Safe Without You (5 page)

              Amber could feel the old doubt creep up, the pain of being judged.  She wanted her confidence back, the part of her that made it possible to be alone, but the ironic thing was that she wanted Cal’s approval so she could find it again.  “Having sex is never really a problem for me, so I don’t give a shit if you tell me I’m great in bed,” Amber said.

              “You are great in bed, but that’s not what makes you memorable,” Cal lifted a wet strand of hair from Amber’s cheek, tucking it back over her ear.  “What makes you memorable is that you have guts.  And guts are in short supply these days.”

              Amber snorted, “Guts?”  She started swimming for shore, but secretly, she was pleased.                              Cal watched as Amber materialized naked from the surf, her skin glistening in the moonlight like the pearly shell he had given her.  There was strength in her body and he liked that.  The corded muscles in her calves stood out as she tried to keep her balance while the sand shifted beneath her feet.  Once up on the beach proper, she turned to face him, a deliberate move to allow him to gaze at her.  She extended her arms, shivering as the breeze caressed the droplets of water off her skin.  He thought her breasts were beautiful; they were full and rounded, with delicate pink nipples, and they had the natural response to gravity that told him they were completely real.  The warmth of the water did nothing to slow his erection, and he wondered what she would think when he emerged from the water.

              “What are you waiting for?  I thought you were my sex slave,” Amber taunted him. 

              Cal couldn’t decide if the sensation of weight in his cock was pleasurable or not.  He did know that every fiber of him wanted to be inside of Amber as he stepped out on the beach.

              “Come here,” Amber commanded, “I’m going to be your sex slave.  Clearly you need attention.” 

              Walking up to Amber, Cal slipped behind her, as he pressed himself against her backside.  His hands cradled her beautiful breasts, and then he started teasing her nipples.  The breeze was making them hard and sensitive and she pushed back against his body as he touched them. He caressed each with a fingertip, and as she whimpered her desire for more assertive attention, she reached back and grabbed Cal’s shaft, feeling his cock become even harder and more rigid under her fingers.  Without warning, he pinched her aching nipples.  Her breath caught and her hand fell away as she whispered, “Again.”  Cal obliged as he rubbed his tingling member between the swell of her butt cheeks.

              Amber dropped to her knees, and pillowed her head on her arms in the sand, her lovely backside raised in the air in an unmistakably invitation.  Cal slid his hand between her legs, gently spreading them ever so slightly, and slipped a finger inside her to find her wet and ready.  He slid in the tip of his cock into her waiting pussy as he encircled her clit with his wet finger. 

              The throbbing of her clit was almost too much, Amber thought, and then he pushed into her, sinking the full weight and length of his cock into her.  She closed her eyes, and he folded over her, not moving inside her, but returning his attention to her nipples with his fingers.  Then he began slowly thrusting.  Amber felt lightheaded, pushing back with her bottom to meet his movement and she could hear Cal’s breath quicken as he deliberately pulled back and then pushed himself in bit by bit.  Each time he did it, her excitement grew and then his finger rippled across her clit, and suddenly, an orgasm of shattering intensity caught her completely by surprise.  She gasped and cried out, grinding back against Cal and then she felt him give himself over to his own pleasure with a guttural sound.

              Cal slumped on her back, stroking her head and neck before slowly drawing himself out of her.  He flopped back onto the sand, and pulled Amber across his body.  She lay there, breathing hard, her hands flat on his chest, her head resting on his belly.  His fingers combed across her head as they lay silently.  Clouds floated across to cover the moon, dampening its light, and the breeze picked up, making Amber shiver.  Cal tightened his arms around her, drawing her up so that the lengths of their bodies touched.  Finally, when their breathing slowed, Cal found his voice, “Please don’t go to Darien, Amber McShane.”

