The coffee place looks like a truck stop, the kind of place I feel at home in after all the years spent on the road, going from town to town and state to state. I get out of the car and glance down the road, tall signs advertising gas stations, fast food joints and motels line the street.
We each have a drip coffee and sit on opposite sides of a booth. We continue to talk, through three whole cups of coffee.
"What are your plans?" Emily asks, changing the subject.
"My plans?"
"Yeah, how long are you staying in town? Are you still working at the carnival?"
Fuck if I know, I haven't thought that far ahead. All my focus has been on getting back to her.
"Don't know. All I was thinking about was finding you."
"Well, you found me," she says with a coy smile while tilting her head.
Plans don't matter much to carnies. I feel like a fish out of water.
"My plan was to find you and now I've done that, it's to be with you." Emily's eyes sparkle and she hooks her foot around mine under the table. Her actions cause a huge smile on my face. "And that's my plan."
"I like that plan. But where are you going to stay?"
As if I've thought that far ahead. Doesn't she get the way I live? Looking out the window, I see a Motel 6 sign down the road.
"Figure I'll stay at a motel while I figure out what we're going to do."
"Isn't that going to be expensive? I mean, how long are you going to stay there?"
"Don't matter how long I have to stay there, as long as it's near you, I'll pay the price."
What am I going to do? Find a nine-to-five job? The same jobs I've been criticizing my whole life?
"Shit," Emily says, pulling her phone out of her purse. "I didn't text my parents, they're probably wondering why I'm not back from the coffee shop."
"What business is it of theirs?"
"I don't want them to worry. Normally, I would've been home hours ago."
"I hope you're telling them you won't be back anytime soon." She'd better not rush off on me.
"I'm telling them I've gone shopping at the mall. They won't expect me back soon."
"Say you've gone with your friends."
"I don't do much with my friends anymore. Not since that night."
"Fuck, seriously?" Am I that hated just because I'm a carny?
"We're still friends, just not as close. They didn't support me when I said I was going to find you. All they did was try to stop me."
I lean back into the booth and look up at the ceiling, Papa Smurf's words rattling through my head, ‘You'll find out the hard way that you're from a different world than her, and the outside world don't approve of us.'
Maybe no one in her life approves of me, but she does, and that's all that matters.
Emily sets her phone on the table and says, "What are we going to do?"
"I'm getting real tired of having this table between us. Let's go check into my motel."
We get back in her car, and I direct her to the Motel 6. It's forty bucks a night, and that's going to add up fast. I don't want to blow my savings on it. I'm going to have to find another solution.
Sliding the key into the lock, I open the door. The overpowering smell of Lysol hits me, but at least it's clean. Other than that, it's your standard two double beds and ugly pictures on the wall motel room.
"Are you finally going to show me the rest of your tattoos?" Emily asks with her killer smile as she goes through the doorway.
It's all I've been thinking about all these months.
"Wait here, I need a quick shower."
"Okay," she says, shrugging.
I have expected her to ask to join me, but then I realize this is Emily, the good girl. Who's still a virgin.
Stepping into the hot flow, I stand still while I let the water wash over me. After three days of hitchhiking in big-rigs, I could stand here all day. But I don't want to keep her waiting. After ripping the paper off a tiny bar of soap, I thoroughly clean myself and shut off the water.
My clean clothes are in my backpack, which is still in the bedroom area. With only a towel tied around my waist, I leave the bathroom.
Emily is sitting back on the bed, looking at her phone. Good, I'm glad she's relaxed and not perched on the edge of the bed or something.
When she notices I've come back in the room, she looks up. Not very far up, her eyes seem to be stuck on my abs. When I take a step in her direction, her eyes move down to my legs. I realize she's seeing the tattoos on my lower legs for the first time, and stay still while she examines them. My dick is twitching under the heat of her gaze, the towel shows each little movement.
This wasn't my plan. I didn't bring her here expecting anything from her. I just want her. The last thing I want is for her to feel pressured.
