For the Love of April French Read online

  All other things aside, she considered, he was a damn aesthetic treat. She loved the way his back moved, smooth complexes of muscles gliding over the bones to get out of each other’s way when he reached up to turn on the hood fan. He was fairly fit, in the way of someone young with athletic hobbies rather than the relentless cut of the gym addict; he was firm but not hard to the touch, with a layer of cushion that made his stomach a delightful place to lay her head.

  “You’re staring,” he said. He sounded amused.

  “You’re sexy,” she replied, sticking out her tongue.

  “I wasn’t complaining. Would you like to touch yourself?”

  She shifted restlessly on the counter. “Is that an order?”

  “Does it need to be?” he asked, still not looking.

  She bit her lip. She had tied back her hair and put on a nightgown that wasn’t particularly sexy; it had squids on it. Almost thoughtfully, she reached up and palmed her breast. “Like this?”

  “I have to watch these eggs,” he said mildly.

  “Hmph.” She brushed her thumbs over her nipples and considered more of what she liked about him. Nice ass. Good ass, the kind that made her mind race on to imagine him in tight jeans, or from behind as he pumped into her... Oh...

  She slid a hand between her legs, ignoring her clit as she often did when she didn’t have a vibrator, and instead pressed her fingers into the folds of skin over her inguinal canal. Ohhhh.

  She’d felt awkward at first, her bone-deep certainty of her body’s wrongness making it difficult to imagine this as sexy, but he wasn’t watching her, and if she forgot about her body and thought about his...

  His dark skin was so smooth...but she knew from experience the tips of his fingers were slightly rough. Strong legs; powerful thighs. She fixated on the column of his neck rising from the foundation of his shoulders and the angles his shoulder blades made in the shirt.

  “Can’t you turn around?” she asked, half-joking, half-pleading. She wanted to see his face.

  “Eggs,” he repeated.

  She tried to make a sound of disappointment but let it trail into a little moan. She saw a subtle twitch then and smiled to herself.

  “I’m getting all wet,” she said breathily. “And starting to...throb.”

  “Hmm,” he said, and reached for the pepper.

  “You’re very mean!”

  “They’re ready. Plates?”

  She huffed out a breath and pointed to a cabinet. As she washed her hands, he looked around for a table but there wasn’t one, just the counter partitioning the kitchen from the room. She grabbed a couple stools. She squirmed her way through breakfast and he pretended not to notice. They were good eggs.

  Eventually: “I was thinking about orgasm control,” he said, in an offhand way which didn’t fool her whatsoever.

  “What were you thinking?”

  “What if you couldn’t come without permission?”

  She felt a hot shiver run through her. “That could be fun.” She poked the eggs around and asked the necessary question. “Your permission or just anyone’s?”

  “What would you be more comfortable with?” His voice was carefully neutral, as it had been all along, but was it wishful thinking to hear reluctance there?

  “It’s your game... You should make the rules.” Only you, she thought, provoking a sharp response from the voice of reason.

  “I’d like it to be me... I’m just not sure that’s fair. Hmm...” He took another bite. “Not just anyone. You can’t be calling up your friends and begging for them to help.” The image of that, of being reduced to that, almost made her dizzy, but he went on. “If you’re playing with someone else, I suppose it’s fair for them to have that option.”

  Shut up about fair, she begged silently. “I don’t mind,” she said. And recklessly: “I’ve always wanted to try something longer-term. Like a...” She gestured vaguely. “A project.” In that moment, it felt like a genius idea; a commitment that wasn’t one. A permanent way to keep him in her life, without asking him for anything so dangerous as his heart.

  He laughed, and there was a gleam in his eye she considered dangerous. “Fair enough. What if I thought about it and made some rules, and we can negotiate?”

  “Okay,” she said quickly.

  “Do you want to come today? Might be the last time for a bit.”

  “Yes please. Sir.” She pushed her plate away.

  “I’ll give you one minute,” he said.

  “Um, that’s not really—” That gleam came back, and she inhaled.

  She knew she couldn’t orgasm in a minute, especially not sitting on a stool, but she was pretty sure he knew that, too. It was still her last chance for the day. She was maybe half-hard from her display earlier, and she tried all her old tricks to coax that into something more before time ran out, but all she accomplished was getting her hand sticky.

  “Time’s up.” He looked at her ingenuously. “Didn’t feel like it?”

  She pursed her lips in a very fake smile. “No, Sir.”

  “Well, there’s always tomorrow.” That shiver ran through her again, a lick of fire up her spine.

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “So well behaved suddenly,” he laughed.

