The Switch Ch. 06

Valery rolled over and surveyed Aimee's sleeping form. It was late Saturday night. The room was dark, save for the thin, weak rays of light that filtered in from the street lights. In three days their arrangement would be complete, and he prayed he'd done enough. He wanted to keep her. He wanted to ask her to come and live with him.

She mumbled something in her sleep. Her bright red hair fell over her face, and she clutched at the doona with long, slim fingers. She had white, white skin with freckles everywhere the sun had touched. The attraction he'd initially felt towards her had multiplied exponentially, and he now only needed to think about her to get uncomfortably hard.

Why had he wasted last Saturday night taking her to Miles' party? It had been stupid. He should have known she'd never fit in. And, really, what did it matter? She was enough, without kink, to satisfy him. He loved being with her. Making love to her. Waking up beside her.

What if she didn't want to stay with him? The thought was enough to panic him. Everyone thought he was this big, tough, strong man, but the reality was far from it. He craved love and security. A woman's touch. A child to raise, one that would refer to him as it's father.

He stroked her red hair absent mindedly. He knew his religion bothered her. She didn't understand faith in a higher being. It was the one issue that scared him, because he knew it had the power to come between them, and yet he couldn't quite bring himself to give it up.

Sure, he was a shitty Muslim. He had tattoos. He drank. He'd slept with multiple women and given sexual favours to a handful of men. He took drugs. He'd not once even attempted to fast for Ramadan and as for regular prayers, well, that was a joke. Ultimately, though, it was a part of his identity, and in much the way most Australians referred to themselves as 'Christian' despite not living a historically Christian lifestyle, he considered himself Muslim.

His ears pricked as he heard the sound of someone unlocking a screen door. Aimee's screen door. He glanced at her face in the dark. She was still sleeping, and he really didn't want to wake her, let alone to tell her that someone was about to enter her house.

Val slid out of bed and fumbled around for his pants. They were aggravatingly elusive. He now had two choices; go and find out who was at the front door naked, or hide out in the bedroom like a sitting duck, waiting to see who was breaking in.

He chose the first option. He padded out to the open plan lounge, dining and kitchen area, and flicked on the light. He grabbed a knife from the kitchen and walked over to the front door, just as it swung open.

The middle aged woman on the other side stared at him shock. Val stared back, frozen in place. Suddenly, the woman swore, slammed the door shut and disappeared from view. Valery stood in the middle of the lounge room, knife in hand, his heart pounding. What the fuck had just happened?

Very slowly, the front door was unlocked again, and pushed opened a few centimetres.

'Is Aimee awake?' the woman asked.

It occurred to Valery that this must be her mother. Of course. Who else would have the keys to her house?

'No,' he said. 'Should I wake her up?'

'I need Ben's asthma inhaler. He's run out, and he's woken up wheezy. I tried finding an overnight pharmacy, but they all close by ten. It's ten past eleven, so I had no choice but to come by. I thought I might just let myself in and out without waking anyone.'

'Hang on,' he said. 'I'll get dressed.'

He went to the bedroom and located his clothes. Aimee remained asleep. He thought about waking her, but immediately dismissed the idea. There was no reason to bother her.

When he returned to the front door, the woman had a young boy with her. Ben. He clung to his grandmother's hand, and glanced up at Valery nervously.

'Come in,' Valery offered. 'Sorry. I thought someone was breaking in.'

'I should have called,' she apologised, as she stepped inside. 'We'll just be a minute.'

Ben followed his grandmother, a suspicious expression on his face as he inspected Val. 'Who are you?' he demanded.

'Um, Val,' he replied.

'What are you doing at my Mum's house?'

Val stared helplessly at Aimee's mother. The woman just shrugged, and headed opened a kitchen drawer and started rummaging through it. What the hell was he supposed to say?

'I'm a friend,' he said.

'Do you have kids?' Ben prodded.

Ben had the same hazel eyes as his mother, and they narrowed in exactly the same way hers did when she was asking a question. He had the same slim build as her, too, but his face was different, and his skin was the colour of milky coffee.

'I have a daughter.'

His nose wrinkled. 'I was hoping there might be a boy here.'

'Uh no. My daughter's in Melbourne, with her mother.'

There was an awkward silence while the two inspected each other. Aimee's mother continued to rummage around in the kitchen, and Aimee remained unfortunately asleep. Val would have given anything for her to wake up and fix the awkwardness.

