Our last evening: after a day of walking—ten miles along the coastal path and back—we were drunk again. Not, like, shitfaced drunk, but unsober enough for Leigh to come back from the pub loos with a mischievous grin that told me they knew something I didn’t.
As soon as Matty and Noah went to buy more drinks, Leigh tapped my arm, whispered, “Look what I’ve got,” and pulled something a little way out of their pocket, keeping it concealed in their hand.
Condoms.
I was too bamboozled to do anything but stare at them—so bamboozled I agreed to a game of pool against Matty, who was a pool shark. Shark pool? OK, maybe I was drunk. Whatever, he beat me, then Noah, then Leigh, then some Australian guy who was definitely drunker than I was.
When we finally made it back to the camper van and tumbled into bed, I waited until we were both settled before I asked, “Why did you buy condoms?”
“Because…we might get carried away?”
Words and images and just general confusion swooshed around my brain, leaving squiggles before my closed eyes. “Are you—” I cleared the huskiness from my throat. “Are you saying you want penetrative sex? Only, I don’t really…I don’t know…” I shoved the words around in my head until they looked like they were in the right order and tried again. “I have zero experience. Sex ed, which was crap, and…I’ve never watched porn.”
“All those hours on the internet…” Leigh teased.
“I’ve seen some, obviously, but I haven’t…studied it?” I wasn’t sure if that sounded more or less whacky than admitting pornography made me anxious, which had nothing to do with the sex. Of course I knew porn was fake and unrealistic, but groaning, moaning skinny women and muscular men with penises you could hang flower baskets from were about as far from my reality as it was possible to get and still be an earthling.
“It makes me hate myself even more,” I confessed.
“Even more?”
“It’s kind of my default position? Or it was.”
“Do you still feel like that?” Leigh rolled onto their side to face me, tracing a spiral from the centre of my bare chest all the way down to my belly button. It gave me the shivers. If someone had told me in advance I’d be lying here half-naked and feeling totally OK about it, I’d have laughed and said, ‘Nah, you’ve mistaken me for someone else, mate.’
“No,” I answered.
“Good.” There was a pause like where it said [beat] on Matty’s scripts—I’d done a few read-throughs. “Because I love you, Jesse.”
[beat]
“I love you, too.” My voice wavered a bit. The vodka amplified the effect of Leigh’s words. That was all it was, not Big Jesse getting all choked up…who was I kidding? I could easily have sobbed myself to sleep, but what a waste of a night that would’ve been. Instead, I concentrated on the erotic spirals.
“I didn’t necessarily mean penetration,” Leigh said, “but you never know where we might end up. Even if we don’t go there, we need to be careful, because it’s not totally impossible for me to get pregnant. I mean, sperm are tiny, and they swim, don’t they? And we’re getting closer and closer to naked, so…”
“Condoms,” I said.
“Yeah. And lube.” Leigh’s fingers continued to spiral, down past my belly button. I kind of melted into the mattress. Leigh chuckled. “You like that idea.”
God, I was glad the lights were out. “I like what you’re doing,” I agreed, and then stopped breathing mid-inhalation as Leigh’s hand brushed my erection through my pyjamas.
“Want me to stop?”
“Nope.” Not ever.
The gentle pressure shifted the fabric up and down with Leigh’s palm, creating a warm friction that felt bloody amazing. They shuffled closer, and we kissed, our lips matching the slow rhythm Leigh had set. The pressure became a grip around me, moving my skin now, rather than my PJs. Without the alcohol in my system, it would’ve been over in seconds. With it, I might last…oh, a minute? It also gave me the courage to follow Leigh’s lead. My palm skimmed their belly, and—
“Nuh-uh.” The rebuttal vibrated my tongue, and they dodged away.
“Nn-nnn?” Which loosely translated to ‘why not?’
“I want to concentrate on what I’m doing.”
“But I want to touch you.”
“Soon.”
“Should we be doing this when we’re drunk?”
“I’m not drunk. Are you?”
“I’m not sober,” I admitted. But no, I wasn’t drunk, and if I was making no sense, it was because of Leigh’s touch and the kisses. It was different from when I did this myself. No build-up in intensity to a quick release. I was on the edge, desperately holding out because I didn’t want it to stop, but feeling selfish for taking so greedily without giving back. Did ‘soon’ mean once I was done? It would be worth rushing it for that.
The decision was taken away from me when I felt air sneak through the gap between the elasticated waistband of my pyjamas and my belly, followed by Leigh’s hand. My breathing was all over the place, and I could no longer keep still. Reinstating their grip, Leigh made short, rapid tugs, and I couldn’t help it. I pushed up into their hand, heroically holding out even though this was the most intense, incredible experience ever.
Leigh paused—“Let’s try lube”—and reached under their pillow. I watched them in my peripheral vision, tempted to turn on the light so I could properly see. Plastic crinkled, a box flicked open, further crinkling…Leigh held up something small and square.
“That’s lube?”
