American Romance

She's a borderline suicidal smoker with sporadic cravings for cocaine, and she has a peculiar habit of shoving her hand down my pants. She is mostly blonde, but there's a color called gerbil that somehow is more prominent, a color she hates. Her lips are improbably soft. Her name is Posey, and she has a body that I would kill to protect, but I never will.

She takes a drag from her cigarette and latches her eyes directly to mine. I have by this time overcome my nervousness, as well as my guilt, shame and remorse. "What do you want to do?" I ask her, innocently enough.

"Screw." She looks at me sideways as she half turns to take another drag. This isn't the first time she has expressed a desire to coalesce, and though I match the feeling exactly, we both know it won't--can't--happen. "Well," I say, trying to play the obligatory voice of reason, "I'd like that too, but..."

...and I sort of fade out of my senses as in one terribly swift motion she drops her cigarette in a soda can and places her hand directly on my crotch with just enough pressure to make my breathing erratic. I feel dizzy as every drop of blood in my body races like electricity to my penis. Our hands take on lives of their own as we explore each other's bodies with them, aching to connect.

Her large orange eyes go wild with lust...

Wait. This is moving a little too fast. Let me start from a more informative, albeit less interesting point in the story...

***** ***** *****

Posey and I collided one hot, thankless summer shortly after I had graduated from high school. There was a wedding in the park, and I was a stoned and uninvited guest looking for some free snacks. She was working with the caterer, and had the victuals I sought. I meandered right up without seeing her, grabbed a cracker topped with something that looked tasty, and shoved it in my mouth like a barbarian.

"Hello," said a soft and sensual female voice that I refused to believe was addressing me. I looked up to see where it had come from and nearly

choked as the cracker became a dry and obstructing mass in my gullet. Blonde hair wisping in her face, large, impossibly gorgeous brown eyes gleaming in the high noon sun, she looked like a goddamn movie star, and, wonder of wonders, she was, really, truly, actually talking to ME.

I spent too long trying to swallow the gunk in my throat, then managed to croak out, "hi," just before she changed her mind about talking to me. I had never seen such a beautiful woman in real life, let alone talk to one, and I wasn't sure what the protocol was, so I just stared. Somehow I made it through a short conversation without making a fool of myself, a conversation that ended with me taking a job. Working with her. On a

regular basis. Either I was stoned halfway to Mars or something special was happening to me, something that had never happened before...

***** ***** *****

Posey's hand is creeping up my thigh like a deadly spider. Officially, her eyes are brown, but in the sharp glare of this mid-morning sun, they glow a very deep orange. They are also large, a trait which I love. Right now, as her hand does a luscious dance on my crotch, those eyes are challenging me, defying me to stop her. We all seem to know that I never will, and when she slides my zipper down to free my imprisoned erection, I can only nod approval.

She leans her head back and gazes at me with unchecked longing. Her fingers march up and down my shaft, checking its length, its thickness. Suddenly they clasp around it like a Venus flytrap and squeeze a few times, feeling the hardness, the heat, and the involuntary pulse of excitement.

As if in a dream, I watch my hand detach from my body and float across the space that separates us, where it lands like a butterfly in her waiting lap.

I am not alone...

***** ***** *****

Several long weeks at my new job grated past without my seeing her again. The work was easy, but boring, and I started to wonder if I had made her up in my pot-addled mind that day in the park, when suddenly, one day, there she was, and she was every bit as beautiful as I remembered, and even more than I had hoped. That day we were working a large, hoity-toity art event, the kind full of pretentious rich snobs who would as soon wipe their feet on you as acknowledge you as human. Anyway, it was busy, and though we crossed paths many times replenishing the four long tables we were charged with, we never got a chance to speak.

Finally, the end of the night came, and with everything cleaned, put away, and utterly settled, we were free. I spied her in the kitchen, tossing a final handful of used towels into the linen basket, and by some misunderstood miracle, conjured up the heavy nards I needed to go over to her. Seeing me approach, she turned fully towards me and smiled. "Hello, again! I'm so glad to see you've taken to the job so well. I knew I had a good feeling about you."

We made some sort of small talk as we walked together out the back of the kitchen to the parking lot. Somehow it came out that we both enjoyed the sweet leaf, and a plan was quickly devised to take a quick drive together.

This would become a nigh-daily conspiracy for us, and one that would develop a happy, platonic friendship between us...

***** ***** *****

Spent, messy, but only half-fulfilled, I relax back down into my seat, not bothering to pull my pants up. Beside me, Posey is still breathing heavily, frustrated, no doubt, by my fingers' lack of skill with her womanhood, but pleased, I know, by my eagerness to try, to learn. We stare at each other for what seems like hours, and then she says, "It's too bad you came already." "What do you mean?" I ask. Eyes lowered to my flaccid member, she answers, "I was going to give you a blowjob." Then she looks up, eyes wide, hungry, horny, and I suddenly feel the hardness returning. She leans over and kisses me, gently, slowly, seductively, then reaches down to check my progress. I am more amazed than she to find that I'm already there, and so finding, her kiss becomes more passionate, her tongue dives into my mouth, looking for its soulmate, and her body writhes deliciously as she squeezes my now raging hard-on.

This powerful, wonderful kiss is broken all too soon, but my sadness quickly turns to nervous excitement as, with one last, voracious glance from those eyes, those fucking huge, beautiful eyes, she moves her body away from me, her head moving down, down, down into my crotch. I feel like I'm stoned on some government super weed, I can't move; I wait, wait to feel what's about to happen, what I've never felt before, what I've only ever dreamed about. Her lips close softly around me, and I suck in my breath like when a mushroom trip has just begun.

Glorious.

Heavenly.

Spec-TACULAR.