'Found it,' Aimee's mother called out. 'Ben, come here.'

Ben sulked. 'I don't need it.'

'You do. You were wheezing.'

'I wasn't!'

His grandmother glared, shoved the inhaler in his mouth, and depressed the button. The expression on Ben's face was pure Aimee, and Val smiled involuntarily.

'I'm Tina, by the way,' the woman said. 'It's nice to meet you.'

'And you,' he replied. 'Did you want a coffee?'

'I want a Fanta,' Ben said, pulling his face away from the inhaler. 'My puffer makes my mouth taste yuck.'

'No, we're going to take this and go back to my house,' Tina said, waving the puffer in the boy's house. 'It's the middle of the night. You need to go to sleep.'

'I don't want to go back to your house,' Ben argued. 'I want to stay here. Where's Mum? I want to see her.'

'She's sleeping,' Tina said. 'You can see her tomorrow. It's time to go. Say 'good-bye' to Al.'

'You just want me to go,' Ben surmised.

'Yes,' Tina agreed, giving him a gentle push towards the door. 'I do.'

Valery watched in relief as the older woman herded the child to the door. He didn't even want to think about how he was going to explain this to Aimee in the morning. Giving your girlfriend's mother the fright of her life by greeting her buck naked and holding a butcher's knife wasn't exactly the way to win a woman over.

After they'd left, he went to the bathroom, peed, and drank a glass of water. He shut his eyes and laughed at the absurdity of the situation. He was an idiot. It should have occurred to him that if someone had a key to her house, Aimee had probably given it to them.

He went back to her bedroom, stripped off and climbed into bed. Aimee was still fast asleep. He scooted close to her, and laid an arm over her. Her hair tickled his nose, but he didn't care. He liked sleeping as physically near to his partners as he could.

She made a noise and pushed him away. He rolled off her and stared at the ceiling. He was wide awake, and he knew it would be a while before he'd be able to get back to sleep. He may as well get out of bed and stuff around on his phone for a while.

He went and sat on her couch, his phone in his lap. His mind started to wander in the way it normally did in the middle of the night, when he was tired, but too alert to sleep. Would Aimee ever want to come and live with him? Sure, her apartment was tiny, and very old, but it was in a great area. Ben could walk to school from here, and she could walk to work. She saved time and money on commuting, and she'd said several times that that was important, given she was a single parent.

If she moved to his house, she'd need to do a twenty minute commute each morning. Would she be willing to do that? He certainly couldn't move here; there wasn't enough room for him and six cats to join them. Besides, he figured that, all going well, in a year they might want to get married and try to have a baby. She was thirty-four, and he was thirty-six, so there was no point dawdling.

For fuck's sake, he told himself. Why are you even thinking about this? On Tuesday your arrangement will end. She might not want to see you after that, let alone move in and have your a few more kids.

He needed to have a wank and go to back to bed. Masturbation was normally a sure fire way to get him to sleep. Aimee was dead to the world, and it was unlikely that anyone else would arrive, so he could just sit here and take care of things. There was a box of tissues on the coffee table, and he had his phone with him so a bit of porn would help move things along nicely.

Val set the volume to mute and settled down to watch an old favourite. He had a killer erection and the fear of being caught was a natural aphrodisiac. He thought about Aimee in the movie theatre, giving him head. She'd been so bold that night. She hadn't asked him what he thought about it; she'd just gone and done it. It was one of the hottest things he'd ever done.

He ran a hand over his chest. He flicked his nipples, feeling them harden under his touch. Aimee played with his nipples all the time. Foreplay. Sex. During cuddles. Her mouth was always on either his nipples or his cock. It was a pity he was too embarrassed to request she give him a little anal attention with that sweet, pink-lipped mouth of hers.

His gaze shifted to the kitchen table. Aimee shared a clothes line with other tenants, and she never left her peg basket outside. She always took it back in, and left it on her table. She'd made a joke a week or so ago about not liking cheap pegs; she liked the quality, hard clamping kind. The kind that, Val thought to himself, would probably work well on his nipples.

Before he could stop himself, he'd collected the peg basket and was back on the couch. He attached a peg to each nipple and swore under his breath at the pain. She hadn't been kidding when she'd said they had a firm grip.

He sat on the couch, legs spread, with a peg on each nipple, pulling at the delicate flesh. He opened another tab on his phone and found another video. He skipped it along until the participants were close to orgasm. He was close; so he needed them to be, too.

