I'll Be Your Everything (26 page)

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Authors: J.J. Murray

BOOK: I'll Be Your Everything
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We go into my bedroom, and he somehow hooks the camera to my little shelf stereo. I lift up the “wall,” and he sighs.
Yeah, big boy, you and me both.
After he uses thumbtacks and some duct tape, we lie on the bed, and for half an hour, we listen, booty-to-booty, the “wall” between us, to thirty-second bursts of sound.
“You first,” he says.
“Nah,” I say. “You first.”
“Um, eleven, nineteen, and forty-nine.”
I look at my list. Did I number wrong? “There wasn’t a forty-nine.”
“There will be.” He reaches under the curtain and pulls up the back of my shirt. “I need to touch you, Shari, and you need a back rub. Number forty-nine will capture the sounds you’re about to make.”
I try to stay focused and slide away from his hands. “Eleven is on my list, too. Eleven it is.”
He reaches even farther and somehow latches on to the elastic on the back of my gym shorts. “When did you first wear these?”
Let’s see. Sophomore year. “Twelve years ago.” I try to pull away, but it’s a feeble attempt. I wave his hand away, but he holds on.
“I can’t see very well,” he says, “but did you have that booty twelve years ago?”
So fresh! “No.”
I see a sweatshirt fly over my head, feel my shirt rising up my back, and soon feel one seriously smoking hot hand working me to distraction.
I, um, I have to put my glasses on the nightstand. I don’t want them to, um, get damaged should I lose my mind.
I wrap my arms around a pillow. “Does
this
mean we’re done for the day, boss?”
“We’re only just beginning, and don’t call me boss.”
“You’re the boss, boss,” I say.
He taps my booty.
“Careful,” I say. “I bite.”
“So do I.”
I like Tom. He says the nicest things.
“Um, Shari?”
“Yes, Tom?”
His hand disappears, the bed bounces, and in a moment Tom is on my side of the bed. “I promise to behave,” he says. “I can’t give you a proper back rub with one hand. Shari, you need some lotion. I could play tic-tac-toe on that back.”
I point to my dresser. Whoo. I’m about to get waxed. “But only if you behave.” Not so sure about me.
He stands beside the bed and warms up the lotion first. He starts at the back of my neck, that little small space that has to be one of the best yet most neglected erogenous zones on my body. Even though I pant quietly, I know my nipples are puncturing my pillowcase. He shapes and digs into my shoulders. That earns a groan. He makes big circles, little circles, in-between circles, and lots of straight lines on my back, working his way down to my booty. And when he gets to the small of my back and really cranks it up, I cry out, but not in pain.
“You okay?” he asks.
I nod. The things he’s doing to the parts of my body that he has yet to touch is driving me crazy. I shouldn’t have worn such tight shorts! I might actually chafe!
He pops up my waistband again, and he is silent for several delicious moments.
I turn slightly and see him staring hard at my booty. “What are you doing?”
“Worshiping. Having a moment of silence. Taking a mental picture I hope never fades.”
“How long do you need?” I ask.
Please
take a long time.
“A lifetime.”
I like Tom. He always gives me more than I ask for.
“Um, does your booty need massaging?” he asks.
Does Peaches need Herb? Does Ashford need Simpson? Does Kid need Play? I answer by wiggling my booty.
Don’t worry, Lord. I’m keeping my drawers on.
Instead of massaging my booty through my shorts, he worms his hands up my thighs and under my panties until all I feel is tight drawers in front and man hands in back. He does some serious damage to my booty, and in less than two minutes, I make this sound.
It’s a sound I’ve never made before.
It’s not in any language I’ve ever heard, nor can I even spell it.
It emanates from my toes, travels up to my booty, and explodes out of my mouth at about a hundred and fifty decibels.
I just know it had lots of Z’s and S’s in it, ending in a series of O’s and a delightful mmm... .
Chapter 25
 
T
hat was intense.
haven’t had an orgasm in ... I can’t remember. And we haven’t even gotten busy yet!
