The Space Between Us

I know all about it, but I’ve never done it. Boys in my school don’t appeal to me. Too young, too immature, and besides, I go away for the whole summer. That’s prime boyfriend-girlfriend time. The one time last year I tried going out with a guy, I came back to school in the fall to find out he’d spent the summer dating his way through the entire cheerleading squad. First of all, I’m so not a cheerleader. Second, I guess I couldn’t blame him. A girlfriend who disappears for three months isn’t much fun.

I work next to Vic all that long, hot summer afternoon. We’re fixing an old Impala that doesn’t look like it’ll ever run. He does take his shirt off, and I pretend I’m not staring, but we both know I am.

“Fuck.” He growls the word when the wrench he’s holding slips and clangs against the metal.

I use that word all the time, but something about it freezes me now. I’m standing too close to him, at his side, our hips touching as we lean over to watch him twist something with the wrench. He says it again, lower.

“Let’s take a break,” Vic says.

In the small back room there’s an ice chest full of cold beers and a couple of Cokes. Vic takes the beer and hands me the soda. I think for about half a second of asking him for a beer, since even though I’m underage, stuff like that mostly goes unnoticed at The Compound. But I hate the taste of beer and wouldn’t be able to drink it, anyway.

“We’ll get it working. We’re a good team, you and me.” Vic tips the beer in my direction.

I care about a thousand things more than I give a damn about that car. One of them is the way Vic looks at me. Or doesn’t look at me, which is closer to the truth. I don’t want to be on a team with him. I want him to notice me.

From outside in the garage, the Rolling Stones start singing about painting a door black. Vic’s fingers thrum against his thigh as he lifts the bottle to his lips and tips back his head to swallow. The bottle sweats, wetting his fingertips. His throat works.

I want to lick the hollow of his throat. I want to run my tongue along the curve of his collarbone. His shoulders.

Suddenly, I want.

This time, I don’t glance away when he looks up to see me staring.

Vic licks his lips.

He could easily push me back when I cross the short distance and stand between his legs. It would’ve crushed me. Probably made me unable to make the first move again for the rest of my life. But he doesn’t push me away when I stand, my calves pressed against his, then my knees on the inside of his thighs.

It’s hot in this room. Stifling. Sweat sheens Vic’s upper lip, and I don’t think about anything but leaning forward and tasting it. My tongue slides over his salty flesh, and my lips brush his.

It’s too much, I know. I’ve made a mistake, gone too far. Vic’s older than me. Has never even flirted with me. And I’ve kissed only a couple boys, nothing like this. Bold and free and wild.

Vic doesn’t stop me. His mouth opens under mine. His hands go to my hips, just above the waistband of my jean shorts and below the hem of my T-shirt. At the touch of his fingers on my bare skin, a soft sigh slips out. I’m sure then he’ll push me away. Maybe laugh.

I end up on his lap. We kiss for a long, long time. His tongue strokes mine. It’s better than I thought it would be. Under my butt, I feel him getting hard. My heart pounds faster than it ever did while I watched him work with his shirt off.

I’d do anything for Vic right now. His zipper’s undone, my hands inside his jeans, before I even know what I’m doing. Then he stops me with a hand on my wrist. Not pushing me away, just holding me still.

“Tesla.” His voice is low and growling, the way it was earlier when he cursed at the wrench.

I don’t want him to tell me we should stop. I shift against him, my fingers curling around the unfamiliar thickness of his dick. I ache to stroke him, even though at the same time, I’m afraid I won’t know how.

He groans when I move my hand.

That’s the first time I understand the power of giving someone else pleasure.

I move again, exploring his length as best I can with his jeans in the way. The couch creaks and complains beneath us as we shift, until somehow we’re stretched out side by side, Vic’s hand at the small of my back the only thing keeping me from falling onto the dirty concrete floor.

We kiss harder. Our teeth clash. Somehow, I manage to get his prick out from his jeans. I’d put it in my mouth if I were brave enough, if I could figure out how, but for now I’m satisfied just with moving my fingers up and down. When I touch him, Vic shudders. He tastes like sweat and beer, and somehow I don’t mind the taste when it’s on his tongue.

