Yale…

She was quiet on the drive over. I kissed her inside the door and let her set up the dining room how she would like it. When I came back from the second trip, she was guiding Dawnie around the apartment, helping her get used to things. I watched the blind woman a moment and I think I caught a glimpse of what Ally loved in her. She walked around, her cane preceding her, Ally at her hip.

With her other hand, however, she touched. With every light graze of her fingertips against a new texture, the wood of my table, the grain of the leather of my favorite chair, the plaid throw on the back of my couch, a slight smile shaped her lips and I realized it wasn’t often she had the time or ability to explore a new space so thoroughly.

“Nice place, Lover Boy,” she said to me with a crooked smile, and I felt an answering one touch my lips.

“If you’re going to call me something obnoxious, might as well streamline it. Call me Yale.” I set down Ally’s totes by the door and Dawnie paused from lightly touching the back of one of my dining room chairs, gauging distance between them.

“Is that where you went to school?” she asked.

“No, he went to Columbia,” Ally said and turned with the cord to her sewing machine to find a nearby wall socket for it.

“Then why do they call you Yale?” Dawnie had one eyebrow raised, and I realized how different she looked without her glasses, staring at something fixed in front of her, without seeing a thing.

“Because I had every opportunity to go and I didn’t.”

“Why?” she asked like it was crazy, and for a lot of people, it was.

“Because it pissed off my mother,” I said honestly.

She laughed, “Oh, my God! You’re serious.”

“Yes, he is,” Ally declared, straightening.

“Not something I am especially proud of in hindsight, but yeah.”

“Holy crap, okay. Your mom a piece of work or something?”

“Dawnie!” Ally barked, exasperated.

“What? I thought we were getting to know each other, here.”

“Enough sharing-is-caring for now,” I said. “I have some things to do over here in the home office. You girls do whatever it is you do, okay?”

“What, just like that?” Dawnie asked.

“Yes, Dawnie! Just like that!” Ally cried and I chuckled, letting them bicker.

I think Dawnie and I understood each other a little better in that unspoken way. She smiled at me and schooled her face into one of a petulant teenager before she turned to argue with her best friend. Intentionally aggravating Ally mildly was a bit manipulative, but, any port in a storm. Anything that could distract her from her grief for even a short while would be a welcome distraction indeed.

I worked late, Ally sewed, and Dawnie sat curled on one of my two couches, her back to me as she crocheted, with the hook and yarn right in front of her eyes as if she could see it. Ally had told me that something about the accident had severed Dawnie’s optic nerves, plunging her into total darkness. It had a tendency to affect her sleep and other things about her life, but for the most part, she had adapted remarkably well.

“Sorry, girls,” I said softly, when I just couldn’t tolerate reading another single brief. “I do still have to get through my day tomorrow before the weekend.” I stretched and said, “I’ll order you an Uber and get you home, Dawnie.”

“Thanks, I’ll call my dad and have him meet me at the curb there.”

I pulled up the app on my phone and Ally hugged her best friend at the door. “I’m going to clean up, up here.”

“Okay, call me tomorrow?”

“Absolutely.”

“Come any time you’d like,” I told her, and Dawnie smiled in my general direction.

“Thanks.”

I walked her down and helped her into the back of the car, as she called her dad. She waved and I smiled, not bothering to wave back. Back in the apartment, I found Ally neatly piling and laying aside strips of material. The skirt she was working on looked like it was nearly completed.

“Looks nice,” I murmured, and she smiled.

“Thanks.”

“Come here,” I ordered softly, and she came to me.

I kissed her and let it linger probably a little longer than would be considered appropriate, given the circumstances.

“You said there were paperwork and things I had to do…” She trailed off unhappily and I sighed.

“Tomorrow morning. I’m going to work from home.”

“You can do that?”

I nodded, “I have a login; I can prepare briefs just as easily here as I can at the office. I don’t have court tomorrow and no meetings with any opposition that I know of. I may get called in, but we’ll see.”

“Okay.”

She looked up at me, eyes glassy with tears, and said, “I’m going to miss her so much.”

“I know, baby. I know.” I held her tightly, but she didn’t dissolve immediately like she had yesterday. She held it together quite admirably.

“I feel like I’m drowning,” she said, and her voice was hollow, drained, and I understood perfectly well how much it cost her to make the admission. How much she trusted me to make such a confession. We had grown up worlds apart, but one thing we had in common was the knowledge that you couldn’t tell anyone anything personal. To do so meant trust on a monumental scale.

