It rained the day she knocked on his door

It rained the day she knocked on his door. A slow, soft summer rain. She wore red rubber boots and a cotton dress. Her hair hung in wet strands around her face. Eight days ago they had made love. He had called a few times since but she hadn’t answered. And now she stood in the rain outside his door. The sunbeams in her green eyes shot straight into his heart.

“Do you want to take a walk?” She twisted her hair around her fingers as she spoke.

When he hesitated, she smiled, showed her crooked left canine tooth.

“Or not?” She shrugged her shoulders and took a couple of steps away from him, turned and started to walk down the sidewalk. Her dark hair was wavy and spilled down her back. Even though she walked in big boots she moved gracefully. He rushed in, grabbed his keys and put his feet in his sneakers, then he headed after her.

At the corner he caught up to her. She didn’t acknowledge him but he could see how a quick smile spread across her face. They walked quietly. The rain, now more a mist in the air made all the colors vibrant. The flowers sparkled in red, yellow and blue. The grass was crayon green. Her skin golden, he could almost recall the smell of her, the taste of her.

“I like the rain,” she said and stopped next to him. “You know how people think that sunny weather is the same thing as beautiful weather. But isn’t it much more beautiful now?”

He nodded and reached for her hand. She didn’t pull it back but she didn’t squeeze his hand either.

“I called.”

“I know,” she said but didn’t look at him.

“Did I do something? Say something?”

She shook her head.

“No.” She looked down at the ground, moved her red rubber boots back and forth a few times. Nudged his foot.  Nudged  it again.  

Her dark hair was covered in a lattice of miniature drops. Tiny, transparent pearls.

“I needed to recuperate.”

“Recuperate?” He couldn’t help but chuckle, a very serious word in his opinion. She lifted her head, anger flared up for a second in her eyes and she pulled her hand out of his.

“Yes, recuperate.” She crossed her arms over her chest.

“From what?” Clearly he was missing something here.

She looked down at the ground again, moved her rubber boots but didn’t nudge his foot this time.

“I was thinking how strange it is that we met. How strange it is that you seem to know me so well. How strange it is that I can’t remember how my life was before I met you. And when we…” She lifted her head again and met his eyes. “ When we made love…” She stopped, bit down on her lip and looked to the side. An older man came walking on the sidewalk with his black Labrador. She was quiet until the man had passed and walked around the corner.  “You know he died, right?”

He did know, everybody knew that her husband had died. Withered away from cancer a few years ago.

“I know and I am sorry.”

She started to walk again and he followed, when they came to the corner she stopped under the big oak tree. Heavy drops came down from the branches. Dropped on his head, on her face. She tilted her head backwards and opened her mouth. Caught a drop and swallowed.

“I had to be so strong,” she said with her head still tiled backwards, “I had to take care of him and when he died I broke. Into thousands of pieces. I couldn’t even get up in the morning. I was so tired. I slept. For weeks that was the only thing I did. And then I cried.”

He wanted to reach out and touch her, but he didn’t know where. She looked vulnerable, her neck exposed.  She rubbed her face and tilted her head forward again.

“But life in itself seems to have a strange power. One day you notice something small. How a bee hovers over a flower or how the water feels against your skin in the shower.  A reminder of…” She started to walk again.

“A reminder of what?”

“That everything is beautiful. And when you realize that you explode inside.”

The sun started to break through the clouds, the ground gave off steam and she grabbed her hair with both hands and twisted it to squeeze out the water.

“That realization makes you feel alive and when you feel alive you  start to heal. But some things are harder to heal. “

She turned her face towards the sun. Stood still with her eyes closed. Her eyelids shuddered and he thought she would cry. But she didn’t.

“Do you want to go and get an ice cream?”

“I didn’t bring any money,” he said and felt like a fool. “I can go and get some if you want or…,”he hesitated. “I have ice cream at home.”

“Ok,” she said and turned on the spot.

 

She left her rubber boots outside his door and made wet footprints on his floor. She moved slowly around in his apartment as he opened the freezer and scooped ice cream into two bowls. He had invited her several times but she had never accepted the invitation before.  She got up on her tippy toes and looked at the photos he had arranged all over a wall.

“Did you take all these?”

“Yes, top left is the first one I ever developed myself and the bottom right is the last one.”

She bent down and looked at the picture at the bottom right.

“That is me!” she said surprised and turned to look at him.

“Yeah, when we went to the beach that day in May.”

She nodded and smiled.

