“Yeah,” he says. “The restaurant’s name translates to ‘A Love Triangle.’ I wouldn’t think too hard about it, but I think they were trying to say people were having a love affair with their food…and once you’ve had some, you’ll agree.”
“The Love Triangle’s burritos it is,” I say, plucking out the menu from the stack. I sit down next to Mark, so we can look at it together. Our legs nearly touch.
In the Louvre, our legs continuously brushed against each other. I’ve spent too much time recalling his weight on me, how rough his leg hair felt against my smooth legs, and how the pressure between my legs as he moved inside me was better than anything else in Paris.
I lean against him to point on his side of the menu. “The grilled steak burrito sounds good.”
“It is good,” he says, but he’s looking at where I’m leaning against him.
“I’m going to get us some wine,” I say. “Maybe it will help us choose.”
I only have one bottle of wine that my parents sent me, but it will have to do. I go into the kitchen and reach into the cabinet with the wine bottle. When I turn back around, Mark is behind me.
“Sorry,” he says. “I just wanted to get something.”
“What?”
He steps forward, his hands cupping my face as he kisses me. It’s hotter than I remember or maybe he’s more skilled than six years ago. Our mouths move against each other in a strange rhythm like we’re trying to take something from each other. His hands move down to my shoulders, then my arms. They move to my hips while he kisses me with a level of passion that I’ve never experienced.
It’s like I’m a teenager all over again, but with fewer insecurities.
I tug at his shirt until he steps back, and I help him pull it off. We kiss, an exchange of desire. My jeans are unbuttoned but I can’t remember if I did it or if he did it. His hands are underneath the waistband of my jeans. Gripping onto my ass.
I’m more of an instigator than I was six years ago. My hands move on their own as they nearly break his pants as I try to get them down. The heat of his erection almost makes me frantic. Before I can accomplish my goal, he tugs down my jeans and spins me around. My legs are rendered immobile from the jeans, locking my knees close together.
“God,” he mutters, his hands move back under my underwear and over my ass. He keeps sliding his hands down, taking my underwear down with it. The cold air should send a shock through me, but my body is burning hot and all I feel is the allure of his body heat.
I’m leaning against the kitchen counter, my hands braced against the edge. The cold, laminate edge is cutting into my stomach, but the pain is negligible in comparison to how much I’m desperate for him. I’ve been reduced to a damsel in distress, waiting on a man, and I can’t even find the self-respect to care right now.
I feel a rustle of movement behind me, followed by the sound of a crinkling condom wrapper. I hadn’t imagined him to be the type who still kept a condom in his pocket or wallet, but it’s low on my list of things that currently need my attention.
The head of his cock brushes against my entrance. As I get onto my toes, he thrusts into me.
It’s been so long since I’ve had sex with anyone, I would have thought it’d be painful, but there’s only minor discomfort before my body demands for more.
As he grips onto my hips, raising me up high enough that my shoes barely touch the floor, and his thrusts crush me against the countertop, it provokes a dark vehemence in me. All the emotions I’d felt for him—aroused, frustrated, free, overwhelmed, confident, disillusioned, fearless, vulnerable, hopeful, humiliated, joyous, bitter, trusting, and betrayed—flare through me. This was never going to be simple sex and I wouldn’t want it to be. I need it to have the ruthless nature of our tumultuous relationship.
I reach back toward him. Without my hands bracing my body, my chest slaps hard against the counter. My fingernails claw at his skin as I try to reach him. His hand moves to the front of my pussy, two fingers snaring my clit. His thrusts cause a blessed pressure against my clit, but it’s only for a split second each time. I try to squirm for more friction, but his movements are too frenzied to gain much control.
His fervor also makes it impossible to grab onto him. I brace myself on the counter edge again. I can barely push myself off from it as my body is immobilized by his strength.
The building pressure is nearly ready to burst or kill me. I press my sweaty forehead against the counter. I don’t want to be the first one to come. I was the first last time and I’d replayed it a thousand times, deciding it meant that he didn’t feel as strongly toward me as I did toward him and I don’t want that to be proven again. But the pressure is about to break, and I can’t hold it back.
For a split second, I hear him stiffen behind me, his low groan trembling through me before euphoria lays waste to all those other emotions that had littered my thoughts. The ache of my muscles, the soreness of my chest against the counter, and the pain in the soles of my feet from stretching them for so long—it all gets consumed by the euphoria. I’m shivering, overtaken by a lightness and divinity.
He pulls out of me slowly. He helps me down to the floor. My head lays kinked against the floor cabinets, but I barely notice. He settles down beside me.
We don’t speak, but words aren’t necessary. As much as I want everything to be different, nothing has changed. He still owns all of me and he knows it.
******
6 years ago
The French police escorted me to the airport. One of them watched me get onto the plane. I sent a text to Mark once I was in my seat. We were required to turn them off nearly a half-hour later. He hadn’t replied yet.
When I got off the plane in NYC, he still hadn’t replied. I sent him another text.
My parents greeted me at the airport. They tried to act like I was returning from France under normal circumstances, but I’d had to call them to tell them why I was returning early. I saw their disappointment when I turned my head too quickly and saw the way they were peering at me. Their movements were more lethargic like my actions had aged them two decades.
