No Words R. N.

Adams Published by R N Adams at Smashwords Copyright 2013 R N Adams

Smashwords Edition, License Notes Thank you for downloading this free ebook. You are welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the book remains in its complete original form. If you enjoyed this book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.

Chapter 1

This relationship has been hard for both of us, Charles whispered into the pressing, humid darkness, But its also brought such good things. Fran lay with her back sticky and clinging against Charless solid chest, biting her lip to hold in the dread. Shut up, shut up, shut up, Charles, youll ruin it. Hours later, sitting in the tub with her head on her knees, shed look back on this moment as the last she would ever have of any illusion that he loved her. You make me feel alive. I like who I am when Im with you. Stop there. You dont have to talk after break-up sex Charles. Just SHUT UP. His hand was vaguely caressing the soft rolls of her breast and waist. You turn me on, you make me laugh. I love you, Sarah. The air froze with silence; the walls seemed to flex with the pressure of it. A cold prickling traveled from Frans scalp to her stomach. Woah, she said. Her heart raced and her hands trembled, as if his words had been a snake or a gunshot. As if a landmine had gone off inside her. Charles groaned, Oh my god, and sat up, draped his legs over the edge of the bed, and buried his face in his hands. Woah, Fran said again, heart thumping, ears ringing in the echoing aftermath of the bomb. That was bad. That was really bad. Yeah, Fran said. She pulled herself out from under the covers and felt around for her clothes, scattered across the floor. Her body seemed to require specific instructions for each breath, so she focused on that - in... out... - while she pulled on her clothes with shaking hands. Charles sat, palms on his forehead, elbows on his knees, and as Fran dressed she watched him through the haze of her hurt and her rage. She saw him like a little lost boy. Hell, she thought. How long will it take me to stop loving him? I said you werent over her, she said gently. Im sorry, Fran, Charles muttered into his palms. Im sorry. He looked crumpled up like a bad poem, she thought, tossed in the bin with all the other clichs. I know. You didnt do it on purpose. Noticing she was dressed, he said, Let me see you out. Id rather you didnt. Still he didnt look at her. Please Fran, I dont want it to end with this. Oh no. She looked through the bedroom window at the sliver of golden dawn at the edge of the horizon. It was over long before this. But he pulled on a t-shirt and boxers and trailed her through the living room, saying, Ill call you. No! She could see the word slap him hard in the jaw. She reined herself in. No dont call me. Im done. Im sorry, he repeated, and looked her in the eye at last, stunned, disbelieving. I know. And I forgive you. And Im done. She turned, walked away, and got into her car. Still he followed her as far as his door, stood in her headlights, his skin dewy in the humid pre-dawn.

There are three seasons in western Massachusetts: winter, humid, and fall. It would switch from humid to fall overnight sometime in late September. This night had not been that night. Fran started her car in the sticky gray of dawn. Charless face collapsed and his eyes welled. Fran watched him take a great gasping breath chest expanding and nostrils flaring and then release one choked, dry sob. She had to grit her teeth hard to prevent the heat behind her own eyes from welling into tears just as tragic. Fran put the car in reverse and pulled away. His tears werent for her. Fuck this, she was going to the gym.

Chapter 2

Oh fucking fuck, yes! Christine was grunting and squealing under Mickys deep thrusting, each little noise ricocheting off the tile of the gyms bathroom, echoing in the air around them, tangled with the rhythmic splashing of the shower spray. Shh, he chided into her ear, hoisting her higher against the wall, until she was balanced on the toes of one foot, her right leg wrapped around his ass. The new angle was just right for her clit, and she laughed and then groaned louder. He chuckled with her, but put a hand over her mouth as he bit her earlobe. Sshh! he whispered again. She drew his fingers into her mouth and sucked. Ah Jesus, he said into her throat, and thrust harder. She was pushing her hips against him now, grinding toward her climax with a hungry persistence, while her hands fisted desperately in his hair. Her leg left the ground and she used her whole weight, pivoting against his cock, to grind against him. Still she sucked hungrily at his fingers, her noises rising in pitch and cadence until, at a shattering moment, she broke in waves, grunting in peals like a siren. Micky thrust harder and faster, coming as her spasms ebbed, trying to limit his noise to gasping and wet rhythmic slaps. As the tension in their bodies lessened, Christine melted down him, easing her feet to the ground and kissing him, hot and deep. Baby, youre amazing, she said when she disengaged her mouth. You too, baby. He kissed her with smack and withdrew himself gently, then pulled off the condom. I gotta go trash this. Thanks sweetie. He left her under the spray, wrapped his hips in a towel from the hook outside the shower stall, and tried to make his way discretely to the door. This was, after all, the womens locker room. Nice work, he heard from behind him, just as he put his hand on the door. He whipped his head around and saw Fran, fresh from her workout, sweaty and pink and smirking under her orange ponytail. I should have guessed it was you in there. With the squeaker. Micky grinned. Hey Fran. See you at dinner? You bet. He turned and left the locker room, tossing his condom in the trash barrel as he went.

Fran sat on the bench by her locker and schvitzed. She had had an intense run fueled by her anger and hurt, and now she sat and listened to her heart rate gradually returning to normal. And tried to remember to inhale. And pursed her lips against the threat of tears, against the growing certainty that love was not a thing that would happen for her. Against the urge to whisper the name of the man who had so decisively and conclusively broken her heart this morning. (Stupid little shit couldnt remember her name, why should she bother with his?) A tall, slim brunette drifted in from the showers, and Fran decided this must be the squeaker. She looked dazed enough to have just had her brains fucked out in a public shower by a man with the body of David. Also, she was studiously avoiding eye contact with Fran, but that

wasnt necessarily because she was worried shed been overheard having sex. It happened all the time here to Fran. The skinny folks felt uncomfortable with the fat chick in their gym. Well. She was here enough, youd think theyd get used to her. Quirking the corner of her mouth, Fran opened her locker and pulled out her phone to check her calendar. Three clients this morning, and then a free afternoon before dinner with Mick. She could wait to cry about Charles until this afternoon. Yep. Big girls do cry, they just wait until a convenient time. Three clients. Three workouts. Three opportunities for success and fulfillment. Then she could go home and cry.

Chapter 3

At 6pm, Mick showed up at and let himself into Frans kitchen. Her tiny condo in the venerable Grant Street neighborhood was lit up yellow in the sinking afternoon sun. He hoisted his burden and inhaled the fragrance of cinnamon that clung to Frans things. Fran? he called, as he piled crock pot, wine bottle, and accoutrements on the counter. Still in the tub! he heard her call. Ill be down soon. Oh no. Shit fuck hell. Fran still in the tub. Charles was a motherfucker. Mick began preparing plates as he fantasized about beating the shit out of Frans worst ever boyfriend. He banged lids and yanked corks and rattled cutlery as he envisioned kidnapping Charless motherfucking dog to lure motherfucking Charles into a dark alley, breaking Charless motherfucking nose with a punch that started in his feet, channeling all his contempt and rage into his fist. He imagined blood pouring from Charless motherfucking face, imagined the shock and horror in Charless eyes as he slammed his fist into his effete, defenseless gut, kneed Charles in his motherfucking Hey. Fran was leaning at the doorway in her knee-length bathrobe and fuzzy slippers. A towel turbaned her hair, so that only her orange widows peak was visible. Whats wrong? Sounds like youre remodeling in here. Hey, he answered. Sorry. Just... it cant be good news if youre taking baths again. You have no idea. Hug. He obeyed, pulling the towel from her hair so he could tuck her head under his chin. He wrapped his arms tight across her round shoulders and felt her arms go around his waist. She fit tidily against him, comfortable, warm, and sweet. Then he felt the shuddering little sobs and heard her sniff. Oh god. He held her tighter and kissed her wet hair, smelled her shampoo. You know I suck at the feelings. She chuckled wetly against him. You dont have to do or say anything, just listen and nod, she instructed. He nodded obediently. When her muscles had softened and her breathing steadied, she pulled away from him, wiped her face with her sleeve and said, You also have to feed me. That I can do." He kissed her on the forehead and got her a bowl of stew. It took a full bottle of wine for her to get through the story, from the questionable decision to answer the phone when Charles had called last night, to the worse decision to go over there to talk this through, to the inevitable sex (Truly, it was brain-melting, Fran said, flushed across her nose from the wine. Dude, he did not need to know that.), to the gut-punch when Charles called her Sarah while saying, I love you. Youve gotta be fucking kidding me. I know. I know. Its like the worst possible - no, actually its the best thing he could have said. Because it just puts it out there so that even he cant deny it anymore. He cant deny it? Yes! Ive been telling him for months that hes hung up on Sarah and hes been insisting that theyre just friends - Im the one who made him see - All right. Mick held up a hand. Well. So what did you do?

So I left. I went to the gym. I ran five miles. I listened to you make Squeaky Fromme come in the shower - Sorry about that. Please, it was the highlight of my day. Then I worked with three clients, came home and got in the tub for four hours. She looked at her shriveled fingertips. Is there any analogy I can use here other than prune? Mick took her hand in his from across the little kitchen table. Hey. She met his eyes and he saw her chin tremble, though she bunched up her lips over to one side, fighting hard against tears. Hes a motherfucker. I know, she whispered. You deserve better. I know. I know. You know Im not that good with... words. Feelings. You know Im not the guy who can tell you all the things you are. But Im here. I know. The sat across from each other at the table, holding hands, holding eye contact. At last, Fran inhaled deeply and blew out a slow, steadying breath and sat back. Im gonna be alone forever, she announced. Of course youre not. I will too, she riposted, pouting. Who cares. At least Ill be rich and old when I die, even if I am alone. You wont die alone, dumbass, Ill be there. Hey fuck it, lets open the second bottle. He got up and retrieved the zinfandel hed brought. The hell you will - Ill outlive you by a decade, at least. Your string of children, all with different mothers, they might be there with me. Auntie Fran. Fran blew her nose in her napkin. As long as you leave them some of your millions. Of course! Even if I didnt want to, youd rewrite my will. Youll keep my as your lawyer when youre a billionaire? Sure, who else would do all that paperwork pro bono? Returning to the table, bottle uncorked, he poured and said, Seriously, what can I do to help? Fran shrugged. Got any chocolate to go with this? Sorry. I didnt know. Well, come watch a chick flick with me and then go home - taking special care to leave the wine with me. She picked up her glass and shuffled into the living room, adjusting her bathrobe around her. Mick followed with his own glass and the bottle and glanced around the space. A tragically small screen sat under the windows that fronted the road, and across from that lay Fran, slung across the lumpy Ikea couch, remote pointed at the screen, scrolling through her Netflix queue. Got a preference? she asked. Nope. Where do I sit? She was taking up the whole couch. He could sit on that little chair in the corner. Or on the battered coffee table. Or the flatweave rug. Or the hardwood stairs. Without looking at him, Fran lifted her legs forty-five degrees off the couch and Mick obediently slid himself into the space below her slippered feet, which promptly dropped themselves into his lap. One hand holding his wine, the other on her knee, he looked at the

screen, where an anonymous old movie about relationships and feelings was starting, then he heard Fran sniff and he looked over to see her fighting tears. She drained her glass, put it on the floor, then crossed her arms under her breasts - which were loose and full without the sports bra he usually saw her in. It was easy to forget how abundant her breasts were when she was in a sports bra. Fran? Im okay. She didnt look at him, kept her eyes on the screen. Fuck Charles. He squeezed her knee in sympathy, and she gave a little sigh. Good. So he began massaging her calf with his free hand. She kept her eyes on the movie, but her breathing lost its tension and she blinked slowly. He put his glass down and started on the second calf, using both hands now. He worked his way down her ankle to her foot, deciding that a foot massage was the answer. He tugged off her slippers and set to work. She sighed deeply from the other end of the couch, as he laced his fingers over the top of her foot to press his thumbs in circles along the arch. Then he tugged and rotated each individual toe, big to little, careful to massage the hidden undercurve and the tender inner edge of each. From nowhere, the idea crossed his mind to put each freshly bathed toe in his mouth and suck, swirling his tongue around it, and he noticed suddenly how round and frankly cute her toes were. In the course of a long friendship with few barriers, they had talked extensively about their feet - her year of plantar fasciitis when she transitioned to minimal shoes, his occasional athletes foot - but he had never before considered their sensual potential. Now he wondered how he had ever failed to notice her tidy, unpainted toenails, with their half-moon crescents and their slim white edges. He pushed his thumb gently backward over each cuticle, stroking from toe to ankle across the top of her foot. Fran grunted approvingly and nuzzled her cushion. And then he turned his attention to the ball of her foot, pink and still wrinkled from the tub. He pressed circles into the flesh along its whole length and then pressed and tugged down its height, each toe bending with the downward pressure. When he reversed the process, pressing upward along the ball, from arch to big toe, Fran hummed a satisfied sigh, and he notice that she had closed her eyes. Turning his attention to her heel, he braced her ankle in one hand and massaged the flesh, rotating and flexing her ankle to stretch muscles and tendons loosened by their long soak. He did it all again on her other foot - arch, toes, the dense network of bones, ligaments, and tendons across the top of her foot, the ball, the heel. And because she seemed at last to feel peaceful, and because her robe left her legs exposed to the knee, he kept going, up each leg from ankle to knee, attending to each line of muscle, digging deep to access the connective tissue. Her dense, strong runners legs seemed ripe for massaging, realigning and renewing the hardworking muscle. The deeper he worked, the more she wriggled and grinned and murmured and sighed, so when he got to her knees, he massaged those too - pressing into the delicate curve at the back, brushing softly where the knee was bruised from a clients ill-aimed medicine ball. On an impulse, he bent and pressed his lips to it, and she chuckled and shrugged her shoulders, to settle deeper into the couch. He paused, then. The bottom of her robe seemed to create a line of demarcation: to here, and no farther. Yes, the flap opened slightly to offer a peak of one thigh, just a few inches, but Fran banged her calves on his thighs and grunted impatiently. Her eyes were on the screen again, and she was smiling, relaxed. Who could say no to that? Mick thought.

