Sommer Marsden - Once Bitten Twice Shy

‘I can’t.’

‘How about you just think about it? He’s not Aaron, babe. No one ever will be. But he’s certainly not Kendall. Just from what you’re telling me, he’s not. And instead of looking for a safe fuck buddy like Brian…why not look for something real?’

August shook her head and took a sip of wine.

‘Just think about it.’

‘I have.’

‘Liar,’ Carley said. ‘Think about it for real. Think about maybe, just maybe giving him a chance.’

‘But Kendall…’ August knew it was wrong to take his haunting words to heart. That deep down all men were like him. But the fear was a very real thing. She knew it was irrational, but it didn’t change the panic she felt at offering to let a man she didn’t know slip into her life. And possibly into her bed.

‘What?’

‘Oh, the old adage, you know…once bitten, twice shy.’

Carley smiled. I also know the old adage ‘Everything you want is on the other side of fear.’

August stared at her.

‘What? Motivational day-of-the-month calendar, baby!’

August couldn’t help it. She laughed.

August finally ushered Carley out when she’d had enough pep talk.

‘You think about what I said,’ her friend said at the door. Her eyes suddenly serious, her voice soft.

‘I will.’ August would have said anything to regain her solitude.

‘For real. Not just to get me to shut up,’ Carley said. She threw her arms around August and hugged her tight. ‘Because, baby, if there’s anyone out there who deserves some happiness – finally – it’s you. Just don’t blow me off, OK? Really consider giving this guy a shot.’

August hugged her back. Tight. Then shut the door behind her friend and locked up for the night. She hadn’t seen Kendall in ages, but just talking about him had put her anxiety about him in the forefront of her mind. She shut off all the lights, checked the back door, put away the leftovers Carley had insisted on leaving behind. Then she poured herself a glass of wine and wandered upstairs. Once in pyjamas, she turned on a bad serial-killer movie and crawled into bed.

She watched the end of the movie, starring one of her favourite 80s actors, and then, yawning, shut off her bedroom light.

Splotches of streetlight wound their way through her Venetian blinds and she found, annoyingly, that she couldn’t sleep. Instead, she studied the white Rorschach blotches on her darkened walls. When sleep still evaded her, August sighed, and did the only thing she could think of that almost always let her fall asleep.

She slipped a hand down into her pyjama pants and stroked herself softly. Too many years, she thought, feeling only her own touch. She considered herself, secretly, a born-again virgin. She had once joked to Carley that she’d been rehymenated. Carley hadn’t found it nearly as amusing as August had. She’d been horrified and had launched into a two-week campaign for August to find a lover. Since then August had left those weirdly humorous thoughts unexpressed.

Her touch was gentle at first on her clit. In the beginning, she pictured, in her mind’s eye, Aaron. She always defaulted to picturing Aaron. Occasionally, she’d superimpose men she found attractive on TV. Sometimes she’d picture a random man she’d seen on the rare instances she went out. But tonight she found, parting her outer lips, stroking slowly over her clitoris, that Jack’s face kept popping into her mind. Jack on his knees, Jack holding her thighs as he licked her, Jack pushing his thick, nicked-up fingers deep inside her. Stroking her to orgasm.

‘You’re screwed,’ she whispered in the dark, thrusting two fingers inside herself, mimicking her mental images. She arched her hips, fingers thrusting, other hand stroking. She was getting close and she both welcomed it and wanted to shun it.

Release was often too much emotionally. It was a reminder that she was alone. And not just alone, she was lonely.

She bit her lip and let her hands take care of what needed to be taken care of. In her mind she saw him, Jack of the small creases around his brown eyes and the unruly dark hair, flipping her so she was beneath him. Kissing down her belly, lapping at her sex, before finally – so slowly that she thought she’d expire from the waiting – moving between her thighs and entering her.

She imagined that first thrust. The first time in six years she felt a man drive inside her. The first moment of being filled and taken.

She came, a half sob, half laugh flying off her lips. Outside a horn blared, a dog barked and she heard rain begin to hit the metal awning. She lay there, shuddering lightly, until the final contraction worked through her. Then she rolled to her side, shut her eyes and waited to sleep. She was just thinking that sleep would never come, now that she’d let this man into the protected territory of her mind, when she finally drifted off.

She woke early again, hearing the ominous, gruff tone of Kendall in her ears. A dream, she was sure. She knew it was her worry, her fear, the blind panic she experienced whenever she considered dating a man. It was all in her head, she knew, but still the message was unnerving. Making her feel as if he was there in the room.

Be careful, you know I’m right. Deep down we’re all the same. And you’ll wear on him the way you wore on me. And then he’ll have no choice but to put you in your place…

Saturday morning often meant one thing for August. The market. Sure, she was a homebody that many would call a borderline shut-in, but it wasn’t really that bad. She simply preferred the company of herself, her latest project and the good vibes of her tiny cottage.

That didn’t mean she never got stir crazy. An echoing warning from her dream was just the kind of thing that provoked the restlessness, so she decided she’d go out, shop for food and a few other things.

Skinny jeans, old beat-up brown boots, oversized cardigan and her outrageously untamed hair up in a knot made August as ready as she was going to be. She made a pot of coffee, filled her travel mug and put a cup of granola in a Ziploc bag for the drive up.

The thought, strange and unbidden, popped into her mind to call Jack and see if he wanted to go to the market with her. After all, it was mid-October and the farmers’ market rarely went into November, never past the first week, at least. She only had the option of going for two or three more weeks.

‘No Jack,’ she muttered, walking through the house to ensure everything was off, locked and safe. ‘Not even Carley. You don’t need her cheerleader chatter in your head. Rah-rah Jack! Rah-rah take a chance! You need to think.’ August pulled her coat on, grabbed her bag and her keys. ‘And you need to get a cat or a dog, or even a hamster, for Christ’s sake, so you don’t sound so bonkers talking to yourself.’

She locked the front door behind her and headed toward the Jeep. The Walking Stick tree sat there gnarled and gorgeous. Crouched low on the ground like some ancient thing that couldn’t bear to right itself any more.

Like something from Tolkien …

Again, that simple remark provoked something in her that made her smile. But just because Jack knew of Tolkien didn’t mean shit. Everyone knew who Tolkien was thanks to the wonder of epically long movies that, despite being amazing, she always dozed off during because of their length. Knowing Tolkien didn’t mean nearly as much now as it had when she was in middle and high school.

‘Shut up,’ she told her own spinning brain. She climbed into the Jeep, waved to her neighbour collecting the paper, and drove off toward Nottingham for the farmers’ market. Some time out in the sun around clusters of people appraising honey and bread and vegetables was just what she needed to shake off the weirdness of the last few days.