Better Late Than Never

Hey everyone. I know it's been awhile. I just hope I "still got it" as they say. I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I wrote it. Once again, I'd like to offer my disclaimer of fictionalizing my own life. I'm not going to confirm nor deny that any of this actually happened.

*

Vera sipped her dairy liqueur concoction. For somebody she had only known for five minutes, Dave made rather reliable drink recommendations. It would have never occurred to her that milk, chocolate syrup and amaretto would be fit for imbibing, yet somehow it worked. Yet it seemed more like a dessert than a drink, so she decided to hit up her gracious host Jim for a shot of something--anything just to cleanse the sweetness from her mouth.

She was pouring herself a shot of rum when something from the corner of her eye caught her attention.

"You've gotta be fucking kidding me. What the hell is he doing here?"

Vera was not inebriated to the point of tactlessness quite yet, so this thought managed to remain only that, as opposed to escaping in the air for Lex to hear it as he walked toward her. Or more accurately, as he walked to the liquor table.

"Hey."

"Hey."

This was typically the exchange between Lex and Vera these days. They maintained a polite civility and a professional attitude concerning the creative writing class they shared. Something had happened, but it had nothing to do with the obvious scenario of them being ex-lovers who navigated around each other with diplomacy due to mutual acquaintances and common professional interest.

No. He was just a good friend of one of Vera's ex-lovers. She winced realizing that Cam was probably not that far behind. Usually when one was at a party, the other followed. Vera mused for a moment, imagining one of the slash-fiction scenarios she had become notorious for in high school but gave up in college for less petty amusement. Perhaps some night while editing the student film they had been working on over the course of a year furtive glances were exchanged, slight innuendo followed by ambiguous touches. Eventually the tension between them would break in some fiery passionate scene (which she could stretch to at least three pages if necessary) only for them to part ways and never speak of their homoerotic encounter again.

"I like your shirt." The obviously inebriated girl standing beside Lex said.

"Thanks. I like your costume." Vera tried to smile graciously, taking a sideways glance at Lex. "Pirates are cool."

The girl pouted, but smiled the instant Vera said "Gypsy?"

Then the girl playfully hit Lex on the arm and said, "See, she figured it out."

"Hey, could I get a beer?" Lex asked Jim."Sure, what kind?" Jim gestured to a faintly-scrawled drink list taped to the wall.

"Miller High Life."

Vera cringed. She had come to the conclusion at the last party she was at, the one where she had first met Jim, that she should never drink beer, especially Miller High Life, again. Vera was the type of girl who could have 8-10 shots of vodka or other sorts of liquor and be fine, but just five beers would result in her making friends with the local toilet.

In fact, that first awkward meeting concluded with her sneaking out of Jim's bed the following morning wondering what the hell happened, only to realize that nothing of any significance probably happened. Jim had only been concerned that Vera's apartment was too far to walk while intoxicated, so he let her crash at his place. His concern also drew from the mile-a-minute conversation they had concerning Vera's not-so-recent break.

The four stood by the booze table conversing with their respective partners until for whatever reason Lex and Vera were left alone with each other.

"I liked your story." The words sounded flat, yet at the same time hollow to Vera. She did enjoy reading Lex's recent workshop piece, but felt she could have found a better way of saying it.

"Thanks." Lex took a swig of his beer and kept an eye on his friend in the other room.

"I just love your premises. I wish I could come up with ideas half as interesting as yours."

"I just wish I could execute them better, you know?" Ah, so Lex really could look Vera in the eye after all.

"That can come with revision. The premise is the heart of the story. Mine just usually revolve around failed relationships, but I guess you write what you know, right?"

The words tasted stale in her mouth. Vera knew she would never be able to teach creative writing considering her own ineptness at actually doing it. She took another shot of rum to wash it out.

*****

Perhaps the real cause of the awkward avoidance between Vera and Lex stemmed from an event a couple of months ago at a party much like the party they were at now. Things had officially been over between Cam and Vera after a summer of distance and speculation. Lex himself had recently gotten out of the nearly year-long relationship with the girlfriend he had rejected Vera for when she had first approached him the year before that.

