The Matchmaker's Medium (10 page)

We got to our bikes, snatched them off the ground, flipped around and ran, pushing them for a few feet then swinging our legs over them like a cowboy jumping on a horse that’s galloping away. I pedaled faster than I ever had before, wind flying into my face and eyes, tears streaming down my cheeks, not daring to look back. Chris weaved through the streets, curving and turning, jumping the curb and taking a few shortcuts. Finally, we zoomed up the driveway to our house, both of us throwing our bikes to the ground so hard it sounded like a car wreck, racing up the stairs and rushing to Chris’s room. He slammed the door and locked it, and we both crammed into the tent-fort he built for practicing his Army stuff, as mom called up the stairs, “What in the blue blazes are you two
up to
? I told you not to throw those bikes! If you break them, I’m not buying you a new one, y’hear?”

We just huddled in the fort, me with knees to my chin and my arms wrapped around my legs, Chris sitting there staring at nothing. Sitting like that for a few minutes, we listened to mom go back in the kitchen, banging and clanging dishes and cupboard doors, mumbling to herself about what awful kids we were.

“What do we do now, Chris?” I asked him.

He looked over at me like I was just invented. “Huh?”

“We have to tell somebody,” I said.

“Okay. Who?” he asked, looking at me with dead eyes. “Who’s gonna believe we just saw a dead kid in my scout leader’s shed?”

“I—I dunno, Chris, but we have to tell
somebody
. We can’t just let the kid stay there.”

“Was that—did the dead kid look like your invisible kid?”

I didn’t answer. Just nodded my head.

He thought about that for a second, then tilted his head down, chin touching his chest.

“Okay,” he said, “let’s call Chief Bennett.”

My eyes got really big, when I thought about the last time I saw Chief Bennett. “No
way
, Chris! He’ll
never
believe me! Mom told him I was a liar back in Kindergarten when I saw Isabella in the bathroom!”

“Crap, I forgot all about that,” he said. Then he lifted his head and looked at me really funny, like he just saw me for the first time in his life. “Can you see ghosts, Stinky?”

I lowered my head and nodded, tears filling my eyes.

“No
way
,” he whispered, shocked. We sat like that for a while, him quiet, me crying. Then, “Okay, we’ll call Chief Bennett, but we won’t say who it is.”

He reached his hand out to me, tilted his head a little, and cracked a half-smile. “C’mon, Stinky, stop bein’ such a cry baby.”

I took his hand and he pulled me to my feet, real quick, like he always did. He pulled the door open, and led me down the stairs, out the front door, and into the garage, where dad’s “private line” was.

He pulled the grease-stained phone off its wall cradle, pushed “0” for operator, and waited.

“Don’t worry, Amber, I’ll keep your secret,” he said, then asked the operator for the number to the police station.

Chapter Eight

“Wow, that’s some story, Amber,” Esteban said.

“I know, it’s insane, right?” I asked, feeling more self-conscious than I wanted to admit.

“No, not insane, just—unreal, I guess. I mean, you really must have some kind of serious connection with ghosts, to keep seeing all these dead kids.”

“Well, I think I saw them because they were around my age. I don’t know for sure, but now that I’m a grown woman, I get the sense that older ghosts wouldn’t come to me when I was that young because there wasn’t really much I could do for them. You know, to fix whatever situation they had going on at the time.”

“I guess that makes sense,” he said, rising slowly from the couch. I was still sitting in the recliner, tilted back a ways, trying to look comfortable but not quite pulling it off, somehow.

“Can I get you anything?” he asked, standing just in front of my feet, kicked up on the foot rest.

“Um, I guess some sweet tea, if you have any.”

He laughed, “We’re in the south; of
course
I have sweet tea. That’s like being in Puerto Rico and asking if someone has rum in the cupboard.” He laughed again, a rich, full-sounding
ha-ha-ha!
She hated to admit it, but she was really starting to like the sound of his laugh.

