The Delivery (16 page)

Why don’t you try to let him love you?

Because I’ll die if I fail.

I fall back on the bed and take to staring at the ceiling.

Mozey tortures me on his way out of the shower, only a small, Paradisian towel around his waist. The rest of him dripping and beaded with water. He’s more than beautiful; it runs deeper than that. He’s probably even delicious to smell, delectable to taste. He turns toward the couch, and the cheeks of his perfect ass are testing the limits of the cheap hotel linen. I groan and flop over in bed until I’m facing the wall.

He hits the light, and my head automatically turns back to him. I can see the iridescent white of the towel through the dark as it falls to the floor. Mozey is naked. He
would
sleep without any clothes on.

“Probably bugs. Roaches are going to bite your penis if you don’t cover up.”

“Why don’t you either shut up or give me something to cover it with.”

Touché, motherfucker. That would be harassment if we were someplace where it would count.

“I can’t believe you just said that to me!” I say, but maybe I’m feigning the shock. Maybe I love that he said it. Maybe I squirm with warmth inside at his ease and familiarity.

“Whatever, Lana. You are the worst cock-tease I’ve ever met. You act like you’re too good for me, but I know what you want.”

“Typical,” I say in a huff and cross my arms over my chest. “If a girl doesn’t want to have sex with you, then she’s teasing your cock. How about we discuss all of the reasons why it’s a terrible idea. How it could never work out and the only reason I’m here is to help deliver your sorry ass to Mexico.”

“YEAH, OKAY. You said that already. But where is the rulebook that says we can’t fuck along the way? Is it written in the bible in that stand beside the bed? Is it some fucking Russian cultural thing you’re not telling me about? Do you not have a vagina?”

“You are so crass!” I say, flying up to sitting and swinging my legs off of the bed.

“Yeah, and you are so fuckin’ uppity. And gorgeous. You drive me completely insane. You’re even sexier when you’re mad. You’re hot all of the time, Lana. And, God, don’t tell me that’s a sexist thing to say. I know it is, and I don’t fucking care!”

Mozey throws a pillow at me and it lands on my head. My face breaks into a crazed Lana smile, my teeth probably showing in the dark.

“My dick is so hard right now we could use it as a battering ram.”

I laugh out loud and then cover my mouth with my hands. Then Mozey laughs too, and it’s a throaty, bubbly sound.

“Well, if you’re not going to get naked with me, could you at least help me out and maybe talk dirty to me?”

Oh, man! Oh God! This is how it starts. This is the gateway drug. The tipping point of no return. Silence is golden, but it only works when you’re too scared for words.

“Don’t pretend you didn’t hear me. And don’t play offended. Lana, I know you’re no virgin princess. You are a prickly pear, and my guess is that you’re a freak in bed.”

My lips part in the dark, and I inhale, taking in his scent from clear across the room. He’s musky but laced with the powdery scent of the hotel soap bar. I lie still and frozen in bed like an animal being tracked, but my insides have gone all gooey and my hips are already searching for him.

“Put your hand into your panties and tell me if they’re wet.”

I hear Mozey’s breath catch, and I know he’s gripping himself. My body flushes with heat to picture his arm muscles flex as he picks up his own rhythm. I snake my hand down my stomach, and my skin prickles with my own touch. I’m incredibly responsive right now. Don’t clip the wrong wire, because I think we’d all die if I were to go off.

I creep my fingers under the lace, and they’re met with more than wetness. It’s a deluge. My body has duly prepared itself for this encounter. My
body
is ready.

“They’re wet,” I blurt out in the least sexy voice imaginable. I’m like an over-eager housewife blurting out her answer on the showcase showdown. Now all of my family members can clap and chant “good answer, good answer” as they inwardly cringe at my failure. I’m mixing up game shows.

“I’m no good at this,” I whisper, feeling ashamed.

“You are so, so good at this,” Mozey gasps. “That was the right answer.” His breathing has quickened, and I can hear his hand gliding along his stiff cock.

“How many fingers can you fit inside your wet cunt, Lana?” He breathes.

Oh Lord Jesus, did he just say that to me?

I slip in two, and my muscles contract around them. I slide them out and back in again, adding another. With three, I can feel the delicious friction, and my hips jerk in response. What’s the right answer to that question, I wonder?

“How many, Lana?” he says, his voice commanding and on the verge of impatience.

“Three,” I say, still unsexy but at least not nearly as abrasive.

“Good job, baby. Another right answer.”

I love that he calls me baby. No man has ever called me that, and I’ve always wanted it. I have singed with envy upon hearing men call other women that. I feel like I just won a prize. My face breaks into the invisible smile again for absolutely no one to see in the dark. I am his baby. And he’s about to come for
me
.

