Chapter 8

She didn’t turn up at the club and she didn’t phone the next Thursday or Friday. So on Saturday I phoned her. She wasn’t in. I left a message but she didn’t phone back. All day I waited. And once again all the buried anxieties bubbled up with in me. All the thoughts that she’s had an accident and is lying dead in hospital somewhere and nobody knows to contact me. All the anger and frustration at the fact that I didn’t know what she was doing.
And I have to admit all the anger and bitterness that she was out somewhere enjoying herself while I was here sitting beside the phone waiting on the off chance that she’d phone. I know I could have gone out. I know I didn’t have to sit in and wait for her. But I couldn’t make myself. I wanted to see her so badly that I couldn’t make myself miss the chance that she might phone. And yet, even thought I blamed her, I knew that I was doing it to myself.
I finally admitted to myself that I couldn’t go on like this. A few weeks of bliss, a few weeks of agony . Trying to switch on and off my emotions when she appeared and disappeared from my life. Trying to convince myself that she really did like me. That I wasn’t a fool to give her so much and get so little in return. That one day she turn around and tell me that she loved me. One day she’d treat me with a little respect.
Every time I’d tried to broach the subject I’d failed to push it home. I’d always chickened out because I’d not wanted to hear that she didn’t love me. While it was in doubt I could convince myself, pretend to myself, that she loved me. But once I gotten her to tell me straight, and if the answer was no, then I’d be fucked.
I was scared shitless that she didn’t love me. That I’d invested all this emotional capital in someone who just didn’t give a shit. But yet wasn’t she acting like someone who didn’t give a shit. Wasn’t I just throwing good love after bad. Wasn’t it time to cut my losses. Wouldn’t I be better off without her.
But then I’d have to admit that I wasn’t the irresistible catch that my male ego was convinced I was. That my manly charms had failed to woo her. I’ll resist the temptation to include a sentence that claims she must be gay. I’d have to admit that I failed to have as much of an impact on her life as she’d had on mine. The fact that I’m writing this proves just how deeply she’d affected me.
It was my own fault for wrapping my life around her when I’d barely knew her. Like I said at the beginning of this novel it was my self-destructive impulse to fall head over heels in love with complete strangers that was to blame. I’m sure the psychologists have a name for this type of compulsive behaviour, but I don’t know what it is. All I know is that it would take only a little more self pity to turn it into suicidal tendencies.
So there it was. I’d finally come face to face with the thought that I’d break it off with her. That she wouldn’t be the centre of my world for the rest of my life. That I’d be able to go with out her. I needed to know once and for all what she felt about me. And I was willing to contemplate the thought that she didn’t love me. That there was no future for us. I was willing to bring our relationship to a make or break situation. I was going to have some resolution to all this uncertainty and insecurity. I’d finally have an answer.
But first of course I’d have to wait for her to get in touch with me again.
I didn’t have to wait too long this time. She was only missing for two weeks before she turned up at the camera club again. I was standing upstairs sipping a cup of coffee after the meeting when she walked in. My heart almost stopped dead.
She stood in the door for a second and smiled at me. Then she walked over to talk, “So how have you been.”
I forced myself to swallow. “Fine,” I replied. My heart now racing.
“You haven’t phoned me,” she said.
“Yes I did,” I snapped. “You never phoned me.”
“Oh,” she looked down.
“Listen,” I calmed my voice. “We have to talk.”
“Oh,” she looked up again. “O.K.,” she gestured at the coffee pot. “Just let me get some coffee first.”
I wanted to end it now. I wanted a short sharp ending. I wanted to be finished with her once and for all. But all I could say was, “O.K.”
Somebody came up to me and started talking about the lecture we’d had that night. I responded automatically, not being able to concentrate on anything except that Alexandra had gotten her coffee and come back to stand beside me. Very close beside me, her free hand brushing against my leg, my balls beginning to tighten.
I could smell her perfume and her hair brushed against my shoulder as she turned to talk to someone else. I walked away and joined a conversation on the other side of the room. A few minutes later Alexandra was beside me again, this time rubbing her arm against mine and once again standing very close. Every time I looked at her our eyes met and she smiled.
She was giving me all these “Come on” signals and I knew that she wasn’t going to have sex with me. I knew that if I made love to her that I’d end up even more frustrated that when I’d started out.
And yet, I thought to myself. If what I had said to her had struck a cord. If she has finally decided to acknowledge her love for me, if she now understands what making love to her means to me, wouldn’t it be foolish to throw it all away. To ruin it by dumping her just when she’s ready to really love me.
I thought, I’ve got to get out of here. I’ve got to get her alone so we can talk about this. I’ve got to know if she’s ready to love me back.
But what it really boiled down to is that I was unable to make myself end the relationship. I was unable to control my emotions long enough to tell her it was over. I was unable to stop my dreams that one day she’d love me back.
I walked over to the counter and put my empty coffee cup down. She followed and put her’s beside mine.
“I think it’s time to go,” I looked at her.
“Yes,” she nodded. “Come on back to my place. We can talk there.”
When we stepped outside the cold night air seemed to clear my head and when she put her hand in mine there was no acute physical reaction on the part of my involuntary muscle system.
We didn’t say much as we walked around to her flat. I was nervous about what would happen, about what I’d say. I knew one way or another that all my doubts would be resolved, at least that’s what I thought at the time. I knew that it was make or break time for our relationship. I just didn’t know which it would be.
