Deep End

ASKING WHETHER I SHOULD TAKE OFF MY SHOES BEFORE stepping in seems like a fairly normal question, and I don’t understand why Lukas recoils as though I offered to smear badger turds all over his guest bathroom.

“Is there an alternative?” he asks, like there is a right answer, before shaking his head, and mouthing something under his breath. Americans, I believe it is.

I cannot help laughing as I follow him down an uncannily spotless hallway.

Sadly, my perfectionism never quite extended to cleanliness. Maryam and I have quarterly household meetings that share a tried-and-true agenda: we start by blaming each other for the pigsty-like quality of our place, continue with some superficial stress cleaning that temporarily assuages the heft of our shame, and conclude by swearing on what’s dearest to us—my dog, her Cthulhu funko pop—that we’ll procure coasters and never again let entropy conquer us.

Pipsqueak and Cthulhu are fucked.

“Your house is so much tidier than mine,” I say, hating the awe in my voice. Lukas looks at me over his shoulder, a little judgmental.

“That’s our closet.” He points at a wooden door. “You may borrow cleaning supplies.”

I snort. “You’re officially never coming over.”

“Fine by me.” He guides me into the kitchen, which looks like something a realtor might show to clients in the hope that they’ll buy the house in cash.

“Lukas, when do you even find the time to—”

“Mate, I didn’t know Pen was—oh.” Hasan appears under an arch and stops in his tracks, eyes settling on me. “Hey, Vandy.”

“Hasan,” I say. He’s British, tall and broad and deep voiced, and while I’ve never seen him be anything but kind, I instinctively shuffle closer to Lukas. My flank meets his heat, and I find that he’s already done the same.

“Sorry. I heard a female voice and assumed you were Pen.”

I glance at Lukas, waiting for him to explain to his roommate why I’m here, but he’s busy selecting a Fuji apple from the most pleasingly arranged bowl of fruit I’ve seen outside of a nineteenth-century still life painting. The burden of half-truthing must fall upon me. “Lukas and I are working on a project together.”

“Ah.” He smiles in something that looks a bit like relief. His expression clears. “You done with rehab?”

Last year, we’d often be in the PT room at the same time. “Yeah. And your right knee?”

“Good. It was just some MCL strain.”

“You’re breaststroke, right?”

“Yup.” We exchange a smile. I already feel more comfortable—

till he adds, “That was a bad injury. Yours, I mean.”

“Oh . . . yeah. I guess.”

“It wasn’t just a tear, right? There was other stuff?”

“Oh, um . . . a concussion. Some lung stuff. Sprains.” I shrug, tense. I doubt Hasan notices.

Lukas, though . . . “Why did you tell me not to ask you about inward dives?” His voice takes me by surprise. I turn to him, admiring the way he’s nonchalantly peeling the apple with a knife—a perfect, continuous spiral, like it’s easy, when I’ve tried a million times and always mess it up. Then his question falls into place.

“I didn’t say that.”

“Close enough.”

“Not really.”

“You said, ‘Next you’re going to ask me about my inward dives.’” He finishes peeling, eyes never letting mine go.

Ugh. “They’re just hard.”

“Ah.” Hasan nods knowingly. “Like mini max sets with double ups?”

“Exactly.” No idea what that is, but I nod, relieved. Lukas’s eyes on me are still sharper than I’d like. I glance around the kitchen, desperate for a change of topic. “By the way, I love your pristine and—I can only assume—weekly pasteurized home.”

Hasan grimaces. “We’ve got a bit of a regime situation going on.” He shoots a heavily insinuating stare at Lukas—who settles apple wedges on a plate, unbothered. “A full-on dictatorship, some would say,” Hasan adds.

I drum my fingers over the immaculate counter. “That’s not very collegial of you, Lukas.”

“We are adult men,” he simply says, sliding the plate toward me.

Did he . . . did he make me a snack? Is it a thank-you for the—

“Adulthood is not necessarily incompatible with the occasional crumb in the sink,” Hasan says.

“And Kyle’s or your head are not necessarily incompatible with the toilet,” Lukas counters benignly.

