Faultless

We toasted "to old friends becoming new again," I proposed to Lily's obvious surprise.

"What happened to all our uni friends?" I asked after we'd took a sip, and I calmed my burning throat. They didn't skimp on the alcohol in these places. "I had no problem cutting them out, but I'm surprised you were so brutal," I grinned.

Lily's face flushed, showing her obvious embarrassment at my calling her out. Her next sentence surprised me. "They cut me out, actually. You all did."

It was my turn to be embarrassed. When I ignored her first few messages after I left, I expected our friends to soften the blow. Now I thought about it, none of them had reached out to me either. My only focus from my uni friends back when I left, was Lily. The rest of them, I could take or leave, given they were mostly her friends anyway.

I swallowed, I didn't wanna do this now but yeah, clearly we had to. "I don't know what happened with the rest of them but unless they all caught feelings for you, the reason I cut you out was very different," I reasoned gently. The mood of the place made me more open to speaking my mind and that in and of itself, made me less comfortable being there.

Lily brushed over my comment and instead said, "They told me I'd changed. I don't know what I did but there you go, change is growth, isn't it?"

I nodded, fair point. I stayed silent while she took a surprisingly big gulp of her margarita and then she added with a hint of a smirk, "Caught feelings, huh? They all said you did long before you made a move, so fair play to you for waiting so long." She bit her lip as she said it, and it was clear she was trying to be funny but was too nervous to the deliver the line as smoothly as she wanted it. She'd have lined that zinger up nicely, had we still been at university together.

I was though, surprised by her candour given what I'd seen of her now, but couldn't let her think it true. "I genuinely didn't feel anything like that for you until after we graduated." I told her with my look that I meant it.

She swallowed and looked down at her drink to avoid my stare. "When you started getting into fights and acting like a jerk?"

I cringed, that was a time I never liked to think about. I'd become so God-damn angry at life, it felt all-consuming. Part of why I joined the army was to burn that anger out. To this day, I had no idea why it got so bad.

"You stuck with me," I admitted, voice caught. "I really ruined some of your evenings."

"You did a better job of protecting my honour than Paul, he was pretty shit at that."

"Shit at a lot, no doubt," I reasoned. Lily blushed a dark shade of red like she was pissed off and I knew I'd overstepped.

I took my last sip of the glass and recoiled in surprise. "Damn, that stayed strong."

"They didn't make them like that in Baghdad?" Lily quipped, keen to change the subject. "Tell me about the army..." she pressed.

The evening went by with stories of my time away. Lily was far too inquisitive to let me gloss over my time on tour and so, I told her some of the scary stories but not the difficult ones. I told her about the IED under the jeep behind me and one or two other close calls that were infact, barely close at all. I left out the ambushes, the IED under the car I was driving; the times I almost messed myself in fear. I didn't mention that only my stubbornness at wanting everyone to think I'd finally made a good decision for myself, stopped me writing to tell them how much it wasn't. I skipped over how happy I was to leave by the end of it too, though Lily might have inferred it anyway.

Lily spent all of our 2^nd drink, where I told all my stories, gasping appropriately and generally showing me she existed in a very different level of reality to that, given the number of "I can't believe it" comments I got. Look, that was understandable, but the Lily I knew before I left wouldn't have found war quite so surreal. Further, the Lily I knew wouldn't have dramatised her reactions quite so much. It felt very showy, in a different way to Chloe.

I moved the conversation on when I grew too tired of it and encouraged her to tell me more about her life and career. She showed me pictures of her plum apartment in the city, with a view of the skyline and the river beyond. I was amazed at both how impeccably neat it was and how well coordinated it was. It was as though she'd lifted all the rooms in her house directly from a showroom.

"What's your place like?" Lily asked the question with some excitement, and I felt that here was a topic she could sink her teeth into.

I thought of the poorly coordinator colours of wood of my dining table and coffee table as well as how my toaster and kettle didn't match. "It's coming together," I replied evasively. "The company gave me enough of a handshake deal to put a deposit down on something when I'm ready and I've got enough behind me to pay the bills for a spell but I'm being careful with how much I spend on furnishing until I get a new job."