After he removes his hands from my grateful booty, I sweep my shirt back down, sit up, and scoot against the headboard, catching my breath. I quickly yank the covers up to my stomach.
“You’re, um, we’re ...” I stop. “Tom, that was ... that was completely unexpected.”
He nods. “Can I say what I’m thinking?”
“No.”
He drops his eyes. “It isn’t anything bad.”
“Okay. What are you thinking?”
“That never happened to me before either.” He frowns at his crotch. “I may have to do some laundry soon.”
I widen my eyes. “You, too?”
He nods. “It’s like I’m in high school or something.” He blushes. “I feel pretty stupid.”
Well, well, well. I turned him on without turning over. And he—
wow!
—he did the same to me. I stretch my neck side to side. “That was definitely a tension breaker.”
“Yeah.”
I lock eyes with him, and he doesn’t look away. I will never find another man like him. I need to make all this permanent somehow, and although we’re both kind of embarrassed, this might be the best time.
“What exactly are we doing here, Tom?” I ask.
He starts to move closer, but I shake my head.
He stops. “We’re enjoying each other’s company, Shari. Very much, I might add. We’re becoming friends.”
“You know what I mean. Are we ...” I have to be out of my mind to ask this so soon! “Is this a lifetime thing, Tom?”
“What do you want it to be?” he asks.
That’s
not
how that question is supposed to work. “You don’t want to answer till I do, is that it?”
“I want what you want.”
That’s still not an answer. I must test him. “So if I say ... ring, wedding, marriage, child ...”
He smiles, his shoulders relaxing. “I’d say
rings
—I want one, too. Um, rings, elope to Jamaica, passionate marriage, and children.”
Elope? Children? “No wedding?”
“I have no one to invite. Come to de islands, mon.”
I burned so many bridges at home that I might not have anyone show up either. “What if I want a wedding?”
“Do you?”
Not really. I shrug. “I suppose it’s negotiable.” Hmm. He said children, as in more than one. “How many kids?”
“Two.”
Reasonable. “A boy and a girl?”
“Two girls,” he says. “I want to be outnumbered, outvoted, and controlled by women for the rest of my natural life.”
I must
possess
this man. “You are a very wise man.” I open my arms to him, and he slides in behind me instead. I rest my head on his chest, and he wraps his arms around me.
“Well, Mr. Sexton,” I say as coyly as I can. “This is sounding right serious, I mean, I hardly even know you, sweetie.”
“There were some times these last few days when I thought I had known you all my life,” he says.
Wow. I don’t know what to say to that.
“You’re the mystery girl I’ve had in my dreams since I was sixteen, only I could never see your face,” he says. “And now that I’ve seen you up close, I know I won’t ever have to dream about my mystery girl again.” He squeezes my hands. “Because she’s here.”
That is so sweet, maybe the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard.
“And, Shari Nance, I am seriously, helplessly, head-over-heels, shamelessly, and endlessly in love with you.”
Oh ... man. I heard “Shari Nance.” I should have known something like this was coming. But maybe he’s only saying it because he’s in my bed and just had some, um, release. I have to make him repeat it. “You’re what?”
He picks me off his lap and turns me around, wrapping my legs around him. He looks me in the eye. “I am ridiculously, passionately, fully, wildly, and out of my mind in love with you, Shari Nance.”
Maybe he’s not just saying it. “So soon?”
“What do you mean, so soon?” He smiles. “I have known you for years. You’ve been my friend for years. I can talk to you like I can talk to no one else on this earth, and we’ve been talking for years. But this morning when you yawned and stretched on the edge of the bed. That little sigh you made. That sly smile. I knew at that moment I wanted
that
for the rest of my life.”
He took down the “wall” so he could watch me wake up? That’s so odd. He could have torn down that “wall” and had his way with me. “You wanted to see me at my worst? Hair a mess, breath humming, crust in my eyes?”
