Sharp Things Sweet Things

"That thing that we talked about yesterday..." I glanced up as John walked into the room, my open book dropping against my chest. It was still early. Pale light fought to come into the room through the sheer, pulled-closed drapes, but the room was still dim except for about two feet in front of each window. John had come into the room already speaking, so it took me a moment to realize that the words were meant for me. Only when I lowered the book, staring at him over the spread cover of

Pride and Prejudice

, did I realize that he was staring at me, "...I can't do it."

I expected this conversation. I expected it after the way we'd gone to bed last night. After seeing his eyes as, halfway through his going down on me, I'd slipped the knife down my thigh, from my fingers into his. One of the yellow-plastic Exacto knives, the angled blade peeking about a quarter of an inch out from the top, so that only the silver tip of it showed.

"

Cut me

?" I'd whispered, my face still flushed with post-orgasm endorphins; and

oh

, hadn't that been a conversation. Nearly two hours, both of us sitting slightly curled against the headboard of the bed. He'd said very little, interjecting only with quick questions:

Why? Is it the pain, or the knife, or the blood?

The blood, I'd told him. And the danger of it. The pain was incidental, but I didn't mind that either--the too-loud hush as the point broke the skin, the bright clarity as it parted the skin. It was something I'd ever only done to myself. Some part of me, a part I'd pushed deep down, had known that John was incapable of it.

He was a wonderful boyfriend. In fact, he was nearly perfect. A fact only solidified as he moved to the edge of the bed, reaching out. He set a small plate of blackberries on the thick white sheets between us. I could tell he'd gathered them from outside; not only because they were of various sizes in a way that the ones from grocery stories were not, but because under the clean smell of soap and aftershave, I could smell the morning on him. He'd been outside, in the dirt and the dew-wet grass. Out, picking berries.

He was sweet. Two years ago, I'd picked him out of the crowded bar at a work function--the older brother of another accountant--because he'd looked like a bulldog. My first impression of him couldn't have been more wrong. He installed fences for a living, kept his house neat as a pin, and loved to garden. He was the most thoughtful man I'd ever met; which was wonderful... and made him exactly the most unsuitable man for what I needed.

"I understand," I traced the tip of my middle finger down the spine of the book. Down, and back up. Tried to hide my disappointment. I could tell I was failing, because his steady brown eyes were studying mine; moving ever so slightly as he searched them for something, "Thanks for breakfast."

I reached out and picked a blackberry up, popping it into my mouth. I sucked a bit of the left-behind juice from the end of my thumb. They were still a bit tart, having only began to change from the small, green beads toward black-redness a couple of days ago. We'd been checking on the patch together.

John shifted slightly, reaching his hand behind him. As his weight settled back onto the bed, I saw him holding something. My eyes shifted away instinctively, but I forced myself to look back; not because I was embarrassed--though it was different now, with the early morning sunlight drifting in through the drapes, than it had been in the heat of the moment last night. He held the Exacto knife in his hand. He turned it over a couple of times, staring at it, and then raised his eyes to meet mine.

"This won't work."

The covered plastic made a soft thump as it hit the carpet beside the bed, following the direction of John's open hand. I watched as the hand lowered once more, slid into the front pocket of his jeans, reappeared once more. In his fingers, he held a knife. It was different. The handle was a bit curved in either direction, like the neck of a violin; I could see the flat edge of a blade, folded against one side. About two inches thick. Part of me wanted to look at John, but I couldn't take my eyes off the folding knife.

"This will."

The words were spoken softly, almost matching the whisper as he folded the blade out from the handle. Even at a distance, I could tell that it was razor sharp. Wickedly so. He'd sharpened it, I knew--I could see the slightly difference in the shine and the grain, where he'd held it against a sharpener. He must have done it this morning, and not too long ago. Before he'd gone out to the blackberry patch.

"Lay back."

"John, you really don't--" It was a single blink, his dark eyes hiding themselves for a fraction of a second behind his eyelashes, that silenced me. I reached over, placing my book face-down on the bedside table. With my hands, I pushed myself a bit higher on the headboard of the bed; grabbed a pillow and adjusted it so that it sat comfortably in the small of my back.

"Close your eyes."

I did. The dim light of the room disappeared as I closed them. I could feel my heartbeat, rising like water; buoyed by a thrill of anticipation. In front of me, I felt John shift on the bed once more. Moving closer.

The first touch of the knife made me gasp. It wasn't somewhere I'd expected--my thighs, or my stomach, or my chest. It also wasn't the point. He'd obviously been carrying it with him, outside; and not in his hand. I could feel the cold length of the metal, touching flat against the underside of my jaw. Immediately, every nerve in my body cried out. Tightened. Went electric.

I sat perfectly still, moved only by the hard beating oy my heart, as I felt the flat of the blade moved slowly around my neck. As it reached the center, held at an angle against the slight bulge of my trachea, I felt it turn.

He knows what he's doing

, part of my mind whispers;

He doesn't

, a slightly more insistent part answered back.

He's used knives before. He's never held once against another person's skin

. I felt the razor-sharp edge. Felt it press down slightly, which only made both my excitement and my anticipation spike higher.

His hand locked. The blade turned, fast. In the sheets, my entire body lurched upward slightly; at the shock of speed, the sudden violence, though the knife remained barely pressed to my skin. It took me a moment to understand. It wasn't the edge of the blade. It was one of the corners, the side of the flat edge, but in my heightened state it

felt

sharper than it was. I let out a shaky breath, opening my eyes to find John staring at me. His brown eyes were soft with understanding.

"I don't want you doing anything... anything you'll regret later," my voice sounded small, in the stillness of the room. I saw a twitch in John's bearded cheeks, telling me that he was suppressing a smile. Behind it, his face looked more serious than I'd ever seen it before.

