21. Phoenix

Phoenix

Howl

I ’m not letting him do this.

Not again.

He grunts when I slam him into the wall, the spray from the shower forgotten while I tongue fuck his mouth. If sex is what will get him to stay, then so be it. I can’t have gone through all this pain just for him to run because he’s too stubborn to show me all the ugly. I know he’s ugly. I can see it in his actions and hear it in his words. I’m ugly, too, damn it.

I abandoned my brother when he needed me the most.

Eli grabs my ass, grinding against me while I taste every inch of his mouth. God, it hurts to kiss him and touch him, but it’s a masochistic sort of hurt. The kind I will inflict on myself over and over until it kills me.

Because that’s love, isn’t it?

Unable to stop yourself from swimming in a riptide, knowing it’s going to pull you under. Knowing you’ll never breathe again. Well, I tried breathing. I lived on that bleak fucking surface for a year without him, and it was worse. If being without Eli means I get to breathe, then I’d rather suffocate.

I tilt his face so I can get my tongue deeper, moaning loudly when he sucks it. My skin zips and zaps with the static bouncing off us. He’s got to stay with me. I’ll attach myself to his insides like cancer if that is what I have to do. I slide my free hand between us, grab his hard cock, and pump it. He yanks at my hair, rising on his toes to hump into the ring of my fingers.

Unsealing our lips, I growl, “Don’t move.”

I turn off the shower while he pants. Jumping out, I grab some towels. I dry him off first while I play with his dick, and then I pat myself down for a whole three seconds. Then I’m on him again. Picking him up, digging my fingers into his asscheeks, and fumbling to the bedroom. We crash to the bed, teeth clashing and biting. I’m shaking while I stretch my arm to find the lube. He takes the opportunity to pepper wet kisses down my neck, gliding our hard cocks together.

“How do you want me?” I rasp, popping the lid while sucking his shoulder.

“Face up.”

We flip, and he licks a line down my chest, dipping into my belly button and swirling it before swallowing me down. I lose my grip on the bottle while he bobs his head, sending pure fire through me. “Fuck,” I moan.

I hold the back of his head, my hips rising to match his pace. He palms the bed for the lube and hollows his cheeks. It’s a blur of pure need, panic, and lust while he preps me. Once his hips meet my ass, I grab his face, wrap my legs around his waist and whimper against his lips.

“Harder, Eli,” I growl.

“No, baby. Just like this.” He grinds into me slowly.

I kiss the cherry blossom petals on his neck, feeling a sob work up my throat. “I swear to god if you leave—”

He silences me with a kiss, flicking his hips to nail my prostate. It’s going to be a torturous incline before I come. He’s making sure I feel every fucking inch on each thrust, feel how full I am. He’s branding his body to mine, feeding me his breaths. He’s ruining me.

“Just fuck me. Don’t do this.”

He props himself up on a forearm, stares into my eyes, and slams into me hard. My dick bobs and leaks, and somewhere in the back of my mind, I know I’m enjoying this. It always feels so good with him, but this is wrong. He’s fucking…making love to me. And I hate it. I fucking hate it.

“You’re beautiful, baby. I could look at you like this all day.”

“Then do it,” I growl. “Look at me all the time.”

His eyes flutter shut as he sucks his bottom lip in between his teeth. Pressing his cheek against mine, he nuzzles me sweetly. He reaches down to stroke my taint firmly, and I can’t help the moan that rips out of me. Every inch of my body he’s memorized, learned to weaponize against me. “Fuck, you’re so hard,” he praises, cupping my balls and kneading them.

I try to flip us so I can ride him, but he grabs my hands and holds them above my head. It’s not that I can’t overpower him because I can, but I get stuck on the look he’s giving me—the sadness in his eyes, the white flag he’s got waving in the air.

“Sweetheart,” I say and moan again because he’s fucking me just right. My stomach flexes while my dick throbs.

“Come for me, baby. I know you want to.”

I shake my head. He kisses me stupid. It’s demanding and filthy. Breaths and tongues. My balls hug my shaft, and I clench around him.

No. It’s too fast.

Once it’s over…it’s over.

Releasing one of my hands, he circles his around my dick and jerks me. I swallow hard, chin wobbling while my orgasm teeters. I’m so close. He sucks my nipple, thrusts into me, and I take it. I take every second of pleasurable torture. My heart cracks and bleeds, the newly reviving organ starting to die all over again.

