After the mess of my encounter with Allie, I had waited in the water for her to be long gone, and slunk inside, hating myself. The fact that she'd accepted it as a side effect of Freddie, giving me an out and finishing me off ultimately made it a thousand times worse.
Wendy sat on the couch she'd slept on the last couple nights reading a book by the fading light of sunset. "Hey stranger, listen, I was wondering if you'd be cool with me taking the other room upstairs. This is your family's place, so you own it n..."
She looked up and stared at me, taking in my body language.
"Oh."
I started to my parent's room, stopped at the mouth of the hall, and turned to head past the bathroom to the bedroom at the corner of the house.
"Yeah, you take my old room."
Wendy pursued me to the short hallway just past the bathroom, "Cal, did something happen?"
I stopped, standing in the hall a few feet away from Wendy, frustrated once again that I had no attraction to. That lack of compatibility had led to my behaviour, and I cursed myself. As the younger sister of my first girlfriend, and a doctor who'd worked the camps at the start of Freddie, she had more insight than most into me and what just occurred.
"I couldn't control myself," I whispered, "it was like... it was like an animal took me over."
Understanding crossed Wendy's face, "ohhh shit, okay, did you..." she roughly penetrated a balled fist with her index finger.
"No. When Katy called her, she was able to snap me out of it."
"Okay," Wendy sighed, "okay, that's a relief." Walking toward me, she put her hands together and looked up at me pleading, "I don't really know either of you that well, but I think it's probably a good idea to give her some space for a couple of days. She feels it too, so-"
"What the fuck are you talking about?"
Wendy put her hands up in a calming posture, "whoa, whoa, just take a sec."
I looked down, realizing I'd stepped forward and was balling my fists. Again, shame washed over me, "fuck. Fuck fuck fuck," I cursed myself.
"Listen, Cal," Wendy stood still as I stepped back from her, "this is something I've seen. Survivor males get aggressive and kind of crazy if they go too long without, well, 'carnal attention,' if you get me," she finger quoted.
"Allie said she'd seen it too."
Wendy brightened, "okay, that's good! She understands what happened, at least."
Tiredness was beginning to seep into my eyes and I rubbed my face, drawing my hand down it. "What did you mean by 'she feels it too,' Wendy?"
"She told me that you smell like evergreen trees," she whispered more quietly than before, "survivor women who smell that kind of thing are identifying a physical match. The smell usually connects to a memory of feeling happy or safe. Men usually smell something sweet, like berries or fruit, something they want."
I stared at the floor, "goodnight, Wendy." I turned and walked away, leaving Wendy standing in the hall.
I lay down in the bed that way back when was a double bed for my grandparents, but had been upgraded to a gigantic king for my parents. I felt lost in it, a tiny island in a sea of shame. I thought about what Wendy had said, smelling of lemons and vinegar. To me, Danni had smelled like mangoes, and Allie smelled like peaches. I drifted to sleep, dreaming of fruit, and them.
====================================
The next morning, I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, still hating myself. I'd crept to the bathroom, narrowly avoiding Wendy coming downstairs. I could hear the women in the main room, the sound of Katy playing with Bailey's Legos. It should have made me smile, her stories that she told as she built structures and cars, but it only fed my self-loathing.
I thought of Bailey, I had to get to the house the bandits were holed up in and make a play to get to him. Every time I got distracted, something went wrong, or had already. I couldn't risk him any more than I had already. The smell of warming food was starting to creep under the door, distracting me. Bailey hung heavy in my mind. It was becoming a theme that day.
That was it, that was my play. I knew where they were, and if Allie and Katy's arrival hadn't distracted me the day before, I'd've gotten to them already. After that? Get back to Danni, figure things out from there. A knock at the bedroom door.
"Calvin? Its me. I'm coming in."
Allie slipped into the room with a small tray of food in her hand. Just simple things, canned, preserves, but a full belly made such a difference. We were going to have to address the food situation soon, but it seemed like she had something else on her mind. A soft frown crossed her wide forehead, creasing her pretty features. She wore an old button-down of mine that was tied off at her rib cage, and a pair of her jeans that I recognized as 'the-ones-that-made-her-ass-look-incredible,' which was all of them.
