86: The Virgin Club

"Isn't it exciting, Brian?" Addison asked me on the phone.

"What is, Addie?"

"That I'm coming to visit you!"

"You are?"

"Doesn't your family tell you anything?"

"Well, usually, but Mom just got home yesterday and we haven't had much time to talk yet. It's all about the baby," I said.

"So is this. Betts is bringing the baby to Indiana in three weeks. Since Allen has to work, I volunteered to accompany Betts and help her as a kind of sort of nanny. If she ever lets go of the little darling. She's so cute, Brian!"

"Betts or Maddie?" I laughed.

"Maddie, of course. Brian, when I get there I want to have a picture of the three of us—you, me, and Madeline. It will be so sweet."

"Um ... okay. But why do you want a picture of the three of us?"

"You are so dense! You and I are that sweet baby's uncle and aunt. Her only uncle and her only aunt. We represent both sides of the family and we'll dote on our little niece."

"I never thought about that. It is kind of cool, Addie. When are you coming in?"

"We'll get there on Friday the ninth."

"Great timing. It's the last day of school. You'll get to meet everyone at the party on Saturday."

"All your girlfriends?"

"And the guys, too. And, Addie, I'm filming my season wrap-up on Saturday morning. Would you like to be in it?"

"Really?" she squealed.

"Yeah. I'm having all the girlfriends on with me and I'm sure you'll be welcome."

"Hmm. Maybe I will get to be a girlfriend," she giggled.

I boarded the bus Friday morning at six-thirty. Ms. Streeter checked everyone in to be sure we had our resource boxes, readings, and lunches packed. It was a two-hour bus trip to Fishers for the IHSFA State Speech Tournament. I was wearing all black, including the tight t-shirt that Nicki bought me and my black beret. It wouldn't be a great outfit for my extemporaneous speech, but I was putting everything on the poem that I'd be reading. Extemp wasn't really my thing, but I hated to waste my box of research.

"Please don't tell me you're wearing your camo jacket, too." I looked up. Nicki sat down in the seat beside me.

"What are you doing here? Did Ms. Streeter convince you to compete?"

"No way. She said that every school had to provide two pages for the competition and she didn't have anybody she could get on short notice and could I please save her. How could I turn down a plea like that?"

"Pages?"

"Students to tabulate scores, post results, and run errands for each section of the competition. Like congressional pages."

"Oh. Well, hi. I'm sorry I didn't greet you and act happy to see you. You just surprised me so much I couldn't think straight. I'm glad you're here to make this trip less boring."

"What? You think I'm going to jump off a balcony?"

"Nicki!"

"I know. Bad joke. I have to joke about it, Brian. You could, too, you know."

"Nicki, you scared the fuck out of me."

"Apparently you got it back."

"Um..."

"Joke, Brian. You know, sense of humor? That was a very funny comeback."

"Yeah. It was. But I'm so overwhelmed lately. I never seem to know what's funny."

"Got plans for the weekend?"

"We're heading down to Kokomo tomorrow."

"Good. Those girls have been waiting for the Brian experience for a long time. How about after we get back tonight?"

"Don't know when that will be so I didn't make plans."

"My tattoo needs touching up. Could you ... uh ... come over?"

My extemporaneous speech topic was 'Should the United States intervene in local conflicts endangering civilians like the recent war between Iraq and Iran?' There was no winning side to this issue. I did the only thing I could. I beat the drum of patriotism and declared that the United States had to save the world for democracy and that wherever civilians were endangered by a conflict of non-democratic militarized powers, we needed to step in to put the people in charge. Even I thought my arguments, while supported by a bunch of powerful politicians, were lame. The strategy worked, though. I guess it's true that when you don't have any facts to back your argument, all you have to do is yell about patriotism. I got third place.

I watched Cassie, Terry, and the rest of the debate team tear apart their first opponent and move on to the next round in debate. They always run the events that every school has competitors in first. So after lunch, when half the schools had already boarded their busses to take them home, I was called in the poetry competition.

"In the Underworld, by Nat Hart," I said when I reached the podium. I whipped sunglasses out of my pocket and as I put them on I saw Nicki settle in a seat in the back of the room. I almost lost it. I hadn't even considered that she might watch me present her poem. I took a deep breath and stepped out from behind the podium. Technically, this competition is for a poetry reading, but you aren't penalized if you recite the poem. I started slow and a little haltingly. "I floated above and could see I was dead/ Panic in my heart was fed..." By the time I was midway through the first stanza, I'd found the rhythm and my pace picked up.

