The Siren. Tiffany Reisz

from the back seat.

      “Another country heard from,” Jarred said with a smirk.

      “I never even blew her up,” I lied. The doll had been a parting gift from Suzy when she’d moved out. Maybe you’ll be more animated with her than you were with me, she’d written on the note. Okay, so I have a difficult time showing my emotions. That doesn’t make me interested in fucking a rubber doll.

      “I’ve got the perfect place,” Jarred told me as he parked the car in front of what was clearly a meat-market-style bar. Half-price cosmos were being offered to the pretty, ditzy secretaries from all the nearby office buildings. “You can’t miss.”

      But I did miss. I sat in the dimly lit bar and missed Suzy. Except maybe I wasn’t actually missing her. I was missing being with someone—anyone. I craved a companion who knew my patterns and my habits, someone who was there when I came home, who looked forward to my arrival.

      I’ll admit one thing: the whiskey tasted good, better than at home. Who knew changing locations could change the way liquor tasted?

      Jarred was working the jukebox. I could tell he was trying to boost my confidence, playing songs from the ‘70s and ‘80s like Eye of the Tiger and Free Bird. I gave him the finger when he dialed up All By Myself. Still, I had to be at least mildly grateful. He would not let me fuck around my apartment totally unsupervised. Every few days, he dragged me out with him—to get dirty playing rugby, to lose money on the ponies. He didn’t know that Byron was calling, too, and doing more than call or haul me outdoors for manly mayhem. Byron was coming over and sitting with me, listening to me put myself down for failing yet again. Here I was, back at the beginning, by myself once more and all that shit.

      Byron sat on the maroon leather stool at my side. “He’s going to make you ask one of them to dance.” He motioned to a gaggle of women who sparkled in a corner booth.

      “I don’t want to dance.”

      “They’re going to start teaching the Texas Two-Step in the other room in about five minutes.”

      “Country? Jesus.”

      “Which is why you and I should slip out the back.”

      “And ditch Jarred?”

      “He’ll be fine.” He motioned to where Jarred sat, at a table surrounded by ladies. “He’s got the car. He’ll probably wind up with two of them.”

      I liked the way Byron said ‘them.’ As if ‘they’ were the enemy. That’s how I felt anyway.

      I’d actually considered fucking the inflatable one vodka-fueled night. Wouldn’t matter if the blow-up doll was a woman, would it? A hole is a hole is a hole. The scent had both aroused and repelled me, and I’d fallen asleep with an arm collapsed over the inanimate object, grateful to have something in my bed if not someone. The toy had sprung a leak in the night, and I’d woken up next to a semi-deflated human—which had made me laugh out loud, a sick sound that had frightened me enough into agreeing to a night out with Byron and Jarred.

      Suddenly, I felt hot and dizzy.

      “I need air,” I said. Byron was quick. He led me to the rear exit, pushed open a door that led into the night.

      “It’s okay,” Byron said, dragging me after him down the alley behind the bar.

      “What do you mean?” I asked as I sucked in great gulps of the cool evening air. Being outside made the world upright once more. Byron stared at me for a moment, and then to my complete surprise, he pulled me closer to him.

      “You don’t have to like girls.”

      I had never been this close to Byron before. I don’t think I’d been this close to any man aside from wrestling. Byron kissed me then, and I felt my cock harden inside my jeans.

      “What do you mean?” I asked, scared, backing against the wall. “I don’t have to…”

      “…like girls,” he repeated, and he kissed me again.

      How did he know? How could he tell? I couldn’t ask. His mouth was on mine once more, and his hand was in my pants. I’d had plenty of women touch my dick before, but no man had ever come close. Why was there a difference? Why did it matter than Byron had his fist around my cock, and that his skin on mine felt more real than anything I’d ever felt before?

      “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do,” he said, and now he kissed the side of my neck, and I thought about how much I hadn’t wanted to dance with those spangled girls in the bar. Pretty, they’d been. But as repellant to me as that inflatable doll Suzy had left as my consolation prize.

      I watched, dumbfounded, as Byron went on his knees in the alley. What was he doing? What was he thinking? He popped the fly on my Levi’s, and then my cock was out in the air, but only for a second before his warm lips found the head, and he started to suck. I wanted to watch him, handsome Byron, with his high cheekbones and his always messy straw-blond hair. But I couldn’t watch, the pleasure was too intense. I had to lean my head back on the bricks, close my eyes, think about anything else so I wouldn’t shoot right away.

      Suzy and I hadn’t fucked in the last six months we’d been together. I’d tried, but I couldn’t get it up. She’d been patient, as patient as a type-A girl like her could be. She’d changed our diet. She’d insisted on exercise. She’d even done research on Viagra. I couldn’t tell her what I couldn’t tell any of them: that I could play the part of the rock-solid boyfriend at the start, because something new made the game interesting. But after things got real, my body rebelled. Didn’t matter where my head was—sometimes you can’t force a lie.

      Byron used his palm to cup my balls as he sucked me. He worked me harder with his mouth than any girl ever had. He knew what he was doing. I felt myself getting close. My thigh muscles tightened. I wanted to come—oh, hell, yes—but I didn’t want this to end, either. This was the best thing that I’d ever experienced—no joke. A BJ in back of a happy-hour bar. What a strange world this was. I’d fucked women in penthouse apartments. I’d done the deed on a balcony in Paris. I’d even managed a threesome with two girls who were more anatomically perfect than the inflatable doll Suzy had left.

      So what made this night trump all others?

      Byron did. His mouth was warm and willing. His hands stroked me and played me. But then I started to worry. What would he say when he was done? Would we go back to being buddies? Would we…

      “Come on,” he urged, backing up far enough to insist, “come for me. Let me swallow you up.”

      That was all I needed. His lips locked around me once more, and I came hard, slamming into him, feeling that brilliant explosion of pure pleasure rocket through me. I was demolished as he moved back. I tucked myself into my jeans with shaky hands. Christ, that was good. I said it in my head before I could even manage to make my lips work.

      “That was…” I started.

      “…so fucking good,” he finished for me, and I had to smile.