Katie wrapped the towel about her head as she reached for her toothbrush. "What the hell are you thinking? Doing?" She asked the fresh-faced young woman that greeted her from the mirror. Her usually tanned face was flushed, and only part of that had to do with the warm shower she had just finished.
"Your mother is fucking dying, and you are thinking about hopping into bed with a fucking Adonis." She chuckled, "Correct that...two of them!"
She wagged the toothbrush at her image for a moment before shaking her head and putting it into her mouth, brushing automatically. Up, down, back, forth, slow, steady circles.
'Fuck, since when has even brushing your fucking teeth become about sex?' For a woman that had forsaken sex as highly overrated after just one feeble attempt, she was...
She spat the toothpaste into the sink and turned on the tap, rinsing her toothbrush. "So, what the fuck you gonna do about it, Katie?"
She laughed at the outline of white foam around her mouth as she began the same motion; up, down, side to side, tiny circles with fresh water. She spat again into the basin and turned the water back on as she reached for the cup to rinse her mouth.
'You should rinse your mouth out with soap, well, your dirty mind anyway,' scoffed that voice in her head. She began to clean up. She tried to focus on the routine of that, but the situation kept coming back to her mind.
For the first time in close to eight years, she was going to sleep with a man. Not just any man, but her best friend. Hell, if they were taking shifts - two men. Of course, that did not mean that anything sexual was going to happen. Not necessarily anyway, she thought.
Her nipples hardened and became so sensitive that the rough terry cloth towel wrapped about her hurt. "Yeah, that is why you shaved? There? You have not shaved there in years."
Katie knew she was procrastinating, trying to delay the inevitable. It was not like her reflection in the mirror had any more answers than she did. After a decade of virtual silence, her best friends show up, and in the space of less than a week, her whole fucking life is turned on its head.
Not that it was not already. She was facing the hardest transition of her life. Her mother's death would leave her alone and adrift. She had spent weeks trying to figure out what happened next. Did she stay in this house that had been her home for her whole life? It was full of memories, but would those be a comfort or suck her into a vortex of depression and grief?
The damned thing was worth a small fortune, even as small as it was. Of course, if she sold it, she knew that whoever bought it would knock down the original wood and stucco structure that her grandparents had built after her grandfather left the Navy. That bothered her - as if her whole family and all it had stood for would simply be erased.
She had thought about renting it out, either subletting or seasonally. Find an agent to manage it and take some time off, a year maybe two, and just travel. Living at home as she had decided to do, she was able to save a great deal of her monthly salary as a teacher. She would be able to travel rather extensively if she chose to.
And that was not even considering the money she would inherit from her mother, though they had discussed it and most of her mother's resources would go into a trust dedicated to carrying on the work that Joy had begun in her life.
Of course, her mother had pleaded with her to consider giving up her job, teaching kindergarten, and take over that work. She knew it better than anyone else since she had always helped out anyway, especially these last few months.
Katie battled the tears as her shoulders slumped under the weight of all the indecision. Her throat tightened as she fought back the panic that threatened to consume her every time she even thought about what was next. "One day at a time," she whispered. Sometimes it was one moment at a time, especially now.
She felt the hot tear trail down her cheek, first one and then another and another. She was about to lose it, and she knew it. What was more, there was nothing she could do to stop it. It was all just too much. Too fucking much.
She jumped at the banging on the door. "What are you doing in there, Katy-did? You have until the count of three to get that cute ass out here or I am coming in. Ready or not. One," the deep male voice caressed her mind.
She inhaled and stared at that reflection one final time. "Saved by the bell?" she giggled as she tried to wipe the tears away with the back of her hand.
"Two," Chance said through the door.
She sighed and turned the water on one last time, splashing some on her face to take some of the redness and puffiness from her eyes.
"I'm coming," she replied as she reached for the towel.
"Three," the door opened, and his broad naked shoulders filled the doorway.
"Damn, is that what has been taking you so long in here?" He filled the tiny space as he came to stand behind her. His hands gripped her shoulders as their eyes meet in the mirror, "And I told you that I would take care of that for you, Katy-did." He bent and kissed her shoulder.
