Sneak Peek: The first month (Patreon)

When I get around to resetting the Patreon tiers, I'm planning to embed a clearer timeline of subscription benefits, set to specific days. I've pretty much been doing that anyways, with updates on a Friday, and sneak peeks or something similar on a Wednesday, but I need to enshrine that properly, I think.

With that in mind, I was looking over what I'd written since last week and puzzling over what to share. The scene with Julia was pretty steamy (and has undergone editing since) and while those scenes are an important part of the story, I think it's some of the... quieter?... moments that are the strength of Constant. I might be wrong, but I think sometimes it's some of the more PG-scenes that some readers enjoy.

With that in mind, here's a peek at a "quieter" recollection of David's first month after his return from the Clinic, without the benefit of Julia's presence.

It's a shorter peek this week. Writing this week has progressed fine, mostly, despite some spillover from last week's brutal workload, though today I've been somewhat derailed.

One of my favourite writers died recently. Her name's Alice Munro--she's a short story writer--and though relatively less well known (despite earning a Nobel prize for literature, and a Man Booker award) her prose is--just about perfect. Not everyone's style or genre, obviously, but for sheer skill of writing, she's got few rivals. I've been rereading her stories and... well, it makes it hard to return my own amateur hack efforts.

Have you ever tried your hand at anything--drawing, music, writing, dance, cooking, programming, whatever--and just been totally in awe of someone better, and know you'll never be that good? That's where I am right now.

In any case, the extract below comes from the same "The Story of Julia" scene, during Julia's first night back after being away for the entirety of September. Enjoy!

I've put this one out there for everone because--I dunno; it's a poor tribute to a favourite author, but if one person sees this and reads one of her stories, I'll be happy.

As always, sneak peeks are in early draft forms.

***

            “I need you,” I said.

            And I did need her, and the most obvious indication of that need manifested itself immediately: in her gentle exhalation at my words, the hunger revealed in her eyes, and the thrill that ran down my spine. In her reaction, I reacted: my nipples tightened, my breath caught in my chest and I felt a tingle below. Her need; my arousal.

            And perhaps one of the things that blinded me that night to deeper potential was my very physical need for some kind of release. A full month, and I hadn’t gotten laid once; nothing, since that night with Chad at the Clinic five long weeks ago.

            Weeknight and weekends, in the company of all these sexy young things—a sexy young thing myself—dressed to kill, makeup and perfume and the tickle of lacy underwear—the shimmy of ass in heels under a tight skirt—flared nostrils—a held breath, wicked smile, and a warm exhalation over an erect cock bobbing in anticipation—wet sounds, saliva and spit—and glossed lips gliding—the grunt and groan and grip of male hands at my hair, firm hold, and the hot spurt to the back of the throat—and seeing, from the outside, and feeling, from the inside, the heavy sway of tits and growing heat at their peak, spreading to tummy, across my neck and… lower down….

            With the ghost of Jonas’s presence a renewed tingle on my lips, I considered the weeks I’d had to come to terms with the vagina nestled between my thighs. But I hadn’t cum, not once. I’d touched myself, obviously—that night clubbing, desperately; another night thinking of Mr Connor, shamefully—gently rubbing my finger up and down my labia, quivering at the feeling, aching and hungry—shivering with the sensual pleasure of my soft touch—

            But never finding release.

            One night after work, I’d gone out for a drink with Mel. Just Mel and me at the bar and while her eyes had been on the fit young men walking past, my eyes had been on her, mostly. That night, the way her tits pushed out her red blouse, nipples poking through, and the gleam of her lips, the little fuzz at the curve of her neck in the pink light from the bar—I wanted to touch her, feel her breasts, take her nipple in my mouth and feel her back arch under my touch. I wanted to slide my hand beneath the waistband of her trousers and touch the hidden wetness and draw from her the eager moan. Peel her panties down. Rise above her. Press her down. And enter—

            Instead, I felt—an ache in anaesthetised balls; a wanting throbbing wetness—and she noticed, I think, her wicked grin and the way she stroked my bare shoulder. 

            After, I went home and—

            Sat in my chair staring into the darkness of the night—

            And drank—

            Picked up that dildo Julia left me.

            I held its tip against my lips and shuddered and couldn’t do it.

            Just as Julia predicted, I was going fucking crazy. Sat behind my desk, warmed by the pink and blue lights of Volumina International at my back, I found myself drifting into these distant sexual hazes—mind adrift, untethered—thighs squeezing together, lips slightly parted—breathing, fantasizing, flushing as inchoate flashes of male and female sensuality taunted me.

            And there was just so much fodder to trigger these fantasies and twist them into pure torture. Bad enough seeing myself in the mirror and feeling the uncalled tremor shivering down my spine. So much of my days were spent in the company of women—beautiful women, wonderful girls. Over the month, I saw some of them in increasingly comfortable, intimate moments. There was the casual comradery of restrooms, obviously: the communal mirror, unguarded adjustments, passing comments and makeup moments shared between girls. Those were now so familiar as to me unremarkable—usually. The gym changerooms began to feel the same after the initial titillation of seeing colleagues in panties and bra as they prepped for a workout.

            But it was the personal moments that got to me, the unexpected intimacies experienced as a girl, shared with girls, a now familiar world once dimly perceived from beyond the veil, both more and less exciting than expected.

            Willow’s sofa, for example. One night we got shit-faced on—what the fuck was it?—Brennevin? Some kind of Icelandic spirit she’d brought back from holiday two years ago, a half-finished bottle buried at the back of her closet. The other girls, her roommates were out for the night—Emma on a third date, Mel visiting her parents—it was just the two of us.

            Next thing we knew, we’re obliterated on paint-stripper Viking schnapps on a Friday night, sat side-by-side on the sofa lit by the light of her TV, volume down and turned to a sitcom she grew up with that I’d never heard of. My feet rested in her lap, and she painted my nails.

            She’d reached the sweary stage of her drunkenness. We sat there in our bras. She complained hers was too fucking tight, the cunting thing, fucking underwire. I told her to take it off. She did. What the fuck about you, you prissy bitch, she slurred, poking at my boob. I joined her in toplessness, my Cs joining her slender Bs. She cupped hers, then mine; fucking not fair, she bemoaned, I wish I had your tits. No you don’t; yours are gorgeous. Liar, and all but purring, Willow cuddled up next to me, muttering cute obscenities under her breath. She fell asleep, head on my shoulder, her breast against mine I sat there watching a show I didn’t know in silence, softly stroking her head as the room spun its slow Viking dance around us. I ached for her all night.

            I was a wolf in sheep’s clothing, an Achilles at Skyros—but what if the wolf never escapes the fold, or Odysseus never arrives? Living among these girls as one of them was torture, and by the end of the month I was ready to….

            Honestly, I don’t know.

***