Phoenix (5 page)

There is nothing
that makes me want to curl myself up in a blanket and never leave the house
more than the sound of heavy rain belting down on a roof. In this cottage that
noise is particularly audible.

That is the weather when I wake up after a restless night’s sleep. I put
on a heavy grey cardigan and some lose faded jeans. Then I twist my hair up and
secure it with a clip. I don’t bother about make-up. Last night I dreamt of
nothing, and sometimes those nothing dreams can be worse than the scariest
nightmare.

When I enter the teacher’s lounge, Tim comes up to me straight away and quietly
apologises for how drunk he’d been on Friday night.

“I’m never usually
that
bad,” he says, and I believe him just
about as far as I can throw him, especially taking his
I plan on getting
shitfaced
comment
into account. But I don’t tell him that. Instead,
I accept his apology graciously.

I sit alone for a while with a cup of tea and try to gather my thoughts
before my first class. But by nine o’clock the school bell rings and my legs
really don’t want to get up at all. I force them. One good thing about today is
that it’s a cold morning and in this old building the heating system makes all
sorts of ancient grumblings of coming to life. I like those sounds. They are
good sturdy sounds that make you feel protected by the age and experience of
the building that shelters you.

At the end of the day, I spot Cathy collecting her son from outside the
school in her shiny black sedan. The rain is still belting down so I pull up
the hood of my purple rain mack and zip it all the way to the neck before
getting on my bike. As I cycle by her car, she pulls out quickly in front of
me, which I think she does on purpose. Then she stops suddenly to let me pass.
I get a quick look at her face before I go, and I’m almost certain she is
sniggering to herself, evil woman.

I had thought she was the nice one, but now I can see that she and
Deborah are two peas in a pod.

I make a note to avoid her. By the time I get home my clothes are soaked
through. My mack was no match for the all-powerful rain. I take everything off
the second I get in the door. Another perk of living alone.

I put on the pyjamas that had been drying on the radiator in the hallway.
I’m tired so I leave the wet clothes in a ball on the floor. Next I root out
the expensive hot chocolate I’d bought the other day and make myself a cup,
which is like a huge warm cuddle in a mug.

I sit down on Harriet’s sofa that I’ve put in the living room. The scent
of her old house still lingers in its ancient fabric and wood. As I breathe it
in, the memory of sitting like I am now, but back home in Wales in Harriet’s
big house, as we listened to the radio and dipped biscuits in our tea comes
back to me. I never realised how much smells can trigger memories like that.

I sit thinking of the smells I associate with various experiences when there
is a hard knock on the door. I go to open it and find Phoenix standing on my
doorstep, his hair dripping from the rain and his shirt soaking wet. He gives
me an apologetic look, like he’s interrupting me or something. Luckily, he
doesn’t know how happy I am to be interrupted.

I stand slightly behind the door to hide my attire, embarrassed that I’m
in pyjamas at only five o’clock in the evening.

“Hi,” I say, clueless as to why he is here, but not unpleasantly
surprised.

“Hello,” he replies.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

“Yes, I’m fine. I’m a little wet, though. I found myself at a loose end
and was wondering if you’d like some company?”

“Sure, come in. I’ll just go grab you a towel.”

“Thank you,” he answers, fixing me with his stare.

 “You’re soaked. You should have brought an umbrella,” I say as I come
back downstairs with a big fluffy white towel from the airing cupboard.

He shrugs. “I didn’t think of it.”

“Oh, well, here you go,” I say, handing him the towel.

He takes it and scruffs up his hair to dry off, before rubbing dry his
shirt as best he can. It doesn’t work much so he decides to take it off. I put
it on the radiator to dry and try my best not to stare. He has numerous scars;
knife wounds, bite marks, gouges, bullet holes. They give me the impression
that he might have been in the army. Yet, at the same time he has the most
perfectly formed male torso I have ever laid eyes on. I want to know so many
things as I take in the sight of him, so many wheres, so many hows, so many
whys. I am scared to ask. Scared to know the truth.

“Would you like some hot chocolate?” I ask on a cough, averting my gaze.

