CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Jeremey
There was something different about Emmet as he made love to me.
It wasn’t bad, and it wasn’t so odd I felt as if someone else was having sex with me, but I noticed we weren’t having the sex we usually had. It wasn’t as if we always did the exact same thing, but Emmet does have his patterns and habits, and, well, we have them in bed too. This was more than that, though. It was the way he was having sex with me that felt different. I liked it, but it was so unexpected I couldn’t stop thinking about it.
He was so gentle. Emmet has a thing about pressure and the way he touches me. When it’s too soft it overstimulates him. I worried he wouldn’t be able to have sex at all because he’d been so upset in the living room, and any contact might have been too much.
So why was he running his hands over my skin, so soft and faint I tingled all over? His lips on my collarbone were bare brushes, teases and whispers—this should be making his skin crawl, but he didn’t stop, didn’t say anything. It was something out of my deepest fantasy, but I couldn’t enjoy it. All I could think about was how out of character it was for him, how it went against everything I knew him to be, and eventually I couldn’t take it anymore. I put my hands on his shoulders and looked him in the eye.
“Emmet, what’s going on? Why are you being so soft?”
He frowned. “Am I doing it wrong?”
I couldn’t stop a shiver. “No. It’s wonderful—but you can’t be enjoying it, can you? You always tell me this is the kind of touch you can’t stand. That it almost hurts you.”
“But you like it. I wanted you to have it this time.”
My heart ached and melted at the same time. “I don’t want you to hurt for me. It isn’t pleasure for me if it hurts you.”
He ran his hand down my sternum, the contact soft but more firm, an Emmet touch again. “It doesn’t hurt exactly. More of a tickle.”
I touched him too, being pointed in giving him the sensation I knew he enjoyed. “Have I ever complained about your touches? Have I said I wished for something different?”
He was staring at my hairline, but I knew he was looking as directly into my eyes as he could. “You like them. You should get them sometimes. And I don’t want anyone else to give them to you.”
My heart swelled, and I pulled him closer to me, so his chest was pressed to mine as I spoke into his ear. “But don’t you see, Emmet? All I want is you. It’s as if you’re the cake and everything else is frosting. I don’t want any other cake but you.”
He pushed up on his elbows and smiled his sideways Emmet smile. “I’m a cake?”
I had expected him to tell me he didn’t like similes. “Yes. You’re my cake.”
“I don’t want to get eaten.”
I blushed, but I made myself say the words. “No. I want you to eat me up.” I pressed on, past the embarrassment. It was Emmet. I had nothing to fear. “I don’t want you to try to change for me. I only want to be with you as you are. I’ll do whatever you want me to do. I enjoy it when you touch me soft or hard, when you kiss me or hold me or simply lie beside me. When you’re in the mood to kiss me all over and drive me wild or when you need to be alone and I only can sit outside your door, loving you. That’s what I want from you, Emmet. For you to let me be with you and help you. I don’t ever want you to change for me.”
For a moment his gaze met mine, and I stilled, thrilling. He was so intense I felt pinned to the bed. “You’re my sensory sack.”
“Your what?”
“My sensory sack. Like at the City Council meeting, when The Roosevelt Blues Brothers closed in for me, but this time it’s just you. You’re better than them. You’re the best sensory sack of all. Better sometimes than the real thing.”
I didn’t know what he meant at first, and then I realized. His sack in the closet. I was his…sack, his place to go for comfort. “Yes. Let me be your sensory sack. Let me be your safe place, where you can be yourself, where you can calm yourself, or whatever you need me to be. Come inside me, Emmet, and let me make the world go away.”
It was as if my words unbuckled something in him. He came at me with all his carefulness stripped away, no longer trying to be smooth and tender. I had enjoyed the other, but I preferred this. I wasn’t worried about him faking anything for me, not when he behaved this way.
His kiss was clumsy, overeager, and so full of Emmet I melted. I opened my mouth and took him in, feeling myself dissolve away as I let him move me into the position he wanted on the bed. I enjoyed, though, the way he trembled as he shifted my body, the way he was in control but only barely. Or rather, he was in control, but he wasn’t disciplining his body the way he did in public. He hummed and rocked and jerked, all his autistic tics on full display, and each one warmed my heart, undoing me further as he undressed me, caressed me, got me ready for him.
Yes, my love. Let me see you, all of you.
This was the same Emmet I had discovered when I came into the apartment with Mai, complete with all the aspects of his autism that so often frustrated him, except right now Emmet moved with his disabilities, made them work for him instead of fighting them. Danced with his octopus instead of letting it strangle him. And I knew I was biased. My love colored my vision, but to me this Emmet was so beautiful, so handsome, so perfect. I would never want him to be anyone other than who he was. If someone invented a technology that could make his brain like brains on the mean, could make him behave the same as other men without all the tics and habits setting him apart, I would still love him, but it would break my heart too, because I would miss this Emmet.
I can’t beat you either, RJ King, I thought, shutting my eyes as Emmet placed his mouth on my neck, but I can do this. I can lift up this man, the one who’s already bested you once. I can shine for him, keep him safe, keep him happy. I don’t have many strengths, but I do have this. Watch me, King. Watch me shore him up. Watch me make him as strong as I can, so he can take you down.
As Emmet made love to me, I imagined I was a liquid sheath, that as he stroked and entered my body I enveloped him right back, putting a protective coating around him and sending all my energy into him, feeding his octopus and strengthening his walls, fueling the computers in his brilliant mind. I let my love pour into him, trying to empty myself, except the more I pushed into him, the more power and strength and love I found inside myself. The idea that my love and our power together was endless thrilled me, and I gasped, clutching at him, imagining so long as we were together, nothing bad would ever happen.
I knew, intellectually, this wasn’t true. But in that moment it felt true. And as we lay in his bed together after, Emmet holding me though I knew he was overstimulated, I swam in the rush of endorphins, knowing for at least a little while they would douse my anxiety and depression better than any drug could ever hope to attempt.
I opened my eyes lazily, my lids heavy as I resisted the urge to stroke Emmet’s abdomen, staring across his naked chest instead. “If you need to go rock in the living room, I understand. It’s okay.”
“I don’t need to. You’re my sensory sack. The octopus is fine, with you.”
I shut my eyes again, heady with the rush of emotion. “Okay,” I replied, because it was all I could manage.
Then I held still, as still as I could, lying beside him as my love spun a more protective web around him. Because I was going to be the best sensory sack Emmet had ever had.