Journal Reflection 4

Did you know that in ancient Greece, wrestling was the first sport they added to the Olympics after footraces?  The wrestlers started from standing positions, but the most important position strategically involved one wrestler lying on his belly, the other over the top of him.  The one on the bottom tried not to submit—they did everything in their power to overthrow the opponent on top, who basically tried to choke them into surrender.  And while the contestants were naked, you couldn’t grab your opponent’s junk, and hitting and kicking wasn’t allowed either.  Pretty much anything else was fair game though.

              There are some men you just want to run away from, and some you run toward, and some try to force you to submit, and some just make you want to struggle against them so that they have to work really hard to reach you.  The physical ways we manifest this interior world are difficult to explain too.  Why do we decide to screw this way and not that way at any given moment in time?  Does the position we assume when we’re having sex say something about what’s going on in our hearts or in our minds or in our gonads?  And the most baffling question of all is: when does fucking become ‘having sex?’  And what elevates the same mechanics to ‘making love?’

              Sometimes I think the position of strength in any challenge is when you choose to submit.  I don’t mean give up, or become a doormat—I mean when you make yourself vulnerable.  It seems contradictory, doesn’t it? 

              I remember going to the dentist the first time I ever had to get a filling.  The dentist seemed huge to me, although I think he was about the same size as my dad, but somehow, as I was tilted back in the padded chair, to my ten-year old eyes, he looked like a menacing giant.  I was gripping the arms of the chair so hard that my knuckles had turned white, and he could feel the edge of terror threatening to overtake me.  I remember him smiling kindly, and patting my hand paternally.  “Are you feeling a little scared?” he asked.  “Everyone is a little scared the first time they have a filling.”  Then he opened his mouth and pointed out his own fillings.  “I have fillings.  Here,” he said, as he handed me the little dental mirror, “Have a good look in there.” 

              Looking back at it, I think he was pretty brave to put his mouth at the mercy of a ten year old with a metal instrument in her hands.  I peered into his mouth, and nothing particularly terrible seemed to be going on in there.  “See?” he said, “No big deal.  If you feel ready to give it a go, I have something that’s going to help you relax.  Do you trust me?”  I remember nodding, and he gave me a good hit of nitrous oxide.  “You might feel a little dizzy or like you want to laugh, but that’s okay.  We’re going to get your filling done lickety-split.”  And he did—just like he promised.  That was the first time I ever experienced an altered state, and I felt so giggly he probably could have done brain surgery and I wouldn’t have cared, but the thing I remember most is that he lived up to his promise—I relaxed, and it seemed to take no time at all.

              He was a smart guy, that dentist.  He managed the situation not by forcing me to submit to what he wanted, but by letting me feel like I had some control.  He made himself a little bit vulnerable, but the result he got was exactly the one he wanted.  But I think about those early wrestlers, too.  On one hand they had to trust that their opponent was going to follow the rules and that he wasn’t going to suddenly kick them in the balls while their entire package was exposed.  Still, the thing that determined the match in the end was a combination of force and strategy.

              So how does it work with sex and feelings?  Do you suck it up and let the person you’re with have a little look inside, or do you struggle against their will, and maybe get choked?  Or maybe…you just hit them where it hurts…and run like hell.

Chapter 4

“What are you going to do when you get your new plane?”  Amber asked as she sucked at a straw stuck into a coconut.  “By the way, I think I need some rum in this coconut.” 

              “I’m sure we can go to town and buy a bottle of rum, but I thought you were being economical.”

              Amber pouted at the reminder, “Stop harshing my day.”

              “Just saying.”  Cal pushed his sunglasses up on his nose, “You said you were down to $378.42 last night.  I’m floating you a place to crash and picking up most of our food.”

              “Stop making me sound like I’m a freeloader.”

              “Well, getting loaded is never free.”  He lifted up his sunglasses, “You’re getting burnt.” He picked up the bottle and slathered lotion on Amber’s shoulders. 

              “You didn’t answer my question,” Amber rolled over on her stomach so that Cal could do her back.

              “You can get a bottle of rum for five bucks, if you want.” 

              “No, not the rum, what are you going to do when you get a new plane?  What happens when you go back to work?”

