That Summer

"Your parents must be really nice people," she said as she began to scrub the dishes in the sink. "They certainly raised you right."

It was my turn to laugh. I pushed back from the table and stood up, picking up the remaining dishes and carrying them to the sink for her. "I don't know if they'd agree with you there," I told her and was rewarded with another lovely smile.

She's even prettier up close, I thought then.

"You don't have to stick around while I do the dishes, Erik," she said softly after a moment.

I blushed and turned away, realizing that I'd been staring at her. "I don't mind helping out, Ms. Jenkins," I replied and walked back over to the table and absent-mindedly pushed the chairs back into place.

"Erik, I will fire you this minute if you call me Ms. Jenkins one more time," she said then, turning away from the sink, water dripping from the cloth in her hand as she faced me.

I looked into her face, my mouth hanging open, ready to say 'Yes, Ms. Jenkins.' The look on her face was surprising though. She looked upset, actually angry with me for calling her that and I thought for the first time that there was an entirely different reason that she must not like to be called that.

"All right," I managed to whisper.

"All right," she repeated and turned back to the sink quickly.

As silence descended over the kitchen, I felt lost suddenly. I'd said something wrong and now Alice was upset. With me. I felt awful. I resolved to change that as soon as I could. I was, however, completely at a loss as to how.

"Uh, I think I'll go check everything outside before the storm hits," I mumbled and turned to the door before I could manage to say something else foolish.

Alice didn't say a word as I left, continuing to clean the dishes from dinner. I hurried across the back porch, checking the outer shutters as I went along. The wind tore at my clothes, rippling it coolly against my skin and I shivered as I moved away from the porch and the house.

As I worked, I tried to think of something to say to Alice to make up for upsetting her. When one particularly stubborn barn door refused to budge under my hands, I grew annoyed. With the door and with the woman back inside the farm house.

What right does she have to be upset with me for speaking to her with respect? I thought to myself, grunting with the effort to haul the large barn door shut. I've done nothing to deserve her snapping at me like that.

At last the great wooden door slid an inch, then another and finally I was able to close it entirely, dropping the latch and sealing it for the night. I huffed a deep breath after that was done and faced the rest of the yard, taking in the black sky and the rumbling thunder in the distance.

"Not long now," I muttered and shivered as another chill blast of air blew through the yard.

Hurrying again, I finished up sealing all barn and shed doors, latching all the gates and securing the shutters on the outside of the house. As I finally made my way back inside, the rain had begun and my shirt was wet across the shoulders when I reached the shelter of the porch.

I entered through the kitchen and saw that Alice had finished cleaning everything up and was nowhere in sight. Shrugging, I removed my boots and headed directly upstairs to my room. Once there, I quickly changed out of my damp clothes and threw on my flannel bottoms. Then I crawled shirtless into my icy bed and tried to warm myself.

The wind outside the house howled and minutes later the rain was pounding in earnest against the wooden siding and glass windows. Sleep evaded me as I lay there, listening to the rain and replaying the conversation in the kitchen.

My annoyance with Alice had faded somewhat but not entirely. I also still felt like a complete ass for doing or saying whatever it was that had upset her so. All in all, not a good recipe for a restful sleep. Sighing and shivering alternately, I tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable for I don't even know how many hours. Still the storm outside persisted and I couldn't get warm or calm enough to fall asleep.

I thought I was hallucinating when I first heard the tap on my door.

I ignored it, figuring it was a figment of my imagination and rolled towards the wall, hauling the blanket up to my neck. When the knock sounded again a minute later, I sat up abruptly, unsure now if I was actually imagining things. Again the knock came and I switched on the bedside lamp. I finally got up, wincing when my bare feet hit the cold floor.

"Did I wake you?" A soft and quiet Alice greeted me when I opened the door.

I was dumb-founded for several long moments. Then I realized what an idiot I must look like, standing there with my mouth hanging open and shook my head in response to her question.

"Good," she breathed and smiled.

I noticed then that she was carrying two steaming mugs of what smelled like coffee. "Is one of those for me?" I asked, finding my voice and sending a silent prayer up that it didn't crack under my nervousness.

"Yes," she answered, handing one of the mugs over.