Perhaps the fact that both of them were very inebriated probably didn't ameliorate things either.

"Are you doing this because of Cam?" Vera's brow furrowed. Earlier in that week, Lex started a conversation with her after an organization meeting almost as soon as she tried to approach Cam.

"No. I'm doing this because of me."

Eyes closed. Anticipating. She knew he was leaning into her at the same rate she was leaning into him, leading to the inevitable. Vera could tell his proximity from the increase in temperature in the shrinking space between them. This was what she had been waiting for since last year, so to speak. Yet something didn't quite feel right. What was it?

God. Lex's lips were just as soft as she had imagined. The heated, heavy and melting sensation Vera had been missing during Cam's absence and eventual abandonment returned in a flood. Everything was switched. She could taste the skin on his neck with her fingertips, she could feel the slickness of his tongue on hers. Suddenly the noise of the crowded house dissipated like in so many tawdry dime-store tales. Yet she was still aware.

Vera was still aware of the two friends she had asked to keep an eye out for her, make sure she didn't "do anything stupid." She regretted having done so. It suggested weakness on her part. There was nothing she didn't do drunk that she wouldn't have done of her own free will. In fact, like many others in her situation, Vera found courage at the bottoms of various bottles and cans.

"Wanna go back to my room?" Lex whispered in Vera's ear, sealing the message around the shell of her ear as one licks an envelope. The only difference is that the envelope has no nerves leading to brain cells which produce pleasure-producing hormones.

"I don't think this is such a good idea." She could hardly believe she was saying this, yet she followed him anyway, the heat of his hand guiding her.

Outside, somebody banged upon the locked door. Lex loudly told whoever it was to go away as he stumbled in removing his pants. Vera sat on the bed, kicking off her shoes.

They lay on his bed, Lex's hands roving about in record time. Vera was unaccustomed to such forwardness from young men, she herself usually being the one to take the initiative, but this was a pleasant surprise. She wondered if spontaneous human combustion really was possible, considering the fire radiating through his hands onto her skin on top of the massive amounts of alcohol she had observed him imbibing over the course of the night. Yet she knew her skin felt cold. She was still outside of herself.

"Vera, you're so sexy, you know that? Ever since I read those stories you wrote online..."

Her eyes opened. Even though she had posted the link on her public profile on Facebook, she never expected that anybody would actually ever read the trash she wrote as a late-night diversion. She watched him take her hand and place it against his mouth. The tip of his tongue met the tips of each finger between his two lips, making casual introductions down the phalanges and between the tiny webbing of flesh at the junctures between fingers to the palm. Vera felt the soft, warm, wet point trace languidly along her life line, fitting perfectly against the notch of flesh between bones. The memory of this one event would be enough to engage Vera's mind with lurid fantasies for weeks to come. He was kissing her hands, not in the courtly-love sense of dry lips barely touching upon wrists, but a nearly cannibalistic devouring down to the marrow.

She wondered if he would devour her. Or if she would beat him to it and consume him.Vera sat up and hovered over him, back arched as a cat poised to strike. Like earlier, they behaved as two planets with potentially colliding orbits. Before, the time had not been right. Now it seemed as what was to happen was inevitable. She braced herself for the gravity of collision, feeling his hand against her spine guide her.

Her eyes opened again. The blinds had only been partially drawn. People outside were talking, failing to notice the potential cataclysm occurring inside.It may have been a hallucination, but Vera's eyes had opened to meet with Cam's.

Her orbit shifted, barely missing Lex as she lay back down on the bed, hiding her face from the world outside. Something definitely did not feel right now. A looming moment passed before she grabbed her shoes and frantically unlocked the door. She didn't want to look back, but felt compelled, immediately seeing Lex opening the window to the porch. With untied shoelaces on shoes half-slipped on, Vera ran back to her friends to crash for the night.

For whatever reason, Vera attempted to approach him later that week at an impromptu get-together. Sitting on the same bed, she looked at him, trying to see what had changed.

"I'm not really looking for a relationship right now. I mean, we have a workshop class and we work on the movie together. I don't want to jeopardize our friendship."

