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“Oh fuck.” I closed my eyes, my hips bucking up, picturing her on the couch just on the other side of the wall, touching herself too.

“Yes, fuck yes!” Carrie cried.

The girl on the screen joined our cries of pleasure and I think she was really coming, from the look on her face. The guy pulled out of her ass right then, aiming his spurting cock toward the slight gape of her hole.

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“I’m gonna…” Carrie’s warning turning into moaning and I was right there with her.

“Yes, yes, yes, me toooo…” I panted, my whole finger buried in my ass, my clit thrumming with ecstasy. I heard Carrie gasping for breath, away from the phone—she’d probably dropped it—and wished I was there to see her orgasm.

“Mmmmm. That was gooooood.” She was back, her voice close again.

“Wowww,” I agreed. “You think Jen across the street took advantage of her free porn?”

Carrie snorted. “I think she probably called the cable company to complain about her free porn. Some people don’t know a good thing when they’ve got it.”

I sighed. “That’s the truth.”

“Oh no!” Carrie protested and I opened my eyes to look at the screen. Sure enough, it was back to scrambled zig-zags again.

“There goes our free porn.”

“Well it was good while it lasted.” She sighed. “Damn, there’s my other line.”

“Go ahead.”

She hesitated. “Are you sure you don’t want to come over?”

“I’ve got some reading to do,” I replied. “But call me tomorrow or something, okay?”

I could tell she was disappointed when I hung up the phone but I didn’t trust myself to go over there and hang out. I didn’t know what it would turn into. And I should be working on my marriage, I reminded myself. Or barring that, considering Mason’s lack of interest in the topic, I should at least be working on my life, on my future. I didn’t 49



have time for play and friends and…well, whatever else the Baumgartners might have in mind.

But even I knew that wasn’t quite the truth. What I really believed, deep down, was that I didn’t deserve them. I couldn’t punish Mason or God or anyone else for Isabella, but I could brutally punish myself and that’s just what I’d been doing. What I continued to do. What else was there? It was all I knew.



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Chapter Three

Once classes started, things got crazy and I hardly saw anyone. Mason didn’t call or come home, but that wasn’t much of a change from the norm. Carrie called though. She encouraged me to come over, to meet after class and go out for coffee.

Usually I turned her down. Dante was a lot tougher than I’d thought it was going to be—

the Italian wasn’t a problem, it was the literary interpretation that was killing me—but that was just an excuse. Carrie was the thing I’d broken out of my shell for, the catalyst that cracked the veneer I’d painted over the surface. Now I was desperately trying to crawl back into that shell and somehow piece it together again.

But it wasn’t working. Even if I only saw Carrie once a week or so, I thought about her and Doc way more than that. I spent nights trying to bury myself under pillows and covers so I couldn’t hear them having sex. I wasn’t avoiding the Baumgartners exactly. I think I was really just trying to avoid myself.

When I passed Carrie on the way back from getting my mail one brisk October afternoon—there was a silver row of boxes at the end of our line of apartments—she stopped me with a hand on my arm, reminding me just exactly why I’d cracked out of my shell in the first place. Just her gentle touch through my coat made me shiver and not from the autumn wind.

“Wow, nice dress!” She eyed me appreciatively. “Going on a date?”

“Coming back from an interview,” I countered with a smile. “The last step in the application process for studying abroad.”

“How exciting!” She sounded genuinely enthused which was really nice to hear. It was certainly a change from Mason’s reaction. Even my mother was against my going, 51



but that was just because she wouldn’t be able to afford to call me every week in Italy and tell me how I’d ruined my life. “Hey, Doc won’t be home until late. Do you want to come over and order pizza? I’m jonesin for some Bella’s.”

I hesitated. I had a paper to write this weekend on Dante’s use of numbers in the Divine Comedy, but it was Friday after all. And Bella’s had the best pizza in town. “I have to change first.”

“Okay,” Carrie agreed cheerfully, getting her mail and following me back to my apartment.