I nearly choke on my apple, and ask, “Did you—was that a threat?”

“I don’t know.” Lukas’s eyes remain on Hasan, serene and challenging. “Would you like to test me?”

Dictatorship, Hasan mouths at me. Regime.

“Is it a Swedish thing?” I mock-whisper at Hasan, biting into another slice. Sweet and crispy. Perfect.

“He also cooks extremely healthy meals, does laundry every weekend at the same time, and probably uses a protractor to fold his underwear. Maybe it is a Swedish thing.”

“It’s a not-a-manchild thing,” Lukas counters. He hasn’t eaten any apple yet. Is this just for me?

“How long have you two been living here together?”

“Since sophomore year,” Hasan explains. “Caleb moved out last year after he graduated. Kyle took over.”

“Is Kyle as enthusiastic a, um, cleaner as you are?”

“He’s as terrified of Lukas and susceptible to his authority as I am, yes.”

“Is he home?” Lukas asks casually, as though we’re not discussing his most despotic personality traits.

“Upstairs, I think.”

He nods and turns to me. “Want more?”

I must have been hungry, because I scarfed down the entire apple. “No, thank you. Want to go work on that project?”

He nods. “I have a desktop computer upstairs.”

“Awesome.”

I smile my goodbyes at Hasan, chuckle silently when he mouths, Tyrant, and then follow Lukas up the stairs. His room is on the eastern corner—must be nice, especially in the summer, when sunrise and practice come about at the same time. I’m still not sure why he brought me here instead of the library, but—

A strong hand shoves me inside his room.

And a second later, when I’m about to trip over my own feet, an equally strong arm catches me around the waist and pulls me back to his chest.

The door closes behind us. Lukas’s face buries in my throat with a long, sharp inhale. “You always smell so fucking good,” he murmurs against my neck, and my heart breaks into a race.

The bed is not close to the door, but it doesn’t matter. Lukas is twice as big as me, a million times stronger, and—it does a lot for me, I guess, the way he picks me up with no difficulty, like I’m a doll, a pet. When he lands me on his mattress, I feel like I do after failing a dive with several twists.

Disoriented. Out of breath. Lost.

He gives me no time to get my bearings. His fingers hook into the elastic of my shorts and pull them down my legs, together with my underwear. I must offer no resistance at all, because a moment later he’s there, on his knees next to his low bed staring down at what he uncovered.

My bare cunt.

He’s not much for preambles. And maybe he doesn’t want to make me suffer more than I already have, because he touches me without hesitation. His thumb is a gentle, firm pressure against my sticky slit, teasing me apart. Starting just below my clit and swiping down, once, twice, until on the third pass it hooks inside of my opening.

I gasp.

He doesn’t.

He stares at the place where a small part of him is barely inside me, and I think he’s unaffected, as in control as I could never be, but when he speaks . . .

“Do you want to know a secret?” His voice is like nothing I’ve heard. A low hum. Hard-edged. Foreign.

I nod.

“I dreamt about fucking you.”

I swallow. His thumb moves up again, and this time—this time he lets it graze my clit.

I arch up, biting a moan into my lower lip.

“Several times. Too many, probably.”

I feel myself clench around nothing.

“The first was about two years ago.”

My heart pounds. I’m right on the verge of—of something, but his thumb is gone. I could come so hard. If he only touched me. Anywhere, with anything. But he doesn’t, and it’s not outside the realm of possibilities that I might burst into tears.

“Scarlett.”

“Yes?” I didn’t think I’d be capable of speaking, but his voice is that authoritative.

“If you want me to stop, what do you do?”

“I say stop.” I can say it. I know I can, and he will. I’ve just never wanted anything less.

“You are even wetter than in the lab. Is it because I didn’t let you come? Because I’m in charge?”

It seems to be a genuine question, something he needs to know for sure. I nod, desperate. Flutter greedily around air.

“You want to be ordered around by someone you trust, is that it? You want rules, to be told what’s good for you.”

It’s so patronizing, and I—I nod like my life depends on it, half ashamed of the loud moan that slips out of my throat.

