Amoeba (The Experiments) (33 page)

He gasped for air, pulling from the kiss but not moving his lips so far away that he couldn’t feel Cal’s rapid warm breaths hitting against his mouth. He couldn’t move his eyes from hers, and there was an emotional desperation in his voice as he spoke to her through his heavy breaths. “I can’t . . . I can’t stop. I don’t want to. Tell me to stop, Cal.” Billy closed his eyes. “Please, tell me to stop.”

Cal’s body tensed up in his hold. She trembled, her mouth still open. Her eyes rolled slightly feeling his body against hers, and Cal gave him his answer, running her hands to his chest, grabbing his shirt and lifting it up over his head a split second before her lips connected to his again.

Kissing Cal, Billy’s hands seemed to move with a rapidness down across the long shirt she had on, to the ‘too big’ shorts she wore. Under the shirt to her waist Billy touched her as he backed her up in the direction of the bed. He undid the button, then zipper, and as Cal bumped into the edge of the bed, her shorts fell to the floor and Billy dropped to his knees.

His hands grazed up the outsides of her thighs lifting up the shirt not only his hands
, but with the top of his head as his lips searched out her chest. He widened his mouth in a hunger, bringing his lips to her breast, and Billy lifted her up laying her down on the bed.

Contact between the two of them was broken only for a moment
, just long enough for Billy to step from his shorts, leaving only his boxers on. He joined Cal on the bed, his body finding a place between her parted legs, his mouth finding hers again, in a search for a feeling that seemed so close. Billy’s moved with a smooth firmness against Cal as his hand pulled on the shirt she still wore.

Cal’s hands reached, so out of control to Billy’s thighs, widening her legs more, inviting him to press against her as she slipped her hands under the back waist of his boxer shorts pushing them off. She shook her head ‘no’ when she felt him pull from her mouth and his body slide down a little. Her lips searched for his when Billy left her, raising her shirt up as he kissed his way to her stomach.

His one hand reached up feeling for her breast, as his other hand gripped tightly to the inside of her left thigh, pushing it out more as he bitingly inched his way down her across stomach.

Cal felt the coolness of the air hit her as she flung off the shirt. She then felt the warmth surround her as Billy’s moist lips touched upon the inside of her thigh moving slowly, teasingly inward, spreading her legs wider until . . . he arrived. Cal’s eyes closed tightly as if in pain. And there was an ache of need that consumed her, taking over her thoughts, her reasoning, her entire body. As if she were feeding in starvation, she couldn’t pull away
, and the second Billy’s soft touch intensified, Cal was gone. Her back arched, she gripped the sheets of the bed, and from her chest, deep, yet soft, rolled the sound of her escaping pleasure.

Billy moaned
, too, bringing his mouth from her, sliding his lips up her stomach and his hands under her back. And before his body met hers completely, Billy stopped.

There was a long stare between them. Eyes connected, thoughts transferring, hesitation. The quest for permission that they sought from each other ended when their open mouths pressed in a passion filled kiss
once again. And Billy, one hand digging deeply to Cal’s lower back, brought his body up and grabbed the edge of the bed as he not only entered into Cal, but entered into a state of ecstasy that overtook him like nothing he had ever felt. He could no longer kiss her, the feeling he felt in his body so overwhelming. He pulled at the bed, lifting the sheets as he clung to Cal, bringing her as tight as he could against him. Cal’s fingers twined themselves in the thick locks of his hair as her lips bit into his arched neck. With each passing moment, and intense movement their joined bodies made, their skin moistened more with sweat, and the room filled with not only their synchronized breathing, but their unison soft moans.

Billy slid his hand up to Cal’s hair as he rolled some onto his side, lifting her head and looking at her. “Kiss me. Please kiss me.” He breathed outward, locking his lips to hers, kissing her as if he were trying to pull something from within her. And Billy stayed in that kiss until his body could no longer do anything else but hold Cal as tight as he could,
and let out that one last gasping moan, and freeze to a dead stop.

The flame of Barb’s just lit lighter illuminated her face with an orange cast as she ignited her cigarette while sitting in her seat before the monitor. She let out the smoke, allowing her mouth to stay open, her eyes still glued to the screen of Billy’s room. What she thought was ‘an end’ actually only turned out to be a pause, and she watched as Cal and Billy, intertwined and covers pulled partly over them, began to kiss. Slowly, passionately and holding on tight.

Barb tried to be unnoticeable
, yet her body was tense. She crossed her legs tightly, and shifted in her chair slowly, reaching for her water, sniffing loudly, and clearing her throat. “Well . . .” She took a long sip and cleared her throat again, this time sitting back. She moved her eyes to Greg who sat in the chair next to her. “I guess we know they got a hold of the drug.”

