Faultless

"It's only shit if you think it's bad for you," I reasoned, thinking of my own experience. She nodded gently at that, swirling the whisky around in the glass.

"See, that's the thing, I don't think it's bad for me anymore even though I know it could put me in a really tricky place if it's the wrong man. I do think it's what I need." She paused and took a deep breath, clearly she hadn't said much of this out loud before. "Because when I'm in the kind of relationship everyone expects me to have, with someone like Benjamin, I lose my mind. I feel trapped into being this person that I'm expected to be. It's like I can't breathe, like my mind won't stop."

I felt for her, really felt for her. I took another long sip, to prevent me reaching out and taking her hand. It felt like it would be more conducive to her if we had some separation.

"At the same time, I want marriage, I want kids. I want what someone like Benjamin can give me. I want that MILF - vibe," she quipped and then snorted. We both burst out laughing, breaking the tension helpfully.

"But, fuck, I want someone who can put me in my place. Someone who takes me off the pedestal and reminds me I'm only what they let me be," Lily was blushing profusely, not looking over at me. If she had, she'd have seen I'd have put my glass down and was staring at her slack-jawed. "Then he puts me back on the pedestal once I'm reminded of it," she finished quietly.

There was silence as I absorbed her words and she let them hang there, taking a small sip of drink.

I cleared my throat which was suddenly dry. "So, what I'm taking from that is that you've never been properly spanked?" My playful tone had the slightest hint of a suggestion, but she couldn't miss it if she was looking for it.

"No, I've never been spanked," she breathed in response, her voice barely above a whisper and her eyes locked onto mine.

My question provoked a change in her, an almost hopeful look in her eyes that I thought was asking me to show her what she'd missed. But I hesitated because I'd got it so badly wrong before. She swallowed and put her glass down, moving it out of the way. It was that which made me act.

We held eye contact, and she moved to me at the same time I reached for her. We both knew we shouldn't do it for so many reasons, but we did it anyway.

I bent her over the breakfast counter with a firm hand on her back and hiked her dress up with my other hand, in one fluid motion that had her groan and spread her legs. She faced ahead but her eyes were angled to her left, looking at the reflection of us in the window. I could see the excitement in her face as well as in my own. There was nothing beyond the glass except dark clear skies.

Despite her slim frame, her cheeks well full - of muscle, of weight that had gone nowhere else. I spanked her without delay, on her bare skin. She took it appreciatively, with a lustful moan. Her cheeks were firm under her white thong, they bit back, and my hand stung wonderfully.

I felt such an urge to soothe her, that I rubbed her cheek with my stinging hand, and she pressed into it. I pulled my hand back again and she relaxed. Then she took it, harder, with barely a whimper but her face was flushed in her reflection.

"Is this better than what Benjamin could give you?" I asked, completely serious. I needed to know. For me, I had forgotten everything but this moment. I needed to know if this was really what she wanted.

"Yes," she replied firmly, instantly. "Yes!"

The power of her 2^nd response made me strike her again, harder still. "YES!" The third cry pierced the air and for the first time, I realised my own arousal. Instinct took my hand down her body. Despite the surreality of the situation, I still hesitated at doing so. Nevertheless, Lily spread her legs invitingly and then I lost myself trying to work out what was warm and what was wet. It was a stunning reaction. Her thong was already starting to soak through.

"Please give me more," she begged, in a voice that was both confident and desperate.

I spanked her again. "That was for not being true to yourself."

Lily gasped, breathing in sharply. "I don't know how," she breathed out, almost whining. Her hands were still gripping the counter, she hadn't moved them at all.

I spanked her hard again, but this time, I took her face in my stinging hand afterwards. She looked at me with intensity in her beautiful green eyes. For once, I couldn't read them. I had no idea what she wanted more of: reassurance or punishment.

"That was for not asking for help," I told her firmly.

She scrunched her eyes up under the intensity of my own look and I knew she was overwhelmed. I moved back to doing what I was doing; giving her what she needed. She was breathing deeply now.

"Tell me Lily, what else do you need to be spanked for?" I asked, my hand assertively on her cheek, waiting. I had no idea why, call it instinct, but I knew she needed to own this.

