Of Hope Lost and Found Ch. 01

"Spread your legs," he whispered, and I did so, rubbing my hands on his bare chest. He knelt in between my legs and I felt the tip of his cock touching my folds. I expected him to kiss me some more or at least look at me first, but before I knew it, he was pushing inside me. His first push was hard and got him almost halfway in. I didn't like the feeling, but I knew the first time was supposed to hurt, so I didn't complain.

James did a few more small thrusts and grunted, "I thought you said you were ready."

By then, the friction was starting to hurt, and I was wincing with each push. I felt him reach my hymen and knew that the really painful part was about to come. James waited a moment, moving around inside me just a little bit. I guess I began to get a little wetter, because he said, "There, that's better," as his rod moved more smoothly in and out. That little bit of movement felt like it had potential, and I realized that, in the future, this could be quite enjoyable.

"Like a bandage, babe. Pull it off real quick and it won't hurt as much, OK?"

I didn't know exactly what he meant, but I said, "OK."

Taking that as permission, James reared back and thrust hard. I felt like I'd been punched in the stomach- a pain I was familiar with, thanks to roughhousing with my brothers. It knocked the wind out of me and I yelled, "Stop!" as I pushed against his chest.

"It's OK, babe, it's over now. It's OK. That's just the bad part...it's all good now." James spoke softly and soothingly to me, one hand running through my hair as he looked down at my teary eyes. I was breathing fast and my heart was racing as my body adapted to the sudden pain that was slowly fading into a throbbing ache. My eyes had been closed, but when I opened them, I saw his loving gaze, watching me, waiting.

Once I opened my eyes, James started moving slowly in and out. It still hurt a bit, but not so much that I wanted him to stop. After a few minutes, I said, "Jimmy....can you kiss me please?"

His lips locked onto mine and the sound of our breath hissed through our noses and our tongues dueled. His arms had been wrapped firmly around me for leverage when he entered me, but now he began moving his hands up and down my sides. My legs began closing together, responding to the pain and soreness I felt. James mumbled, "Keep 'em spread, baby." I followed his instructions, realizing he had a much better idea of what we were doing than I did.

That first time didn't last long. James broke our kiss and started huffing and cursing, making noises like I had heard Daddy making all those years ago. I looked forward to the day when I would make the same happy noises during sex that Mama had made that night.

James' hands grabbed my hips, and I winced as his thrusts grew harder. I was almost ready to ask him to go easy when he pushed deeper and held there. I winced and cried out, feeling his tip push open parts of me he hadn't gotten to yet. He pulsed inside me and groaned. I took a few deep breaths to try to avoid crying again.

James collapsed onto me, which I hadn't expected, and I rubbed the smooth skin of his back as he calmed down. After his breathing slowed, he rolled off me and said, "Damn, that was good. You are nice and tight, baby."

I guessed that was a compliment and said, "Thanks." Then feeling wetness all around my entrance- a mixture of my blood and his cum- I realized I should go clean up. As I walked to the bathroom, James said, "Just let me know when you're ready to go again."

At that point I was thinking it would be at least a day or two before I wouldn't be sore, and when I told James that, he gave me a funny look. "You'll be fine. This is...it's like a honeymoon. People get married and then have sex all day for like a whole week after."

"I guess so...but I'm still pretty sore," I said, pulling on some panties.

"Well, take an aspirin and let's go get some dinner. We'll see how you're feeling tonight. Besides, there's other ways to do this that don't involve your sore parts."

Dinner sounded good, and Jimmy was as happy as I had seen him in a long time, so I grabbed some aspirin and we headed out to eat.

*******

Later that night, James tried to teach me about blow jobs. I didn't take too well to them at first, especially when James held my head down while he came down my throat. I figured it would just take a little time before I started to enjoy sex the way Mama did. I didn't want to consider the possibility that James wasn't the right guy, because...well...we were married, so it must be right.

I gagged and felt like I would vomit. When he pulled out of my mouth, I needed to gasp, but then choked on the stuff he had shot into my mouth. It took me a few minutes to regain my composure. I felt a few flashes of humiliation and violation, but I pushed them down, figuring it was just residual guilt. Now that I was married, I didn't need to feel bad about this- everything was just as it should be, I just needed to learn. And soon, I would get used to it and enjoy it, like I was supposed to. After that unpleasant experience, James held me in his arms and said sweetly, "I guess you've earned a little treat. Go ahead and take off your pants."