"Hush," he lowered the knife. Not removing it from my skin, but letting it slide down my stomach. The touch of it was so light, it was impossible for me to tell which side of it he was using; the sharp, or the dull. Only the fact that my skin didn't open told me which it was, "I was awake most of the night thinking about this. I have a plan. Close your eyes."

I did as he instructed once more. The knife went lower, and the blankets shifted down as it came to rest against the inside of my thigh. I could feel the pointed tip, pressing into my skin. Above it, in the crease of my legs, I'd begun to become wet. Arousal stirred to life inside of me, as the knife moved slowly upward. It stopped just before my leg met my pelvis, turned for what felt like the space of an entire minute--and then pulled.

It took a couple of seconds to register. To realize that he'd pressed down,

hard

, before pulling upward. It was incredibly strange. It didn't

feel

like I'd been cut; or rather, it felt as if I'd been cut so deeply that I lay in the moment before pain registered. I

had

been cut. I could tell, because I felt blood. A line of liquid, that dripped over the inside curve of my thigh and into the sheets.

I flinched, as John's thumb wiped over it. Felt the sting in the skin, but strangely, not the tell-tale pain of a cut. More like the stinging heat of a scratch, or of friction. My mouth opened instinctively, as his thumb came to rest against my bottom lip. I couldn't quite taste it, yet, but I could feel it. The liquid being rubbed over the curve of my lip, following the line of his thumb downward. over my chin. It caught there, pinching slightly, turning my face upward.

My eyes opened once more. I couldn't believe it.

"Look," he said, raising the flat edge of the polished knife in front of my face.

I almost gasped. There it was--blood. There I was--bloody. Red juice running down my stained bottom lip over the low curve of my chin. The sharp edge of the knife was the same; the very bottom of its edge brilliant, shining red. Past the knife, on my thigh, I saw bloody fingerprints, left by John's fingers; saw a red line running down my thigh, but still, inexplicably... no pain.

It was only a moment later than I understood. Only when I saw John's hand rise, a blackberry caught between finger and thumb. My eyes were fixed, unmoving, as it broke open under their slowly increasing pressure. I watched the red liquid of it run in long trails down his fingers, following the lines of his palm, and down the length of his arm. I could barely breathe. Something lurched inside of me, faster and harder than before, as a single drop fell from his elbow and into the white sheets below us. Between my legs. As the white swallowed a splash of red; was stained, changed, disfigured--permanently.

Raising his hand to his mouth, he tucked his fingers between his lips. Juice made him look as if he'd been punched in the mouth, as he sucked it from his fingers. Only when they were nearly clean, did he lower his hand once more. My breathing faltered, my body leaning further down on the pillows, as two stained fingers slid inside of me. Into the now almost thought-drowning wetness between my legs. As he fingered me with one hand, the other traced a slow pattern over my belly with the edge of the knife. Eyes fluttering, I lay back and focused on continuing to breathe.

I felt the slightly bristly hairs of his short-trimmed beard against my skin, as he leaned down and caught one of my nipples in his mouth. The other, he traced with the back of the knife. First around it, with the tip, and then pressing down with the back. The dullness of it was unnoticeable, because the sharp edges of his teeth were grazing the other. Teasing me. Making it impossible to tell, in my spinning thoughts, which could cut and which could not. The sound of my breathing became obscene, in the otherwise quiet of the room. My stomach rose and fell with every breath.

Beside the knife blade, I felt one of his fingers reach down. Felt the edge of his nail drawn over my skin, making a long scratch just beneath my left breast. Heat bloomed, and I gasped as the cool metal of the knife followed the path exactly. Between my legs, his two fingers were moving inside of me. His thumb brushed, sideways and back again, over my swollen clit.

My entire body went weak, as he changed the angle of his fingers slightly; curled, found the perfect point inside of me. My heart hammered in my ears, and I knew an orgasm was coming.

I felt John's mouth disappear from my breast, and it seemed to take him an unusually long time to reach my face. As soon as I felt his lips brush my own, I opened my mouth and grasped at his. Eyes still closed, I felt for his tongue with mine. The taste of blackberries exploded over it. The liquid of their juice slightly iron-tasting in their newness; bloody. I heard John's full-body exhale, as my pussy clenched around his fingers. And then I was moaning into his mouth, riding his fingers with my hips as I came. He kept going, mouth pressed to mine, fingers thrusting inside of me, until I swore I could see the white light of the windows even behind my closed eyes. As I came, his palm pressed the flat side of the knife against my left nipple. Held it there, pressing hard enough that I could feel my skin against both sides of the blade.

A bead of sweat rolled down from my damp forehead, and he broke our kiss to lick it from my skin. When our kiss resumed, I could taste the salt of it beneath the sweetness of wild berries. Slowly, the fingers drew out from between my legs. In his other hand, the knife clicked closed. It clicked again as he set it down on the nightstand, beside my book. I barely heard the sound.

"I love you," his voice was a warmth beside my ear. My body still trembled slightly, holding to him as I came down from the pique of my orgasm. The words continued, gathering coherence as he spoke, "

All

of you. Even the parts I don't understand.

Especially

the parts I don't understand. I love you, Clara. I love the bloodiness of your heart. I want to show you that."

I kissed him, then. So deeply that our bodies came together, wrapping around one another in the red-stained sheets. My legs went around his thighs, pulling him closer. I caught the lingering taste of blackberries on his lips, felt the warmth of his tongue against my own, heard the low inhale of his pleasure as he entered me, followed by the exhale of my own. Between us, something bloomed--something dark, and sharp, and sweet.

Sharp Things, Sweet Things ---- THE END.