I stayed silent, patiently, while she decided whether to answer. The seconds crept by. My hand was raw, my cock was so hard now, lust was desperate to consume me. But the respect and love I had for Lily kept me waiting there, hoping she'd open herself up to me in the way she hadn't for anyone before.

She couldn't.

I felt her frustration, then I heard it. A muffled cry as she kept her mouth tightly closed even as she screamed from her throat.

I nodded; I knew she wasn't there. Despite my lack of experience and her years of longing, I was more in ownership of my desires than she was. I rubbed her bottom softly, affectionately. Then I took the hem of her dress and started pulling it down.

"For being superficial," she burst out in panic at it being over. "For being impossible to please, for letting everyone tell me what I should be and then for believing it."

I paused, shocked to the core at her outburst. Lily thrust herself back and moaned; begged for it.

"Four, one for each reason. Count them," I ordered, far less confident than my tone would suggest. I'd never expected to put my army voice in use for a situation like this.

"One... thank you Sir," Lily gasped, surprising me further still.

"Two... thank you Sir," she breathed after a harder spank.

"Three... thank you Sir."

"Four... oh SHIT, thank you Sir."

I paused, the last one hurt her, even though I'd been alternating cheeks. I instinctively leaned down and kissed her cheek. Yet again, I was driven by instinct, by feeling. Her skin felt so warm on my lips and for a second, I felt awful. But then Lily whimpered and thanked me quietly and I knew I'd just given her what she needed.

I leaned back up and rubbed her cheek. It was red raw. Lily looked behind her and stared at me dead in the eyes, with a look of determination I'd never seen from her.

"For pretending to like vanilla sex with un-intimidating men, just to feel normal." She swallowed, not breaking eye contact. "For never having the kind of sex I fantasise about when I'm alone and aroused."

I stared her down, trying to put reason into her. Two more spanks, are you sure about this?

As if reading my thoughts, she stared forward and waited. I gave them to her, both of them, one after the other. Before she could react to the first, I had stung the second. She whimpered into the counter and then her legs gave out.

But I had her. She didn't even put her hands out; she knew I did. I gripped her in my arms, and I carried her the small distance to my sofa, and I curled her into me as if she was tiny, not this colossal woman who had just taken what I'd given her.

"Good girl," I whispered, kissing her on the head.

Her whole body seemed to relax at my praise. She leaned into my chest, sighing contently and we cuddled intimately. Her hair was scattered and messy. But it didn't make her unattractive, far from it. I thought back to the picture of her in the gym and saw the similarities in what the effort had done to her.

"I've got you," I promised, kissing her forehead. I felt her body start to relax, the adrenaline seeping out of her rapidly. She wrapped her arm around my neck and leaned into my chest at an awkward angle.

"I know," she breathed.

I carried her to my bed and rested her on top of it. She was out of it; I'd never experienced anything like it.

I brought some moisturising cream in and weighed up what to do. I couldn't leave her like that. She was going to bruise, for sure. I turned her onto her front, moved her thong away from her cheeks and rubbed cream in while she laid there, moaning contently - awake and aware, but without any energy, or indeed, any concern.

I left her like that, loosely covered over and slept on the sofa. I couldn't sleep with her, despite what we'd shared. It felt like an invasion of her space she hadn't granted me. What we'd just done was sexual, but it was so much deeper than sex. It took me no time at all to sleep, despite the mixture of emotions I was grappling with.

The next morning, I woke before my alarm, immediately aware that something was wrong. Lily was up and she was hunting for her shoes in the dark living room.

"Are you okay?" I asked, sitting up.

She jumped at my sudden action. "I need to leave," she said, in absolute panic. The kind of tone that transmitted even more panic in me. I immediately worried that she hadn't remembered the night before.

"Lily?" I whispered, because I was so unsure, so nervous, about where her head was at.

"We shouldn't have done that," she said at once, angry and bitter. I took relief from her tone in that she'd remembered, but at the same time, it was more panic.

I stood up, searching for words. I was normally so awake and alert in the mornings, but I felt groggy, disorientated. I thought I'd be waking up to a conversation that would be something bordering the opposite of my present reality and I was playing catch-up. Lily was so far on the other end of the scale; it didn't even feel repairable. I was freaked out by the level of her horror.

