Dream Guy

I was the first to awake the following morning. Maddie and I had fallen asleep in each other’s arms, but on waking I saw that we had found our own sides of the bed. She faced away from me, giving me an uninterrupted view of her bare back and bottom. I shook my head as I lay looking at her, wondering how on Earth I had ever thought she wasn’t my type.

She mumbled and stirred, perhaps because of the cool air on her back. I shifted towards her, my arm over her torso, my leg finding its way between hers. I felt her bottom press into my tummy and her foot found its way over my ankle as she allowed herself to be wrapped up in my limbs. We settled in together and I gently took hold of her wrist. She sighed, a sound which instantly turned me on.

‘Morning, Conall…’ she murmured.

I lay perfectly still and started counting in my head. One, two, three…

She jerked awake. I held her fast, my hand gripping her wrist as she tried to fling herself off the mattress. Then, just as suddenly, she stopped, her body still, her muscles tense. I could feel the thump-thump-thump of her heart through her back.

‘Jason! Fuck!’ she said. ‘I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to–‘

‘It’s okay. Shh! It’s okay!’

I held her, full body, feeling the warmth of her skin, the delicious firmness of her flesh and muscles. Slowly, I felt her breathing even out and her body come to rest. She let out a long sigh.

‘God, this feels nice,’ she said.

‘Yes, it does.’

‘You know, most guys would be freaking out by now.’

‘You reckon?’

I felt Maddie turn her head slightly.

‘You don’t think so?’ she said.

‘If we were married, I’d be freaking out,’ I said. ‘But we’re not. You’re cheating on your boyfriend and I’m the other man. The usual rules of polite conversation don’t really apply.’

I lay relaxed, feeling Maddie’s body against my own. I could sense that she didn’t like what I’d said.

‘Are you judging me?’ she said.

‘Yes and no.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means I’m not going to lie to myself about the ethics of what we’re doing, which I suppose requires a judgement of some kind. But I’m not judging in the sense that I’m looking down my nose at you as some sort of moral inferior. Do you know what I mean?’

I felt Maddie consider what I said. Then she tried–and failed–to twist her head around to look me in the face.

‘Jason, do you have an answer for everything?’

‘You make it sound like I’m trying to pull a fast one.’

‘Are you?’

She said it playfully, but I was pissed off. I pulled away, lifted the duvet and sprang out of bed. The speed at which I was on the other side of the room took Maddie by surprise and she sat up in bed, blinking in my direction. She struggled to focus on me and I saw that her penchant for trendy glasses was more than just a fashion statement. She really was short-sighted. I felt the urge to let her off the hook and instantly stepped on it.

‘I thought you valued honesty?’ I said, my voice sharp.

‘I do!’

‘Then why are you doing this? If you think I’m being evasive, by all means call me on it. But if I give you a straight answer to a straight question, don’t act like I’m trying to trick you! Fuck’s sake! After last night, neither of us can claim to be a “good person”, but at least we can be honest about it!’

I turned and headed for the door. Maddie clambered to her knees.

‘Where are you going?’ she cried.

‘To take a piss!’

I walked out of the room, leaving the door open. My need for a piss wasn’t actually urgent, but it was a good moment for a dramatic exit and I was curious how Maddie would react. However, just as I walked across my living area, the bedding still piled on the couch, a phone started warbling. It was a silly sound–like the call of an electric goo-goo bird–so it had to be Maddie’s phone. Yes, there it was on my coffee table next to her glasses, lighting up and warbling.

It was Conall.

I went straight to the bathroom, having no desire to be around when Maddie came rushing out of the bedroom. Sure enough, I heard her voice almost as soon as I closed the door. I took my piss and was about to flush when I found myself pausing to listen. I could just hear Maddie’s voice from the living room and there was an edge to it which troubled me. I couldn’t detect the slightest hint of apology in her tone, despite the fact that she had cheated on this guy. So, she was either lying or rubbing his nose in the truth; I wasn’t sure which was worse.

I flushed the toilet and took a shower. The rush of water from two sides blocked the sound through the door. Relieved, I shampooed my hair, washed my body with shower gel and rinsed myself off. It felt good to have had sex and now it felt good to wash the girl off me. I was clean, refreshed, and ready to say to her: ‘Thank you and goodbye’. I was almost done when Maddie walked in, stark naked, talking to me as she entered.

‘Fuck me, what a baby Conall turned out to be!’ she said, stepping into the shower. ‘He was crying! Actually crying! After all the shit he put me through with Serena Fuckface, he has the nerve to act like I was the one who started this mess!’