“Trust me to take care of you?” I asked.

“Of course,” she said dully, her emotional exhaustion coloring her voice in muted tones.

“Come into the bedroom with me. Strip. I need to gather a few things,” I said to her, and she looked up at me, drawing back to do so.

“Okay,” she agreed, and I kissed her forehead and let her go.

She moved past me for the hall and I watched her go, before pinching the bridge of my nose. I was tired, but she needed an escape, one that only I could provide, so it would be coffee tomorrow ‒ copious amounts of coffee. I pulled my shirt over my head with a sigh and went after her. She stood at the foot of my bed, mutely taking off her clothes, her long tee falling to the floor, her leggings peeling down her legs. I went into my walk-in closet and discarded my own tee in the laundry basket.

I kicked off my boots and put them back where they belonged. Socks to the laundry hamper as well. I left my jeans on for now and went into one of the drawers in the wall unit, sorting through the rope I had there. I skipped the hemp rope and went with the softer bamboo, pulling out two thirty-foot lengths. The rope I had chosen was a beautiful cobalt blue. I selected a black satin sleep mask out of another drawer and returned to the bedroom.

Ally was on her knees, legs parted, seated back on her heels, hands resting on her thighs in the slave rest position I had taught her, and I felt my cock stir. Her submission was beautiful to me and I had every intention of rewarding her for the gift she brought to my heart which swelled with a fondness and love for her like no other.

“Stand up for me,” I ordered. She did, and I gave a further command: “Turn your back to me, Bright Eyes.” She turned away from me. “One giant step to the left.” I needed her away from the bed so I would have the room I needed. She obeyed beautifully, and I set the rope on the foot of the bed. The mask I retained, and went up to her back, pressing a light kiss to her shoulder. She sighed out and I murmured, “Close your eyes,” against her skin. I felt more tension ease from her as she submitted to my will.

I gathered her hair down her back‒ it reached nearly to her waist now. I loved her long hair, her supple skin, her light breaths as she waited in anticipation of what I would do to her next. I slipped the mask over her eyes, and she sucked in a sharp breath before letting it out in a trembling sigh. She was so stressed, so distraught, that this was going to take some work.

“Put your hands behind your back, palms together, lace your fingers, like this.” I guided her arms gently to where I wanted them to be and pressed her forearms together, doing some light stretching. “Is that too much?” I asked.

“No.”

“Are you comfortable holding this stance, like this, for a while?”

“I think so.”

“You know your safewords, tell me if at any time it becomes uncomfortable.”

“Yes, sir.”

I undid the first bundle of rope and flung it out to the side. It unraveled and slapped the carpet and she jumped slightly at the unfamiliar sound. I made a soothing sound and started a loop at her thumbs, holding the rope at the bight. I smoothed the length between my hands and wound it around her wrists, creating a wrap-cinch, binding her wrists together. I used the extra rope to bind her in a double column from wrist to elbow, her shoulder blades sharply pulled together. It would have a similar effect when I got to fucking her from behind that as it would if I pulled her arms back to drive into her. This would only be slightly less intense and would leave my hands free, though.

I turned her and she went willingly with the motion. I shoved her forward and she yipped slightly as she fell face-first into the mattress. I helped her up onto the bed and said, “Wait for just a moment. I’m still here; I’m not leaving you or going anywhere. Just hold that thought.”

I went and grabbed my wedge pillow from just inside the closet door and brought it to the bed. I helped her to her knees, set it in front of her and laid her back down. The wedge, under her lifted her hips and took some of the pressure off. It also allowed her to breathe a bit better. Just flat to the bed she would be face-planted into the mattress, which could be claustrophobic or unpleasant.

I was going for bound, helpless, and at my mercy, but I didn’t want to go too extreme for our first time engaging in serious rope-play and bondage. I went to the foot of the bed and unfurled the next set of rope, mimicking what I’d done to her wrists with her legs, binding her from ankle to knees, so she was trussed and safe. So she would just need to take what I gave her, feel everything, with no other choice.

God, I was hard. I admired my handiwork, how she lay helpless, her head turned to the side, her lips parted as she took deep, steady breaths. She was calm and sinking fast into sub space, as if her overwrought mind had simply switched off, finally.