His climax was approaching. He could feel the pressure in his balls, and he reached down and massaged them with his free hand. He imagined Aimee fondling them. Sucking on them, one in her mouth at a time. Her mouth moving lower, over his perineum, and back to his tight hole.

fuck, he was close. He pulled roughly on his cock, gasped, and came. He let out an involuntary cry as he frantically rubbed himself. Cum spewed forth, landing on his chest and face, but he didn't care. Didn't care about anything but his orgasm.

When the last few waves of pleasure had died away, he laid back on the couch, breathing heavily. He casually pulled the pegs from his nipples and tossed them into the peg basket, before reaching for the tissues. He rubbed a handful of them against his chest and face, cleaning up the sticky mess. There was a bit of cum on his finger from the tidy-up, and he licked it casually.

He yawned. He was tired, and ready for bed. The screen on his phone had locked, but he unlocked it and closed down the videos. He put the box of tissues back on the coffee table, the used ones in the bin, and the peg basket on the table, before going to the sink and washing his hands.

It was only when he turned around to head back to the bedroom that he saw Aimee. She was standing naked in the hallway, staring at him. How much had she seen? He was too embarrassed to look her in the eye and find out.

'We should go to bed,' he said gruffly.

She nodded. 'Okay.'

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There was no polite way to say 'I saw you masturbating on my couch', so Aimee said nothing. She simply went back to bed with Valery, and snuggled into him. She'd embarrassed him, and she was sorry for that. She should have said something. Joined in. Anything rather than stand there stupidly while he jerked himself off.

'How long were you watching me?' he mumbled.

'I wasn't. I just came out and you were putting something in the bin,' she lied. 'What were you doing awake?'

'Your mother came by earlier in the evening. You were asleep. She needed Ben's asthma puffer.'

A horrible knot formed in Aimee's stomach. 'Oh. Shit. Sorry. I didn't tell her I was seeing anyone, so, um, you probably surprised her.'

He laughed awkwardly. 'Yeah, I reckon I did. I thought someone was breaking in, so I got out of bed and grabbed a knife. She got a good full frontal view of me naked, holding a butcher's knife.'

'Are you kidding me?'

'No.'

'Holy shit,' she whispered. Her face was burning with embarrassment. 'Oh my God. What did she say?'

'She was pretty good about it. She said she just needed a puffer. I went and got dressed, she came in, Ben followed her...'

'...Ben saw you naked holding a knife?'

'No, no, no,' he reassured her. 'I don't think so. I think he must have been waiting in the car originally. Anyway, they came in, got his puffer, and went.'

She sighed with relief. 'Wow. That was, uh, eventful. Why didn't you wake me up?'

'It seemed pointless.' He reached for her, and buried his face in her hair. He mumbled something, but the words were unclear.

'What did you just say?' she asked.

'I said 'why didn't you tell your mother you were seeing me?'.' Val clarified.

She shrugged. 'Have you told your family about me?'

'Yes.' He squirmed. 'You're invited to my father's sixty-fifth birthday next week. If you want to come, that is. You can take Ben as well, if you want. I've already met him now...'

Aimee bit her lip. She hated meeting families. Chris's family had hated her. She'd stolen their baby boy away. Dane's family had been the same. Tim had never taken her to meet anyone, so she had no idea how that might have gone, but she guessed it would have ended much the same.

'Everyone's mother always hates me,' she confessed.

'Mine won't. My family are really nice.'

She didn't doubt he believed what he was saying. He'd always talked fondly about his family. He was from one of those close-knit units where everyone looked out for each other, and that, in her eyes, was precisely the problem. She'd be the Atheist Australian out to corrupt their little boy. Worse, she was a single mother.

'Would you rather we go our separate ways?' Val asked cautiously. 'I know our arrangement ends this week, but I'd like to keep seeing you.'

'Oh no, I want to see you. I'm just not sure about this family business.'

'It's okay. We'll leave it for another time,' he said.

He tried to sound casual, but she could hear the disappointment in his voice. He wanted her to meet his family. They'd met each other six weeks ago. Next Sunday it would be seven weeks to the day since that fateful lunch. It was early to be getting introduced to families, but to be fair, he'd now met her mother and son.

'No, no,' she said. 'I'll go.'

'You don't sound very enthusiastic.'