"Oh," Lily's excitement continued, "how's the job-hunt going?" She sipped her drink to keep quiet and looked around awkwardly, aware she'd been quite loud. "Sorry," she whispered guiltily.

"What for?" I laughed. She shrugged, still looking apologetic but I continued on as though the interruption hadn't happened. "Lots of applications but nothing yet. My experience is pretty specific though my knowledge base is wider, so I think it's about getting that across a bit more. It's all a numbers game, isn't it?"

We spoke for some time about job applications and interview tips. Lily was alive for the conversation - this was life to her: having a good job, progressing in a career, all of the other stuff that came with it. It was a stark contrast to what I'd spent my last few years doing and I could see how jarring that part of the conversation would have been to her.

I finished the last of my 3^rd cocktail a little before Lily had finished hers. I made a signing motion to the waiter and he re-animated before my eyes, to go and sort the bill. I hadn't checked with Lily as I assumed 3 would be her limit and I wasn't wrong.

"Thanks," she said when we cleared the bill. "Three's enough for me nowadays," she added a moment later, with a guilty grin. It was perhaps the first reference she'd made to being anything but perfect during our time at university together when she would get blind drunk on a weeknight and stroll into class the next morning with a hangover.

She excused herself to the bathroom and I took the opportunity to fall deep in thought. The image of Lily entered my mind as though she was still sitting in the chair opposite me, with her cream loafers, crisp white shirt and blazer. Her hair was straight and long - completely untouched by her and in place all evening.

It was a bizarre train of thought (except for an ex-wallflower like me), but I thought about the level of self-discipline someone had to have in order to not touch their hair at all. How many times had I ran my hands across my own hair, as I answered a question or thought of one to ask? Yet she had stayed immovably flawless, with a straight back and perfect posture. It was unnerving - and this was coming from someone who spent years learning discipline in the most structured organisation in life.

Lily had changed way beyond the person I recognised her to be when we met over 10 years ago. I'd changed over that period and so had she. Hers was not my world now, nor mine hers. She looked happy, even if she lived her life in a way that I couldn't endorse, never mind be a large part of. We weren't going to exist in each other's world and honestly, I didn't feel sad about that. I wasn't going to see her again.

She emerged from the bathroom and I greeted her warmly, taking her in for the last time. I put my jacket on after we paid and she waited for me for a beat like I was going to help her and then did the same to herself when I didn't. We walked out together, though apart. I held the exit door open for her out of politeness, but she thanked me nonchalantly as though it was to be expected.

We walked out onto the street towards the taxi rank as I knew she wouldn't be taking the train. "Now that you've had a few drinks, I can ask you this and expect a more honest answer," I paused, looking over at her as we walked, "How are coping without Catherine?"

She flinched at my question but seemed to brush it off with a deep breath. "Tough," she replied, slowing her walk and giving us more time until we got to the taxi rank. "It's tough. I loved her so much and now she's just not here and I keep forgetting. When I planned my week, I always made sure to have a day where I was seeing her. So, when I set my week out now, I keep thinking 'why do I have a day free, what should I be doing?' and then I remember."

"She'd be proud of you, Lils," I said gently and honestly.

She looked at the driver of the closest taxi and nodded towards him. The engine came to life and the taxi slowed its way over. Lily took a steadying breath and then composed herself in that time. She looked over at me as she walked to the door and said, "She'd have been glad you were there, she always asked after you."

I smiled. "Goodbye, Lils."

I didn't mean it to sound so final, but it was.

Lily knew it too. "Goodbye Michael."

***

Lily and I didn't exchange another message after that evening. Over the following weeks, I found cause for hope that my life was on a good trajectory. I'd had two recruiter interviews for jobs that I didn't get - but still, progress. I was seeing my gran frequently and making sure I cherished the time I still had with her. Mum, Megan and I made it a weekly ritual to have dinner together. Sometimes Megs & I would meet up in addition to those meals. She was busy and had her own life, but she tried to make time, and I appreciated that more than I let on.

I started going to the gym a couple of times a week and that basic level of activity and stress relief aided my mental health immeasurably - I hadn't even had a smoke since the funeral. The routine and some sort of structure, gave me the headspace to begin to ask myself tough questions about relationships and what I wanted in them.

