Chapter 13: George's Forbidden Fantasy
The chowder had gone cold. George stared at the congealing surface in the bowl on his lap, the television a blur of meaningless color and noise. The taste of Sterre’s words still coated his mouth, a bitter tonic more potent than the cheap whisky he’d been sipping. You think I’m the risk?
He set the bowl aside with a clatter. The recliner groaned as he shifted, a familiar complaint. The entire house seemed to sigh around him, a museum of solitary habits. He’d built this life, piece by quiet piece, after his own marriage had dissolved into silent phone calls and separate bedrooms. It was sufficient. It was orderly.
Now, the memory of that disorder invaded everything.
It wasn’t just the visual—though Christ, that was seared onto the back of his eyelids. Marc, fucking like a man possessed, his body a taut bowstring of muscle. Sterre, her small frame taking every inch of him, her face a mask of ecstatic surrender pressed against the cash register. It was the sound that haunted him. The wet, rhythmic slap of skin. Her guttural, uninhibited scream. The raw, animal groan ripped from Marc’s throat—a sound George had never heard from him, not in thirty years of friendship, not through broken bones or failed businesses or his father’s funeral.
It was a sound of complete abandon. Of ownership.
A thick, uncomfortable heat pooled low in George’s belly. He tried to dismiss it, to summon the appropriate disapproval. Instead, his hand drifted down, palming the undeniable erection straining against his sweatpants. A flush of shame burned his neck. This was wrong. She was a kid. Marc was like a son.
But his body, traitorous and lonely, didn’t care.
He pushed himself up from the chair, the motion stiff. The bedroom was dark, the only light from a streetlamp filtering through the blinds, casting barred shadows across the king-sized bed he never used half of. The surfboards leaning against the wall were silent sentinels to a youth spent chasing glory that never came.
He lay back on the quilt, the rough fabric familiar under his fingers. He didn’t undress. He simply shoved the waistband of his sweatpants and boxers down, freeing his cock. It stood thick and angry against his stomach, a bald testament to his solitude.
Closing his eyes only made it worse. The memory played in high definition.
Her cheek, smeared against the receipt printer’s glass. The way Marc’s hand had fisted in her blonde hair, possessive, controlling. The stark contrast of his tanned, work-roughened hand against her pale scalp. Her lips, parted in a perfect ‘O’ of shock and pleasure as he first entered her.
George’s own hand wrapped around his shaft, his grip too tight, almost punishing. He stroked slowly, the dry friction a counterpoint to the slick, imagined vision.
He’d seen everything. The way Marc’s balls had tightened, slapping against her. The glistening proof of her arousal coating Marc’s length with every withdrawal. The sheer, vulgar fullness of her around him.
A rough groan escaped George’s lips. He sped his rhythm, his thumb swiping over the leaking head. He imagined it was her wetness. He imagined her tight, young body was his to claim. The fantasy was a gut-punch of guilt, but it only fueled his arousal, twisting it into something darker, more desperate.
“Fuck,” he muttered into the empty room, his hips bucking up into his fist. “That tight little cunt.”
The words were foul in the quiet. He hated them. He craved them. In his mind, he wasn’t himself. He was Marc. He had that strength, that certitude. He had her.
Her screams. The way they’d echoed off the surfboards. “Yours!” she’d sobbed. “God, it’s yours!”
He pictured bending her over the counter himself. Her defiance would melt into submission under his hands. He’d make her say it. He’d make her scream it until her voice broke. He’d fuck her harder than Marc, prove something, ruin something beautiful and terrible just to feel that power for a second.
His strokes became frantic, jerky. The bedframe squeaked in protest. The image shifted, fractured. It was no longer Sterre’s face against the register, but her eyes—those defiant blue eyes from his doorway—staring back at him from the memory, seeing him, judging him. You’re the one judging him.
“Christ,” he hissed, the orgasm tearing through him with a violence that felt like punishment. It was less a release than an expulsion. Thick, bitter stripes landed on his stomach and the worn quilt. He lay there, panting, gripped by a wave of such profound, immediate self-loathing it stole his breath.
The silence afterward was deafening. The phantom sounds of their passion were replaced by the dull hum of his refrigerator. He was a sixty-two-year-old man with come on his shirt, jerking off to the image of his best friend’s girl. Pathetic. Sterre’s words circled like vultures. The friend who has his back.
