connected to the bathroom also accessible to the hall. I only had to share when we had house-guests, since Dennis had his own bathroom on the third floor.
I made certain the intercom was working and set, in case Adam woke and needed me, then set about stripping out of my work clothes. The mirror tried catching my attention, but I ignored it. I no longer knew the woman who lived in there.
I ran a bath and added essence of lavender, then dimmed the lights. I settled into the water and let it enfold me. Hold me. It cradled me, and I slid deeper, up to my chin, while my hair spread out around me like seaweed.
I found sanctuary in the dark and quiet, in the one place where I didn’t have to be strong, optimistic, happy, or anything else anyone thought I should be. Where I couldn’t and didn’t have to pretend I didn’t know the truth.
My husband didn’t love me anymore, and I didn’t know how to make him.
I met Joe two years before, two random strangers sharing a bench in the atrium of a local business complex for lunch. Frigid January weather had made our secluded bench a real treasure, and we’d shared it with the glee of kids who’d stumbled onto a candy shop giving away free samples.
We’d made polite conversation, nothing serious, nothing deep. We checked each other out in the surreptitious way men and women do when they have no intention of flirting but want to see if it might be worth the effort. I noticed his smile first, the expensive suit some time later. He made me laugh almost right away during a time when I thought I’d forgotten how.
Remembering Joe’s smile, I slid my hands over my body in the hot water. The bath oil made my skin slick. Smooth. My palms skidded over my belly and thighs. I sank lower, my ears covered, listening to the secret underwater shush shush of my heart beating.
With one thing or another, I didn’t make it back to the atrium until an entire month had passed. It was something like a magic number—thirty days—and when I flipped my calendar something reminded me about the man on the bench and my feet led me back there as if I had no choice but to see if he were there again. I’d ignored the way my heart jumped into my throat when I saw him striding toward me beneath the hanging ferns. The sun had lit his hair into shining gold. His smile was even brighter than that. That was the first time he grumbled about tomatoes on his sandwich. We spent an hour and half on that bench talking. I didn’t ask him if he had to get back to work. I was late for my first afternoon appointment. And something unspoken had passed between us. An agreement.
In March, I made sure to wear lipstick. In April, we moved outside to the park, where a hanging willow muted the echo of our laughter and made it something secret. In May we shared a thermos of lemonade, in June he brought me a muffin and I’d lent him a book we’d talked about the month before.
By July, the conversation was no longer polite.
The first time he told me a story, I’d sat, riveted to the bench, my sandwich eaten but untasted. Joe was an exquisite raconteur. He left out not even the smallest detail of sensation. He’d enthralled me, bound me with his words.
Joe, in his words, loved women. Their curves, their scents, their moods. He loved long hair, big asses, sturdy thighs, concave bellies, tiny, cherry-tipped tits, blue and green and brown eyes. He loved women, and he loved fucking. And every first Friday of the month, when we met for lunch, he had a new story to tell me. He was Scheherazade, saving not his own life, but mine.
I cupped my breasts, their weight made light in the water’s embrace. I stroked them, passing a palm over my nipples before pinching them both between forefinger and thumb. A sigh leaked out of me as they burned and tightened. I tugged and felt an answering pull in my clit, my cunt, my ass. I moved the firm flesh back and forth, jerking them like twin erections.
My thighs fell open as my hips pushed against the water. Eddies left behind by the motion swirled heat against my clit and I rocked harder, but the pressure was too light to do more than tease.
Still tugging on my left nipple, I slid my right hand between my legs. My clit already poked out of its hood, hard, ready for my touch. I bit my lip, the gentle stroke-stroke enough to make my hips jut forward again. I pinched my clit like I pinched my nipple, moving in time, alternating. The water supported and lifted me. My shoulder blades bumped the bottom of the tub as I pushed my pelvis against my fingers.
My clit swelled. My cunt opened, aching to be filled, and I left my nipple to slide three fingers inside. It wasn’t enough. It wasn’t what I wanted—a thick, hard cock fucking me. I dreamed of it, being filled, dreamed of taking an erection down the back of my throat while another filled my vagina, another in my ass, while hands stroked and pulled my body all over. I dreamed of being consumed by men who made me come over and over again with their tongues and fingers and pricks, until I exploded and disappeared.
You didn’t need a doctorate in psychology to analyze that.
I might dream of faceless men who consumed me with their sex, but when I fantasized, it was about Joe. I didn’t need to analyze that, either.
My skin had gone pink from the hot water and arousal. I looked down over the curve of my breasts and belly to where my hands moved between my legs. I wanted more than my own hands there. I wanted Joe’s mouth on me. I wanted to feel him lick the soft, wet slit of my cunt, feel that smile on my clit. I wanted him to fuck me with his mouth until I came.
I slowed my hands, fingers sliding in and out of my pussy without friction. I pinched my clit again. It had gone dark red, pushing up from my trimmed-short pubic curls. I stroked it up and down and my pelvis jumped again. A spasm shuddered through me.
I wanted to scream myself hoarse with this pleasure. I wanted to moan and whimper. I bit my lip, hard, to keep back a cry, mindful that I was not alone, not ever alone.
I moved my hands away and rocked my hips, moving the water over my clit. Fuck, it was good, almost but not quite like a tongue. I let it lick at me for a while until I shuddered and banged my elbows against the side of the tub.
I could bring myself off in another second. I’d been on the verge all day, first in anticipation of my lunchtime meeting, then with Joe’s story, then with Adam’s unexpected kiss. I’d been slick from need all day, my clit aching. Another second, one more touch and I’d go over.
I waited, breathing hard, heart pounding. The water began to cool. I wanted to come and I wanted to stay poised here forever, with every nerve on fire and every muscle tense. I wanted to feel alive just a while longer.
I waved a hand in the water over my body, not touching my skin but letting the water do it for me. The ripples felt good, and I imagined Joe’s hands. His long, strong fingers and clean, neat fingernails. I’d memorized his hands—every wrinkle of every knuckle, every vein. The exact spot on his wrists where the hair on his arms began.
Thinking of Joe’s hair, I fought back another moan. My hands slipped down to stroke myself again. I wanted to bury my face in his chest hair, to rub the coarse curls of his arms against my eyelids. I wanted to feel his hair on my belly when we fucked, cock in cunt.
I couldn’t stand it any longer. I had to come. I thought I might die if I didn’t let myself finish, right then.
I thought I was dying when I did.
Everything stopped.
Then all at once, it started again. My heart, beating. My breath, held in my lungs, rushed out. Water splashed as my body quaked. My clit had filled to the point of bursting and now it emptied in small, perfect spasms
