I turn to him angrily. “If you are home why is there a glass force-field around you?”
His chest rises and falls in anger.
“I can’t break through it, I try and try and your heart is so closed up that you won’t let me in at all … and I can’t fucking handle this ambivalence anymore. You don’t even know what you want!”
“I want you,” he whispers as his eyes hold mine.
I shake my head angrily. “Well start acting like it. I can’t deal with walking on eggshells anymore, Joshua. Make your decision. I have done my time for leaving you, my punishment is over. Let me in!” I cry.
He grabs me roughly and brings his lips to mine. “I want you,” he whispers as his tongue gently swipes through my lips. My eyes close as my hand comes around to the back of his head.
“Prove it,” I whisper into his mouth.
His dark eyes drop to my short red dress and he grabs the front seam and effortlessly rips it apart. I gasp at the violence of the act. I stand before him in my underwear, vulnerable and half naked.
“Don’t you ever tell me I don’t want you,” he growls. “It’s a damn need. A fucking obsession.” He grips my hair in his hands. “I don’t know how to control it, it controls me. I have a need to be so deep inside you that’s it’s all I can think about.”
He bites my neck hard and I cry out in pain as he rips my underpants off, turns me and bends me over the dining table in one motion. His fingers plough through my weeping flesh from behind and my eyes close in reverence. He brings his body over mine as his fingers pump in and out of me. This is what I need, to be taken so hard that I can’t remember any of the shit that goes on between us. He lifts my right leg onto the table to fully open me to his onslaught and I cry out as I am gripped with the sharp sting of his possession. He lines his throbbing length up and pushes into me as he growls and I sigh in relief. His hands splay onto my shoulders as he rips my body back onto his. Back … forward … back he pulls me roughly. I feel him harden and I know he’s close, the front of my leg is hitting the table so hard I know I will be bruised tomorrow and I don’t give a damn. Bring it on … I need this.
“I want you.” He rips into me. “I need you.” He growls as again he slams me back onto his length. I drop my head to the table to try and deal with the punishing rhythm.
“Come Natasha,” he yells. “Make me come … Squeeze my cock with that beautiful tight cunt of yours.”
And I fall, so deep into ecstasy … where I have never been before that my voice is stolen as my body contracts and I cry out silently. One … two … three pumps and I feel the telling jerk as his body empties itself into mine. We fall onto the table in a heap as we both gasp for air. His lips rest on the back of my neck and I smile as he kisses the side of my face.
I don’t know what just happened between us, but I think I found a crack in the glass.
My eyes open sleepily to the faint sound of my phone ringing and then I hear Joshua’s phone ringing. We both sit up immediately. Dear god, what’s happened?
I pick up my phone and see Mum’s name and the time, 4 am, and my stomach tightens Oh no.
Joshua answers his phone and walks into the lounge room and I sit on my bed.
“Hi Mum,” I whisper through the lump in my throat.
“She’s gone, beautiful girl,” she sighs through her tears.
Pain lances through me. “Where are you?” I whisper as my eyes close.
“I’m at the hospital, love.”
“I’m on my way.” I hang up as the tears start to fall.
Joshua walks back into the room and his haunted eyes meet mine. I burst into full- blown sobs as he sits next to me on the bed and I fall into his arms.
“I’m sorry, baby,” he whispers into the top of my head.
“I’m sorry too Josh.”
I sob out loud as the pain of the finality of the situation hits home.
My beautiful gran has gone and I will never see her again and it’s just not fair.
Death, what is it? What does it mean? And where do you go after you leave this life? It can’t be the end … can it? Is heaven wishful thinking? These questions have been running through my head and in my thoughts since Dad’s death and have once again been magnified.
I sit in the church in a daze. It’s been a week since Gran died and today we bury her. Bridget and I are on either side of Mum. She is inconsolable and sobbing uncontrollably.
I have cried more with this death than I did with Dad’s. I haven’t stopped actually. Where do the tears all come from? When Dad died I was in shock and couldn’t comprehend what had happened, but this time I know exactly what is going on. There are no drugs, no antidepressants and no guilt but still way too much hurt.
I sit and stare at the pastor through the blurry tears that fill my eyes. I have no notion of what he is talking about, my eyes are fixed on the coffin and the picture of Gran, sitting on the top surrounded by flowers. She looks happy … kind … loved.
I start to feel that pain in my throat that I get when I am trying to hold in hysteria and I look around the filled church. Mum, Robert , Margaret and Didge and I are in the front row and behind us are the Stanton boys. Joshua is sitting directly behind me and every now and then I feel his reassuring hand on my shoulder. Just having him here eases my pain. The service ends and I watch in horror as the Stanton boys, who are all in tears, rise and move to carry the coffin out to the hearse. The black suits, the black cars, the black day, it’s too much, and I put my head in my hands and weep.
I can’t handle any blacker, I need some light.
It’s Saturday and I am lying on my lounge feeling sorry for myself. Joshua has been fussing around me and desperately trying to cheer me up since the funeral. I know I should get up and do something but I honestly just don’t have any energy or motivation. Bridget scammed some cheap tickets to Hawaii through her work so Abbie and she are taking Mum there tomorrow night for some much needed respite for ten days. Mum deserves a break and I know she needs it. She hasn’t been away since she lost Dad. Joshua wanted me to go with them but I only just started my new job and I didn’t want to call in sick. Deep down though, the real reason is I didn’t want to leave Joshua. The reason he is in Australia is no longer here and he will no doubt be returning to America any time soon. I would have been a head case being away and not knowing if he will be here when I got home. He still hasn’t said anything about me returning with him and whether in fact we have a future together. I’m not asking. Something changed the other night … I think for the better. I finally cracked the glass force-field. For the first time he showed me emotion and even though it was anger … it was there and it was real. The Tatiana thing is stupidly playing on my mind. I know he didn’t tell me so I wouldn’t worry but the fact is he didn’t tell me and I feel like I’m going crazy with all this over- analysing. The puzzle isn’t fitting together.
“Can I get you something to eat, presh?” Joshua leans over me and kisses my face gently as he rearranges the blanket he has put over me.
I take his hand and smile at him. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For being here, it means a lot.” I smile. “Are you ok?” I ask.