CHAPTER FOUR
STERLING
Opening the door to my mom’s shop, I find the lights are all off. The chairs stacked up, some stuff covered in sheets. It’s obvious no one’s been in here for a long while. I run my fingers across the station where my mom worked. This was her spot for as long as I can remember. I had a playpen here. I did my homework in here after school. Other kids had forts or tree houses in their backyard. I had my momma’s shop. The majority of the memories I have of my mother are in this space, that’s now covered in dust.
I hear the screen porch door open, knowing Momma’s staring at me from the house. She knows I know. How can they have kept this from me? I know the answer. Why do parents do a lot of things? To protect their children.
I walk across the yard, the rush of the Bay waves in the background. “Where’s Daddy?” I ask. “Church?”
She doesn’t respond other than to take my hand. “Stop beatin’ around the bush.”
“Why’d you close your shop?”
She draws a deep breath and looks out into the blackness. “Sterling, it’s nothing. I didn’t want you to worry.”
“Momma?”
She takes my other hand, sitting me down on the porch swing with her. “I had a little stroke.”
“Stroke!” She says it like it’s no big deal, like she’s telling me she has a hang nail. I didn’t think there were such things as little strokes. Suddenly, I’m sobbing, finding myself scanning her hands, her face—anything for a sign of her health. “Are you okay?”
“Baby, I’m fine. The only side effect is a tiny bit of shaking in my left hand. Other than that, I’m fit as a fiddle.”
“But what caused it? What did the doctor say? Did you see a neurologist? Is there medicine?”
“Sterling,” she says gently, pulling me into her arms and using her foot to make the swing rock back and forth.
How many nights did we spend out here exactly like this? There really is nothing like your momma’s arms. She starts to hum softly, her voice mixing with the wind and waves, creating a melody of peace. Being an only child, my parents have always been overly protective of me. I know that’s why they didn’t tell me, but I sense a shift happening. Soon enough, it will be my time to take care of them. They always wanted to give me everything, and I want to do the same for them. I know just what to do.
“How’re my girls?” Daddy asks, stepping out onto the porch. Momma strokes my hair, giving him a little nod. They’ve been together so long they can speak without words. It only takes that one motion for Daddy to know she told me. “I see,” he says, grinning.
“It’s not funny,” I say. “When did this happen?”
He kneels in front of us, looking up at my momma. “About six months ago. Sugar, your momma is just fine. I promise you.” I give him a little nod. “Heard you were at the school today.”
“How’d you hear that?”
“Small town,” Momma says, laughing. “Knew you were there before you knew you were going. Nothing is secret here.”
I get to my feet, teasing them. “Well, I’ve got a secret.”
“Got anything to do with Rorke Weston?” Momma asks, raising her eyebrows. “That boy has turned into a handsome young man.”
*
I forgot how hot the South is in the summertime. Opening my bedroom window to let the night breeze come in, I know there’s another reason for the heat. My skin’s been on fire since Rorke mentioned us being together that night. I can’t believe he’d bring that up, after all these years. But what I can’t believe more is that it would make me feel like this—pent up and horny as all get out.
People assume because I developed a vibrator that I just sit around and masturbate all day and night. But the truth is, I don’t. I never even use a vibrator anymore. That’s probably not the best thing to admit, but my product is so good, no man can live up to its standards. I worried that I was ruining my chance to ever have satisfying sex with a real live man, so I stopped using it. I’m cursing that decision now, because the only thing I want is to release some stress, to get off.
I don’t hear any noise in the house. My parents must be asleep. But with no locks on my bedroom door, I better be sure. To be on the safe side, I keep my cotton nightgown on, slip off my panties and get under my sheets.
Rorke’s question echoes in my brain. Better than me?
The truth is, there’s not a man, a toy, or anything else for that matter, that is better than that one night I shared with him. What are the odds of having the best sexual experience of your life at eighteen, both virgins? I can’t explain it. And over the years, I’ve wondered if it was just my inexperience that made it seem so good. After all, I had nothing to compare it to. But seeing him again, I know it wasn’t.
But I meant it when I said I wanted to be his friend. It’s better that way. One of the unforeseen consequences of developing a sex toy is that relationships with men just don’t work out for me. It’s better for everyone this way.
But that doesn’t mean I can’t have this little fantasy. At eighteen, he was as inexperienced as I was, maybe even more. But what he lacked in knowledge, he made up for in pure desire.
Pulling down my nightgown slightly, I stroke the hot skin of my breasts, remembering when Rorke first reached for me. The way his strong hands felt caressing me, like he was touching something forbidden, like a work of art in a museum that’s there to be admired but not touched. That’s what I was to him, and even at that tender age, I knew it. But I didn’t know he’d ruin me for every other man. That no man would ever make me feel that revered again.
This time, when my breasts hit the night air, I don’t tremble like I did then. My nipples peak, and I close my eyes, licking my finger. His tongue circled and sucked softly at first. Boys were usually rough and rushed, but not Rorke. My body was his shrine, his place to worship. His kiss, the tender nibbles, both creating a deep ache between my thighs. I’d never felt it before when a boy touched me. It almost hurt, this deep need to feel him.
“Rorke,” I whisper into my empty bedroom, just like I whispered it into his ear that night.
My hand slips lower.
His kiss meandering down my flesh.
There is nothing that could’ve prepared me for the first feel of his tongue between my legs. I’d heard about oral sex, but mostly about the “bad” girls who did those things. I was a deacon’s daughter, raised a certain way, but I didn’t care. All I knew was if this was bad, then I never wanted to be “good” again. Now he’s got a slight stubble on his face that I know would just add to my pleasure.