So he pressed his hands up and down along the outside of her thighs, over the terry of the robe. He rotated his palms in circles that traveled down from hip to knee. He tucked his hands behind her knees and ran his hands up the backs of her legs, both at once, massaging circles along the full length of her powerful hamstrings, to the crease where thigh joined buttocks, and back down again to her knee. And then he casually flicked aside the robe to reveal several inches of thigh above the knee. He placed his warm palms above her knees and let the heat transfer to her body. He massaged just above her knee and then shifted his hands up an inch or two and repeated the process: heat, massage. And again: heat, massage. The tension in her body seemed to shift subtly, but it wasnt until he began moving his hands lightly over the surface of her thighs that he noticed the nature of the change. One of her hands went to her hair, her fingers tangled in the barely damp orange waves. Her mouth was open, her eyes closed. Mick trailed his fingertips lightly, lightly a few inches along the insides of her thighs. Her skin, under the folds of her bathrobe, was palest white, firm, soft. And he nudged the fabric apart an inch more, to reveal more of it. His fingers had a will of their own now, and he watched as they traveled in tender circles over the delicate skin, tracing their way, slowly but inexorably, up the length of her thighs, pushing away her robe incrementally, just a little farther, and a little farther, until he saw a peak of dense orange curls. He lost his breath, his jaw dropping slightly as he remembered that this was Fran, his best friend for ten years, the funniest, smartest, kindest woman he knew, and also someone toward whom he had never felt the slightest sexual attraction. (Well, maybe the slightest, but long ago.) He looked back at her face. Her eyes were still closed, her expression soft, and Mick had a sudden urge to press his face into those curls to watch what happened, to see how her mouth would open, how her skin would flush. Jesus. But instead he kept his fingers brushing along the thick length of her inner thighs, so attuned to the softness and warmth under his palms that he was scarcely aware of anything else until he heard her exhale sharply, and then he realized that her hips had been rocking slightly, her belly tense. He kept his touch light, the flat of his hands moving with slow delicacy over the fragilelooking skin. On an impulse, he eased her thighs slightly farther apart, and her legs fell open, revealing an expanse of flesh that met half-way between her knees and that tantalizing apex. He wanted to put his hands under her knees and lift her legs wide and open, gaze at her center and its hidden folds and pinkness. But he just kept brushing his palms in slow strokes over the pale expanse of thigh, the entire length now, tucking his finger between her thighs where they met. And her breath got shakier and her hips kept rocking in minute, tense movements. Every now and then Mick glanced at her face, watched her lips grow redder, watched her bite her lips, lick them, listened to the tiny, breathy noises she made. He could smell her now, the musky, unmistakable scent of arousal emanating from her body. He knew she was wet, knew that if he looked hed see the shine of moisture at her entrance. Jesus. When her hand began to wander, seemingly of its own accord, over her breast, he felt a tense twitch and discovered he was hard - raging hard, with a spot of wetness through his jeans. Jesus, he could fuck her. He could open his pants and spread her legs and slide into her wetness right now, right now he could She broke, with undulating hips and sharp little cries. Mick watched her face and hardly recognized the quietly heartbroken woman who had sat across from him at dinner. In orgasm,

she was transformed, beautiful, transcendent. For suspended moments, he felt her thighs under his hands contract in rhythm with her noises, felt her skin hot and taught. Then her body seemed to melt into the couch, as the tension of orgasm ebbed. What the hell had just happened? Did all women have orgasms just from having their thighs stroked? He felt like he had unlocked some sort of sexual easter egg. At sea, he tucked the folds of her robe across her legs and massaged her calves, waiting for her to open her eyes. When at last she did, they were glittering and calm. Did you do that on purpose? Hed never heard her voice like that, kittenish, shadowed. No. She sighed and snuggled into the cushions. Well thanks. Was better than the chocolate you didnt bring. I - do... should I stay tonight? Stay? Why? She was drowsy, drifting in a haze of wine and orgasm and no sleep the night before. I dont know. It seemed like the right thing to ask. Oh. She yawned hugely, blinked at him, then closed her eyes. No. I think Im gonna go to bed. Okay. Okay. Ill do the kitchen. With a hand under her heels, he lifted her ankles, rose from the couch, then gently lowered her feet to the cushion. He watched her face, but her eyes stayed closed. Limping slightly, he went to the kitchen and started rinsing dishes and filling the dishwasher. The empty wine bottle went into the recycling. The half-full crockpot went into the fridge. And all the while, flashes of Frans ecstatic face crossed his vision. No amount of deep breathing would allow his erection to fade, no thoughts about icebergs could block his mind from the feel of her thighs, tensing and releasing under his hands. That orange patch. The scent of her. Oh Jesus. When the counters were wiped and still his dick wasnt soft, he leaned on the counter and considered his options. He could go home and jack off, like a gentleman. Or he could go in there and ask. Just ask. Whats the harm in asking? She could always say no. Hopefully shed say no. He knew there were many good reasons why he should not fuck Fran tonight, and even though he couldnt remember what any of them were, she surely would. He draped an apron around his neck and went back into the living room. She was gone. And that answered his question.

Chapter 4

When she awoke, Fran stretch luxuriously in her bed, her muscles easy and energized. And then she thought, Woops. Well, so her best friend made her come on her couch, while It Happened One Night played in the background. So it was a blinding, massive orgasm that blotted Charles entirely from her battered mind. Maybe that was what she needed. Maybe a little non-Charles sex was just the ticket. Maybe she should do it again. Or anyway, do something. She groped for her phone on the nightstand, then carried it to the bathroom to pee while she checked her email. One from Mick, sent just after 10 - right when he got home, probably.

Subject: hey just checking in. hope you slept ok. hope the thing that happened was ok. hope charles dies in a fire. m

Fran replied:

Slept like a post-orgasmic log. The thing that happened was completely great and dont worry Im not pregnant. Charles still alive, to the best of my knowledge, but, absent any fire retardant coating, still prone to ignition and you never know your luck.

F PS - Race tomorrow?

Coffee, the news, and her weekly tidy-up, along with a fair bit of aimless puttering, filled the rest of the morning. But mostly she was thinking about Charles. Charles and how he didnt love her. Charles and how he didnt know what he wanted. Charles and how he couldnt let go of Sarah, when it was obvious that Sarah would never love him, would never appreciate him, would never deserve him. Charles who was too stupid to want what would make him happy, what was right in front of him! Fran oscillated from sadness to rage and back again, mourning him and hating him and loving him all at the same time, certain that if she could just think of the right words, the light would come on in his confused little head and at last hed see the world as it really is. But the worst of it wasnt Charles. The worst of it was the landmines, the sudden explosions of noise in her head that howled at her. FAT. BITCH. She hadnt heard that for years.

Years ago, she had successfully locked that particular noise into a small box in an unlit corner of her mind, and there it had sat, silent. Until now. She wanted to go for a run. She always felt calmer at the far end of a 5k. But it was a rest day; if she ran today, Mick would blast her tomorrow and no amount of Charles-related bullshit justified sabotaging the race. So instead she did core exercises on the living room floor until her abdominal muscles burned and she could barely lift herself off the floor. She lay, panting and sweating and aching, and finally she burst into tears, and that hurt her abs too. But at least it was pain she knew how to treat, pain that would heal and make her stronger. She rolled to her side and waited for the wave of sadness to pass. In 15 months of dating Charles, she had learned that the sadness always passed. She always survived it. She always would. But it left behind a wound of self-doubt that had been building up in her heart, and now a deep bruise had formed, persistent and painful and all too familiar, and only now was she realizing how deep it went. So deep, it reached all the way back to the box. And unlatched it. Hadnt seven years as a professional athlete, as the most successful personal trainer in the state, as a bestselling author and sought-after expert on health at every size, hadnt all of that made her immune to this kind of burning, crushing insecurity? No. Fran dragged herself from the floor, shuffled to the bathroom, and started a bath. While the tub filled, she went to the bedroom to strip. She dropped her pajamas in the laundry basket, and then stopped to look at herself in the mirror. She remembered when she couldnt do this, even this simple thing. Look at herself naked. She looked now and thought, Im beautiful. And she believed it. She knew it. Every curve, every fold, and every roll was beautiful. She was healthier than shed ever been in her life. At 32 (her age matched her BMI, she realized), she ran an 8 minute mile, she could bench over 200 and deadlift almost 400, and she had abdominal tone that her caused her gynecologist to say in surprise, Youve got a deceptive frame. Yes, doc, deceptively enough, fat chicks have muscles. Did they not teach you that in med school? By every measure, she was healthy. Even her body fat percentage, her waist to hip ratio, and her sagittal abdominal girth, were all healthy by any evidence-based standard - not the bullshit, pharmaceutical industry-driven standard, but the science-based standards. Health is beauty, she reminded herself. It was the title of her goddamn book and the essence of her message for the world, of her lifes mission. So how could it be that 15 months of Charles failing to love her could make her feel worthless again? Easy. Blood chemistry and resting heart rate and pace-per-mile over a marathon were not what her mother had taught her, early and well, would get her a man who stayed. A woman deserved love when she was pretty and sweet and thin and nice. Pretty and sweet and thin and nice. No, screw that! He hadnt failed to fall in love with her because she was fat and blunt and stubborn (persistent, she corrected herself automatically). He failed to fall in love with her because he was an asshole. A stupid jerkface asshole who... oh, hell with it. She got in the tub and stayed there until her fingers shriveled. Three hours later, she had a plan.

Chapter 5

It was a five mile run on the bike path from Micks house to the gym. Sundays were always his long runs, and once a month he used it to race with Fran. The ten mile round trip plus the 45 minutes on the treadmill next to Fran got him to maybe 15-20 miles, depending on the hills he set and how hard he pushed. He kind of hated the treadmill, but this monthly ritual of watching Fran work inspired him like nothing else in his life. He wouldnt miss it, had never missed it. When Fran had traveled for her book tour, or early in her training when she was periodically injured, sometimes he had come here to run anyway, just to imagine her at his side. Today though, he felt himself dragging his feet. Maybe his knee was twinging. Maybe he should be catching up on work. He didnt really like the treadmills. But he ran anyway, because it was Sunday. He met Fran at the edge of the glass wall where the treadmills stood. The sun radiated into the gym and glittered in her hair. Usually Frans face was the shiningest thing about her usually it was the shiningest thing in the room - but today she looked beaten down. Fucking goddamn Charles. Hey, he said. Uh-oh, she said, like she saw a spider on his face. What? That look. Dont use that look on me. I know that look. What? That look. Ive seen you use on women for years, that look that says, Its been fun but I have to go now. Listen, she tapped him on the chest, just because you made me come once doesnt mean to get to treat me like Im one of them, bucko, I dont follow those rules. Get on your treadmill, weve got a race to run. He obeyed, bemused. Ready? They set their timers for 45 minutes. Set? They selected the same course of demanding hills, one level more challenging than each had selected in the previous month. Go! And the race started. They werent running to finish first - Fran was slower than Mick and she always would be, with her legs six inches shorter and, moreover, endless novel-reading in place of physical activity during her first two decades of life, against his lifelong, easy athleticism. They ran to peer pressure the other into beating their own best efforts. She was slower, always would be - but she was driven like nothing else Mick had ever known. After a few minutes, Fran broke the silence. So whats with the look? Seriously, I dont know what you mean. He believed he had a look - Fran was never wrong about these things - but he didnt know what it was. Okay. She didnt push him. She said, Okay, so then Im going to admit something now. Ready? Uh, sure. I came here planning to ask if you would be interested in getting laid. By me, I mean.

A pause, and Mick realized she was waiting for him to react. Oh, he said, not sure what words could convey the twin jolts of erotic visions and undifferentiated terror that raced through him at the thought. She seemed to understand though. Fran always did. Look, Im a mess. Every second since Charles has been filled with this... she gestured around her head, noise. You know, all the body crap. It got loose in my head again. Every single second, except for when you were... you know. And I thought, maybe... She panted and ran and shook her head. I think it would help to put the noise back in its box. And if I could just stop all these noisy explosions going off in my head, maybe I could get to the basic job of getting over Charles. She glanced at him - watching his reaction, he thought. He must have seemed okay because she continued, And I trust you. I respect you. Apparently my body enjoys the way you touch it, and Im pretty sure that if you can bring yourself to tolerate my squishy body, youll have a good time too. Just one time, you know? Just one night of free-range fucking. I really think itll help me, and Id do everything I could to make it good for you, too, if possible. Mick listened to this passively. It sounded logical, the way she said it. Like she was asking him to pick up her dry cleaning - something shed only ask under rare circumstances, and of course shed respond in kind whenever he asked. A favor. Small and easy and not unpleasant. He had no clue why part of his brain was resisting the idea. He had wanted her, after all, had fantasized about fucking her that very night, masturbating to a huge orgasm at the idea. He had spent a major part of Saturday reliving that moment of her orgasm, seeing her mouth all red and open. There was something wrong, though. But your look has me worried, she was saying. Your look tells me it might be complicated for you. A lot of treadmill turned under his feet while he searched for words. Its just... I mean, Friday was, like I guess, what I do. Women are in bad relationships and I come along and make them feel better. Im the good time. Fran considered this. Is that how it is with Squeaky? Youre the good time? Her names Christine and yeah. Shes married. Squeakys married? Theyre all married. Conjunction Junction wasnt married. No, but she was a lesbian. No! Thats what she told me. What about The Dildo? Engaged. Analingus? Living with her boyfriend. How did I never realize this before? I mean, weve talked about how you always leave first, but I had no idea. Hell, Mick, you gotta get some therapy. He looked at her, puzzled. Why? They have a good time, I have a good time, Im honest with them, theyre honest with me. Fran sputtered. And whether or not theyre honest with their significant others isnt your problem! Not so far as I can see. They ran side by side in silence. But its different with me?

Yeah... She was waiting for him to say more. Apart from whatever else, youre my best friend. Im not just a good time to you, and youre not just a good time to me. Silence again, and panting breaths and the thudding of their feet on their separate treadmills. Does it follow that because Im not just a good time, I cant be any good time? Of course not. I mean, it was a good time. Definitely. Definitely. So I ask again, why the look? Mick shrugged and struggled to put words to his internal state. Maybe... I mean theres a reason I havent had anything but a good time since Mandi. Because Mandi was a hellbasket who made you crazy until she left you, and then you became suicidally depressed? I mean, Fran stopped herself, apparently aware that she might sounds insensitive. Not to put too fine a point on it. Yeah. Fran laughed at his tone. The word for how you look right now is chagrined. Okay. Well. She ran and thought. A mile went under his feet before she spoke again. I remember what it was like after Mandi left. Remember that night when you called me? I remember. Mick stared out through the window, watching the first of the falling leaves. I came over and I stayed all night. I was really afraid for you. So was I. Micky, do you believe having sex could cause me to treat you the way she did? Is sex what makes the difference between me and her? No. No. No, Frannie. She hesitated and then asked, Its not my body? Her body? On the contrary. No. I know Im not your type. I dont have a type. Did he have a type? Oh please. Please. As we established long ago, you are interested in the skinny ones. Theres about twice as much of me as there should be, as far as your dick is concerned. Oh shit, that conversation all those years ago, just days after they met, when he had unthinkingly commented on the body of a passing woman. Thats not - Its not the only reason, but it must be a big one. Oh god Im gonna be alone forever. Fran battered at the minus sign on her machine and slowed to a walk. Youre gonna lose if you do that! I cant bring myself to care right now. Jesus, it must be a big deal for her if she didnt care about winning. He pushed the plus sign on his own treadmill, just to make the point. I hate this noise in my head, Mick. I need the noise to shut up. She was walking with her fingers laced behind her head. She was trying to get all the air she could. Frannie. My entire career, my goddamn wildly-successful-by-any-measure career, is built around making the noise stop, but I cant do it now. I dont know what happened.

He didnt have words for her. They were nearing the end of their 45 minutes. So youre afraid, she said, that if we have sex, youll do what you always do, which is be the good time and then leave. Yeah. Thats it. That was it exactly. Fran could always figure things out. Well. You say yourself, youre not so good at the feelings and the words, but you are good at the kinetic. I cant help wondering if we should play to your strengths as a friend supporting me in... my time of need, I guess. She was still walking instead of running. What would it take for you to believe that it wouldnt change our friendship? Half a mile of thinking later, transitioning into the cool-down, he said, I have to think about that.

