Everything I Left Unsaid Read online

  I whimpered, closing my eyes, imagining it as best I could, a dirty movie on the back of my eyelids, gathered from bits and pieces. The book. That one time when I was sixteen with my cousin in town. Dylan’s voice.

  “I got come leaking out the tip, and I smear it all over my cock…”

  Again that word. I pulled my fingers away from my body, the tension in my belly, between my legs, about to explode.

  “I go faster,” he said, his breath sawing in my ear. And I could hear his movements. The click and squeal of the chair maybe. The slap of his skin.

  “Tell me,” I whispered. The lake of bitterness and anger was gone, replaced by a desire for everything. A hunger for it all. I felt empty and wide open to the world. Waiting for experience to fill me up. To satiate me.

  “I gotta slow down,” he moaned.

  “No,” I said, reaching for myself again because I could feel the orgasm coming, touching myself or not.

  “Stop, Layla.”

  I pulled my hands away. “Come on,” I moaned.

  “No, let’s slow down for a second.”

  I growled at him but he only laughed, panting a little.

  “How many men you slept with?”

  “Why?”

  “Cause we’re taking a break…slowing shit down.”

  “One.”

  “One man?”

  “Yes.”

  “Other than that dirty book of yours, you ever watch any porn?”

  “Oh my God,” I laughed, trying to imagine how that would even work. How or where I would find it, much less watch it. “No. No porn.”

  “What’s the naughtiest, dirtiest thing you’ve ever seen in real life?”

  I barely had to think; the memory was right there. Plugged in like it had been waiting.

  “My cousin…” Shit, I was already using Layla’s name. “Annie. My cousin Annie and my aunt came to visit my mom and me on the farm. And I think…maybe because my aunt was there, Mom let me take my cousin into town for ice cream. She never, ever let me go into town by myself.”

  “How old were you?”

  “Sixteen.” It was a year before Mom got sick. Hoyt had just been hired but I hadn’t really met him yet. Saw him in the barn every once in a while, a big blond guy with his hat pulled down low.

  God, it seemed like a lifetime ago.

  “What happened?”

  “Town was like a half hour away and we drove the old station wagon in, but once we got there my cousin decided we should get beer instead of ice cream.”

  “Naughty girl. Were you on board with that?”

  “I was terrified, but I didn’t want my cousin to think…or to know, really…how weird things were in my life, with Mom and being out so far. I mean she probably knew, but I wanted her to think I was…normal.”

  “Normal?”

  “You know…”

  “No. I got no damn idea what a normal sixteen-year-old does.”

  “You were sixteen once.”

  “But I was never what anyone would call normal. So what happened?”

  “We went to the liquor store parking lot and sat out on the hood of our car…just waiting I guess for someone to come by and offer to buy us beer. It took like five minutes. My cousin was real…pretty.”

  “So you got a six-pack and got loaded?”

  “No, the guy…the guy asked if we wanted him to buy us beer and my cousin said yes. And he asked what was in it for him? And my cousin told him she’d give him a hand job in the back of the station wagon.”

  I remembered that night like it was yesterday all of a sudden. The hot summer air, the smell of the fried chicken place up the street and Layla’s clove cigarettes that truly did make her seem like the coolest girl in the world. The cowboy had been rail thin, his belt buckle nearly bigger than his waist.

  “How old are you girls?” he asked, his eyes making me feel dirty. And scared. And…excited.

  “How old do you want us to be?” Layla said, twirling the end of her ponytail with her finger.

  “What happened, baby?” Dylan asked.

  “He said yes,” I said, “but he wanted me to watch. My cousin shrugged like it was no big deal, like she gave hand jobs to strangers with me watching all the time, and she just hopped off the front of the car and then climbed in the backseat. The guy jumped in after her and I…I went to sit in the front seat.”

  “I want you to watch, sugar,” the guy said. “Back here with us so you get a good view.”

  “She can see just fine,” Layla said in the backseat. “Just tilt the mirror, Annie.”

