Page 44 of Just a Little Crush
“Why? I just don’t understand how it can feel as good for you as it does for me.”
“I can’t explain it, I just know I loved it.” She’s quiet for a moment, her breath still slowing back to normal. It matches the rhythm of her fingers stroking out at the base of my neck. How does something so simple feel so incredible?
“I think it’s that thing of feeling pleasure and pain mixed together,” she continues, “but I know you’d never truly hurt me. And it doesn’t feel painful, it feels like a beautiful gift. It makes me feel powerful. In the moment, you’re in control, but it’s me who gives you that power. Does that make sense?”
“I’ve never thought of it that way.”
“You weren’t like this with Sophie or… other partners?” She strokes her hand up and down my back.
“Sophie was…” I don’t know how to explain this. I’ve tried to reconcile it so many times, it never adds up in my head. “We were young, we didn’t really talk much, we just hung out, more like friends than boyfriend and girlfriend. It took a long time for us to work up to it, but when we finally slept together, I loved it. I was basically obsessed. I couldn’t get enough, and I felt like that’s all I wanted to do. But then she broke up with me. It wasn’t because she wanted to go travelling, it was all my fault. She couldn’t get far enough away from me.”
“Oh Rennie, you can’t possibly still think that, given how things turned out.”
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“Sophie’s gay,” she says, “Or bi, maybe, I don’t know, but she married a woman in Australia. They have two kids. How do you not know this?”
“How doyouknow this?”
“Instagram.”
“Are you fucking serious?”
She tugs at my t-shirt. “Come up here. Come lie with me.”
I climb up and we lay on our sides facing each other. She strokes my chest and I brush my fingers through her hair, tucking it behind her back, tracing down the dip of her spine. This is a totally different kind of bliss, but one I love just as much as her making me come.
“I can’t presume to know how Sophie felt, but there’s nothing wrong with enjoying sex, or having a high sex drive. I thought you were a boring, vanilla gentleman, and that you’d never be a match for my filthmongering. But I promise you, everything you like is totally fine, as long as it’s with someone who likes it too. I’m sorry that Sophie didn’t. Not everyone is compatible, you said that yourself.”
“How are you so wise, little miss only ever been with one guy?”
“If you think I’ve only been with one guy you are deluded.”
“What? Who? When?” I frown. “Don’t answer that. Doesn’t matter, and none of my business.”
“I’ve had some crappy experiences too, you know. Jamie didn’t want to do half the stuff I wanted, he’d rather play video games than have sex, and it made me think there was something wrong with me.”
“Is that why you split up?” I ask.
“No,” she sighs. “We split up because he applied for uni and didn’t tell me. We were more like friends too. He kept us a secret from his mum and we dated fortwo years.”
“What a prick.”
“I overheard her at a party telling someone how she couldn’t wait for him to meet a nice girl, and it would get him away from“that awful girl who follows him around like a puppy”. She meant me.”
“Oh Bec, that’s horrible.” I pull her closer. “Thank fuck they moved, or I’d be round there now to have a word.”
“I know you would,” she smiles softly. “But what I wanted to say is that I’ve read enough romance novels to know there’s nothing wrong with me. Or you. You can be rough and gentle. You can take what you need while you give me what I want. You don’t have to be in control all the time. I can handle it if you let yourself go.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying to me, baby.”
“I don’t know what you want that you think is so bad. It’s probably more normal than you realise. That’s why I said we can help each other figure out what we like.”
“I don’t want to take advantage of you.” I whisper against her forehead.
Bec tips her head back to look up at me. “Does it feel like you are taking advantage of me?”
“No, it feels like I’m worshipping you somehow.”