Every time he had run by her house in March and April he had seen her digging in the dirt or carrying heavy bags of manure or peat moss. One day he stopped by her fence and asked if she needed help. She had smiled brightly, showed her crooked left canine tooth and said “yes”. When April turned into May and her garden was finally done he had asked her out. First for dinner, she said no. Then to a movie, she said no. Then for coffee, she said no. His friends told him to go after someone else. A widow had too much baggage. His mother had said he should be careful.  He kept asking and eventually she had said she wanted to go to the beach and they had gone. It was a windy day and the ocean was not much more than fifty degrees. They had a great day and came home with windburns and sand everywhere.  After that day they had gone to every forest or beach within two hours of driving. She never spoke of her dead husband and he never asked. And then they had made love. A hot humid night in June. 

She sat down on his couch, pulled her legs up under her dress and balanced the ice cream bowl on top of her knees.

“After we made love I felt like I was an inch away from falling in love with you. It scared me to death.”

She blushed suddenly and looked down into her ice cream.

“Scared me to death. What a crude choice of words,” she said quietly, her cheeks flushed.

He took a spoonful of the ice cream; let it melt slowly on his tongue. Mulled over her words.

“Why did it scare you?”

She looked out the window, chopped her ice cream into small pieces.

“Because love means attachment and when you are attached…” Her voice faded and she took some ice cream and looked at him. “I guess this is the last thing that needs to heal. Me daring to feel attached again.”

He looked away from her face, looked out the window and tried hard not to think of this as a rejection.  The clouds had grown thicker and darker again, it would soon start to rain.

“So,” he said slowly, “what do you want to do?”

She sat quietly, it started to rain, light at first then heavier. They surely needed the rain; it had been a dry and hot June. He felt something nudging his thigh, he looked down. Her foot had moved close to his leg and she was gently poking him with her toes. 

“Can we go slow?” Her voice gentle and soft. “So I have time to heal as we go along?”

His heart did a summersault. She didn’t reject him. She didn’t reject him! He started to smile.

“Yes, of course! As slow as you want.”

It rained the day she knocked on his door. A slow, soft summer rain. She wore red rubber boots and a cotton dress. Her hair hung in wet strands around her face. When she left the moon hung heavy in the clear sky.

 

 

Leah and Max (Sequal to The Blowjob)

Sweaty palms, the nerves in her stomach twitching, anxiously pacing on the sidewalk. She took a deep breath in through her nose and let it out through her mouth. The June night was warm but not yet humid. People were drifting down the avenue; the water was calm and covered in bronze scales from the evening sun.

Max had flown in today and now they were meeting. Finally!

She straightened her dress for the hundredth time and checked the time again. She was fifteen minutes early. Staying  at home for any longer had been impossible. Her nerves had forced her out.

They had talked all through the holidays, grey January and milder February. They had talked about sex, they had talked about politics, they had talked about children, they had talked about the past and the future. They agreed, they shared everything. He made her inside bubble, her soul long, her mind dream and her heart quiver. But every time she had brought up the concept of meeting again he had one excuse or another. Not enough money, no vacation days, grandparents sick. Eventually she had gotten so tired of it she wanted to holler.  One morning in early March she had woken up with a steel cold will.  She had written an email stating she would not talk to him again until he had made plans to see her. 

 That first day she waited impatiently, thought he would write back. Tell her that he was on his way. But nothing! He could of course have fallen ill or had an accident and eventually she sent a text asking if he was ok and if he had received her email.  He was fine and yes he had received her email. But no promise, no comment on the content. And she had gotten furious! Sat and stared at the text, her blood boiling, her cheeks flushed. And then it sunk in, the notion that this was not good for her. She was over her head invested in this man. He was not much more real than a character in a book or in a movie.  She deleted the text and slammed down the phone on her desk. That night she cried herself to sleep, exhausted from tense nerves and deflated hope.

The first few days she thought he would contact her but he didn’t. Every time she got a text message she jumped, she checked her emails constantly and waited and waited. She had gotten so addicted to his time, his presence that she had withdrawal symptoms, nervous, irritable, hard to sleep. And she cried out of anger, grief and longing.

 After a week she told herself she would never hear from him again and then suddenly the whole world was filled with dark haired, slender men. She went to Applebee’s with Jodi and the baby and all the waiters looked the same. Dark hair and beautiful hazel eyes. As Jodi nursed the baby, Leah talked and talked and talked about Max. When there were no more words left and the baby was already sleeping in the car seat Jodi had said very certain and on the smug side; “If he wants you he will come back. I think you are doing the right thing; this is the only way to know if you actually mean something. If he can stop talking to you and not miss you then it was all a game.”

“I know,” she had said and her whole inside had turned into a knot.

Eventually she relaxed; the world became less filled with dark haired men. She didn’t jump every time she got a text, she stopped checking her emails obsessively and she could go long periods without thinking about Max.

A Friday night in early April, the rain was drumming against her roof.  She was curled up on the couch watching “The Lord of the Rings” when her phone beeped.

