I clenched my eyes shut, to try and stop the scenes from my night with Brent Lucan from flooding into my head, but no such luck. My head was full of the sound of our labored breathing as his cock thrust in and out of me … the sensation of my hands in his silky hair, the taste of his skin in my mouth.
I tossed and turned until I fell asleep from sheer exhaustion.
The sound of my cellphone jarred me awake. I dragged my eyelids open and saw Maddie trying to leave the room quietly.
“What is it?” I asked, groggy with sleep.
“Uh.” She turned around. “I didn't want to wake you. You got a text.”
“Oh?”
“It’s from Barclays bank,” she answered.
My heart caught in my throat. Without realizing it, I pulled the covers just a little higher. I suddenly felt cold.
“It was alerting you to a deposit. He sent the money, Freya.”
A few seconds ticked by before I could nod in response. I felt empty and numb. “Thanks,” I said, and shut my eyes.
She didn’t leave. A little while passed before she spoke again, “Do you want dinner? I’ve made chicken casserole.”
I knew she wasn’t going to leave me alone so with a nod, I rose to my feet and followed her out. I sat at her tiny dining table by the corner while she served up two plates of her famous broccoli rice chicken casserole. We began to eat quietly as I tried to sort out the terrible pain in my chest.
He had cleanly cut off all contact between us. There would never be a reason to get in touch with him again. I didn’t want to care, or feel anything, but the fork clattered from my hand as I turned to Maddie. I spoke before I could stop myself, “He didn't want to kiss me. What does that mean?”
Maddie raised her gaze to mine, but didn’t say anything. She looked a bit sad.
I picked my fork back up again and pushed my food around. “Perhaps he …”
“Perhaps he what?” she encouraged.
“I don’t know.” I picked up my phone on the table and unlocked it.
A few seconds later Ella was on the line. “Tell me everything,” she responded, her mouth full.
“Ella, what does it mean when a guy doesn’t kiss you?” My voice lowered. “I mean … when he sleeps with you.”
She sounded confused. “What are you saying?”
“Nothing,” I muttered. In fact, I already knew what it meant. It meant he didn’t want to.
“You mean while they're both having sex?”
“Yeah.”
She burst out laughing.
“What’s so funny?”
“I never heard of a man that didn’t want to kiss a woman. It usually only happens with prostitutes. Kissing is deeply personal, and when they're fucking someone random for money, they don’t do it. That way they can continue believing they haven’t given anything important away. I guess it keeps them sane.”
I lifted my gaze very calmly to Maddie.
She watched me with worried eyes.
Ella went on, “I suppose in a man’s case, it could be he’s just chasing the release, nothing else. Maybe that is what guys do when they are hate fucking.”
“What the hell is that?”
“You know when you hate someone’s guts, but you want to fuck them at the same time. Why are you asking by the way?” She stopped, and went quiet.
“Woah! Freya, did you ... did some guy not want to kiss you?”
“Hmm …”
She went silent again. “How much did you get?”
“One million,” I answered, the enormity of the amount hitting me all over again.
She choked on whatever she was stuffing her face with. When the coughing episode passed, she rasped into the phone, “Are you joking?”
“I’m not, and it’s all thanks to you, babe.” I handed the phone to Maddie, then I rose and returned to bed.
Freya
That evening, I returned to work as though absolutely nothing had happened. However, a lot of things were now different.
For one, I didn’t need to be there any longer, but I remained. I served customers with a smile, cleaned the floor with a mop when a child threw his food on it, put up with a drunken customer who pinched my bottom as I passed by his table. All the while thinking how life can change in a day… I was no longer the girl I’d been just a mere night ago.
Throughout my life, I had felt an emptiness I could not explain, like something was missing. Then it had meant nothing, but not anymore. Not after last night. Now I knew exactly what the craving was for. Until my body had joined with his, I had not known that I was just one piece. Another piece fitted perfectly with my piece and only when the two pieces were together was I whole and complete.
What scared me the most was that I almost couldn’t picture him any longer. I knew what he looked like, but perhaps I had thought of him too much, or perhaps not enough. Every time I brought him to mind, the distinctiveness of his features seemed to fade farther and farther into the distance.
All I could feel were his fingers, gliding like feathers down my arms, the burn of his kisses across my skin, the feel of him inside of me. I recalled what it was like to be so completely filled, the walls of my sex, convulsing around his cock. I throbbed with arousal at the recollection of how my sex had sheathed him like a second skin.