DAMAGED - A Bad Boy Romance (80 page)

The trouble with losing your virginity is that you can only do it once. The trouble with fantasies is that they’re not real. And the trouble with bad boys is that they’re …well, they’re bad.

I went to my dorm room that evening and secretly had to admit to myself that things just weren’t right. That maybe it was me who was the bad guy in this story. That first night on the futon, Jared wasn’t a real person to me, I’ll admit it. He was my ticket out of my “issues”, out of my stuffy ideas abut sex and my unhealthy home life and my toxic, religious upbringing. He was a catalyst, the same one that had released my aunt from of her crazy red chrysalis and now had worked on me, sparking some fierce repressed rebellion in me and letting loose a new beast entirely.

That night, the blood of something old and primal smeared on my belly like a dangerous idea, I had changed. Jared has the eerie talent of being able to reach deep into people and pull out their real desires, pull away their layers and reveal what’s really underneath. He was a “toy boy”, sure, but he was also something like a sexual magician, his irrepressible energy and ridiculous abs conjuring ordinary people into caricatures of themselves.

How could I deny him his talent? How could I be jealous? My aunt had move don fairly quickly and was happy now, so where was the harm? He had been taking money from wealthy, burnt out women for years, and what he gave them went far, far deeper than a quick fuck in their laundry rooms before their husbands came home. It was an unspoken understanding between us. We were an unlikely pair, I knew it, but he tolerated my warped sexuality and I tolerated his …line of work.

Jared had fucked me so hard he seemed to have melted melt my brain – and I was left now with a strange new imprint, a permanent glitch in me that compelled me to live out the same scene again and again. I was stuck as the naughty virgin asking for it, and I couldn’t get out. And he was stuck being my bad boy and I would rather he squeeze my throat than hold my hand.

Now I was a little older, and living alone where my mother would never catch me in the act, and I was running out of space to put new tattoos, and worse, running out of people who cared.

The trouble with having wild fantasies like mine is that sometimes, they come true.

Jared and I didn’t see each other for another year at least.

In hindsight, we were both pretty immature. My aunt had moved to Costa Rica to give my mom something to stress about. Perhaps she’ll get married there to some guy, who knows. We adopted Buttons, who got fat. I finished my degree, although just barely, and, my old good girl image well and truly fouled, I began to relax a little.

I thought of Jared often, how we were ridiculous opposites of each other, how all that weirdness that had happened in his dark little apartment was like the meeting of matter and antimatter, cat and dog, good girl and bad boy.

But opposites sometimes cancel each other out. We had seen to the end of that game and didn’t know what more to do with each other, and so we drifted, I guess. I wondered whether wealthy, sexually frustrated women were still paying his secret way through college, or whether he still kept that same little stash under his futon, like he always did. I went to therapy for the beginnings of an eating disorder. My mother and I threw plates on the floor and I told her I was never going back to church. Mostly, life moved on.

Of course, by now, you can guess that that wasn’t quite the whole story, and that him and I had unfinished business to tend to. That business resolved itself one rainy afternoon, when I bumped into him outside a supermarket. It was unmistakable -  I could recognize his body, his gait, anywhere.

“Mel? Oh my god is that really you?”

I spun round to look square into his face, still as youthful as ever, only with a quieter knowing sparkle in it instead of the naughtiness I had remembered. He was different somehow, but only a little. He still had that same audacity that comes with wearing loungewear in public, that cockiness that comes from an effortlessly buff body, that cheeky sideways grin.

Without thinking, I flung my arms around him and gave him a big, broad hug. He was surprised, even laughed a little. It felt easier, so much easier, to just touch him and be close to him than to say words, which I had none of just at that particular moment. He laughed again at me struggling to find something to say, and so I leant in and hugged him again, this time laughing too.

He had finished his degree, he told me, and had recently landed a job he had been interviewing heavily for the past few months. Things were looking up for him. He was going to move, next month, to a new city, and start a new life there. He seemed so happy.

“It was good luck that I bumped into you then!” I said, and we both went a little sad.

He had moved out of his dingy apartment, and, naturally, had long parted with that ugly black futon, the altar on which I had sacrificed all my weird sexual hang-ups. Over and over again. We chatted, and then, just like dusting the cobwebs off an old path we had cut a long time ago, I found myself all at once sitting with him at his place, which he proudly showed off. His decorating skills had certainly improved.