He smiles as if amused and a touch embarrassed, then tells me he would
love a cup.

“Okay, go sit down in the living room. I’ll be back in a second.” I take my
cup in with me for a re-fill.

When I return with the drinks we sit and sip quietly. He looks at me in
my tartan pyjamas and smiles.

“I like your outfit,” he says.

“I got soaked coming home from work, so I just threw these on,” I say,
realising my hair is a damp mess. I run my fingers through it to get it a
little less tangled. My fingers get stuck in the knots at the back. Phoenix’s
hand twitches at his side, as though he wants to be the one running his fingers
through my hair. Well, that makes two of us, because I really want to run my
hands over his chest right now. See if it feels as hard as it looks.

“Do you like the hot chocolate?”

“Yes, it’s nice.”

“You should have come to Margaret’s yesterday. She made a lovely dinner.”

He says nothing, only arches his brow ever so slightly. I don’t think I’m
ever going to convince him that Margaret isn’t all that bad. Perhaps he senses
she knows more about him than he’d like her to.

He moves closer to me on the sofa, bringing his hand up to rub my
shoulder. “Did you have a good day at work?” he asks huskily.

I shrug, unable to voice words when he’s rubbing me like this. He shoves
my top over to expose some skin, then continues to massage me; this time
without the barrier of fabric. Even though we hardly know each other enough yet
to be touching so intimately, this feels normal. It feels right.

“Ah, not so good then?” The tone of his voice and his breath on my ear
combine to make me melt.

“I’m just not sure yet if I’m cracked up for the world of teaching,” I
eventually manage to squeak out.

“You should only do what you enjoy, Eve.”

“I know. I suppose I just don’t really know what I enjoy yet. Maybe I’ll
find my feet with this teaching thing eventually.”

“I’m sure that together we could find something you like,” he says and
whispers his lips over the tip of my ear. I whimper and fall into him, my back
pressed against his chest.

I breathe in deeply. His closeness makes the hairs on my arms tingle and
stand on end. He moves his hand from my shoulder down to the soft, round part
of my lower belly. Reaching under my top, he strokes lazily back and forth. It soothes
me, yet sets my nerve endings alight at the same time.

His hair is still wet and hangs slightly over his face. For some reason I
really want to touch it. I reach up and smooth a lock between my fingers.
Phoenix stares down at me intensely, then closes his eyes for a moment.

 We stay like this for a while, and his strokes are so close to my pubic
bone that I feel all sorts of needy desires.

Finally, I break myself out of the reverie and say, “You know, I saw that
woman Cathy today when she was picking her son up from school. I was on my bike
and she nearly ran me over with her car.”

“She did?” he questions, face turning serious. Protective, even.

“Yeah, I was cycling from the school and she pulled out right in front of
me.”

“Was it on purpose?”

“For sure. I saw her smirking at me as I rode away.”

“You should key her car the next time,” he suggests. “Better yet, I’ll do
it for you.”

“That, my friend, would be illegal,” I scold him with a tiny grin.

He says nothing, only gives me a look that says he’s explored the depths
of illegality much further than keying a car in the past. By the scars he wears
like a story on his skin, I’d best believe it.

I swallow and keep talking. “Maybe because I’m new in town she thinks she
can intimidate me. Although I have no clue why she would want to.”

“People like Cathy aren’t worth your worry, Eve.” He touches my forehead
to smooth out the crease between my eyebrows. The affectionate gesture makes my
stomach flip. “She’s just a small town housewife who’s bored and wants to
create some entertainment.”

“That’s exactly it, but I don’t want to be her entertainment. I just want
to be left alone.”

“A woman after my own heart,” says Phoenix, starting up with the belly
stroking again.

A long silence elapses.

“You can’t know how good that feels,” I tell him in the smallest voice,
breaking the quiet.

His mouth has returned to my ear now. This time he flicks his tongue
against my lobe before sucking on it with his lips. I dig my fingernails into
the sofa.

He smells delicious. Like soap and freshly cut wood, with a hint of male
sweat.

“W...would you like some more hot chocolate?” I manage.

He laughs softly. “I haven’t finished my first cup yet. And my mouth is
otherwise engaged right now.”

