed to everyone the moment he found out, because none of these men can keep a damn secret. So whenever we're around the others, we get a lot of smirks and comments about how loudly we're humming. That resonance is taking its time with us. Prior to our therapy sessions with Steph, I'd probably been irritated at their commentary, but now I see as sibling-teasing. It's affection from people who love one another and look out for one another. Even I'rec and O'jek have been decent, and Raven hugs me and refers to me as her sister.
It's a good feeling for someone who's always been an only child, cast aside and forgotten by parents who couldn't be bothered.
Because of the ongoing resonance and because everyone talks, A'tam and I tend to spend a lot of time by ourselves. We're together practically
every minute of the day. If A'tam goes fishing, I join him, handling his nets and repairing them or just sitting atop a rock and talking while he casts them out.
It feels like I've got my best friend back, and there's no feeling quite like it.
He takes me hunting one day, and I'm not sure if it's to get away from everyone else in the tribe or because he truly feels the need to slog through knee-high snow, but I figure it's the former. Sometimes being in camp feels a little too noisy, a little too open, and we're still so fragile, him and I. I thought hunting with A'tam would be a pain in the ass, but I love it. Despite his normal impatient nature, he's a good teacher. He shows me how to look at tracks and tell which direction the game is going, and what it is. I can't sniff things out like he can, so he works with me on traps. I already know how to set them, but he helps me perfect them—finding the right location, tightening a knot here or there. And when the day gets long and I grow tired, he carries me on his back, and I whisper silly things in his ear. We laugh and joke all the way back to camp, and as we pass by R'jaal, he rolls his eyes at us.
Yeah, we're being silly and loud. I don't care.
I feel lighter than air. Happiness just floats out of me. It doesn't matter that we haven't solved the whole resonance problem. We'll get there. For now, I'm just enjoying A'tam's presence. I'm enjoying waking up in the morning to touches and cuddles and amazing sexy petting. I love our kisses and huddling under the furs at night in the hut by our cozy fire. I love…everything.
I don't think I've ever been so happy. Even back on Earth, I wasn't this content, this joyous. Here, though, I feel free.
Well…mostly free.
Two things still bother me.
One is Goliath and the fact that we've resonated, of course. That's a problem that still needs to get solved.
The other is my stupid fricking pottery.
Every night, I spend a few hours working on things. I have two more pots made, and A'tam made a pinch pot with a wobbly lip that I think is rather adorable. I've tried firing some of the ones I have ready, and it's not working. No matter what I do, I can't get the temperature right. It gets too hot, or not hot enough, and the pottery gets brittle and breaks into a million pieces the moment I touch it.
I should be used to that by now. I should be able to laugh off the fact that yet another batch has bitten the dust, and that hours of hard work are down the drain again. I can't, though. Each pot that doesn't fire correctly feels like a slap in the face. It makes me feel like I'm never going to succeed. That I'm always going to never quite pull my life together.
I'm sure some of my stress over the pots is hormone related, thanks to resonance, but it's just one frustration after another, and I'm ready to give up.
A week into happiness with A'tam, and I'm at my lowest with the pottery. He sits next to me in the small cave as I pick through shattered piece after shattered piece. Some of the pots crumble the moment I take them out of the fire. Some look great until they cool completely, and then snap in half. This one didn't even make it that far. There's no signs of my pots in the ashes, just sad pieces of broken ceramic. I tried making the pots thinner this time, hoping that would be the trick.
Turns out, no. There is no trick.
I just suck.
Stupid tears slide down my cheeks as I pick the pieces out of my fire pit. There's not a bit of it worth salvaging. "I think my process is fucked," I tell A'tam. "I should just give up."
"Are you crying over clay?" He brushes a tear off my face, his voice teasing. "It is dirt, my pretty mate. There is no reason to cry over dirt."
I manage a sniffly laugh. "Oh sure, you can say that. You're not the one that has failed twenty out of twenty times." I gesture at the wreckage of my latest batch of pots. "I have to start all over again. I have to sift more clay, prep it, make pots, dry them, and somehow figure out what I did wrong, somehow change it, and hope for the best. Again." I shake my head. "I'm just tired of failing all the time."
I want to whine about how things are never easy for me, but it would be stupidity. After all, there is nothing easy about life on this beach. Not when everything—and I mean everything—requires dozens of steps. Even something as small as a morning cup of tea is the work of many hours and multiple hands. I think of the carved tea cups. I think of Gail and Elly, picking tea leaves and then sorting and drying them for hours. I think of the pouch the tea boils in, and how the pouch is cured, treated leather. I think of the fire, of the fuel gathering, and the work to keep it going.
Nothing is easy anymore. Nothing at all.