He cleaned himself up with a grim efficiency, avoiding his own reflection in the darkened window. He tossed the soiled quilt into a corner. He needed air. The bungalow, with its memories and its ghosts, was suffocating him.
He stepped out onto the small porch. The night was cool, the salt air a cleanser. He lit a cigarette, the flare of the match illuminating his weathered, tired face. He drew the smoke deep, willing it to burn the taste of shame from his throat.
Down the street, a familiar truck pulled into the driveway of Marc’s cottage. The headlights cut off. Two doors opened and closed. He saw their silhouettes merge into one against the soft glow from Marc’s front window. A long, deep kiss. Then Marc swept Sterre into his arms, carrying her over the threshold like a bride, her laughter a bright, clear bell in the quiet night.
George watched, the ember of his cigarette burning down toward his fingers. He felt a dull ache, a hollow where the jealousy had been. It wasn’t arousal anymore. It was grief. Grief for the passion he’d never had, or had let slip away. Grief for the simple, uncomplicated friendship that was now forever altered.
Marc carried her inside. The door closed. A light went on in the bedroom upstairs.
George stubbed out his cigarette. The decision, when it came, was quiet and absolute. He couldn’t unsee what he’d seen. He couldn’t purge the unwanted, shameful heat it had sparked in him. But he could choose not to let it fester in the dark. He could choose a side, as she’d said. Not for them, but for himself. For the man he used to be, and the friend he still wanted to be.
He went back inside. He didn’t look at the rumpled bed. He picked up his phone from beside the cold chowder bowl. His thumbs hovered over the screen for a long minute before he began to type a text to Marc.
Paint’s on me. That blue. First light. Don’t be hungover.
He sent it. Then he went to the kitchen, filled a sink with hot, soapy water, and began to scrub the bowl clean. The methodical, familiar action calmed him. The water was hot, the suds were plentiful, and for the first time in two days, the shop didn’t feel like a crime scene in his mind. It just felt like a shop. Their shop. And maybe, he thought as he rinsed the ceramic clean, that was enough.
The text from George glowed on Marc’s screen as he carried Sterre into her small apartment over the laundromat. He didn’t mention it, just set her down and showed her the phone. She read it, her eyes softening from their earlier defiance. “He picked a side,” she whispered. Marc just nodded, a knot of tension he’d carried since the dinner finally unraveling in his chest.
The apartment still held the day’s warmth, smelling of sand and sunscreen and her. Without a word, she walked to the center of the room, the hardwood cool under her bare feet. She gave him a look that was all challenge and promise, then slowly spun, the thin, sunflower-patterned sundress flaring around her thighs. It was the only thing she wore.
The cotton was cheap, flimsy. It clung to the swell of her breasts, the curve of her hips, and betrayed nothing beneath. No lines, no shadows. Just her. She stopped spinning, facing him from across the room. Her gaze was dark, holding his with an electric charge. Then she sank to her knees, the movement deliberate, graceful. She stuck her tongue out, a pink promise against her lips, and waited.
A rough sound escaped him. He toed off his shoes, never breaking eye contact. His hands went to his belt buckle, the rasp of leather loud in the quiet room. He pushed his pants and boxers down in one impatient shove, his cock already hard and jutting out. He stepped free of the fabric, leaving it pooled on the floor.
“So,” he said, his voice a low gravel. “You liked being watched, huh?”
She smiled, a wicked curve. “I liked you not giving a fuck who was watching.”
He closed the distance between them in three strides. His hand fisted in the thin fabric at her neckline. He didn’t undress her. He pulled, hard. The sundress tore down the front, buttons pinging across the floor. The fabric gaped open, exposing her breasts, her stomach, the bare apex of her thighs. She gasped, but her eyes flashed with thrill.
His other hand tangled in her hair, tightening at the roots. He guided himself to her open mouth, the swollen head bumping against her lips. “Show me,” he commanded.
She opened, taking him in. He pushed forward, not gently. The thick crown hit the back of her throat immediately. She gagged, a wet, choked sound, her eyes watering. He pulled back just enough for her to gasp, a string of saliva connecting her lip to his shining tip.