“Use your three fingers to fuck yourself because I want you to come with me. Can you do that?”

“Uhuh! Yes!” I grunt, and to me it sounds really very unsexy. But I think it works for him because I can hear the hitch in his breath.

“If I came on your body, where would you want it?”

He’s so good at this, that a little piece of me is terrified that he’s done it before with another woman. I want all of his intimacy. Even whatever happened in his past. It all belongs to me. No one else can touch it. I want to own all of it, his virginity, his every ejaculation, his every sexual thought.

“On my face,” I say, gaining momentum in the game. “On my lips and my tongue.”

I can hear his speed increase, his breath running out of his lungs.
Good answer, Lana.
I can tell that he liked it.

“Oh God! I’m so fucking crazy about you, Lana. Are you gonna come?”

I forgot about myself for a second because I was so captivated by his forthrightness. I love knowing Mozey likes this. I increase my speed, and my muscles contract. I want him inside of me so badly. I want to feel him spasm between my legs even more than my own spasm.

He groans loudly as he releases, and it’s the very best noise I’ve ever heard in my life. The only things missing are his noises near my ear and the weight of his wonderful body as he collapses, exhausted, onto my chest. But this is good enough. This is as close as we’ve come to ever satisfying one another in person.

I whimper a bit as I thrust my fingers inside. I’m soaked and so revved up, but my body doesn’t want my own fingers. Mozey stands, and I wonder if I he’s leaving me already to go clean off. I also wonder if I should stop and pretend that I’ve finished. But the dark outline of Mozey is walking toward the bed. Even his outline is sexy. This man was built perfectly both in proportion and virtue.

I moan because I don’t want him to touch me. I’m embarrassed I didn’t come yet, and I still need to hang onto the distance and the fact that we
didn’t
fuck.
Social worker,
my brain says.

“Keep going,” he says, and I can see his confidence just in the outline of his shoulders and neck. He puts one hand on the pillow right beside my face, and the other lands on the edge of my hip. Without caressing me with his hands, he makes our mouths connect. His tongue sweeps inside my mouth devouring the space. He takes the space like it’s his, and he owns it. He all ups and moves into the place. With his kiss I imagine his semen melting on my tongue, the salt-water taste of his sweat. All of Mozey would taste good, feel good. All of my senses are intoxicated by this man, but his physical presence has nothing on what he does to my mind. I push my fingers in deeper and open my mouth to him. I’m about to go off when Mozey whispers into my lips,
“Come.”

And I’m right there to meet him.

Chapter 24

W
e drive south through the Mexican state of Sonora along the sea of Cortez. There’s been mostly silence between us, a few uncomfortable stares and some incredible fish tacos with mango salsa from an unassuming stand. Mozey drank a Negra Modelo, and I’m addicted to what’s called Tamarindo. I don’t know what the hell it is, but it tastes both sweet and tart, a little torture mixed with heaven.

The scenery is breathtaking both inside and outside of the car. He is fidgety. He is quiet. He is so fucking hot. This man lives out of a backpack and back and forth between a couple of pairs of jeans. He acquires and discards t-shirts, paint-staining them are the hazards of his trade. I’m in love with smelling him and just sitting this close. I’ll drive him all the way to Tierra del Fuego just to get enough.

Have you ever wanted something so much that you could burst at the seams? The very thought of his kiss from last night makes sweat magically appear on my brow. I clear my throat like a crazy person—five times in a row.

Sometimes he beats out drum rhythms from whatever he’s listening to in his ears. Once with a pen and once with his fingers. Whenever his brow creases, he grabs for his art pad and furiously scratches out something. I am memorizing everything, recording it in case it’s ever taken away.

It frazzles me to imagine spreading my legs for him, letting him take all of me. Letting the fuse burn all the way to the round, black, ticking time-bomb. Mozey between my legs would mean everything. All I can think about is his cock, the groans he made, his gorgeous and disciplined, wide-opened mouth.

He rustles the map that I told him we wouldn’t need. I guess he’s old fashioned. He plots the drive with a pencil like my mother always did on our shitty summer trips to the KOA campground. He’s toked his inhaler twice in a row, taking hits so deep into his lungs I begin to wonder if he catches a buzz. I shoot him a dirty look over my steering arm.

His shit-eating grin is enormous. As big as the boner I imagine in his pants. He bursts the grin, and it pops as he exhales. He’s laughing and shaking the cartridge like a fiend.

“Lana, quit trying so hard to be a grumpy bitch.”

“Quit acting like a twelve-year-old. You already make me feel all kinds of old.”

“Do you want to try to make it to Culiacan? I think we could do it—no problem. I’ve got some Redbull if you want one.”