"Jimmy, I'm still a little sore down there," I said firmly.

He smiled and said, "I'm not gonna poke you...yet. Let me show you something else we can do."

I slipped out of my pants, eyeing him with hesitation. Jimmy told me to lie down on the bed, and once I did, he began kissing my thighs again. This time, instead of moving up on top of me, he put out his tongue and did one long lick along my folds. I yelped in surprise and Jimmy laughed, catching my hands as they attempted to push him away.

"This'll feel even better once we trim back this bush," he said. I wasn't too hairy, but James said the girls in California kept things real short- even bare sometimes. I didn't like thinking about how much experience he seemed to have- it was funny that we had never talked about it before. But I did appreciate getting to enjoy the fruit of that experience.

James kept licking, slowly pushing his tongue deeper into my folds. Once I got used to the feeling, I relaxed my hands and James let them go. He then used his fingers to pull my lips open a bit, which allowed his tongue to tease my entrance. His soft, pliable tongue felt soothing on my still raw pussy. I closed my eyes and breathed out through my nose, actually beginning to enjoy the sensations.

Now, I know you aren't going to believe me, but I had never had an orgasm before that day. I didn't know about rubbing myself- it just wasn't something girls I knew talked about. And I'd never thought to try it. Sure, I'd felt sexual desire, and I would usually respond by squeezing my thighs and feeling tingly, but nothing more had ever come of it (no pun intended).

So when Jimmy, who turned out to be quite talented with his tongue, began circling my clit, I almost lost my breath. I opened my eyes wide and gasped. I didn't know exactly what he was doing, but I wanted him to do more of it. I moaned and wiggled and pushed my hips up. Jimmy backed off a bit, slowing down to tease me. I tried to complain, but I could only moan. No words...I had no words for what I was feeling and wanting. I put my hands on the back of his head and pulled him in to me.

"ooooohhh, Jimmy...what are you doing to me?" I said under my breath. When I tried to pull him even closer, trying to force contact between his tongue and my clit, Jimmy slipped a finger into my pussy. At first, I winced at the contact, not liking having something in there again. But before I could complain, his tongue pressed hard right where I wanted it. My breaths came fast and I felt my body tense up, like I was holding in a sneeze or something. Then suddenly it all released. I yelled sounds I couldn't control, I squeezed my thighs together around Jimmy's head, I rubbed my hands over my exposed skin...it was too much sensation and not enough. I sounded like Mama and thought, "Jimmy must be the right guy!"

I started to relax and open my legs. I was still trembling a little and had goosebumps on my arms. I wanted Jimmy to hold me and kiss me, so I tugged at his shoulders, trying to pull him up. He sprang forward and got on top of me.

"Damn, that was hot! You got me all ready to go again!" As he said that, I felt him poking around my entrance.

"Nooo, Jimmy. Not yet. I'm still sore," I whined.

"You can't get me all hard like this and then say no," he snapped, finding my hole and starting to push. Mercifully, I was much more prepared this time than the first time. When James pushed, he slid right in. I felt a dull pain, especially deeper inside, but it wasn't nearly as painful as I had feared. James started thrusting fast and grunted, "Pardon me if I just get mine right now. You already got yours."

I could smell my own scent on his smooth cheeks and wondered if I would be willing to kiss him like that. But I didn't have to worry about it- he wasn't interested in kissing or anything so tender. Jimmy pushed and thrust and grunted for three or four minutes, then came with another deep thrust that made me wince in pain. He quickly rolled off me and went to the bathroom to wash up. I lay there for a few minutes, wondering how long it would take for me to enjoy sex the way I wanted to.

*******

I know almost every marriage goes through changes, and over the years your spouse becomes like another person. That's normal. But James seemed to change overnight. All the idealistic talk, all the good manners and charm, it ended right away. Oh, he wasn't a cruel and hateful man, but he wasn't who he seemed to everyone else- or who he had seemed to me. I realized that he really did have a gift- a special ability to know what people wanted to hear and to say it convincingly. A few months after we got married, I started to realize that he'd done the same thing to me.

