As much as I tried to avoid her, Mary eventually caught up to me. I was in the “art room,” tuning a guitar and hoping the aging strings still had enough juice in them not to snap, when I heard the door close. “You’re missing snack time,” she said as I looked up.
“Always sounded too Kindergarten to me,” I told her, plucking the G string and tightening it a fraction.
“It’s part of a plan to get you guys to eat regularly,” Mary said, coming further into the room. She took up a stool a few feet away from me. “I’m sure I don’t have to tell you what a problem addicts and alcoholics tend to have with not eating.” I shrugged, twisting my arm to look at the F-hole tattoo permanently painted there, a souvenir from my first Festival gig that I’d gotten at Love Hate almost as soon as I’d left the stage.
“I eat like a fucking pig,” I said quietly, turning my attention to the B string. I cringed at the sour tone. “You know, if you expect anyone to make anything of these instruments, you should probably keep them tuned.” I looked at Mary. She smiled slightly.
“You’re probably the only one we currently have here who’s capable of playing a guitar decently,” she told me. “The rule is if you can tune it, you can play it.”
I rolled my eyes. “You could at least get some fresh strings.”
“It’s low on the priority list, but I could see if we could get some, if it fits in the budget.”
I went back to tuning, carefully not looking at her. I finally settled the B string and moved on to the bottom E, closing my eyes to catch the tone as it shifted. This was a tricky one; the three bottom strings were all likely to snap—but the high E was the likeliest of all. After a few moments, I got it in tune and opened my eyes.
“So,” I said, strumming a quick chord. “I take it you’re here to follow up on my situation?” I shifted my fingers on the strings, moving into another chord, and began to idly pick out an old Elliott Smith song. This is the place you end up when you lose the chase/ where you’re dragged against your will from a basement on the hill…
“I was checking up on you, sure,” Mary said, watching my fingers moving across the neck of the guitar, my other hand plucking the strings in the familiar melody. “You didn’t think I’d forgotten, did you?” I shrugged, humming the vocal melody to myself for a moment. If it’s your decision to be open about yourself/ be careful or else, be careful or else… I decided it was good advice.
“My lead guitarist thinks you’re hot,” I said with a little smile. “Did he get your number? He was going to try.” I knew Nick had given up the idea; but his words—his suggestion that I was into Mary—still rankled.
“Was he the tall one who looks a little like a bird, with the long hair and the blue eyes?”
I nodded, shifting into a different song; Frank Turner’s “Fisher King Blues.” Lovers don’t be sparing with the truth/ break their hearts if that’s what you must do/ Fill them with remorse, tinged with hope of course/ and let their baser instincts pull them through…
“He’s cute enough, but he knows it already.”
I laughed in spite of myself. “Yeah, he’s definitely aware.”
Mary took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, looking down at her hands.
“Do you have any tattoos?”
She looked up sharply. “Why do you ask?”
I took a brief break from strumming and picking to spread my hands, indicating the ink marking my own skin.
Mary glanced away, her lips twisting into a wry grin. “I do, actually, but you’re not likely to ever see them.”
I raised an eyebrow. “That sounds like a challenge to me,” I pointed out. We were born without reason/ We’ll die without meaning/ and the world will not shrug all that much at our passing/ you can try and try and try, but no one ever makes it out alive…
“It’s not,” Mary said flatly, and I smirked to myself as her cheeks flushed pink. “I got them in specific places for specific reasons and part of that was so that I could cover them up easily.”
“Where are they, then?” I stopped strumming, trying to decide which song to play next. My fingers were starting to ache from the strings; I hadn’t played for a couple of weeks before being admitted, and my calluses were almost all gone.
“If I tell you, will you talk about why you’re here?” Mary looked at me intently, and I looked down at the guitar, smiling to myself. Not one to miss a trick like that, is she? I started playing OK Go, “Let it Rain,” since the acoustic part wasn’t very complicated. I tapped my sock-covered foot on the linoleum tile floor in time to the waltz beat, running through the lyrics in my mind. I’d played the song at an acoustic gig Molly Riot had had at a coffee shop a month before, while the rest of the band except for Nick was pissing or grabbing refills.
“Sure,” I said finally. “You tell me about getting inked, I’ll talk about why I’m here.” I looked up and raised an eyebrow, inclining my head towards Mary to tell her silently to go ahead. She looked away for a moment and her lips twisted in an expression that wasn’t quite a smile.
“I have four,” she said quietly. “All of them are along my hips and thighs.”
My eyes widened as I tried to picture it.
“What are they?” I asked, shifting back into Frank Turner, “I Am Disappeared.” I keep having dreams/ of pioneers and pirate ships and Bob Dylan/ Of people wrapped up tight in the things that will kill them… I shook my head, not to dismiss the question but at the aptness of the lyrics. A different song entirely tugged at my sobriety-addled brain; something about Mary. I ignored it and played faster than the song actually went.