I stood there thinking she had a fucking nerve herself, just climbing into my shower with me in it. But as Maddie stuck her head under the stream of water, her buttocks pressed against my groin and my cock sprang to attention so fast, I had move so that it didn’t poke her in the side. I opened my mouth to say sarcastically, ‘Please join me’, but what came out instead was:

‘Did you tell him about us?’

‘Of course!’ she said, slicking her wet hair back with her hands. ‘I’m not going to lie to him!’

She looked around, probably for shampoo, but her gaze fell on my erect cock. She took it in her hand, touching it the way one might touch a smooth porcelain figurine. She let out a soft grunt, turned around and put her forearms flat on the tiled wall.

‘Come on, Jason,’ she said. ‘Don’t tease me like this.’

I looked at the way her bottom was pushed out and her feet planted flat on the smooth shower floor. Shit, she wanted to be fucked. But before I could remark on how she was taking a lot for granted, I was already positioning my cock between her legs and pushing it into her.

My God, but Maddie had a great cunt! Fucking her in the shower, hot water pouring over our bodies, her butt firm and strong, was one of the all-time best fucks I’ve ever had. I don’t usually go for sex standing up–finding it more exciting in thought than in practice–but this was the exception which proved the rule. By the time we were done, any irritation I felt at her behaviour was well and truly gone. A woman who fucks like this can do what she wants.

After the shower, we went back to bed and fucked some more. Maddie spent a good deal of time on top of me, grinding herself from one orgasm to another, then I got her to sit on my face so I could wash it in her juice. By the time we were done, it was nearly lunchtime and my stomach was growling. Yet I could hardly move. I didn’t want to move. I was spent–lying in my bed with a young woman’s body sprawled over mine and I wanted to stay here for the rest of eternity.

‘You…’ murmured Maddie, ‘…are a really good fuck.’

I stared up at the ceiling, frowning. Only one past girlfriend had ever paid me compliments in bed, and it was always the prelude to something else she wanted. I cleared my throat and said:

‘Why are you telling me?’

‘I wasn’t telling you,’ said Maddie. ‘I was telling me.’

I felt Maddie’s head turn towards me. I looked back at her. When she stopped trying to look ‘funky’, Maddie was actually quite pretty, with kissable lips and a kind of chubby sexiness I was liking more and more. Even so, right now she looked upset and confused.

‘I only wanted a quick shag,’ she said. ‘And to make Conall jealous.’

‘Is he?’

‘God, yes. But now it feels like…’

She tailed off, her expression still troubled. She leaned in and kissed me. It was tentative at first, careful, exploratory, then our mouths opened, our tongues pushed deep, and we were kissing full on, her hands on my body, my hand on one of her buttocks. I gave it a squeeze and she groaned and forced herself to break the kiss.

‘God, what is this?’ she said. ‘I want to fuck you again! What are you doing to me, Jason?’

She rolled off the bed and stood up, her back to me, her arms hugging herself.

‘This was not supposed to happen!’ she said.

I leaned on my elbow and looked at her–her feminine back, her round bottom, but also her hunched shoulders and the way her fingers were digging into her arms as she battled in her mind. Then I got out of bed and wrapped my arms around her from behind. The moment our bodies connected, I felt Maddie relax into me, a complete surrender, and she allowed me to lift her off the floor and physically put her back to bed. When I climbed in next to her, she clung onto me like a girl lost in a forest, wanting to be wrapped up in the warm, firm blanket of my manhood. I felt wise and strong, like a man who knows what a woman needs, because it was obvious to me that she needed this.

This feeling I had holding Maddie — I never had this feeling with a woman before. Every woman in my past had a wish list of wants, but with Maddie it was obvious that the things she wanted were the cause of her unhappiness. She was desperately trying to make Conall love her, yet too smart not to know on some level that she could never succeed. But Conall was Maddie’s ‘Dream Guy’–the boyfriend who made her the envy of the girls–and she didn’t want to give it up. I understood that. I could even imagine being the same way.

I gave Maddie a squeeze and kissed the top of her head. She snuggled closer and sighed.

‘You make me feel safe, Jason,’ she said.

‘Good.’

‘Well, it’s not good, actually. I’m supposed to be a strong, independent woman. And the feminist in my head is furious.’

‘With me or with you?’

‘With you, of course. You’re the man–it’s always your fault. Haven’t you figured that out yet?’