About that time, two big things happened. First, I told my parents we had gotten married. We had planned to wait until the next spring to tell them we were "engaged," and then have a real wedding that summer. But I had to change that timeline because of the other thing that happened. Just before Thanksgiving, I started getting sick. It didn't take long to figure out that I was pregnant. James and I just stared at each other when we found out. Neither of us had given a thought to kids and how to not have them. And with Jimmy huffing and puffing on top of me every night, it was inevitable that something would catch, sooner rather than later.

Daddy and Mama weren't sure what to think. They liked James and were glad we had gotten married before getting started on a family. But they didn't like it being all secret- like we were ashamed or hiding something. And they didn't like that it was going to interrupt my studies. We spent the Christmas holiday with my family, and Mama and my sisters-in-law surrounded me with pregnancy stories and advice. James charmed his way through the family, earning the approval of my brothers, and I felt like we were a happy couple.

But when we got back to school, James was unhappy. He insisted I take time off of classes to work while I could. We had been scraping by before, but with a baby on the way, something had to change. James argued that he needed a degree if he was going to support us down the road. I could come back later and finish my classes, once our child was in school all day. We fought and yelled and I cried and James seethed and after one such shouting match he hit me.

He smacked me right across the face. He immediately apologized and moved back a few steps, putting his hands over his mouth. Then he moved towards me and hugged me, mumbling apology after apology. I was just stunned. My cheek was stinging, but my tears weren't from that pain. It was the betrayal. The How could he? The fear of what he might do the next time he got angry.

And as most such stories go, that one hit wasn't the last. For a while, every blow was accompanied by an apology. But then he was less and less sorry. Then he started blaming me for doing things to make him upset. I finally did drop out of school, hoping it would make him stop being so angry. It didn't. I found a job that I could work almost full-time, hoping that the money would make him less stressed. It didn't.

I never even considered leaving him- James was my husband, and we had to make it work. Besides, where would I go? Where would I live? How could I face people if I left him, if I gave up on our marriage? I knew I could always go home, but even the thought of that filled me with shame.

Then when I tried to surprise him on campus one day in February, bringing a picnic lunch for the two of us, I saw him sweet-talking another girl outside his classroom. She looked a lot like me- petite, blonde, thin- apparently Jimmy had a type. Talking was OK- I couldn't expect him to stop talking to women. But when he reached out and ran his fingers along her blushing cheek, just like he had so many times before with me, I broke. I went home in tears. Jimmy got back a few hours later and we had an epic fight.

"I'm your wife!" I screamed. "I'm your wife!" I threw books at him, he threw them right back. All my fears and hormones and insecurities found expression as I crafted insults to lob at him. He responded with derogatory and hurtful names. I grabbed a pillow and tried hitting him over and over. He blocked the blows, then grabbed my wrists and pushed. I stumbled and fell, catching the arm of a wooden chair in my gut on the way down.

James stormed out of the house, calling me a "crazy bitch." I just sat on the floor and sobbed. My stomach hurt, my pride hurt, and my heart was broken.

James didn't come home that night. I woke up with a sharp pain in my abdomen and had to drive myself to the hospital. It was a rough night, and I was too dazed to catch most of the details. Long story short, I was losing the baby. After the doctor told me, translating the medical jargon, he asked if he could call my husband. I looked at him through my tears and said, "No. I want my Daddy."

*******

Daddy picked me up at the hospital a few hours later and drove me all the way home, stopping at my empty apartment long enough to grab a few things. Neither of us spoke the whole time. Daddy wasn't angry- not at me, anyways. When we got home, Mama hugged me and walked me to my room and made everything feel OK for a while.

When I was ready to talk, which was the next morning, I told them about our fight. Daddy stayed calm, but I could see his knuckles turning white as he gripped his coffee mug. We all three cried about the baby, even if I was slightly relieved not to be facing such a huge responsibility for which I felt wholly unprepared. We talked about forgiveness and how turning the other cheek doesn't mean subjecting yourself to more abuse. Daddy and Mama talked about some of the hard times they had gone through- some things I had never heard about. It was a meaningful and enlightening conversation, but at the end of it, I still didn't know what to think about James and me. I asked them what I should do.

