Lily of the Valley (3 page)

On cue, Alana pushes me to the bed and straddles me. She slips her wet, hot pussy over my cock and it’s fucking heaven. All of my reason and doubt disappear as I feel her contract around me. She rides me until we’re both satisfied – and I am
extremely
satisfied.

“I wish you weren’t so far away. It’s so hard without you,” she says after.

I stroke her hair. I know her mind races after we fuck. I’ve seen it when her dead eyes come back to life – the fear that it’s a mistake, that things will change between us. Despite my shitty lack of self-control, I would never hurt her. She’s my best friend, my only friend now that Dave’s gone and left us behind with nothing.

She dozes off and I will myself to love her, to be more for her, but I can’t change anything. It’s weak and pathetic, but those are the traits that seem to define me.

****

Alana comes back one more time during the first week of classes, one night after I finish work at the café. It’s late and I’ve just parked my bike when I walk up to the dorm and see her sitting on the grassy hill nearby. I join her on the hill; it’s still warm and the night seems more comforting than the sterility of my dorm anyway.

“I missed you again,” she says. I sense her wariness in the way she bites her lip, the way that the words don’t fall from her as they should. “I needed to see you.”

“I know, and I miss you, too. But you’re going to spend all your money on gas.”

She only works part time, between classes and dealing with her mother. It’s unfortunate; she’s too smart to be where she is. She could have had scholarships, too, but she didn’t want to leave. I’ll never understand that and it’s what divides us more than anything.

“Why didn’t you stay?”

We’ve been over this and yet we have to rehash it at least once a month during the school year. I know Alana’s moods well now. This one is neediness, driven by fear of losing me, of losing
us
. We aren’t an us, we haven’t been an us in years, and yet she still imagines a future where there
is
an us. Every time, I try to let her down gently, but it doesn’t work. And, of course, every time I end up in bed with her, and then I wonder why she believes there’s a chance.

“You know I couldn’t. I needed out of there. Fucking bullshit and the way they looked at me. I need this, Alana. I need something new. I need to prove that I’m not this guy, that I can be something else.”

“You can do that at home.”

I shake my head. “No. I can’t. And you know it. What’s going on?”

She lies back on the grass and I join her. She slips her hand down to my crotch, but as much as my cock says one thing, I let my brain take over this time. I move her hand back.

“I’m losing you,” she says. “I can just feel it. Something is different. The air is different.”

“You’re being ridiculous. The air is exactly the same. And it smells like ass.”

I get a laugh out of her, but the sadness returns. “I’m not enough for you.”

“Don’t do this.”

“Why is it so hard with us, Jack?”

“Because you’re my best friend, and I adore you, and I want to love you always. I can’t love you always if I
have
to love you. You know I can’t be in a relationship.”

“You’re not him,” she tells me.

We’ve trodden over our pasts endlessly in the time since we met. I’m not him and she’s not the victim she was. Either way, though, I refuse to talk about this. I need school, I need to get out, and I need not to have roots here. The farther I get away, the better. And I will never give Alana what
she
needs, which is someone to love her unconditionally. For me, everything has a condition. She’s just lucky she gets the shortest list.

“You wanna go for a ride?” I don’t really feel like going back out now that I’m mere yards from my room, but I also don’t want to invite her back there. Some nights, there is too much promise in what’s supposed to be fun.

She shakes her head. “I miss him, you know.”

“Dave?”

She nods.

“Me too. Asshole never even said goodbye.”

“He didn’t want us to hurt if he dies. But I hurt already.”

I say nothing, only hold her against me. I miss him, too. At the end of high school, we had a fallout – something stupid, my own anger at everyone tearing me away from the two friends I actually had. Although we fixed things before he left, I still imagine the day we get a telegram that he’s dead and I know that guilt will destroy me for good.

“Everyone leaves me,” she says.

“You’re being whiny as fuck.”

She smiles. “You’re a shitty friend.”

“The worst,” I agree.