Chapter 6

Harder! Thats it! Harder! Go! Jesus fucking Christ, Fran! Fran was kneeling on the feet of a favorite client, passing the medicine ball back and forth, coaxing power from the womans nascent triceps as she crunched her lateral obliques. Do it! Go! Come on, Madeline! Four more. Four lactic acid inducing passes later, Madeline lay back on her mat, arm above her head, groaning and breathless. I must be some kind of masochist to pay you for this, she huffed. Hurts so good. Fran pasted on a smile as she gave her standard reply. She was checked out, half-aware of her surroundings, the world around her drowned in a sea of in emotional noise. Not even phoning it in. Texting it in. Every conversation about pain - and she had a lot of them, as a trainer - set of a landmine of emotional noise in her head, a chaotic echoing barrage of pretty, sweet, thin, nice. Every conversation about weight - ditto - set off a landmine. If I were still a lawyer, Fran wondered as she led Madeline through stretches to minimize tomorrows delayed muscle soreness, would conversations about probate or legatees make me think about my essential shortcomings as a human being? Whatever the reason, her heart or her job, Frans days that week were pocked with landmines. The journalist who wanted to know how she came to feel so confident about her shape. (Is there a biological basis to that attitude change? What the hell kind of useless question is that??) The new client who emailed an emotional brain dump about how Frans book had made her realize how her own body shame prevented her from living the life she truly wanted. (Can someone please write a book that does that for me? Fran thought.) The blogger who linked to Frans own blog, commenting, Thinspo can suck on this, my friends. Health at every size is where its at, and its beautiful. Landmines, all. Fran spent a lot of time in the bathtub. Same time next week? Fran snapped back into the world. You bet. Dont skimp on the meditation - its just as important as the cardio! Landmine. She hadnt meditated since Charles. Her mindful eating practice was a shambles. The noise in her head simply would not let up, and every bite of food screamed at her, shamed her. She didnt see Mick again until their Friday dinner, and in the meantime he only emailed to ask about what she wanted to eat. (You! she didnt answer, You and your hands that made me forget, for just a few minutes, that Ill never deserve love.) She felt self-conscious now about her request. She hadnt considered any emotional consequences and had been frankly unprepared when her friends principle objection was not lack of sexual interest but a fear of complicating things; it never occurred to her that there might be anything that could seriously interfere with their friendship, not after nearly a decade of significant others, career changes, house purchases, his suicidal thoughts, her heartbreak. Why would being naked together change that? How could a few orgasms affect anything? And after all, he started it.

Her body trusted him, just as her heart and mind trusted him. And thats really all it took to have a perfectly satisfactory sexual escapade. If he decided he wasnt interested, that was fine, shed look for some other way to stuff the bullshit noise back into its box. But the time she had spent with his hands on her had been the only time in the last week that it was quiet in her head. And she longed for quiet. Every client she worked with, every hour spent answering journalists emails, every word she wrote on her blog, all of it had happened with a background noise, like the roar in your ears before your faint. Like a series of landmines exploding when you put your weight in just the wrong place. So when Friday came, she greeted Mick at the door with a battered smile and no expectations. She had managed to get dressed this week - well, yoga pants and a t-shirt - and she was proud of that. It showed progress from last week. And she had only cried once that day, briefly upon waking. Either she was less of a mess, or she was getting better control. Either way: win. Fran had always been aware, in an academic way, of Micks physical appearance - after all his athleticism had been was made her approach him that first time. But tonight her eyes tuned in to the breadth of his shoulders under his blue striped Oxford shirt, the shape of his thighs in his jeans, the strength of his wrists where they showed under his rolled cuffs. He was a beautiful man. And he had brought chocolate. In fact it was all he brought - chocolate fondue, to make up for the previous weeks deficit. He hadnt bothered with a main course. Fran clapped her hands and bounced like an eight year old. This is why I let you in the door every week, she told him - landmine. Charles always wanted to shoehorn in on her Friday Night Dinners. Maybe if she had included him... They sat with the pot between them on the table and an array of cake, fruit, candies... Fran was particularly impressed with one dipping option: You brought chocolate to dip in the chocolate fondue? You have learned well, Little Cricket. She rolled her fondue fork in her hand and watched, awed, as the melty goo wrapped around and began to melt the little hunk on the tines. Mick grinned and shrugged and bit into some pineapple. Fran put the chocolate in her mouth (Landmine!! Fat, fat, and more fat. Still fat, after all these workouts. Pretty, sweet, thin, nice. None of the above. Blammo.) and chewed morosely, hoping Mick wouldnt notice her mood. I thought about the thing, he said abruptly. He had noticed. The thing. The sex? Fran wanted to say that she had been dumb to ask, that she perfectly understood if he wasnt interested, that she would never bring it up again, but she was too exhausted from the pain, from the constant barrage of noise, so she just sat and chewed. Yes. I thought about it. And the thing is, you fall in love when you fuck. Huh? Mick counted them off on his fingers. Charles. Bobby. Marcel. William. You fall in love when you fuck. Fran goggled at him. That was all of them since shed met Mick. William in law school landmine. Marcel the client - landmine. Bobby the editor - ugh, landmine. And Charles. LANDMINE. She fell when she fucked them. How had she not seen that? Pretty, sweet, thin, nice girls dont have sex with boys, so they dont get their hearts broken. Fran really, really, really wanted to crawl back into a bath.

I do, she said. And you dont. No, I leave, he said. Thats true. Jesus, Fran said, putting it together. For a guy who isnt good at The Feels, thats a pretty intense insight. Given time, I can usually work out why something is a bad idea, he said. Then he added, Im a lawyer. Fran tried to think rationally through the war in her head. Im trying to imagine under what circumstances I could possibly lose my mind enough to fall in love with you, when in all these years Ive never been tempted. Is there any sex that could make me forget you dont really dig fat chicks? Your body isnt - Or that you always leave first? Or that youre The Good Time? Could it really be that being naked with you would make me forget all that and turn into some kind of orgasm zombie? I thought about that, he said, leaning forward. The thing is, I was definitely getting weird last week. You noticed it - the face. If you hadnt pointed it out, I might have started slinking away and never known why. But when you pointed it out, I could notice it and stop it. So I think maybe if I point it out to you, you can do the same thing. His face was so earnest, his eyes so warm. The last time shed seen him look like that, hed been explaining how important it was for her to have a revocable living trust. I cant be protected from everything, she thought. Frannie, you know I know what its like to not to be able to turn off the noise. I want to help you, and this is something you know helps. It would just suck if you got this short-term benefit at long-term cost. Its no big deal, Micky, dont feel pressured. I mean, most of the time I know Im amazing and gorgeous, but that doesnt mean everyone on Earth wants to fuck me. Oh, landmine. Oh. Hell, there are days when I dont want to fuck me. Mick looked at her and tilted his head. How... would you-- Its a figure of speech, buddy. Wash your brain out with soap. They both smiled, trying to leaven the weight of what their words. I just want to shut out the noise, and what you did last week quieted everything down. It put the noise back in its box, she said. I know. And I think if we both just promise ahead of time not to get weird and disappear, he gestured to himself, Or get overly invested, gesturing at her, We can avoid the unwanted consequences. Fran was ready to believe he was right. She couldnt imagine a world where she fell in love with Mick, and she couldnt imagine a world where Mick would ever flake on her. He never had, not once in a decade. So she took his fondue fork out of his twiddling fingers and clasped both her hands around his. She looked into his eyes and said, Michael Washington. You know I love you and I always will. But all the orgasms on earth will not make me fall in love with you. I promise. I believe you. Good. Now get your ass into the bedroom. Im bringing the fondue, he said, rising.

Chapter 7

Okay! Fran raced upstairs to the bedroom and then called, Hey, is that why you brought fondue? No, he called as he followed her up the steps, but since its here and we didnt eat much I just figured. He walked in and shrugged, looking a little lost there in her bedroom, one hand holding a fondue pot, the other scratching his head. Fran giggled suddenly, feeling absurd, like a kid, experimenting. He stood there in her frowzy, girly bedroom, his jeans and blue striped button front shirt a solemn contrast to her cozy white eyelet duvet, her cozy cozy brass bed, and even her own cozy, rounded self, curled as she was on the bed. Oh. Landmine. Im ready, she said, meaning it. Where should I start? Where would you usually start, dumbass? A... pick up line? Look, just kiss me. Forget about the rest of it and just kiss me. Mick did as he was told. He put the pot on the bedside table, sat on the bed beside her, and leaned in - but then he stopped, turned away, and came back with a thumbful of chocolate. He smeared a bit on her bottom lip and sucked it off, so quickly and naturally, it took Fran a moment to register that he was kissing her - kissing her, while he put that thumbful of chocolate into her mouth, not stopping the movement of his lips on hers while he swiped the pouty curve of her upper lip with it, then sucked and bit that curve. She scarcely noticed that both his hands were holding her face as the tangle of his thumb and tongue and lips and teeth overwhelmed her awareness. Is it quiet? What? Fran breathed. Good. And he pressed her down on the bed. Lying on her back, with Mick on his side, she felt one of his hands in her hair and the other at her jaw and ear while his mouth continued its steady attention. Who knew he could kiss like this? She put a hand on his wrist and whimpered a little. You like soft, he whispered. I do? Yeah. And he showed her, lavishing her throat, her jaw, her ears with soft, warm kisses, mixed with the abrasion of his stubble and the occasional nip of his teeth. His hands were under her shirt, exploring her back, taking their time, their light touch on her skin more intense, more demanding of her attention than the hardest slap or the deepest penetration. I do, she sighed, and his hands were pulling off her shirt, her bra, and then they were gone, and he had moved away from her She was desolate, alone. Dont stop. Im not, Im taking off my shirt. He was kneeling on the mattress beside her, fingers working his buttons.

Let me. She took control, knelt beside him and felt her way rapidly down the row and then pushing the fabric off his shoulders down his arms. He shrugged, such a characteristic gesture, she had a sudden awareness of how familiar he was to her - and then her attention was pulled to the powerful arms, shoulders, chest, abs. How many times had she seen him without a shirt? How many times had she noticed his beauty? Countless, countless. But this time, she could touch him. Mesmerized, she put a hand on his pectoral muscle, the deltoid, the biceps, the brachialis, each muscle distinct and firm under his skin. And oh, his skin. She glanced at his face, saw him waiting, watching her. Slowly, she shifted to her hands and knees, put her open mouth on his skin, and swept her tongue in a patient circle. She moved her mouth, still open, to another spot, and made another wet circle. And another. And again. On his nipples, on the ridges of his abs. She bit lightly into his lateral obliques. His hands were on her again, roaming over her back and shoulders and breasts. With pressure under her elbows, he coaxed her up to her knees in front of him, put his hands at the nape of her neck, and kissed her, tongue exploring her mouth, twining with her tongue. At the feel of her breasts against his chest, her body rejoiced, and she wrapped her arms around his back, felt the muscles around his spine contracting under her hands. She rubbed her nipples against his skin, delighting in his warmth and smoothness. With a bolt of impatience that sparked across to Fran, he tugged at her yoga pants, pushed them below her hips and ran his hands over her over her ass, over that sensitive patch at the base of her spine, making her rock her hips forward. He tucked his fingers under the bunched fabric of her clothes, and pushed them, pants and panties together, to her knees. Fran felt his jeans against her belly and legs as his hands made their way over her legs, to the sensitive inner curve between her bottom and her thigh. Yes, yes, yes. He laid her back down on the bed and pulled the tangle of clothes from her legs. She was naked now, with her calves dangling at the knee over the edge of the bed, legs separated, with Mick on the floor between her knees. And she knew exactly what she wanted. Go down on me? Wordlessly he complied, moving between her legs to kiss and tongue and stroke his way toward her vulva. He approached gradually. Softly. Silently. When at last he arrived, he just brushed his mouth against her labia. Then he brushed his tongue. All the while, his fingertips stroked the sensitive insides of her thighs. I should warn you, Im one of those clit-diddle types, I like it nice and - oh my yes. A quick study, her Mick. His lips were soft and indirect and slow, his tongue moving with the lightest of touches over her labia. She tangled her fingers into his hair and moaned, Oh yes. Oh it took Charles ages to learn - Mick removed his mouth abruptly. If you talk about Charles again while Im doing this Im gonna... I dont know, but something. Fran laughed. Okay, okay, anything, just dont stop. More. He obliged, his attention focused, using breath and lips and tongue. He moved one hand steadily up and down the inside of her thigh, while the other pressed lightly on her mons, tugging upward just a little to expose her clit. The blend of sensations consumed her attention, filled her awareness. With astonishing speed, her arousal accelerated and crescendoed, and she found herself at the brink. And then he stopped again. You want to come or you want to wait? Are you kidding? I want to come, please dont stop, oh god fuck please I want to come!

He disappeared between her legs with a grin, and Fran felt his tongue move unerringly to her most sensitive places. He seemed to read her mind - or read her pussy - tuned in and adapting to each change in tension and desire. She came hard, clutching her hands into Micks hair and grunting raucidly with each overwhelming contraction of her pelvic muscles, until she burst out laughing, when her hands softened and she stroked his head affectionately. Oh man, she said. Man oh man. She giggled, and Mick moved himself up from between her legs. He kissed her full and wet, tasting of her own pussy. Oh yummy, she murmured into the kiss. That what you were looking for? Mazing. Thank you. Happy to oblige. She rested, floating, in his arms for a long while, until he kissed her forehead, disentangled himself from her, and rose from the bed. Ill let you sleep, he said. Frans eyes flew open What? Where are you going? He looked at her bemused, his shirt half on. Uh, home? You dont want to do more? Its okay if you dont want to, but I thought you were going to fuck me. Landmine. Shit. Hell. I want to. You want me to? Uh, yeah! Oh. Okay. He stripped fast, leaving his clothes in a heap on the floor. Condoms in the bedside table drawer, Fran said, watching him, half amused, half aroused. She arranged herself on the bed, her head on her pillow. He quickly rolled on a condom and Fran said, Wait, hang on, and retrieved a bottle of lube from the bedside table. She handed it to him with a wiggle of her eyebrows. Really? Oh hell yes. He squeezed a load of lube into his hand and massaged it over the condom. Like that? Dude, have you never used lube before? No, its... He was kneeling on the bed, the body of a mythological creature, but with his hands in the air. They both looked at his penis. Its sticky. Fran laughed at him and said, Just come here, genius. Youll see. She lifted her feet off the mattress and let her knees drop outward, open. He stared at her, first at her pussy, then at her face, Okay. He lay over her and adjusted his at her entrance. Ready? Ready. You romancer. She grinned. It was less awkward than she feared, having his long, lean body - so familiar, still somehow so new - pressing along her round, soft body. Her breasts loved the feel of his chest against them. She glanced at his face, distracted by the task of aligning himself. And then he entered her. Frans brain went mushy. Her eyes closed. And she didnt think anything anymore. He just started fucking her. There was no hesitation, no build up, just slow, steady rhythm, his full length moving into her and out again, into her and out again. Slow. But steady.