"Well that depends on what you want to do, pumpkin," Daddy said simply.

"I...I don't want to be around him anymore. But I'm afraid to leave. And...and I do want to be around the him that he used to be...if that makes sense."

"It does honey, but that might not be possible," Mama offered.

Daddy reached out and put his hand on mine. "Just wait, Dottie. If he's as bad as he seems, he's going to mess up big sooner or later. Then it'll be real easy to end it. You won't need to go through a whole 'he said, she said' battle in the court. But if he's gonna change, you can give him time. Meanwhile, just rest up. He'll know where to find you when he's ready."

Daddy made a lot of sense, and I agreed to stay there for a while. "A while" ended up being almost two months. James showed up unannounced early on a Sunday morning in spring. My parents had just left for church and would be gone until after lunch, so James and I had a chance to talk alone.

Turns out Daddy had been right. James had messed up in a big way, stealing petty cash from his job. When he got caught, he mouthed off to his boss. He got fired from his part-time job and had been too drunk to keep up with any of his classes. He came back to me penitent and humbled- a new man.

"Dottie, I'm human," he said earnestly. "I've got weaknesses and I screw up. I need you to forgive me and help me change. I wanna be the kind of man who deserves you, the kind of man you used to think I was." And so on. He said all the right things, and he looked at me with those deep, burning eyes, and I just couldn't turn him away.

I really believed him and I really had hoped that this would be a fresh start for both of us. I would go back to school, taking some summer classes to catch up; we would learn how to be a happy couple; we could get our future back on track. I hoped, I earnestly hoped that he had lost his bad qualities and kept his good ones.

James had been kneeling in front of me, his arms on my lap as he apologized. I told him about losing the baby, which didn't seem to faze him. He looked at my eyes and said, "I guess...that's for the best?" He spoke hesitatingly, watching my reaction. I gave a small nod and he said, "Yeah...for the best."

As he said that, he was planting kisses on my knees, then along my thighs as he moved my skirt up. I knew where he was headed, and I really did want to be touched. I had missed the feeling of him next to me, on top of me, around me, and in me. I stood up to pull down my panties, and he directed me to the bed. I lay down and he began licking me. I could never cum except when he would lick me, which happened far too seldom, I thought, compared to the daily intercourse James had insisted on.

That morning, he put all his skill to work, making every tender touch an apology. He twice drove me to a hearty, gasping climax- twice! I sighed deeply as he crawled onto me, pulling up my shirt and doffing his own clothes as well. He closed his eyes and groaned as he pushed in. I lay there and enjoyed the feeling of his skin on mine. I took in his familiar scent. I moved along with him, helping to guide him to a quick and quiet cum. He grunted softly in my ear as he pulsed inside me. I wrapped my arms around his back and smiled, floating on the euphoria of sexual satisfaction and hope.

*******

We packed up my things in the car and waited for Daddy and Mama to return from church. We both knew Daddy would want to take a walk with James before we left. When my parents came in the house, Mama was polite but tense around James. Daddy stood still, looking from James to me and back again. Before he could say anything, Jimmy stood up and walked towards the door. "Shall we take a walk, sir?" Daddy nodded and followed him out.

They returned two hours later, James looking a little pale. He'd been crying, I could tell, but I wagered Daddy had put some fear in him, too. We stayed through dinner, then drove back to our apartment, arriving there at almost midnight.

The next morning, we set about finding jobs to help us save up before the next school year. I quickly got a stable 9 to 5 as a retail clerk, and after a week, James got an early morning job driving a delivery truck. We got into a comfortable routine- we worked during the day, I would come home and make us dinner, we'd watch some TV, go to bed and make love before falling asleep. It was simple and easy and just what I needed.

*******

It didn't last, though. A month and a half into what I thought would be our new and better life, James got fired again. Apparently, he had made some inappropriate remarks to a female coworker and had touched her in a way she didn't like. On top of that, he mouthed off to his boss when he was confronted about it. James didn't tell me any of that- he only told me they'd had cutbacks and he was looking for a better job. I heard about it through a woman I worked with whose sister worked at the same place as James.