Simple Choices

"I have news," said Debbie.

I'd just come through the front door to find her standing in the foyer of our small apartment. She was 29 with dark hair, girl-next-door beauty and a smile that was usually ready.

On that summer evening, her smile was not ready.

Had it been another day I would have given her the bouquet of long-stemmed roses at the door, but she was too distracted for that. Instead, I kissed her lightly on the lips and said, "You can fill me in after I put this stuff away." I squeezed past her to drop the groceries, wine, and flowers on the kitchen counter. I put the roses in a vase, added some water, and put them on the table.

She absentmindedly sat at the table, silently admiring the roses while I put the groceries away.

"Would you like a glass of wine?" I asked. She didn't answer, so I poured her one anyway.

Debbie took a sip of wine and said, "They called about Jeff today. They want me to go to a hospital in Germany to be with him."

I took a healthy swallow of wine as I studied her face. Her usual upbeat perkiness had been replaced by thoughtful concern. That morning's news reported that her former lover, Jeff Belanger, had been found, badly beaten but alive, outside a forward operating base in Kandahar province. Until that moment we'd all thought he'd been killed in action.

I asked, "What does that mean?"

She turned her wine glass in her hand as she thought, then, without looking up, she said, "It means I'm still engaged to Jeff." They'd dated for only a few months before he'd deployed, and then he'd disappeared not long after that. I'd never met him, but he was a good guy by all accounts.

I exhaled deeply, then said, "I'm still not sure what that means to me."

We sat there, answerless, staring at one another for several minutes before she said, "The flowers are beautiful. Thank you."

I nodded, then we drifted back into silence.

We were still sitting in silence when the doorbell rang. Debbie's best friend, Michelle, opened the door and shouted, "Hello, is anyone home?"

"Come on in Michelle," I shouted back.

Michelle and her husband Stan joined us at the table. Michelle was a large, boisterous woman who commanded attention wherever she went. She was partial to loud colors and oversized plate-gold jewelry that hung from ears, neck, and wrists. Stan was short, thin and bald. He wore round glasses over a thick mustache. They were oddly perfect for one another. One of them would nod and smile long before the other finished their story, but they never talked over one another.

Michelle announced, "We brought Chinese," as Stan pushed the flowers to the side and put bags of food on the table. She passed out chopsticks, paper plates, and napkins while he opened up the packages.

Michelle kissed Debbie on the cheek, sat down and said, "Tell us everything."

Debbie slowly shook her head, "I don't know much. I guess Jeff's alive and he asked for me. They want me to go to Germany, maybe as early as tomorrow, but I don't know when for sure."

Michelle turned her attention to me. She took my hand and asked, "What do you think about all of this?"

I shrugged. "I don't know what to think."

Stan prodded some of the rice from a box to his plate then topped it with General Tso's chicken and a mixture of beef and broccoli.

Michelle said, "Stanley! We brought the food for them."

"What?" Stan waved his chopsticks over the brown paper bags filled with food and said, "There's enough food here for an army. Besides, they're too depressed to eat."

"Well, maybe you could show a little compassion. Deb and Doug's lives have been turned upside down."

Stan rested the tips of his chopsticks on his paper plate as he regarded his wife. "Maybe. Maybe their lives have been turned upside down. Maybe this is a bad thing, but maybe it's a good thing. Maybe everything will work out. We just don't know, so there's no reason to panic."

Michelle rolled her eyes. "You read one philosophy book and all of a sudden you're Mister Philosophy."

I happened to like Stan's thinking. That Debbie's fiancé was still alive and asking about her didn't mean that we were finished. Maybe he'd had a spiritual awakening, and he wanted to tell her that he was joining a monastic order in Tibet. There was no point in jumping to conclusions before we knew the situation.

I put some rice on a plate, surrounded it with a little bit of everything and passed it to Debbie. She thanked me with a shallow smile then stirred the food around with her chopsticks.

Michelle asked, "Are you going to go to Germany?"

Debbie answered, "Do I have a choice? He's a war hero that was given up for dead. What would people think if his fiancé didn't go to his side?"

Stan responded, "They'd think that she'd done what most people would do and moved on with her life."

Debbie shook her head and said, "I was just beginning to move on."