“I have a blue lotus,” Mary said, her voice barely louder than my playing. “A peony. Some song lyrics. A yellow rose.”
I nodded.
“All below the belt,” I confirmed.
“None of them are where you’re thinking about right now,” she said firmly. “Now stop playing and talk.” I finished the song with a little flourish and pressed my fingers to the strings, silencing them.
“What do you want to know?”
Mary sighed, shifting on her stool. “I want to know what the situation is, and how exactly I can help you. There’s no point in you being here if you’re not actually trying to get sober; you could stay somewhere else just as well.” I considered it. The rehab was a secure facility, they did bed checks through the night, it would be difficult for Big J to get to me in any direct way. Also, I thought that in spite of the band’s warnings, it would be difficult for him to persuade someone to go clean for even a few days for the sake of getting in and killing me.
“My dealer wants me dead, my band thinks I’m not quite in control, my label figures I might as well take a break while they try and get the heat off of me,” I said, ticking off the reasons on my fingers. “As for me? Fuck. I don’t know.” I looked at my hands; they trembled from the effort of playing, and my fingertips felt like they were swelling. Everything that happened to me seemed to be so much more intense—twinges of pain, feelings of sadness, feelings of happiness.
“Are you willing to at least give it an honest try?” Mary crossed her arms over her chest. I closed my eyes, willing myself not to notice. Okay, Nick was right about one thing; she’s hot as hell. Fuck. Fucking tattoos. Fucking hips. Think about something else, North. I clenched my teeth until the wave of heat finished washing through me, willing it to stop pooling right above my cock.
“Are you willing to show me your tattoos?” The words left my lips before I had even fully thought them and I opened my eyes. Mary stared at me, her cheeks red, the blush spreading down along the little scoop of skin her tee shirt showed of her chest.
“You know I can get you kicked out for coming onto me,” she said, licking her lips. You say that when you’re licking your lips like you wonder what I taste like. Fuck—fuck, fuck, fuck. Bitch is crazy.
“You should call Nick,” I said, breathing slowly. “I’ll give you his number.”
“Why should I call him?” Mary’s dark eyebrows came together as she frowned in confusion. It felt like I had a bar of molten lead in my pants.
“You need to get laid, if you think me asking you to see your tattoos was a come-on,” I told her, trying to keep my voice level.
Mary’s blush deepened. “Do you really think you’re going to convince me that you just want to see my ink to check the artistry?”
I snickered; she was right.
“No,” I admitted. “I wanted to see if you were telling the truth about it not being where I think.” Mary scowled, her arms tightening across her chest, and I bit back a groan at the sight of her tits pushing up against the neck of her shirt.
“You’re being really inappropriate, Alex,” Mary said, pressing her lips together.
“You like it, admit it,” I told her, unable to keep from grinning. “The only reason a woman like you gets tattoos where her clothes cover them up is so she can reveal them to someone she likes at the right time.”
Mary opened her mouth and then shut it abruptly. “That doesn’t mean I want to show them to you,” she said, the color in her cheeks burning brighter every moment.
“You wouldn’t be blushing like that if you didn’t,” I countered. “Ever fuck a patient before, Mary?”
“No,” she said, almost biting the word off. “I haven’t. I’m a professional.”
I glanced at the door to the art room.
“No one has to know. I’m sure we’re not the first people who’d use this room to fuck each other’s brains out. Besides, you have a key. You can lock the door.”
Mary stood quickly and my heart beat faster in my chest, my blood roaring in my ears. She looked at the door and then looked at me, and the look in her eyes was hot enough to melt steel.
“I have lost my goddamned mind,” she said, turning and almost sprinting to the door. I laughed as quietly as I could as I watched her fumble with the keys on her lanyard, finally sticking the right one into the lock and turning it over. “If you tell anyone, Alex North, I swear to God you will not be able to find a rehab place in all of Florida that will take you.”
She strode towards me, her shoes clack-clack-clacking on the old linoleum, and I felt a jolt of heat shoot through my body. This was really about to happen. I was about to fuck my counselor’s brains out, right here, right now. Mary stopped in front of me, taking a breath, and reached down to the fly of her jeans.
“Stop,” I said, pushing her hands away and leaning forward. “Allow me.” I looked up into her dark eyes with a little grin.
I could feel Mary trembling as I unbuttoned and unzipped the fly of her jeans, peeling the denim down slowly. I caught the sight of her lace-trimmed black panties, and as I tugged at the waistband of her jeans, the black-lined petals of her tattoos peeked up over the lace; one soft and ruffled, the other bloom sharp and linear. The peony and the lotus. Mary twisted slightly and I could see the fine calligraphy anchoring each of the blooms on either side of her hip, the words disappearing underneath the lace of her panties.
“Where’s the rose?” I asked, looking up at her with an eyebrow raised.