  “I tipped the mirror,” I told Dylan. “So I could see what was happening in the back.”

  “And did you see?”

  “It was dark, too dark really. I could see her hand…moving. But mostly I just heard it.”

  “What did it sound like?”

  “Wet, sort of. And the guy talked a lot.” I squeezed my legs together remembering what the guy said, the filthy things that came out of his mouth about what a good girl Layla was, and how he wanted to fuck her.

  “Were you turned on?”

  “I guess…I mean, I think I’m more turned on now, thinking about it, than I was then. Mostly, then I was scared.” But I wasn’t now. The ache was back. That empty throb.

  “Did he buy you beer?”

  “Yep. I drove around while my cousin drank a six-pack and talked to me about how to give a hand job.”

  “Yeah, what was her advice?”

  “Spit. She said you need to spit on your hand.”

  At the time I’d never heard anything so disgusting, but right now I wasn’t so sure.

  “I’ve never told anyone that story.”

  “No?”

  “Not a single person in my life would appreciate it.”

  “I appreciate the fuck out of it, baby.”

  I laughed. “How about you? How many—”

  “How many men have I slept with? None.”

  “Hilarious. How many women?”

  “Lots. But I used to be wild.”

  “Wild?”

  “Following around my badass brother. It wasn’t pretty and I’m not proud of it, but it was wild.”

  “What’s the wildest thing you’ve done?”

  “Baby, it’s not—”

  “Tell me.”

  “A couple women at once, I guess.”

  Lightning struck my body. “How—?”

  He groaned as if my curiosity turned him on, or maybe he was remembering those women. “Truthfully, I was so messed up I barely remember. Mostly, they did each other and I watched. By the time I got around to actually fucking one of them it was over pretty quick. I was wild, but I was young.”

  “Well, there’s the difference between us. I’ve never been wild.”

  “You want to be, don’t you? That’s why you’re calling me?”

  “Yeah, I guess…maybe…”

  “Yes or no. There’s no one else here to hear you and I ain’t judging.”

  “Yes. Yes, I’d like to be wild.”

  I had my doubts that I’d ever really get there. I was after all still in my underwear. But just today I’d gone skinny-dipping. There was no telling what could happen. A girl had to have goals.

  “All right, you listening? We’re going to get back to it in a few seconds and we’re gonna come and then I gotta go, but before you call me again, I want you to go out to that strip club your friend works at and watch the girls dance.”

  “What?” I cried. How did I graduate from cake for breakfast to going to a strip club?

  “You heard me, and before you start acting like you’re not interested, remember it’s just you and me here right now. And I do not judge you.”

  I do not judge you.

  The problem was not him. Not at all. It was these ghosts in my head. My mother and Hoyt and a lifetime of trying to appease the unappeasable by suppressing everything about myself.

  That’s Annie, I thought. Annie is the one with ghosts.
/>
  Layla is the one giving hand jobs in the backseats of cars for a six-pack of beer.

  “Okay,” I whispered.

  “Okay, what?”

  “Okay, I’ll go out to the strip club,” I said.

  “You want that?”

  I thought of Joan’s perfect body and how hard I’d tried not to stare at it.

  “Yeah…I do.”

  Again that laugh of his did something to my blood because my whole body got hot.

  “Fuck, that’d be something to see, baby. That would be something to see. Now, where’s your hand?”

  “In my pussy,” I whispered, feeling brave and bold and flush, and the word came out of my mouth on a gust of air, so easy. “Where’s yours?”

  “Around my cock,” he moaned.

  We were silent for a moment, just the sound of our breath between us. Harsh and raw.

  “Dylan,” I groaned.

  “Right here. Right fucking here.”

  It was fast and hard and quick and over in seconds, and I listened to him gasp and groan and wished, more than I could say, that I could see him right now.

  “Layla?” he asked after a moment.

  “Yeah?”

  “You okay?”