And he was still cute.
Damn
cute. I remembered the last time we saw each other, the nasty words. I had often felt pangs of guilt whenever I thought how I must have hurt him, how I judged him for letting others use him – all the while using him myself. How after everything, he wasn’t that much older than me, it had just
felt
like it. Caught up in my own childish drama, I didn’t notice his own quiet ambitions, how lonely he must have felt, how harsh my judgment must have seemed.

He opened a little carved cupboard beside him and extracted a small, familiar box, which he waggled my direction. The old stash.

“What do you say, for old time’s sake?” he said, pulling out a lighter, and some papers.

I laughed. “Some things never change,” I said, but the second I did, I felt sad. Lots of things
had
changed. In some ways, he was the cute stud I had met in my hapless aunt’s kitchen so many eons ago; in other ways, I barely recognized him now. I felt childish around him. Again.

“We had some good times, didn’t we?” he said, and to my surprise, my face flushed hot and I realized I was probably blushing.

“Some very good times,” I said quietly.

Fearing I might burst into tears and dissolve into a blob of inconvenient emotions, I smiled and tried to lighten the mood a little.

“You were the bad boy, remember?”

“Yeah and you were the good girl,” he laughed, putting scare quotes around the “good”.

“God, we were both so messed up.”

“Mostly you,” he said.

“Shut up!”

“Seriously you were a royal pain in the ass.”

“I know.”

“Hey Jared I’m sorry, I’m really sorry I said all the things I did that day, I was just being an idiot, I didn’t mean what I said at all, it’s just that I was -”

Oh here we go. The inconvenient emotions were coming out regardless. But he was shushing me, reaching over a friendly hand to rest over mine.

“Hey, don’t apologize, please. If anything, it was I. I was in a bad place. We were quite the bad influence on each other, weren’t we?”

I laughed.

“And holy hell were you
obsessed
about me taking your virginity,” he continued, and I hid my face, giggling.

“Oh God, I’m so sorry, I’m cringing to think of it all now …can’t we just chalk it up to my strict upbringing and not talk about it? You weren’t an angel either you know…”

His expression changed a little and I wondered if I had hurt him again. I couldn’t help asking, “Well, do you still, you know…?”

He put the box firmly on the table and fixed hard eyes on mine.

“No” he said simply, a small vein twitching in his jaw. I thought he was about to launch into an explanation, tell me that he had hit rock bottom, that he had learnt his lesson or something, found Jesus, won the lotto, met a girl, anything really. But he simply said “no” and kept looking at me, and I sensed that this was the only answer I was getting. Shame for me had only been a game. Something sexy to toy with. But I realized then, staring at his young face, how much pride there was in him, how different his demons were to mine.

I kissed him quickly, once, and something like happiness flickered in the corners of his mouth so I kissed him again, this time more deeply. His lips were as smooth and yielding as ever, and his tongue as soft and luscious as I remembered. We smiled tenderly at one another for a moment. With some hesitation I touched his arm, the little hairs there rising up to meet my fingertips.

“I’m kind of sad you’re going, to be honest.”

“Me too,” he said.

I don’t know how it happened, but his tongue was in my mouth again, and we kissed slowly and with delicate purpose, feeling out one another as though we hadn’t already done it so thoroughly so long ago. We had both been worn a little by life, humbled a little, with our strange edges rubbed off, but I was thrilled to find that same boyish deliciousness in him still, that same elasticity in his movements, the way we could lap each other up, how his tongue would respond so swiftly to mine.

The same naughty thrill rushed all through my body, but this time it felt more naked, unencumbered with my …well, “issues”. Back then, I had
made
him manhandle me; he had thrown my young body around, squeezed my wrists, bruised my hips. I had egged him on, thinking that more was better, always more. But now, with his subtle, inquisitive tongue, it felt like we were doing something that even we were too afraid to do back then.

It seemed as though the more softly his lips touched mine, the more intensely my body pulsed and ached; the more slight the delicate caresses on my wrists and forearms, the deeper the pining in the rest of me grew. He sensed this too, it seemed, judging by the tender, almost pained expression he had as he stroked my arm, trying to discover if I, too, was the same.

Our clothes came off easily. First him, then me, then him again, then me again, until we were naked as the good lord made us, bare as Adam and Eve before the fall, only not quite so innocent. His caresses continued, flowing smoothly all over my whole body, missing nothing, lavishing warmth and attention onto each part of me. Had we done this before? Why not?