Mary licked her lips, her cheeks still delicately pink. “Further down,” she told me quietly. I tugged her jeans down off her hips completely and the yellow petals came into view, right at the top of her thigh were the line of her panties ended on her left leg. I pulled her jeans down to her knees and admired her for a long moment, leaning in a little closer to get a better view of the details.
“Very good shading work,” I murmured, reaching out to brush my fingertips along the edges of the peony that decorated her right hip. “What are the lyrics?”
Mary shivered as my fingers tugged at the waistband of her panties, revealing the bottom of the bloom. “It’s a Silverchair song,” she said, her voice breathless. I turned her hip to look at the first block of text, reading it in the fluorescent light. All the bridges/ in the world/ won’t save you… I nodded slightly and turned her the other way to examine the second half of the text. If there is no/ other side/ to cross to… “It—it came out when I was a teenager, and it always seemed pretty significant to me.”
“I’m the last person to give someone shit about their tattoo choices,” I told Mary, looking up from my examination. Breathing in, I could smell the sweet smell of her radiating from her panties, mingling with the light perfume she wore. “Now that we’re here, might as well enjoy it.” I licked my lips, glancing up at Mary’s face.
“Seriously, Alex,” she said, her eyes dark with lust and wide with a little fear. “If anyone finds out about this, I’m fired. And you’re out of here—and Big J won’t even have to try and get anyone into the facility to take you out.” I nodded.
I leaned back on the couch and pulled Mary down with me, wrapping my arms around her waist and pressing her body against mine. I had just a moment to realize that I’d been right; I could span her waist with one arm. Then she was bringing her lips down against mine, and I groaned, my grip tightening as I opened my mouth and slid my tongue along her lips. Mary shifted against me, and I trailed my hands all over her body; I hadn’t realized just how much I had been thinking about what it would be like to get to know the curves I’d been watching until the moment my hands slid from her tits to her waist, tickling her ribs. I tugged the hem of her shirt up, pulling it over her head in a quick movement and letting it fall to the floor next to us.
Bit by bit our clothes fell away; I shifted around and twisted underneath Mary until my cock sprung free of my boxers, until I felt her hand close around it. “Fuck…God, babe. If you don’t stop that I’m going to come in your hand.” She gave me one more lingering stroke and then her hand fell away, her weight shifting on top of me. I opened my eyes to get a full view of her heavy, firm tits; her pale pink nipples, now firm little nubs that begged me to suck and lick them. I cupped the heavy mounds in my hands, bringing each one to my mouth in turn and smiled against Mary’s skin as she gasped, trembling from the feeling of my lips and tongue worshipping her. She wriggled and writhed on top of me and I groaned out at the feeling of her hot, slick folds rubbing against my aching-hard cock, teasing me for what seemed like hours. I rocked my hips against hers, clutching her close, wanting more—but knowing I couldn’t hold out for long.
I pushed down on her hips while I thrust up, and for a second I thought I’d lose it—that I’d come immediately, as Mary’s tight, wet, hot pussy wrapped around me. She moaned out, kissing me hungrily as her legs pressed against mine, every muscle in her body tensing as our hips met. I held her still for a long moment, trying to regain my self-control, and then we started moving together, touching each other everywhere. It had been years since I’d wanted it so bad; and with all the drugs out of my system, every little tightening of her inner walls, every little moan that left her lips, threatened to send me over the edge—I was so sensitive everywhere, it was like the first time I’d ever done E. We fell into a rhythm together, and I tried to keep it slow; I wanted to remember this when I was tossing and turning in bed in a few hours, when Gerard had gone to sleep and I could pretend like I had a little privacy. Mary felt so good, so right; I kissed her lips, her throat, her chin, as she rode me steadily, her hips twisting and shifting as she rose and fell, her inner walls tightening and flexing around my throbbing, aching cock.
I lost all track of time and didn’t care; I wanted it to go on forever. I started thrusting harder and faster without being able to help myself, and Mary’s moans filled my ears, vibrating against my shoulder, my lips. I managed to hold back just long enough to feel her whole body tense, feel her shudder against me as the first wave of her climax rocked her. A moment later I tumbled over the edge and pushed my hips up against hers mindlessly as I came, moaning against her hot, soft lips while her body clenched around me tightly in little erratic spasms.
We both collapsed, panting and gasping, and with my eyes closed, fireworks lit up the inside of my head, aftershocks of pleasure crackling through my nerves. I felt Mary’s weight shift what seemed like only a heartbeat later; it had to have been longer. I opened my eyes to see her standing, quickly pulling her clothes on. The tattoos disappeared behind denim, cotton and lace; her gorgeous tits became nothing more than a silhouette. “Remember, Alex,” she said, smoothing her hair back off her face. “One word of this and we’re both out on our asses.”
I nodded, too spent still to talk.
“Get dressed, and be out in the common area in fifteen minutes. The door locks automatically.” She turned on her heel and I heard the clack-clack-clack of her shoes on the floor as she walked quickly away from me.