Thursday, November 13, 2008

Without (much) pretense

"Do you want to meet for lunch somewhere? We could do the Chinese place or the Thai place..." I have Voice on the phone. We haven't seen each other in months. At that time we (well, I) had decided to discontinue the relationship and I'd avoided her and her entire social group (which meant spending more time alone and more time with people I don't like as much). But I went away for a few months, came back, and missed her. Not like an emptiness I wanted to fill with anything that came along. Like a Voice-shaped hole in my heart that I could stand to leave empty, but that would also never be filled by someone else.

She hesitates.

"You could just come here. Why don't you just come here first and we'll decide."

"Okay, I'll just come over."

I have a day's growth of stubble. I shave. I change out of the clothes I wear around the house and into a good pair of jeans and a well-fitted long-sleeve t-shirt.

The doorbell rings and she's on my porch, facing the street. She's been to my house a million times. When I get to the door her back is always to me. I open the door and she turns around slowly, like she's dancing. She never smiles when she sees me. The smile is always a reward for something I say or do. She walks into my arms though, I hold her for a little longer than I would a friend.

She walks in like it's her home. I watch her take her shoes off. Which she's done many times here. She leaves her jacket and bag in my room. Like she's done many times.

"Tea?"

We go to the kitchen and I remember having her here. How I like having her here. How since we were estranged four girls have come through my place and my bed and how none of them meant as much to me as a single smile, or shit, even text message, from her did.

She's chatting about the million things she's doing, all the projects, what she's writing, what I missed when I was away. We take our tea to the living room, where she's always hated the furniture. I sit apart from her. I don't think I'm testing her, but maybe I am.

"You're far. Why are you so far?"

I sit next to her on the couch. I tell her stories from my travels. She complains about the couch. "Let's just go to my room." At each step, with each failure to find a new routine, we slip back to our old habits.

I close my door behind me. We put our teas down and she crawls into my bed. She puts a pillow on the wall and props herself up. I sit next to her. Our voices have changed. We are talking softly, sitting close, I can feel her warmth. I've been thinking about her body since I saw her. She says something, leans into me, puts her head on my shoulder. I put my arm around her and our cheeks are touching. I turn my head a little. She does. And her mouth is on mine.

She has a beautiful mouth. When she talks, I'm torn between her mouth and her huge eyes and her big boobs. She's always complained that I pay more attention to her ass than her boobs. She doesn't kiss so much as invite kisses, and take them from me like she was waiting for them.

Now that she's in my bed and our mouths are together, we both know the rest of the choreography too well. My hands wander up and down her back, to her ass, under her shirt, to her breast, down to her knees, in her hair. We move down the bed. I undo her bra with one hand, while her shirt is still on. As I unbutton her jeans, she pauses, as she always does.

"What what what what what what are you doing?"

"Taking your jeans off."

"Oh."

She wears tight ones that don't come off easily. So she takes them off, while I pull her shirt off behind her.

"I'm naked," she says.

"I know," I say, kissing her again, my hands wandering, my finger finding her pussy. She moans.

"But you're not."

That has always been her way of undressing me. To blandly call attention to the fact that I am clothed. I've told her she could feel free to undress me herself, but there is still a shy side to her. I remove my clothes quickly and while I do, she pulls the covers over her. Shy. She sighs when she looks at me. She laughs like a little girl. "Yay, Verbal is naked!" She likes my body. She doesn't hide that, even in public. Certainly not in bed.

I crawl in next to her and she is soon on her back, I'm on top. I move my mouth on her, down her neck, to her boobs, back up. I suck one nipple, then another. I start to move my fingers inside her. She's wet. She's always very wet, very fast. She moans and gasps, "Verbal, baby. My baby. My baby I missed you."

I move down to her belly, and lower. She panics again, moving her hands under my arms to try to pull me back to her face.

"Baby baby what are you doing?"

"I'm going to lick your pussy."

"Oh."

And I'm on her. Now I remember the smell of her pussy. It is clean and bright and the strongest of any woman I've been with. And that's like her. She's a fire that burns brighter than anyone else. This part of the dance is easy for us, too. But she doesn't like to come with my mouth on her pussy. She wants to be held not just after, but while she comes. So as she's coming she starts to yell, "Verbal verbal baby come here get here please..." and I have to stop what I'm doing to hold her. She puts her hand on the wall and looks at me, and to the sides, gasping, shuddering. "I'm still coming" she says, writhing. I grab her hair and kiss her hard.

"Baby why aren't you inside me?"

I'm hard now, so I answer by entering her. She cries out. Then she's crying. "I'm home. Baby I'm home."

"I am," I whisper.

Voice can lose herself easily but when we're fucking she becomes very concerned with my pleasure. "Please take me," she says. She means she wants me to come. I have to stop (which she hates) to put the condom on, but she forgets quickly when I'm back inside her. "Verbal baby take me, please take me."

"I'm going to come now."

"Yes baby please come now please please..."

I keep my eyes on her when I come. She says there's a moment when I'm coming when I smile and she can see that I love myself as well as her.

She hates when I have to get out of her and remove the condom. "Where where where where are you going baby?" I remove it quickly, wrap it in a tissue, come back to lying next to her. "That was beautiful," she says, drawing it out. "My baby my baby my verbal I love you." She's like this, after. Always. "I missed you soooo much."

Our tea gets cold. I have her sweat on me and I can smell her on me. Eventually, like always, her phone rings. She dresses in a hurry. She uses the hairbrush I bought for her. She checks herself out in the mirror for signs of sex. I walk her to the door. She turns away, then turns around to kiss me. Does that a few times, before she finally goes out into the street.

I go back to my room. Take the tea cups and pour out the tea into the sink. Take the tea bags and throw them into the composter. She calls from the street.

"I really love you," she says.

"I know, babe. I love you." I just wish...

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