I tried not to think about Lily, even though it was the drinks with her that prompted my self-reflection. Not that it took me much cause at all, to look-inward and reflect. It was my favourite pastime during my lonely teenage years.

My favourite pastime now, if I was honest with myself, was sex with Chloe. It was a novel experience for me to have someone so gorgeous, be so obsessed with being intimate with me. It wasn't just that I loved the sex, I loved the type of sex. It was intense and hugely intimate. There was nothing quite like being on top of and inside Chloe, while she was powerless to resist my frame but still had complete trust in me as I took her relentlessly. Her legs would shake as I pinned them up and her body would redden with the effort of handling me. The more I let go and dominated her, the more submissive she would become. Seeing her take on that role always pushed our sex into hotter territory.

"I love how ruined I feel after you've had me," Chloe confessed in my bathroom afterwards as she was cleaning herself up before getting ready for our double date. She had started to fetishise it and that was a worry, in truth.

Increasingly, the relationship between Chloe and I was becoming more about sex and less about anything else. I guess that was the more pleasurable way around for a relationship to begin to fall apart given it was so often through lack of sex. But the change in what we spent our time doing had led me to organise the double date with Richard & Dave - in part so that we had a reason to go out and hang out.

We got ourselves ready and made our way over to a chain cocktail bar. Dave and Richard were already there.

"Hey Dave, Rich, this is Chloe," I made the intros and Chloe, being the social butterfly she was, jumped into her seat and got talking.

I left her to it and ordered our cocktails. As I was walking back, I heard loud laughter echo from our table and came back to see Dave wiping his eyes behind his glasses. "What's going on?" I asked, sitting down next to Chloe who grinned at me.

Rich replied while Dave sorted his face out. "Dave was telling Chloe about the time you got detention for..."

"Ah, 'the incident'," I grinned, cutting him off. Rich had heard it before - Dave and he had got together during university and had been together ever since. He'd heard it all and was clearly enjoying having someone new to bounce off.

Dave and Rich worked well but were opposites in many ways. Dave was slim and taller, quieter and more introverted. Rich was a masculine man that treated Dave well but certainly took the lead across the relationship. He was assertive and confident - it was little surprise that conversation gravitated around him, even if it was mostly about me, as I took a backstep to let the 3 of them bond.

As the evening wore on, I felt Chloe gravitate towards Rich in a way that started to feel not entirely platonic. There was the occasional arm-touch and laugh when they reached for the same onion ring. Dave looked over at me in surprise and I laughed in disbelief. Rich alone seemed comfortable, though he glanced at me a couple of times to make sure I too, was fine.

When Chloe excused herself to the bathroom, he turned to me with a smirk. "She knows I'm gay, right?"

I laughed, shrugging my shoulders. "Mate, I'm not sure she knows we're together, given that."

"Heads up," Dave nodded towards the bar, where Chloe was rather obviously flirting with a man who was chatting her up on the way to the toilets.

Watching her do that was the final straw. Before Chloe returned, I was fuming.

"Guys, I think I'm going to call this a night when she's back. Her & I need to have a chat," I announced.

"It was only a bit of flirting," Dave tried to pacify, surprising both Rich and I.

I shook my head, "Na, it's more than just today. This was a Hail Mary and I don't think its landed. I'm sorry guys." Their faces jointly fell at the premature end of the evening.

Chloe returned and I let her finish her cocktail before saying we were calling it a night. She looked shocked and then, guilty. It was as though she had no idea her flirting was obvious. We left with awkwardness between us, though both of us said goodbye to Dave & Rich warmly, leaving me in no doubt Chloe knew why I was pissed.

"What the fuck was that about?" I asked, the second we left, unable to hold it in much longer.

"You're well over-reacting," Chloe pushed back firmly - and then she smirked. "Was that pushing your buttons?"

I was livid. "Was that a game to you?!"

"Oh my God Mike, it's not like anything was going to happen, I was just having fun teasing you!"