  I laughed, boneless and weak on the bed. “Yeah. I’m good. You?”

  “I’m good, baby. Real good.”

  “Can I ask you something…that’s not dirty?”

  “As a rule I only answer dirty questions.”

  “Dylan,” I laughed. “I’m serious.”

  “Shoot.”

  “Have you ever done this before?”

  “Phone sex? Sure.” Part of me was crushed at his words, though it was ridiculous. I had no reason to care. “But this other stuff?” he continued. “Talking to a total stranger like this? Totally new.”

  Ah, not so crushed anymore.

  “Me too.”

  “You grew up on a farm?” he asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Where?”

  “Worlds away from here. Where did you grow up?”

  “You changing the subject?”

  “I am. My past…is…”

  “Complicated?”

  “Very. So where’d you grow up?”

  “Outside of Jacksonville.”

  “Now where do you live?”

  “Does it matter?”

  Because we’re never going to meet. That’s what he wasn’t saying. We were never going to meet, so this…small talk didn’t really matter.

  “I guess not.”

  The silence between us hummed for a second, nothing bad. Just quiet. Just space between two people. It was kind of comforting.

  “Why are you going to all this effort to watch Ben?”

  “You’re full of questions, aren’t you?”

  “I guess so. You have any answers for me?”

  “And sassy. I like this.”

  I did too. I really did.

  “Tell me about Ben.”

  “Are you talking to him?”

  “No. Not really. Today I did a little bit. He said he has no family.”

  Dylan didn’t say anything, and I guess I’d been hoping that he’d tell me Ben was lying.

  “Why are you having him watched?” I asked.

  “He’s fucked up my life more than once. I feel better knowing where he is and what he’s doing.”

  “How did he fuck up your life?”

  “I’m not talking about this.”

  “But—”

  “Layla, we’ve got to have some rules about this thing between us. And one of them is I’m not talking about Ben.”

  There was something so naked in his voice. So raw, and I was suddenly sorry to have put it there.

  “Okay,” I breathed.

  “What are you going to do before you call me again?”

  “Go look at naked ladies.”

  He laughed, sounding satisfied, and though I had no basis to even consider it—or know—he sounded happy, too. “That’s right, baby. Do that and call me when you’re there.”

  “Call you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Like while I’m watching?”

  “Yes.”

  Heat bloomed again in my stomach, between my legs. The idea was unbearably exciting. Unbearably hot.

  “What are you going to be doing until then?” I asked.

  “Waiting for you.”

  The next day I stepped into the arctic chill that was the Flowered Manor office.

  “Hey, Kevin, the lawn mower died again.”

  “What?” he cried, looking up from the game of solitaire he was playing on his computer. In the three weeks I’d been working here, it was really just about all I ever saw him do. “You’re kidding. This is like the third time this week.”

  “Fourth.” And I’d been in here telling him about it every time, too. Kevin didn’t seem to have a whole lot of concern that I wasn’t going to be able to do the work he was paying me for. But I did. I had oceans of concern. “And I’ve done everything I know how to do to keep it running. Can you get someone to take a look at it? It’s in the field.”

  “Can you ask Ben to have a look-see?” he asked, unable to make eye contact for very long. As though the solitaire had magnetic powers over his eyeballs.

  “Sure,” I sighed and opened the door back, the hot air rushing into the small office.

  “Oh, hey, I think there’s a package for you.”

  “For me?”

  “Well, it’s addressed to Layla. I figure that was you last time. Must be you again.”

  The wild thump of my heart was ridiculous.

  “Where is it?”

  “There.” Kevin waved his hand behind him toward the far end of the counter, where a white box sat tied with a red ribbon.

  For some reason just looking at that package made me blush. It looked like a secret. A delicious, dirty secret.

  “I’m…it’s…Layla is my middle name.”

  “Whatever,” he said, clicking on a Jack of Hearts. “Ask Ben to look at the mower.”