She darted her tongue out, licking the slit, tasting the salt of his pre-cum. She swirled it around the sensitive rim, her eyes locked on his. “More,” she breathed, the word vibrating against him.
He didn’t hesitate. He pushed back in, deeper this time, setting a relentless rhythm. He fucked her mouth with shallow, then deep, penetrating thrusts. Her nose pressed into the coarse hair at his base. Gagging sounds punctuated the wet, sucking noise each time he drove in. Tears tracked through her flushed cheeks. She kept her hands on his thighs, accepting it, taking every inch he gave her.
“That’s it,” he grunted, his hips pistoning. “Take it all, you hungry little slut. Just like you took it on the counter.” His grip on her hair was iron, controlling the depth, the pace. Spit slicked her chin, her neck. The obscene, rhythmic noises filled the apartment, a filthy counterpoint to the distant hum of dryers below.
He could feel his climax coiling, a white-hot wire in his gut. “You want it?” he gasped, his thrusts becoming erratic, brutal. “You want me to come in that pretty mouth?”
She couldn’t speak, could only moan around his length, a desperate, affirmative vibration. It was all he needed.
With a final, deep shove that stilled her throat, he came. A raw shout tore from him. Hot, bitter pulses shot directly down her throat. She swallowed convulsively, her throat working around him. He kept pumping, emptying himself, until he was spent and sensitive.
Slowly, he pulled out of her mouth. A thick rope of white cum followed, spilling over her swollen lower lip and down her chin. It dripped onto her chest, streaking through the valley between her breasts. More pooled on her naked stomach before sliding down to the floor between her knees.
She knelt there, panting, a mess of spit and semen and torn fabric. She looked utterly ravished. Beautiful. His.
He sank to his knees in front of her, his own legs shaky. He wiped a thumb through the mess on her chin, then brought it to her lips. She sucked it clean, her blue eyes holding his with a startling tenderness. He gathered her to him, ignoring the wetness between them, and held her tight against his chest. They stayed like that on the floor for a long time, breathing each other in.
Later, in the shower, he washed her hair with a focus that felt like worship. The water ran clear. They didn’t speak much. The silence was a balm. In her narrow bed, with the sound of the laundromat below cycling through its final loads, she traced the tattoo on his shoulder. “George is painting the shop blue,” she said.
“We’re painting it,” he corrected, his voice sleepy. “At first light. You’re on roller duty.”
She smiled into his chest. “I’ve never painted a wall before.”
“You’ll learn.” He kissed the top of her head. His phone buzzed once on the nightstand. A follow-up text from George, a color swatch image named ‘Sterre’s Blue.’ He showed her. She laughed, a soft, happy sound that he felt in his bones.
Sleep pulled at him. For the first time in weeks, his mind was quiet. There was only the weight of her leg thrown over his, the smell of her clean skin, and the concrete plan for tomorrow. Paint. A fence. A life built on his own terms. The other world—the one of condos and suitable women and five-year plans—felt like a fading dream. He knew it would come knocking again. Chloe’s month would end. The thought was a cold stone in his gut, but a manageable one. He had his ground. He had her.
Just before sleep took him, she whispered into the dark, “He heard everything, you know. In the shop.” Marc didn’t open his eyes. “I know.” “Does it bother you?” He considered it. The shame was gone, burned away. What remained was a stubborn, unyielding truth. “No,” he said, and meant it. “Let them hear.”
“Let them hear.”
The words hung in the dark, a final decree before sleep swallowed them. Dawn arrived not with a bang, but with the gentle, persistent seep of gray light through her thin curtains. It found them tangled, her back pressed against his chest, his arm a heavy, comfortable weight across her ribs.
The distant growl of a garbage truck on the main drag finally pulled Marc from the depths. He blinked, disoriented for a second by the unfamiliar ceiling, the scent of laundry detergent and girl. Sterre. Her blonde hair fanned across his arm, her breathing deep and even. He watched the rise and fall of her shoulder, the faint freckles there he hadn’t noticed before.
He extracted himself with the care of a bomb defusal expert, but the bedsprings gave a shrill protest. She groaned, burrowing deeper into the pillow. “Time’s it?” Her voice was muffhed, thick with sleep.