I clawed my way to the top of the bottom of the heap
Where I learned the art of how to keep
A spark of light alive in the deep
Chasm that opened beneath my feet
I discovered that opening was more than a well
As I slipped at the edge, tumbled and fell
And my voice was silent as I raised it to yell
Just because it's private doesn't mean it's not hell

Then you came to me, gagged and bound; you
Wore nothing at all but the pain that hounds you—
The source of which still confounds you
Beyond all reason fear surrounds you
You carried a grudge for all that you'd lost
And blamed me for all it had cost,
But I cut the cords that bound you and tossed
Them in the flames of hell and carried your cross
There was a deafening crash when we came together
Nature abhors a vacuum whether
It's in outer space or in the nether
Reaches of an empty heart seeking something better
We reached the heights as lover to lover
And danced in the brightness under the cover
Of the sky—we never thought to discover
Whether two empty vessels could fill each other

I kept the pace going, beating out the words like a drum at the audience. I pounded them with my fist, looked at the sky and continued to rant.

Wherever you walk there is hope and cheer
I learn bravery and show no fear
Of the haunting ghosts of sadness and tears
That wait below in the winter this year
By autumn's first frost I was pushing up daisies
While you wandered free in the places
I'd come to love; it just drove me crazy
That I was again consigned to Hades

I reached the crescendo and crashed, my voice coming down as I leaned forward to whisper the last lines.

That's the promise of the eternal wheel:
What comes around goes around, that's the deal.

The judges scored my performance and there was a smattering of applause when they dismissed me from the podium. Apparently my choice wasn't controversial enough to merit an inquisition this time. I was done. I didn't care if I won or lost. I only cared about what Nicki thought and when I'd gathered my things, she was no longer in the room.

As it turned out, I won. We left the competition as soon as the debate team won its final round, though, and didn't stay for the awards ceremony. We had a two-hour bus trip back to school and got there a little after six.

When I got on the bus, I looked for Nicki, but she wasn't there. I sat down and Cassie plopped into the seat beside me. She was pretty stoked as her team had just won the state debate title. When Cassie gets into that kind of mood, there's no way to derail her. She held my hand and gave me an argument-by-argument replay of all four debates they'd had. I saw Nicki get on the bus, look around and sit in the front seat across from Ms. Streeter. I hoped she wasn't pissed at me.

"Are you still coming over for dinner?" she asked. Nicki was waiting for me when I got off the bus. Cassie kissed me on the cheek and ran with the rest of her team to where their parents were waiting.

"Of course. Sorry I wasn't available on the bus. I thought you were ahead of me and then Cassie just occupied the seat."

"She's your girlfriend. I had to run a bunch of copies for the judges before I could leave. Ms. Streeter actually had to come and get me so we could go. I'm parked over there."

We went to her car and rode to her mansion in relative silence. Once we got there, she pulled some kind of casserole out of the refrigerator and microwaved it. It was probably pretty good when it was fresh, but something in it got soggy in the microwave.

"Where are your folks tonight?" I asked. She shrugged.

"I think they said Masons. I don't pay attention unless I have to. They have a dance almost every Friday night."

"I didn't know that."

"Why would you?"

"Nicki, are you upset?"

"No. Just more tired than I expected to be. I need to go take a pill. Come on." I followed her upstairs to her bedroom and she went into the bathroom, I assumed to get her pill. When she came out, she was wearing just her panties."

"Um..."

"I said I wanted you to do my tattoo. I got this new stuff. I guess it isn't that new. It's been around for hundreds of years, but a girl down at the gathering a couple weeks ago told me about it. It's henna. I'm kinda marked up because I had to try it. I think I've mixed the right consistency. So instead of using a pen, you have to use a brush and let it dry. It seems to last pretty well. Of course, it's not black." She handed me a bowl of goop, a brush, and the stencil. Then she flopped on her back on the bed beside me. "Do the one over here on my boob."

"May I touch you, Nicki?"

"You kinda have to, don't you? Hell, they're just tits. Grope 'em, suck 'em, whatever. Just put the stuff on me."

"You don't sound very happy, Nicki."