I decided to sit up, instead of half-laying there on the recliner like some awkward couch potato in the middle of his living room. Hearing him clink, clank and bang in the kitchen, I figured it was safe to move. Struggling to sit up, I flopped and squirmed, but ended up doing nothing more than flailing my arms and legs, trying to grab for the handle at the side of the chair, finding nothing.

“It’s on the inside,” he said, his deep voice rumbling just behind me, as he slid his hand down the outside of my thigh. I thought my heart would literally
explode
when his hand met my skin, electric shockwaves of desire shooting up and down my body, my groin throbbing in anticipation.

He pulled his hand upwards, the chair righting itself as I heard a metallic
clunk!

“There you go; good as new.”

I turned to look up at him, this tall, shining, golden drink of sexual maleness, as he met me with his own lustful gaze, the glasses of sweet tea in his hands suddenly forgotten. He leaned down, hands with tea glasses out to the sides like he was doing a very fancy curtsy for the queen, and kissed me. His breath was sweet, tasting of sugar and lemon-flavored tea, his lips slightly cold from the ice. I shivered with pleasure as he ran his tongue over my bottom lip, then softly plunged his tongue in to find mine. I responded with a quiet moan, powerless to keep it from escaping, my body moving closer to feel his touch.

He fumbled the glasses onto the coffee table, refusing to break the connection, some ice tinkling onto the floor as it sloshed out. Finally freed of the glasses, he gently pulled me out of the chair, taking me in his arms as he explored my face, neck, and collarbone with his lips. I could hear his breath quicken, smell his cologne and soap on freshly-shaved skin, as he pulled me over to the couch. Slowly, he lowered me onto the soft fabric, his powerful arms and hands stopping her just above the surface, pressing his body onto mine as I sank into the cushions.

He pushed his hands under me until his arms were encircling my body, as I reached up and touched his shoulders, chest, back, pulling at his clothes, trying to free him from the material. He obliged, slipping his head down, so the shirt would slide free of his head. I tossed the shirt to the floor, and stared at his body: a newly-exposed, soft layer of dark, curly chest hair over powerfully-toned muscles, earned during thousands of hours working with wrenches and heavy engine parts.

“You’re beautiful,” I said, my amber eyes wide and shining. He responded with a deep, passionate kiss, cupping my face in one hand as he slid the other one under my blouse. I felt my heart skip, felt a pleasant pounding in my neck, as blood rushed to more sensitive spots. He ran his fingers through my hair, then unbuttoned my blouse with his free hand, still kissing and licking me, dipping his head to my cleavage and lightly darting his tongue in and out.

I sat up slightly, reaching behind me with one hand, popping my bra strap apart in one liquid movement, releasing my breasts for him. He gasped, an automatic response, his lips moist as he bent to take my nipples in his mouth, one by one. I moaned, pulling his head closer, as he ran his tongue over the sensitive skin, teasing with his teeth.

Finally, he reached for my pants, and I scrambled to undo his belt. Suddenly, he was picking me up—like I weighed nothing—carrying me down the hall, as he quickly tore at a condom wrapper with his teeth, pulled out the slippery rubber circle and put it on, before we even made it to the bedroom. Just before he gently slid me to the bed, he slid himself inside of me, rock hard to my warm softness, and I felt the comforting memory of thoughtless physical ecstasy envelope me in its forgiving embrace.

* * * *

“Okay, confess, where did you learn that nifty trick with the condom wrapper?” I asked, trailing a finger down the middle of his soft-fur chest hairs.

“Hmm?” he asked, in fake-confusion.

I smacked him lightly on his chest, “You know what I mean, you big faker. Which saucy coed taught you that in college?”

“Ha. No college, mechanics’ school. And the sauciest classmate there was this big, fat hairy guy who always had Big Mac sauce stuck on his beard.”

“Eww,” I said, scrunching my nose in disgust, “thanks for the terrifying visual.”

“Trust me, seeing it is
much
worse.”

“Okay, so where, then?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Try me.”

He looked at me in mock disappointment, shaking his head. “All right. You asked for it. I learned it from my cousin, Raul.”

