You startle and the radiator hisses and the soundtrack of Hannah and Her Sisters delivers instrumental old love songs and you brought me a coffee like a good girl and you hand me my fleece. I take it and sit down on the stool at the register and you bat your eyelashes at me and that perv is still looking and I have to take care of him.
“When you come back,” I say, raising my voice, “you better be wearing a bra.”
You blush and try not to smile and you slip into your peacoat and grab your bag of shit you dragged in here and you nod. “What color?”
It can’t be long before we fuck and I shrug. “You pick.”
“Red?”
“Fine.”
“Black?”
“Go,” I say and you go and I look at the pervert and call him out good, cold. “Did you need help, sir?”
“Uh, no, just looking.”
“Well, if and when you do need help, I’m here,” I say, and I turn off the Hannah and put on the Beastie Boys and wait for you to come back, which you will, because you love it here with me and did I mention that this was the best idea ever? Your first shift, you were an arrogant disaster and you fucked up every sale you made and overcharged and undercharged and wore your fucking Brown University sweatshirt as if you needed everyone to know that you’re above this kind of shit and I told you no sweatshirts and you turned red because you know when you’re being an asshole. The perv in References asks if we have a bathroom and I tell him, sharp, cutting, “No,” and he doesn’t say good-bye when he leaves and I take the opportunity to go downstairs and beat one out because working with you and waiting for you to get here so I can smell you and see you and be near you every day has me worked up like a fucking eighth-grade kid with a slutty substitute teacher.
My phone buzzes and you’re fast and you have texted me: Knock knock
And there’s a photo and it’s you, in a red bra, and you text again: Is this appropriate for the workplace?
And I write back:
No
And January is the deadest month in the world and I could stay down here reviewing bras all day and you know it and you come right back: Knock knock
I type:
Yes?
And here it is again, you, no face, just your tits shoved into a pink lace bra and your nipples are hard for me and I can’t take it anymore and I finish and you text me again: ?
And I refuse to give my dick to you in this way and you’re starting to figure that out and you text another photo of yourself. No bra. And I give you what you want. I text: Bad girl. Come here. Now.
You text right back lightning fast:
Yes boss
No punctuation just yes, the universal euphemism for FUCK ME NOW, and boss, the universal euphemism for I SUBMIT, and I clean myself up and bound up the stairs and find the Paula Fox I’m pretending to read every time you show up and I take out the Beastie Boys and put on some Beck—it’s a regular thing now, a joke we have, we are that couple with a secret vocabulary of songs and books and looks and meals—and by the time you get here it’s almost time to close and I haven’t even checked your e-mail in days, that’s how into me you are, and you slip out of your peacoat and you’re in a fucking lace, see-through tank top and you smile at me.
“Is this inappropriate?”
I close Paula Fox and the Beck song “Sexx Laws” starts to play, an ode to handcuffs and illogically great fucking. You and I will make our own fucking song and I adjust so I’m facing you and the door is not locked and the sign says open and the streets are emptying out (a Monday in January) and the Hannah was foreplay and the texts were first base and you move toward me, slightly, and I spread my legs, slightly, and you are standing on your peacoat in your fuck-me boots and I can’t take it anymore and I break.
“You’re late. We’re about to close.”
“Sorry, boss. When do we close, boss?”
“Now.”
“Uh-oh.”
“Yeah,” I say, and I’m a rock and you’re not wearing any panties under that skirt, you whore, and you tilt your little head and twirl your little hair and it’s amazing how the most generic shit in the world can be so hot: half-naked girl in a bookstore, reaching for a Twizzler, chewing on it, slowly, begging for it, silently.
“Well, maybe there’s something else I can do for you,” you coo and I shake my head no and motion for you to come here now and you have the Twizzler hanging out of your mouth and you put both of your hands on both of my knees and lean in and dangle the Twizzler at my mouth.
I bite it. Finally.
28
I have just fucked you for the first time in our lives and it was not good and it did not go on forever and you did not scream. Where was that Macy’s heat when I was inside you? And who’s to blame for our quick fuck? Was it because we weren’t in a dressing room or in front of an open window? Or was it me? Was I too hungry? Too eager? Did I hold you too hard? Maybe I’m better at eating you out than I am at fucking you, and that’s a horrible and unfair possibility. We’ve only done it once. Do I get to do it again? Do you want to do it again?
You don’t want to do it again. You aren’t revving up as we recover on the floor of the cage. You are on top of me stroking my hair and I can’t see your face but I can feel the disappointment in your hands, in your touch, which is full of pity. The pads of your fingers go pat-pat and I can’t let go of you or you might back off of me and I might have to face you and I can’t do that. I lasted maybe eight seconds. Nine. I’m running over it in my head and I don’t know how this happened. Maybe I jerked off too much and maybe you teased me too much and maybe I should have locked the door.
“No,” you said. “It’s so hot with the door open and the open sign up, right?”
I should have been honest with you and told you that the lack of security would only make me nervous. But I didn’t want to disappoint you and I wanted to put your needs first. You wanted to go at it by the register, but I said no.
“Let’s go downstairs.”
“Really?” you said and you were lit up. You were. I’m sure of it.
We got down here (my idea, I have the key, I am the boss), and I unlocked the cage and ordered you in there and I locked it and you smiled and I told you to take your skirt off and you obeyed (I am the boss) and you weren’t wearing any panties and I told you to touch yourself and you did and I willed the other Beck to shut the fuck up. You wanted the music on and so I left it alone (I am the boss and I am allowed to please you on occasion). You stood holding the cage door with one hand and working at yourself slowly with the other while I started getting undressed, and you watched me smiling one second, intent and ready the next. I told you to beg for it and you begged me to come in there and I took my pants off and you saw how badly I wanted to come in there and I told you to get down on your knees and you did and you reached for me (I am the boss, I am allowed to please you on occasion) and I unlocked the cage and entered. You took me in your hands and in your mouth and you kept looking up at me and I knew it was time to fuck you and let you know that it was time and you leapt at me, an animal, and straddled me and commanded me downward (I am the boss and I am allowed to please you on occasion), and then.
And then.
And then I was inside of you and I came. I blew it. I came so fast and so hard and you said nothing at first and you didn’t act like you wanted me to help you finish, you just went smack into gentle stroking my hair mode (the wrong kind of fucking touching), and you quietly told me:
“Don’t worry, Joe. I’m on the pill.”
And that was the moment I was most afraid of you and what you could do to me and not do to me because that was the moment that I realized that you are the boss, not me and you can please me on occasion if you want to. When we finally stood up we were both hungry and dizzy and there was an old man upstairs standing at the register and he looked at us, me all dressed, you in your bra and he smiled.