At this, his fingers press hard into my soft flesh before moving down to
the waistband of my knickers. He toys with it for a moment, then hesitates.
Instead of wandering under the fabric, he keeps his hand over it, trailing down
to the area between my thighs. I let out a breathy moan and he pauses, as
though trying to control himself.

“Open your legs a little more for me, darling,” he requests with laboured
breathing.

They fall open involuntarily. His hand is on me then, clutching me, massaging
right where I am throbbing for him.

“Ah, you are so soft,” he hisses, biting gently on my earlobe. He does
some skilled things with his tongue as he sucks and licks.

“Phoenix,” I moan his name and he growls appreciatively.

His thumb finds my sweet spot over the fabric and makes slow, agonising
circles. I’m so lost in the sensation that I hardly realise he hasn’t even
kissed me properly yet. Although saying that, his tongue is doing a pretty good
job of thoroughly corrupting my ear. Tingles spark all the way down my neck,
down my spine.

“Let go,” he urges with need.

His voice sounds shaky, like he’s nervous or something.

My eyes widen when I feel how hard he is as I press back against him. His
thumb moves faster now, bringing me to the cusp of orgasm. I bite my lip hard
and cry out as I feel it building.

“Oh, God, please,” I mumble.

With one arm tight around my waist and his mouth sucking on my ear, I
explode with pleasure. I shake several times, shivering against him. His thumb
moves slowly now, riding out the waves with me.

“Christ, you’re beautiful,” he mutters, looking at me with uncertain
eyes. I was right before, he really is nervous. “You make me want to do things
I’ve not done in a very long time.”

His words give me pause and then I whisper, “Sorry,” feeling like I came
too fast.

“What did I tell you about apologising so much? And more to the point,
what are you apologising for?” His voice couldn’t dip any lower.

“I – I’m not sure. Did I do that right? I thought maybe I was too quick,”
I answer, blushing profusely.

He pulls me closer into his arms and caresses my red hot face. Tilting
his head to the side, he questions, “Too quick? There is never too quick when
it comes to that, darling. The quicker you are, the more times I get to do it.”

“Oh.”

He chuckles now. “I like it when you say that. It makes your full lips
get all round. I didn’t plan on this when I came over here. But then you were
in those adorable pyjamas with your hair all dishevelled and sexy and I couldn’t
not touch you.”

“Oh.”

It’s ridiculous, but I can’t think of a single other response.

His chuckle deepens and he leans in, taking my mouth in the softest, most
barely-there kiss in the history of time. His tongue slides over mine briefly. When
he pulls away he runs his tongue over my bottom lip and says, “Your innocence
makes me wish I was a better man, Eve.”

My heart beats fast at his declaration. What wouldn’t I give to see what
he sees in me?

I don’t know how to respond, so I change the subject. “Your accent is
gorgeous, you know. Where do you come from?”

My question seems to take him off guard and his expression sobers. “I was
born in a small, poor town in rural Greece.”

Greece! So that explains it. I think back to when I’d thought of his name
as being unusual when I’d first heard it and remembered it being in
The
Iliad
. I had actually been right about its country of origin all along.

“And how did you end up in the UK?”

“The answer to that question is not a pretty one.”

“Real answers rarely are.”

He swallows and pulls me over to sit on his lap while he plays with my
hair. “When I was a young boy there was a man in my town who taught Pankratian
to some of the local kids.”

“Pankratian?”

“It’s a martial art, sort of similar to wrestling, which originated in
ancient Greece. Anyway, I got really good at it and at the age of fourteen a
British man came to visit our town. He was particularly interested in seeing
how well the boys fought and he singled me out. He asked me if I would like to
come with him to England to fight professionally, told me I would make a lot of
money that I could send back to my family. I worked with my grandfather in his
carpentry shop at the time and refused, knowing he needed me to keep the
business running.

“My father was a drunk and a gambler, and when he found out I had refused
the British man’s offer, he beat me as was his habit. He then went to the
British man and told him he could have me for a price. So, I was sold off like
a slave and brought to England to fight on the underground circuit. That is how
I ended up here.”