She shook her head, "About that, Chance. Since I am smaller, I'll take the couch. It won't be that bad," she stammered.
He turned her in his arms and used the pads of his thumbs to brush the tears away, "No, no, you won't. All kidding about orgasms aside, sweetheart, we are sleeping with you, because of this," he brought her last tear to his lips and licked it from his thumb. "The point of this night is for you to get some sleep. Real sleep. Rest."
He drew her tenderly into his arms and just held her, pressing her head into his shoulder with one hand as the other wrapped about her waist, clamping her against him in the tight space. "We don't know what is ahead, Katy-did. We don't know if this is..." he stopped and sighed heavily.
She did not just hear his pain; she felt it. Knew that this man mourned for her mother as she did, maybe not quite the same, but he did. And that united them, drew them closer as they once had been, inseparable.
He drew back slowly and did his best to smile, reassuringly down at her. "We are here for you now. No matter what happens, we aren't going anywhere, Katy-did. You are not on your own anymore." He pressed a kiss to her forehead, "You won't have to face this alone. We promise you that. Never again."
She nodded her head slowly at his words. Though she knew that they offered false hope. The truth was that eventually, she would have to face it by herself. Those same decisions that she had been trying to avoid for months, she would have to come to some final conclusion, and she alone would have to do that.
Whether they stayed for days or a couple of weeks after her mother, she sighed and forced the words through her brain...after her mother's death. Death. Dying. Transitioning. Whatever the fuck you wanted to call it. It was coming. Too quickly.
And suddenly she felt incredibly tired. Exhausted. "I'm ready for bed now," she whispered somehow.
He nodded and scooped her into his arms. She was shocked by the sudden move and clutched at the top of the towel trying to hold it in place as he carried her across the small hall to her bedroom. He practically tossed her in the bed.
Her breath caught in her lungs as he began to unbutton his jeans. "What are you doing?" she stammered.
Chance winked with a devilish smile, "Don't worry, Katy-did. I didn't go commando today." He unzipped them and pushed the denim down his muscled thighs, kicking them off his bare feet and tossing them into the corner.
The air froze in her lungs as he stood by her bed wearing nothing but a second skin of dark blue boxer briefs. She could not keep her eyes from the thick bulge at the front of them. Worse yet, she had to consciously will her hand not to reach out and caress it.
"Fuck," he growled. "Stop. It. Now. Katy-did," his hands fisted at his side.
She tried to clear the cobwebs from her mind as she shook her head, "Stop what, Chance?" she whispered as she bit her lower lip to keep from licking it.
"Stop looking at me like that," he sat down on the bed next to her. His hands framed her face and forced her eyes from his crotch that was growing thicker with each beat of her heart, "You keep looking at me like that and I promise you, you will find yourself laying naked with my cock buried inside you in less than thirty seconds."
She shivered. From his touch on her face? From the night air that was getting cooler by the moment? Or from his words...or the possibility of them becoming more than mere words? She dragged her eyes away and forced her breathing to slow. "Let me up, Chance. I need to find something to wear tonight."
He nodded as he moved aside a bit, just enough for her to squeeze past him. She held the towel tightly about her tits as she opened her top dresser drawer and pulled out a pair of panties. She promised herself that she would wear the plain white boy shorts but somehow ended up with the black lace thong that had never been worn.
They had been a bit of a gag gift for her twenty-eighth birthday from friends at work, who considered her a bit conservative and too uptight. She chuckled...what would they think if they saw her now? Alone with him in her bed? If they knew that just a few days ago, she experienced the most powerful orgasm of her life? On a public beach?
She closed the drawer and pulled out the one below it, trying to figure out what to wear. The truth was that she usually slept naked. Of course, these past few weeks she had typically worn work out pants and a t-shirt to sleep in the chair in her mother's room.
She rummaged until she located one of her extra-large t-shirts. She pulled it on over her head, leaving the towel in place until it covered her to mid-thigh, then she tugged it free.