I’m so caught up in figuring out how to jerk him off, I don’t notice at first that Vic’s got his hand down the front of my shorts. But when his fingers stroke over the front of my panties I discover exactly why he shuddered. His hand moves. One fingertip circles slowly, slowly, pressing against me through the cotton. Then faster, until I gasp into his mouth.

I know about sex, but I don’t know about this. All I know now is that the hot, thick feeling I get when I watch Vic work with his shirt off is building up between my legs, in my nipples. Crazily, in the soles of my feet.

We’re not even naked. We don’t even get that far. Vic and I kiss and kiss and kiss. My grip stutters on his dick, but his doesn’t falter against me. When he slips his fingers inside my panties, directly on my skin, I think I might die. A couple minutes later, when he pushes one finger down inside me, then up again, when it moves in slippery circles on my clit, I do.

Or at least I explode, which I imagine might feel the same. It feels so good I shake and push my hips against him, needing something but not sure exactly what. Vic knows. His fingers move a little faster. Then faster still.

And I … I am surging along on this wave of pleasure that’s so strong I can’t decide if I never want it to end or if I can’t stand another second of it.

When it’s over and I can focus again, when I can breathe, I blink up at him. My hand is sticky, lying flat on his hard belly. His fingers have stilled between my legs, though my clit is thumping with the beat of my heart. I’m not exactly sure what happened, but I know that whatever it was, I can’t wait to do it again. Looking down at me, Vic licks his lips and smiles. Despite my earlier fears, he doesn’t laugh.

But I do.

Chapter 5

I woke up laughing and coming at the same time. I hiccupped, my eyes flying open, my fingers clutching the tangled mess of my sheets that told me I’d had a rough night. I cut off the laughter by sealing my lips together, but nothing stopped the surge of pleasure that ripped through me, not entirely unwelcome.

A wave of guilt followed it.

I hadn’t thought of Vic in that way for a long time. Now everything was turning upside down and sideways. My body ached from being twisted in the sheets, and it was still a few hours before I had to get up and take care of some things before it was time for work.

I’d only just closed my eyes and started to drift when the two small bodies pounced on me. It wasn’t unexpected, but it was alarming. I shouted before I could hold it back, then fell onto my pillow with a groan and a hand clapped over my eyes.

“Guys, please,” I begged. “Go away.”

“Turn on ‘toons? Peeze,” said Max, who had good manners only when it suited him.

His sister, who fancied herself far more mature at four than any baby two-year-old could ever be, poked him. “Please and thankyouverymuch!”

“Thankyouverymuch,” her brother said. He smelled of wet diaper, a stench that reminded me too much of crèche duty at The Compound. “‘Toons?”

I shifted, bunching the cushions and pillows so I could sit up. “How is it that the two of you can operate every electronic device in this house, but not the television set?”

“The memote,” Max explained patiently. “Mama says don’t touch the memote.”

Of course their mother didn’t want them messing around with the remote—it was a complicated and expensive thing that operated all their dad’s complicated and expensive audiovisual equipment, including the television, the TiVo, the sound system and the Wii. It was supposed to make everything easier because you needed only one piece of equipment to operate everything in the rec room, but it was for adult use only. And since I was the closest adult, I was the one the kids came to.

“What’s Mama and Daddy doing?” I was afraid to look at the clock, but the light shining through my window meant it was at least past six. “Getting ready for work?”

“Mama’s in bed,” Simone said, self-important with this knowledge. “Daddy said to leave her alone so she can sleep.”

Max had something to say about this, too, accompanied by a sour look that said exactly what he thought of the situation. “Baby.”

“Just give me a few minutes, okay?” I begged as they bounced on me. “I’ll turn on the cartoons in a minute. Can’t you play with your toys or something?”

They had plenty of them, spread all over the floor in the very places I usually wanted to walk in my bare feet when the lights were off. I’d been lamed by Legos so often I’d taken to shuffling along the floor with each step, much the way they tell you to walk along the sand where there are stingrays so you can push them out of the way rather than step on them. That was what my life had become—shuffling to avoid the sting.

They could play with their toys, but it turned out the screeching that went along with the game was worse than the mindless blather of cartoons. No more sleep for me, then. I scrubbed at my face and turned everything on for them, settled the remote high on the shelf where they couldn’t be tempted to reach for it, and made my careful, shuffling way up the steep and uncarpeted stairs to the kitchen.