With a quiet God, she put her hands on his ass to feel his muscles moving under his skin. Her palms traveled over his hips, his back, his thighs, his shoulders, arms, touched him everywhere as he fucked her, simply. When his lips found hers, she twined her fingers in his hair and kissed him hungrily. Still he maintained his steady, deliberate rhythm. She rocked her hips against him, coaxing him to go faster, but he kept his pace, his full length moving into her and out again, into her and out again. The movement of her hips only sensitized her own body, building the urgency inside her. All she could think was that she wanted him to slam into her body, hard and fast, and the more she wanted that, the more agonized she was by his even, purposeful strokes. So she rocked more, gripping her hands in his hair, pinning her nails into his shoulder, pulling with the flats of her fingertips at his ass. And still he moved his whole length into her, and out again, into her and out again. His lips were on her neck now, on her shoulder. She grunted, wordless, and spread her legs wider, raising her feet in the air above them to make her clit as available to his thrusts as possible. The angle deepened his penetration, the head of his cock reaching her hiddenest depths. His only change was a little noise and the shift of his lips to her earlobe. In desperation, she reached to the full extent of her arms to grip his thighs just under his ass, to push him into her, push him. He would not be hastened, but he was trembling now with the effort of maintaining his steady, steadfast rhythm, and his breath near her ear was labored. Groaning once more, she wrapped her arms tight around his waist, gripped him to her with all her considerable strength, and he whispered, Jesus. Still he fucked her, moving his whole length into her and out again. She neared climax, her hands fisting against the small of his back and her breath coming in short, noisy pants. She made half-articulate noises - Ye - Mi - Fu - Go - and scraped her nails down his back. She pressed her hips against his with jabbing thrusts, as he steadily fucked her. Then he stopped. Hey! she cried, as he raised himself to kneel between her legs - but his face told her he knew exactly what was doing to her. He reached out his hands and held her two ankles, stretching her legs wide, wide, wide. And held himself still inside her. And looked at her. She was panting still, her belly and her hips still searching for orgasm. He seemed determined to delay her, waiting until her tension diminished, waiting until she was no longer close. She felt stroked by his gaze as his eyes wandered from her face to her breasts to the junction where their bodies met. The tendons in her inner thighs stretched against the pressure of his hands. She felt not the least self-conscious, not the least unsure. She knew her power. She knew her beauty in that moment. He took a few warm up strokes and then, oh he fucked her, as hard and fast as she had wanted. All the force she had longed for came at her, and she softened her body into it, allowing her hands to curl, soft, near her shoulders. Her breasts and belly bounced with the rhythm of his thrusts, and she let them. She watched him watching her, watched as his eyes traveled the length of her body, up her legs, and then, without warning, he pulled one foot to his mouth and sucked her big toe, swirling his tongue around it, even as he continued to fuck her fast and hard. In a decade or more of fairly exuberant sex, Fran had never had her toes sucked certainly not while she was being fucked. The sensation astonished her. He moved with incongruous slowness and diligence from one toe to the next, giving equal, focused attention to each. And with each toe, his warm grip on her ankle shifted, which changed the angle of her leg,

which changed the angle of his steady, fast, hard fucking. And then he licked along the arch of her foot - and Fran didnt know which did more to her: the sensation of his tongue along the sensitive underside of her foot, or the sight of it. He kissed and nibbled her arch, eyes closed, as though he were savoring some rare treat. He did it all again to her other foot, and Fran watched him, her hands finding their way of their own accord to her breast and her clit. When he had done and he opened his eyes, he saw her busy hands and made a noise of heady approval. Then everything changed again. He brought her legs together, her toes in the air, wrapped his arms around her knees to press them together against his chest. And his fucking changed utterly. Now, his eyes fixed on her face, he gave one hard thrust and was still. And then another thrust, and still. And then a long minute of shallow, slow fucking, just the tiniest movement inside her, and two hard, deep, fast thrusts, and then still. He kept on fucking her, surprising her, and she surrendered to it, anticipating each change, unable to anticipate anything, and utterly focused on him. Now quick and shallow, now steady, deep, hard, intense - and now the barest movement, his cock almost - not quite - almost still, deep, deep inside her. His hands were moving on her thighs, still pressed against him, and he turned his head to kiss and bite her feet. Fran couldnt tell if she felt more worshipped or more subjugated to his will. Whichever it was, she handed herself over to it, bit by bit. She saw sweat on his forehead, on his chest. His jaw was tight and his brow was furrowed in concentration, in effort. She closed her eyes, giving herself him without any reservation. And thats when it came. He planted both her feet flat against his chest, his hands folded over her insteps, and he leaned over her to press her knees into her chest. She was folded up, aware of her own body pressing against itself, aware of his cock waiting at her entrance, waiting. Then he fucked her fast and deep, the angle of his penetration unlike anything she had known, the warmth of his chest against the bottoms of her feet a beguiling adjunct to the vulnerable depth of his cock inside her. She tucked both hands between her thighs and rubbed at her clit, so near the edge she could scream - she did scream, and she could hardly tell when she crossed from building tension to exploding tension. With each wave of release came another of build-up, so that she hovered endlessly at a peak, moaning and breathless and mouthing words she couldnt find. And in the middle of it, he changed again, releasing one of her feet to his side and hooking the other over his shoulder, so that she was split open to him, still coming. Her hands reached for him and he leaned in to kiss her, her leg stretching and pressing between their bodies. She struggled for air, kissing and coming, as he fucked and fucked into her. His own breath came in grunting spasms, the tension pulsing through his body matching her vibrating, spinning awareness. She was swimming, lost in her drugging, suspended orgasm. Her fingers tangled in his hair, her teeth in his neck, urging him to join her, knowing that only his release could bring her final satisfaction. Come. Micky. Come in me. He kissed her and he fucked her and he let himself meet her with a wild, grunting series of thrusts. He put his hand over her throat, bit and tugged her lower lip, and the gradual slowing of his movements inside coaxed her own arousal gently downward. And at last the drugging waves ebbed from her and she drifted, drifted down into quietude. Her muscles softened as he softened inside her. Her mind was silent. He withdraw gently, and through a haze Fran heard him walk to the bathroom to trash the condom. When he returned to the bed, he folded her against him.

Oh Frannie. He carried her hand to his mouth and bit into the meat of her palm. The fingertips of his other hand continued to move over her skin, tracing her shape, smoothing her hair. She put her mouth on his, wrapped her hand around his neck, thrust her tongue searchingly into his mouth, and he whimpered at the invasion. His hands flexed and pressed, now caressing her oh-so gently, now gripping her flesh fiercely, fingernails stinging into her, now stroking away the sting. Her shoulders, her breasts, her back, her hips, all over, he held her attention with his hands and renewed her arousal. She wanted to stay in this place forever, free from the noise, free from fear. Nothing but his hands on her, his lips on her, his eyes on her, would shut out the noise. And when he touched her, everything went quiet inside. She felt whole and safe and beautiful and home. So she was insatiable. Make me come again, she said. More. He pulled away from her and reached for the lube. I like this stuff, he said as he turned her onto her back. Fran didnt know what she expected to happen next, but it wasnt what did happen: he straddled her shoulders and lay over her, his head over her hips, his feet on either side of her skull. She felt him kissing and caressing her wide, rounded cheeks, felt his hand slip underneath her to reach her clit. And she felt one well-lubricated fingertip touch her anus. Um, she breathed, and even she could hear the Yes! in her voice. He toyed with her at first, just brushing that slippery finger up and down and around and around the outside, with no pressure at all just a delicate touch, so that the muscle there contracted and flexed in anticipation. Meanwhile the fingers at her clit were still, with just steady warmth and pressure. When he finally did slide just the tip of one finger into her ass, she gasped and clenched and flexed her hips, which rubbed her vulva against his hand, so she did it again. And again, With each shift of her hips, his finger went just a little further. And just a little further. The sensations from her clit and her ass melded with the feel of his lips on her hip, and then of his tongue tracing along the edge of her crack. Holy moly, she said, and above her she felt him laugh. The layers of sensation built and deepened, and Fran was half-aware that nearly all of it came from her own movements under his bracketing hands and mouth. So she moved more, searching out pleasure, letting it build. She folded her hands over his feet and drew an impulsive line along the arch with the tip of her tongue, letting her pleasure channel itself back into him, completing the circuit. He muttered wordlessly, and when the movement of her hips was steady and full, he began to fuck her with his finger, the movement matched to the pace and intensity of her rocking. Oh my - And he was still kissing and licking and biting her ass and the juncture with her thigh. His fingers on her clit began to make circles in time with her movements. The layers of sensation built inside her, built to a towering, precarious peak. With his hands, with his tongue, with his tireless, focused attention, he brought her to a third orgasm, toppling her into the abyss. She fell as he held her in his focused, steady hands. She rocked and spasmed and cried out, and then softened and relaxed and breathed. He disappeared briefly and Fran heard water running in the bathroom. Pragmatic Mick. She was drifting to sleep when he returned. She heard rattling and rummaging and wondered vaguely if he were getting another condom, but then she heard a familiar buzzing. She opened one eye and saw him watching her face.

He tucked an arm under her neck and turned her to her side, nestled in the crook of his shoulder. He set the little vibrator on her clit. He kissed her. One more and then you can sleep, he said. Give me one more. I dont know if I can, she murmured through her drowse. Course you can, Frannie, you can do anything. And tonight is all I get. One more. The toy was compelling, and the warmth and pressure of his hand over it, of his body against hers, of his lips now pressed at her temple, conspired to arouse her when she thought she had nothing left. Hey, he whispered to her, Remember that first year in law school? Uh-huh? She let the warmth in her pelvis expand bit by bit. When you asked me if I would work out with you that first time? Yeah. And we ran our first treadmill race? Well I ran. You walked. Fran smiled into his shoulder. Trundled, more like. God I was so slow and weak. Weak? I watched you next to me, all pink-faced and dripping sweat and more determined than anybody else in that place. And I thought you were the sexiest thing I had ever seen. Oh. I went home and fantasized about you in the shower. Oh. She rocked her pelvis against his hand. Im glad we never had sex - Im pretty sure we would never have gotten to be friends if we had, and your friendship is everything to me, Frannie. But dont ever think again that your body doesnt turn me on. Mick. He moved his mouth from her temple to her ear, whispering directly into it. She felt his eyelashes against her cheekbone And last week when you came just from me touching your legs. Oh god Frannie, I wanted to fuck you right then. Oh. That night was the second time I fantasized about you in the shower. I imagined doing all the things I did tonight, and more, much more. But my fantasy didnt come close to the reality. Your orgasms are the sexiest thing Ive ever seen in my entire fucking life, Fran. Oh thats it. Oh come for me, come for me one more time honey. Just one more. God yes. Tell me you like it. Oh I like it, Micky. Gasping, striving, reaching for it. I like it. Ill make you come again. Ill make you come. Oh honey. Oh my beautiful woman. With spasming contractions, she came once more, and Fran felt an inexplicable wetness where his eye was closed against her temple. And that was the last thing she was aware of before she fell into sleep.

Chapter 8

Mick awoke to the smell of coffee. Opening his eyes and stretching, he saw that Fran was missing. He turned over and fell back asleep. When he woke a second time, Fran was leaning over him, talking into his ear in her kidfrom-The-Shining voice, Coffee. Cooooffeeeeeee. He opened his eyes to see her freshly showered face smiling down at him. She held out a mug with a cartoon pony on it. It read, SMALL FAT AND MIGHTY. You fell asleep, he said, taking the mug. Yeah. She wrinkled her nose in apology. I stayed. Yes! Which means I get to feed you, for a change! I didnt know if it would be okay for me to stay, he persisted. Of course its okay! Youve stayed before. A million years ago. On the couch, when I drank too much. This was different. It was. She nodded, sunshine sparkling in her hair. It was fabulously different. Yeah? Fabulous? Transformational. I feel... she paused to inhale deeply and sigh. Ebullient. Like Im back in my body. I dont know where I was before, but I wasnt here. The noise is back in its box. Thank you. Good. Good. He rubbed his face and took a sip of coffee. She sprawled herself next to him. Dare I ask how it was for you? All that Woman in the bed wasnt too much for you? It was maybe the best sex of my life. He heard the awe in his voice. Felt it in his heart. I told you fat chicks are awesome. She beamed and snuggled into her pillow. Youre okay about... the thing? What? Oh, am I in love with you? She rolled her eyes and snorted. Please, Micky, get over yourself. It was an awesome lay, but I know who you are. And are you all weird? Not that I can tell. Awesome. We are awesome. Hey should I make pancakes? He didnt want pancakes. He wanted to make love to her again, make her come again, watch her face, the way she got lost in pleasure, utterly abandoned to the sensations he created in her. Reverently, he brushed a wave of damp hair from her forehead, and said, Sure. Melt the fondue on them. She laughed and bounced from the bed, I like how you think, sir! As she floated from the room, she called, Showers ready when you are. Breakfastll be ready in a few. When he had hauled himself into the shower, Mick stood under the spray and smiled. She was back. Almost miraculously, overnight, she had gotten the sunshine back, gotten back the bubbles that made her the fizz and float in his life. When he pulled on last nights clothes and made his way to the kitchen, empty mug in hand, he found Fran pouring batter and effervescing. She smiled at him and started talking. I knew this guy once who - okay actually it was Marcel - he said, Eat to live, dont live to eat, and I was all, Okay, but eat to live, not just to live. Dude, I think you must be right about me falling in love when I fuck people. Actually, now that youve pointed it out, I think the problem

is when I screw people before I really know them. Would I ever have had sex with him if I had known he was so hung up about pleasure? It makes me wonder if I would ever fall in love with anyone if I waited for sex until I knew them better. Theres a stack in the oven if youre ready, and the chocolates in that pot. Mick poured himself more coffee and filled a plate with equal parts pancakes and melted chocolate. At the table, he cut into his food and watched Fran bend to put the last pancakes in the warm oven. Her bathrobe stretched around her bottom, outlining it vividly. She stood and looked at her vacant pan. Ive got this hot griddle here. Should I make bacon? What the hell kind of question is that? he said through a mouthful of chocolate-soaked pancake. Ill make bacon. She retrieved a lump of butchers paper from the fridge and started pulling strips of bacon from it. Soon the kitchen smelled like heaven. You gonna sit down and eat? Thesell be done in a minute, then we can dip them in chocolate! Mick chuckled. The fizz and the float. She made him fizz inside too. He ate for a time in silence. As she joined him at the table with her own plate and a platter of snapping bacon, he said,You seem better. I really, really am, she declared as she constructed a sandwich of bacon and chocolate between two pancakes. She bit into it and closed her eyes. Just put the carrot in, she said. What? Thich Nhat Hanh. Mindful eating. When you chew it, you are aware that you are chewing a piece of carrot. Don't put anything else into your mouth, like your projects, your worries, your fear, just put the carrot in. Im back in my body, and the noise is in its box. He watched her mouth as she chewed, and it was the same as last night. Everything else disappeared, her entire being focused on her experience. He picked up a slice of bacon, wiped it into the chocolate residue on his plate, and munched thoughtfully. He noticed that he was eating his jealousy of a chocolate and bacon pancake sandwich. It wasnt as delicious as the bacon and chocolate. Huh, he said. She ate without speaking - though not silently. She made little noises of delight and discovery with each bite. She breathed deeply and sometimes vocalized her breath, as she sometimes did when she stretched after a run. Everything about her was radiant this morning. Then out of the blue, Hey, how did you know I had a vibrator? Mick choked a little on his bacon. I saw it when I got the condom. She nodded and mopped chocolate off her plate with a bit of pancake. You really complimented me last night. The thing about being turned on by me that first time we worked out? That was really nice. Was it true? Sure. How come you never told me? She sucked chocolate off her thumb with a smack. He shrugged. It never came up. He sipped his coffee and considered for a long moment, then added, You were completely uninterested, it was never a thing. Well duh, why would I waste my time being interested when you said yourself you werent attracted to - wait a second.