'Because they'll hate me?'

He rolled over and propped himself up on an elbow. 'Why are you so insecure about everything? When I first met you, you refused to take off your clothes. You didn't want to meet my friends. Now, you don't want to meet my family because you think they'll hate you.'

Aimee grabbed the blanket and buried herself in it. She didn't want to discuss this.

'Aimee,' he prodded, pulling the blanket off her face. 'Your mother's seen my penis. My flaccid penis. I wouldn't mind so much if she'd seen me rock hard, and...'

'...Val,' she interrupted, shrieking with embarrassed laughter. 'Stop it.'

He grinned and kissed her. 'Tell me. Why are you so insecure?'

'Because I don't want to let you down. I don't want you to think I'm ugly. I don't want to embarrass you in front of your friends. I don't want your family to wonder what you're doing with me.'

Val snorted. 'None of that will happen. Trust me.'

She snuggled into his arm. 'If you say so.'

'I say so. And one thing; don't eat before we go next week. The food is heavy. You'll need an empty stomach to cope with it.'

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Valery's parents lived in a huge modern house. Aimee took a deep breath and tried to calm herself. There was nothing she could do to influence things. All she could do was be pleasant, smile, and hope for the best.

Ben, who was sitting in the back seat, was oblivious to his mother's anxiety. He'd been told there was a pool, and given that it was the middle of a hot summer, he was eager to have a swim. He'd quite happily accepted Aimee's explanation that Val was a 'friend' and, other than showing off shamelessly in Val's presence, he hadn't said or done a thing out of the ordinary.

They got out of the car and walked up the driveway. Aimee handed Val the bunch of flowers she'd insisted they stop off and buy for his mother.

'Why don't you just give them to her?' he asked, puzzled.

'Because it would be weird.'

'And it's not weird for me?' he asked with a grin. 'She'll know something's up if I try and give her flowers.'

'Well, make something up,' she replied. 'I have no idea what Russian-Chechen etiquette dictates.'

'My Mum is so strange,' Ben sighed dramatically.

They went to the front door, Val holding the flowers and a gift for his father, Aimee meekly following him, and Ben jumping around excitedly at the prospect of a pool. Aimee tugged anxiously at her blue and white sundress. She was wearing her togs underneath, but she was very confident she wouldn't be getting in the pool.

Val opened the door and gestured for them to go in. Ben pranced inside, tripping over his rubber thongs, while Aimee meekly tiptoed in.

'Val!' a woman roughly their own age shouted. 'You're here! This must be Aimee and Ben.'

The woman came thundering down the internal stairs, her dark hair flying everywhere. She kissed Val on the cheek, and inspected Aimee and Ben with a broad smile.

'This is my sister Roza,' Val introduced.

Roza smiled. 'I'm Val's twin. Nula is the younger sister.'

Aimee looked at Val in surprise. 'You're a twin?'

He shrugged. 'Didn't I mention that?'

'No, you probably didn't,' Roza argued. 'You don't mention anything unless it's pointed out.' She turned to Ben. 'Ben, how about I show you where the pool is? All the other kids are already swimming.'

Roza led the way, with Ben hot on her heels. Aimee glanced at Val, who shrugged non-committedly. It occurred to her that he was just as nervous as she was. He was taking her to meet the people who knew every embarrassing thing he'd ever done, said or experienced.

The house wasn't as big or ostentatious as Miles', but Aimee liked it much better. The ceilings were high, the floors were wooden, and it looked comfortable. They could hear people talking, and as they made their way through the house, the voices got louder. They were speaking in English and another language, either Russian or Chechen Aimee guessed, although she couldn't yet tell the two languages apart.

They turned a corner and reached the kitchen. It was crowded with women talking and laughing and cooking, but the moment they saw the new arrivals, the women fell silent.

'This is Aimee and Ben,' Roza announced.

Ben clung to Aimee's legs, suddenly shy. Aimee smiled nervously. The women were going to crucify her, she just knew it.

'Aimee bought you flowers,' Roza said to a woman, plucking the bunch from Val's hands and handing them over. 'Obviously. It's not as if my shitty brother would ever be so thoughtful.'

The staring and awkward silence continued. Aimee glanced at Val helplessly, and he returned her gaze with the exact same expression in his eyes.

'Can I go swimming please?' Ben whispered.

'Let's all go swimming,' Roza said. 'Come on.'