In the Pantry

“I’m kind of nervous,” I said to Jake, as we stood in front of the door to his friend’s apartment. I was still buried in layers of winter clothes; gray snow dripped off my boots onto the welcome mat.

“Why? You’ll like my friends.” He stopped and hugged me, kissed the top of my head. “I’m glad that you’re getting to meet them. They were beginning to think I made you up.”

I smiled, and pressed my cheek into the warmth of his jacket. It had been a long, cold walk from the T. He shifted so that he had one arm around me, and knocked on the door. There was a muffled shout of, “Hey, just come on in,” and so we did.

The change in temperature was dramatic. My glasses fogged up and I struggled to untangle the scarf from my coat zipper. The house smelled like pizza and popcorn. I really did not want to be there.

Jake dragged me into the living room, where most of his friends had gathered. I smiled and was introduced to a bunch of rowdy guys in their mid-to-late-twenties. There were a couple women in the room too. One was talking with the guys and laughing a lot. The other was still dressed in her business clothes. She was sexy in a cold sort of way; she had a strange vibe about her. Jake steered me through the crowd of khaki and flannel shirts to the first woman. “This is Lauren,” he said. “Lauren, this is my girlfriend Honey.”

She gave me a big smile and shook my hand. “It’s nice to meet you,” she said. “Jake was telling me about you and your website, so I checked it out.” She paused and looked a little embarrassed. “It’s very good,” she said.

“Thanks,” I replied. I liked her. But as we chatted, I was watching the other girl out of the corner of my eye. Jake had gone to stand next to her. She turned, smiled slightly, and put her hand on his arm. I made eye contact with Jake over Lauren’s head, and he motioned me over. I excused myself and made my way to them.

“Hey,” I said, “what’s up?”

“Honey, I’d like you to meet Sylvia. Sylvia, this is Honey.”

“Hi Sylvia, nice to meet you,” I said, as cheerfully as I could.

“Hey,” she said, deadpan, before turning back to Jake. I stood in awe of her rudeness for a moment, until Lauren came up and greeted us.

“Honey,” she said, “your presence has been requested in the kitchen.” She tugged my arm and led me into the less crowded kitchen.

“I don’t know anyone else here, who requested me?” I asked.

“I did,” Lauren said, looking serious. “Just so you know, Sylvia’s boyfriend of two years, Derek, broke up with her last month. So if she seems…off, that’s why.”

“Huh. Well. That explains it.” Since we were in the kitchen anyway, we grabbed a couple of beers and sat down at the table to drink. A bunch of guys were gathered around the PlayStation in the corner, very enthusiastically killing things.

I asked Lauren where she worked, and she said she was doing some kind of internship before going to grad school in sociology. We talked about sociology, veering into other topics as well, all the while drinking and generally having a good time. At some point, Lauren got up to go to the bathroom. I sat at the table, started my fifth beer, and just enjoyed the atmosphere.

Then it was like a cold breeze entered the room. I looked up and Sylvia was standing in the doorway. She grabbed a guy who was walking by and told him she was out of whatever mixed drink she was drinking. “You know where we keep everything, help yourself,” he said.

She was staring at me. She put her empty glass down on the kitchen table and pulled a chair right up next to me. “So,” she said, pointedly, “you’re dating Jake. That’s….interesting.” She reached for her glass, remembered it was empty, and stopped. I realized she was drunk, and that fact combined with her recent traumatic breakup was some excuse for her behavior, but not much. I ignored her statement and tried to steer the conversation into lighter topics.

“So, did you go to school up here?” I asked.

She gave a short laugh and said, “Actually, I went to Columbia undergrad and just finished at HBS, that stands for Harvard Business School,” she said slowly, for my benefit, “and now I’m working in Boston.” She literally narrowed her eyes at me and asked, “Where’d you get your education, the back of somebody’s van?”

I glanced around the kitchen. No one was watching. I leaned in and hissed, “I turned down Ivy League for Seven Sisters, bitch. You’ve been completely obnoxious since we met. What the fuck is your problem?”

She looked down at the table, and waves of sadness passed over her face. She suddenly got up, grabbed her glass, and headed as fast as her slightly weaving gait would allow her into the pantry. I was right on her heels.

I slipped into the pantry, the big walk in kind with a pull light, a counter, and cabinets that these old houses usually have, right before she closed the door behind her. The light was already on. She was dizzy and leaned against the wall. We stood like that for what felt like a very long time. I was just breathing and listening to her breathe, trying to think like a Buddhist and let the urge to murder her dissipate. Then I saw that she was crying. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m really sorry.”

I couldn’t just let her cry. I wrapped my arms around her and patted her back. I was surprised when she pulled me even closer and rested her cheek on my chest.

“I suck at sex,” she said, tears running down her cheeks. “I loved Derek but I hated having sex with him. That’s why we broke up in the end.”

“Were you just not attracted to him?” I asked.

“I thought he was attractive. Except for his penis.” She began to cry even harder. “It’s not fair,” she wailed, muffled in my sweater, “I’ve looked at your website. You like fucking guys and girls. None of that has ever been good for me.”

And here I was thinking she was just a closet lesbian. “So, you’ve slept with women also?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said. “But I couldn’t relax, and I couldn’t come.”

“Do you have a therapist or someone that you’re talking to about this? Because it seems like you need to deal with your own stuff before you’ll be comfortable. That’s all.”

She shook her head, then sighed.

The weirdness of the situation suddenly overwhelmed me. I opened cabinets until I found the alcohol, pulled out a bottle of vodka and a bottle of Bloody Mary mix, and took a swig of each. It was gross, but effective. I offered the bottles to Sylvia. She took the vodka. “So,” I asked her, “can you come from masturbating?”

