Pink Neon Dreams (7 page)

Although
the only Spanish she knew were a few scraps and phrases anyone would recognize,
Cecily identified the word as an endearment.
 
She summoned up a response,
“De
nada,
”
as she headed back to her
seat across the table.
 
They finished the
meal with light conversation, and it wasn’t until hours later she realized he
never answered her question.

After
they finished the cream horns, Daniel tossed their trash and offered her his
hand.
 
She took it and he led her down to
the rocky swimming beach.
 
Above them,
the night sky sparkled with a thousand stars, bright and thick.
 
Cecily couldn’t recall ever seeing the stars
with such clarity.
 
A waxing moon swelled
almost full and the silver light bathed everything in a mystical beauty.
 
The orb reflected in the lake waters and a
soft wind rippled the still surface.
 
Around them, darkness loomed full and deep.
 
So
night can be magical, like in a movie or something.
 
Here it’s not dangerous, not threatening,
just beautiful.
 
Maybe I’m dreaming or
the cream horn was spiked with some really good shit to make me high.

“It’s
lovely,” she said with feeling.

Daniel
chuckled. “Yeah, it’s nice.
 
Do you know
the stars at all?”

“I
couldn’t recognize the Big Dipper unless someone showed it out to me,” she
admitted.

“That’s
it, right there,” he said and pointed it out.
 
“And there’s the Little Dipper.”

Cecily
picked out the star patterns with a childlike wonder.
 
“Oh, wow.”

He
proceeded to indicate where other constellations could be found including Orion
as well as the Evening Star.
 
“It’s
really Venus, you know,” he told her.

She
hadn’t. “How do you know so much about the night sky?” she asked. “Did you
study astronomy?”

He
snorted. “No, my dad taught me.
 
He
served in the Navy and learned about the stars then, I guess.
 
He used to take me out into the country, away
from Fort Worth to see the sky. Sometimes we camped out, sometimes not but we
always had good times.”

Her
imagination painted an image of a father and son staring up into a sky this
amazing.

“It
sounds awesome,” she said, her words tinged with regret. “I never knew my daddy
or anything about him except he was white.”

The
few times she’d shared with anyone, she noticed the same reaction.
 
A flustered moment, a shocked stare and then
the same words, “I’m so sorry.”
 
Cecily
loathed pity and wanted none but she waited, certain Daniel would offer it to
her, maybe clothed in pretty words.
 
His
arm circled her shoulders and snugged tight.

“Shit
happens,” he said in an ordinary tone, “and sometimes it spatters the wrong
people. My dad worked in the stockyards and when I was twelve, a runaway cow
gored him.
 
He died a week later.”

Cecily
leaned against him and gazed upward at the timeless sky.
 
An intense peace, something she’d never
known, poured into her consciousness and she became as at ease with Daniel as
she’d ever been with anyone.
 
In the
distance, noises filtered through the light breeze, highway traffic far away,
tires humming against pavement, and the sound of a train’s whistle, lonesome
and poignant.
 
She heard the quiet lap of
the lake against the shore and the noise the wind made as it rustled the leaves
on the nearby trees.
 
As the hour
stretched onward toward midnight, they remained in place and it became
quieter.
 
They said little, an occasional
word or two about the stars.
 
A few
airplanes passed overhead, their moving lights a reminder of the modern world,
but when a shooting star flared, then fell to earth, Cecily grabbed Daniel’s
hand.

“Did
you see it?” she asked with excitement. “It was a falling star!”

His
chin shifted against her as he nodded. “Did you make a wish?”

Last
time she made a wish, she’d blown out the candles on her sixteenth birthday
cake.
 
She wished for a chance at a
college, for a life outside the neighborhood, for a man to love her and keep
her.
 
None of it came true and instead,
Willard rolled into her life like a Sherman tank and destroyed it.
 
After that, Cecily gave up on wishes.
 
She stopped tossing pennies into fountains
with a silent dream, but tonight something felt different.
 
Hope lived in the open sky, it flickered
among the stars and she answered him. “I did.”

“Me,
too,” he said. “Do you think either one will come true?”

“I
think there’s a chance,” Cecily replied, voice soft. “If it does, it’s up to
you.”

“To me?”

“Uh-huh,”
she whispered. “’Cause it takes two of us to make my wish happen.”

His
serious mask vanished and a vulnerable expression softened his face. “Then tell
me your wish, pretty lady.”

“Take
me home,” Cecily said.

A
grin teased the corners of his mouth. “Are you tired?” he asked.

“Not
unless you are,” she replied. “Take me home and find out.”

Daniel’s
eyes glittered as he grasped her meaning and nodded.
 
“Let’s go.”

On
the way back into Branson, he exceeded the speed limit, but his Ford held the
road tighter than a fist.
 
He changed the
CD from the tribal chants to the Pointer Sisters. Whether by chance or design
the song pouring from the speakers was
Slow
Hand
.
 
An old favorite, learned as a
child listening to her mother and aunts play the stereo, it suited Cecily’s
mood.
  
The desire prickling her skin
increased with the music and she hoped Daniel would have a slow hand when they
made love.

As
he rolled down the Strip, the car seemed to crawl after their fast ride back to
town.

“Don’t
you want me to tell you where I live?” she asked. If she didn’t know different,
she’d swear he headed in the right direction anyway. “Or am I going home with
you?”

