A Midsummer Night's Cream

I woke up that morning and decided I was done crying. Seven days of body-wracking sobs, more tissues than I could count, every romantic comedy I owned scattered around Amanda's TV and the empty pints of Ben and Jerry's in the garbage were all what I needed, but that was over now. It was the perfect midsummer day, hot already at eight-thirty, with a bright blue sky. Ollie poked me with her cold wet nose. Time to get up.

I walked into the kitchen, scooped food into her bowl and patted her butt as she crunched on her breakfast. I went into the bathroom, put my glasses on and brushed my teeth. I looked at myself in the mirror and noted my red, puffy eyes and tangled hair.

Coffee, I thought. I need coffee.

Easier said than done. It took me five minutes to figure out how to make a simple cup of coffee with Amanda's complicated espresso machine. Cup in hand, I hooked Ollie to her leash and we walked down the hallways and stairs to the patch of grass designated by the apartment complex for dogs to do their business.

"Good girl, Oll," I said as she squatted. She was a German Shepherd mix Amanda had rescued a few years ago from the local humane society. Ollie was sweet, loyal and protective. Everything Mike used to be.

"Maybe I just need to get a dog, Oll," I muttered as we walked back to Amanda's apartment. She was in Europe for two weeks and I was dog- and housesitting. Her place was gorgeous and I loved staying there. It had recently become a post-breakup retreat for me. Hell it had been a sanctuary pre-breakup these past few months when things had been really bad with Mike and me. Amanda and Ollie had kept me sane and gotten me through the worst of it but every girl needed a good cry (or five) before she was ready to change out of sweats and put contacts in. That day had finally come.

I took Ollie's leash off, hung it up on the hooks by the door that held more dog than human stuff, finished my coffee and put the mug in the sink. Ollie played with her raccoon toy as I poured a bowl of cereal and took it onto the balcony. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath of warm morning air.

So far, so good.

I ate my cereal and thought about what I should do today. Definitely post office to mail that credit card bill, get a birthday card for my mom, call my sister and go grocery shopping. But I wanted to do none of it when the pool and my new book were calling to me.

I decided I'd take Ollie to the dog park, shower and spend as much of the rest of the day in a lounge chair with a glass of sangria as I wanted.

***

Two hours later, I touched the pool key fob to the electronic pad and heard the doors unlock. Somehow I was able to juggle my plastic water bottle of peach tea sangria, jar of coconut oil, my book under my arm, keys and cell phone so that I had one hand free to open the door. A wave of crisp air hit me as I stepped into the covered walkway. There was a lounge room to the right, they gym to the left and the pool ahead.

My flip flops slapped against the ground as I walked into the sunshine. There was no one else at the pool and I took a lounge chair under an umbrella. After dragging a small table to the chair's side, my fingers played with the hem of my tank top, hesitating.

"There's nothing attractive about your body," Mike had told me one morning a few weeks ago as I grabbed cream cheese out of the fridge for my bagel.

"What?" I had asked, sure I'd heard him wrong.

He looked me up and down. "You've put on a few pounds. I told you not to get fat. I won't be with a fat chick."

I'd scooped out an extra helping of cream cheese and licked it straight off the knife without breaking eye contact. He'd shaken his head and walked out. He didn't see my tears.

"Fuck it," I muttered now and pulled my tank top off. My skin was paler than last summer and I slathered extra coconut oil on my stomach. It smelled delicious, like the beach on summer's best day. I tugged my shorts off and put more oil on my legs before tying my light brown hair in a ponytail. I felt the ends brush the middle of my shoulders as I lay a beach towel on the chair and added a hair cut to the list of things I was not going to do today.

Stretching out, my muscles clenched and relaxed. Finally, a moment of peace, of absolute contentment. The sun warmed my skin and I wasn't missing Mike anymore really. The entire day was ahead of me, filled with nothing more than this if I wanted.

I'd caved in yesterday on my way to Amanda's and stopped by the bookstore downtown to buy a copy of The Fault in Our Stars. I didn't normally read young-adult fiction, but it was one of those books that everyone was talking about. While the subject matter was heavy and serious, it would be a good read. I loved the book's weight in my hands, the tight binding and musky page scent. There are few pleasures in life as pure as that of a new book.

I was forty-three pages in when I heard the doors to the clubhouse open.

"Great," I muttered, knowing my peace was gone. It would be just my luck that a family or bunch of chattering women would come in, but it was a single guy. He looked a little older than me, maybe mid-twenties, with buzzed hair, tattoos peeking out from his shirtsleeves and dark sunglasses shading his eyes. I felt a stiffening in my bikini bottom. It had been months since Mike and I had had sex—well months since I had. He'd been fucking a girl at work for a few weeks.

This guy surveyed the pool and me, its sole occupant, before walking to the side I was sitting on and setting his towel on a chair a few away from mine.

We made eye contact and I smiled.

He nodded. "Hey."

"Hi," I said. God help me if he was not the hottest guy I had ever seen.

He smiled, his teeth two perfect white rows. I watched over the top of my book as he pulled his T-shirt off. His arms had thick tribal pattern tattoos on both biceps. He flexed and my pussy clenched. Mike could barely support the weight of his precious controller, I thought.

He walked to the pool's deep end and dove into the still water in one perfect arc. He moved through the water with an athlete's grace while the water appeared to part before him. He did a few laps while I made a concerted effort to read my book but my eyes kept following his movements through the water. He swam to the opposite end of the pool and stepped up the stairs.