She nodded. “Yeah, that’s the one way I can. I like masturbating. I have toys.” She giggled.

“Did you and Derek ever use any of them?”

“No. I didn’t want him to know. That’s too personal.”

“But you’re telling me.”

“I’m drunk and you’re a porn star,” she said. I wasn’t offended.

“What do you do when you masturbate?” I asked.

“First I use my fingers on my clit. I think about sex or I read stories while I touch myself. Then most of the time I get out my vibrator, and use that in me or on my clit.” Her cheeks were beginning to get flushed, and she was shifting her weight. I sat on the countertop, and she sat down next to me. “I know how you masturbate,” she said. “I’ve seen pictures, and I’ve read your stories.”

“Yeah, they’re based on truth,” I said.

She looked slightly disappointed. “You mean you don’t really do it like that?”

“No, I do. Most of me masturbating is pretty boring though. I’m just in bed with my hand on my clit, rubbing away.”

“And that does it for you?”

“I definitely come like that. Thinking about watersports, of course.” I smiled sheepishly. My pussy felt hot and wet.

Sylvia spread her legs slightly, in her expensive black pants, and put her hand on her pussy. She pressed her fingers against the fabric. I could smell her in the room.

“Do you want me to watch you come?” I asked, softly. Her fingers pressed harder on her pussy, gripping her clit.

“Yes,” she groaned, all primal body needs now, too far gone to let her head get into it. She unzipped her pants, and pulled her lace underwear to the side. Her pussy was glistening, dripping wet. She spread her legs the rest of the way and I saw the slit of pink appear in between her thick lips and curly dark brown hair. “Oh,” she moaned, as her fingers touched her slippery cunt, finally without layers of clothing in between. “Oh god, it feels good,” she said, plunging two of her fingers into her vagina.

She was the kind of woman who got really, really wet, and as she fucked herself her juice kept dripping out of her, coating her fingers and her thighs. She had her head thrown back against the cabinets, panting and pink, her long hair carelessly tossed over her shoulders and down her back. She was dying to come.

I leaned into her lap and kissed her thighs. She moaned loudly before shoving her knuckles in her mouth. I licked her clit, sucked it into my mouth. Her hips were gyrating so much and she was biting her fingers to hard that I knew it would be cruel to make her wait. So I did.

I ran one finger up and down her slit, pressing but not nearly hard enough. She was practically humping my face, and whispering through clenched teeth for me to fuck her, please.

I slid my fingers inside of her, deep. The walls of her vagina were wide open, and I fucked her with my fingers as hard as I could. “Oh, please, please, please,” she panted. “Don’t stop, make me come!”

I started sucking on her clit again, at the same time I was fucking her cunt. I licked quick and light, then long and slow, and kept alternating until she was absolutely out of her mind. She grabbed my hair and rubbed her pussy against my mouth. She was trying to stifle her shouts, and was doing an admirable job. She had one hand working her nipples.

Then, it was like going over the top of a roller coaster. Everything froze for a split second and then she was coming, down to her toes, her whole body clenching and releasing, spilling juice into my mouth and my chest, pulling my hair.

The moment she was done, she was pulling my pants down. “Show me, show me,” she said. “I want to see you come too.” She reached inside my underwear and began stroking my pussy. I moaned and she purred in glee. She let her fingers rest on my aching clit before reaching inside my cunt and pulling out very wet fingers. Without a word, she slid her hot wet fingers up and down, over my clit. I have never seen a woman in such rapture over pussy. She must have needed it bad.

Sylvia stretched out, almost on top of me, fingers slit working my slit. She leaned down and kissed my breast, first through my sweater, then pulling up the layers of clothes I was wearing to kiss naked skin. She tucked one of my nipples into her mouth and licked it just like I had her clit. Her fingers still stroked me, and I was spilling almost as much juice as she had.

She was so good at touching my clit that I came even quicker than she had. She slid her fingers into me as I came, moaning as she felt the walls of my pussy squeeze her inside of me.

She let her fingers slide out of my pussy and rest on my thigh. My heart was pounding, and I was suddenly seized with fear. What if someone had heard? Sylvia seemed to be thinking the same thing. We quickly put our clothes back on and opened the door.

It was silent. The boys around the video games had all turned to face us. Lauren was standing at the table with Jake. She quickly gave me a look of fear, a warning, before Jake stormed up, grabbed my hand, and said, “I think we’ve all heard enough for one night, don’t you think, Honey?”

It was a blur. I was so scared and embarrassed I thought I’d die. Jake and I weren’t monogamous, but it was still shitty as hell to fuck a girl in the pantry while your boyfriend and all his friends are gathered right outside; especially when this is your first time meeting any of them.

I grabbed my coat and Jake dragged me outside. “It’s over,” he said, stamping his feet in the snow, not looking me in the eye. “You don’t even deserve to know how fucking awful that was for me.”

I couldn’t say anything, I couldn’t begin to apologize. I couldn’t even think. “OK.” I said. “I understand.”

“You fucking don’t understand anything. I never want to see or hear from you again, got that? You have no control over your sexual urges. I hope you get some fucking STD.” He turned his back to me, and rubbed his eyes roughly against the sleeve of his coat.

There was snow on my face, melting down my cheeks, but I was too numb to cry. I walked back up to him, wrapped my arms around him from behind. He tensed, stiffened, started to shake me off, then didn’t. “It’s completely over, Honey,” he said, face still buried in his sleeve.

“I know,” I said, and stood like that for another minute before heading to the train by myself.