“What makes you say that?” Greg asked
in a monotone, his eyes transfixed on the screen, watching Cal and Billy kiss.

“Because from
my experience with the last experiment, and with this one, I know Cal, and she won’t even walk across her room in a towel without blocking out the camera. Yet . . .” Barb’s hand pointed to the screen. “There they are. How long will they . . .”

“Don’t know.” Greg shrugged. “We’re kind of looking at our case study now.” He pointed to her cigarette pack. “May I?”

Barb handed him one. “I have to say, even though it was, well . . .” She cleared her throat. “I expected it to be, how can I put it . . . more hardcore or pornographic.”

Greg stood up as he lit the cigarette. “Like I have said all along
, we can help magnify sexual stimulation, but we can’t generate the types of feelings that start them. Point taken.” He indicated to the screen. “Let’s make a copy of that tape and send it down to editing to have them make some stills for Lt. Col Graison, just in case Cal doesn’t tell him inside a week.”

“I’ll take . . .” Barb’s heart pounded in her throat when her eyes moved to Jake in the monitor, sitting on his bed, reading something, so unsuspecting. She closed her eyes to shake the ‘feel bad’
feeling that overwhelmed her at that second, vowing the second Greg left she was going to blur Jake’s monitor so she didn’t have to see him. “I’ll take care of it.”

“I’ll be in my office. I have to call Aldo.” Smoking the cigarette, Greg proceeded to leave.

After Greg was gone, Barb started to follow his instructions. First she blacked out Jake’s monitor, then with a touch of a button, she switched the live feed of Billy and Cal to a new tape recorder, and rewound the one that had captured them thus far. Hearing silence in the control room, and seeing that she was completely alone in there, Barb fed the tape through another monitor, viewing what had transpired between Billy and Cal all over again.

^^^^

Nearly dropping the receiver from his hand, Aldo hung up the phone with a heavy look upon his face. He ran his hand over the bridge of his nose, took a deep breath, and folded his hands. He stole a moment to get his thoughts together and to think about what work he would need to take with him when he left for Los Angeles as soon as his private plane was ready. Aldo wanted to go there so he would not miss a single moment as Cal and Jake took on what would probably be their most difficult obstacle course. And despite Greg’s assurance that nothing would be happening with Aldo’s team for at least a week, Aldo knew better. Aldo knew Cal. And if his gut instincts were right, it wouldn’t take a week for Cal and Jake’s troubles to start.

When did it happen? When did they realize the wrong that they had done? It wasn’t during the act that was upon them that they realized, an act that had taken them from any logical state. It was somewhere still lost in the moment, still feeling consumed by urge. It was somewhere in their slow kissing, touching, after-moment-continuance, that it hit them.

BAM!

At the same time, like they had been awakened from a dream, reality rumbled toward them, roaring like a wave of the ocean, knocking them over and snapping them out of a place they should have never gone.

Reality . . . consciousness . . . guilt.

^^
^^

As soon as Cal saw the face of her watch, her face tensed up in anxiety when she realized how much time she had been in that room with Billy. By the fire, she grabbed her now dried shorts, and stepped into them. Like a trailer to a movie, visions of what happened between her and Billy flashed powerfully in her mind, almost as if even if she wanted to forget it, her conscious kept saying . . . remember. Remember. Remember. Arms wrapped tight. Kissing. Hands and lips touching her in places that only Jake had been for years, places that only Jake was supposed to be. Pulling the belt to her shorts tight, she could hear Billy in the bathroom, and with a shivering breath, she slowly moved there.

Billy coughed one final time as he leaned over the toilet holding on to the seat. His trembling hand hovered over his mouth as he reached and flushed the commode. He shifted over to the sink, turning on the water full blast, rinsing his mouth, then splashing his face, not noticing the water that ran down his bare chest. It was in his tight grip
of the sink’s edge, head hung low, that he saw Cal leaning in the bathroom archway.

Cal was silent. Billy looked as bad as she felt. Raising his head with a lost look, saddened, needing so much to hear answers that weren’t there.

“Cal.” Billy spoke to her, water still dripping from his face. “It’s not . . . don’t think . . . I don’t want you to think I’m sick because . . .”

“I know.” Cal pulled the hand towel from the rack and handed it to him.

Billy let out a single emotional sound as he buried his face in the towel. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Cal.” He shook his head. “I never wanted it to happen under these circumstances. I never . . .”

