CHERRY BLOSSOMS // Revisited // Bachelorette // 2.12

Two in the morning, and he heard someone in the kitchen.

He’d been woken from a fitful sleep. He’d dreamt of Nia. A warm and sensual dream where he experienced all the love for her he had and it washed over him in light, imbued the edges of his vision with a hazy white brume. She’d turned to him and she loved him—a statement to him not with words but with absolute fact. Everything in her face told him what she felt. Her hair flapped in a breeze. They laughed, and he shared her. Quick pornographic pulses; her thighs parting, another man’s veiny hand caressing that smooth sweep of her lower back, her head tilted in passion. He woke up with a smile on his face. His erection had somehow worked its way out the slit in his underwear and his glans pressed into the inside of the bedsheets. The tip cool, out in the bare world, his balls warmly tucked still in his sleepy underwear.

Now he listened with no doubt the sound of someone in the house woke him. Someone was in his home trying to be quiet. His skin crawled, his scalp flexed, his hair stood up on his neck. His beard bristled, his thick hair trying to stand on end. His heart started to pound, and he was still frozen on his back, looking up at the ceiling, eyes wide in panic. His hand worked under the covers and he tucked his steely cock back in his underwear, his balls had gone in hiding, safely away in some sort of corporeal witness protection program.

Another thump. He pictured two youths down there, woolen masks, going through their things. Or the Lindbergh abductor, time-travelled to take away the love of his life, spirit her out her bedroom window, the last the house would know of Odie was her shadow, clutched in the arms of a kidnapper’s shadow, sliding along the white oak tree he’d painted over her bed.

He jumped up, crossed to the door now. He was no hero, but when it came to Odele, he would eat the skin off someone’s face like a Florida flakka zombie if they tried to touch her. He opened the solid wood door, stopping before it made its signature creak. He listened.

Would kids wear woolen masks anymore? Probably not. And if it was a robber, the real haul would be his studio. Fifteen thousand in equipment, reasonably. Fuck, he should yell down to them, tell them they’d missed the big score. He had insurance. A brief bright flash: Nia. It might be Nia, coming home early from her bachelorette. Maybe she didn’t drink. Maybe she missed him and wanted to wake up in bed tomorrow morning and spend the day together. Fuck, he missed her. Her new job robbed him of his most wonderful joy. Took away the person he could spend every minute with forever.

His mouth opened to call down with an innocent little gasp: Nia? But the fear of hearing a man’s voice in response stopped him, kept that sound trapped in his lungs. Then a shadow. It passed along the wall, someone coming, someone coming to the stairs. He watched it cross the wall, bump soundlessly over the bannister, slide across the family photos that lined the side of the stairwell. A thin figure; a slight but tall person. They had a mane of hair. He sighed. Nia? He bit his lips, seeing a brief flash of some skinny teen with long hair and a wispy mustache, a Marilyn Manson T-shirt, a straight razor in his right hand...

Then black hair, thin body, black dress, beautiful legs. Fuck, it was Nia. He collapsed against the wall next to his bedroom door. His heart pounded harder than when he was waiting and anticipating. The relief flooded through him.

She padded through the hall on bare feet and as she opened the door, he loomed, mad for some reason.

“You were about to get knocked the fuck out,” he said.

She screamed, and she jumped back. He lost her in the darkness and he heard her thump into the wall across the hall. He jumped out, apologizing, putting his hands out to find her.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry, shit, Nia, sorry,” he whispered. His hands found her, swept her forearms. They snaked around him, held him gently but firmly. She cried into his neck.

He said, “Nia, God, I’m so sorry, honey. Baby, sorry,” he said, and he rubbed his hands on her warm back. He rocked her back and forth. She kept crying. He got a sudden jab in his belly. She wasn’t crying because he’d scared her.

“Nia, what’s wrong?” he asked her. He held her out from him but she hid her face. She tucked herself into her mane of hair, but a sliver of moonlight fell on her chin and mouth and he saw it twisted up in a silent cry. “Oh shit, oh no, Nia, what happened?”

She fell into him again. He helped her into the bedroom, and she lumbered to the bed, her shoulders slumped, her head fallen forward. She climbed up into their bed and he joined her, his arms looking to grab her and pull her to him. He was dying inside, thinking of an ounce of her pain. Sympathetic tears welled up in his eyes, harsh and fast, one spilling over his lid rolling down his cheek. It dripped from the tip of his chin. She curled up, and he held her, pressed his chest to her back. He was still hard, a thundering pulse racing through his erection, but he kept it back, kept it from pressing up against her. He held her tight and closed his eyes. This was like when they were young. She’d come to his apartment, or she’d call him to hers and she’d burst out in tears. Short-lived, furious at first, then easing as he consoled her and told her she was right and everyone else was wrong. He’d always given her license in a way to be whatever way she wanted. His heart pounded, thinking that maybe she had gone through with her encouraged freedom.

“Sweetheart, Nia, I love you, it’s okay, whatever it is...you’re home now, I’ve got you.”