"Lily, please talk to me," I almost pleaded.

She couldn't look at me, as she grabbed her shoes. "There's nothing to say," she replied evasively but firmly.

I couldn't have it. I walked over. I was torn between holding her and not invading her personal space while she was like that. "Are we going to pretend last night didn't happen?"

She snapped her stare to me in the low light, and I saw the conflict in her, the horror too. "Yes, we are," she said immediately. Before I could even argue the point, she added onto it, and it was more cutting than I ever thought it could be. "I let myself go and did that with the man that was fucking my cousin a few months ago. That makes me physically ill and I'm going to be feeling what we did for days. This was the biggest mistake of my life."

My mouth fell open and I stood there in paralysed silence. Lily, for her part, realised the gravity of her words only after she said it. "You need to leave," I replied firmly. I too felt physically ill now.

Lily put on her sandals, leaning against the doorframe as she did so. "Look," she reasoned more softly, but I already didn't want to hear it. "I shouldn't have said it like that..."

"Please leave," I repeated.

Lily collected her stuff and as I watched, I felt my resolve crumbling despite my anger and hurt. This was my best friend, and I was forcing her out as though she was nothing to me. When she got to the door I finally spoke, though my mouth was so dry, I wasn't sure if I could voice anything.

"What do you have to lose by putting your misplaced shame aside and embracing what happened? Why does it matter that I was with Chloe months ago?"

Lily didn't turn around, but she froze, still facing the door. "My self-respect," she replied at last, her words taking the final blow to the feelings I didn't even have for her 24 hours before. "I want marriage and children more than I want what happened last night, I know that now. I can't have that happen to me again. Me and you can't happen, I can't have Chloe's seconds."

She was out of the door before I'd processed the brutality and the finality of her words.

***

A week later and we still hadn't spoken. I was, by that point, sure we wouldn't. We had no threads connecting us, no mutual friends. We had no need to stay in touch bar our own will and mine had certainly been eroded by her last words. I hit the gym, hard. I worked out like a man possessed, willing the thoughts to go away. But they wouldn't. I couldn't stop thinking of Lily, of what we'd shared and we'd then lost. I finished that bottle of Balvenie in record time and the only things that I did for the next few days was show up to work, go to the gym, and drink. A lot.

I was quiet at the dinner with Meg and Mum the next time I went over. It was timely that Mathew had now become a permanent fixture at our meals and that took the focus off me. When I did become the topic of attention, it was thankfully about my new job and not about my love life. I wasn't sure I could hide the bitterness of my realisation that they were right - well, Megan was. That in pursuing Chloe for a stress-free life and some fun, I'd ruined my chances with Lily. The chance I never knew I had nor thought that I'd want.

I felt myself feeling bitter about it all. It angered me in a way I'd never felt before. It wasn't physical anger, it was hatred at the universe, anger. It was self-loathing at being the spotty kid with no friends who couldn't have been the man Lily picked from the start, who'd have been the man who gave her everything she needed and more. Not the man she saw as a friend and in her weak moment, a conduit for her darkest fantasies.

When conversations came up after dinner about my dating life, as they invariably did now, I found myself lying about going on a date later in the week. In truth, I hadn't even touched the dating app. What had happened with Lily, what it had almost been... how could anything top that?! We had been drawn together in such a deep way, founded on our solid friendship and with aspects of our personalities that were in perfect symmetry. If I couldn't have that, I wasn't sure I wanted anything at all. I couldn't imagine what Lily had put herself through mentally for so long, trying to hide that part of herself away.

At the end the evening, I travelled home on the train, and it was well after 10pm when I walked up my road towards the small block of flats. I hadn't driven since my time in the army and the journey each week was starting to chip away at my resolve to avoid getting behind the wheel ever again.

I clicked into the building and climbed up the first flight of stairs, stopping dead at the flight leading to my door.

"Hey," I swallowed.

Lily was sitting there, her face rapidly draining of colour as I stood before her. She was wearing black trainers, dark jeans and a long-sleeved grey cotton jumper, that fit her snug. It was the kind of casual but flattering outfit that I'd got used to seeing her in and had paid no mind to it. Now I was acutely aware of how good she looked. She was utterly, frustratingly, stunning.