Mick wondered what the statute of limitations was on dumbfuckery. Why had he ever even talked about other girls with Fran? I was 23. That was why. But it had all worked out okay. Were you lying when you said you werent interested in fat chicks? I never said that. I just said I liked that one girls body. You said - I didnt. Thats what you remember, but its not what I said. Was it important that she understand? Was it important that she not understand? Whats a good outcome here? She looked at him with eyes full of questions, her thin, pale eyebrows knit together. This has been an educational fifteen hours, she said, and sipped her coffee. Mick wanted to change the subject. You were right about that goop. It stayed slippery for a long time. Even in the shower, I noticed. I know! I cant believe you never used it before! She rose as she spoke, gathering dishes. Mike watched her moved through the kitchen, watched her tidy and rinse and wipe. We havent woken up together since the thing. The time after Mandi left, I mean. This is about as different as it gets. Oh my god, so different. She sighed, sitting back in her chair. Im not over Charles. Thats going to take a lot of time. But now my pain is all about the relationship itself and not that awful, noisy, self-hating bullshit that wouldnt shut up. She met his eyes and smiled, deep peace inside her, and a tiny fleck of chocolate on her lip. He wanted to lick it. He wanted to grab her hair and arch her back over the kitchen sink and bite into the flesh of her throat. He wanted to fuck her standing up here in the kitchen. Fuck her on the kitchen table, fuck her on the kitchen floor. Well I should get home, he said. Glad you feel better. Youve got chocolate on your - he gestured around his own mouth. She smiled and ran her tongue around her mouth. He handed her a napkin. Next Friday? she asked, following him to the side door. Oh, actually. Can we skip next week? There this... did you know that if youre in somebodys wedding you dont just go to the wedding? Theres all this other stuff you have to do. I just found out I need to go to a rehearsal dinner on Friday. Why do you have to rehearse dinner? She laughed. Whos getting married? These friend of mine at work. He shrugged. Theyre already living together; its not news. Okay, see you in two weeks then. Youll be okay? Ill be completely okay. The noise is back in the box. The rest of it I can cope with. Okay. Okay. See ya. She hugged him for a long, long time and said into his ear, Thanks, man. She was soft and warm and smelled like flowers. When he withdrew from her, the hollow space between them felt so empty, he said You wanna come to the wedding Saturday? just to fill the space. Youre not taking Christine? Seems like a bad idea, taking a married woman to a wedding.

Good point. Seriously, dude, she shook her head at him. We gotta get you some therapy. You dont have to go. Backtrack. Its not a big deal. No, Id like to! Weddings of strangers are generally hilarious. Ill take business cards too - people always end up saying, And what do you do? and I can very often get a new client out of it. Okay. Ill email you about it. She kissed him on the cheek. He went home.

Chapter 9

Sundays were his long runs. Mick put on his shoes at 6am, went out the front door, picked a direction at random, and started running, thinking maybe hed go ten miles. Ten miles should be enough to deal with Friday night. And, more importantly, with Saturday morning. All that desire. The opposite of what he usually experienced. Usually he was ready to get out the door, and instead he had wanted her all the more. So ten miles. Hed go up the mountain. Sundays had been his long runs for going on twenty-five years, ever since Mrs. Brindy, his elementary school gym teacher, noticed he was fast. She made it a game, a game for a kid with nothing else to do on Sundays, for a kid with a mom whod drunk herself into a stupor on Saturday night and then walked out, never to be seen again on Sunday morning. Yeah, that was when he started his long runs. Hed missed exactly one since he was eight years old - the Sunday after Mandi left. Hed lain in bed with Fran tucked around him, and couldnt get up, couldnt get up, couldnt get up. He told her he never missed a run: not when he had the flu, not the day of his fathers wedding, not the day after he graduated from law school. But he couldnt get up. Want to hear something funny? she had whispered over his shoulder. Sure. Im training for a marathon. He had turned his head to look at her. Whats funny about that? One of her pale eyebrows had disappeared into her hairline at that. He said, Seriously, marathons are mostly about the determination to finish, no matter what. Youve already got that. The only thing between you and a marathon is practice. He rolled onto his back. What marathon do you want to run? She hadnt wanted just any marathon. She wanted the Western Mass Marathon, known locally as the Lesbianville Widowmaker. The route seemed deliberately to seek out all the largest hills in the Pioneer Valley, up and across their little mountain and back down again. Training with Fran on the mountain - this mountain, he thought, as he inhaled and glanced at the sharp incline now before him - had saved him. Training with Fran had given him something to hope for. Something to live for. And on the day, he had had no doubt shed finish. She seeded herself near the back of the pack, he near the front, so he finished hours ahead of her, even though he took it easy. After a rest and water, hed taken off his number and backtracked, finding her five miles from the finish, in the middle of the descent past the Eyrie House ruins. If she pushed really hard, he had realized, shed have a time under five hours. Shed started with the goal of finishing in under six. So he had trotted along beside her, cracking jokes to distract her from the pain. When that didnt work anymore, he had run backwards in front of her, taunting her, telling her she should just give up, just go home and eat a cheesecake, and she cried and laughed at the same time. Oh fuck you, Mick. And then that last mile. You can see the finish line as you round the bend into the last flat, straight mile. When Fran saw it, everything inside her changed. He watched her realize that she was going to finish, she was definitely, definitely going to finish. She looked stunned for just a moment, then flashed him a smile and said, Race ya, and shot off like she had a jetpack.

When he realized what she meant, he gave her five seconds and then chased her, chased hard. She was sprinting, fired up, burning, wanting to beat him for real in this last mile. So he chased her for real, though his legs were rubbery from the 36 miles hed run that day. When he had nearly caught her up - what made him do it, hell never know - he let out a banshee wail, and she turned to see him gaining on her, and she yelled too, and ran even faster. They ran and screamed, and the crowd near the finish line must have thought they were a couple of lunatics. He just barely caught her at the finish line, crossing beside her, both of them screaming and gasping and laughing, and then crying and she kept saying, I won! I won! So he said it too: You won! You won! And they bounced and skipped, exhausted and supercharged and high like he had never been, not in a dozen marathons. She was his fizz and his float. And that had been it, he realized now as he crested the peak and saw the horizon expand around him. That moment when theyd crossed that finish line together, hollering like a pair of charging soldiers, like a pair of teenagers in a horror movie, like the good guys at the end of an adventure movie. Thats when he had fallen in love. Im an idiot, he said, and he stopped. He had crossed the ridge and begun the switchbacking descent, and was standing now amidst the stoney burnt ruins the Eyrie House hotel. Well, he panted, his hands on his hips. There was really only one thing to do. He started running again. He had a long run ahead of him, but at least he was going home.

Chapter 10 Fran? She heard him calling from the kitchen. Tub! Sorry! Running late! Fran gave her razor a final rinse and zipped from the tub to rub herself dry. A slather of lotion later, she poured herself into her dress - red, with a deep V. Ten more minutes in front of a mirror and she breezed into the kitchen, wafting perfume and confidence. Hey Fran. Hey. Sorry to make you wait. Had to shave my legs. Nice dress. Youre not looking at the dress, my friend. She smiled at him. Youre right. His eyes locked with hers, and Fran felts something new coming from him. Hey you seem pretty good. Hows your noise? Quiet. Tidily packed away in its box. She sighed peacefully. Ready? Mick drove them to the country club where his friends were getting married and having their reception. Fran amused herself as Mick served as usher and attendant, tried not to laugh when he fought hard to stifle a yawn in the middle of the ceremony, and then strolled with the rest of the group into the adjacent and much larger room for the reception. She found Table 2 and waited for her fellow Table 2ers to join her. Mick came over to check on her. Bored yet? They both said at once, and grinned at each other. Just then a frizzy, middle-aged lady in an unbecoming shade of pink sidled up to Fran and put a hesitant hand on her arm. Are you... Francine Dolan? the woman asked. Fran smiled. Thats me. Oh my goodness, I am... this is probably so inappropriate, but I just have to tell you. Your book made such a difference in my life. Oh, Im so glad to hear that. Tell me your name. Fran shot a scram look at Mick and gestured the woman to a chair and the two of them sat talking - or rather, the woman talked, while Fran beamed her benevolent smile and nodded sympathetically. When Mick returned as salads were being served, Fran said to him, Im a rock star, I know, Frannie. I changed her life. I know, I know. If theres a heaven, Im going there. Okay, Frannie. Plus Im frickin gorgeous. Have you seen what I do to this dress? Yes. A wicked idea entered her mind. Hey Mick, I need to go to the ladies room. Would you come with me? Why? For company? Come on. Mick shrugged and stood and they walked side by side through the crowded ballroom. Fran jabbed her elbow into his ribs. Everyone here wonders who your hot date is. I know.

Apart from the ones who know who I am and are whispering behind their hands, Thats Francine Dolan, bestselling author, life-changing personal trainer, and smokin hot fat chick. Yep. Again, his eyes met hers and she felt that jolt that started somewhere in the middle of her chest and traveled like a bolt of lightening to her clit. I think theres a less crowded restroom down this way. She led him down a side stairs and around a corner to the country clubs locker room. Turning her head to see if they were observed, she snuck through the door and gestured him in. Come on, come on. As places to pee go, this one was pretty elaborate. The foyer - it had a foyer - contained a circular padded bench with a fountain in the middle. Fran led him back through an array of wooden-doored lockers, past the showers and sinks, to the toilet stalls. Come here. She tugged him into a stall with her. What? Why? Because I would like to give you a nice blowjob in gratitude to you for bringing me to this lovely event.

# What? Now? You fucked Christine in the gym locker room. Her hand were undoing his pants, then groping amidst the fabric for his cock. That was different. Because shes skinny? Stroking the shaft now, with firm, steady hands. Both hands. Because shes not - We cant just... Cant just what? Her hands continued to work on him, and her eyes were warm and challenging. If you say no. Ill stop. If you say yes, Ill suck you off. Its entirely up to you. And take your time deciding, because I could do this for hours. And she smiled with those shiny, dark lips. Jesus, Frannie. Yes. Yes. Yes. Frannie is heartbroken and needs time, he recited to himself. Marathons are about She dropped down and in an instant her mouth was on him, taking him into her. For a few vertiginous seconds, Mick watched as the image of her mouth around his cock went from the erotic novelty of a new mouth sucking him off to the oddness of his best friend with her mouth on his penis, back to erotic novelty, switching and unfocused until they resolved into the woman he loved with her warm, wet mouth on him. Then her hand cupped his balls and he tilted his head back and tried to breathe. It didnt take long. The hours of watching her body move inside that dress, the skill of her mouth and hands on him, and the delicious risk of being caught all conspired to take him to the edge of orgasm in minutes. He gave up the fight and surrendered to her, and instantly his arousal peaked. Oh god, fuck, god! Im gonna come, he warned. But instead of pulling away, she sucked him hungrily and grunted around him when his semen hit her tongue. When the shocks of pleasure had eased, Fran stood up and kissed him, her mouth drenched in his fluid. Mick sucked her tongue, tasting himself, smelling her perfume, feeling her body along the length of his. Dazedly, he felt her hands at his crotch and heard his zipper go up. Lets get a cocktail to go with that, she grinned.

What? A cocktail. She wrapped her arms around his waist and gave him a little hug. As in, the alcoholic beverage? What? he said again. But you didnt come. I didnt want to come, I wanted to make you come. But thats not fair. What? Not fair for who? You? Because you came and I didnt? You dont make any sense. I - She was walking away from him, her hips swinging, her shoulders relaxed. She was happy. It shone from her. Mick stayed behind, still half hard, still not thinking straight, with a vague sense that he should follow her; he would be required to brush aside the men who fell at her feet on her way to the bar. He went to the row of sinks to splash water on his face. He needed more of his brain online before he went out there again. Hands braced on the counter, he met his own eyes in the mirror. Youre fucking it up he watched himself say. You want her too much. But he knew what it was like when the noise wouldnt shut up, knew that when you found the thing that made the noise go away, you grabbed it and you never, never let go. You did whatever it took to keep it with you. He knew that. So he would give her everything she wanted and hold himself back. By the time he joined the party again, Fran was back at their table, her feet propped on his chair, with two drinks and both of their desserts in front of her. For you, sir, she said, handing him his drink and dropping her feet so that he could sit down. I was just chatting with our neighbors here at Table 2. Chatting. Schmoozing. She had probably signed three of them up for free introductory sessions already. Beth, Jonathan, Sarah, Bill, and Olive, all lawyers, were clearly charmed. A personal trainer, huh? asked Bill. I bet your legal background comes in handy with that! Ha ha! Bill was a dick. Beth said, Tell us more about this health at every size thing. I feel like Ive read something about it. Sarah nodded with an encouraging smile. Sarah was a sweetie, too pretty for her own good, and if she had an ounce of guile in her shed use her looks to her advantage, but no. She and Beth leaned in, imploring Fran with their eyes to tell them everything she knew. Beth was constantly on diets and the office fridge sometimes suffered for it. Maybe Fran could fix that. And so Fran launched into her topic with all the fizz and float she had in her. Looking around the table, Mick saw how every face was turned toward Fran, sunflowers to the sun. Then she turned it back to the group, elicited opinions, experiences, engaging everyone equally, making them feel included, invested. Sarah had leaned in, confidentially, to Fran. Im sorry, I cant help asking - it would be the weirdest coincidence, but... would you happen to know Charles McAdams? Fran looked at her, and Mick saw the dimming of the light in her eyes. Uh, yes. That is unbelievable. He told me all about you - all great things of course. Is that so? Im sorry, Sarah said with her hand at her heart, her sweet self-deprecation evident, Where are my manners, let me introduce myself. Im Sarah Stephens. She held out a slim, elegant hand to shake.

What? Im sorry - what? Frans face turned white and all the molecules around her body froze.