“I’d say so. It’s squidgy.” They brought it to their face and used their teeth to tear the packet open. “Blurgh. That is not nice.”
“What does it taste of?”
“Nothing. It’s just…” Leigh giggled. “Su-per slippery!”
They’d given me the giggles, too, until they kissed me and I got to see what they meant. It was a bit like the aftermath of a snotty sneeze.
“OK, are you ready?” they asked.
“Yeah.” I braced, expecting a blob of cold gel to land on me, soon after discovering Leigh had spread the lube over their palm. It was warm, and awesome, and too much.
“Stop,” I said very quickly and held my breath.
“Sorry.”
“No, it’s OK. Um…I’m… I’m almost there already.”
“Just do it.”
“But…it’s nice.”
Leigh gave a dirty chuckle and murmured deeply against my lips, “Do it.” They resumed the motion, letting their hand slide all the way up, and down, and up, and down, slowly, but getting faster. I clamped my lips tight together, but it was no use, and Leigh knew it. Their mouth came down on mine as I gasped and tensed.
I felt the rush; everything around us fell away, leaving only the intense peak of ecstasy, within which my brain threw out I’m shooting all over Leigh’s hand. Except Leigh didn’t seem to care. They were still kissing me, and slowing, slowing…
“Oh, God.” I was out of breath and out of spit and a tiny bit out of my mind. I swallowed. “Need a drink.”
“I’ll get you one. And some tissue.”
“Thank you.” Through the blissful haze of my high, I watched Leigh slide the door back and slip through the gap. Slap, slap, slap, slap of bare feet on vinyl, running water, glass filling, a paper-towel rip. They came back, slid the door shut and handed me the paper towel, then knelt by, glass in hand. I got the feeling they were watching me clean up, but it was too dark to tell. Whatever, I couldn’t exactly be embarrassed when they’d just given me my first orgasm at someone else’s hand. It felt like a precious gift.
Cleaned up and almost back on Earth, my self-consciousness returned, and I covered up.
“Do you want this water?” Leigh asked.
“Oh, yeah. Thanks.” I took the glass from them, checking Leigh’s profile to see what state they were in. Still aroused. I glugged the water and put the glass on the window ledge. “Your turn now?”
Leigh literally leapt into the bed. “I didn’t think you’d still want to.”
“I still want to,” I confirmed, rolling onto my side.
I started with the same slow build-up Leigh had given me, following the dip down the centre of their stomach with my fingertips, mapping their skin, down and up and around and down, to where the light stubble gave way to unwaxed hair. I’d reached Leigh’s pyjamas and tugged one end of the cord, felt the resistance and then slackness as the bow unravelled. Tracing the edge of the fabric, I gradually worked my fingers beneath it, slowly, relishing every touch. God, they were beautiful.
Leigh arched and sighed. “You’re, um, ready again?”
“Yeah.” Because touching Leigh turned me on as much as Leigh touching me, although I hadn’t been conscious of thrusting against their hip. Now I was, I stopped, or tried to, but my body seemed intent on doing its own thing.
“Hold on.” Leigh cast aside their top and shoved their pyjama bottoms down to their thighs. “OK. We should maybe do this with lube.”
“Is there any left?”
“Yep. I only used half of it.” They held up the sachet. “Give me your hand.” I did so, and Leigh smeared the gel over my fingers and palm. I used my thumb to spread it a little, and also to delay. I was nervous. I wanted so badly to get this right for Leigh. Returning my hand to its previous position, just above where I needed to be, I edged closer, being guided by Leigh’s long breaths and the roll of their hips.
“Are you deliberately teasing me?”
“Um…kind of?”
“OK. It’s nice, but…” Leigh reached down and moved my hand. “There.” They resumed rolling their hips. I curled my fingers and thumb around them, experiencing a brief moment of oh, God, I’m actually doing this. Leigh pushed up into my hand. “Like that,” they whispered, massively boosting my confidence. I squeezed tighter and moved my hand in opposition to Leigh’s thrusts, so aroused, and yet I was also struck by the wonder of it all—the beauty of Leigh moving to my touch, simply the beauty of their body… How was it they could feel the same desire for me as I felt for them? Was it even possible? I wished we’d left the light on so I could watch them. Was that weird? Did I even care if it was?
In the absence of my vision, I took a chance on exploring with my mouth, placing a kiss on Leigh’s shoulder and nipping lightly at their skin with my lips. Their breathing became faster as I worked my way along their collarbone, down the centre of their chest, taking a detour and searching out their nipple, closing my lips around it. I heard Leigh whisper oh my god, and then they were reaching down between us, no hesitation this time as they slipped their hand inside my pyjamas.
“Leigh…”
“Don’t stop.” The words were barely out before they drew an enormous breath, held it, and then released it in short, sharp bursts. I could no longer keep a rhythm with my hand, but I guessed I didn’t need to as Leigh jolted sharply. I stopped; they didn’t. Aaand…there went another pair of pyjamas.
Lucky we were going home tomorrow.
* * * * *