He walked to his chair and toweled off. As he patted his abs, he caught me staring. "Hot, huh?"

I nodded. "Yeah, hottest we've had in a while."

"I'm Damian," he said, sticking his hand out.

I smiled and shook his hand. "Rachel."

He looked at my book. "What are you reading?"


"The Fault in Our Stars."

"Is it good?"

"Yeah. I mean, I've read a lot worse." He laughed and I asked, "Not a big reader?"

"No, never have been. Literature always went over my head."

"The best books make you feel like you've known them forever. They teach you so much yet never judge you."

He smiled and my pussy clenched. "You like to read?"

I nodded. "More than almost anything else."

He raised an eyebrow. "What do you enjoy more?" He pulled out the word "enjoy" into two syllables: en-joy. It stretched across my skin, wrapped around my tongue so that I almost repeated it to hear it again.

I licked my dry lips. "I can think of a few things." I wiped sweat from my forehead, took a sip of sangria and admonished myself for not bringing water too. It was hot even shade, at least ninety-five, and not noon yet.

I looked up and saw a drinking fountain on the other side of the pool by the bathrooms and outdoor shower. I put my book face down at the foot of the lounge chair open to the page I was on, got up and walked around the pool. I could feel his eyes on me with each step and put a little swing in my hips just for him.

Bending over the fountain, I pushed the button and brought my mouth to the stream of cool water. I knew he was behind me before I turned around. Perhaps I bent over a bit more than needed, but hey I was only human and he was hot. Before I could walk back to my chair and pretend to read while trying and failing to ignore him, he pressed against me. As the water from his body melted against mine, I imagined myself on my knees, licking the drops off. I could almost taste the tartness of the pool water and his skin.

I thought he would walk back to his chair, but instead he brought his hands up and moved my hair to my left shoulder and kissed my exposed neck. I turned around and saw his dark brown eyes as they took me in—all of me for not much was left to the imagination in my bikini. They were so hot that they nearly seared my skin. He cupped my head in his hands.

"You are so fucking sexy, Rachel" he said and kissed me. I could smell the chlorine, water and his cologne as his soft lips pressed against mine. He tasted like summer. My hands came up to his biceps. To my pussy's delight, they were rock hard. I squeezed them and they didn't give at all. I moved closer, so close that the moisture from his body steamed between us.

He growled and stepped as close as close as he could while his tongue ran around the seam of my closed lips. He shifted and I moved back until my back was pressed against the wall next to the fountain. A part of me knew we would need the privacy.

This is so reckless! the rational me yelled. You need to stop! This is insane. You don't even know his name!

His hands tangled in my hair and his tongue twisted around mine. That shut that voice up quick. All I wanted was his fingers peeling my now-wet bikini from my body and licking every inch of me.

His mouth moved down to my neck. I panted, "Oh God, yes Damian."

He looked up at me with the most alluring spark in his eyes and nipped the sensitive spot where my neck met my shoulder. It sent a jolt straight to my pussy and my knees almost buckled. He pinned me harder against the wall. "Easy," he murmured. I smiled as I felt his erection press against my left.

I moaned. "No, more." He pulled one of my bikini cups down and sucked my hard nipple. I moaned again as his hot lips pulled my sensitive skin. My fingers and toes curled.

"Harder," I grunted. I was thankful he had me pinned against the wall or else I would have fallen down from the sweet pressure running through my chest each time he sucked.

I slipped my hand between our bodies and felt his hard dick through his swim trunks. Damn, I thought. He was easily seven inches and very thick. My pussy tightened in expectation of having him inside of me.

He growled as my fingers clenched and thrust into my hand.

"Yes," I moaned.

He fingered the top of my bikini bottoms. "You want me to fuck you?"

"Yes."

He bent down and ripped them down. I stepped out, giving him better access to my aching pussy.

"You're wet," he said on his knees. The next second his mouth was pulling my clit.

"Oh, oh, oh yes Damian." His tongue fucked my clit and I dug my nails into his shoulders. His lips closed around my clit and I almost came.

He stood and kissed me. I tasted the musty sourness of myself on his lips. I tugged his swim trunks down and took him in. He was over eight inches long and the thickest I had ever seen. My mouth salivated at the thought of blowing him, but I knew there was no way either of us could wait that long. We both needed him inside me.

I spread my legs as he thrust inside me in one smooth motion. His hard cock filled my wet pussy. The pressure was uncomfortable at first. Mike had been half his size and it had been months since we'd had sex.

I wrapped my legs around his waist, the angle change helping with the pain, and pulled his mouth to mine, devouring it in a hungry frenzy. I rested my head against the wall, licked his spit off my lips and reveled in the weighted sensation of a dick finally buried balls-deep in me.

I clenched my walls around him and felt that spark low in my belly. "Faster," I whispered. Instead of complying, though, he pulled out almost all the way and waited. I opened my eyes and found him staring at me. With one hard thrust, he was inside me.

I moaned. "Again."

He waited almost ten seconds this time and the anticipation was almost as exquisite as his cock inside me.

He whispered in my ear, "Cum." His teeth grazed my earlobe. "I need to feel you cum around me first to finish." He fisted my hair in his hands, kissed my neck and hissed, "Fucking cum."

Three more thrusts and I exploded, my entire body clenching and shuddering in the biggest orgasm I'd ever had. Fifteen seconds later, I left him filling me with hot semen.

After we both stopped panting, I unwrapped my legs from around him and wiped my hair from my forehead.

He leaned over and kissed me. "I want to fuck you in the shower next."

I smiled. "Same time tomorrow?"