I smoothed a hand over her exposed skin, touching her lightly but firmly, sweeping my fingers and palm over her body and watching the goosebumps raise on her. I took my time stripping out of my jeans, undoing my belt, letting her hear everything. Letting her listen as I opened the drawer on what had become my side of the bed when she was here. The sound of tearing the condom packet off the string of them. The crinkle of the wrapper as I tore it open. The subtle sounds of me rolling it down my length.

Every bit of it was more erotic than the last. Every subtle noise, every shift in air current against her skin, every shift of the mattress as I straddled the backs of her thighs, ramped up the anticipation. The tension so thick with what next you could slice it with a razor. Her breath was already coming in soft, short little pants the more I touched her.

I pressed on her glorious ass, pressing it out of my way to her entrance and, of course, found her body slick and wanting me. She never disappointed me on that front. I pressed my fingers inside her and massaged her walls, finding and exploiting that rough patch just a few inches inside and down. She whimpered and writhed against my hand as much as her bonds would allow and I smiled to myself.

“I’m going to fuck you,” I told her, and she clenched around my fingers. I grinned and went further, “I’m going to fuck you and you’re going to come all over my dick. I’m not going to stop fucking you either. I’m not going to stop until I’m satisfied.”

I slapped her right ass cheek with a sharp report and she let out a low, gasping cry, and came lightly around my fingers. I felt a wicked grin curve my lips and said to her, “That’s it. That’s my good girl,” as I teased another orgasm out of her. A stronger one, this time, with my fingers. She bit her bottom lip, whimpering, body relaxed and languid beneath mine. When she reached that point and she was super wet and ready, I plunged my cock into her warmth.

I wasn’t easy on her, but I wasn’t as rough as I could be, either. I stroked inside deeply and thrust just that little bit more and she cried out, a wailing, begging sound that was music to my ears. I set a rhythm that was just this side of punishing and rode her body into the mattress and wedge and she screamed, “Yes!” and angled her hips as best she could to both accept my body into hers and thrust hers back onto me.

It was hot, she was so far gone from her worries and concerns for the moment, and I had successfully gotten her there. I sighed out and worked my body into hers and let myself go and really feel her; let my body make the decisions for me in a pale imitation of what I had already stripped her down to.

The pressure built, things tensed and I thought I would explode and then I did in the best way possible. My balls contracted, my cock jumped inside her and I filled the damn condom so hard I thought it might very well be to the damn brim.

“Oh, god! Ally!” I cried and collapsed over her, chest and belly scraping over the ridges of soft rope holding her at my mercy.

We panted, lying spent for several minutes while I tried to find the strength to push myself up and work her bonds loose. Slipping the rope free from its quick-release knot at the top and loosening things from elbow to wrist, I managed to pull the lot of it free, sliding it off like a sleeve.

I took my time, massaging life back into her hands and admiring the lattice of rope imprints in her delicate skin. She moaned softly, groaning when she took her arms back and moved them forward to lay flat on the bed.

“I’ll get your legs, just lay still.”

I pressed fingers to the root of my softening cock and slid out of her, holding the condom on and walking backward on my knees to either side of her so that I could step off the end of the bed and deal with it quickly before I got to unbinding her the rest of the way. She lay limp and in a perfect state of bliss while I threw the condom in the trash and wound the rope from her arms back into a neat bundle. I unlaced her legs and wound that rope too, while she basked in her afterglow. She didn’t move once she was free and I smiled to myself, glad she’d liked it.

I set the rope aside on the nightstand and pulled back a triangle of blankets and sheets, saying “Come on Bright Eyes. I need you to move under the covers with me.”

She pushed herself up slowly, languidly, and I pulled the wedge out from under her and set it aside. She stretched luxuriously, like a cat, and crawled to the top of the bed, sliding beneath the covers. I chuckled and got into the bed with her, reaching up and switching off the bedside lamp, plunging us into darkness. She sighed and settled against me, cuddling as close as she could get, putting as much of her warm, silky skin against mine as she could.

“I love you,” she breathed and I kissed the top of her head, understanding the importance of sharing those three little words. Understanding the importance of sharing them back, as quickly and as often as possible.

“I love you, too, Bright Eyes.”

You never wanted to waste the opportunity to tell the ones you loved that you did, or just how much. You never knew when it might be the last opportunity and what’s more, the world we lived in needed as much love and positive energy as anyone could muster to put out into it.

The truth was, I needed this as much as she had. The briefs and case-files scattered on my desk in the next room weren’t going to soon be far from my thoughts, just as the pile of funeral arrangement paperwork for her grandmother wasn’t going to be, either.