"Yeah. I get this way sometimes. Live with it. You've got my tits in your hands. Get over it." Ah shit. I was still a little scared of Nicki in some ways. But if she was getting crazy like she did back in January, I guess I was glad someone was here, even if it was me. I didn't maul her breasts and only touched her as was necessary to position the stencil and apply the henna. I did a light outline with the stencil and then removed the paper so I wouldn't risk smearing the henna later. Then it was a difficult job to fill in the spaces. I was honestly too focused on not messing things up to notice if I touched her nipple or breathed on her.

"I think I've got it. I sure hope this works."

"I have to just lie here like this until it dries thoroughly," she said with one hand over her head. If she moved the other hand up it would change how her skin stretched. "I'm pretty helpless, you know? I couldn't stop you if you sucked on me or even if you pulled my panties down. I'd just have to lie here and let you do what you wanted to."

Okay, that was an arousing speech in its own way. It was a little melodramatic, and if she didn't want me to do something she could just sacrifice the tattoo and push me away. But she needed to own whatever happened. I wasn't completely comfortable with just doing whatever I might feel like while she lay there docilely.

"Nicki, do you want me to take off your panties? Do you want me to lick your pussy? Do you want me to pull out my cock and push it into you and make you come as I spurt inside you? Is that what you want?" Her eyes popped open wide and she looked at me with a little fear in her eyes. She still didn't move.

"No," she whispered.

"If you just lie there and tell me I can do whatever I want to, I might misinterpret that and do something that you don't really want me to. You have to tell me what you want, Nicki. That's the rule."

"But I'm an anarchist. I'm supposed to break the rules."

"Is that a rule?" I wasn't sure if the grimaces she was going through were a sign of impending rage, crying, or laughter. It turned out that laughter won and I breathed a sigh of relief.

"Are you supposed to be Mr. Spock or something? I hate logic."

"Nicki, I care about you. Sometimes I just can't figure out what you want."

"But it's so hard. You were right there when we did the first one and you asked if you could and I just said yes and it was okay. But when I think about asking you if you'll touch me and lick me and make me come ... I always do it for myself. But when you did it, it was so different and ... and ... and..." Nicki was getting stuck.

"Nicki, may I touch you and kiss you and lick you including between your legs? I'd really love to do that."

"Yes! But ... can I suck you this time? I felt so bad last time I just took from you and I didn't get to give anything back."

"I would love it if you sucked me, if that's what you'd like to do. But Nicki, you'll have to wait."

"Why?"

"Because your henna isn't dry yet. After it's dry and won't smear, then you can suck me, but until then, you have to lie back and let me enjoy kissing and touching and licking your beautiful body." She moaned.

"Please?" I took that as my cue.

Nicki was always desperate to be in control. I think it was part of her ... I guess she called it an ICI—invisible chronic illness. She had to put herself in a position of vulnerability—waiting for the henna to dry—in order to let me take control and love her.

I started with her lips and we kissed for a while. By the time I moved away from the kisses, the henna was probably already dry, but neither of us said that as I moved down to kiss her breasts and nipples—careful to not touch the henna artwork. When I'd thoroughly kissed her belly, I moved down, dragging her panties down with me. The tattoo next to her pussy was fading. I kissed it thoroughly. I pulled her panties all the way off and surrounded her pussy with kisses and little licks. Nicki wasn't skinny like Liz or a hard-body like Whitney. Her tummy was soft and that softness spread to her pussy as well. She'd trimmed her bush enough so the rose would be clearly visible but didn't shave or even cut back the rest of her pubic hair. It collected her juices as she became more and more turned on.

Unlike the first time, it didn't take long to build to her first climax even before I'd directly touched her clit. I hadn't been invited to penetrate her, even with my fingers, but I thrust my tongue in and out of her as far as I could. Then I flattened it against her clit and moved from side to side as she rocketed into a thunderous climax. As soon as she was down, I started flicking at her clit with the tip of my tongue and alternately making long swipes up from beneath her opening to her clit. It seemed to take her body a moment or two to figure out that she was going to come again but when she climbed to the third height, I sucked on her clit and kept flicking it with my tongue until she begged me to stop. I cushioned my cheek against her mound and just lay there holding her to me.

"You're still dressed," she said accusingly when she was able to speak again. I looked down. I'd kicked my shoes off and lost the beret someplace, but I was still dressed in my black slacks and tight black t-shirt. "Do you always have sex fully dressed?"

"I'm trying to think when the last time was that I just 'had sex.' Not that I haven't, but there's a difference between that and what I just did."

"What do you mean?"