“I love you,” I say, but it comes out like a beg.

He smiles down at me, eyelashes wet. “I know.” He flicks his wrist, fucks me harder, and I come.

It hits me hard and fast. My dick throbs in his fist while I unload into it. The moan rips from my throat, only to be swallowed by his frantic kisses. My hole clenches and flutters while he uses me, breaks me. I hold his face as tightly as I can, keeping my legs firmly wrapped around him.

“No one feels like you, baby,” he whispers against my lips and comes. I feel every pulse, every subtle flex of his cock while he sears me from the inside out.

The post-orgasm wave of euphoria feels dirty. My eyes feel like lead weights. I keep us connected, chests flush. I kiss his cheek, his nose—everywhere. I’ll cling to him like a Koala. Keep him right here so I'll feel it if he moves even a millimeter. His cock softens and slowly slips out of me, but I still don’t move. Neither does he.

We lay together like this for a long time. I stroke his back and listen to his soft breaths against my neck. When he starts to get cold, I throw the blanket over us. I try to stay awake because I’m terrified of what’s waiting if I close my eyes. But try as I might, they keep shutting. I wrench them open, squeeze Eli tighter, and force myself not to cry.

More time passes while I play with his hair, smell his skin, feel his cum drying between my legs.

It’s pathetic. I know it is.

It’s selfish, but I’ve never claimed to be anything else.

If he wants to leave, he’s going to. I won’t be able to stop him. It doesn’t mean I’m not wishing with everything in me that he stays. That he lets me love him. And with that soul-crushing wish firmly projected into the universe, I feel myself fading—vaguely aware of a soft brush of lips before sleep comes for me.

“ Eli ,” I gasp, arms flailing as my cold bed greets me.

Helios is curled at my feet, but there's no one else. I launch from the bed.

Frantically grabbing some sweats, I throw them on and grab a hoodie on my way out. His suitcase is gone, and the silence in the apartment is deafening.

Fuck.

Nonono.

I rip open the front door and barrel down the stairs out onto the street. I'm hoping to find him out here sitting on the curb. The cold night air hits my face as my bare feet hit the pavement.

I search the complex, my heart shattering into pieces. Taking off into a jog, I check behind parked cars and dumpsters and then out onto the street. Yellow streetlights overhead illuminate that he’s fucking gone. I grab at my chest like that’ll somehow keep everything breaking together. Tears stream down my cheeks while I spin in place, still in denial. He has to be here still. I just didn’t see him.

“Eli!” I call out into the night, and a neighbor hollers, “Shut up, asshole!”

The sob rips from me while I ball up my fists and tuck my chin to my chest. That mother fucker . I begged him to stay with me. I told him that I loved him. I’ve never said it before. His cum is still inside me, his kiss on my lips a ghostly presence. This isn’t happening. He’s not doing this again. I hurry back inside the apartment, grab my phone, and call him.

“This number cannot be reached,” an automated robot voice says.

I pull the phone back from my face. “What the fuck?”

I call three more times and am met with the same response. “FUCK!” I try to text him but it doesn’t send. He blocked me.

Just like last year.

Throwing my phone, I grab my car keys and go for the door but pause. I’m shaking, insides convulsing, and crying so hard I can’t see. I sink to the floor, drop the keys, and hold my knees to my chest. Where would I even go to find him? He’s probably at the fucking airport by now because it’s 2 am, and I know I’ve been asleep for hours.

I sniffle and roll my head against the door.

The tantrum I’m throwing is pointless. I knew he’d do this. He said he was going to leave. He made love to me, knowing he was going to do it. Part of me wants to fly to Chicago and beat on his front door until he has no choice but to deal with me. But what good would it do? I’d be the psycho ex who can’t take a hint. These past few days have made me forget who he really is. It has made me forget I’m chasing someone who doesn’t want to be found.

So why the fuck did he come back? Because he missed me? I call bullshit.

You don’t leave like this if you miss someone. Which only leaves one answer. He wants his drugs, and he knows if he’s with me, I won’t let it happen. And that hurts so bad that I can’t breathe. Crawling over to my phone that’s halfway under the couch, I fumble through my recent calls and hit Jorge’s name. He answers on the third ring.

“Phoenix?”

I cry into the phone, snot dribbling down into my mouth. “He left. He fucking left.”

“I’m coming.” He grunts and curses. “I’m coming, Phoenix. Hang in there, Bebe. Ten minutes.”