Michelle threw me a smile, then turned back to Debbie and said, "You can still be happy," while squeezing her hand.

I offered Michelle and Stan some wine, then Stan followed me into the kitchen to help me get it.

He asked, "What are you going to do?"

"I think I'll take your advice and not panic."

"Are you going to ask her not to go to Germany?"

I poured wine into a couple of glasses, put the bottle down and said, "I don't think that's the right move. One of the things I love about Debbie is that she keeps her promises. She made a promise to that guy, and now we have to see how it plays out."

"Did she make a promise to you?"

I shook my head, "No, I never got around to asking."

Stan picked up a glass and sipped at the wine. "Jeff's a good guy. Michelle liked him. I liked him. Shit, he received the Bronze fucking Star, the whole damned Army likes him. Despite all of that, Debbie is happier with you." He touched my sternum with his fingertip. "And I think you are happy with her. I know it isn't going to be easy, but you've got to figure out a way to keep her."

I chuckled softly, "...but don't panic, right?"

Stan raised his glass. "Never panic. Panicking is never the right thing to do."

I nodded uncertainly. "I'll just keep my cool and see what happens."

Stan continued, "You've got your work cut out for you, but I think you're up to the task. If you pull this off, you and Debbie will be in an amazing place."

We walked back into the dining room. When I put Michelle's wine in front of her, she said, "I've got an idea. Why don't you go to Germany with Debbie."

Debbie looked to me as she shook her head.

I smiled at Michelle and said, "I think Debbie knows that I love her, but she needs to figure this on her own. I just hope that whatever's coming down the pike isn't too painful."

Stan pointed his finger into the air and said, "Pain is unavoidable. Suffering is optional."

"Good Lord, Stanley, please give it a rest!" said his wife.

***

After Michelle and Stan had left, I cleaned up the dining room, filled a couple of glasses of ice water and took them into the living room where Debbie was sitting on the couch looking at a blank TV screen. I handed her a glass and asked, "Do you want me to leave you alone?"

"No, of course not." She patted the couch for me to sit down next to her. Once we were side-by-side, she said, "You know that I have to go to Germany, right?"

"I know."

"You know that I may not come back to you, right?"

"I know that too."

She touched my cheek with her finger and lightly kissed my lips. "I want you to treat me like tonight will be the last night we will ever have together."

I didn't like the sound of that, but I knew what I had to do. I stroked an errant lock of hair from her face, kissed her lightly on the lips and then paused with my lips a fraction of an inch above hers. She waited patiently while my face hovered over hers.

I soaked her in with all of my senses so that I might remember her in a lonely future. Her fading perfume smelled of basil, lime, and mandarin oranges. It was her favorite scent and a Christmas gift from me. Her lips were red, deep in the shade that was my favorite. Her brown eyes held a hint of green mixed with the sadness that had been there all evening. A light sprinkle of freckles crossed her cheeks and nose.

She looked into my eyes and said, "Do you remember what you said to me the night we met?"

We'd shared the story a thousand times, but I wanted to hear her retell it. I said, "What was it again?"

"We were in Michelle and Stan's kitchen at their old place. I'd poured a rum and coke and was waiting for you to pry a few cubes from a refrozen bag of ice. You looked up at me, took a double take and asked, 'Are you always that beautiful?' I was wearing a t-shirt and a pair of Levis, so, I said, 'Yes.'"

I laughed and said the same thing I always said, "No self-esteem issues there!"

Debbie touched her hand to my chest the let it slide around to my back. She pulled me in close, kissed my lips and said, "Now I need you to have the self-esteem. I need you to know your worth despite everything that goes on around you."

I shifted so that I was above her with my right leg between hers. My hand massaged her breast through her blouse. I said, "Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Right now let's worry about right now."

Her smile brightened ever so slightly. "You are so right." She tipped her head back exposing her neck and pushing out her chest, which forced her tit into my grasp.

I leaned in to bite her neck while my hand drifted to the buttons of her blouse. It was the blouse I'd given her for her birthday. It was tighter than she liked, and it exposed more cleavage than she was comfortable with, so it usually went unworn. It was too sexy for her to have worn to work, so I assumed that she'd changed into it before I'd gotten home.