Then we stood there in silence for another minute, each holding a coffee mug. I took that minute to drink in her appearance. She wasn't dressed in her usual attire of jeans and a button-up shirt. Tonight she had on a light blue dress with little green and pink flowers all over it. It hung limply from her slender form, not exactly accentuating her curves, but it certainly didn't make her look frumpy either. She looked beautiful to me.

"May I come in?" She asked, breaking the silence and before I knew what was happening, I'd nodded and she was walking past me into my cold bedroom.

As she brushed by me, her scent wafted up to my nose and I breathed deeply, my eyelids sliding low over my eyes. She was wonderful.

"I wanted to talk to you about earlier," she said, circling the room once before deciding to sit in the lone rocking chair. She didn't look up at me immediately, her fingers playing with the handle of her mug as she sat down. "And apologize for how I acted."

All my previous annoyance and frustration melted away in an instant. I slowly walked to the bed and perched on the edge, holding my own mug gingerly between my big hands. I faced her, regarding her shyly and silently. I wanted to appear as though I was mature and could handle a mature conversation but the truth was, I just didn't want to say something brainless and spoil the moment.

"It's just been so long since I've had someone around that I could talk to," she went on, taking my silence as a cue to continue. I wouldn't have stopped her for the world. "Like we do," she added a second later, still playing lightly with her mug. "I mean, I enjoy our conversations at dinner." Finally she looked up and I was caught immobile in her emerald gaze.

"Uh, m-me too," I stammered and flushed, hating myself all the while.

"Do you?" She asked incredulously, but smiled as she spoke to take the sting out of her words.

I nodded dumbly, refusing to say anything else.

"Good," she said. "I'd hate for you to not enjoy your time here, Erik. I mean, you've still got another two long months to go."

"Not long," I said suddenly and shook my head in accompaniment.

"What?"

"It's not long at all," I repeated, feeling foolish for even speaking. When she didn't respond, I kicked myself mentally. Now I'd have to say something else! "Um, I mean, it doesn't seem like a long time. Like, I haven't been here a long time either." Stupid, stupid, stupid.

"No?" She asked, raising her eyebrows but still smiling. That was encouraging, to say the least.

"Well, no. No, it doesn't feel like it's been all that long," I went on. "And two months doesn't seem long enough-" I stopped abruptly, halting my stilted words before I said too much. But as I met her steady gaze, I knew it was already too late. She'd heard what I was trying hard not to say and now I felt a new sensation tingling up my spine; embarrassment.

"Sorry," I mumbled and looked away, down at the steam curling up from my coffee mug.

"For what?" Alice whispered and the chair creaked as she moved.

It wasn't until I felt the bed shift beside me that I looked up again. I thought she'd been getting up to leave me alone but instead she'd moved closer, sitting next to me on the bed.

"For..." I began but then shook my head. How do you apologize for lusting after your employer? It's not like there's a course at university for this sort of thing.

"Don't be sorry, Erik," she whispered and her scent swirled around me, invading my senses.

I didn't say anything. I didn't move, didn't look at her. When I tried to lift the mug to my lips, she stopped me, her rough, calloused hand staying the movement. The feeling of her hands on mine brought a recent memory racing to the forefront. I'd hurt myself about two weeks ago, nailing wire to a fence post along the outskirts of her property. Alice had swiftly and carefully cleaned the wound in the kitchen, bandaging the gash and giving me a piece of cake to 'make it all better;' she'd said that with a smirk and a light-hearted laugh. As the memory washed over me, all I could think about was how I'd felt as her hands moved on my skin. They were rough and toughened from years of work on the land and in the house but she'd not been rough in the slightest with my wound. That had also been one of the many sleepless nights in this very room, thoughts and images of her crashing around in my skull, keeping me from a dreamless sleep.

But in the here and now, she gently removed the mug from my hands and set it on the nightstand, next to her own discarded mug. Then she turned to me again and placed a hand on my cheek. I think I stopped breathing.

"I know what you were going to say, Erik," she murmured, her fingers soft against my chin.

I swallowed and nodded slowly, unable to look away from her greener than green eyes.

"You were going to say that two months isn't long enough to really get to know each other," she went on, bringing her other hand up to touch the other side of my face. "Right?" She asked, pausing in her movements to gauge my reaction.