When we got into her flat I hung my coat on the back of the door beside her’s. Sitting on an armchair and I automatically took off my shoes and stockings. While she started to tidy up in the kitchen alcove.
“Do you want some coffee?” she called over her shoulder.
“No,” I replied. “I won’t get any sleep tonight if I do.”
She put a few cups and a couple of plates away in the cupboard above the sink. Then she walked back out into the middle of the room. “Listen,” she said. “I know I’ve been a naughty girl, not phoning and going away and everything.”
I didn’t know what to say. “Naughty girl”? “Going away”? Did she want me to spank her? Did she think I wanted her to ask my permission before going away for the weekend?
“It’s not that,” I said. I wanted to explain that she didn’t need to ask me before going away. I just wanted her to tell me, to let me know so I wouldn’t be sitting around waiting for her to phone me. So I wouldn’t be disappointed when she didn’t. So I didn’t feel as if I’d been dumped.
But more than that, was it so much to ask that she tell me what she felt for me? That she’d talk to me. That she’d treat me with some respect and not take me for granted.
I wanted to tell her all this. But when I opened my mouth nothing would come out. After all those months of frustration it had all clogged up inside me and I couldn’t tell her. Now, the first time she’d seemed interested in listening to me, I couldn’t find the words to explain.
There was a few moments of silence while I struggled with my feelings and the words I needed to explain them. While she stood there looking down at me. Eventually I ended up just shaking my head.
She looked me in the eyes, slowly sat down on the floor, pulled off her sweatshirt and leaned back against the bed. She was wearing a silk cami-top over her bra. Looking up at me she smiled invitingly. And I was on the floor beside her, with my arms around her before I knew what had happened. The feel of the silk on her skin and the taste of her lips on mine was divine. Then her tongue was on my ear and I was sucking the joint of her shoulder and neck.
I said to myself, I shouldn’t be doing this. Yet her skin was hot under my fingers as I unhooked her bra. I told myself that I’d come here to talk to her, as I slipped the straps off her shoulders and arms and pulled her bra from under her cami-top before tossing it onto the bed. I thought, now would be a good time to stop and tell her that I’m not happy with the relationship, as I put one hand to the back of her head, the other to her breast and kissed and squeezed and hugged her.
Her arms wrapped around me and pulled me close. Then both my arms where around her and our bodies were pressed tightly together. She tilted her head up and lay back on the floor.
I lay on top of her and she wrapped her legs around me. As we kissed my mind went into over drive. I thought, here we are in a parody of the missionary position. I knew if we where naked she’d never have lay like that. I thought, but for a few layers of cloth …. That she was bringing me so close just to deny me ….
I sat up suddenly.
She looked up at me, but my left hand continued to stroke her crotch and she giggled. She was available. I wanted her. I couldn’t resist. With my other hand I started to untie her shoes. First one, and her sock, then the other and her feet where naked. I ran my hands along her legs, up and down the insides of her thighs, feeling her muscles through the denim. Her breath came faster and I ran both hands up to open her jeans.
Denim on silk, on silk as I stroked outside. Then silk on silk on flesh as I slipped my hands inside her jeans. Then silk on hair as I slipped them between her cami-top and her panties. Then straight flesh as I slipped them inside that. Then hard nipples surrounded by firm breasts as I leaned forward and ran my hands up the length of her body.
She gasped. Then my lips where on hers and my tongue probed deep. I rested my weight on my elbows and rubbed the bulge of my erection against her silk panties. She squirmed underneath me and her hands where inside my jumper pulling my T-shirt out of my jeans. Her hands kneaded their way up my back pushing both my jumper and T-shirt before them. I lent on one elbow as she pulled my other arm free. Then reversed the process. Then she pulled them over my head and threw them away. I pushed down and sucked a breast into my mouth. She arched her body under me and her hands where stroking my body again.
I snaked my hands back down her body and slipped them inside her panties. I pushed both them and her jeans down off her bottom. Then I zig-zaged my lips and tongue and nose down her body as I pushed my hands onto her the back of her legs. I stopped when I reached her pubic hair. I could smell she was hot and damp. My mouth watered. But I forced myself to sit up.
Slowly I pulled her jeans and panties off her legs. Caressing her firm muscles as I did so. She sat up, keeping her legs together and to one side, and put her arms around my neck. She smiled at me before we started kissing again.
Then all my memories fade into an ecstatic blur of sensations. There was warm silk scrunched in my fist. Her tongue probing deep into my mouth. Her hair pressed against her ear as I sucked. Her breast dangling over my mouth as I licked her nipple. The feel of her skin under my fingers. Her hot breath on my ear, and my shoulder, and my nipple. The weight of her as she rolled on top. The weight of me on her as I continued the roll. The constant rush of hormones as we made love.
Then my memory snaps back into focus.
She was on top. We where kissing. My hands where running up and down her back, feeling the silk against her warm skin. She began to rub her body against mine. She pressed her vagina against the bulge in my jeans and started to masturbate herself. I froze. Something inside me snapped and all my passion evaporated. I let my hands drop to the floor. She continued to kiss me and rub her body against mine for a few moments. Then she noticed I’d stopped responding. She sat up and took a deep breath. Looking down at me she smiled.
I don’t know if I smiled back. A sequence of thoughts burned in my head. it’s one thing to let somebody make love to you and not care if they come. it’s another stage of unacceptable to let someone make you come and to deliberately stop them from coming in return. But it was the straw that broke the camel’s back to deliberately deny someone their orgasm and yet to make sure you yourself came. I blinked and looked down at her.