9. Reel Me Back In

Reel Me Back In

M ara

I am a kite. My thoughts are the wind. He holds the string that tethers me to the earth. My thoughts fly, pulling out more line and the winds swing me further up and further out.

This is me.

This is how I am, and I enjoy the journey of discovery in allowing my thoughts to roam for a while, until I go too far where the wind and my thoughts rear up and begin to batter me about. I toss and twist in the wind, I cry out to him my pain and he gently reels me back in.

This is me.

I live inside my head most of the time. Sometimes it’s a good place to be. The words fly around in my thoughts, I examine them from every angle, make new connections, collect evidence, search for the perfect words to describe what I’ve discovered.

Sometimes the thoughts get away from me and the same old tired messages show up. You’re not good enough. He can’t possibly want you. You’re disgusting. You force yourself on him. He doesn’t love you. He’s stuck with you. They gather steam as my brain makes connections to lend credence to their claims, they spin faster, lacerating me from within. When the pain becomes too much, I take my pain to him, only he can bring me back to baseline. Only he can forge a path through the bullshit and give me space to breathe.

It’s too much. I’m too much. Too much and not enough at the same time. Too demanding, too sexual, too moody, too messy, too feisty. Not slim enough, not pretty enough, not patient enough, not giving enough, not gentle enough, not fucking good enough.

Zale came home from work in time to have dinner with Olivia. We ate together, showed Zale the cards we’d made, and Olivia gave him his in which we both wrote how much we loved him.

We played Spot It with Olivia after dinner, and she begged for one more round, three more times before she gave up the ghost and headed for bed. Zale went with her, and I tidied the kitchen, nervous to go to our room, unsure how to act, and physically ticking with a need I was striving hard to hide .

Finally, I could put it off no longer.

As soon as I got to our door, he spoke. “Close the door, baby.”

Oh, thank God. My shoulders drooped in relief.

I closed and locked our bedroom door, my eyes cast down to avoid his gaze. Sliding into bed on my side, I rolled into his open arms. He held me tightly for a moment, kissed the side of my neck, pushed his heavy thigh between mine.

The tyrant arrived right on cue.

Do you actually think he wants this? How could he? Look how hard he has to work to get his leg between your tree trunk thighs.

No, you’re okay. He loves you.

I flattened the palm of my hand against his hard chest, flexing my fingers into the crisp hair and toned muscle, flicking a nail across his sensitive nipple, listening for his breathing to change, sliding my palm across his abdomen, enjoying the feel of his hair bristling against my palm, over his naked hip, a favorite spot of mine, and down to find him hard and ready.

See? You’re okay, he wants this, he wants you.

It’s a biological need. You could be anyone. Probably wishes you were anyone else.

I focused on him. I loved the feel of him, the warmth of his skin, his small sounds, his beautiful face. I wrapped my fingers around him, and he thrust lightly into my hand, his hand smoothing across the skin of my back and down to cup me under my ass and pull me closer to his heat.

I concentrated on the feel of him under my hands. I thought about the pleasure he only gets from me, slapped my fears away and gave as much of myself to him as I could. The tyrant temporarily muted as a sensual storm rose to muffle her voice.

Oh, God, the relief.

I lost myself in the pleasure that I gave, lost in the pleasure he gave me. I needed to lose myself. I needed to be consumed, before I consumed myself.

He made short work of getting our clothes off and rolled me onto my back, giving me his weight. Barely nudging the entrance to my womb, my thighs spread wide in entreaty, he gave me his mouth, his tongue. I was parched and could not get enough.

I held onto his head, holding his lips to mine, not wanting to let him go. His weight, his cock, his mouth on my mouth, on my throat, his whiskers scraping over my sensitive skin on his way to my breast, pain and pleasure, angst soothed as his hands and his mouth danced across my body, sweeping every other thing away.

Lost in him; lost in him, lost in me.

My favorite place to be, my only escape, the only place I was free.

With his forearms braced on the bed on either side of my head, his lips on mine, he spread my thighs wide with his and entered me with one thrust, quickening both our breaths. Lips clinging, bodies straining, waves of pleasure peaked and engulfed me, my soul released its held breath and my body unwound.

He carried me along with him once again as he ramped up and I heard him grunt softly, and I felt that he loved me, with his face pressed to my throat, as he emptied himself inside of me.

I wrapped my legs and arms around him, not wanting to leave this space. He tried to lift off me.

“No, please, one more minute.”

I could feel him exercising patience to stick with me, but he took no pleasure in the extended embrace and the shame slithered in. I wanted only for him to get up, and I prayed he wouldn't look at me when he left our bed to clean up. I couldn’t go into the bathroom with its bright light while he was there.

I waited.

The tyrant arrived with the receding of the waves.

You’re disgusting. He can’t wait to get away from you.

The reprieve was welcome while it lasted.

He walked back from the bathroom, his easy, rolling gait a pleasure to watch. Tanned, olive skin, black hair, sculpted shoulders, wide chest, long muscular legs, and that face that I loved so much. I watched him walk toward me. A beautiful man. Inside and out.

He slipped under the covers and extended his arm to invite me close. I lay down, aligning the front of my body with the side of his, my foot on top of his, and I tucked my head into the indentation between his shoulder and his right pec, my right hand over his heart, where I assured myself of its steady beat. He pressed his cheek against the top of my head.

“I’ll be a better man, baby,” he whispered. “I’ll be more of what you need.”

I said nothing, my throat locked up tight. I didn’t want to cry tonight. I squeezed him tight and pushed my face harder into his chest.

I needed to tell him.

After a while he clicked off the tv and turned his face to press his cheek to the top of my head.

“I love life with you,” he whispered into my hair.

I snorted.

He chuckled.

How I loved when he laughed.

“You’re a complicated little molecule, but I love you.”

I held him tighter. I said nothing but I thought about his words all night and all the next morning.

They warmed me.