Addicted. Charlotte Stein

laughing at himself, a little, but I hope it’s clear that I’m not joining in. I can’t even answer him. He just talked about fucking his fist into a mattress. I mean, the image of him standing naked in front of a mirror was bad enough.

      This is turning my insides purple.

      ‘Well, maybe it is. But that’s how it was. I started understanding stuff I liked – slippery things, obviously. The amount of times I imagined oiling her all over with that suntan lotion of hers, then getting to ease myself between her soft thighs …

      ‘Though that wasn’t the only lesson I learnt. I realised pretty quick that holding off made it sweeter, when you finally let it happen. Sometimes I’d keep myself on the edge for hours, until my orgasm felt too intense to take. I felt feverish, too on edge. I felt like pheromones were leaking out of my pores. She had to notice me, eventually.’

      I think he’s right. I’m noticing him, and I wasn’t even there. I’m fifteen years into the future and a million miles away from whatever American town he’s talking about, but I’m sure I can smell that earthy, saltwater scent from here. And though it’s never been something that particularly interested me, I find myself tingling at the idea.

      What would it be like, to see him aroused and in this state? I don’t know, but I’m no longer content to wait and find out more.

      ‘And did she?’

      ‘It’d be a pretty weak story if she didn’t, right?’

      He pauses, and for that one second I think he really means it. This is just some tale of for ever wanting and not getting. He could call it The Madcap Adventures of Kit Connor.

      But then he continues – like a warden, granting his sexual prisoner a reprieve.

      ‘So, the longer this went on for, the worse things got. And the bolder I became. I stopped being satisfied with the bathroom, and makeshift masturbatory aids. I started wanting the smell of her perfume, the feel of her silk underwear against my skin. I turned into her stalker, slipping into her bedroom when I knew no one was around. Running my hands over the clothes in her wardrobe – the works. It got so bad I could get hard by stuffing my face into one of her couch cushions.

      ‘I was pathetic – but when I finally got caught, I tried to bluster it. I turned on the ridiculous swagger I thought I had. Think I even told her, “You want it, baby?” God, I was such a punk.’

      ‘You still are a punk,’ I say, but I don’t know if I really mean it. I don’t think punks talk so openly about their sexual habits, before admitting that they are one. And I definitely don’t think they look hurt, when some chick hurls the word at them.

      Because that’s what it feels like I’ve done. His eyebrows draw together briefly, like a flicker of an expression he’d like to have, if it didn’t make him seem so vulnerable. And then it’s gone as quickly as it came, leaving me to wonder if it was ever really there at all. I mean, guys like him … they don’t care if girls like me think they’re a little … douche-y.

      Right?

      And if they do, oh, God, if they do, please let him just say. I’ll apologise if he just says. I can’t do so without it, because then I’ll just look like an idiot who’s imagining feelings that aren’t really there. It’s the first step towards lovesickness – wanting to be sorry for hurt you might have caused.

      And he’ll know it, and laugh.

      He’s laughing now, as he plunges on into the story.

      ‘Yeah, I thought I was hot stuff. So when she said, “Oh, I want it all right,” I preened like nothing else. I didn’t think a single thing to her telling me to strip. I thought my body was hot and she just wanted to see it, so I took off my T-shirt, I took off my shorts. By the time I was down to nothing, I was practically mute with excitement. My cock was almost touching my belly, and everything felt real swollen down there, you know?’

      I do know. I’m so swollen in that same place I can hardly keep my legs closed. It’s like trying to fit myself around a burning coal – though I think I keep the signs to a minimum. I’m so hot I’d love to fan myself with my notepad, but I resist. I don’t even run a finger around my clammy collar, and I definitely don’t remove my jacket.

      My nipples are too stiff for something like that. They’re showing through my shirt, and I know it – though I’ve got less idea about the why. The story isn’t even that exciting, really. I’ve heard lots like it a dozen times before. He’s going to nail her, now, then write. ‘Dear Penthouse’ on the top and mail that sucker in. He’s going to show me what an incredible stud he was, because he could fuck her like her husband never could.

      Or at least that’s what I’m sure of, before he tells me the rest.

      ‘But she didn’t touch me. She didn’t sink to her knees the way I’d always imagined she would. She said: “Do you know how to make a woman come, Dillon?”

      ‘And now, every time I’m flicking through the catalogue of every sexy thing that’s ever happened to me … every time I’m on the brink and I need to pull out something intense to really get there … that’s what I think about. I think about that one sentence, like a siren’s song. “Do you know how to make a woman come, Dillon?”

      ‘I couldn’t even tell her yes. I knew it was a lie. In every fantasy I’d ever had about her, she’d screamed like a porn star and lapsed into unconsciousness the second my cock touched her, but I never stopped to think how or why. I assumed my dick was the magical key to a winter wonderland, but when I tried to show her I could do it, when I tried to climb on top of her like some fumbling fucking idiot, she stopped me in my tracks.

      ‘She waved her red-tipped finger in my face – and I always remember that, too. I remember her pressing me to my knees with just that one talon on my big shoulder.

      ‘Then she said more words that still send a burst of arousal through me, now: “Lick your fingers. Lick your fingers, baby.” Like she was the one with swagger, and I was just her little cutie-pie, ready to be serviced. And I can remember feeling like I didn’t want to – I was sulking, then, I guess. I was thinking she was messing around with me.

      ‘But the weird thing was – that didn’t make it any less hot. In fact, it made it hotter. My cock actually jerked when she said those barely-anything words. I was kind of bothered by the mess I was making all over her carpet – I was absolutely dripping by this point.

      ‘And I was shaking. I was really shaking. Putting my fingers in my mouth felt like the most erotic thing I’d ever done. Like I was sucking myself. Like I had nerve-endings there that I didn’t know about. I actually got lost in the feel of them, sliding in and out of my mouth.

      ‘Until she lay back on the bed, and spread her legs.

      ‘Of course, I’d seen pussy before – in magazines. In pornos. But it’s kinda not the same, don’t you think? Have you ever looked at yourself, when you’re aroused? It’s not the bleached, waxed, perfectly positioned and pert thing from porn, as dry as the Sahara and hardly a notch above pastel pink. It’s flushed, and slippery, and so swollen, like a beating heart between your legs – or at least, that’s how it was with her.

      ‘All of her folds were coated in her clearly visible wetness, and her clit … oh, Jeeze, her clit. I’d always thought it was something kind of mythical, you know? You couldn’t really make anything out in dirty movies, and no one ever talked about doing anything to it. There’s no locker-room talk about banging some chick’s clit last night.