When she gets out, she tells me about everything. Her father. Her mother. Charlie. The fun nights they had together. How she feels about her best friend moving away, and how it hurt not to attend the wedding.
She talks to me about her feelings growing up, feelings toward an unloving mother and an absent father. She tells me she knows how normal it is in America to have that. I tell her it’s true, how normal it is, and that everyone who experiences it has a unique way of coping.
That makes it special, I say. So, I ask her how she coped. Clamming up, she says. She never showed her heart to anyone. She would kiss boys and lead them on, but that was as far as it went. They always hated her for it, leaving them horny and unattended to behind the locker rooms.
She told me it was the same in college. Classes turned into study sessions, and that was when she first learned to masturbate. She was alone at the time, or so she thought. Her crazy religious fanatic of a roommate, who had strict rules against boys and girls and the sins of the flesh, walked in on her climaxing for the first time.
‘It was the best high, knowing I was caught but still wanted to go on.’
She was kicked out, of course. For indecent exposure. This was where Charlie came in.
‘You should have met her. She was a divine friend.’
She caught her too, masturbating to the licks of a thick wand. But there was no anger or disgust. That act made them closer. Sisters. Charlie did the same thing—with no shame at all, even when she should have some basic modesty.
She tells me of the day she had to move out. The day Charlie got engaged. The day the constant calls stopped coming in.
‘She’s alright. I check up on her once a while online.’
Julia pauses to breathe and rub lotion on her ankles. The robe suits her well.
‘How about you?’ she asks. ‘What hidden secrets does Henry Palmer hide behind his cold hard soul?’
‘Cold?’ I ask, visibly yet playfully hurt. ‘I am never cold.’
‘Yes. You. Are. Remember who catalogs all your calls and emails and meetings?’
‘Oh, yeah.’
‘That’s right.’
She’s won.
Propping myself up with my elbows, I say, ‘I think we need snacks. Popcorn?’
‘Salted butter, right?’
‘Um, just the normal kind.’
She scoffs and then goes to get some.
‘This is the best goddamn popcorn I have ever had in my life.’ It really is. Better than that rough movie theater sawdust I was so used to.
‘Butter makes the world go round,’ she says, with a quick and powerfully sedating smile.
I have to agree. This is a better bribe than a kiss.
And so I tell her.
The moment I get to the part about my abusive father, her arms lingers strongly on mine.
She empathizes.
She understands.
She sees.
I see too.
I see Julia Cast, as secretary and aide, no more.
I see Julia Cast, listener and lover.
I see her carefully undressing now.
‘Come here,’ she whispers, lowering her head and opening her lips to my groin. ‘Let me own you the same way that you own me. Now we know each other’s secrets, each other’s pasts, everything about each other.’
She’s right.
I never give my heart to anyone, but I just gave it to her.
She owns me as completely as I own her.
Chapter Nine – Julia
His cock gets bigger on my mouth, and I slurp it all the way down. My tongue slithers and grabs along the edge of his helmet, the throbbing pulse enough to make a man, a god like he, grab my head and shove me down deeper until I kiss his engorged balls.
I choke on him and fight back the tears. The inner lining of my mouth grows wetter, slicker and hotter. Friction.
He calls out my name. I answer with a tightening of cheeks and sucking out every bit of Henry that his balls can offer. I taste the jut’s salty stickiness and let it coat the roof of my throat. It oozes down my throat, and I slurp him out.
His body is shaking as he thrusts me onto the bed and applies his cock where necessary. In my cunt first. Deep and wet he slaps his firm thighs into my ass and pushes my head into the pillows.
Hot air and silk are in my mouth. His strength and weight plunder. My core lets go and the rush spasms from my clit, my womb, my tits, to my brain and back, zigzagging and crisscrossing my nerves like thin confused wire.
I hang limp in his arms and he kisses me. I taste cold thirst in his throat. He carries me elsewhere. Kitchen, I think. Door frame. My leg on his shoulder. He penetrates me. I gasp. His hands squeeze my breasts. He massages my shoulders, my scalp, as his lips hold mine and play.