Chapter 11

How she managed to mumble through the niceties, Fran would never know. Drowning in the rushing noise in her ears, she saw more than heard Mick say, We gotta go. See you on Monday. Yeah you too. Best wishes to them. And she felt his hand around her arm, leading her out of the ballroom, through the foyer, and out the front doors, where they stood in the atrium, and Fran glanced dully around her. Why are we standing here? Theyre bringing my car. Oh. She nodded sagely. That was Sarah. Sarah. As in, I love you, Sarah Sarah. I got that. Its not so much that that was Sarah, as it is that Sarah was that. Okay. I mean she was so nice. She was so pretty and sweet. And so thin. Micky, she was like a size 6. I hadnt noticed that. She was so... Fran stopped and bunched up her lips against a wave of tears. She looked at her shoes. She fiddled with her purse clasp. Oh god. What would she tell a client to do? Go for a run. Not gonna happen right now, not in three inch heels. Meditate, then. She sent her attention to her breath, compassionate attention to her breath, and noticed all the tension in her muscles as she fought tears. Oh god. Mikes car had arrived and he ushered her into the passenger seat. She sat there trying to breathe until Mikes voice cut through the haze: Seatbelt. Fran. Seatbelt. Lets go home. Seatbelt, right. She buckled her seatbelt with fumbling hands, the car moved forward, and without preamble the bomb triggered by being face to face with Sarah finally exploded. She burst into tears - wailing, body-wracking, hyperventilating tears. She gripped her hair with both hands and tried to keep breathing through the nightmare pouring from her heart. This thing was happening to her, insisted on happening to her right now, and she could only let it happen and hope it didnt kill her. She let the sobs take her. Mike was saying, I didnt know. I had no idea. Frannie, honey, and looking panicked. She just shook her head. It wasnt his fault. Now that it had happened, it seemed inevitable. The drive, arriving at her house, stumbling into the house, finding her way somehow to the bed, she would never have a clear memory of these things, as her brain simply refused to register the world around her. When at long last her tears had run out, she simply lay there and shook - not the whole-body shivering of cold, but sporadic, hard trembling that suddenly gripped one muscle group, and then another. She didnt try to control it. She simply breathed and allowed her body to release whatever it wanted to release. I see myself as a mountain, she thought. I feel solid. I make myself still as a mountain pond. I reflect things a they are. I see myself as space. I feel free. That Thich Nhat Hanh, hes onto something. She wept then, quiet, wholesome tears, simple grief for things as she had thought they were, for what she had mistaken for freedom.

Chapter 12

Water was running. She was out of bed. In the tub, but out of bed. Progress. Even if it was - he pulled out his phone - 11pm. Thats fine. She had finally eaten the chicken salad he brought her around 7. Now shes in the tub. In the tub. Fran in the tub had an entirely different meaning now. Her soft skin lapped by water, her pale eyelashes clinging and wet. Mick sat on the sofa, suspended in indecision. He could go in there. He could climb into the tub without even taking off his clothes, his hands over those curves, push his fingers into her wet heat, feel her tense and tremble under him, make her come there and then. She would moan, he knew. She would sweat and rock and press herself against him. She was just yards away, naked and wet and... probably obsessing about that fucker Charles. That brought him back. Motherfucker. Mick ran his finger under his collar and tried to remember his plan. A marathon is about the determination to finish no matter what. You need to pace yourself. Fran is heartbroken and not thinking straight. Fran needs time. Fran... was naked right now, wet and smelling of soap. Right now. It was his own fault he was in this mess and having to clean it up. She didnt ask for that first orgasm, and when she asked for the second, he could very easily have said no. Very easily. He stayed on the sofa and listened to water lapping upstairs, trying not to imagine Frans body, but every time he succeeded in not thinking about it, hed think, Hey Im not thinking about Frans body, and then hed be thinking about her body again. Around midnight, he heard the water drain, heard shuffling and rustling and then... silence. She was back in bed. He waited to be sure she was asleep before he let himself rest. He would give her what she needed, whatever she needed, whatever it cost him, and maybe eventually they could build up to something new. Mick settled in for an uncomfortable nights sleep.

He had slept on the couch. When Fran dragged herself downstairs in her robe at 6am, having abandoned hope of falling back asleep, she found him splayed on the couch, one hand over his head, the other wrapped across his stomach. Without turning on a light, she sat on the coffee table and looked at him, stripped to his pants and shirt, and then she noticed he had crumpled up his jacket to serve as a pillow. Well honestly, didnt the man know she had a linen closet? Dumbass, she sighed. She watched him, his face slack with sleep, every muscle along his length soft, quiet. She remembered how those muscles flexed and bent when he ran with her, the tone of his abs, relaxed now, rising and falling with his breath. His hands curled where they lay. The hand over

his head rested palm up, and with her eyes she traced the creases of his palm and the turn of each knuckle. She thought of this hands on her skin, fingers inside her, how they had coaxed and urged and wooed her to mind-altering heights. Where had he learned all that? From the parade of women, she supposed, that passed through his life and through his bedroom. Or maybe that was why they paraded in such clamoring numbers, though apparently they had other partners in their lives. Her gaze returned to his face, turned toward her in his sleep. She let her eyes travel over his skin browned by hours in the sun and just beginning to show creases of age around his eyes and mouth. He hadnt had those when they met. She gave witness to the overnight stubble that reached from his throat to his cheekbones, over the lips that had kissed her lips, kissed her breasts, her belly, her clit. How had she never before noticed how beautiful he was? She had always known he was handsome of course - he knew himself - but she had never before seen his beauty. And now that she did see it, she knew why those women paraded, and why he could give her the silence and oblivion she craved. A tender warmth budded inside her, making her shift and fidget, as images and ideas sprang unbidden to her mind, ideas of his cock in her mouth, in her pussy, of biting his nipples and the meat of his lip. How had she never before noticed the almost girlish pout of his lower lip, or the short, dense fringe of lash that His eyes opened. Hey, he said. Its Sunday, she said. Yeah. Youre missing your run. I can run later. His eyes were so warm on her. He sat up on the couch and scrubbed his hands over his face and through his hair. Are you okay? Im okay. You need anything? Coffee? She didnt need coffee. She stood in front of him and slowly untied her bathrobe, then let it fall to the floor. Make it quiet, she said. Oh. His eyes, still half-lidded with sleep moved over her body, no reservation, just desire. She straddled him quietly, opened his pants, and held his early erection in her hand. Then she licked the palm of her free hand and used that to stroke his shaft until he was fully hard. She scooted closer to him, wrapped an arm around his neck, and began rocking her vulva against him. She was slippery wet from the minutes of watching him, remembering him. With her lips at his ear, she said, Can you feel how I want you? Yeah. He swallowed. Still his hands were at his sides. Do you want me? Yes. The strain in his voice shot through her. I wanna put you inside me and ride you right here on the sofa. Can I do that? Okay, Frannie. And his hands were on her at last, on her thighs, her hips, her waist, her breasts, her shoulders, her back, roaming wildly over her skin as she lifted herself slightly and positioned him at her entrance. Want it? She looked him in the eye and squeezed her muscles around the head of his cock.

He responded with a squeeze of his hands on her ass. Yes. She inched lower, squeezed again, holding his gaze with her eyes. Want more? Yes. He pushed down on her hips, but she resisted. Frannie. She teased him, shifting minutely so that just the head of cock moved inside her, tiny, tantalizing movement that made him close his eyes. With swift fingers, she unbuttoned his shirt so she could run her hands over the taut muscles of his chest. A dirty grin stretched across her face as she decided to give him a taste of his own medicine. She gave one hard thrust down, taking all of him into her, then back up, so that the head just clung to her entrance, and then she was still. And then another thrust, and still. And then a long minute of shallow, slow fucking, just the tiniest movement, and two hard, deep, fast thrusts, and then still. Now quick and shallow, now steady, deep, hard, intense. But rather than surrender to her, as she had to him, he took control from her. In an instant, with an arm around her waist, he tossed her to belly on the couch, one leg dangling over the edge. With a palm pressed against the center of her back, he filled her completely with his cock. And he began to fuck her, both palms now flat on her shoulders, pounding into her without subtlety. He was still half dressed, the wool of his pants against her legs and ass. Fran wanted to put a hand on her clit, but with the pressure on her back, she couldnt lift herself enough to move. She could barely even rock her clit against the couch, so thoroughly had he pinned her. So her pleasure grew steadily but with torturing slowness, expanded from her pelvis to her thighs and belly, until it seemed to fill her up, too full, so she had to release it in little gusts of noise with each thrust. Still he fucked her, steady, fast, hard, and still her pleasure grew, beyond her will, pulling sounds from her she had never made before. When she came, she let out ragged, agonized groans. And he groaned with her. But he didnt stop. He didnt slow down. He kept fucking her. He slapped her ass - hard, really slapped it. And then he brushed his palm over the spot, soothing away where it stung. And then he slapped again. Hard. And again. And then soothed again, soothed with light, warm strokes of his palm. Another slap, and then he scraped up her thigh with his fingernails - still fucking her, still pressing down on her shoulder now with his other hand. Fran had a sense that her body was not her own, that the sensations that overwhelmed her were his as much as hers. When she comes a second time, he leaned over her, fucking her slowly, and whispered into her ear. Is it quiet now? Yes, she said. Thank you. Were not done, he said, and lifted himself off of her, out of her. Go the bedroom and kneel on the bed with your hands on the wall. Now? Right now. Go. With a quick glance at him, feeling both satisfied and hungry for more, she trotted naked up the stairs, knelt on the bed, put her hands on the wall and waited for the sound of his feet on the stairs. And waited. And waited. Mick? she said. Then, louder, Micky? The sun was rising through the window, the first gold of dawn casting color across the room. Stay there, he called.

At last he came, his steps tormentingly slow. When he appeared at the doorway, he had an open bottle of olive oil in his hand. His face looked dark, not angry but... almost. Uh. Whats that for? She turned to him and moved her arms over her torso, feeling suddenly exposed. Vulnerable. Keep your hands on the wall. Its for making you come. To make it quiet. Oh. She moved her hands back to the wall, but kept her eyes on him. Her heart was beating faster now and she couldnt quite tell how much that was due to arousal, and how much to the disconcerting lack of control, the not knowing what would happen next. He put the bottle on the bedside table and began stripping off his clothes. His eyes never left her body, and her eyes never left his, but his gaze was thunderous, driven, while hers was watchful, as a fencer tracks her opponent before a thrust. When he was naked, he picked up the bottle and climbed on the bed and knelt behind her. His whole body conformed against hers, his calves outside her calves, his thighs outside her thighs, his hips aligned with hers, his chest pressed to her back. Suddenly she felt an odd cold sensation on her back and gasped - then realized he had just poured a quantity of olive oil between them and it was dripping down her back and his chest. He leaned back and massaged it into her skin, spreading it from her shoulders to her knees, from her spine to her sternum. His hands, slick and strong, covered every inch of her torso, slathering her breasts and belly and arms with the oil. With his cheek on her shoulder, his teeth scraping her skin, and his arms wrapped around her, he entered her from behind. As he fucked her slowly, all she could do was receive his caresses and his thrusts. She pressed her palms against the wall, accepting the sensations of his body, slippery against hers, rocking her. His hands moved up her arms to her wrists, and his fingers tangled with hers, turning her hands inward, her palms facing each other. He pushed her forward so that their elbows were against the wall. Braced thus, he began a storm of fucking, hard and fast and so deep she felt him against her womb. Fran dropped her head between her shoulders. When his hands moved to her waist, her hip, her back, her breasts, caressing her slick skin, she used the freedom to put a hand on her clit, granting herself the wide, tugging circles her body craved. But he grabbed her wrist - both her wrists - and pushed her downward, her elbows on the mattress, her ass rising into the air. The change in the angle let him even deeper inside her and she cried out with the agonizing pleasure of it. Is it quiet? he asked from behind her, his voice coming through gritted teeth. Yes, and her voice was a moan and a plea and a thank you and Im yours. Yes. He rewarded her with his hand on her clit, making the very circles she needed, while his other hand pressed into her back and his cock still fucked her and fucked her. She came with piercing cries that echoed around them, and he fucked her steadily until the very last of the pulsing waves had receded and her knees gave in to exhaustion. She laid herself on her belly and breathed like shed sprinted a mile, and she heard him breathing too. Oh god Mick, she said, her face in a pillow. I know, he panted. He left the bed, and Fran barely had time to wonder where he was going now and when he would come in her, when she felt his weight shift the mattress under her. He turned her over to her back and straddled her, his knees at her waist, his still-hard cock above her. Frans mouth opened reflexively, anticipating the sensation of him in her mouth. Yes please. Now please.

But instead he reached out to each of her wrists, brought them together over her head, and began to tie them with the stocking he had retrieved from her top drawer. Um? she said. He stopped and looked at her, hard. Is it quiet? he asked again. She nodded, and let him, and found her wrists bound to the brass bedstead above her head. And she let him fuck her mouth. At first he only brushed the head of his cock against her open lips, and she let her tongue slip out to explore the warm, curving bulb of him. When he dipped into her mouth, the first time, she raised her head to meet him, to take him deeply, but he withdrew. Her head fell back on the pillow and she waited for him impatiently. He dipped into her again, and she raised her head again, hungry for him, but he withdrew again. The third time, she kept her head on the pillow and let him go as far as he wanted. Apparently she was to be a passive recipient of his cock. Well, as passive as she could be. She constrained herself, closed her eyes and fought to relax into the pillow while he moved into her mouth and pulled back again. Her tongue took what it could and she sucked, keeping as much of him in her as she could. The more she allowed herself to receive, the deeper he fucked, and she wanted all of him. But he was so gentle, so tender. She opened her eyes and found that he was looking at her with a gaze almost frightening in its intensity. The burn of his wanting penetrated to her heart. She blinked slowly and held his gaze, while she opened her mouth wide and let him in. She didnt suck. She held her tongue still in her mouth. She just opened to him, wide, deep, ready. His arms, stretched above her with his hands gripping the bedstead, went taut, trembled, and his mouth dropped open with hers. Still he watched her, even as he thrust ever deeper into her mouth, took her wholly. The tension in all his muscles vibrated from him, and finally he put one hand on her face, brushed her hair from her forehead, put his thumb on her chin and spread his fingertips across the flushed, soft ridge of her cheek, and whispered, Frannie. Oh. With a desperate cry, his brow wrinkled and his eyes still trained on hers, Mick came in her mouth, thrusting and fighting, and she kept her mouth soft and open for him as she felt his fluid rush over her tongue and lips. Frannie, he whispered again, and he played the softening, wet head of his cock over her still open mouth. Her heart was hammering against her breast. More, more. Mick came down to her and kissed her, licked his come from her lips and her tongue. He kissed along her throat, bit and licked and kissed and sucked his way downward to her darkened nipples. The sun had risen as they fucked, and Fran could see how his shoulders bunched over her and his hands stroked and caressed her, her skin still gilt with oil. By the time his lips found their way to her pussy, she was roiling again, and when his tongue met her clit and his finger slid inside her, she arched off the bed, drawing him deeper, closer, more. He responded by coaxing another finger into her ass, fucking her doubly while his tongue stayed soft and tantalizing. He made it build slowly in her. When she pushed for more, want, now, he pulled back, and when she eased, held still, waited, he gave her everything he had, everything she could take. He extended her arousal, drawing it from her like spider silk, extending it across screeching, grunting minutes of blissful torture. And then with a groan that sounded next to despair, he lifted himself between her thighs and thrust inside her. He kissed her and fucked her and tangled his fingers in her hair, still kissing her, kissing her, his cock moving hard and fast inside her.

It seemed that all the time with him she had been waiting for precisely this: his body over her, inside her, moving with her, taking her as she opened herself and allowed him fully in. She had learned - he had taught her - and now she softened into him, deliquescent under his caresses, and let her body be his. Frannie, he said, moving his lips to her throat, Beautiful woman. You are, he grunted and asked for breath, The most beautiful thing Ive ever known. She came then, and she split wide open. All the fireworks, all the stars, all the galaxies were nothing to it. She disappeared, her atoms spread themselves through the room, through Micks body, out and out, across the world, into space. She was the universe. She was light, and Mick alone was with her, inside infinity. It took a long, long time for her atoms to find their way back home and reassemble themselves, and when they did, she found that she was something quite new. Her mouth sought Micks and he kissed her as though she were his air. How will I get enough of you? he sighed into her throat.

