*** This is a work of fiction. All characters are eighteen or older. Enjoy. ****
She couldn't sleep again. Eleanor could barely remember the last time she'd had a decent night's rest, the last night she'd drifted peacefully off, rather than slowly dragged under by the weight of anxiety and all her other insecurities.
Sometimes she'd take sleeping pills, but they didn't always help. Most nights, she resorted to the only thing that made her feel normal, the only thing that made her feel like everything was okay.
At least, it felt that way sometimes.
She tossed and turned amidst the tangle of sheets, rolling onto her side and pressing her face into the pillow, breathing softly. She squeezed her eyes shut, her legs too, sandwiching her hand between the enveloping heat of her damp thighs. She had her index finger buried deep in the snug, wet grip of her sex, and she rolled her palm gently back and forth over her mound, softly massaging her tender clit.
She knew it would be better if she could just cum, wanted desperately to, but post-orgasm clarity wasn't always her best friend. She let herself hover right on the threshold for over an hour sometimes, savouring the way the haze of endorphins numbed her mind. So she spurred her burning arousal, lulling herself dazedly along, half conscious as the sweet, comforting euphoric haze calmed her mind, all the while infuriatingly avoiding release, until she could take it no longer.
She ground hard, groaning, breathing hard into the pillow as she gripped the soft hood of her slippery clit and mashed it firmly into her pubis, feeling the swell of arousal flare for just a moment, before softening her grip, and sighing as the tantalizingly elusive threads or her orgasm slipped away once more.
She drew her hand free, her fingers glistening and slick. She was soaked, her thighs and ass dewy with sweat, her panties a saturated bundle around her legs, her sheets damp beneath her, her soft crown of dark hair matted to her skin. Her sex radiated heat, clit throbbing with need. Her whole body felt flushed, brimming with that need for release, but deep inside she knew her climax was only going to fall flat and leave her underwhelmed. She rolled onto her back with a sigh, frowning up at the dark roof.
Her eyes still felt puffy from where she'd nearly cried herself to sleep, nearly an hour ago now. She couldn't remember what had started the tears, probably nothing. She knew it wasn't healthy letting the dark shroud of anxiety and over-thinking overwhelm her to the point where she sat curled up in her room crying until she was too tired to move, and then did the only thing she could to feel normal and fall asleep.
Masturbate.
But she didn't care, it got her to the next day and that was good enough.
She felt tears welling again, and forced out a harsh sigh, gritting her teeth.
Ugh, when did I become such a mess...
She'd always had issues with stress and anxiety, but they'd been sporadic, and it was only in the last few years they'd come creeping up on her in force. In the year and a half since she'd finished high school she'd been...drifting, feeling lost and overwhelmed. She put off university, trudged to work four days a week, and took care of her dad as he did his best to take care of her.
It was just the two of them, for eight years now, since her mother had died. Neither of them had ever really gotten over it, she thought. It had likely been the root of her state of mind, but for her Dad, well, he coped in his own way.
Which usually meant he drank himself to sleep most nights. She loved him, God knows she did, he really did his best to be there for her. But she knew he was struggling, and their relationship wasn't always smooth.
He wasn't a mean drunk or anything, the opposite, at least to begin with, but then he just got all quiet and reflective and usually fell asleep. She'd almost gotten used to him stumbling home in the middle of the night and passing out on the couch, where she'd leave his breakfast on the table beside him before heading out in the morning. Nothing would wake him when he was under, just like her, when she actually managed to fall asleep. Her mother had used to joke the two of them could sleep through an earthquake.
He was lonely, she could tell. Early on, a few years after Eleanor's mother's death, he'd started brining home women. Mostly for sex, she knew now, but he'd stopped that. For her, she thought, which made her feel bad, like it was her fault he was so miserable.
She'd hear him, in his room when he thought she was asleep, watching porn as she shoved in headphones and tried to pretend she didn't know what it was he was doing. She'd even grown used to the embarrassment of him stumbling about in sweatpants in the morning, the front tented out obscenely by an erection that never seemed to dull.
She'd been shocked by the size of that bulge the first few times, her face flushing red in embarrassment, but she'd soon found herself glancing at it, unable to stop herself, like being drawn to the macabre scene of a car crash as you drove past. She'd had to stop inviting friends around, what few of them she had, after he'd done it in front of them once.
She remembered sleeping with him when she felt sad, curling up in his bed with his arms around her, feeling safe and secure, and ignoring the hard point jabbing at her back or the softness of her ass as he snored.
It was fine, for the most part. She knew it wasn't really a big deal. It was natural, he was pent up, and she was the spitting image of the women he had loved and lost.
She knew he saw her mother in her, especially when he was drunk, and knew how hard for him that was. She caught him gazing at her, lost, eyes roaming her, and she'd meet his gaze and smile, and it would take him a moment, but he'd smile too.
She had never really understood just how similar they were, her and her mother. It had dawned on her rather suddenly one day, after she'd opened her Dad's laptop, and found pornhub open. She'd almost slapped it shut, but something had compelled her to press play on the video.
She'd watched as ma teenage girl was fucked by a slightly older guy, a typical male pornstar with rugged good looks and an enormous cock. But it was the girl she stared at, the pretty young thing, comely and sweet-looking, a slight belly, curvy and wide-thighed, with a mess of brown hair, rosy cheeks, wide eyes, and large pale breasts with dusky brown nipples.
She'd stared, because it looked so much like her mother. And then, as she saw her reflection in the screen, it had clicked. This girl was her age. It almost could have been her. That was when she'd shut the screen, swallowing, and sat there very still for a long time, as she'd tried to convince herself she was wrong.
But all she could think about was all those erections, those long, lingering looks, the gazing, eyes roaming as she wandered the house in nothing but pajamas.
Was this how he had been looking at her? How he had been...imagining her?
It should have disgusted her, the very idea that her father might be thinking about her in even a vaguely sexual way, but...