  “I will.” Clutching the box to my chest and acting as nonchalant as I could, I raced back to my trailer to open it in private.

  I set it down on the table and pulled one end of the red ribbon, until the bow came undone and the box opened a little. Like it took a deep breath. There was the name of a bakery in Asheville embossed in gold on the front. Looked fancy. My fancy scale was skewed to the low side, and so this was the fanciest thing I’d ever seen.

  There was a note folded on top.

  Call me.

  That was all it said.

  I lifted the lid to find a large piece of yellow cake with white icing covered in coconut. It was oozing sugary, creamy liquid.

  Smiling, I went to grab my phone.

  As I had become accustomed, he answered on the first ring.

  “You got it?” he asked.

  “It’s beautiful. What is it?”

  “Tres leches cake.”

  “Your favorite thing for breakfast,” I sighed, touched so much that he’d gone to this effort.

  “I couldn’t let you settle for that shitty experience. Try it.”

  “I will. I just wanted to thank you—”

  “Try it while you’re talking to me, Layla.”

  I swallowed and blinked. This…this seemed oddly intimate.

  A chill raced over my skin, and my nipples were hard. My mouth was salivating. It was a full-body response to this gift. To its implications. I was…utterly charmed.

  Delighted.

  Turned on.

  By cake.

  By Dylan.

  I smiled and pulled one of my three forks out of the drawer.

  The first bite made me moan. “Oh my God,” I sighed. “That’s…that’s amazing.”

  “Tell me.”

  “It’s so moist. And sweet. Really sweet. It’s kind of carmelly somehow and coconutty.”

  “That’s how my mom made it. With the coconut.”

  I
took another bite, the sweetness gathering in the back of my throat. “Oh, God…Dylan. It’s so good.”

  He was breathing hard. I was breathing hard.

  I felt the emptiness inside of me. The place in my body where he would go if he were here. I wondered, suddenly, what else he would do if he were here.

  “The frosting is whipped cream.” I put some on my finger and sucked it off.

  “Do that again,” he said. “That sound.”

  “I’m sucking the whipped cream off my finger.”

  He groaned a little, in the back of his throat.

  “It’s perfect,” I whispered. “It’s so perfect.”

  “Take another bite,” he said.

  I did. Moaning, because I knew somehow that was really what he wanted to hear.

  “No more,” I said.

  “What?”

  “I want to save it. Stretch it out.”

  “You’re the kind of kid who had her Halloween candy until Easter, aren’t you?”

  “I didn’t get to trick-or-treat much,” I said, putting the box of cake in the fridge. My body was humming, from the sweetness of the cake.

  The sweetness of him.

  “But usually, I’m…greedy. I like all my treats at once.” The door closed with a small snick. “You don’t have to do these things, you know.”

  “What things?”

  “These…nice things.”

  “I like to do these nice things.”

  “I don’t know how to thank you,” I said, smiling a little. Enjoying playing coy. Because I knew how to thank him. I knew what he wanted. I wanted it too.

  “Take off your clothes, Layla,” he breathed. “I’ll tell you how you can thank me.”

  I went back into my bedroom and did every single thing he told me to do. I didn’t think, not for even a second, of saying no to him.

  “You can do it, baby,” he breathed, when I was sobbing that I couldn’t take any more. I had three fingers in my pussy and my clit was on fire. He wouldn’t let me touch it. “I want you to do it.”

  He wanted it, so I did too. I wanted it for myself, because it felt so sharp and real. Painful and so good at the same time. And I wanted it for him.

  I wanted to please him.

  So, inside my tight, aching body I slipped a fourth finger. I was stuffed, so full. Too full. My hand hurt, my arm ached. My body was shaking.

  “Dylan,” I whimpered. “Please…”

  “Now, you can touch your clit.”

  I did. And the world exploded. My world exploded. It was dark and bright at the same time. And I didn’t recognize myself in it. I didn’t recognize my body, as if it had been fundamentally changed by this pleasure.