Why is he looking at me like that? Ugh!
I hated—okay, I kind of loved it—how he was looking at me, waiting patiently for me to answer. How dare he think I don’t know what to do! How dare he think I couldn’t handle him! But I really didn’t know what to do. I had an idea; I’d heard things, read things, but I’d never actually done any of them and thought it was probably different than I’d imagined.
And I wasn’t sure I could handle him. I had felt his hardness against my backside many times, but I had never touched it, I had never seen it, nor held it in my hands, nor put it in my mouth like I pictured myself doing right then. That’s the answer! I can tell him I’ll pleasure him with my mouth! I can one-up him because I hadn’t even let him do that for me yet! I may have been comfortable around him, but I was self-conscious about his face being between my legs. Oh, how awkward that would be!
I felt brave and bold suddenly, and—no I didn’t; the second I looked into his grinning eyes, my bravery melted into a puddle of intimidation.
I took a deep breath, uncrossed my arms and coiled my fingers nervously down in front of me; I shuffled my toes in a little circle on the floor; my shoulders were drawn up.
ATTICUS
“I could…put my mouth on you,” Thais said in such a quiet voice I had to strain to hear her.
Oh, but I’d heard her. The grin I wore left my face in an instant, replaced by…hell if I fucking knew. Was it shock? Or maybe….no, it was certainly some form of shock.
“Come again?” I inquired.
Maybe I didn’t hear that right, I debated.
“I said,” she said a little louder, bolder, “that I could put my mouth on you.”
Oh my God, Thais…why’d you have to go and say that?
I could tell, by her shy demeanor, the look of pure terror in her eyes, that she was uncertain about everything she was saying; she was not prepared to actually do what she was proposing. She regretted ever saying it.
Hmm.
I thought I might just see how long I could play this out; teach her a lesson never to try being too bold—especially for the sake of getting me off. Maybe this would make her stop asking altogether.
“Oh,” I said casually, pursing my lips, “you’re saying you want to give me a blowjob?”
THAIS
I froze, and nodded timidly.
“Okay,” he said, and glanced at his lap. “If that’s what you really wanna do, love, then it’s all yours.”
I blinked—I thought he would say no!
My stomach swam with air. My hands were sweating and shaking; all the moisture in my mouth evaporated as if the sun had moved a mile closer to the Earth. I can’t let him see how terrified I am! I tried to counter the fear in my face with courage, and then raised my chin properly.
“Yes,” I said with a solid nod, “that’s what I want to do for you, Atticus Hunt.”
ATTICUS
I wanted to laugh at the formality but I didn’t laugh. I just smiled up at her, one side of my mouth turning up more than the other. Then I uncrossed my ankles and opened my legs. I reached down and slid the zipper open on my pants and then unbuttoned them. But I didn’t take it out; I figured I’d let Thais, bold and brave Thais, do that part.
I reached up both hands and fitted them behind my head. And then I waited; big close-lipped smile intact.
THAIS
I thought I was really in over my head. I looked down at him—at anything but his eyes now—and my hands continued to move restlessly, clasped in front of me. A lump moved stubbornly down the center of my throat.
Then I reached out a reluctant, shaky hand and placed it atop the very visible, very sizeable bulge in his pants.
“What are you waiting for?” he asked.
Stop looking at me like that!
I took a deep breath, knelt beside him and dipped my hand behind the elastic of his boxers, over the trail of dark hair beneath his navel that led to the center of my timidity, and I found him. I gripped it nervously, enclosing my small fingers about the girth and my eyes got bigger in my face and my heart beat more rapidly in my chest and I decided then that I was, without a doubt, in over my head. How am I going to fit that in my mouth? What if I do it wrong? I will definitely do it wrong. I felt like crying, ashamed I couldn’t get it together. I wanted to give him pleasure as he had given to me, but I was terrified of making a fool of myself. If he didn’t wish he’d taken Rachel with him before, he’s sure to now!
“Thais?” Atticus’ voice no longer held the playful undertone it had before—it was soft and consoling. The infuriating grin was gone from his face.
Without ever feeling his arm move as I sat there on my knees in a trance, I looked down to see his hand atop mine, pulling it out of his boxers—he’d never planned to let me go through with it, I realized.
Atticus sat up and turned on the sofa, setting his feet on the floor. He reached down and helped me up. I stood before him and he gazed up at me, taking my hands into his.
“Thais,” he said, “I don’t know what all happened to you while you were out there, surviving with your family, and you don’t have to tell me”—he tugged on my fingers so I’d look at him, and I did—“but I will never make you do something you don’t want to do. Never.” He tugged a little harder in emphasis. “You owe me nothing, and all I want from you is to know you’re safe and fed and always able to smile.” He smiled at me then.
He was breaking my heart. Not with pain, but with affection. Oh, Momma, you were wrong. Oh, I love you always, but you were so wrong when you said there were no good men left in the world! You were so wrong…
39
THAIS & (ATTICUS)
In the following days, Atticus and I really did forget about the outside world; we forgot about the devastation that went on all around us while we lived peacefully in a speck of forest amid an encompassing mass of violence that was the rest of the country. We and our tranquil place of residence was a pinhole of light in an endless sky of blackness.
“I think we should stay here,” I told him one afternoon as we brought back fish from the pond. “At least for a little while longer. A couple months.”
Atticus set the fishing poles against the side of the house, and the bucket of fish down on the ground.
“I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s not a good idea to stay in one place for too long, especially if it’s only the two of us. Strength in numbers, remember?” He plucked his big knife from his boot and set it down on the porch railing.
“I know,” I said, “but I’m still not ready to leave.”
“We’ll see.”
I smiled and went inside to prepare our salads while Atticus cleaned the fish.