I pushed back from him in shock, pulling the sheet over my naked breasts on the way.

“What the hell?” I said, trying to swim backwards on the mattress.

Laughing, he said, “I told you—and it’s not what you think.”

“Well, thank God for
that
!” I said, still a little freaked out by the thought of Esteban and his cousin doing…
oh, never mind, for God’s sake
.

“He told me his trick for getting a condom on without the chick having a chance to stop it. He learned it from his dad, my uncle. We’re pretty damn fertile, the men in our family. So, it’s a good trick to know to protect against any women with, let’s say, ‘other motives’ in mind.”

“Hmm. Good to know. So, note to self: remember to take my birth control pill and don’t be offended by male cousins teaching my lover superfast, sneaky ways to put on condoms.”

Chuckling again, he slid his feet off the bed, completely naked and unconcerned about it.
Well, look at him for Christ’s sake, no wonder—he’s gorgeous with clothes and without. Hell, he makes clothes seem like a ridiculous luxury for fat losers.

“I guess that means you’re ready to take off running out of the house, as soon as I got to the bathroom?”

It was my turn to chuckle. “Not if that means I have to run out of here naked. Unlike
some
people—no names mentioned—I feel a little self-conscious when I’m in the buff.”

“Why do they call it that?”

“What?”

“Why do they say ‘in the buff’? I mean, that doesn’t even make sense, does it?”

I started searching the floor for my clothes.
What is it with sex and throwing clothes all over the place? Ah! There we go…

Pulling my pants and underwear off the floor—I hated even thinking the word ‘panties’, it always seemed so weird, like ‘5-year-old girl dressed like a princess’ kind of weird—I was already regretting taking the top half of my clothes off in the living room.
Great, now I just get to parade around here like some cocky lifeguard dude?

“In the buff? Uh, I really don’t know
why
the hell they call it that. For some reason, I think it’s a color or something.”

“Well, that makes sense. Maybe we should Google it.”

“Ha-ha, very funny. Google it. Five years ago if someone said that to me, I’d be accusing them of sexual harassment.”

“It does sound kind of nasty, doesn’t it?” he shook his head, chuckling. And, thank goodness, he was finally pulling clothes on, a pair of basketball shorts and a tank top.
Yum
, I thought,
he even makes the nickname ‘wife beater’ seem like it’s almost okay, with his golden skin and soft, curly chest hair against that white cotton.

Trying to distract myself, I crouched on the floor, like I was looking for a sock, hoping he would just go in the other room, already. When I heard the toilet flush, I breathed easier, clutching my clothes and scurrying back out to the living room.

“So, are you gonna tell me about this Marcus guy, or what?” he called to me from the bathroom.

Scrambling to refasten my bra before he came back out, I yelled, “Yeah, sure!” Finally managing to hook it, I turned the bra around on my chest, slid my arms in and repositioned my ‘girls’ back in the cups, moving my arms to make sure it felt right. Satisfied, I reached for my shirt, and heard, “Need some help?”

Shit. How’d he get out here so fast?

He slowly pulled the shirt from my hand, helping me ease my arms back into it, one at a time. Then he pulled the panels together, sliding each button into its respective hole, with his strong hands working just under my chin.

“Thank you,” I said, feeling my pulse quicken again.

“You’re very welcome,” he murmured, kissing me again. I felt my body go from barely-warm embers to raging inferno in just a few seconds. My skin was tingling, mind racing, as I remembered the feel of his muscled back under my hands, as he moved on top of me, in me. Finally, a few agonizingly sensual minutes later, he pulled back again, smoothing my shirt until it was flat.

I cleared my throat, raked my fingers through my hair, and tucked my blouse into my pants as he picked up the tea glasses.

“Whoops,” he said, looking at the little puddle on the floor. “I’ll get a towel. You still thirsty?”

“Yeah,” I said, snatching one shoe off the floor, while visually searching for the other one.
There! Under the recliner, where it all started…