I can almost feel the heat from her against me as I imagine pulling her close, my lips already on her neck, breathing her in.
The hand around my cock grips tight and moves fast.
Too fast for the slow, burning, sensual thought of her in my mind.
The scene jumps, and suddenly it’s her hand wrapped around me and my hips thrusting into her fist.
“I want you so bad,” I whisper both in and out of my daydream, and I strain to hear her tell me she wants me too.
My breath is ragged in my own ears as I can feel it coming. Me. Coming.
“Faster,” I tell her in my head. And she complies, her eyes on mine as I feel my body fall over the edge.
“Oh, fuck. Fuck.” I groan as I come. My eyes never leaving hers, making sure she knows it’s her that makes me feel this way.
My head falls back onto the pillow, dizzy.
God, I want her.
I want all of her.
All of that sweet, sunshiny, sexy, effervescent, creative body and mind that makes her her.
For all of the ways she makes me me.
***
The hallway light is on when I get up to get a glass of water; there’s a flash of a figure running between the kitchen and my mother’s bedroom.
“Oh, Xavier! Thank god, you’re awake. I have to go into work, Peggy’s sick, so I’m taking her shift. I’m so tired but you know I have to take it.” She dabs at her face with a sponge covered with something like putty to hide her tired eyes. My heart twinges for her, but also for myself.
“Mom, I’ve got plans today.”
“Honey, I don’t have time to discuss this. I need you to take care of the boys. Okay?”
I feel my fists curl into a ball. But I know it’s not her I’m mad at. She doesn’t deserve me making her feel even worse.
“Yeah, ok. Don’t worry about it. I’ll… I’ll take them to the park or something.”
“Oh, thank you! I promised them something fun this weekend, they’d love that.”
“I’ll think of something,” I nod, even while my heart sinks.
She throws me a tired wave over her shoulder as she disappears out the backdoor.
“Has mommy gone to work again?” Brian asks, startling me. He looks so small, hidden in the shadows, rubbing his eyes as he stands in his pajamas.
“Yeah, buddy.” I go over and give his shoulder a squeeze.
“But she said she was goi-…”
“She couldn’t help it. We’ll do something fun today, okay? How ’bout we eat cereal from the box and watch some cartoons?”
His face lights up. “Without the twins?”
“What twins?” I answer and give him a wink and he giggles.
By nine a. m., all three boys are up, breakfasted, dressed, but nowhere near ready to leave the house. I’m not sure what it is, but something about needing to leave the house at a certain time seems to trigger their bladders. By the time the backdoor swings closed behind us, it’s almost ten o’clock.
“Fuck,” I curse under my breath, checking my watch, one hand on each twin as I yell at Brian every fifteen seconds to stay close as we head to the basketball court.
“You said a bad word,” Michael, the younger twin points out.
“No, I didn’t.” Sometimes it’s hard to refrain when they’re around.
“You said ‘fut’ I heard you,” he insists.
“Fine, I said ‘fut.’ Don’t tell anyone.”
“What will you give me?” he asks, and I realize four-year-olds don’t get enough credit for being the master manipulators they are.
“Well, how ’bout I let you say ‘fut’ one more time, but you can’t tell Mom.”
He thinks about for a moment, and then nods.
“Fut!” he yells, beaming proudly at both winning the negotiation and getting to curse without repercussion.
“Now, no more, okay? Mom doesn’t like us saying naughty words. That was the deal.”
He nods, willing to respect the sanctity of his given word.
“Where are we going, Xavier?” Hamish, the youngest of us all, asks.
“You’ll see. Now hurry up.”
As we half-walk, half-run through the abandoned school yard, I pray that she hasn’t left. She’s becoming like air. And I’m addicted to the high that breathing her gives me.
I spot the back of her skirt billowing in the wind as we round the corner and into the basketball court, and the tension I didn’t know I was holding in my chest relaxes.
“Oooh, are we going to play basketball?” Brian shouts.
“Um, yup. You want me to teach you, so here we are,” I say, half-truth that it is.
“YAY!” The three of them cheer. The sound of their voices drifts across the court and she turns around, scissors and glue gun in hand.
“Hey! I didn’t know if you were going to make it!” she says as we walk up to her.
“Sorry I’m late. I had to…” I gesture my head to the six eyes staring at her unblinking. “Um, guys, this is my friend, Malynda.”
“Hey guys! Nice to meet you!” She shoots them all one of her 1000-watt smiles.
For once in their lives, they’re completely mute. I don’t blame them. I was like that for the first week of knowing her.
“Guys! Stop staring! Why don’t you go over to that hoop and start throwing the ball around and I’ll be right there,” I urge.
They stare at her for another moment, before Brian finally regains function of his brain and breaks the silence by bouncing the ball. In an instant they’re off and running, one in each direction, yelling each other’s names.
“Sorry,” I say again, shrugging, not wanting to add more to the explanation of why I have three in tow today.
“Aw, shush. Don’t worry, I was actually here early anyway, I couldn’t sleep. I laid awake thinking about what I wanted to add.”
I laid awake in bed thinking of you stroking me, I wanted to say, but don’t.
“Okay, well, I’ll be here. Keeping guard. And keeping them alive. You create.”
She just gives me a bright smile in response.