jeevey
Rock n' Roll Doggie Band-aid
This one might be a little shorter but was SO tough to write. Hope you all like it. As ever, I adore feedback.
When they stepped out of the congested bar Edge was startled to discover that it was snowing. Fat thick flakes, barely frozen, floated down to stick to Solvieg's lashes, though they disappeared instantly on touching the pavement. He followed her in a random direction, all his focus tuned to the faint warmth that radiated from her body. He had noticed something unusual about her when he first laid his hand on her in the club, and he thought about it now as they walked.
Like every successful performer Edge touched a lot of people in the course of his work, doling out hugs and handshakes like notes from a bank teller. Although these were usually pure dull routine he had learned to trust certain observations. The proverbially repellent "cold fish" handshake was a signifier of something very real- of people who were compressed, who withheld themselves in some way. He doubted most of them knew it given the enthusiasm on their faces when they met his band, but it was like hugging an empty shell. There was simply nothing inside the hand. The real person must be tucked away somewhere down near the middle, he thought. Other people existed unprotected very near the surface, and you could feel it in their hands. He suspected that it was one reason that women liked Adam so much, and he knew it was part of what made his friendship so comforting; even his casual pat on the shoulder had a faintly humming, wakeful feeling which said, I know you're there. I'm here too. Edge couldn't count the number of times that he had found himself suddenly blinking, relaxed, after Adam squeezed him gently in passing. He thought that a lover would probably find it very nice indeed.
And Solvieg, it seemed, could barely be contained by her own skin. That feeling which was reassuringly warm from Adam or a prick of consciousness in a stranger's handshake, from her had the jolt of a live wire or a floodlight in the face. Even being near her without touching was like when the big amps were turned on before sound check; even when silent he could feel them there, latent and powerful. He thought it was this that must have attracted his attention to Solvieg quite as much as her ridiculous, incredible ass in those unattractive trousers. She felt, quite simply, as though she was all there. He had felt it at the sweaty small of her back when she first laid down her bow and looked at him, and he felt it now when she tripped on a bit of broken pavement and lurched against him. He put his arm out to steady her, and then pulled her off balance just to feel it again.
Solvieg put her arm around his waist and walked on, her eyes turned up to snowflakes appearing like white stars out of the blackness. She seemed to know that he needed time now, that he needed to find his way to her on his own. Her uncovered hair had a scent like green plants and musty amber resin. It felt like silk against his upper lip. Her mouth, when he reached it, tasted of sweet American whiskey. Cool on the surface, inside it was all sweetness and burn. He pulled her to face him and for a time all was silence. Her body just a hint inside her puffy mujahedin coat, her lips, that seemed to be listening to his thoughts. Her hands, slipped under his jacket and gently stroking his ribs....
It was too much, too fucking much. The adrenaline surging through his hands was terrifying. He pulled away, fighting the twin impulses to leave and to put her up against the nearest wall, trying to slow the thundering of his heart, feeling her stroke the thick leather belt at his back.
"Is everything all right?"
"It's just... it's been a long time for me. I haven't been with anyone since her. My wife." He spoke the last words with difficulty. Those were memories that he usually avoided. By the time things with Aislinn neared the end Edge had learned that sex between people who detest each other is a grim and ugly business that never wanted to experience again. His few attempts to wipe the stench of it from his skin with someone else were even worse. God, he spent most of his days doing anything other than think of these things, but right now it was uncontrollable as vomiting. He went on, telling her things he had never said to anyone.
"We were just kids when we got together, we were at secondary school and it's just what kids do, have a pretty girlfriend. But we never broke up. I was on the road with the band so young and it was just good having someone to come home to, but things were never right. Everyone knew it was a mistake to get married. Everyone except her and myself. I've... " He swallowed. "I've only been with a couple of other people. Just random things on the road. It was.... degrading. For everybody." He felt again the sick revulsion of coming home to find Aislinn exhausted, resentful, half smothered from keeping things going by herself and the baby regarding him suspiciously, he thought, from her arms. The older girls elated to see him but constantly startled by his awkward attempts to play with them, the house growing more suffocating by the moment and he crawling the walls, loathing everybody, everything, and himself most of all...
Solvieg was so still beside him. He opened his eyes.
"This is not random," she said.
It wasn't. He knew it.
She shook her head. "This is... something else, I don't know what."
"You are something else.," he said roughly. He ran his thumb over her cheek, shuddering a little when she tipped her head into the pressure. She ran her fingers though his without speaking. They stood quietly, breathing each others' air, testing the draw of their bodies like magnets. Edge knew the power of opposite poles from building magnetic amps as a kid. Inert and blackish, they appear innocuous until they come within range of each other and then they leap to life, crossing distances and even flipping over to unite face to face. He had seen the power of their longing, how a single electrically charged magnet placed next to an ordinary one inside a speaker creates sound, vibrations which can be compressed, distorted, delayed, infinitely sustained.... he made his living through the manipulation of invisible tensions.