He
laughed, short and somehow harsh. “I wouldn’t take you back to the flea pit
where I’m staying,” he said. “So tell me how to get to your place unless you
want me to get a room in a nice hotel or something.”

“Home
will do,” she said. “Turn up here.”

After
parking the Ford in her empty drive, Daniel came around to open the door for Cecily.
 
She handed him the door key and he kissed her
with a swift savagery beneath the wide branches of the maple tree in the front
yard.
 
Once inside, things escalated with
speed.
 
She dropped her purse onto the
couch just inside the front door, and he tossed the key onto the end table
beside it.
 
She kicked off her shoes and
watched him do the same, noting he wore no socks.
       

 
“Do you want a glass of wine or a beer?” she
asked, testing the water.
 
Cecily needed
him to be as certain about this as she.

“I
want you,” Daniel said.

Her
bones melted inside her flesh, victim to the heat flaring through her
body.
 
When he opened his arms wide, Cecily
walked into them and he locked her in a tight embrace.
 
Sweet shudders rocked her torso as she
anticipated what came next.
 

Daniel
lifted her chin upward and bent to press his mouth on hers.
 
His lips caressed her mouth and his hands
reached beneath her blouse to touch her body.
 

She
clutched his black t-shirt with one hand, her other stroked his hair, rubbed
his cheek, and then rested on his arm.
 
Eyes
shut, Cecily reveled in his kiss and as the heat they generated spread, she
worked her hand up under his shirt, no easy task since it fit skin tight.
 
Her fingers fondled his right nipple and she
liked the way it hardened beneath her touch.

At
the same time, Daniel’s fingers unhooked her bra and with deft talent managed
to remove it, pulling it through one of her sleeves.
 
He dropped it on the floor without sound and
his hands cupped her breasts. His grasp burned against her flesh, but he didn’t
hurry, just rubbed her breasts and accentuated the sensitive nipples as he
did.
 
Each stroke brought a moment of
pure delight, physical and intimate.
 
She
rubbed her twat against his denim crotch, up and down to enjoy the friction
then arched her back like a cat.
 
Even
through the heavy cloth Cecily felt his dick harden and he worked her blouse
over her head.
 
With quick fingers, he
removed his shirt too, and she ran her hands over his naked torso with
delight.
 
Rock solid and lean, she
savored the feel of his flesh under her fingers.

When
she fumbled at his zipper, Daniel paused long enough to pull off the pants, and
she shimmied out of hers without waiting for any help.
 
She admired his red briefs before she hooked
one fingernail into the waistband and pulled them down to his ankles.
 
He kicked them away and removed her
panties.
 
The heat of his hands against
the silk sent tremors through her body, and she thought she’d come before he
ever entered her.
 
Damn girl, he’s got you lit and going, all the way.

His
cock stood up, proud as a soldier at full attention and she grasped it in her
hand.
 
Cecily stroked it with steady
motions and he groaned.
 
It twitched in
her hand as if it possessed a life of its’ own.
 

As
Daniel’s breathing increased, her pulse kept pace. When he stuck a finger up
into her passage and fingered her clit, she gasped aloud. Intense sensation
began within and spread like wildfire as he worked his finger, then dug deeper
to hit her G-spot.
 
Her legs buckled and
if he hadn’t caught her with his free hand, she would’ve fallen onto the
floor.
 
Daniel steered her onto the couch
where Cecily collapsed onto her back.
 

When
Daniel lowered himself onto her body, her hands flailed out and then stroked
his back.
 
Her long fingernails raked
over his skin, deep enough to tantalize, slow enough to provoke.
 
Within, her cunt grew warmer and moist.
 
Need tensed her body tight and she spread her
legs wide to welcome Daniel into her inner most sanctum.

“Take
me,” she begged. “Come on, do it now.”

He
didn’t need the invitation and by the time the words flowed out of her mouth,
he’d entered her, his cock hard as stone as it plowed into her depths.
 
His passage brought erotic delights, and her
box squeezed tight to caress his dick as he came into her body.
 
Cecily locked her legs around his back and
tilted her body for maximum effect.
 
Connected, they rocked back and forth, each movement swirling pleasure
through her body in intense waves.
 
He
slowed his pace until she didn’t think she could bear much more.
 
To tease, he worked his prick up and down in
a sewing motion but he never pulled out all the way.
 
His grunts were sounds of pleasure, she thought,
and her own cries mingled with his.

Their
momentum hastened until they were in full motion, seeking the moment of
nirvana, the ultimate explosion as one.
 
By the time they came, she thought she’d die within moments, but the
intense burst of incredible delight relieved all the pent-up tension. The
powerful climax eased the longing and she came on a wild tide of feeling.
 
Tears rained down her cheeks from the
powerful impact, a release as emotional as it was physical.
 

Daniel
rode the rush with her and he cried out, hoarse and wordless at the end,
shuddered. Then he went still.

They
lay intertwined together, two vines made one with their coupling.
 
Cecily lacked breath to speak, but as her
heart rate slowed back to normal, she wanted to purr with contentment.

That’s the best ride I’ve ever
had.
 
He’d taken her body and devoured what she
offered in return but beyond, Daniel managed to notch his name on her
soul.
 
He owned a little piece of her now
and although she wasn’t quite sure how she felt about it, happiness surrounded
her like a mink throw, soft and all enveloping.

“So
did your wish come true?” he said after several minutes.

“Oh,
yeah,” she replied, her fingers playing across his chest with light caresses.
“How about you?”