And we’re okay. It’s not a mood shift; it’s not a sudden acceptance of anything. It’s simply realizing that, for all of the ways we hurt each other, we are still better together than apart. Alana kisses me, but it’s a resigned kiss. I’m not sleeping with her tonight. She’s too volatile and as much as her skin sets mine on fire when her hands slide up my arms, it’s dangerous to be with her like this.

“You want me to go, don’t you?”

“I want you to wake up tomorrow and not hate me.”

There have been a few times in our friendship, early on – after we broke up - when I didn’t listen to the warnings in my head. She would have moods like this and try to solve everything with sex. And every time, I conceded. In these moods, the sex is better than it’s ever been. Alana loves to prove that I need her and she gets creative when she wants to show me something.

I get hard just thinking of it, but I resist the urge to have sex with her here on the grass. In the morning, I won’t be her boyfriend. And she’ll feel used, like she did those other times. To outsiders, we may have a fucked up relationship, but I know the rules now and I make sure I follow them, even if Alana cannot.

“You’re still a shitty friend.”

“Yup. And you’re still whiny as fuck.”

Chapter 3

By Saturday morning, I feel like I’ve been back at school for the whole semester. Not having a roommate has its perks, but the biggest one is that I wake up at noon, undisturbed by anyone else. I have to work, but first I need coffee. I grab my work clothes – black pants, black shirt – except for the apron, and I get dressed before heading into the lounge.

The girl sitting on the couch looks like everyone else at this fucking school. Blonde, clean cut, dressed in clothes that probably cost more than my grandmother’s house.

“Lost?” I ask.

It’s her eyes that get me. I don’t even know what color they are. They seem to swim across the entire palate of blues and greens, no color enough to own the eye completely. There is something else in those eyes. A strange innocence mixed with a subtle sensuality that I bet she doesn’t even know she possesses. I can’t look away from her.

“I’m waiting for my boyfriend.” She gestures to the hall. I guess she’s saying this boyfriend is in the bathroom or something. It figures she has a boyfriend. Something about her, though, is causing things to happen that I don’t understand. The voice in my head knows how poorly this could go and I try to act cool, to distance myself from her.

“Innocent thing like you? I wouldn’t let you out of my sight.”

That was
not
cool and certainly not distant. I’m standing here flirting with this girl who probably thinks I’m a creep. I see in her face a wary curiosity, but girls like her think of guys like me as nothing more than a challenge. Anything that could happen after this moment would just turn out bad, likely with a lot of anger and her calling upon the aforementioned boyfriend to kick my ass. I don’t even have to see him. I know his type.

She meets my gaze and her mouth turns up in a wry smile. “I’m not that innocent.”

The challenge is there and I would love to test it. This girl looks like she’s just one wild night away from becoming an entirely new woman. I wouldn’t mind being the guy to help her out, to give her that one wild night. I’m tempted to touch her, to play with her damp hair, to see how she’d react if I kissed her right here. Her challenge would surely result in me being slapped, though.

“Sweetheart, I am sure we have very different understandings of the term.”

“That wouldn’t surprise me, but I don’t know that I mind being your idea of innocent.”

There it is. The judgment. She may have something hidden in her that’s more than what she appears to be on the surface, but the superficial persona is too important to her. Fuck her and her judgments. I’m going to watch her squirm.

I step closer and lean down slightly in her direction. She smells like she just showered; her wet hair carries the scent of a strawberry field.

“I don’t doubt it, but I just wonder what would happen if you let loose a little. You know, had a bit of fun.”

She backs away. I can almost hear the words in her head.
Freak. Loser.
What would her parents think of her for talking to me? What would her
boyfriend
think? She’s still nervous, but I can sense that our closeness makes her feel something. I just don’t know that I want to test it.

“I have plenty of fun. I don’t need anything else. Especially not whatever
you
have in mind.”

I have to get to work. Things are hard enough without playing games like this and I go back to my coffee. She crosses her legs and I think of what’s between them. I hope I made her tingle at least a little. After I finish my coffee, I smile and I see her thighs reflexively tighten. The muscle movement is hot and my cock springs to life. I need to get out of here.