“You were the most beautiful person, place, or thing I have ever seen in my life at that moment.”
It’s nice to be wanted, and everything he said
was
true, but ... I was at my worst.
“I’ve, um, I’ve never spent the night anywhere with anyone, Shari,” he continues. “And you’ve had me staying with you three nights in a row. This is a big deal for me.”
Never? Well, I can see why. He barely fits in any bed. “You never stayed the night with Corrine?”
“No. She always kicked me out.” He sighs. “She didn’t want me to see her in the morning, and for that, I am eternally grateful. But you ... I want to wake up with you.”
This is so ... sudden. He skipped the “best friend” part and went to the “love” part. “You never stayed the night with anyone else?”
“No.”
“So because you spent the night and saw me yawning, you know you love me.”
“That’s not all, Shari,” he says. “It’s how I
felt
about staying, how I
felt
when I held your hand all night, how I
felt
when I got to see you wake up. I was here to see it. I saw you when you thought I was asleep, and I saw
you
. I saw
you
. Just you. I didn’t see the room anymore, didn’t see the window, didn’t see the bed, the ceiling, the floor, the bedspread, or the ‘wall.’ Just you. I saw you, Shari Nance.”
He’s saying such wonderful things. Why isn’t my heart aching or something? “Was I floating in the air?”
He stops smiling and drops his eyes. “You weren’t floating in the air, Shari. It’s hard to explain.”
Man, he’s serious.
This
is serious. I can’t play this off. And I certainly can’t tackle this man. I’d bounce off.
“It was like ...” He looks up for a moment then back into my eyes. “You know those photographs where the subject of the picture is in crystal-clear focus while the rest of the picture is fuzzed out? That’s how you looked. You were in focus while the rest of the world disappeared.”
“Maybe you just had sleep in your eyes.” What an insensitive thing to say, Shari! Why’d you say that?
He looks away. “I saw what I saw. And I feel what I feel.” He slides closer to the headboard, and I have no choice but to come with him. He looks toward the window. “Sun’s setting.”
I look at the window. It looks pretty. “I’m rarely here to see it on a weekday.”
Tom is silent.
Shoot.
“So, what’s on the agenda for tomorrow?” I ask.
Tom is still silent.
“Tom?” I don’t ask what’s wrong. I know what’s wrong. He loves me, and he now knows that A, I don’t believe that he loves me, and B, I don’t love him in return.
He sighs. “Shari, I’ve just told you that I love you.”
“I know.” And it scares me.
“Doesn’t it affect you in any way?” he asks softly.
“Um, it’s still sinking in. I feel ...” What a time for Chaka Khan’s “I Feel for You” to play in my mind. “I ... I feel good about it, Tom.” Thank you, James Brown. “I feel bliss. My heart is uncluttered, and my mind is open.” Is that what love truly is?
“No ... comets, shooting stars, rainbows, fireworks?”
No. Well, I did have those a few moments ago, and from a booty rub! “I just had quite a few of those during my, um, back rub.” But that’s not what love is. Comets fly by, shooting stars burn out, rainbows fade and go away, and fireworks blow up and leave lots of smoke. “I feel ... calm. Content. In the right place.” I feel ... tears? I’m crying? “I feel home.”
“Do you think that it might be love?” he asks.
What is happening? And why am I crying? “Yes. Yes, it might be. I’m where I should be, and it’s with you. I don’t have a care in the world.”
He wipes a tear from my cheek.
“This is so familiar, Tom,” I say, and it is. “You there. Me resting on you. Us talking, making plans. I want this.” I watch my tears dot his T-shirt. “Yes, Tom. Yes. This must be love.”
That night, after tearing down that silly “wall,” I sleep with a real man for the first time in my life
without
having sex with him. It is the most intimate thing I have ever done in my life. I touch him, hold on to his arms, feel his breath on my hair, hear him purring in my ear, and it is glorious. Bliss, sheer bliss.
It has to be love.
Love is here.
Love is home.
I’m finally,
really
home.

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