His lips and tongue now followed where his hands had traced, and my skin thrummed and prickled in response. He lay the full length of his nude body against mine, the heat of our flesh so surprising I smiled into the new kiss he was giving me. His warm dick was between us, hardening. Cradling my body in his hands, I undulated up into him, stroking the length of his shaft with my belly, kissing every part of him with every part of me. Then, with no force, and no resistance, the thick head of his cock found its way to my slit and sunk into me slowly, and easily. I exhaled loudly, this single thrust melting away all my doubt, my body melting onto him and swallowing him with something that felt like gratitude. He mumbled something into my ear, both hands cupping each of my breasts, and I curled my hips up to pull him more fully into me.

The moment was swollen, and slow. His movements were almost graceful, hips describing big, round, subdued shapes and the weight of his strong body bearing down on my thighs, pressing them open. Each movement was so precise, so exquisitely tuned into every little breath and moan, that it wasn’t long before I was quivering right on the precipice of a great, towering orgasm.

To my delight, he skillfully kept me lingering there, pushing my body right to the edge and pulling back slightly, letting me relish the moment, so full and so close to splitting right open. It was quiet, fragile fucking, and at its apex, I sat twitching round his hard body, his heavy dick stirring me into a frenzy, teasing me, leading me down thick, syrupy paths of pleasure. He detected my pussy whispering round him, drew me closer to him.

“Come,” he whispered.

I moaned, and he pushed once more, his fullness stretching me. Under his comforting weight, I whimpered and came, hard, crying out as deep thundering strokes moved through me. He smiled down at me, taking in every quiver of my lips, every flash on my expression. With each ripple of my pussy, I pulled him further down with me, and eventually he gave in and came tumbling after me in an orgasm that made him grunt, and press down into me with his broad, manly hips.

I clung to him with my legs and anchored against his sweaty form. We both giggled. He stroked a piece of wild hair from my face and smiled that sideways smile at me.

Ladies and gentlemen: it was my first time. I had fucked Jared millions of times before. But this time we had done something else. Something both of us had never done before. With anyone.

My name is Melanie, and I’m a pretty good girl.

I have just one secret.

Judging from what a crazy mess the world is, and how awful most people are, I would rate I’m not doing too badly if I only have one.

My secret is that I have fallen in love, and I don’t know what to do, or how to do it.

“You don’t have to make a decision yet,” he was saying, his warm hand resting on my lower belly. He wanted me to move in with him, pack up everything and come run away and join him in his new life and his new job. Now was the perfect time, he said, and every time we met up again he had some new detail to add: I could help him decorate. They had this amazing park there I’d love. We could bring Buttons. It would be great.

“But just think about it?”

I hemmed and hawed, and played at thinking about it, but honestly my mind was already well made up. He sat up quickly and gave me a more serious look.

“Mel, I’m going to show you something now, and it’s a secret, and you’d better promise not to tease me about it.”

I looked at him with new interest.

“A secret? I’m sure I know all
your
naughty secrets…” I said with a cheeky smile.

“No, I’m serious though. Promise you won’t judge me?”

“Well just how bad is it?”

“It’s …it’s kind of bad …just promise you won’t be mean if I show you?”

I was curious now. I sat up as well. What dirty secrets didn’t I know about? Didn’t we know
everything
about each other by this point? Was he more of a “bad boy” than I had thought?

“Yes ok, show me.”

He pulled out his iPad and started to swipe. Glossy images whizzed by on the screen. I peered over, intrigued. He took a deep breath and then turned the screen around to face me. A Pinterest board. With dozens of colorful pins of home décor. Pages and pages and pages of tasteful shabby chic quilts, Scandinavian style furniture, light fittings, Japanese crockery.

“What’s …what’s this?” I asked.

“It’s my Pinterest account. This is my ‘Home’ board. Come and live with me. Come and live with me and we’ll make a house that looks like just this.”

I burst out laughing.

“That’s very,
very
bad of you!” I giggled, swiping through the pages, barely believing my eyes.

“Well, will you come?” he said again, boyish puppy eyes staring at me.

It was naughty, I know, but something made me rest my hand over his, and trace his fingers downwards, where I was still slick.

“Sure, but you’ll have to convince me first,” I said and, you know, we both still knew how to play that game.

- THE END -

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