With a frustrated sigh, I flop onto my back and wince, because the uneven floor of the cave is hard and covered with broken shards of almost-pottery. "Let's just give up, A'tam. Let's go back to camp and I'll learn how to carve bone or something. Fuck the pottery."
When he doesn't answer, I prop up on my elbows and look over at him.
He crouches near the fire, a thoughtful expression on his face. He has a piece of pottery in his hand, but he's not looking at it. He's looking at the fire pit instead, the round indentions in the ash where the pots were lifted from the coals. His tail flicks slowly, very slowly, in a manner that tells me that he's thinking hard about something.
"What is it?" I ask.
"This is not right." A'tam gestures at the fire pit.
"Well, of course it's not right," I answer irritably. "If it was right, all of my pots wouldn't break into a million pieces." Immediately, I bite my lip, because I sound pissy even to my own ears, and I don't want to bitch at him. Not when we've been so happy. "I'm sorry. I'm not trying to lash out at you. I'm just frustrated."
He reaches over and pats my knee, still staring at the fire. "You are upset. I do not take it personally." A'tam stares at the fire for a moment longer and then looks over at me. "My mother's fire was not like this."
"No?" I sit up. "What was hers like?"
He lets out a long, heavy sigh. "I do not know. I wish I could remember. All I know is that this does not look quite right." He tosses the broken piece of pottery back into the ashes and turns to me. "I am sorry I cannot remember. I want to. But it was not something I ever gave much thought to."
I manage a half smile. "I know. I never thought I'd have to create my own pottery myself, but here we are." I nudge the broken curve of what was probably the lip of a pot. "I'll start over tomorrow, I think. Tonight, I am far too tired to deal with this shit."
A'tam moves to my side. He kneels next to me and pulls me close, pressing a kiss to the top of my head. "Do not stress, my pretty mate. As with everything else, the answer is time and patience."
My mouth quirks with amusement, but I settle into his arms. "I find it incredibly ironic and yet on the nose that you're the one preaching time and patience."
"I have learned a lot in the last two hands of days," he admits. His hand travels up and down over my arm, a silent invitation for more sexy petting. "I can only imagine how good things will be in the next two hands of days. Or the next turn of the moon."
I chuckle at that. He's right. I just need to be patient.
After all, we're on an ice planet with no television, no radio, no books. What else do we have but time? I tilt my face up to his, and when he kisses me, I forget all about pottery.
At least, for a little while.
37
BRIDGET
"You two have really come so far in the last few days," Steph says to me as she enters our hut the next day. "I'm so proud of you both."
I smile at her. "Thank you." I'm a little sleepy this morning. We've been staying up late, exploring and touching one another and just talking, and talking, and talking. It's funny, I never feel as if I'll run out of things to say to A'tam. He's endlessly fascinating, and I love hearing how his mind works. I think he likes hearing how I think, too. We just always seem to have a lot to say to one another, and sometimes the conversations turn into teasing, which turns into kissing, which turns into…foreplay and mutual masturbation.
Whi
ch is what happened last night. It means I'm yawning this morning, but pretty happy. My khui is humming angrily, but I'm trying to ignore it.
"Can I say something while it's just the two of us?" Steph asks, giving me one of those calm-eyed, guileless looks. It's funny—Steph is probably close to my age, but there's a serenity to her that I've never been able to achieve. She has a funny side, too, but she just seems so satisfied with who she is and her lot in life, and I envy that. I've always been restless. I suppose it's what makes her a good therapist—however primitive our situation is—she's a fantastic listener, doesn't gossip like everyone else, and she asks really thoughtful questions.
I am a little concerned that she waited for A'tam to leave, though. He smelled the seed cakes cooking on the main fire and went to snag a few for us. Something tells me that mine will end up in his belly—A'tam has an unabashed sweet tooth and the seed cakes are very sweet when Gail makes them—but I don't mind. I love his boyish enthusiasm, even when it relates to cooking. "What's up?"
"I just wanted to ask how the intimacy is going between the two of you," Steph says, sipping the cup of tea she holds in her hands. "You're both still resonating, so I assume you're still waiting?"
There's no judgment in her tone, but I feel defensive all the same. "A'tam said he didn't mind waiting."
"I know. I'm not chiding you." Steph smiles, her posture easy. "I just wanted to ask how you're feeling about things. I know it was a deal-breaker for you and now that resonance is in play, it changes things. But I also know that it doesn't automatically make your concerns go away. So I wanted to ask how you were feeling, now that we're alone."
I hesitate. I feel like A'tam and I have come so far, but Steph's words remind me that maybe we haven't come that far, after all.
"There's no wrong answers," Steph says quickly. "I just wanted to know if there was anything you needed to talk out."
I guess it can't hurt to talk about it. I pitch my voice lower, so no one passing by can hear us. "Like I said, we're taking it slow. He knows how I felt that first time, and so he told me he wants to wait until I'm ready."