“Stop it.” Cal reached up and grabbed his wrist bringing down the hand that held the towel. “Just stop it. I was there
, too. I was with you.”

“But I blame myself for this whole thing.”

“How? Tell me how?” Cal spoke with passion. “I was right there with you. There wasn’t anything that transpired in that bed that I didn’t reciprocate or initiate just as much as you. We, Billy, we are both partners in crime here. There was no one thing that led to another. Plain and simple, we lost it.”

“I never wanted it to be like this.” Billy reached behind him, lowered the lid to the commode and sat down. “And know I’m not feeling like this over you. If circumstances were different I would be basking in this night.” Billy clasped his hands. “I just can’t stop thinking about . . .”

“Jake.”

“Jake.”

Cal let out a heavy sigh as she slid down the archway to the floor. “Jake.”

“I like Jake
, Cal. I really like Jake. And even if I thought there was a chance for us, I would have never said anything to you about how I feel because of him. Know that.”

“I know that.” Cal ran her hand down her face, reached to the floor
, and lifted herself up slowly. “Well . . . .” She looked helplessly at Billy. “It’s time to face the music.”

Billy nodded and stood also. “I’ll grab a shirt.”

Cal shook her head. “No, Billy.” She walked from the bathroom.

“Cal, I’m going with you.” Billy followed her
, grabbing his shirt off the floor. “I want to do this with you. I was wrong, I was there. I can’t let you face this alone.” He tossed on his shirt moving quickly to the door after her.

“I have to be the one to do this
, Billy, and I have to be alone with him.” Cal opened the door and paused, looking out into the steady falling rain. Then, with a deep breath, she stepped onto the porch.

Billy stayed with her. “Cal.” He grabbed onto her shoulders turning her, feeling the shaking of her body. “Oh my God, you
’re trembling. Don’t do this alone.”

“I’m scared to death
, Billy.” Cal looked over her shoulder at her bungalow, the light still on. “And I should be scared. I should. Because I’m just about to crush the person I love most on the face of the planet.” She laid her hand over his, squeezing it for a little support. Her breath shook as she took it in. Then Cal turned slowly around - rain pouring down hard on her - and, heart beating from her chest, Cal moved to her bungalow.

Her one hand grabbed the door knob as she laid her other hand flush against the door. She closed her eyes tightly as she turned the knob, dreading with everything she was that first moment that her eyes laid upon Jake. And as she opened the door and slowly walked inside what she imagined she would feel was wrong. It was a thousand times worse.

“Hey.” Jake smiled, setting down his book and standing from his position on the bed. “Look at you.”

Cal felt as if there was an earthquake beneath her. Her entire body vibrated at that moment as she tried to walk. Her lips quivered, trying to speak.

Jake walked into the bathroom and came out with a towel. “You’re drenched. What did he do, have you out walking in the rain?” He moved to her.

“Jake.” She said his name with a near whisper.

“So how did it go?”

“Jake.” His name whimpered from her. “Jake . . .” If it was possible, Cal’s body shook more. “Listen to me.” She sniffled loudly.

“You’re shaking, babe. God, you must be freezing. Why don’t we get you out of . . .”

“Jake.” Cal grabbed his hand that reached for her clothes. “Listen to me. I . . . I was with . . . .” She closed her eyes, three heavy breaths of courage were taken and exhaled. “I was with Billy.” She opened her eyes, she had to see it. Seeing the pain on his face was part of her punishment.

“I know. And for a while, too.” Jake shook his head. “So did you guys get everything resolved? I really hope because . . .”

“Jake, no
, listen.”

“Cal.” He wiped off her face. “Sweetie
, we can talk after we get you dry. I don’t want you getting sick on me.”

She saw his smile
, and it was like a guilt knife burning through her. “Stop it. Please stop it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Stop being so nice to me.” She raised her hands and her voice stepping back.

“Cal?”

“I don’t deserve it.”

He smiled in a quirky way. “What are you talking about
?”

“I was with Billy tonight
, Jake.”

“Yes
, Cal, I am well aware. I sent you to talk to him, remember?”

“Oh
, God.” Emotionally, she covered her mouth with her hand.

“Cal?” Jake stepped to her.

“Jake.” She said his name with a sob, her shoulders bounced. “I was with Billy, Jake.
With
Billy.”

The towel dropped from his hand at the same time that his heart dropped to his stomach. Any smile, any emotions, were swept from his face and were replaced with a cold stare. Jake’s eyes grew wide, his head lifted up, the muscles on his jaws twitched.