“How far is it?” I ask, pressing random buttons on the GPS like I’m factoring the driving time and I know what I’m doing.

Mozey shakes his head and laughs at me some more.

“Like fifteen-hundred kilometers, more or less.”

“That means nothing to me. Please, habla English.”

“Like seventeen to twenty hours by my guess. I thought you were supposed to be Russian.” He’s chuckling at my expense.

“Twenty hours? Jesus! Do you even drive?”

“Yeah, I can drive. I’ll drive! We’ll switch!”

We battle back and forth like a couple that’s dating, or married, or better yet—on the brink of divorce. What do I know? We haven’t even begun, but we peck and caw at one another like two old crows.

He ends up reclining the seat all the way to nap before we switch off and it’s my turn to rest. I watch the rise and fall of his chest almost as much as I watch the highway, which is empty except for the occasional semi or passenger bus. I watch how his hand curls as it drapes off the side of the seat. I watch how the other hand moves occasionally, gliding along the cotton of his t-shirt, palm down and splayed out on his broad chest.

I sigh inside with so much looking at him. Is it unhealthy to worship someone? Because I think I might be worshiping Moisés as we speak. I long to know everything about him. I can see those hands when they were pudgy toddler hands seeking the comfort that we all seek. I know that his past was a painful one, but he somehow turned out so good-natured and sweet. I had it easy in comparison, and I’m the one that’s ill tempered and chronically moody. The drawings he created in Tijuana were painful ones. I need to be strong enough to ask him about those things. But for now I’ll just watch him sleep.

A truck whizzes by and pulls my attention away from him. Away from the beauty that is Moisés in dreamland. There hasn’t been a sign of civilization for over an hour. I’ve only seen a stand offering barbecued goat. A stand in the middle of nowhere. Where did they come from, and how far did they bring the goat? I’ve got to pee so bad my bladder is numb. I’ll have to pull over and make ends meet.

I ease over to the shoulder when the earth dips down rolling away from the highway enough for me to hide and pee. I start talking to myself as the car rolls to a stop, and I undo the seatbelt. It’s now almost dark outside, and the landscape is fading. There’s only a star-filled sky against darkened earth, with the zipper of the highway stretching righteously up its gigantic backbone. Mexico still scares the shit out of me. I shoot Mozey one last look, hoping the lack of motion has pulled him from slumber-land. His warm, brown eyes are staring right at me, with just a touch of smile beginning to break.

“I love waking up close to you,” he says and raises his arms above his head, simultaneously stretching his legs. I hear his tendons and fascia snap with excitement. I search my brain for a romantic come back, but I suck at talking about feelings and my bladder is trying to prove equations about distance and water weight.

“I have to pee.”
Oh, how romantic, Lana! Make him swoon with your gross bodily needs
.

“Okay, let’s pee.”

I feel like he’s always smiling, like somehow he’s always amused with whatever I say. In part it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy, and at the same time, it totally unnerves me. Moisés de la Cruz does all sorts of funny things to me.

Our pee steams in the cold night air. Apparently the temperature drops down to nothing as Mexico goes to sleep and the sun takes its leave. Mozey finishes way before me and I get self-conscious, thinking he might be watching. My urine stops its exodus midstream. He laughs, and his sneakers crunch on the gravel.

“Lana, don’t tell me you can’t pee in front of me.”

“Go wait in the car!”

“Last night you masturbated in front of me,” he says as if he’s talking about dinner.

I whimper in response and try to push out the pee. I guess he’s got no problem just mentioning the thing that’s been eating away at me. I ignore my feelings and his comment, and the stream agrees to cooperate again.

“Is it wintertime here or is it just cold like the desert?” His laugh makes me start and scares away my pee again.

“Mexico is to the US as the US is to Canada. We’re not in South America,” he says, still laughing and now kicking up rocks in the gravel under his feet.

“How’d you get so smart for a—“

“A what? Mexican? Immigrant? Last time I checked, Lana, you were from someplace else too.”

“That’s not what I meant. I was going to say delinquent.”

“Oh, that’s generous of you. A juvenile delinquent.”

He walks back to the driver’s side, and I toss him the keys. I keep my comments about being careful and questions about a license all to myself. I lie down in the reclined seat that’s still warm from his slumber and heavy with his scent.
This
is paradise. This spot is all I need.

“Mo, will you tell me your story to put me to sleep?”

He runs his fingers through his hair and throws a curious look my way.

“You really want to know?”

“Every single thing.”

And that is how I hear the story I never wanted to hear. The story that just about kills me to know. The story of baby Moisés and how he made it to the States. Probably the saddest story I’ll ever live to know.