Chapter 13

Mick slept only fitfully beside Fran, who lay like a warm little bandsaw beside him. Nothing had worked the way he expected. He thought he could avoid bolting by being aware of the urge to bolt, but then when he didnt bolt he found himself in deeper love than he knew he was still capable of. And so then he thought he could ease into loving Frannie gradually, that if he just waited, gave her what she needed, and let her heal in her own time, the oblique approach to loving would fool his heart into feeling safe. But nothing had been gradual, it has been intense and immediate and full on. Too much, too fast. He gave her what she needed, and it had broken him. Now he lay beside her with his heart already out the door, wanting nothing but a long run and a cold shower. They had made love off and on all day and most of the night, barely speaking. Fran would sleep in bursts and wake hungry again, insatiable. Each time she crawled into his lap or whispered into the darkness, Take me again or guided his head to her breast, he had given her everything. And he had taken, too, waking her with urgent kisses or with the softest stroke along her inner thigh. In quiet moments, he would brush her hair or they simply laid together, curled around each other like ribbons, until their hands began to wander and they could not be still. With each orgasm he gave her, Mick had felt his love expand more and more until he scarcely felt large enough to hold it all. It permeated his cells. And the last time, when they had reached for each other in the darkness, every barrier came down, he placed his heart in her hands and she made it safe. She had ridden him, her breasts pressed against his chest, her hands in his hair as she kissed him, their two bodies rocking and pushing and rising in accord. It was the way she kissed him, it was her tenderness amidst the darkness, it was the quiet of their broken breathing and the light touch of her feet against his calves. When his jaw had tightened and his eyes stung, she kissed his damp lashes and whispered his name. And he had held her tight, tight to him, brought her to a shuddering orgasm with her head against his chest, tucked under his chin. He had almost said it then, the words hovered at his lips like the fog of his breath on a fall morning. I love you. And his love expanded out to tangle them up together, their two bodies made one by the alchemy of his heart. But then he had woken before dawn to find his heart condensed within his chest, withdrawn, and he recognized the old fear, the permanent fissure in a heart that had seemed last night almost - almost, almost - to be whole. It was not whole. He was not. So when the morning showed gray through the windows, Mick slipped from the bed and into his clothes. He stopped to leave a note on the kitchen table, then got in his car and left. It was Monday morning and he was driving alone in the humid darkness away from the woman he loved, away from his best friend - maybe his only friend - because he simply would not survive having his heart taken from him a third time. It was a simple choice, really: hold on to his cracked and battered heart, and survive, or leave his heart in Frans hands - Frans trusty but human and grieving hands - and succumb to the agony of loss. His heart and his life: to give one was to abandon hope of the other.

Had to go to work. See you Friday. M Fran shook her head and read the note again. In the last 48 hours, they had had a quickie blowjob at a wedding reception, she had had a mega-meltdown, and they had had easily the most intense marathon of sex in her life. And she could have sworn there was something growing between them, some kind of connection, some change. And now this? He had to go to work and shed see him Friday? What?! What happened to How will I get enough of you? What happened to the dark whispering and the urgent, gentle hands? Fran strapped herself into her most supportive sports bra, tugged on her shoes, and started running. She had to go to work too, and she had a training schedule to keep, and she had a life and a career to manage. Fuck all the men. All the boys. But what?! Mick? Her feet fell into the frustrated rhythm of her thoughts as she trotted along the bike path. Mick was unfailingly there for her. He supported her, pushed her to work hard, inspired her. And when she was running on empty or when the landmines wouldnt stop, he stayed with her until she could go on her own again. Hadnt he, after their first marathon - her first marathon - walked her, limping, to a tent, gotten her a mylar blanket, and kept her walking? When she couldnt stop crying and she couldnt stop laughing, hadnt he forced water into her, bit by bit, he made her stretch, though she cried and laughed the whole time? Fran remembered the way his arms had slid over her sweaty skin. Remembered how his eyes had met hers, how they had shone on her. Her heart stopped as the thought of it, and suddenly she couldnt breathe. She stopped dead in the middle of the path, put her head between her knees, and wrapped her arms over her head. Are you okay? She felt a small hand on her back. She was standing with her head between her knees and realized with a jolt that she must look nuts. She stood up too fast, so that her head rushed dizzyingly, and she saw a woman with a dachshund on a leash looking at her with concern. Fran said, Yes Im fine, I think Im just having an epiphany. It happens sometimes - a little like low blood sugar. Thanks for asking. Okay, if youre - The womans face changed suddenly and she said, Are you Francine Dolan? Oh my gosh, I heard you lived around here! Your book changed my life! Fran burst out laughing, on the edge of tears. (Why did the two so often go together?) Could the timing be more perfect? Could the gratitude and joy in this womans eyes be a better mirror of her own feelings for Mick? Oh, can I hug you? she said. Well sure! the woman looked bemused but opened her arms. You have made my day! Fran told her, giving the woman a warm squeeze and then stepped back. Tell me your name, dog walker who made my day. Janet Morris - and this is Paulie. Paulie was sniffing in the grass. Well, Janet Morris and Paulie. I am having a complicated day, to put it mildly, and you have just made it much, much simpler. Heres what you should do: when you get home email me - do you know my blog? Yeah!

Go to the blog and email me your contact info and Ill send you a signed copy of the book. Would you like that? That would be amazing! Oh I cant wait to tell people. Oh that would be so great! Janet continued along this vein for some little time, inserting important tidbits about her own battle against the cultural thin ideal. Fran listened with deep compassion until the woman had run down. Listen, Janet, I have to finish my run. But dont forget to email me! I wont! Oh, thank you Francine! Fran turned on the path and made her way back the way she came, feeling new in her heart. Because she owed Mick this, too, she remembered now. That noisy, hard-fought win, that screaming, oddball finish of their marathon, had gotten her her first media attention. And from that moment, she wasnt just Frannie the fat chick personal trainer, she was fancy, famous Francine Dolan, plus size fitness guru, advocate for fat chicks everywhere, and future cover girl. But more than that - much, much more. That hard-fought win had been the last she had heard of the noise in the box. There had been no more landmines. Until Charles. And it was thanks to Mick. As she ran, Fran meditated, quieting her mind and to summon little box where she kept the noise, the landmines. It was gone. Gone. Not shut tightly away, just... gone. Utterly. Oh my god, she panted. Because she knew now. She was in love with him. Shed been in love with him from the day of that first marathon when he had coaxed her and supported her and eased her though the aftercare of the run. All this time. In an instant, five years of loving hit her like a fist. Five years, and shed never realized - never even considered it as a possibility. And she had felt self-righteous about showing Charles he was hung up on Sarah. The irony smacked her like a skillet on the back of the head. Shed been adrift in a lifeboat for five years, paddling toward shore, and her best hope for rescue had been sitting right next to her the whole time. Unfortunately, her shipmate appeared to have gone overboard this morning. Well. Shed just have to drag him back on board somehow.

Jamie, Alice, what are you guys doing here? I thought you left right after the wedding. Nope, not til today. Were on our way to the airport - I left our passports in the safe. Hi Mick! Wow. You guys look happy. Yeah. Two faces beamed at each other, and then at him.

Hi Mick, hows it going baby? I havent talked to you in a while, huh? Christine. How are you? Id be better if I had your cock in me right now, baby. Wanna come over and fuck me? I - I cant. Im sorry. Aw, cmon baby. Are you trying to make me beg? Ill beg if you want me to. Pleeeeease, baby -. No I really just cant tonight. Im sorry. Silence, silence. Christine? Is there someone else? What? No. Ive just got a lot of work and I had a hard weekend and missed a lot of sleep and... I cant tonight. You know if you want to end it, you can just say so. What? I - I just... look, can we talk about it another time? Can I call you this weekend? If you want to. You call me. Okay Christine. I will.

So you both sign at each line with a yellow flag, and initial where theres a blue flag. We can start with you, Bob, and pass each sheet to Angie. Sure thing chief - here ya go, hon, first sheet. Thanks sweets. You know I cant decide whether this is more romantic or morbid. Romantic, Mick thought. Everything about these two seemed romantic to him - the casual intimacy, the teasing, and perhaps above all the revocable living trust, a legal contract declaring, in a way simple marriage didnt, that theyd stay unto death. What was the matter with him? Since when isnt morbid the very heartbeat of romantic? Bob winked at his wife and handed her another sheet.

Fridays Mick worked in the morning, ran at noon, then went home to cook. This Friday, he worked in the morning, ran at noon, and then sat in his kitchen with a beer, trying to think. Cooking for Fran is what he did on Fridays. Had been for years, at first because she was teaching him and then because he liked it. He liked feeding her, liked witnessing her pleasure as she rolled food over her tongue and sighed. And he had said he would see her Friday. He wanted to see her. Every night he had gone to bed thinking of her, woken every morning thinking of her, spent his day enmeshed in thoughts of her, fighting to get out. She had called only once, and he hadnt answered, too afraid of what he might say.

Sitting there with the beer bottle between his hands, he settled at last into the inescapable reality. If handing over his heart was handing over his life, then he was already lost. There was no choice left to make but the speed of his descent. Far better to get it over with, tell her he loved her, have maybe a few weeks - months, could he hope for months? - of her before she moved on, as everyone did. Everyone did. And then hed find out just how much loss a person could tolerate before their whole being disintegrated under the corrosive power of grief. It wouldnt matter much, either way. Fran had saved him after Mandi, given him a purpose that kept him alive long enough to heal. He had little doubt about his chances of recovering from her departure. He wrote a grocery list. He shopped. He came home and cooked, meticulously preparing everything she most loved: spinach with hollandaise, red onion, and egg; roast lamb with pomegranate reduction; sheeps milk yogurt and agave. He would have at least this one night with her, one perfect night.

Chapter 14

Oh hell. She had thought it was Mick ringing the doorbell, ringing it instead of coming straight in because he was being weird and distant. But no. It was fucking Charles. Fucking Charles, who never knew when to shut up. Ive realized how right you were, Fran, he was saying. I know now that everything you said was true. She stood in the kitchen with one hand on the counter, the other on her hip, her head down to hide her expression. Charles should not see her expression. Because while he rattled on and on about how right she was and how much he valued her now, she was thinking about Micks cock sliding into her, his mouth on her breasts, his hands everywhere. All she wanted was to get him out before Mick showed up, or else all her plans were down the drain, her carefully thought out plan of explaining to Mick that she was in love with him and if that freaked him out she understood but he needed to get the hell over it. She was just waiting for Charles to take a breath so she could break in. Finally she couldnt take it anymore, and she just interrupted him mid-sentence. Charles, I appreciate everything youre saying - Im so glad, Fran, Im so glad. I want you to know that I heard what you said and I really understand now how right you are. He said that already. In fact, that was at least the fourth time hed said it. For the first time, Fran listened instead to what he wasnt saying. He wasnt saying anything about feelings. It was all ideas, all thoughts, all logic and reason and none of it meant anything really. None of it meant change, none of it meant he was connected to her in any way beyond the words he used. Because she knew now what it felt like to recognize something youd been denying for a long time, knew the Scrooge-on-Christmas-morning combination of regretted years and joyful surrender to the present and the new future. And she knew her whole plan with Mick would fail, because there was nothing she could say to him that would give him what she had gotten from Janet Morris. He had to find it on his own. All should could do was hold a space for him to come to, and hope he found his way. She could be grateful to Charles for showing her that. And then she heard door open and saw Mick let himself in. His opened his mouth. His eyes moved from Fran to Charles. And his mouth closed again.

Well hi there, Mick. I forgot you had that Friday dinner thing. Memory problems are a first sign of dementia, he didnt quip. Im gonna punch you in the face now, he didnt announce. Fran how could you let this asshole back into your life? he didnt demand.

That was even faster than I expected, he didnt say. Blood was pounding in his head. He could barely hear above the noise; certainly he couldnt think. Well, what amazing meal do you have planned for us tonight, Mick? Charles inquired. So Mick broke his nose. Just a fist to the side of the septum, nothing elaborate, nothing forceful. Just one efficient swing, and then some blood. Charles bellowed and pressed both hands to his face, eyes watering. You broke my dose! Yeah. Sorry. Jesus, Mick! He turned to look at Fran, who was staring at him, jaw slack. Im gonna call da bolice! Charles shrieked nasally. Ill have you fugging arresteg, asshole! Oh for gods sake Charles just go home. Fran was shooing him to the door. She stopped along the way to pull an icepack out of the freezer. Here, you can keep this. Just take it and get out. Mick watched as she escorted him out. Dat botherfugger broke by dose! I know Charles, what can I say? You invited yourself to dinner. It was rude and you made him angry and hes like that sometimes. I apologize, now get the hell out of my house, okay? When at last Charles had been ejected and Fran had slammed the door behind him, she stood with her back to Mick, her hands on the door, her shoulders shaking silently. Fran. She held up a hand to stop him, but kept her back turned, and Mick heard her gasp. Frannie, dont, I - Her knees bent, her hands sliding down the door, until she crouching by the door, shaking and gasping, and finally, she rolled to her side on the floor, curled in the fetal position. Mick looked at her face. She was laughing helplessly. That was, she gasped, The funniest thing, she moaned, I have ever, but that was as far as she could get before a wild fit of cacchination overtook her and she bellowed out a cackle, eyes closed, mouth wide, wide open. Her whole body shook on the floor and she rolled to her back, her arms wrapped around her belly, trying to breathe. Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes. Oh my god! she whooped. Oh my god! And another squall of laughter overtook her. Some part of Mick that had tightened itself into a knot loosened incrementally inside him, and he smiled. But he couldnt relax, he couldnt, so he waited while her storm passed. When at last she pulled herself to her feet, last residual giggles slipping from her like the last drop of a sunshower, he was just standing there. Looking at her. Full of... hope? Fear? Anger? Grief? Definitely love. Wasnt that all of the feelings? Were there any feelings left? He was pretty sure he was feeling all of the feelings at once. Oh Mick. Fran looked at his face and came over to hug him. He stood through her embrace, his eyes closing to focus his attention on her soft body against his. But he couldnt lift his hands to embrace her. When she pulled away, she kept her hands on his forearms and looked at his face.