“Jake, I don’t know what to . . .” Cal felt the brush against her shoulder and Jake’s rage as he moved passed her, flung open the door
, and stormed out. “Jake!” Cal raced from the bungalow following him. He walked steady, eyes forward and focused on Billy’s place. “Jake.” She caught up to him. “Please we have to talk.”

Jake pulled his arm from her hold, snapped his
eyes only once to her, then walked again with determination to Billy’s.

Cal froze for second.
Her sob was laced with fear as she watched Jake step onto Billy’s porch.

There was no knocking, no stopping, no calling out. Jake walked right in, his stride never slowing in his entrance as he stepped down the single step into the center of the room. Billy was not there. And the moment Jake saw the bed, the unmade bed
, his gut felt as wrenched and twisted as the sheets were. He stared long and hard at the bed, turned to look at Cal by the door, looked back at the bed, then, like a man on a mission, he stormed back out, still not saying a word.

Jake’s silence frightened Cal more than anything. What was he going to say
? What was he going to do? She followed him in his determined walk all the way toward the other buildings.

Billy sat at the table in the recreation building, staring at his folded hands, ignoring the comments of Rickie and Lou who tried to instigate him. Billy couldn’t react, he couldn’t think about anything but Cal. And he knew the inevitable had come when he heard the door to the recreation room open and he looked up to see Jake. It was happening, It was his own personal Judgment day. Slowly, he stood up.

A knot thickened in Jake’s stomach when he saw Billy. A twinge of disgust burned him when he had a vision of Billy being with Cal. With no words, and a steady outraged stride, a small curl of his top lip, Jake stepped to Billy, fist tightly clenched, and with everything he had he sailed his fist into Billy so hard that Billy literally lifted a foot from the floor, flew back with a spin, and landed hard with a roll to the ground.

Jake stood exactly where he had thrown his punch
watching Billy lying on his stomach, not moving. Then, taking in a long breath, Jake turned and walked to Cal grabbing hold of her arm. He saw her looking at Billy, and he pulled her while he moved. “Don’t even think about it.” His one hand reached out opening the door, releasing Cal’s arm, and with a hand to her back, led her out.

Rickie knew. Watching what had transpired so fast
, the look on Jake’s face, the look on Cal’s face, Billy’s demeanor. That said it all to him, and he walked over and stood above where Billy lay.

Billy could see the top of Rickie’s tennis shoe as he lifted his head. Blood flowed from his mouth and cheek. He felt as if his face was ten times bigger, and it pounded with so much pain. But to Billy, it wasn’t enough. And he guessed it wasn’t over yet. He still had one member of the family to deal with . . . Rickie. He figured that was what Rickie waited for. And Billy was okay with that. He was willing to take anything right now because he felt he deserved it all. Rising up some, Billy was shocked. He was prepared to take whatever Rickie had to say or do, but he wasn’t prepared to take the hand that Rickie extended down to him as help.

^^
^^

The second shot of whiskey passed through Jake with angry ease, and he poured just one more, slamming the bottle to the dresser and downed that one as well. Wiping the back of his hand across his mouth, he looked at Cal who still hadn’t moved since they returned to the room. She stood not far from the door. Her face the same, her folded arm stance still the same. Jake walked to the fridge, opened it, and grabbed a beer. “Sit down,” he told her as he untwisted the cap and move toward the table. Cal didn’t move. “SIT DOWN!” he blasted at Cal.

His words not only shook her entire body, but they caused Cal to fly to the table and sit down. So scared, so cold, she sat, arms tight to her, her eyes never leaving Jake. He’d pace, look at her, take a drink of his beer
, and pace again. “Jake.” She spoke his name sadly, and then sobbed. Her head dropped and she grabbed her arms tighter. “Jake, I am so sorry. I am so, so sorry. I don’t know what else to say to you.” Her words shook as she hyperventilated when she spoke. “I don’t know what happened. I didn’t mean for it to happen.”

“Cal.” Jake silenced her with his one, firm, yet soft word. “You didn’t mean it?”

“No.” She shook her head drastically staring at the floor.

“Look at me
, Cal.” He waited. “I want you to look at me the whole entire time. You will raise your fuckin head and face me. You got that?”

Cal nodded and looked up.

“Did he force you?”

“No.”

“Did he coerce you in any way?”

“No.” Cal answered.

“You were drinking. Were you drunk?”

“No.”

“Then you knew exactly what you were doing?”

Cal didn’t answer.

“Did you know exactly what you were doing?”

She held back from crying, but it escaped in her answer. “Yes.”

Jake took another drink of his beer. “Then how in the hell did you not mean for it to happen?”

“I didn’t think
, Jake. I didn’t think it would get to that point. I didn’t think my feelings . . .”