“Early.” He pulled on his boxers and jeans from the floor. “George’ll be at the shop by seven.”
“Ugh.” A hand emerged from the covers, waving vaguely. “Tell him I’m dead. Wake me for the funeral.”
Marc smiled, a private thing in the quiet room. He leaned over, kissing the crown of her head. “Coffee. Then death.” He padded out to her tiny galley kitchen, a space dominated by a single window overlooking the alley. He found the filters, the battered tin of generic grind. The machine sputtered to life with a promising gurgle.
The smell did what his careful escape could not. She appeared in the doorway, swimming in one of his surf shop t-shirts she’d claimed weeks ago. It fell to her mid-thigh. Her hair was a wild halo, her eyes squinted against the morning. She looked young, rumpled, and utterly captivating.
“You’re a cruel man,” she muttered, sliding onto one of the two rickety stools at the counter that separated kitchen from living space.
“Realist.” He placed a chipped mug of black coffee in front of her. “You said you wanted to learn to paint.”
“I was lying. I’m a terrible person.” She wrapped her hands around the mug, inhaling the steam. She peered at him over the rim. “You look… okay.”
He sipped his own coffee, leaning against the counter opposite her. “I feel okay.” It was an understatement. The corrosive anxiety that had lived in his gut since Chloe’s dinner was gone, leaving a strange, calm hollow. “You?”
She considered it, watching him. “Sore.” A slow, sly smile spread. “In the best ways.” The smile softened into something more thoughtful. “Quiet. Inside, I mean.”
He nodded. He understood. The frenzy had burned itself out, leaving this: two people sharing a quiet morning, planning to paint a wall. It was profoundly ordinary. It felt like a miracle.
He rummaged in her fridge. The contents were sparse. A carton of eggs, a block of cheddar, a half-empty jar of salsa with a questionable lid. “Your culinary world is a place of stark choices and great courage.”
“It’s called being twenty-one and poor. Cook, then critique.”
He cracked eggs into a bowl, found a marginally clean pan. The sizzle of butter was a second, richer morning scent. He whipped the eggs with a fork, sprinkled in shredded cheese. “So,” he said, his focus on the pan. “George. The text.”
“Sterre’s Blue.” She said it with a hint of wonder, testing the weight of it. “He really sent that?”
“He did.” Marc divided the scramble onto two plates, topping them with a reckless spoonful of salsa. He set one in front of her, handed her a fork. “He’s trying.”
“I know.” She took a bite, chewing thoughtfully. “It was weird, confronting him. He just looked… sad. Old.” She met Marc’s eyes. “Not angry. Just lost.”
Marc felt a familiar, complicated twist in his chest. George was a fixture, a part of the landscape of his life. Seeing him through Sterre’s eyes, as something fragile, was unsettling. “He’ll be insufferable today. Full of unsolicited advice on roller technique.”
“Good.” Sterre pointed her fork at him. “Means he’s back.” She ate another mouthful, then leaned her chin on her hand. “What’s the first thing you’re gonna build? For the fence. After we paint.”
He didn’t even have to think. “The gate. Strong hinges. A latch that sounds solid when it closes.” He mimed the motion with his hand. “A click you can feel in your bones.”
She watched his hand, a small smile playing on her lips. “That’s kind of hot.”
“It’s basic carpentry.”
“Same thing.” She finished her eggs, pushing the plate away. The morning light had strengthened, turning from gray to a pale gold that caught in her hair. “We should go. Your surrogate father is waiting with paint samples.”
“He’s not my—”
“He totally is.” She hopped off the stool. “I’m driving. You look like you need more coffee.”
“You drive like a pod person who just learned the concept of brakes.”
“It’s called momentum conservation.” She disappeared into the bedroom, leaving him with the empty plates and the feeling. The feeling was expansive, light. It threaded through him with the caffeine, a steady current of possibility. He looked at the two plates side-by-side on the counter, the forks crossed. A domestic tableau. It didn’t feel like a trap. It felt like a foundation.
She emerged in cut-off jeans and a bikini top, her hair wrestled into a messy bun. “Ready for your masterpiece, boss?”
He dumped the plates in the sink. “It’s a wall, Sterre. One wall.”
“Same thing,” she said again, grabbing her keys, her smile wide and sure in the morning light.