His wandering thoughts settled in the spot where she touched the inner curve of his fingers. Of course the fingertips of his left hand had been heavily calloused for many years, but he had never realized how sensitive the lower portion of the pad had become in compensation. The skin just above the joint was much more sensitive than he knew, and the tiny rake of her nails there was a sensation he had never imagined. Christ, she knew him down to the bone and they had hardly touched yet.
He dropped his head til his forehead rested on hers.
"I find it confusing, sex. It's complicated- there's too many variables. I don't know what to do. Either it feels important and it- it hurts, or it's just getting your rocks off, just fucking depressing, and I can't do either one. I want--” The words stopped in his throat. He rubbed her cheek again, thinking maybe she could hear them anyway. I want you so much, and I don't dare.
There was no sound but their breathing. At last Solvieg sighed and spoke, still looking at the ground beneath her feet.
"Edge, there's a lot I don't know, stuff I don't believe in. But the things that I do, are being generous to each other. In being kind. In creating joy, and not hurting each other. I don't know of any other person who could be hurt by this, do you? And we...I think we have something to give to each other. It's not mechanics. It's the person. It's you. That's what I want."
She shivered. He realized it wasn't just the cold- she was trembling, too. All her earlier brashness was gone, and she seemed very small. Her upper lip was wide with a deep divot at the center, pink with cold. He tipped her chin and kissed it, tasting the shape of it, then nudged closer.
Her mouth tightened. She released a small noise, her head relaxed backward into the cup of his hand and then all of a sudden Edge was on fire, tearing at the zipper of her coat and pushing his way underneath, gathering her close and taking handfuls of her ass to tug her tight against him. Her elbows bit into his shoulder and he braced himself to take her weight; her knee crept slowly up to lock around his hip. He dug one hand underneath, hoisting until he had all of her; her feet barely touched the ground at all. She clasped his face to take him deeper into her mouth. She was so strong, so hungry, and the want of her was making him dizzy-- Edge broke off, breathing hard, realizing that he was very near to taking her right on the street.
"Where do you live?'" he demanded.
"Right behind you."
"What?" he said, startled.
Solvieg nodded breathlessly towards a shabby brownstone across the way. "That's my house. Top floor."
He looked around, taking in the quiet street for the first time. "Did you...?"
He felt a ripple of laughter in her back. "I didn't stop us here. I was just keeping us headed in the right general direction, just in case."
He released her to the ground and kissed her with deep gratitude. "I knew there was something I liked about you,” he said. “Come on. Show me your place."
When they stepped out of the congested bar Edge was startled to discover that it was snowing. Fat thick flakes, barely frozen, floated down to stick to Solvieg's lashes, though they disappeared instantly on touching the pavement. He followed her in a random direction, all his focus tuned to the faint warmth that radiated from her body. He had noticed something unusual about her when he first laid his hand on her in the club, and he thought about it now as they walked.
Like every successful performer Edge touched a lot of people in the course of his work, doling out hugs and handshakes like notes from a bank teller. Although these were usually pure dull routine he had learned to trust certain observations. The proverbially repellent "cold fish" handshake was a signifier of something very real- of people who were compressed, who withheld themselves in some way. He doubted most of them knew it given the enthusiasm on their faces when they met his band, but it was like hugging an empty shell. There was simply nothing inside the hand. The real person must be tucked away somewhere down near the middle, he thought. Other people existed unprotected very near the surface, and you could feel it in their hands. He suspected that it was one reason that women liked Adam so much, and he knew it was part of what made his friendship so comforting; even his casual pat on the shoulder had a faintly humming, wakeful feeling which said, I know you're there. I'm here too. Edge couldn't count the number of times that he had found himself suddenly blinking, relaxed, after Adam squeezed him gently in passing. He thought that a lover would probably find it very nice indeed.
And Solvieg, it seemed, could barely be contained by her own skin. That feeling which was reassuringly warm from Adam or a prick of consciousness in a stranger's handshake, from her had the jolt of a live wire or a floodlight in the face. Even being near her without touching was like when the big amps were turned on before sound check; even when silent he could feel them there, latent and powerful. He thought it was this that must have attracted his attention to Solvieg quite as much as her ridiculous, incredible ass in those unattractive trousers. She felt, quite simply, as though she was all there. He had felt it at the sweaty small of her back when she first laid down her bow and looked at him, and he felt it now when she tripped on a bit of broken pavement and lurched against him. He put his arm out to steady her, and then pulled her off balance just to feel it again.
Solvieg put her arm around his waist and walked on, her eyes turned up to snowflakes appearing like white stars out of the blackness. She seemed to know that he needed time now, that he needed to find his way to her on his own. Her uncovered hair had a scent like green plants and musty amber resin. It felt like silk against his upper lip. Her mouth, when he reached it, tasted of sweet American whiskey. Cool on the surface, inside it was all sweetness and burn. He pulled her to face him and for a time all was silence. Her body just a hint inside her puffy mujahedin coat, her lips, that seemed to be listening to his thoughts. Her hands, slipped under his jacket and gently stroking his ribs....