***** ***** *****

Max was a wildcard I could never have accounted for, the ace in the hole of whatever cruel deity found my misery amusing. He was a mechanic and

small-time drug dealer, mostly marijuana, and it was at his house that Posey spent much of her time when she wasn't with me, because Max was her boyfriend. I had been completely unprepared for this development, and I was glad she had supplied this information up front before I had a chance to ask, which would have tipped my hand. As it was, several months had gone by without her ever suspecting I wanted to be more than friends, even though by that time I was certain I loved her. Max seemed a nice enough guy, a little clueless, a lot apathetic, not exactly the caliber of boyfriend I felt Posey deserved. I sometimes felt that he was completely insensitive to her, and as much as possible without overstepping my boundaries, I tried to outdo him in every way. This achieved the result that Posey and I became best friends, the kind that were always together, always in touch, never what I hoped. Still, I would take what I could get, and I knew that Max couldn't last forever...

***** ***** *****

I have been in Posey's car for roughly six minutes, careening down a dirt road in total darkness, when suddenly she pulls over, sets the parking brake, and flies at me like a wraith, pinning me to my seat with a brutally sexy kiss. She has my pants open and my stiff dick in her hand before I even realize what is happening, and in an effort to catch up with her, I accidentally rip her pants. This only serves to excite her more, and she lifts halfway off her seat, undulating like a magic carpet as my fingers slip inside her. She moans, an earthy, trembling sound that pushes me over the edge, and I'm spurting all over myself and not caring. She continues to jack me absently as I continue to probe her, moaning louder and thrusting herself at my hand, lusty, primal, so goddamn sexy. Her moans reach a crescendo, becoming squeals as she orgasms, her body tense and tight as it floats in the air, her pussy alive with a death grip on my knuckles. She falls gently as a leaf back into her seat, sighing with delight, and releases my hand with a grin. We both lean back in our seats, staring into each other's eyes, both unsure of what's inside. She takes my hand in hers, lifts it to her face, closes her eyes. She softly strokes her cheek with my hand, an action which makes my heart skip, and she says to me, "I love you. I love you..."

***** ***** *****

Two more years passed. Posey and I were as close as two people could be who were not romantically involved, but my resolve had started to waver. She was still with Max. It was clear to me, however, that their relationship for nearly a year had been almost completely automated. It was as if being with each other was all they knew, and what reason was there to change that? There was no abuse, no treason, nothing to warrant a separation. And so they stayed together, automatically, carelessly, but I knew there was no love.

In February of my third year in Posey's life, at a ridiculous outdoor event sparsely attended, there was an accident which somehow changed our friendship forever. I don't know how it happened, because I was not there, but somehow Posey had taken a spill and broken her arm. I rushed to the hospital as soon as I heard, and was surprised to find the only other person there was her father. Inexplicably, I was furious at Max. It seemed that she had had a seizure or something while at work, and had keeled over sideways landing on her arm, which, due to a subtle lack of calcium, broke. I sat by her bedside as x-rays were taken and explanations were given, and when it was all over, I gave her a hug and went home.

One week later, Posey asked me to come over and take her for a drive in her car. She was, of course, unable to drive, a fact that hurt her more than any broken bone, and I of course complied immediately. We spent most of the evening driving various back roads and smoking as much pot as we

could handle. That night, on the way back to her house, we stopped at a small diner to get something to eat. I don't remember anything that happened there, except for the part where she pointed to something out the window of the diner, then leaned into me as I looked, her full, heavy breasts resting very deliberately on my shoulder. I denied to myself the obvious translation of this body language, until we got back in the car and she suggested we smoke one last bowl. We never even started it, because as soon as I turned to face her in the car, she kissed me...

***** ***** *****

Posey wants something from me, and as I stand there by the river watching the rain in short spurts water my beer, I realize I want her to have it, and I feel foolish again. She kisses me for the hundredth time and I ask, shaking, "Why are you doing this?" It's the same question I've been asking her for months, the same question I ask myself when I can't sleep, when I feel like a snake, when I wonder why I'm still alive.

Her answer is swift, prepared, rehearsed: "Because I love you." Just once, I wish she would look at me and say it. She never looks at me when we're having a real conversation. She must realize I don't believe her, because she says, "Do you believe me?"

"I want to." I don't know what else to say, so I take a sip of my beer. It tastes worse than anything I've ever had, but I don't care. "Why won't you leave him?"

She stares at the ground, pretends to think, pretends to care that it hurts me, that it confuses me. I know her answer before she does.

"I don't know." Is she completely obtuse, or are those the truest words to ever slip past her teeth? Either way, I hate myself for loving her, for wanting to trust her, despite the obvious lies. I have nothing more to say to her, and I know my anger, my frustration, and my distance are tangible. I know it's finally over, and I know it's my decision.

She says, "I love you."

I say, "No you don't."

Silence. She smokes a cigarette, I finish my beer. A mountain quietly swallows the sun.

"It's getting cold" she says. I ignore her, watching the clouds burn themselves black.

"I have to go" she says.

"Then go." I can hear the impact of those words slapping her across the face. It's really over this time, but she still doesn't believe it.

"Can I have a hug?" I feel her staring at me, those enormous brown eyes soaked, those unbearably soft lips quivering imperceptibly. I hate myself for loving her. I want to wrap her up in my arms and hold her there forever, until the sun comes back up, until it goes back down again, until it reduces us to ash and the wind carries us around the world—until God Himself is dead and buried.

But I don't. I can't. I hate myself for loving her. I hate myself for hating her. My arms are useless, my arms I never deserved.

I ignore her.

She says nothing more, and I stare at the dark river until her footsteps fade and all I can hear is the harsh flow of water, and blood.