Merry Hell of a Widow 01: Hers

A big thank you to fellow author C_Rion for the idea and for the inspiration.

I do hope I did it justice.

*****

The sudden lights cast brilliant shadows on the inside of my retina. I blinked. Tired. My eyes feeling raw. Scrubbed by the sands of too many failed attempts at sleep. I felt like hell. Crumpled and sweat soiled and reeking of 48 hours of airports and steel tubes. The sterile air of the over-conditioned airport smelt metallic and cold. A sharp contrast to the oppressive heat I could see simmering just beyond the glass. I eyed the Australian summer ruefully through the length of the terminal window as I weighed my coat in my hands.

I was tempted to just throw it away.

To drop it where I stood.

The further I walked to the baggage area, the more enticing the idea. If there had been a charity collection I would have done so. Shed my layers like a snake, coat, sleeves, beanie, the skirt I wore over leggings. Part of me wondered if I would stop there. Stripping until I was naked, ready to be born again, back on home soil...

Probably best I didn't test my impulse... probably best I didn't draw attention.

Instead I held my coat as though it was a shield and kept my beanie on my head, pulled low to the dark frames of my sunglasses. My scarf wrapped in billowed layers up to my chin. Hiding inside my wardrobe like it was armour. Hiding and finding a corner near the baggage conveyor, as far from the restless crowd as I could.

It was my isolation that meant when I heard the man's voice at my elbow I knew it was addressed to me.

"Excuse me."

I looked up, my hands unconsciously digging deeper into the coat draped over them. I didn't want to engage with anyone. Not yet. The stirs of panic starting to rise when I felt the wall at my back. Instead of running I tried to shuffle deeper inside my clothes, perhaps they would just go away?

The voice seemed to feel my apprehension.

"I am sorry, you looked like someone..."

The voice was hesitant, gentle... familiar... I blinked through the haze of fatigue. My hand unconsciously finding my sunglasses, pulling them from my face. A habit from so many years ago when you would tell me how much you loved the colour of my eyes. I heard you gasp. Mid apology. Your arms spontaneously thrown around me across the distance between us, sweeping around me in an embrace I did not deserve.

"Woman, I thought you were dead."

Your voice broke when you spoke, cracking as the emotion came. You always were a softie. I lent into you, your arms fierce, holding me and then holding me again, tighter. Not letting me go until I felt a deep breath reach down inside you and you finally released me. Your thumbs smoothing my cheeks, wet with tears I hadn't felt fall, before you hugged me again.

I closed my eyes as your scent enveloped me.

You always smelt like home.

You had insisted. On carrying my bag. On hailing the cab. On 'walking' me to my door. Your body pressed against mine as you climbed into the backseat beside me. I managed to remember the name of the apartments before I found myself resting against your shoulder, the warmth of your hand in mine. Your hands holding onto some part of me since your first embrace, as if you were scared I would disappear in smoke and heartache. Thinking on our history I did not blame you. I squeezed your hand to assure you I was there beside you and fell into a wakeful sleep. Lulled ever deeper by your low phone voice making excuses to people who weren't me, for wherever else you were meant to be that wasn't here.

It was the jerk of the cab braking that woke me. I let you lead, your hand still clasped in mine. I don't remember paying for the cab, or checking in. I expect you did both of those things for me. You always did take care of me. The only one I had ever allowed to do so. It was easy to lean on you, my key in your hands as you opened the door to my temporary home and ushered me inside.

I still felt like hell and eased my hand from yours to find the bathroom, running the shower until steam billowed while you lounged in the doorframe. Watching as the layers of clothes fell from me. I hesitated in my singlet and panties, unsure as to whether I should be shy, unsure of the gold band that encircled your finger. You answered the silent question by moving into the room and closing the door, helping me ease the singlet over my head and hooking your fingers under my panties, tugging them down my thighs before you let them fall to the floor. I was reminded then, of us, in distant hotel rooms, before the universe had found a way between us.

It was my turn to watch as you undressed. Cuffs and buttons and your leather belt before a zipper and socks and your trunks found their own pile on the tiles, out of the way. You held my hand again, stepping into the shower and under the stream of water. Pulling me with you into a wet embrace. Our skin naked and warm and wet. Your hands running over my with swathes of bubbles as you washed the travel from me, diligent and careful, tracing every line of my body that I now thought was too thin despite the curves of my hips.

Yours hands felt as worshipful as ever. The intensity of your attention focusing my own scattered thoughts awash with our history. And when your lips found mine I admitted still wanting you. Even after the length of parting. Your mouth provoking my urge to devour. My own tasting the sweetness of your saliva, the softness of your lips. I murmured softly when the length of your cock slipped between my legs. My eyes opening to watch your face as your cock nudged my sex open and then pushed inside.

The heat of your length forging to depth inside me. Your body seeking a closeness that your heart sought to find. I exhaled slowly into droplets as your hips pressed my own. Folding yourself around me like an embrace. It struck me as strange, the immediacy of our comfort. As if time had never passed. We had loved one another once. Once when we had no right to. Our affair encircled by a line as surely as the gold that had encircled our fingers. That encircled yours still... But even through our history and the time between us, I still felt our desire, the height of our passion. Your cock reminding me of the angst and want and the endless game.

The game before everything changed and suddenly life wasn't for games.

It was for roses and caskets and the heat of the crematorium.

It was for goodbyes.

Unspoken.

Even to you.

I hadn't trusted myself not to force your hand. Not to cross our golden line in a bid to fill his void. Not to destroy your world in the ruin of my own. Though as I moved against you now, clawing at your back, I knew I had damaged you regardless.

It was this rush of emotions, the depth of your cock, my hand finding your cheek, that invited our kiss. My lips finally whispering your name before I lifted my face to the water in a bid to hide my grief. Your body moving into my own. Your strength holding me firm against the tiles. Your intent slow and careful and focused, not on pleasure, but on finding me again.

"Come back to me." You whispered through the falling water.

"Come back to me." You whispered, your nose finding the hollow of my throat.

"Come back to me." You whispered, your hand hooking my knee and urging your cock deeper inside me.

"Come back to me." You whispered, as I turned my face from the stream and caught your mouth with my own.

"I am here." I answered. "I am here."

I held your face as you began to thrust in earnest. My body braced against the shower wall, elbows tucked between our chests. I held your eyes, my body supple to your intent. Accepting your need dressed as want, allowing you it's expression without sanction. Your orgasm shuddering as you emptied yourself inside me, the warmth of your cum mixing with the warmth of the water that cascaded down the length of my legs. I felt your breath against my breasts as you pressed your forehead to my chest. And while your cock slipped from my body your arms lost none of their strength. Keeping me against you, dancing me from shower to towel and then to bed, where you lay me down and once more found yourself inside me.

"Gods I have missed you."

Your breathless admission between kisses and I am crying again. I swallow down my own, that your face in my heart had finally called me home.