"R-right," I stuttered, unable to move; unwilling to move. I was afraid that at any moment the spell would be broken and I'd wake up to a humid morning following a wild rainstorm.

As if to punctuate my thoughts, a flash of lightning brightened the sky and illuminated the dim room. Thunder followed almost immediately and it did wonders to disguise the erratic thumping of my heart.

"Well, let's not waste any more time," Alice whispered in the silence that followed the thunderclap.

At first I didn't know what she meant. I felt entranced and all I knew was that her hands were moving on my skin. Then her face seemed to grow larger in my vision and I gasped out loud when she kissed me.

Her lips were as soft as they'd looked. She moved them against mine and I clutched at the blankets underneath my hands, uncertain as to what exactly was happening.

"Erik?" She whispered, pulling back and frowning slightly up at me.

"Wh-what...what are you doing?" I finally managed to ask, breathless and trembling.

She smiled then and leaned forward again. "Getting to know you better."

"Alice," I murmured against her lips as she kissed me again and still I couldn't quite wrap my head around her actions. She slowly moved her mouth over mine, her hands sliding from my face to my shoulders. Clutching my shoulders, she pulled herself closer, angling her body more firmly against mine.

I felt it then, the flutter of her heartbeat within her chest and realized that this was making her as crazy as it was making me. I eased back from her, breaking the kiss and looking down at her face. We didn't speak for a long, drawn out moment. I was breathing heavily and my heartbeat was obliterating all other sounds in the room; the rain, the thunder, the wind. All other sounds but the air rushing in and out of her mouth.

Slowly, I moved, lifting one hand from the bed to rest on her slim waist. Her mouth dropped open suddenly and I froze, afraid that she was going to yell at me for presuming. But she didn't yell. She didn't move or swat my hand away. So I brought my other hand up, releasing my death grip on the covers and placing it against her neck.

She smiled then, her eyes sliding shut and tilting her head to rest against my hand. Still the air moved between us, breathing in and out from our bodies and I honestly didn't know what to do next.

"Alice," I whispered her name, not wanting to spoil the moment but not wanting to stop it, either.

"What?" She replied softly, her eyes still closed.

"I don't..." I started and stopped. "I, uh, I mean, I'm not...I don't know..."

She opened her eyes then, smiling up at me with a tender expression on her gorgeous face. "Erik, it's ok," she whispered.

"But I've never-" I began again only to be stopped by her fingers pressing against my lips firmly.

"That's all right," she murmured and leaned forward to kiss me again.

It was then, that exact moment when all the pieces tumbled into place. I'd been swimming in a dream until the moment I realized that I could do this; that I would do this. And that there's no one I'd rather be with in that moment than Alice.

I kissed her back, my fingers tightening on her body and I relished in the feeling of her pressing against me. Her arms circled my shoulders, her light fingers sliding over my bare skin and raising goose bumps. Still, I was uncertain with how to proceed, what came next.

I needn't have worried. Alice knew what happened next and she guided me through it all.

Her lips opened under my mouth and when I felt the first hesitant touch of her tongue on mine, I grew hard instantly. I groaned against her, feeling the sudden restriction of my once loose pajama pants. But I refused to end this kiss. I played my tongue against hers, sliding along one side and then the other, pressing and pushing as she did the same.

At last, she was the one to break away. We were both gasping, our chests rising and falling rapidly. In the dim light from my bedside lamp, I could see her flushed cheeks and sparkling green eyes and felt a swelling in my chest.

I'd done that to her.

Then her hands swept low over my body, grasping the waist of my pants and pulling with one hand while pushing her other hand inside. I gasped when I felt her fingers encircle my stiff cock and had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from coming right then.

"Erik," she murmured, her voice warm against my neck as she moved closer, her hand moving on me. "You never cease to amaze me."

A breathless laugh escaped me at that and she removed her hand from my crotch. I thought she meant to leave me then, a sudden swift thought that was stupid and clueless and completely groundless. She simply moved away for a second to flick the light on the nightstand off. Then she was in my arms again, her lips against mine and her body moving closer.

I lifted her into my lap effortlessly, my weeks at the farm already strengthening me in ways I hadn't expected. Not that she was all that difficult to maneuver. In spite of her knowledge and strength out in the fields or around the house, she was a woman. A slender, soft woman who was just now melting against me.