I smiled and gave her another kiss. We lay in bed holding each other, questions turning over and over in our minds. Then, through the door, we heard Maddie’s phone warble in the distance. She lay in my arms and waited, not making the slightest move to leave. When the calling stopped, she snuggled closer and began planting lights kisses on my pectoral muscles. When she was done, she rested her head on my chest and stared into nothingness.

‘Tell me what to do, Jason,’ she said. ‘I’ll do whatever you say.’

In that moment, I felt more masculine than I had ever felt in my life. It felt like this woman was handing me her future and my heart seemed to expand with pride and determination. I wanted to be this man — a man so well put together that a woman would trust him with her life. It was both a joy and a responsibility, and I turned my mind to the question of what I was going to tell her to do.

‘Go to your flat,’ I said, ‘pack a bag and come back here to me.’

‘For how long?’

‘For as long as is necessary.’

‘And Conall?’

‘Tell him you’re sorry, but Jason wants you to be his Woman and you’ve decided to say yes.’

I felt Maddie’s whole body react. The palms of her hands felt hot on my skin and her breathing quickened. She turned her head and I saw her open her mouth as though preparing to take a bite out of my chest.

‘Do you really mean that?’ she whispered.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I really mean that.’

She pressed her face into my chest, sucking as much of my flesh into her mouth as she could. After marking me with the fiercest purple love-bite I had ever seen, she clambered onto me and within seconds we were fucking again.

***************************

By the time Maddie left my apartment, the feeling between us was so intense that I was certain she’d be back that same evening, suitcase in tow. It hurt when she didn’t show up. Sunday was the same and I had to switch my phone off to stop myself constantly checking for messages.

What made it worse was that I had specifically told her she didn’t have to call or text me. ‘Do what you need to do,’ I told her. ‘I’m a grown man. You don’t have to worry about me.’ I meant it too, but now that she’d taken me at my word, I felt like shit. I spent half the time torturing myself and the other half beating myself up for torturing myself. Finally, on Sunday night, I sent a text saying, ‘Just let me know you’re alive.’ Within ninety seconds, a text arrived back: ‘I’m alive.’

And that was it.

Monday was better as I had to go to work and after work, I went to the gym. I went to the gym on Tuesday night as well and by Wednesday I was pretty much back to normal. I had made a woman an offer and by her actions she had said no. Fair enough. I gave it my best shot and it missed. That’s how it goes sometimes. Life goes on.

Ten days after her exit, Maddie called.

‘Hey there!’ she said, trying to sound casual. ‘It’s me.’

‘So it is.’

I was in a coffee shop and I went out onto the street to talk, keeping an eye on my stuff through the window. The weird thing was, because I’d already let her go in my mind, I wasn’t even angry.

‘How have you been?’ I said.

‘Okay, I suppose,’ she said. Then she sighed. ‘Actually, not so good. It’s been a tough week.’

‘I see.’

‘How about you?’

‘Listen, Madeline…’

‘Maddie!’

I sighed and said: ‘Why are you calling?’

‘Wow, straight down to business!’ said Maddie. ‘Typical man!’

‘I’ll take that as a compliment.’

‘You’re a fucker! Did you know that?’

I suddenly wondered why I was wasting my time with this kid, this spoiled brat. She was a great fuck, but even that was now something in the past. Standing on the pavement, I stepped back to let a woman with a pushchair pass and exchanged a long stare with the toddler sitting in it. The silence began to drag.

‘Jason?’

‘Still here.’

‘Listen, Jason…’ said Maddie at last, and her irritation was obvious. ‘I called because Conall wants to meet you.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘I said, Conall wants to meet you.’

‘Why?’

‘To talk. He thinks we need to clear the air.’

I stood and blinked stupidly. The news seemed to have scrambled my brain. Even though Maddie had repeated herself, I still wasn’t sure I’d heard correctly.

‘Conall wants to meet me?’

‘Yes! Is that really so weird?’

‘Yes, frankly.’

‘Look, Jason, he doesn’t want to beat you up or anything.’

‘Really? I would if I were him.’

‘Yes, I know.’

I heard disappointment in her voice. But was it disappointment in me for being so Neanderthal or Conall for being too civilised?

‘How about you, Madeline?’ I said. ‘Do you want us to meet?’

‘I don’t know what I want,’ said Maddie.

***************************

Conall had suggested the Six Hammers, the same pub where I’d met Maddie the last time. It felt strange walking into that saloon bar again, like a continuation of the same evening rather than something which happened two weeks ago. Conall even chose the same table as before — I walked in to see the two of them sitting in the window seat like a bona fide couple. Conall got to his feet as I approached and offered his hand.