She continued spinning her car keys in her hand as we stared at each other. She seemed unable to talk. "Do you want to come in?" I asked eventually, when it became clear I couldn't pass her without offering so.

She stood and let me pass. Her silence was unnerving, and it was only when my back was to her, and I was putting my key in the door that she spoke. "I forgot you had your family dinner tonight, but then I couldn't leave once I got here."

"How long have you been here?" I questioned, moving aside to her let in.

She walked in with some hesitation but didn't look back, nor did she look at me at all as she went by. "A couple of hours," she answered once she was safely in the living room. "I went downstairs to the pub to see if you were there and when you weren't, I remembered you were probably at your Mum's."

She leaned against the breakfast bar instinctively and then moved off it when she saw me look over. We both made the connection of the last time she had touched it.

I sighed. "What do you want Lily? I'm not ready to talk to you again, what you said was fucking brutal and I didn't deserve that. Last week was something I never expected to happen, and you blamed me for shit I could never have known."

Lily didn't flinch, not even at my bluntness. She took a few steps to the sofa and sat down, perched on the edge, her hands on her lap, back straight. I noticed her posture reverting back to how it used to be when her walls were up, but I said nothing. I leaned against the doorframe and sighed, not wishing to get comfortable.

Lily saw my behaviour and nodded gently at it, accepting it. Then she looked at me, with resolve that I'd seen before, in a different circumstance. "I need to say this, and you need to let me, or I think my brain's going to explode."

I shrugged, go ahead.

She took a deep breath. "Wow, er, this is scary. I've never done this before. You know, just said something like this. Okay, so here it goes." Another deep breath and then it spilled out of her. "I can't stop thinking about you. I haven't stopped thinking about you for months, Mike. I can't keep telling myself that you're off-limits because of who you were with and how that would look on me."

Lily paused for breath, searching my eyes for understanding of where this was going. She found what she was looking for, even if I dared not to think it.

She leaned forward. "I said what I said in a desperate need to push you away and the fear I had if I didn't. The fear of what I was risking and what I'd be opening myself up to if I was honest with myself about my feelings for you. But I'm fighting that fear now because I've accepted how I feel and everything that comes with it," she emphasised.

She took another deep, steadying breath, "I love you."

"What?" I replied ungraciously, in complete shock.

"I love you," she declared simply. She'd made peace with it; I could see it in the relieved way she said it. "It feels so good to say that and yet, so scary," she finished with a shy smile.

I couldn't process it. It was so far from what I thought our next conversation would look like and it was never a conversation I expected us to have. Lily loved me?

"I really need you to say something Mike," she pleaded.

"I.. you really want to do this?" I stuttered. "Us?"

Lily smiled at me. I had no idea how she was so calm when I was all over the place. "I really want to do this Mike. All of it. I want to show you all of me, if you'll have me. I don't care what anyone else thinks anymore, just you. I've spent every single day across the last week trying to talk myself out of this because I've been so scared. This morning, I woke up and I just thought: what the hell am I gaining by denying this? More of the same? So here I am, finally being honest with myself, and therefore with you. Take your time and think this over. I'm going nowhere because this is what I want," the conviction in her tone didn't waver. She was serious.

She stood up and walked towards me. I stood paralysed, yet again. For someone trained to move even in the face of danger, Lily had an affect on me I could never categorise. She was beside me before I knew it, her beautiful green eyes staring into my plain brown ones and then she was moving by me, towards the door. That shook me awake and adrenaline kicked in. I wasn't going to let her walk out on me after that. I reached out for her arm and managed to close my fingers around her hand, turning her back gently but firmly. She was smiling as she turned and then I was too.

"I thought you weren't going anywhere?"

I moved my face down towards her and she met me in the middle. We kissed. It was just our lips but the intensity we shared as we kissed was staggering. We both pulled away, breathless and excited. We met again mere moments later, with our tongues this time and Lily wrapped her arms around me, pulling me into her, not able to get enough. I took her thin body in my arms, and it felt made for them. She moaned into it, enjoying the way I held her and dare I say, would protect her. I promised myself that I always would. She kissed me hard and passionately, letting herself go.