“Max”

“Do you still want me to come?”

Dumbfounded, she held the phone in her hand. Started to write a sarcastic text message but stopped and put down the phone. Four weeks ago she would have jumped with joy but now she was wary. Didn’t know what to say. Didn’t know how to respond. Picked up her phone again and looked at the question.  Her heart quivered slightly. Slowly she wrote; I have to think about it. She pressed send and waited. Saw the little black and grey dots moving, showing that Max wrote something back to her.

“Sure, I understand. Take your time.”

Then she turned off the phone and tried to focus on the movie. No point! Her heart quivered again. Stronger this time.

“I won’t answer him today. I won’t,” she mumbled to herself as she turned up the sound on the TV and took a handful of popcorn. But her eyes moved over to the phone next to her.

After the movie she went to bed, left the phone by the TV, still turned off. Rolled around in bed for two hours before she got up and turned on the phone. He was probably still awake even though it had passed midnight. He had a tendency to stay up late and sleep little.

“What took you so long?”

Pressed send and waited, the little black and grey dots moved again.

“Pure stubborn stupidity.”

She tried hard no to let down her defense but it melted as fast as an ice cream in the hands of a toddler.

“Fuck!”

The battle was lost.

 

But this time around she was wiser, more careful, reined in her heart before she lost herself. Didn’t hunt him, didn’t seek his attention even though she wanted to. Let him set the pace, let him have his space. 

 

The sun was about to set when she saw him coming down the street. He wore a white dress shirt and beige khakis.  Her teeth chattered and her stomach turned upside down.  He stopped a few yards away and looked at her. Stood still for a moment and then smiled at her. Friendly. Charming. Wicked. He walked up to her and gave her a kiss on the cheek but she put her arms around his body and held on tight.

“I am not done yet,” she said as he tried to let go and he laughed quietly into her hair. When she let go she could tell that he felt it as much as her. The affectionate desire.

She didn’t eat much, more occupied with watching him carefully as he ate. Pictures are one thing but to actually sit like this with him within reach was marvelous. The few hours they had shared more than six months ago had faded as they had shared so much more in letters and words. After dinner, whatever they had eaten didn’t really matter, they started to walk slowly up the street. Closer and closer until their hands touched and he took her hand in his. She was all grown up but the excitement was the same as when she was 16 and her first boyfriend had held her hand for the first time.

They ended up outside his hotel and when he asked her if she wanted to come up she said yes.  In the hallway outside his room, he pulled on her hand so she stood in front of him.

“Do you want to make out here or do you want to do it in my room?”

She had to laugh but then she stopped and put a hand around his neck. Pulled him so close she could whisper into his ear.

“We can start here but I want to finish in your room.”

His mouth tasted of beer, his hair was thick under her hands and he smelled delicious. Every kiss, every touch made the hot honey spread through her body.  He managed to unlock the door as they kissed and they almost toppled over as he pushed the door open. His hands were under the dress, caressed her ass, her thighs and the lower part of her back. She unbuttoned his shirt; put her nose, her tongue, and her fingers against his skin. Smelled him, tasted him, felt him. The honey turned to lead in her groin. Vibrated, resonated through her body. Everything turned into sizzling slippery.

She put her hand down his pants. Hot silk under her hand, pulsating. He moaned in her ear and the sound multiplied the sizzles inside her.  She pulled the dress over her head and unzipped his pants. Both stood half naked, panting, looking.

“Come,” she said and took his hand in hers and led him over to the bed.

Finally, he was inside of her and it was good. Good! Good! All so good! No hesitation. Two puzzle pieces. A perfect match. Fit like a glove. Never want it to end. Please! Don’t want it to ever end.

Afterwards, she spread her arms out like wings on the bed. Felt totally satisfied, totally content. She sighed deeply and crawled next to his naked body. Rubbed her face against his neck, kissed his shoulder, put an arm across his chest.

“Mmmm,” he said and pulled her close. Both of them yawned and Leah felt  her eyes get heavier and heavier.

When she woke up many hours later Max had put the blanket over them. He moved a little and she realized he was awake.

“I am parched,” he said and got out of the bed, turned on bedside light, grabbed the water bottle and drank from it. She looked at his slender body and sighed again.

“You are beautiful.”

At first he looked surprised at her words but then pleased, he handed the bottle to her and she drank several gulps.

“I still wonder if that magic mouth will get me off,” he said with a grin.

She started to laugh and water sprayed out of her mouth. When she had calmed down she patted the bed.

“Come here and I will prove it to you.”

He lay down again. She started with his neck, nibbled, kissed and licked. Moved down his chest, his stomach. Put her hot breath on him. Licked his groin.

Guess who was right? She was right! It took some time but in the end she was right.