It’s coming

We rolled the dice, and the variations began.

I traced freckles. Her arm was damp. It was Dallas in the summer, which meant it had to be 100 degrees outside. I ran fingernails from her fingers to her shoulder, my knuckles bumping into her torso.

“I have a serious boyfriend.”

I traced. We rolled. We moved backgammon pieces.

I traced an oblong shape on her inner bicep. “That’s the state of Florida, where your boyfriend is living all summer.”

On her stomach, my forefinger wound in circles, around her belly button, down to her bikini line and around.

“What’s that supposed to be, mister?”

She sounded gruff, but she didn’t move away. “Clouds.”

“Clouds? That’s lame.”

My finger traced a straight line from her belly button to her chin, daring her to move, underlining my proximity to all things sexual, but not exactly getting to any bases. Back and forth, then swooping slightly, sensing the swell of her breasts.

“Hey,” she quietly barked.

“I won’t go beneath the suit. I promise.”

“You’re making it difficult to play.”

“That’s why it’s called a variation, plus you get to pick who plays which dice. You have the advantage.”

“I think I lost the advantage when I agreed to this game.”

Perhaps it was the beer, but I was hardly paying attention to the game.

I grabbed inch-long, downy red hairs on the nape of Anne’s neck. I tugged.

“He wouldn’t like us to be back here.”

I looked around. They had, of course, a very nice backyard. “Your boyfriend doesn’t let you play backgammon?”

I played with her ear, tugging and sliding.

“The rest of me is getting very jealous of my finger,” I said as my pinkie slid into her ear canal.

“Don’t get any ideas. My parents could show up and surprise us.”

“I thought you said they’d flown to Houston this morning? And we’d hear the gates if someone tried to drive in.”

“I never told you there’s a chime that goes off back here when the gates open.”

“I just made up the thing about the gates. You really have chimes?”

She moved pieces. I moved pieces. I’d never seen such a mess. Half the pieces were unguarded.

I reached back to her neck and twisted and pulled those red hairs.

She looked at me intensely as I released her hairs, momentarily, and then pulled them until it seemed that her eyes were watering. She hung in there, gritting her teeth. “I thought you weren’t allowed to hurt me?”

My hand shifted, lightly gripping her neck. I recall thinking she had the neck of a bird. Thin, dignified. I rubbed her neck gently. I leaned over and kissed those hairs on the back of her neck.

I moved around so that my face was inches from hers. “Does it still hurt? I whispered. Her eyes were closed.

“You know I have a boyfriend,” she said for perhaps the fifth time.

“Oh, and I bet he wouldn’t want us to be making out.”

“We aren’t making out.”

I kissed her on the mouth, and she responded.

I rubbed her arms, and her breath deepened.

I slid a hand inside her loose bikini top and teased her, for long minutes.

She moved away and opened her eyes. “You said you wouldn’t go under the suit.”

“I have a confession to make.”

“What?” She asked

I paused, reached over and slid the bra strap off her shoulder. I reached down and liberated her breast from its confinement. The breast was a perfect handful. The nipple was a pale pink. I’d never seen such pale pink nipples, and haven’t to this day.

“You have a confession? I didn’t hear it. What I heard was my clothes being pulled off.“

“Well, you have excellent ears If you heard your bikini rustle.” I returned to teasing her nipple, puckering and squeezing.

“But I do have a confession. I lied, and I felt guilty, but now I feel better.”

“Why do you feel better?” She asked, crossing her arms, but at belly level, so that she didn’t block my view or my hand.

“I fixed the problem.”

“Seems to me you’re just starting more problems,”

She shut her eyes.

I leaned down and sucked at a nipple.

I reached around and unclasped her bra. Her breasts fell free. Decades later, the image remains.

“Well, I fixed the problem of my guilt about lying. I’m not under your suit anymore.”

“You did my bra on the first try? You’re too good at this. We should stop. I’m getting played.”

She’d begun to smell like sex.

“Confession time. I practiced on my sister’s bras. I used all the kinds I could find, and rigged up a chair and even covered them with shirts to increase my degree of difficulty. Front clasps, back clasps. You name it. And if you don’t believe it, she even walked in on me. Perhaps the most humiliating moment of my life.”

That seemed to reassure her, and we kissed.

I don’t think I paid her body enough compliments. I don’t think I said her breasts were beautiful, perfect. I don’t think I flattered her nearly as much as she deserved.

Instead, as we kissed and I gently massaged a breast, my left hand casually dangled to her inner thigh, back and forth, gently rising closer to her nether regions. When I grazed her mound, she started.

She opened her eyes. “Really, this isn’t what I had planned.”

“I promise I won’t let this get out of hand.”

I stood in front of her. Her dad’s trunks were way too big for me, and only my hard-on seemed to keep them up.

She looked straight ahead, at her dad’s trunks, at my hard on, and stood. I held out my hand.

She paused, took my hand, and, as we walked into the grass on the other side of the pool, she looked at me, shook her head, and said, “liar.”