“Oh, Geoff,” she cried. Her tears were drying, but her voice trembled.

“What happened? Please tell me.”

“Geoff...fuck, why did I ever listen to you.”

“To me? What did I—”

“I didn’t even want to, and I did it.”

“Did what?”

“The stripper.”

An icicle drove through his heart and he physically jumped. He wanted to scream in her ear right now, tell her no, no, no, I was wrong. He wanted to shake her and ask her what was wrong with her. How could you! But it was him. It was something wrong with him. The most pervasive thought after the initial horrible shock was that he wanted to slide that piece of steel between his legs up inside her from behind. He wanted her disgusting sloppy seconds, he wanted to slide himself up inside her stretched out hole, her pussy speared from a night of intense fucking by a real stud. He wanted his cock to taste another man’s semen, to slide in and out of her with the sweaty remnants of her own sticky orgasm.

He heaved breath against her collar. His cock ached. Her skin was warm through her dress. She smelled like her Chanel, she smelled like smoke, wine. How did she get home?

He squeezed her tight, his heart swelling with bursting cherry starburst love. His eyes teared, but he whispered, “You did . . . the stripper?”

“Geoff,” she sobbed, “I almost did.”

“Did you or didn’t you?” his voice cracked.

“I didn’t. We messed around. I touched him. He touched me. I made him . . . Geoff, I made him come.”

He flinched, picturing it. Picturing some faceless hunk with a beautiful body and he was coming for his wife. She was stroking his big thing, both their eyes locked on his wet white eruption, laughing together at how much came out of him. How did she make him come? Oh God. Her mouth? Could she have used her mouth—did he, shit, did he come in her mouth? He smelled her, sniffed through her hair, looking for evidence that his dirty wife had been defiled. She smelled like Herbal Essence.

“I’m okay, Nia. It’s fine. I told you I—”

“I got caught. Angie . . . Angie . . .”

He let his head fall forward, touched his brow to the back of her skull. Shit. “What did she see?”

“She didn’t see anything. Just saw him getting out of our Volvo, me getting out after him, wiping my hands with a napkin.”

“Oh. You gave him a hand job?”

“Yes.”

This was no joke. This was no act. His heart pounded and his cock throbbed. His tip had caught in the fabric just below the waistband and it strangled his glans, choking it. He wanted to puke at the thought, but the arousal overwhelmed him. He didn’t care how gross it was.

“I love you, Nia, we’ll figure it out.”

“I’m such a shit.”

“No, baby, you’re not. You’re not at all. It’ll be okay. I’ll tell them you told me about it. That it’s okay, they didn’t understand what they saw.”

“I told them that. I told them nothing happened, I didn’t do anything.”

“We’ll talk to them.”

“They’re so mad at me. Say I ruined the wedding.”

“How did you ruin the wedding?”

“I know, right? They were fucking crazy.” Sadness touched her voice again, a wet warbling sound.

“We’ll tell them. I’ll tell them. Nothing happened. Tell them you were just talking, and I knew about it.”

“Angie said she saw us kissing.”

“You were kissing?” Now sadness gripped his voice, making it a struggle to come out. Sex was okay, but intimacy . . . That hurt.

“Yeah, we made out a little.”

God, talking like a teenager. Made out. It tortured him, pain and intense consuming desire for her. He breathed in her barroom smell. “Shit—Nia, how did you get home?”

“I called a cab.”

“From Vaughan?”

“Yeah. I had to come home, Geoff.”

“How much, like, seventy bucks?”

“I couldn’t stay there, Geoff.”

“I know. I don’t care, Nia. You being home is the greatest gift,” he said, hugged her close again.

“Geoff, I feel so dirty, I feel so awful . . . I fucking hate myself right now.”

“Don’t do that, baby. I’ve got you. I’ll hold you.” He held her for a while, looking out over her shoulder, breathing against him, hoping she would come around, hoping he’d get a chance to show off the metal rod sticking out between his legs. “Tell me. Nia, tell me what you did.”

She was quiet, thinking about it. She turned then in his arms and he lifted for her until she faced him, then his hands stroked her back and held her by her waist, as he looked into her perfect face.

“He surprised me—”

“The stripper?”

“Yeah, I wasn’t after him at all, I swear. He got me alone, got me alone in the dark parking lot, came up behind me while I had my head in the car.”

“He did?”

“Yeah, like he was lurking, waiting for me. He scared me. At first, like for a minute, I thought I was going to be attacked, like—”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I thought he was going to take me against my will, you know?”

“But didn’t you want to?”

“No. Yeah, I guess, maybe. Something in his eyes . . . I liked it. It turned me on.”

“Nia . . . don’t be offended.”

“What?”

“I want you to feel something.” He took her arm, and she didn’t need help. She knew what he meant. She touched him through his pajamas.

“Wow, Geoff. Wow. I mean it. You are . . . God, you are so hard right now.” Her hands slipped into his waistband, and his heart jumped for joy. He hooked his pants down, shimmied out of them and thrust his cock towards her and she held it, stroked it gently. “Geoff, I’ve never held a harder cock in my life.”