"I just made love to you, Nicki. I didn't have sex. There are times when just getting off with your partner is all that either of you want and it can be mind-blowing. But those times, you are really aware of and looking for your own fulfillment. Not that you don't care about the other person or anything. It's just that you are more involved with getting off than with what the other person is feeling. When I make love to you, all I care about is pleasing you and making it good for you. Even if I was buried balls deep in this little vagina that my tongue just made love to, I'd be trying to make sure that it was the best thing you'd ever felt."

"So, like you made love and I had sex? I mean, I have to tell you that I did not think once about whether you were enjoying yourself. I just wanted you to never stop."

"Maybe it isn't a perfect system. There's nothing wrong with having sex just for the pleasure it gives you. But it's special when I can do something for you and not be thinking about what I'm getting out of it. And I think that when we make love with one another and are both involved in just showing the other how much she or he is loved, then it reaches a whole new level."

"Okay. So lie back and get ready to have sex because I'm going to make love to your penis with my mouth." We both chuckled a little, but it didn't take long to get me out of my clothes and for Nicki to start focusing on my cock.

"I love what you are doing," I said as she slurped away. "But if you are making love to it, don't focus on the outcome. Believe me, I'll provide come coming out. Just focus on loving it." She was obviously inexperienced and tried a bunch of things that were uncomfortable for either her or for me, but once I got her to relax and just love my cock, my head went away and my other head took control. I was in never-never land and didn't even think to warn her when I erupted.

"Whoa!" she coughed as she backed up and the last spurt hit her in the nose. "Oh! I knew it would happen, but it surprised me. Isn't a gentleman supposed to warn a lady when he's about to drown her?" She started laughing and wiped the mess off her nose. Then she stuck it in her mouth and looked at me.

"I'm sorry. I got so lost in what you were doing to me it kind of took me by surprise, too. I should have told you."

"It was actually a good thing you didn't. I'd have probably pulled back and we'd have a real mess to clean up. I didn't even have time to decide if I was going to swallow it. It just was in my mouth and that was the easiest way to get rid of it. And I wanted to do that ever since we were in bed with Whitney that night. I just would have been too chicken shit to do it. Thank you." She jumped toward me and gave me a big spermy kiss. It's not like I like the stuff, but if she took it in her mouth for me, who am I to complain?

I was aware, also, that her demeanor and attitude had changed.

"You seem a lot happier now."

"Yeah. That happens, too. It's the same shit that the lethargy and the anger and the depression come from. When your life is controlled by drugs, you just learn to accept whatever emotion they plant in you. It's like I don't own any of them. I don't know what's real and what's drug-induced. It's supposed to control the manic-depressive state but most of the time you just don't feel anything. It's okay mostly when it's bringing me up out of depression, but then I never get the really intense drive to complete something. I don't get the high. My voices don't talk."

"You hear voices?" Oh shit!

"Sure. They all shut up when I write them down. Somebody said that if you hear voices in your head and they are ignoring you, then you are probably a writer. I know what will happen if I go off of the drugs, but I hate being on them."

"I think you're a great writer. I was so afraid that you were mad about the way I interpreted your poem today."

"My poem?" she sighed. "You said it was by Nat Hart."

"That's what the note said."

"Really? I thought you did your research. Nat Hart was the pen name of the editor of the Argosy Review ten years ago. The faculty advisor didn't think it was right for the editor to be a named contributor because no one would believe the poems were selected in a blind competition. I've never been to Champaign-Urbana."

"I assumed you kind of adopted the persona. Nicki, are you saying you are not Nat Hart? Who sent me the poems, then?" Nicki didn't respond to me, but rolled off the bed and rummaged through her desk as I watched her naked bottom. There was absolutely nothing wrong with this view. She turned and smirked at me.

"Here. Read the editor's note at the beginning." She tossed me a copy of the Argosy Review. I wondered how the heck she got that. I opened the magazine and started reading the 'From the Editor' in the front. It was pretty innocuous, thanking all the contributors. Then I got to the signatures.

"Wait! Ms. Streeter was the editor of the Argosy Review? And you say Nat Hart was the pen name for the editor? Ms. Streeter is Nat Hart?" Nicki didn't say anything else and I was just about pissed at my teacher.

We left for Kokomo mid-morning on Saturday and Sam promised to take care of the horses. I got a big kiss from her and then another each for Jennifer and Courtney. Mmm. I hoped Jen and Court would give me kisses for all our girlfriends.