The family took me and Margo to get dim sum. She didn’t demur when they invited her, and I didn’t delude myself that she accepted with her whole heart. As expected, they bombarded her with questions. Nothing more than anodyne comments about the service for me, but for her, they were curious and opinionated.
Margo was polite, but I could tell she was uncomfortable. I was uncomfortable too. This was something they always did; directed all of their conversation through whoever I brought along. I should be used to it, but I kept trying to initiate conversations only to watch my olive branches die on the trunk. I used to think it was sweet that they put effort into making my dates comfortable. I used to hope those efforts could be a bridge to them knowing me, not as the self-isolating oldest kid who got grumpy at how many baseball games everyone else in the family was playing in, but as an adult. Someone to find common ground with.
Instead, they’d get cozy with my date and continue not talking to me.
And now they played out the same pattern with Margo, even though I’d been clear with them that she wasn’t staying in Rockport. Even though they knew that by the time of Dad’s February birthday dinner, I’d be showing up alone again.
Instead of responding to Margo’s compliment of Mom’s flower earrings—she didn’t even glance my way to show she remembered they were a gift from me—Mom asked, “And Karl taught you how to ring the handbells?”
“Back when I was in high school, yeah. I hadn’t picked them up since I was seventeen, but he’s a great director. Getting back into the swing of things was easy.”
My brother Aiden laughed. “That’s a bell pun, right?”
I took more spare ribs. Offered the steamed pork bun basket to Margo. Her hand lingered on mine when she took it, which meant a ridiculous amount. She turned back to Aiden. “I think we’ve heard every ringers pun in the English language out of your brother.”
No one took the bait. Even my dad had moved right past the opportunity to engage in a pun war.
The next time I noticed her trying to hype me, Margo was deflecting Mom’s nosiness about what she would do next by saying, “I know people who have always know what they were passionate about. I don’t even mean paid work—I think it’s great to have a generic job and make time for your passions outside of that. Most people live that way, after all. But, like with my sister Jeannie; she worked for the Chamber of Commerce because she loves her town, and organizing, and making her community a great place for everyone. Her passion for those things helped her to get the kind of paid work that meant she could do them, even if she also had less-fun tasks to do. Or like Karl, how he deals with the Church Council and admin stuff and sometimes being the only one around to move the tables, but most of his time, he gets to work with the music he loves. Choosing the right pieces to enhance the liturgy, guiding people of varied abilities into harmony together, teaching and empowering them to express themselves through music. It’s amazing to see, and mostly that’s because he’s bringing all of himself to the work he does. I don’t know what my version of that is yet, but that’s what I crave.”
Even with Aiden rolling his eyes and Dad glancing away to look for more sticky rice, I had to drop a kiss on Margo’s cheek. She’d talked about this before, but—call me egocentric—it clicked for me, hearing her map the journeys she desired on what she said while defending me.
Not that the defense would change anything. I’d get awkward questions about Margo the first few times I saw my family in the new year, and then they’d stop asking, and then I’d be the quiet one in the corner again.
Still. It was nice she tried.
Margo and I went back to my place after lunch. After walking Parsley, who indicated she’d suffered mightily by being left at home for the entirety of a Sunday service and lunch afterwards, we tried to watch a movie. I gave up on it pretty quick, cause it was too hard to keep my hands off of her.
I wanted to worship every curve and dip of her body, awed that she saw me so clearly. And that she seemed impressed with who I was, with no expectation I’d learn to talk sports, or stop filling my weekends with church stuff, or aim for a higher-paid career that meant making music was relegated to the margins of my life.
The parts of me she championed to my family so deeply aligned with who I strived to be. She didn’t ask me to be apologetic or guilty about my family’s failed expectations. “I’m going to eat you out right now.”
”Is that some kind of threat?” She widened her legs, which made it tougher to whisk down her pants. But it gave me room to wedge between them as I knelt on the floor.
“I kind of consider it more of a sacred duty. I know you never wanted all that. You were kinder then you needed to be.”
She cupped my cheek, and it felt like tenderness. Like something more. “Being kind wasn’t a chore, Karl. They’re nice people, and they were mostly nice to me. Plus the dim sum was delicious.”
“It was. It even made up for Aiden. Mostly.”
Laughing, Margo lifted her hips so I could wrangle off her pants and underwear. “He wasn’t bad. He gave me the last soup dumpling.”
I kissed her from knee to hip, very much done discussing my brother. Or anyone in my family. She opened her legs to me, giving me an unobstructed view of her glistening pussy. I leaned in, ravenous, and licked from her clit to her opening. She gasped, arching her back, and I repeated the movement, this time dipping my tongue inside her. I moaned into her sweetness as I continued to lick and tease her. Her breathing was coming in short gasps now, and her hands fisted the couch cushions as she writhed beneath me.
The sharp scent of her arousal, the way she drummed her ankle at my back, the memory of her implacable defense of me at lunch. I was hard as the bronze of the bells, and as likely to fracture if I didn’t get into her soon. But she was close. So close. Her clit pulsed, and I wanted her to come so hard. I kept teasing her until she was panting and moaning and bucking her hips at my face. Finally, I succumbed to her demands and pressed my tongue firmly against her clit as I simultaneously sent two in pursuit of her G-spot. She came instantly, crying out and clawing at me as she rode the waves of pleasure.
When I kissed my way up her belly, shoving her shirt up as I went, her hands went to my head, stroking me absently the way she did after orgasm.
Languid. She was languid, and my chest expanded with each brush of her fingertips through my hair. I peeled off her shirt and bra, then my own shirt.
When I stood, her hands fell to her chest, and she began to brush those fingertips over her hardening nipples. Her eyes were closed, but she smiled—still so languid—when I unzipped my pants. She licked her lips and plucked slowly at her nipples and I didn’t bother with kicking off the rest of my clothes. I just yanked out my cock and fisted it hard as I watched her slide around until she lay with her legs hanging over the sofa’s arm.
At last she opened her eyes, and she was looking straight at my pumping hand. “You gonna feed that to me?”
Christ. This woman. I managed to strip the rest of the way as she watched, humming quietly, then I braced one knee by her hip, and one hand on the back cushion, and leaned in.
Margo swirled her tongue around my cock, teasing before taking it into her mouth. At first she was as gentle as she’d been with her breasts, but soon was sucking at me in earnest. I wasn’t quite thrusting, but her hand on my balls guided me to lean deeper, and she took more of me in.
I kept saying her name, over and over, a litany of, “Margo, God, Margo. Margo.” She watched me with those deep brown eyes full of desire and lust. And then my balls were tight, and my spine was tense, and my hips were demanding more. I brushed back her hair, and she hummed, and I nearly whimpered. Below me, she wriggled against the couch, like she needed the friction as badly as I needed the motion.
I pulled away and scrambled for a condom. And as soon as I was fully seated in her, I knew, to my complete doom, that I’d fallen in love.