Oh, and the way she was kissing me, her tongue doing things I didn't even know were possible. She pulled her lips from mine to plant hungry kisses along my chin, nibbling lightly as she moved on. Her hands were moving up and down my sides and back, leaving a wake of shivers and tightening muscles behind.

Suddenly she was groping for my hand and I turned my palm out to grasp her smaller hand. She kissed my neck as she pulled my hand down to rest on her leg. I made a noise that I think was a groan and squeezed my fingers on the revealed skin of her thigh. At her urging, I slid my hand higher, nudging the lightweight fabric out of the way. Her own hands moved back to my shoulders where she clung to me, still kissing and licking my throat.

I marveled at the feel of her; her soft skin under the pale dress, her hungry lips on me and her strong hands grasping my body. I wanted to kiss her again but I didn't want to stop stroking her legs; her marvelous legs. I slid my palm over her knee and up her thigh until I reached the fleshy bump of her bottom. She gasped as my fingers brushed the cotton panties hidden beneath her dress and her nails dug unexpectedly into my shoulders.

"Alice," I whispered her name reverently and turned my face to hers. She obliged, lifting her lips to mine.

As we kissed again, she moved off of me, lying back on the bed. I pulled away, watching her as she moved and smiled up at me.

"Come here, Erik," she murmured, crooking a finger at me in a 'come-hither' gesture.

My stomach turned over and I shifted to kneel above her. I didn't lean down to kiss her, though she reached for my shoulders again. I touched her cheek gently, devouring her with my eyes. Another flash of lightning lit the sky outside and the room, throwing bright, slanting dashes of light across Alice's face.

"Erik," she whispered with a smile, running her fingertips lightly over my chest. My nipples hardened almost painfully as she touched me. "Are you just going to stare at me all night?" She asked.

I blushed, gratefully that the almost non-existent light in the room kept her from seeing my embarrassment. "I just don't want to rush anything," I replied softly. "I don't want to forget this moment."

"Oh Erik," she murmured and cupped her hand behind my head, drawing me down to her.

I tried to resist, afraid my weight would harm her, but she laughed breathlessly and assured me that it was fine. She wanted to feel me against her. As she spoke, she moved one hand low on my body, slipping over my flannel pants and stroking my erection through the fabric.

"I want to feel every bit of you, Erik."

"Alice," I hissed out, tensing as I felt the throbbing reach an almost unbearable point.

"Undress me," she whispered then, relenting and releasing her grasp.

I obeyed, feeling helpless to do otherwise. I pulled her skirt up, feeling every inch of her soft skin as I did. She sighed and moved one way, then the other, helping me to remove the light dress all the way. She sat up and held her arms over her head, allowing me to pull the dress up and off. Then she lay back down, arms spread, welcoming me down to her.

Again, I obeyed, sinking down against her, breathing her in before pressing my lips to hers. She wrapped her arms around me, kissing me deeply, pressing her tongue between my lips. Her hips rose against me, pushing into me and I broke away from her mouth, sucking in deep gulps of air, trying to stave off the orgasm I could feel building at a furious pace.

"Erik," Alice murmured, lifting her head from the pillows to run her tongue along the outer rim of my ear. "I want you," she whispered as she continued to lick my ear.

"God, I want you too," I managed to gasp out, still feeling her hips rubbing against my painfully hard cock. God, it hadn't even been that long since I'd polished myself off; maybe two days. And still she had me on the brink of coming inside my pajamas.

"Take off your pants," she ordered, her hands moving down my sides to push impatiently at the waistband of my flannel pants.

I obliged with a swiftness I didn't even know I possessed. It must have impressed Alice because she laughed; a brilliant, tinkling laugh that I fell in love with immediately. I vowed then and there that I would do whatever it took to make her laugh like that again.

"No underwear," she remarked and laughed again as she stroked my sides. Her hand ventured lower and lower as I held myself over her.

I was immobile as she explored my body. Her hands were so unbelievably soft. I couldn't comprehend how she'd managed it; one minute I'd felt her work-roughened hands touching me and the next, all I could feel was the velvet stroke of her fingers. She ran her hands over my torso, pausing at my hardened nipples before moving lower, lightly scratching her nails over the sensitive skin just above my hardened cock.