“Hey. Hey, baby.” One of his hands comes up, fingers brushing against my lips, circling my jaw. “Kyle’s room is just down the hallway. You’re going to have to be quiet. Can you be quiet?”

I’m lost for a second. Unable to fully grasp the magnitude of—this. The way he talks to me. His grip. The mix of violence and control and tenderness. So close to what I’ve always wanted and never managed to ask for, it’s hard to believe it’s not a fantasy.

“Scarlett. Can you be good?”

I nod against his hand while the other pins my wrists to my belly. His pleased smile works me up that much higher. “If you can’t, just bite,” he says, his palm right by my lips, his long fingers caging my cheeks, and I want to tell him that it’s okay, that I can be good for him, that he doesn’t need to worry, but it turns out to be a lie.

The first time, it takes him less than ten seconds to make me come. It’s just his tongue on my clit, flat, relentless, and when my orgasm rushes over, Lukas grunts like it’s happening to him.

I thought I could be quiet. Instead, I keen into the fleshy part of his hand.

“You are so fucking good,” he tells me. I’m not sure how, but a handful of moments later, I come again. “Already? You are perfect, huh?” He continues to suck and lick and hum against my clit, eating at me like I’m made of air and water. Quickly, the pleasure shifts from something to chase, to an avalanche that I want to run from. Tears slide hotly down the corners of my eyes. “Lukas, Lukas—I—” My voice breaks into a sob. I arch again, head tilted back, convulsing. It’s too much, too intense, too new to be defined by something as uncomplicated as good. It is, however, thought-annihilating. My bouncy mind and my racing anxieties sit still, as though Lukas knows exactly how to bend them to his will.

I squirm away from his mouth, but he knows it’s not what I need. “Shh. It’s okay. You’re doing great.” My heels push against the muscles in his upper back. He presses my wrists more firmly against my stomach, avoids the hypersensitive, over-touched parts of my cunt, and still manages to make me come again.

“More?” he asks after I float down, like the past ten minutes have not just been a glorious assortment of mores, like I don’t twitch every time his breath puffs against my flesh. I’m hot. Heavy. Made of sparks. I watch him watch my clenching hole, on display for him.

“I . . .” My throat is raw, scraped from the inside. His palm, marked with my teeth. “It’s not up to me.” I say it because we’re both thinking it, anyway.

“You sweet thing. You were made for this, weren’t you?” His hand leaves my face and comes down to spread my legs. Pin my right knee to the bed. When his teeth bite into my inner thigh, my whole body jerks. It hurts a little, more than that, but I’m cross-wired, neurally confused, and the pain and pleasure are impossible to tease apart. “You’re so right.”

I wonder if I’m going to get used to his strength. The rational part of me knows that his physique is a simple product of training, discipline, and questionable priorities. The other part, the one that just wants a minute of rest, loves the ease with which he flips me around until I’m all the way on the bed, belly down on the covers, my cheek pressed against a pillow that smells so much like him, I cannot help grabbing two fistfuls.

Mine.

“I really want to fuck you,” he says from behind me. I’m still quivering. Wearing nothing but a white tank top that has long ridden up to my rib cage. Lukas is on his knees, my thighs trapped in the spread of his. He must be looking at my ass, and if this was anyone else, I’d be fretting over it. Am I pretty enough? Have I disappointed him with my body?

Except, he’s the one who gets to decide what happens. And if he didn’t like me, he simply wouldn’t continue. My worries quiet down, and I smile into the comforter.

I could live here, in the quiet of this moment, forever.

“You’d let me, right?”

His hand comes up to the valley between my shoulder blades. Pushes down. My head has little range of movement, but I try to nod.

“That’s so sweet of you.” He leans forward. Kisses the first vertebra of my spine, slow and patient. “Then again, I really don’t want to fuck you with a condom.”

His voice pierces through the dense fog in my brain. I recall the list. On birth control, to avoid periods, scribbled in the margins of mine.

If you’re up for it, let’s both get tested and exchange results, he wrote.

I sent mine.

He got busy, and didn’t send his.