My legs spread wider in my bed, my finger mimicking the movements of his tongue over me. I credit Rorke with teaching me everything I know about a woman’s orgasm, that it doesn’t come from one place. The most powerful and best orgasms are a whole-body experience. You can’t ignore any part. The clit is great, but the lips are just as important. And Rorke worked it all.
I remember the wave of heat flashing over me, my first orgasm sending my entire body trembling. “How’d you learn how to do that?” I asked him.
“I think I was made to love you,” he whispered.
“Can you do it again?” I teased, not really expecting him to slip back down between my legs.
But he did.
And I did.
My fingers start moving faster between my legs, and I’m desperate to get there, to find release, the rush of memories feeding my desire. Rorke would’ve been content to bring me to orgasm over and over again that night. We’d already crossed a line, so why stop there? Somewhere inside me, I knew this was how I wanted to lose my virginity—with Rorke.
We did more together that night than many couples do in years. He pleased me, I pleasured him. He was on top. I was on top. He took me standing up. I took him sitting down. It was one night of pure bliss.
Nothing compares to that first moment, the feel as he lingered at my entrance, his eyes studying my face so intently. The way my body stretched, making room for him. The slow way he pushed himself into me. The look of pure, raw pleasure on his face, like I was watching his greatest dream coming true. The way our awkward teenage bodies seemed to know just how to move together.
Stuffing my pillow over my face, a flash of heat washes over me. His name falls from my lips, carried out by the bay breeze.
*
RORKE
Hammering the nail with one hard pound, I mutter, “Friends?”
That should be a cuss word, especially coming out of her full, pink lips. I toss the hammer aside, scanning the mostly-converted barn. Yep, I live in a barn. Well, not any barn. The barn where Sterling and I lost our virginity. I know just the spot. It’s the spot where my bed is now.
I didn’t plan it that way. In fact, I didn’t even really think about it until she showed up in town the other day. I came home, walked in, and realized I’ve designed this place around her. Crazy, but true. That woman has burned herself into the deepest parts of my soul. Deeper than even I realized. She was my first, a memory. I thought it was over. I thought we’d only ever get that one night. She had her life, and I had mine. I didn’t see this coming.
This old barn sits on the edge of my parents’ property. It sucks to be almost thirty and still living on my parents’ land. Technically, I’m not living at home, but sometimes it feels like it. Unfortunately, buying my own house on my teaching salary isn’t in the cards, so a few years ago, I started converting one of the old barns.
Every nail, every piece of wood in here has been touched by me. And it’s almost done. It’s wide open, designed that way mostly because it’s less work than putting up a bunch of walls. The only room with any privacy is the bathroom. I left the distressed rafters from the ceiling exposed and just refinished them. The original sliding barn doors have been replaced with new ones. Almost one whole wall houses my personal library. The only thing left to finish is the kitchen. The upper cabinets are in, but my only appliances are a refrigerator and microwave. So any real meals I eat come from the main house—my parents’ house. My plan is to use part of my summer vacation to finish it up.
I look over at the bed. My subconscious must have taken over with that decision. Sterling is etched into the fiber of this place. Maybe that’s the reason I haven’t ever brought a woman to see this place before? Who knows? The subconscious is a tricky bitch.
But the memories of that day and night are so vivid. It’s all flooding back now that she’s back.
I remember a buddy of mine had rushed me home my freshman year of college, making the two-and-a-half-hour drive from New Orleans in just under two. But I was too late. I wasn’t here when Levi took his last breath. Those few days are a blur. Everything is a blur until the moment I stood up at his funeral to speak; her green eyes were the only thing I saw, her whimpers the only ones I heard. I hadn’t expected her to be there. I hadn’t expected her to fly home from college to say goodbye to my brother, but she had. And I didn’t expect her to find me at my parents’ house after the funeral. I swear, there were hundreds of people there, and it was the loneliest day of my life. I had to get out of there and started walking. I’m not sure if it’s just me, but when I need to think, I tend to walk. That day, Sterling was by my side. We didn’t talk, roaming around the fields until we ended up at this old barn. It was the place that Levi and I escaped to. As little kids, we’d used it as a fort, a clubhouse. Later, it held our bikes and four wheelers.
I remember being embarrassed bringing Sterling inside. It was old and filled with our junk. The only place to even sit was an old, beat up sofa. We made good use of it, though.
I’ve never been as unprepared for something as I was that day. Unprepared to put my brother in the ground, unprepared to lose my virginity, unprepared to let her walk away.
I chuckle remembering exactly how unprepared I was when our naked bodies first touched. My brain thought “condom.” But I didn’t have one. My dick promised it’d pull out. But I had no idea the kind of willpower that would take. I swear to God, I had every intention of pulling out.
I thought for sure that she’d kill me, and quickly launched into the lamest apology in the history of the universe. Just thinking about it makes me cringe. I was never so thankful for anything in my whole life as when she kissed me to shut me up, whispering she was on the pill.
Some might think it’s a dick move to be banging a girl the day you bury your twin brother. But it wasn’t like that at all. It wasn’t cheap. I didn’t think of it as a one-night stand, even though technically it was. It’s impossible to explain. It was us clinging onto life, onto each other. Emily Brontë wrote, “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” And after that night, our souls have been forever linked.
Every single second of that night is burned into my mind, my heart, my skin.
After that night, we stayed in touch for a long time—email, phone calls. But we were thousands of miles apart. And our paths never crossed again. If I was at home on break, she wasn’t. It just seemed like it wasn’t meant to be. She is the one that got away. We never got our chance.
Now she’s back, and she thinks we can be friends? I spent my entire childhood and teenage years being “friends” with her.
She wants to be friends? That’s fine. I’ll be her friend. But I’ll be damned if that’s all I am.