I turned and walked away, leaving her there. I expected her to follow, and she did. I could hear her heels clipping against the floor as she chased me. I turned around, strangely calm. She caught up and closed the gap, looking at me with a most apologetic look and a batting of her long eyelashes. I saw her for what she was - an adult who hadn't made it into adulthood just yet. She'd stepped up massively to be with me and now was acting out as she struggled to keep up.

"You're a brat," I stated calmly.

Something changed in how I saw her right then. She opened her mouth to reply but before she could, I kissed her. My hand pulled her into me, and the other took hold of her long hair. She returned my kiss with welcome passion in the middle of the street. Were we indoors, we'd already have been naked, such was the simmering of sexual tension.

I flagged a taxi and almost threw us in it. Chloe put her hand brazenly on my cock as we made the short journey back to my apartment. What little blood was needed to bring me to full hardness, quickly found its way into my cock, which was prominent against my trousers. Chloe groaned and the driver looked back in his mirror. I glared at him, challenging him to pass comment. I didn't want him to give Chloe ammunition to push my buttons further, particularly as I was in a heat of lust and desperately trying not to think all of it through, as I always did.

When we made it back to mine, I pushed her hard against the wall the second the door closed, with my hand behind her head to take the blow. Her pert ass cheeks were not so lucky, and she gasped again at my manhandling of her. Her high heels made it harder for her to balance and seemed to arouse her more.

"You're going to mark me," she gasped, when I gripped her hands and pushed them above her head and against the wall. It was more of an invite than a warning as she kissed me straight after and pulled away, looking at me expectantly.

"You deserve it," I replied with a growl, "behaving like a brat."

Lust and frustration merged. Before I could caution myself, I'd turned her around with a hand around her waist and bent her over at an angle. I spanked her ass over her short jean skirt and tights. Chloe moaned sexily when the second blow landed. "Again," she pleaded. I knew right then that some part of her had orchestrated the evening for this outcome.

In response, I picked her up from behind and took her into the bedroom, throwing her roughly onto the bed, where she landed with another gasp and a lust-filled look over her shoulder. I grabbed her by the ankles and pulled her lower half off the bed, bending her over as I did, so that she was facing ahead of me with her bum on show. I spanked her again, curling my hand in such a way that it would leave a mark, but it wasn't a full-on slap. Chloe loved it and the dirty talk soon followed.

"Oh fuck, I've been a bad girl Daddy, show me who's boss."

I spanked her hard again, pulling her back by her hair.

"I'm a teasing little slut who needs to be put back in line!"

Upon hearing that and how uncomfortable her calling herself a slut made me, I didn't want to hear any more. I dragged her off the bed and onto her knees, where she paid no attention to my face and kept her eyes on my crotch, eyeing it hungrily while I undid my belt at pace. Her lips were around my hard cock the second it came into view, and she took it on roughly, taking my balls in her hand and directing my cock into her throat, where her eyes immediately started to run. I thrust into her mouth, moaning as I enjoyed her wet tongue and tight throat. She was still fully clothed and looked up at me when she saw me studying her.

I saw the mascara running down her eyes and the smeared lipstick. She made no indication of a wish to move, keen to submit to the dominance she had brought out in me. I pulled her away and pulled her jumper off her, leaving her in just a bra. She went back to sucking my cock as though I hadn't interrupted. I could see that she was living in her depravity.

Again, the frustration I held with her fused with the lust I had, and I pulled her up and threw her back onto the bed where her landing was celebrated with a moan of need. I kicked my clothes off and pulled her skirt off with a growl as Chloe laid on her front, stretching her body out. I found her soaking wet when I felt her tights over her hole.

"No underwear? Why did you want me to react like this?" I asked with exasperation.

"Because I can't help myself Daddy, I need it like this - uhhhh"

Chloe moaned as she felt me ripping her wet tights. I pushed her face down into the bed and held her there as I lined up and pushed my way inside her. Even muffled, her moans were loud, and she squeezed the sheets as she took me inside her.

"YES!" She cried her approval loudly.

Ordinarily, I'd have taken the time to taste, tease and please her. But there was no chance of that here. She'd broken things between us to get this dominance from me - and I was going to give it to her, even if I regretted it the next morning.