I fumbled with the buttons for a moment while I pondered the future of the blouse without me. I said, "This blouse is mine." I grabbed the collar with my hands and ripped it apart, popping the buttons off in rapid fire.

She smiled up at me while thrusting her hips, "Oh yes. That's it."

I pulled off the top, then took off her bra, exposing her buoyant, double-margarita size breasts. "These spectacular breasts are mine."

She wrapped her hands around my neck and said, "Come here and suck on your breasts," as she pulled my head to her chest. My lips latched around her left nipple, and I began to suckle. I sucked, nibbled and bit, while she held my head firmly in place with her hands and arched her back to push her breast into my mouth. She gently stroked my hair and said, "Oh, baby."

My hands flowed up from her ribs, across her shoulders to her arched back. My fingers traced delicate circles over her soft skin as my thigh ground firmly against the crotch of her jeans. The pull of her hands at my neck slackened, releasing my head to explore the gap of her cleavage and her other erect nipple. I sucked the nipple into my mouth and gnawed at it until I felt a twinge of pain through her spine. I kissed her neck, her ear and finally her lips.

My thoughts drifted from pleasing her to replaying past conversations. I thought about my self-esteem and the amazing future that we might still be able to have. I subtracted my lips from hers, and then, without pulling away, I softly whispered, "You will always be mine."

Her eyes gazed blankly into mine.

"He may hold you and have your body next to his, but something inside you will always belong to me."

She shook her head to protest while I unbuttoned her pants. She said, "I... No, I..."

"I'm sorry. There is nothing you can do about it."

I could tell by her bewildered expression that she knew I was right. Her only hope was that something magical would resolve her predicament. While she was lost in her emotional conundrum, I loosened the button at her waist. She lifted her hips, and I slid off her pants. I pushed them down past her ankles, then stood over her.

I stepped out of my own pants and said, "You are so beautiful tonight."

I paused there for a moment, looking down at her unclothed body. My throbbing erection pointed at the ceiling above her head. There might have been sounds of traffic, neighbors fighting or even gunfire in the streets, but neither of us would have noticed. The only things in the universe that mattered were in that small room.

She looked at my stiff cock, smiled at its expression of my desire and said, "I'm always this beautiful."

I smiled back, "Of course you are, and your beauty is mine." I knelt down, placed my hands on her knees and traced a slow line up her inner thighs with my thumbs. I continued by saying, "Your body is mine," as my thumbs ventured up and down her thighs. "Your love is mine."

The smile dropped from her face as her expression became serious. She said, "I... I can't..."

I interrupted her, "You've loved me for a while now." My thumbs slowly traced a line back to her knees.

"I... I can't love you," she stammered, while her legs yielded to my gentle pressure.

I shook my head. "You don't get to pick who you love."

Her eyes were wide, and her mouth was agape in tacit acknowledgment of the truth in my words. She said, "I promised. I have to do it."

My thumbs marked their progress up her inner thigh once again. Rather than retreat, this time they pressed onto her precious pussy, slowly traversing its gentle ridges and troughs. Her eyes closed as my thumbs crisscrossed her vagina, enticing its ravenous lust. After completing their sensuous massage, my thumbs yielded their position to my fingers, which lightly landed on her buoyant skin.

Her body began to writhe slowly to my finger's call. She protested, "This was a bad idea."

"Your mind may want to believe that, but your heart knows better." I slid my fingers inside of her while I pressed the mound of my thumb against her clit.

"Please, please stop," She continued to protest.

My hands froze in place. I said, "I'll stop if you tell me that you don't love me."

She stared into my eyes and said, "I have to keep my promise."

"That's not what I asked you."

"I need to go to him."

"I didn't ask you that either."

"But I need to be true."

"All you have to say is that you don't love me."

She was silent. We both knew the truth.

The base of my palm began to slowly grind against her clit while my fingers flicked inside of her. Her hips rolled and swayed to my touch. Her pussy was drenched, and her eyes were locked on mine.

"Say it," I commanded.

Uncertainty flashed across her face between the waves of the slowly rolling ecstasy I was inducing between her legs.

"Say that you love me." The pace of the waves increased ever so slightly.

She silently squirmed beneath me.

"Say that you will always love me."

She whispered something as her shoulders tipped from side to side.