              Cal’s motion changed from a vigorous rubbing to a slow caress, “I’m not really sure.”

              “How can you not be sure?  Do you just wait for clients to call, or is there some kind of scheduled service, or what?  Where the heck do you keep your plane?”

              “It’s complicated,” Cal said.

              “Complicated?  How can you not know where you’re going to park a new Cessna?”  Amber rolled her eyes.

              “I didn’t say I didn’t know, I said it’s complicated.”

              Amber pushed herself up from the sand to a seated position.  “This cryptic bullshit is getting old, Cal.  I’ve been totally upfront about my unemployed status, my lack of funds, my plan to go to Darien.  And all you do is tell me to not go to Darien because you have this idea that there are revolutionaries or drug king pins or some bullshit people running around in the jungles there.”

              “Well, they are.  Not in the main part of the park, but along the Colombian border.”

              “And I’m supposed to believe that because you are some kind of mysterious—and apparently not very good—pilot?  That’s bogus.  I like you Cal, but if you want me to stick around, you need to give up the cloak and dagger routine.”

              Cal suddenly blurted out, “FARC is holding my dad hostage.”

              Amber blinked slowly, trying to process what that meant.  “
That’s
the family trauma you’ve been alluding to?”  Amber’s voice was soft and careful.

              “I told you my dad’s a military contractor, right?  Well, he was captured in Colombia along with two US Army officers.  They were trying to help negotiate a hostage release, and things went totally off the rails.  FARC is not the most logical organization.”

              “Shit, I’m sorry.  So this has been going on for two years?”

              “They have hostages they’ve been moving around for a lot longer than that, six, even seven years.  You’d think after a couple of years of not getting any ransom for them, they’d just think it was more trouble than it’s worth and either let them go or blow their heads off.  But they don’t seem to think that way.”

              “So you know for a fact he’s alive?  That’s good.”  Amber put a gentle hand on Cal’s leg.

              “There was a video six months ago, but one of the other hostages was clearly very sick with some kind of jungle fever.  They all looked skinny and haggard, and you can’t fight off infections when your immune system is compromised like that.”  Cal rubbed at his jaw.

              “But the army or somebody is trying to rescue them, right?”

              “So they say.”  Cal didn’t look convinced, Amber thought.  “I shouldn’t even be talking about this,” he said, “But I want you to stay and you’re forcing my hand.”

              “I’m not the enemy here.  Don’t get pissed off at me.” 

              Amber stood up, brushing the sand off her legs.  Her simple blue bikini covered more of her than some suits on the beach, but it still showed off her assets.  Cal noticed two older men a short distance away checking Amber out, and making lewd gestures behind her back.  That definitely pissed him off.  “Sit down, those pervs over there are getting off on your ass.”

              “So if another man finds me attractive, they’re a pervert?”  Amber huffed.

              “They are when they are fifty years old and practically slobbering on themselves.  Stop making them want to go choke the chicken.”

              “The possessive shit is not attractive—it doesn’t do a damn thing for me, Cal.”  She eyed him coolly as she wrapped a cotton sarong around her waist.  “There—I’ve covered up my ass.  Are you happy?”  She grabbed her string bag with her valuables.  “I’m going to go buy a bottle of rum.  You are welcome to come.”

              Cal stayed seated, and watched her go, unwilling to admit that he had been overbearing.

              As Amber stomped down the beach, she felt conflicted.  She was sorry about Cal’s father, and could understand how that would put someone on edge, but it didn’t give him the right to order her around, or to act like she was deliberately provoking negative attention.  Besides, she thought, what did she really know about Cal?  He could be making up all that stuff about his dad.  It seemed pretty far-fetched.  Then she started questioning the little he had told her about himself.  Maybe he wasn’t even a pilot.  Maybe those scars were just from a car wreck or something.  Maybe Cal was some kind of pathological liar.  She remembered reading an article once about how sociopaths can be incredibly charming—and dominating.  Her mind starting running away with the ‘what ifs,’ and she started to view everything he had done through the lens of deception and fabrication.