In the doorway, I reconsider, thinking of her strawberry hair and her gorgeous eyes. Turning in her direction, I reiterate the challenge.

“I’m Jack. 401. If you ever want to test that theory. See what real fun is like, princess.”

Back in my room, I know I need to get to work, but I’m feeling horny as hell. It’s strange. She isn’t even my type. I like girls like Alana – wild, bitter and angry, and willing to do it all in bed. Lounge girl is probably a virgin, a sweet and pure angel who doesn’t even swear and goes to church every Sunday. Given my own experiences, I should feel some guilt about how badly I want to corrupt her, but I don’t. I think of strawberries as I stroke my cock; closing my eyes, I picture slipping into her innocent pussy, the strawberry smell surrounding me as I fuck her into submission. It takes almost no time to come, and then I go to work.

I can still smell strawberry as I ride.

****

Today the café is busy, but Liz is back. Sandee has the day off, which is disappointing, but the rush is endless and I don’t have time to chat anyway.

Cooking here is always a pleasant break from the elitism at school. Given everything I am and everything people think that I am, I’ll never be able to make sense of the way people use college as another totem. Most of my classmates are not even functionally literate, yet tuition is over forty grand. Although I suppose I should thank them every time I need to use the library. Someone had the buy the books none of them can read.

At work, though, the people are real. Both the customers and the staff. During the busy times, we get more douchebags - mostly my classmates who probably should be in said library and not eating a hangover away.

Mal is also on this morning. He’s a recovering alcoholic, a total asshole to nearly everyone, and an incredibly shitty employee in a lot of ways. But the dude can cook and when I walk in a couple minutes late with no explanation, he just shrugs and hands me an order.

“Big parties last night?”

“Huge party. I spent the night reading Dostoevsky.”

“He a scientist?”

Mal flips over the largest slab of ham I have ever seen. For all the sort of dive element of this place, the food is fucking great.

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Eh. Never cared for all that mumbo jumbo. Don’t know any of it and I’m doing just fine.”

That’s something else I admire about Mal. By no one’s standards is he “doing just fine.” He has a tendency to fall off the wagon as soon as he approaches his ten-month anniversary – which he’s been doing for longer than I’ve been alive. He’s been married and divorced five times. He has three kids who don’t speak to him. Finally, he only eats the food from the café and he lives in a motel out by the prison. Oh – and he works as a short order cook in a crappy café. But in his mind, life is “just fine.” Sometimes, I think I need to get ahold of whatever it is that keeps Mal from losing his shit.

We settle into our routine, since there’s very little we can talk about. I can’t discuss Raskolnikov’s character traits with him and Mal simply has nothing to say. So we cook in silence, but it’s comfortable.

I feel a strange affinity for this place. Even thinking about leaving when I eventually get the hell out makes me a little sad. I hate that it makes me sad. I want to leave with no connections, with no strings.

I go to stick an order on the counter for Liz when I see
her
. Strawberries. She’s with some dude, who’s what I pictured when she mentioned her boyfriend. Broad, tan, blond, and eating like a fucking pig. I don’t know what they’re talking about and I can’t see her face, but he loves her. It’s immediately recognizable and I hate him for it. I don’t know why I hate him, since at least maybe he’s not as much of a dick as I would’ve expected. If we’d been placing bets, I would’ve gone with the safe assumption he had something else on the side.

I wonder if maybe she isn’t as innocent as she looks. The thought makes me horny again. I don’t get what’s so damn attractive about this girl, but something makes me want to taste every inch of her skin.

“-not listening.” I catch the end of what Liz is saying.

“Huh?”

“Right. Thought so. I need you to make this order, but they want to change every fucking thing on the damn menu.”

“Bastards.”

“Just make sure it’s perfect so they don’t fuck me out of my tip.”

I look at the slip. What is it with people?

I get to work on their ridiculous order, but my eyes keep going back to that girl.

“Do you know her?” Mal looks over at me and it’s strange. I think he’s trying to converse, like in a real conversation.