It was the same crap Vera had heard so many times before. Pride wounded, she was tempted to not accept a ride home from Lex, but conceded just to spite herself.

After that, neither spoke of the incident again. They had become strangers to each other almost as Cam and Vera had become strangers, but all-the-more surreal since they saw each other on a regular basis.

*****

Just a couple months later, they were at yet another party making mundane small-talk about craft which would have been appropriate for a class discussion and life which would not have been.

Jim returned to his post as bar-keep, shifting his eyes between the two people conversing while everybody else was in the other room. He approached Vera and Lex. The same subtle look of concern crossed his face when Vera looked at him. It was like two months ago all over again, but this time, she didn't want a concerned friend to hold her hand and be her ears as she spilled the same sob story: that even though it had been more than three months, she still couldn't get over Cam. Why couldn't she just live in the moment the way she used to instead of calculating cautiously around things which could never be spoken?

"I'm going to get something upstairs." Jim's words were like some sort of clumsy code to her.

"Ok. I'll see you later." She said, readjusting to face Lex once more.

"So anyway, Lex. Do you believe you're the hero of your own story? You revisit the idea of an uncertain, but not entirely unreliable, protagonist or narrator. I find that curious. Are you using your characters as a mouthpiece?"

"Yeah. I think sometimes I put myself in my stories too much. I try not to, but it just happens." Lex drank down the dregs of his beer and set the can down on a table.

"I'm the same way. I just remember someone saying that all writing is really just masturbation, rubbing one out on the page." Lex laughed, smirking at the somewhat-expected sexual reference. "But I think we all have stories to tell, and it's important to get them out there. I mean, if you don't tell your story, who will?"

"Yeah."

The two avoided eye contact as if it would somehow make the lull in conversation pass by any faster.

"You know, after reading your first story, I thought to myself 'I knew that I was attracted to you outside the physical.'" Vera took another shot of rum to feel the warmth return to her veins again.

"Vera--"

"No. I'm tired of dancing around things. Do you want to know the real reason why I left your room that night? I was always afraid that it was the wrong time, that something just didn't feel right. I decided that I didn't want you that way, that it wasn't enough of a challenge if you were drunk enough to the point where you probably would have fucked the couch we were sitting on. I was looking at things outside the moment, reading it like a story, trying to find some deeper meaning to it all only to find nothing." This actually seemed to pique Lex. "Even if our actions are rendered inevitably insignificant--no, especially if they are insignificant, then why shouldn't we act on impulse? Give me one good goddamn reason."

"I can think of one reason." Lex's eyes wandered across the doorframe.

"What the fuck is he doing here?" This time, Vera was inebriated to the point where she had lost the tact to leave the thought in her mind.

Cam was in the center of the next room, surrounded with people as he usually was at social events. At this particular party, since it was Halloween, he was dressed in a particularly preposterous costume; a bad remix of old costumes, a mad superhero scientist. Vera knew it was inevitable, but the anticipation did not lessen her surprise or dismay.Vera seized Lex by the hand and threw open the patio door.

"Come with me."

"What the hell are you doing?"

"No words. Goddamnit, no more words tonight." She pushed him against the side of the house, pressing her lips again. Vera feared that the force of this deliberate collision would only result in a counteractive force of repulsion.

He stiffened against her. She hesitated a moment, believing it to be like the last time she tried to hold Cam; it was like embracing a wall. Then she remembered her own words earlier, remembering to just exist in the moment, even just for once.In remembering that, she found herself caught off guard by Lex. He pushed her away only to touch her face in the coldness of the dark. Vera moaned. His hands were just as warm as ever. Lex took her hand and started running. In the dark and from a different direction, she had no idea where she was going, but she was all right with that. She didn't care about the destination. All she cared about was that that she was exploring with him.

The distance between Jim's house and Lex's house was much shorter than she had once imagined, but once again, brevity in delay is always a welcome surprise in all matters physical. With the slam of a door, Lex and Vera fell into each other, completely missing the bed. Unable to disengage, the two slunk their way across the floor up to the bed. As Vera raised herself to sit on the mattress, Lex slid his hands beneath her shirt, pulling up. His lips met the skin of her stomach, lingering to graze around her navel. The warm, wet point of his tongue traced up her sternum and between her breasts as he raised her shirt to hide her face. She didn't care that she couldn't see. All Vera wanted to do was feel, to be able to touch again.