The TV remote is on the desk behind me, and I turn and grab it. Turning the tv on, I flip through the channels until I find MTV. Coldplay is playing, which is perfect even if they are old.
"Do you have any more under that towel?" she asks.
Am I going to show her the rest under my towel?
"You'll find out," I say, turning to face her. "Now come over here and kiss me." I stay where I am but hold out my hand, beckoning her.
Emily flies off the bed and into my arms. Exactly the way I've been imagining all these nights alone in my bed.
Holding her close to me, I inhale her rose scent and let it soothe the frustration of the time we spent apart.
I kiss her silky hair and down along her cheek. Tilting her head to mine, my mouth connects with her soft lips. Emily gasps and submits to my touch. My tongue probes her mouth, and before long her own tongue is twirling with mine.
All these nights I've been thinking how I can make her first time special for her, and now I finally get to. Shit, I almost forgot to show her something.
I pull my lips away from hers and say, "Hold on, Goldie, I did something I want to show you."
Her brow furrows in puzzlement as I move away from her and to my backpack. I rifle through the papers, my passport, and birth certificate until I find the piece of paper I'm looking for and pull it out of the bag. I step back to Emily and place it in her hand.
"What's this?" she asks, confused.
"It's a test I did to show you I don't have any STDs or anything."
"This is from October."
"That's after the last time I was with anyone. The last time I was with you. Now I know you, I could never look at another woman."
"What happened to the party every night?"
"The parties were pretty boring without you there," I say, chuckling.
Emily flings her arms around me. Speaking into my chest, she says, "Thank you for this." She hesitates before continuing, "I haven't been with anybody else, either."
I know that already, Goldie. Your pussy is all mine.
More Than Words Can Say (Emily)
Steel's clean scent envelops me, and I take a deep breath to savor it. He tucks my hair behind my ear. The warmth from his hand helps to ease the tingling in my tummy. But the heat from his body pushes the tingles straight down between my legs.
He brushes his finger down my cheek before using it to tilt my chin. His mouth crushes against mine, and all the tingling between my legs flies throughout my whole body.
Every single night since the carnival, I've gone to bed sad that I hadn't found him, and tonight I won't be thinking that at all, instead I'll be elated that he found me.
Though I didn't wake up this morning thinking today would be the day I'd be in a motel room with a mostly naked Steel. It's all so fast, but at the same time, so right.
In the back of my head, it seems like I should be more nervous, but I'm not. Everything feels exactly as it should. In the months I spent longing for Steel, I sometimes wondered if my memory of that one night was wrong.
My friends and family told me over and over that I was being silly, and that one night could never mean so much. But after the hours spent with Steel today, I know they were wrong and my memory was right.
The test he did for me proves it. That was so sweet of him. It makes me crazy happy to know that all these months he's been thinking of me the same way I've been thinking of him.
And now I'm in Steel's arms. I never want to leave them.
I'd be lying if I didn't admit I'm a little nervous. I have no idea what to expect, or even what we're going to do. But at least this time he doesn't have his jeans to hide behind.
Already his erection is digging into me. It seems so big. Huge in comparison to Connor's.
As his tongue explores deeper into my mouth, his hand slides down the back of my sweater and settles on my jean-clad butt. A moan escapes me as he squeezes it.
Following his lead, I run my hands over his naked chest. No matter where I touch, his muscles under my hands are rock hard. Everything about this man is perfection.
Steel's hands grip the hem of my sweater, and leans back from me. I lift my arms over my head to allow him to take it off. He reaches around behind me and undoes my bra before pulling it off and letting it drop on the floor.
His eyes slide over my breasts and torso before capturing my own eyes in his.
"You're beautiful," he says.
Wrapping my back in his arms, my bare skin presses against his for the first time. The feeling is electric, and my skin prickles with goose bumps. I want to feel all of my body against his, and start tugging at my belt.
"I'll do it," Steel says.
Without any warning, he scoops me from my feet and cradles me in his arms, and I gasp. My heart beats at a million miles a minute as he takes the few steps to the bed and lays me down in the center of the bed.