"Allie, please, you don't have to-"
"Stop," she put the plate down on the end of the bed, cocking her hip to me and slicing her hand through the air to shut me down. "Just be quiet. Allow me to say this."
Allie sat down next to me, her hip nearly touching mine, and she leaned over me, closed her eyes and inhaled quickly three times, then once slowly, a gentle close-lipped smile crossing her face. "I knew it." Opening her eyes, she showed me her teeth as the smile widened. "I still like you," her smiled faded and she sat up, "but I am also angry with you. So angry with you."
"I know," I admitted as I sat up, "you're right to be. I can't tell you how sorry-"
She slapped my chest.
"Stop apologizing! You've done it enough," she looked down and leaned toward me, pressing her left shoulder to mine, so that we were in parallel contact. "You weren't in control of yourself, and I lost control of myself too. I knew I wasn't ready for more, but I needed it so much. You, I needed you, and I got lost in my happiness that you're alive. And then you scared me. You scared me so badly, Calvin."
Lightly, gingerly, I placed my hand on her shoulder. She didn't flinch, but she did move her head to watch that the hand didn't creep further, "I know. I can't ever apologize enough to you for that, Allie."
She curled into my chest to hug me, wrapping her arms around my waist, her face pressed to my shoulder, "I will take that," she told me in her gentle Russian accent.
Sitting up, Allie stayed on the bed, looking at me with that sweet smile of hers. I felt a bit better, but I was scared too. That I'd missed my chance to find Bailey, that I'd permanently damaged my relationship with Allie. She'd relieved some of the pressure the night before, but it was barely a drop in the bucket, I could feel that angry animal inside me.
"We need to talk about this," she reached out, tapping my rising member on the head.
"Cripes, Allie, don't wake it."
She pulled the sheet down from my waist, my cock springing from under it. Allie stared, taking in my thickness and length. Her eyes moving over the skin made the tingle in my belly grow.
"I can't let you get so... overheated, Calvin. It's dangerous." She reached out, taking my cock in hand, and began to gently twist and stroke. "I'm going to help you with it. If you can follow my rules; You'll lay down and put your hands behind your head. That way, I can help you be calm."
"Allie, what are you doing?"
She squeezed my shaft hard, almost painfully. "I didn't ever imagine I'd want to be with a man again." She pumped, her thumb working the tip. "I always liked both, and Marcel was so...." She looked away, "you know. Women just seemed safer, and easier to trust after."
I tried to breath slowly, control myself, but it was Allie, and she was working my rod firmly, steadily, unfazed by last night's events, smiling as she watched the precum bubble from my tip. "Allie... oh goddamn... it's okay."
"No, it's not," she told me, turning to look at my cock, her hand wrapped tightly at the edge of my purple helmet. She arched her head away from me looking at straining erection critically.
"I made you my boyfriend without realizing, and I let you think I was not an option to you so I wouldn't have to deal with your feelings. I got you for free, I let you become a father figure to my daughter." She bent forward, pursing her lips and gently dripped a long stream of saliva onto my cock, smoothing her ministrations.
"Ahh, Allie," I panted as the warm fluid of her mouth slipped over my cockhead, coating it in her, "oh man, is that an apology?"
Allie shook her head gently, sliding the pads of her fingers around my tip in a circle, slipping them down and back steadily. I lost my balance, falling back to my pillows. Allie stroked harder, my cock slick with her saliva. "No, but I am acknowledging that our friendship was unfair to you. I should have been honest, but I also honestly didn't know what I was doing."
"I... mother of... I forgive you," I stammered, "just please, fuck..." My balls had begun to boil, and Allie grabbed them, rolling them in her palm like marbles, pumping my shaft faster, slipping her hand up and down my cock from stem to root. I was at her mercy, laying back, my hips arching up to her.
"You don't need to," she panted, staring fixedly at my prick as it twitched in her grasp, "I don't want forgiveness from you."