“We’ll have to do something else,” he says.

I groan into the mattress. “Please.”

He licks the trails of my tears. The stubble on his jaw brushes deliciously against my ear, and he lets out something that resembles a regretful, strained laugh. “You’re pretty when you beg.” Another kiss on my cheek. “You always are.”

I let out a second, frustrated groan, but he’s unbuttoning his jeans, pushing layers of fabric down his hips, his weight infinite as he lowers himself against my back, presses my legs together with his knees, and—

Oh my god.

He grunts. I gasp. The first glide of his cock between my thighs is choppy, too rough. Unlubricated. But then his thrust slides up, where he made me plenty wet just a minute ago.

“Jesus, you feel—” His hips find a steady rhythm, and it all works like a dream.

And that’s when I realize, he is fucking me. Not the way I want him to, maybe, but his head bumps my clit on every push. I can feel the hot length of him against my folds, and it’s good enough for me to beg for it.

“It’s like I made you up in my head, Scarlett.”

I’m babbling, wild and inappropriate, and he has to shush me again. He laughs once, a little rough. “You just can’t be quiet, can you?” This time it’s the palm of his hand wrapped against the lower side of my face, and biting into it is not an option.

I shouldn’t moan this loudly. I should be able to choke these sounds back. But I’m not and it’s okay, because for once the responsibility is not on me. This time, Lukas decided, and I don’t get to be heard. Fresh air is hard to come by, his fingers span my entire jaw, and I wholly forget the burden of being myself for a few moments.

“Next time,” he promises in my ear, heavy and urgent and raspy, “I’m going to fuck you properly.”

I nod and roll my spine, trying to get closer to him. Failing. I have no control over this, and I hear myself whine, high-pitched and reedy.

“What am I gonna do next time? C’mon, Scarlett. Say it.”

He’s not unreasonable. Kind, really. His hand on my mouth loosens just enough to allow me to speak. Cool air fills my lungs. I open my mouth to whisper, shaky, “Next time, you’re going to—” A silent hitch when the head of his cock hits a perfect spot. I gasp, a hairbreadth from coming. If only he was to do it again, just once. Even stay there.

But he knows. And pulls back right before I slip over the edge.

“Not until you say it. Come on.”

I am so close. So close. “You’re going to . . . to fuck me properly.”

“It’s a promise, Scarlett.” He resumes thrusting, and I’m so wet now that the sounds are filthy, the slapping of his body against mine faster, and the noises I make—his palm seals against my mouth, a tight grip that I never want to lose. His movements stop. “And you’ll fucking take it.”

He bites a deep, guttural groan in the tender flesh of my shoulder, and when I feel the thick ropes of his come painting my cunt, I start convulsing against him. For long moments, I’m just pleasure and sensation, no awareness of anything else.

When I can breathe and think and be again, Lukas has shifted us so that he’s spooning me, held to his chest with both arms—at once precious cargo and a flight risk.

“Okay?” he asks.

His voice is so shaken, I wonder if that should be my line. I turn a little and lift my hand, letting it run through the soft hair at the side of his head, where it’s shorter than the top. He leans into it like a pet, still trying to catch his breath. “Yeah. You?”

He doesn’t say yes. What he does say is, “Fuck,” which means nothing and everything at once.

I nod in agreement, because yeah. Fuck.

Fuck, we’re really doing this.

Fuck, your roommates are here, and I’m sure I lost consciousness at some point, and I hope they had headphones on.

Fuck, I thought it would be good, and it still felt so much better than it should have.

“God, you are so . . .” Lukas pants, but never finishes the sentence. He presses sweet, open-mouthed, almost involuntary kisses to my neck and temple and collarbone. He licks my tears dry. His hands are—well, still strong, but his grip is nothing like before. He caresses me like I’m crystal, follows the line of my arm and my hips and my belly, a little desperate, a little hungry, a little incredulous, a little satisfied. “I’m going to clean you up in a minute. Just let me . . . I just want to touch you. Okay?”

I nod with a happy, sated smile.

And a handful of seconds later I fall asleep.