When you’ve only seen photos of someone, it’s weird to meet them in person for the first time. Conall’s long hair and fine-boned features were all there, but he also looked thin and tired. His denim shirt and black jeans looked good on him, yet I didn’t feel as unhandsome as I was expecting. Despite his photogenic masculinity, I could sense discomfort. His handshake was fine, but he had trouble looking me in the eye and I got the feeling that–despite appearances to the contrary–I was the one with the edge.

There was a pint of bitter waiting for me on the small, round table. I’d brought the car this time and had only intended to have a half, but I didn’t want to be a prick. As we sat down, Conall read my face and looked troubled.

‘Maddie told me that was your tipple,’ he said.

‘It is,’ I said and raised the glass. ‘Thank you.’

Conall looked relieved and raised his pint in return. Maddie had a straight glass of rum-and-coke, but she didn’t join the toast. She simply swigged her drink, sulking like a kid who had been dragged to a museum. Any thoughts I had about Maddie being behind this meeting vanished. This really was Conall’s idea.

‘So, Jason…’ said Conall. His pint was already half gone. ‘I understand Maddie’s told you something about me?’

‘Something,’ I said.

I had to admit, the Scottish accent was a winner. It was easy to see why girls fell for him.

‘Yes, um…’ Conall took another swig. ‘Well, she also told me about you. About… what happened.’

Maddie looked away, the tiniest gasp of exasperation escaping her lips. Conall looked sharply at her.

‘What?’ he said.

‘Nothing.’

‘Didn’t sound like nothing.’

‘Fuck me, Conall, did you invite Jason here so he could watch us fight?’ Maddie turned to me. ‘By the way, Jase… I’m not pregnant. I had my period this morning.’

Conall went pale. Maddie acted as casually as if she had remarked on the weather. I watched the two of them, feeling strangely detached. While Conall stared at her, Maddie finished her drink and rattled the ice cubes in the glass.

‘I’m getting another one,’ she said, getting to her feet. ‘See you boys in a minute!’

Maddie sauntered off to the bar, her bum looking pretty damn good in the mustard-yellow jeans she was wearing. Conall looked like he was struggling not to cry. I looked at him, feeling both sympathy and contempt. Any thoughts that I had something to fear from this young man were well and truly gone. I cleared my throat.

‘Conall, why did you want us to meet?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said miserably.

‘You must have had some idea.’

Conall looked at the remains of his pint. His lifted the glass, then changed his mind and rested it on his knee.

‘Maddie told me you asked her to move in with you,’ he said.

‘Yes.’

‘After one night.’

He looked up at me and for the first time, I saw his anger. I had always been afraid of being hated, but now that I found myself at the receiving end of an angry glare, I realised that I was okay with it. Being hated by Conall was the price I paid for having sex with Maddie and, to be honest, it was totally worth it.

‘Yes,’ I said, looking him in the eye. ‘After one night.’

He turned away shaking his head, as though unable to believe my lack of scruples. I considered bringing up the Serena Smith thing and decided not to. I was okay playing the bastard in this little drama. Indeed, I was a bit shocked at how comfortable I felt in the role.

‘Shall we take this outside?’ I said. ‘You know… “settle this like men”?’

‘What, you mean have a fight?’ said Conall.

‘Yes.’

‘No…! Besides, I don’t believe in violence.’

‘Listen, I haven’t thrown a punch since school, so I doubt there’d be much violence. More like two guys flailing at each other.’

‘You look pretty fit.’

‘I go to the gym, sure, but that doesn’t mean I know how to fight.’

‘What would Maddie think?’

‘She’d love it! Two guys fighting over her? Her girlfriends would never hear the last of it!’

Conall frowned and looked across my shoulder. I turned around myself and was somehow not surprised to see Maddie, drink in hand, having an animated conversation with two older guys at the bar. All three turned as Conall and I watched them and Maddie raised her rum-and-coke. Judging by the men’s amusement, she had told them exactly what was going down at this table. I laughed quietly to myself, but something in Conall seemed to snap.

‘Excuse me,’ he said, bumping the small table as he got to his feet.

Left alone for a moment, I stared at the empty window seat and wondered why I was here. Did I really want to have Maddie for myself? Did I want her to choose me? I thought about the naked woman in my bed, and what a stupendous fuck she was. But this was the same woman who found it perfectly okay to seduce a man away from his family and then publicly humiliate him. I only got to know Maddie because she wanted to use me to make Conall jealous. Did I really want to share my home with such a woman? Were ‘I like her and she’s great in bed’ really good enough reasons?