"I couldn't hear you."

In a low voice, she said, "I want you to fuck me."

"I know that, but I want you to say that you will always love me."

She shook her head, "Please just fuck me."

In all the time we'd dated she had never once said that she loved me in so many words. She'd said it with her eyes, with her body, and with her actions, but the words had never crossed her lips.

Her hand reached out to stroke my steel-hard cock. "You have the nicest cock. Please put it inside of me."

I pressed the urethral opening of my penis onto her excited clit. Once its tip was lodged in the slit at the end of my cock, I began to massage it by moving my cock from side to side.

Her eyes closed and her head dropped back. "That feels fantastic. Why haven't we done this before?"

I flashed the tip of my cock back and forth across her engorged clit, while she tossed and turned beneath me.

"Oh baby, that's amazing."

My free hand slid up her side, circled her breast and then firmly pinched her nipple before twisting it.

She cringed at the pain of my fingers turn at her nipple. "Oh fuck me. Please put your cock inside me."

"I will if you say it one time for me."

"Please don't ask that. You know that I can't."

We'd talked about it many times. No matter how I asked or what I promised she was never willing to say it. I didn't know if it was the loss of Jeff or something else from her past, but a dark shadow had been cast over those three small words.

Her body came to a halt, and her eyes begged me to let it drop. It was clear that I couldn't press her any harder without spoiling the mood, so I conceded defeat and said, "Well, you should know that I love you."

Her index finger touched my lips to silence me. She didn't want to say it, and she didn't want to hear it. All she wanted was the essential act.

I aligned my stiff shaft with her slippery slot and slowly slid it in. Her eyes closed as her head drifted back and her spine arched. She said, "Oh God, you feel so fucking good."

My rigid erection slowly glided the extent of her steamy pussy. I paused at its zenith, kissed her exposed neck and then deliberately slid it free of her vaginal embrace, leaving her hungry cunt longing for re-entry. I took her nipple into my mouth and sucked it for a long moment. She thrust her hips up to force a reinsertion, but I kept her at bay, torturing her with my denial.

"Oh baby, please don't tease me. I need you inside of me."

I almost begged for the three words one last time, but I thought better of it. I slowly impaled her again, nipping at her neck as I did. Once my balls drew tight to her ass, I ground my pubic bone against hers for a moment and then gradually extracted my cock.

She tipped her head up and asked, "Why are you going so slowly?"

Without breaking the flow of my motion, I said, "If this is the last time we'll ever do this. I'll be damned if I'm going to rush through it."

Her fingernails traced a sharp arc across my back as she said, "I thought you weren't going to panic."

I looked down to watch my engorged penis as it emerged from her pussy's extended lips, paused for a moment over her abyss, and then was slowly subducted between her pussy's folds. "I'm not panicking."

"Well, don't be so pessimistic. We don't know what the future holds."

I had a pretty good idea what the next couple of weeks were going to be like, but I smiled and pretended to be happy anyway.

Debbie was a beautiful woman. She was generous, kind and gentle. On our first date, she'd told me that life was too short to waste time pretending to like someone. At the time I'd thought she was preparing me for a letdown, but she refused to end that date until I'd arranged a second. After that, we'd been together at every opportunity.

Sex had been good from the start. It was mostly plain vanilla with a little bit of nipping and scratching thrown in at the right time. We took turns being on top, and we both enjoyed fellatio and cunnilingus. That night something different was happening. Her eyes held a hunger that I'd not seen before, and she looked at me as if I was the only one that could satisfy her. My cock was harder somehow, and her cunt was wetter than I could remember. I reveled in the intensity of the moment as my cock swam through the copious lubrication of her pussy. Her fingernails dug sharply into my back, and she pressed her cunt hard onto my cock as I hastened the pace.

She said, "That's it, Daddy. Fuck your good girl."

Rather than play her dirty talk game I spoke from the heart: "I don't give a fuck what you say."

Her brown eyes burned uncertainly into me.

"You can pretend that you don't love me, but it doesn't matter because I know better."

Her fingers clawed at my back as her hips turned and reeled beneath me.

"You can run across the globe, but that won't matter either."

My throbbing cock repeatedly bored into her excited, narrow tunnel. Her skin became slick with sweat, and she began to pant.