“You mean it?”

“I mean it. This is unreal. Does it hurt?”

“Yeah, it kind of does.”

She kissed him. His hands slid up her back again, enjoyed her warmth, the life inside her, how she moved those muscles, her fine joints, her ribs, her heart beating underneath. He kissed her back, pressed his lips to hers, tasted her mouth, knowing she’d had it on another man. Did their tongues find each other? What did that man feel when he had her in his hands? No way that guy knew how lucky he was. No way he knew her like Geoff did. No way he could appreciate this woman. She was just a dirty sex object to him. She wasn’t a wife. Wasn’t a mother. He didn’t know that she’d pooped the table that night she’d pushed that little girl out, didn’t know her recipe for chicken parmigiana or her one secret ingredient, didn’t know how much she liked olives and how she could eat twenty in a row never screwing her face up once despite how salty they were. She was just a set of tits, a dirty wet snatch, a whore mouth to stick his big cock in. He wouldn’t give a fuck about her. Geoff was the one who loved her, and no one could ever be better than him at that.

“I had his cock in my mouth, Geoff,” she whispered into his ear, kissing her way there while she stroked his incredible hardness.

“Ooh,” he groaned and his head sank into the pillow. She kissed his neck. Her hands came away from his cock and he whimpered. Saw she was shimmying out of her panties, peeling them down her long legs from under her tight black dress. “Oh, Nia, God, honey.” He watched her, and she held his eye. He laid back, and she straddled him, threw a leg over his hips.

Her phone dinged with an incoming text, tucked somewhere inside her tight dress. “Sit up,” she said.

“What?”

“I want you to sit up straight, okay, baby?”

“Yeah, okay,” he said. He scurried up the bed, and she bunched up pillows so he could lie back against their headboard. She came to him on her knees. She scratched her nails through his hair, through his beard.

“Tell me what happened,” he said.

She kissed his face, kissed him under his eye. “I thought he was going to rape me, Geoff.”

“Oh, Nia, no. I’m so s—”

“He wasn’t going to take no for an answer . . . so I told him yes, told him yes with my hands.”

“What did he do?”

“He pushed me down and he took his big cock out of his pants and he made me suck it.”

“Made you, Nia?”

“He forced me, Geoff.”

“Baby . . .”

“I didn’t mind. He had a nice cock, a nice body. I submitted.”

“You did?”

“Yeah, I sucked it for him. It tasted so good, Geoff, I think he oiled it.”

He tensed his hips, struggled to reach her with his cock, struggled to plug her up with his hardness, but she kept him pinned to the mattress.

“He got hard in my mouth and he put it in me so deep I almost choked.”

“Oh Nia, I’m sorry.”

“He got that big thing right into my throat.” She’d lowered herself to him, the heat from between her hips wavering against his sensitive, aching glans. He needed to be inside her. “I got him into the car with me and he came in and he got on top of me, had my legs spread and I hoped he didn’t fuck me.”

“You didn’t want to?”

“I didn’t want him to. I wanted him to . . .”

“What?”

“I wanted him to do it because I didn’t want him to . . .”

“What?”

“So, I took his cock in my hand and I stroked it. I made him sit back, and I made out with him and I jerked him off.”

“Oh, Nia, please.”

“He came on strong at first and I liked it. Then I rubbed the head of his cock and he became a little boy. I lost interest.”

She lowered more, her wet damp mound pressing against him, her heat spreading through his cock from where it kissed against his frenulum. She humped his underside, and he shuddered. “Oh, God, oh,” he cried.

She brought the soft lips of her pussy over the very tip of his cock and she squeezed him, polished him, teased him, let the head pierce her and he loved her grip on him. She let him slide deeper, but the way he sat, he couldn’t fuck her. Not like he wanted.

“Let me lie back,” he said.

“No, stay like this. You’re not big enough. It’s okay. Stay like this and kiss me. Stab me with your little cock.”

“I can’t get it.”

“You’re too small for this. It’s okay. Keep going. I can feel it trying to get deeper.”

He struggled, strained to push himself into her pussy, but he was just piercing her with his tip.

She kissed him.

“God, Nia,” he said around her mouth, “you feel so good.”

“He came in my hand, you know?”

“Yeah, he did?”

“Yeah, he got so hard and swollen and then pow, he came all over the inside of our car. I give great hand jobs.”

“You’re, oh, ah . . . you’re so bad.”

“A lot of come . . . he really sent it everywhere. I had to, mm, wipe the car down later with wet wipes.”

“Please, please fuck me, Nia, please.”

“I want a real man to fuck me, Geoff.”

“Like the stripper?”

“No, he was a boy.”

“He was big.”

“But he was a boy. I want a man.”

“Ah, you do? Who?” He struggled to get himself deeper, but she didn’t let him, satisfied somehow to just let herself suck on his end.

She clasped his cheeks in her hand and looked him in the eye, said, “I’m going to fuck Rocco behind your back.”