Thats a new one, she said. Whats a new one? That look. I have no idea what that look is about. Why was he here? He was still just standing there, suspended in a colloid of emotions. He just came over - if I hadnt thought it was you, I would never have opened the door. So really, its your own fucking fault, ya dipshit, for being all weird this week. If you were normal, Id have known you would never ring the doorbell and I would have checked to see who it was before I answered it. But no, youre all silent and sullen and blah blah blah. She made a little duck quacking motion with her hand. She was teasing him. His brain comprehended Frans teasing as an attempt to soothe him. But, like a caress on sunburn, it just irritated him and he flinched away from it. Im... he said. But he didnt know what he was. He sat in his chair, the chair he sat in every Friday, propped his elbows on his knees, and clasped his hands behind his neck. He stared at his feet. He heard Fran moving, heard her chair slide out, felt her sitting across from him. She would be looking at him. I knew it would be bad if you saw him here. Yeah. Yeah. They sat in silence for a long time. I cant put a bandage on it if you dont tell me where it hurts. He threw himself back in his chair, eyes on the ceiling, and clutched his hand into the center of his shirt. I dont know where. His brain tried to analyze, but there was nothing, no language, no logic, no law. Just... Okay. So, Im going to confess something now. Ready? He kept his eyes on the ceiling. Uh, sure. I had a plan for tonight, Fran said, I was going to explain to you about how Im a dope because it turns out Ive spent the last five years in love with you and how actually we belong together, but then Charles came over and he said... I dont know, all this crap about how he saw that I was right about him and Sarah - which, let me just say, I completely was - and I realized that my whole plan with you was almost the same plan I had for Charles. And look how well that worked. So Im not going to do the same thing with you that I did with him. She stopped, waiting for him to respond, he thought, but he had no response to give. Or rather, he had too many, and they were all bottlenecked somewhere around the center of his chest. The difficulty is, she stopped and swallowed. Her voice had become a little unsteady. The difficulty is that I don't have a backup plan, so now youre here and all Ive got is the news that Im a dope. And possibly also a hypocrite. And... did I mention the thing about Im in love with you? Run, his whole body said. That was all the insight he could get from inside himself. Youre in love with me. This is not going well, is it? He glanced at her. She was rubbing her hands over her face. Why could he not feel that this was good news? Didnt it mean that he would get his brief window of happiness? In fact, because it was Fran, might he not get a long window of happiness? He had come with the expectation that she would accept his love, take what he had to give for as long as she wanted it, and then that would be it. Wasnt this better? If what she was saying was true, that meant they were in love with each other.

Which just meant more to lose. RUN, his whole body said. Thats all he had. I think I gotta go, he said, and rose from his chair. Are you kidding? Oh my god, youre not kidding. She stood too. That asshole Charles... he started. That asshole Charles nothing, she said, she exploded, as if her leash had just broken. Youre the asshole in this situation because it is precisely at a time like this that I need my best friend, only I cant talk to him because hes the problem! How can you leave? Dont you have anything to say to me? Even just, Gosh Fran, Im not in love with you and now its gonna be awkward? He looked at her. She was staring at him, her eyes appealing him, Dont go, tell me its okay. All the things he wanted to say battered against his chest, birds against the windshield, oh god Fran, I just dont have the words. Give me time, time. What, she said. Is going. On. I have to go, he said. You have to go. You have to go. Thats fine. You have to go. Okay. Go ahead. She was breathing like shed just raced him to a finish. You go right ahead. RUN!! his body said. So he left.

Mick shut the door behind him. Heart racing, still breathing hard, Fran picked up the grocery bag hed left on the floor, filled with the meal hed brought her. She took out each container, lay them on the counter in a row, and saw what he had done. Spinach with hollandaise, red onion, and egg; roast lamb with pomegranate reduction; sheeps milk yogurt and agave. Every one of her favorites. Oh Mick. She shaped the words on her mouth, but no sound came. Not knowing if it was a sign of hope or a sign of utter and unending loss, she looked at their dinner and her heart filled. He loved her. He loved her. Well that was one good thing. And there was another: through the whole, abysmal scenario, not once had she thought, Its because Im fat. And she had Mick to thank for that. So she sat down on the kitchen floor and wept.

Chapter 15

He didnt come the following Friday. He didnt. Fucking. Come. He really was going to be a chickenshit little motherfucker. Fran sat in the kitchen oscillating between righteous anger and lonely tears, until finally she decided that sitting in the kitchen looked too much like she was waiting for him, so she sat in the living room and oscillated there instead. Fran was good at not calling Mick. A decade had taught her plenty about his need for space, for time. He needed time. She was giving him time. He needed to think about things, to hold each feeling in his hands and examine it like a puzzle piece. Given time... what was it he had said? Given time, he could usually work out why something was a bad idea. Oh for fucks sake. He hadnt even texted her to say he wasnt coming. Theres time and space, and then theres just rude. She watched Ball of Fire on Netflix and thought how much Gary Cooper looked like Mick. She filled a hot tub and sat in it for fifteen minutes, then decided shed had enough baths to last a lifetime, and had a glass of wine instead. She tried to read. Couldnt focus. She tried to cook dinner. Wasnt hungry. She tried to clean. Didnt care. Tried to meditate. All she found inside herself was adrenline: run, fight, run, fight, her body didnt care which, but it wanted it now. In the end, she just stood in the middle of her tiny little house, fighting tears. She took a couple of deep breaths and screamed FFFUUUUUCCK THIIIIIIIS!!! and felt a little relief. But since nothing was different, she didnt really feel better. She tried to think of something else she could do that wouldnt just make it worse. But there was nothing she could do. Not until Sunday.

He didnt go on Friday. He worked in the morning, he ran at noon, and then he didnt go. He did cook. He made enough paiella to feed minor island nation. He made enough paiella to construct a minor island nation out of rice and chorizo. And then he sat in his dark little kitchen and stared at it all. He had been waiting for his insides to settle into some kind of decision: stay or go. The difficulty was that either outcome was change, and both would ultimately mean losing Fran. And if this last week had taught him anything, it was that he wouldnt survive for long without Fran. Not that she kept him fed and clothed or anything, but she sustained him. Without her, he fell into tiny, broken pieces. He had moved through the week in a body that was no longer a single coherent unit, but a not-very-cooperative coalition of cells. Some of them wanted to go this way, others wanted to go that way. Some of them wanted to run, some of them wanted

to lie in bed. Some of them wanted to live, some of them wanted to die. Some of them were already dead. Fran was the secret ingredient that had made him whole. So the choice is, he thought, Be a person with Fran for a while, until she gives up on you, or cut to the chase and stop being a person now. Well. No, that was a conclusion he came to last week, before Fran had said she loved him. She loved him. She was in love with him. While he held that one thought in his mind, he was whole. Did it change anything? After all, this was Fran. She could do anything.

Sunday morning was supposed to be her race day with Mick. For most of ten years, one Sunday a month was race day with Mick. But he didnt come on Friday, and he wouldnt be there today either. Mick was gone. He was a chickenshit bastard who apparently believed that she was a horrible person who would make him miserable, so he clearly didnt deserve her love, so the sooner she stopped loving him, the better. Screw him. (Oh god, she wanted to screw him! Why was he not in her bed every night, every afternoon, every morning?) She was still going for her run. Fall has arrived overnight. At last the morning was brisk and orange, and it would stay that way through October. She stepped out the back door for the one-mile trot to the gym. He was sitting on her back step. Just sitting there in his running clothes, sweating, with his elbows on his knees, like she was the one who was late. Hey, he said. Hey. She frowned at him. How long have you been there? About half an hour. Forty-five minutes. Oh. She frowned at him, half hope, half despair. Why? He shook his head, swatting away the question. Lets go up the mountain. You didnt bring me dinner. Why are your here?? Are you here to dump me or make love to me?? I know. Im sorry. And you were an asshole the last time you were here. I know, Frannie. I - she stopped and fought the sting in her eyes. I have been scared out of my mind that you were never coming back. He stood up then. He didnt touch her, but he said, Lets go up the mountain. So she drove them to the mountain and they started to climb, side by side, not speaking. If silence was the best he could do, shed take it. As long as he was beside her. The trail gained 600 feet of elevation in the first mile, then more or less flattened out across the ridge, until they approached Dry Knoll, the peak with a view over the whole valley. They ran across the ridge, Mick pacing himself to Fran, until Mick said, Lets stop a minute.

What? Why? They were passing the crumbling stone walls of the Eyrie House ruins, a mountaintop hotel that had burnt to the ground 100 years ago, leaving just some scattered stone remnants of wall and arch. Just, I need to stop for a minute. They stood looking across the vista, hands on hips, getting back their breath. Why are we up here, Micky? To give me perspective. He stood still, his eyes traveling over the span of the valley. Cmon lets sit down. He led her to a soft, mossy patch tucked behind a blackened stone wall, where they sat side by side in silence for a long time. Fran tried to stay calm and still, give him the time and space he needed. Fran you know I dont have any words for this. It only takes three, she sniped, and instantly regretted it, so she turned her face to him and extended her hand, palm up, with a self-depricating smile. But no pressure. Mick sighed massively, put his hands through his hair, and then took her proffered hand between his. He looked out at the horizon. Look, Fran said, I dont know what this is or what you want right now, but Im about to make it harder for you. She moved so that she was sitting on her heels, right in front of him, face to face. She took her hand back and waited until he looked at her before she continued. I respect your insights and I wont push you. I hear your fear. But I want to make sure you know theres nothing in the world - not sex, not love, not anything - that could make me disappear. Im permanent in your life, until you kick me out. And then she added, You jerk. He smiled and looked at the ground. How can I - he stopped and swallowed. Cleared his throat. Took a deep, deep breath. And at last he looked back up at her, eyes glittering despite his struggles. I dont know how to believe that. I dont know how to make you, she sighed, and she tilted her head, puzzling. But things cant stay like this. He nodded as though she had told him his dog was dying and then watched her face carefully. He said, Will you marry me? For one heart-stopping instant, Fran wanted to dance across the mountain like Fraulein Maria in The Sound of Music, she wanted to fling out her arms and cry, YES! YES! or strip off her clothes and fuck him here on the mountain, but she thought better of it and said, Dont you think maybe the more grown-up thing to do is to learn to trust that Ill stay, whether Ive signed a legal document to that effect or not? He shook his head slowly, and Fran didnt know if he was saying no or just thinking. Im in love with you Fran. I want you next to me forever. Im scared as hell about it but it seems to me Ill break into little pieces if I dont. Im in love with you. He was shaking, but now that he had started, it seemed he couldnt stop. Im in love with you. Ive loved you forever. I think maybe Ive loved you since that first time you asked to race me, but definitely, definitely after our first marathon. Definitely. I didnt recognize it because it didnt hurt and it wasnt scary. But it hurts now, and its scary, so its like I can recognize it. Its like the lack of fear and pain was a cloaking device and it got uncloaked when we made love and then I panicked but - Wait wait wait. She held up a hand, her face crooked in half a smile. Cloaking device? I dont know, Im... Im not a metaphor kind of guy. It was a simile, dear, and her smile spread to her whole face.

He kissed her, and she couldnt think for the pressure of his lips on hers. He was kneeling with her, her face in his hands, his mouth on hers, focused, attentive, allencompassing. Her hands went to his wrists. She opened to him, accepted his tongue, offered hers. All at once, in a sweep of motion, she was on the ground, with Mick urgent and possessive above her. He was tugging down her leggings, pulling them to her knees. Mick, wait! Were in the middle of the woods, there are people - Dont care. His mouth stopped her in a brief, hard kiss, and then he - how did he do that? - he tucked himself between her thighs, her leggings bunching around her calves, he tugged away his running shorts, and he pushed his cock into her, claiming her. Mine. With each thrust. Mine. He marked her. Mine. Forceful, jarring thrusts that rocked her. Mine. And Fran rejoiced. The woods, the people, disappeared from Frans mind. Only the stone walls and the crystalline blue sky could see them, and what did they matter when he was inside her? What did anything else matter as long as he was inside her. And oh, she wanted him inside her. Had she ever wanted anyone - anything - else? He kissed her throat, he scraped his teeth on her earlobe, he bit into her neck. All while fucking her in those steady, solid strokes, so deep, so complete. Fran gripped her legs around him, pressed her hands to his ass. This was not tender. It was not gentle. It was force and demand and possession and now. His lips moved to her mouth, and his eyes were open, locked on hers. Gradually, his pace increased. He drew his mouth away, kept his eyes intensely focused on hers. His nostrils flared, his jaw locked, his cheeks flushed, his breath came ragged and rough, and his eyes burned into hers. She matched his gaze, her own brow worrying with increasing arousal, tension, a budding and incipient orgasm deep inside her. Still he thrust into her with building intensity, speed, depth, need. Frannie, he grunted, and beads of sweat trembled along his hairline as the tension in his body climbed. Fran could feel the muscles in his shoulder quivering with effort; she could see the need worrying his brow. His rocking hit her clit in a perfect, satisfying rhythm, layering pleasure onto pleasure. She was holding herself back now, waiting for him. She wanted his straining muscles to cross their threshold and release their passion explosively into the air around them. She wanted his pleasure, to hear and feel and smell and taste it, as surely as she wanted her own. And above all she wanted to be his. She wanted there to be no question, not the least hesitancy or doubt. She moved her hand up his back in a slow caress, relishing the flexing muscles under her fingers, and then she rested her fingertips delicately over Micks lips. She whispered into his hoarse grunts, Mick, would you come in me? As though this were the invitation he had been waiting for, he gave a wild moan and his bodys thrusting accelerated. With every increase in his arousal came an increase in her own. Again, she kept pace with him, her body following his lead intuitively. When at last he hovered at her entrance, dangling at the peak of desire, he thrust minutely into her, eyes on hers, watchful, pleading. She returned his gaze, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, breath suspended in her throat. Tell me, he ordered. Say it. Please, Fran. She didnt have to ask what he meant. She put her hands on his face, eyes on his, and whispered it to him. I love you, Mick.

He blinked and his expression change; his movements relaxed into broad, ecstatic strokes as he leaned over the precipice of his arousal. The movements pushed Fran over the edge, and she arched her back with the first spasm of her orgasm, but kept her eyes on his. And the instant her muscles contracted around the head of his cock, he let out a stabbing cry and thrust hard and deep into her, fucking into her over and over with near-painful force, eyes wildly, fiercely focused on hers. Time dilated, and each wave of their shared climax washed through them, circulating through their pulsing bodies, through their enflamed gaze. Their tension ebbed and they lay together, breathless and radiant. Mick held a hand to Frans face and brushed away the strands of hair clinging to her damp cheek. They searched each others eyes in the autumn sunlight, and Fran found in his face a vow that required no words. They lay together amidst the crumbling rocks, sleepy under the warm September sun. Fran murmured, I see myself as a mountain. I feel solid. I make myself still like a mountain pond. I reflect things as they are. Mick lifted his head from her shoulder and they watched each other glitter in the sunlight. When his eyes met hers in a suspended moment, it happened, the words just came, easily. I love you Fran. I know. She smiled at him, punched him playfully on the shoulder and said, I love you, too.

Fran awoke to a morning of sparkling early autumn, clear and crisp. She rolled and stretched and luxuriated in an unaccustomed sense of wellbeing, her thoughts straying to coffee and her morning run. And then she remembered last night. Mick! He was - he was right there, back to back with her in the bed, snoring lightly. She curled herself against him in the sunlight, pressing kisses to his chest. He held her and held her, his lips against her hair as she spoke blindly into his neck. You were a coward there a minute. And you were a mess. You kind of suck at words. I know Frannie. I know. I usually like the ones who are good at words. I know. So its mildly inconvenient that Im so very, very in love with you. Oh Frannie. Frannie. His arms tightened around her. He paused for an instant to sniff and get his breath back. I didnt even know this feeling existed. If you screw this up Im gonna kick your ass, she said, kissing her way along his throat to his jaw. Okay, Frannie. Her lips found their way to his, and she kissed him long and slow. Fuck me one more time, she uttered into the kiss, wrapping her arms around his neck. He didnt need words to respond. He reached for her wrists and pinned them above her head, pressed her onto her back, and bit into her lower lip.

END