Black panties slid down legs to fall beneath a flowing black skirt as Vera hitched her legs up onto the bed and kicked off her shoes. The clink of a belt buckle preceded the rustle of pants dropping to the floor. This time Lex didn't trip, as he had the sense to remove his shoes before his pants this time. As he ran his hand up Vera's leg, feeling her heat radiating, threatening to scald his long fingers, he wondered. What was he to do? It seemed like this moment was meant to be seized to completion. Everything leading up to it, those past three months--no, the entire year was just foreplay. He fully intended on finishing what he had started that night on his bed. On the other hand, perhaps it was that same mad, rapacious pawing which drove Vera to change her mind.

Somehow, Lex reached a happy medium. His lips and tongue followed his hands. Cloaked in the darkness of the room, beneath her skirt, he finally devoured her. A twinge crossed Vera's palm, the phantom of a past memory. She lifted her skirt, wanting to see him engage in the destruction of her previous self. She could not keep her eyes open, but the sighs shaking through her showed her all she needed to know. Vera reached down, fingers meeting with short blond curls, wisps whispering in a language only she could understand, playing as a needle against a record against the whorls of her fingerprints.

Vera's eyes flashed open, a feral gleam finally unleashed. She pulled him up, willing him to meet her. Rolling on the bed, she pushed him down, making short work of eliminating the buttons of his shirt and inhaling the heat from his chest. Lex was unearthly, pale as the moon, once part of the earth but now no longer. She raked one of her canines against his stomach and took his black boxers between her teeth, guiding and shifting them slowly down off of his hips. Vera had no qualms about making slow torture of it. This moment was going to last, to fully count. Feeling the smooth skin of her cheek against the joint juncture between hip and thigh caused Lex to shudder, fully appreciating her proximity.

A hand met the groove of a back in an arch upward. A strange symmetry occurred between gentle strokes of fingertips and brutal pushings of the tongue against heat-hardened flesh. Vera understood not the intricacies of a young man's heart, but she had well-mastered the manipulation of his other blood-ruled organ. She could taste him as far as the back of her throat, feeling the smooth head against the roughness of her hard palate as she slid out and upward again. Vera wondered how this actually felt to Lex: the slow burn of a tongue sliding up and down. Did he feel each deliberate motion in each cell, perhaps of his entire body as she had felt when he had consumed her. His back arched once again, wanting to meet his fulfillment, his destruction.

Yet he was not to gain completion so easily.

In one mad, sweeping movement, Vera sat up on her knees, raising her skirt. At first, she barely coaxed him with slow, gentle, light movements. Then she guided him into her, as slow as possible to ensure that every cell in each of their bodies would retain memories of this for years to come until their inevitable apoptosis. Lex attempted to seize control. His hands wrapped around on each side of her hips, pushing her, urging her to move faster, informing her of his need. But Vera was not to be pushed tonight. She indulged his urgency only to withdraw on the moment right before climax. A cheshire-smile flashed in the dark as she looked down on him in his desperation.

This desperation soon turned into a demonic wrath. With one inhuman sound, Lex seized Vera by the arms and pushed her down at the other side of the bed. Using his knees to wrest himself between her legs, he was finally able to push her. He lifted one of her legs over his shoulder as he pressed onward, seeing how deeply he could touch her.

The searing pain only made Vera more aware of the position she was in. This was what she wanted, was it not? Someone to finally challenge her, not just go through the motions of what people are supposed to do in these situations. When Vera had first felt Lex's hands, she did not believe anybody could feel any hotter than that without risking serious medical problems. Yet he sustained in his heat, seemed to feed off of it as she did. Vera looked up at him, feral gleam still challenging him. A sneer crossed Lex's lips as he pushed down to collide once again in more of a bite than a kiss. When he pulled back, he was unsure if it was her blood he tasted on his lips or his own.