Across The Sea

"You like words a lot, don't you?"

"What do you mean?"

There were about an hour from Paris, approaching the peripherique.

"Words. You like them. You notice if I say 'pussy' rather than 'cunt'. You almost lose control if you hear me say the word 'wet'.

Carl considered for a minute.

"Yes. I like words."

"Just dirty words or all words?"

"All words. I did English at Uni. I actually wanted to be a writer but, you know, life."

"You should do it now. You have time. Aren't you unemployed now?"

"Maybe."

"So what was Uni like? Just sitting around and reading poems all day?"

"Kind of. Poems. Plays. Novels."

"We did poems at school. It was boring."

"I used to think that too. But there are some good ones."

"Tell me one."

"What, right now? I don't know any by heart."

"Don't bullshit me Carl. You know I hate that."

He looked hard out of the windscreen at the cars ahead.

"Had we but world enough and time," he murmured.

"What was that?"

"Had we but world enough and time. It's the first line of this one poem. I don't remember all of it, but you'd like it, it's about shagging."

"Oh yeah. Is it dirty?"

"Not really. It's bittersweet I guess. It's a guy trying to persuade his girlfriend to have sex with him."

"Why wouldn't his girlfriend want to have sex with him, if she's his girlfriend?"

"It was the seventeenth century. It was different."

"Oh, okay. Fair enough. I guess. Still seems dumb to me."

"He's saying that if they lived forever he wouldn't mind waiting forever, 'but at my back I hear, times winged chariot drawing near'.

"What does that mean?"

"It means they're going to get old and die, so they should just fuck while they still can, while they're still young and good looking. I don't remember all of it but it ends like this:

"Now therefore, while the youthful hue

Sits on thy skin like morning dew,

And while thy willing soul transpires

At every pore with instant fires,

Now let us sport us while we may,

And now, like amorous birds of prey,

Rather at once our time devour

Than languish in his slow-chapped power.

Let us roll all our strength and all

Our sweetness up into one ball,

And tear our pleasures with rough strife

Through the iron gates of life:

Thus, though we cannot make our sun

Stand still, yet we will make him run."

He felt suddenly self-conscious and looked over at her to see if she was making a face at him. To his great surprise, she had tears in her eyes.

"Oh Carl, that's beautiful. It's.. it's how I feel you know. I know you think I'm just a dirty slut but what have I got to look forward to? I'm young and sexy but I won't be young and sexy forever. Then what? Get a shit job in a factory, shack up with some wanker who cheats on me, squeeze out a couple of kids, bingo, white wine, netflix, dirty novels, menopause...

When I fuck, I don't think about any of that. When I have sex I just feel good and young and sexy. When I fuck I.. I.. I actually like myself."

She put her head in her hands and started to sob uncontrollably.

He awkwardly put his hand out to pat her and said, "It doesn't have to be like that?"

"Doesn't it, Carl? Doesn't it? You're sweet but I'm not being funny but what have you got that's so good? Swinger's nights? I'll tell you why your wife fucks strangers like that. It's not to even the score. It's just to feel something, anything, even if it's just Mr Jones from the Butchers coming all over her tits. "

He took his hand away and they drove in silence along the peripherique as Carl looked for their exit. He had booked a cheap hotel on a business park by the main road and he needed to concentrate to find it. He was glad to have something to think about. Staci sat in silence next to him.

After about half an hour, she just said in a small voice.

"I'm sorry, Carl. I didn't mean it."

"It's OK," he replied. "I'm not cross. And you're not exactly wrong either."

"I know. But it's not your fault. I shouldn't take it out on you. I asked for the stupid poem."

Carl found the exit and moved off the motorway into a side road leading to the business park.

"You know, you should like yourself," he said as they approached the car park.

"No one likes me, Carl. Guys want to fuck me but no one actually likes me. And they shouldn't either. I'm mean, rude, ungrateful, dirty."

Carl pulled the car into a space outside the hotel and said quietly, "I like you."

"No, you don't, Carl. You've been really sweet but you don't like me. You just want to fuck me too. And that's okay. But it's not the same thing."

He turned the engine off and turned to look her straight in the eyes.

"Staci, I like you. For you. You know when I'm bullshitting you, so tell me, am I bullshitting you now?"

She looked back soulfully at him, then said in a small voice, "No."

"I mean I do want to fuck you too. I'm not going to pretendI don't. But I also very much like you."

"Oh Carl," she said and put her arms around him, holding him tight.

"Will you fuck me now, Carl?" she whispered in his ear.

"Yes, pretty baby. Let's get you inside."

They checked in and went upstairs. She put her arms around him and kissed him fiercely. He put his arms around her neck and kissed her back.

She pulled him down on to the bed and he lay on top of her, her body soft and fragile under his. He kissed her neck and the tops of her breasts. She moaned in soft delight.

"Will you kiss my pussy Carl?"

"Yes, pretty baby."

He pushed up her dress and gently, almost reverently slid her panties down over her long legs.

She suddenly looked at him.

"Stop, I should shower. I'm still dirty from when you fucked me before."

"Oh Ok."

She jumped off the bed and pulled her dress off, allowing him to admire her naked form. He quickly got undressed himself while he waited for her as she quickly showered.

She practically danced out of the bathroom towards him, a smell of floral soap around her. He thought she looked like a nymph.

"Here I am baby," she put her arms around him, "All nice and clean and fresh for you."

"Mmm, you smell good."

Mmm, and I see you're nice and ready for me," she reached down to stroke his rapidly hardening dick. "Now, where were we?"

"I was just about to kiss your pussy."

"Oh yes."

She let him go and jumped onto the bed on her back with her limbs spread wide.

"Come, taste me, Carl."

He climbed onto the bed again and got on all fours on top of her. He smoothed her hair and looked her deep in the eyes. He felt her start to tremble.

"Do you really like me? Just me? For who I am."

"Very, very much."

He kissed her very softly on her red lips. He kissed her neck and her breasts, feeling the warmth and softness of her skin. He could hear her heart fluttering.

She moaned softly and contentedly as his mouth grazed over her belly and she gently stroked his hair.

He took her in his mouth and lavished her with his love and attention. His hands were on her waist as he moved his tongue inside her.

She was so sweet and wet in his mouth as she gave herself to him. Her body was slowly pulsing and undulating as ripples of pleasure spread through her.

"Oh Carl," she whispered softly.

He had never felt this close, this loving, this intimate with anyone in his life, not even with Melissa. Staci truly gave herself to him and he was adoring her in his turn, drinking her sweet nectar.

He could have stayed that way forever but soon he could feel her starting to get close to her climax. Her moans were sharper now, more like little breaths and she was bucking her hips more firmly into him.

He didn't want the moment to stop but he was too far into it to hold back and as he felt her approaching, he flicked his tongue more determinedly over her clit.

Then she came. Every other time he'd made her come, she'd come hard, a hot sweet rush of moans and fury. But this time she came softly, like a little bird, her moans almost whispers. It was beautiful.

He looked up at her.

She looked down at him. Tears of joy in her eyes.

"Oh Carl. Make love to me."

And he did. He made love to her. Her skin on his as he moved inside her. He made love deeply and tenderly, long slow strokes connecting them deeply as she wrapped her arms and legs around him, holding him tight, trying to pull all of him into her.

As they came together, he looked into her shining eyes.

"I love you," he breathed.

"I love you too, Carl."