It was too much, too fucking much. The adrenaline surging through his hands was terrifying. He pulled away, fighting the twin impulses to leave and to put her up against the nearest wall, trying to slow the thundering of his heart, feeling her stroke the thick leather belt at his back.
"Is everything all right?"
"It's just... it's been a long time for me. I haven't been with anyone since her. My wife." He spoke the last words with difficulty. Those were memories that he usually avoided. By the time things with Aislinn neared the end Edge had learned that sex between people who detest each other is a grim and ugly business that never wanted to experience again. His few attempts to wipe the stench of it from his skin with someone else were even worse. God, he spent most of his days doing anything other than think of these things, but right now it was uncontrollable as vomiting. He went on, telling her things he had never said to anyone.
"We were just kids when we got together, we were at secondary school and it's just what kids do, have a pretty girlfriend. But we never broke up. I was on the road with the band so young and it was just good having someone to come home to, but things were never right. Everyone knew it was a mistake to get married. Everyone except her and myself. I've... " He swallowed. "I've only been with a couple of other people. Just random things on the road. It was.... degrading. For everybody." He felt again the sick revulsion of coming home to find Aislinn exhausted, resentful, half smothered from keeping things going by herself and the baby regarding him suspiciously, he thought, from her arms. The older girls elated to see him but constantly startled by his awkward attempts to play with them, the house growing more suffocating by the moment and he crawling the walls, loathing everybody, everything, and himself most of all...
Solvieg was so still beside him. He opened his eyes.
"This is not random," she said.
It wasn't. He knew it.
She shook her head. "This is... something else, I don't know what."
"You are something else.," he said roughly. He ran his thumb over her cheek, shuddering a little when she tipped her head into the pressure. She ran her fingers though his without speaking. They stood quietly, breathing each others' air, testing the draw of their bodies like magnets. Edge knew the power of opposite poles from building magnetic amps as a kid. Inert and blackish, they appear innocuous until they come within range of each other and then they leap to life, crossing distances and even flipping over to unite face to face. He had seen the power of their longing, how a single electrically charged magnet placed next to an ordinary one inside a speaker creates sound, vibrations which can be compressed, distorted, delayed, infinitely sustained.... he made his living through the manipulation of invisible tensions.
His wandering thoughts settled in the spot where she touched the inner curve of his fingers. Of course the fingertips of his left hand had been heavily calloused for many years, but he had never realized how sensitive the lower portion of the pad had become in compensation. The skin just above the joint was much more sensitive than he knew, and the tiny rake of her nails there was a sensation he had never imagined. Christ, she knew him down to the bone and they had hardly touched yet.
He dropped his head til his forehead rested on hers.
"I find it confusing, sex. It's complicated- there's too many variables. I don't know what to do. Either it feels important and it- it hurts, or it's just getting your rocks off, just fucking depressing, and I can't do either one. I want--” The words stopped in his throat. He rubbed her cheek again, thinking maybe she could hear them anyway. I want you so much, and I don't dare.
There was no sound but their breathing. At last Solvieg sighed and spoke, still looking at the ground beneath her feet.
"Edge, there's a lot I don't know, stuff I don't believe in. But the things that I do, are being generous to each other. In being kind. In creating joy, and not hurting each other. I don't know of any other person who could be hurt by this, do you? And we...I think we have something to give to each other. It's not mechanics. It's the person. It's you. That's what I want."
She shivered. He realized it wasn't just the cold- she was trembling, too. All her earlier brashness was gone, and she seemed very small. Her upper lip was wide with a deep divot at the center, pink with cold. He tipped her chin and kissed it, tasting the shape of it, then nudged closer.
Her mouth tightened. She released a small noise, her head relaxed backward into the cup of his hand and then all of a sudden Edge was on fire, tearing at the zipper of her coat and pushing his way underneath, gathering her close and taking handfuls of her ass to tug her tight against him. Her elbows bit into his shoulder and he braced himself to take her weight; her knee crept slowly up to lock around his hip. He dug one hand underneath, hoisting until he had all of her; her feet barely touched the ground at all. She clasped his face to take him deeper into her mouth. She was so strong, so hungry, and the want of her was making him dizzy-- Edge broke off, breathing hard, realizing that he was very near to taking her right on the street.
"Where do you live?'" he demanded.
"Right behind you."
"What?" he said, startled.
Solvieg nodded breathlessly towards a shabby brownstone across the way. "That's my house. Top floor."
He looked around, taking in the quiet street for the first time. "Did you...?"
He felt a ripple of laughter in her back. "I didn't stop us here. I was just keeping us headed in the right general direction, just in case."
He released her to the ground and kissed her with deep gratitude. "I knew there was something I liked about you,” he said. “Come on. Show me your place."