  They finished breakfast and did the dishes together. “I can do it,” she protested. “You’re the dom. And a guest.” But he shook his head and grabbed a dish towel.

  “That’s not the kind of obedience I want from you. And I’ll be damned if I’ll be a guest after last night.”

  “What kind of obedience do you want from me?” she said, eyes flickering to the front of his boxers. “Does it turn you on thinking about me not being allowed to come?”

  “Oh, very much,” he agreed. Still playing it cool. God, she wanted to see those fires in his eyes again.

  “Do you want me to do anything about it?”

  He shook his head. “I’ll be fine. After all, I can masturbate.”

  She squawked in frustration, to his laughter. For as long as his voice and laughter filled her studio, she could hold it together. It was only when the door closed behind him that she plummeted into despair, at the mercy of the screaming match in her head.

  The counsel for the prosecution: You miserable bitch, do you get off on suffering? This voice wanted to know what the hell she was thinking, did she ever think, why would she do that, and so on. It hauled in evidence both recent—the way he touched her, that one particular expression, dancing, sitting on his lap—and historical—the GSA meeting she’d almost attended in college then blown off, the fact that she was still in the closet to her grandmother—to make the case that she made bad decisions, that this was a bad decision, and that she should feel bad. That she should take it back.

  The counsel for the defense: Why would something good happen to you? This voice reminded her that it was only a matter of time before someone else caught his eye; that if they weren’t open now, he’d just want to open it up in six months; that soon she would be one among multiple, probably five or six other girls the way he looked and topped and fucked, and while she might just barely earn a place among those five, she would never be number one. Hell, she would never make the top three. That she had sat on his lap all night like a fucking billboard: this is one of the good ones!

  This side had evidence, too, evidence that she absolutely did not want to look at or even think about or remember existed. The closing argument was a long, detailed self-examination nude in front of the mirror, pointing out all the lingering traces of a man that would always lie between them.

  It’s not his fault. It’s not even your fault. But you’re not pretty, French. Maybe he thinks you’re pretty when you scream or when you choke on his dick, but guess what? There’re a million other girls who want to do that who don’t have to shave twice a day. You’re aiming too high.

>   Ultimately, the jury found that she couldn’t take it back even if she wanted to because he would laugh in her face, sooner or later he probably would’ve wanted her to fuck him anyway, and also, she was getting fat.

  When she got the email on Monday, informing her that Dennis worked for her company, she knew she had to tell him. It was the only ethical thing to do. Not telling him was planting a ticking time bomb at the heart of their...thing, their thing that was not a relationship.

  She had to tell him, and she had to tell him soon, because the longer she waited the more likely it was that telling him meant things were over. It would be awkward as hell, and he might end it right then, but it was the right thing to do and if she didn’t, it would just be hanging over her head all the time.

  And then she didn’t tell him. It was not a decision to never tell him. She was just...delaying it. It would be an uncomfortable conversation and it would likely torpedo the best thing she had going, or had had going in months. She still had time to do the right thing. Just. Not yet.

  Later that week she got an email with his plans for her, which filled her with equal parts desire and dread. The sexy kind of dread, mostly. He’d left her with very simple instructions not to touch herself until he got back to her, and by Wednesday—between the tension in her core and the anxiety of knowing he was in the same building—the guy in the next cube had asked her twice to stop bouncing her leg.

  Her phone pinged with a new email on her personal account, and she looked both ways before pulling it up on her monitor. She had a window cube, one of the perks of her long tenure, and the management offices were around the corner in a different area. All things considered, it was hard for anyone to sneak up on her, but a little paranoia never hurt anyone.

  1) You may only orgasm with my permission.

  a) You may ask me to transfer that permission to another dominant.

  b) You may ask for permission as much as you want, without penalty.

  2) You may beg.

  a) You will bring yourself to the brink of orgasm and stop at least once per day. (“Edging”)

  b) You will stop immediately if you go over, ruining the orgasm. (“Ruins”)

  c) You will accept all penalties assessed for ruins or unauthorized orgasms.

  3) I will check in a minimum of once a week, virtually or in-person.

  a) I am very unlikely to give permission outside of a check-in.

  I will check in with you this Saturday morning. That will be your first deadline and opportunity for an orgasm. Unfortunately, it will have to be virtual—I have to travel for work.

  Okay. She could work with this. She shivered at you may beg, but yes, she could work with this. The edging would make things much more difficult; there were times in her past she’d gone months without masturbating at all, when she was still sorting out her dosage of hormones and antidepressants, but constantly teasing herself was something else. She replied immediately.

  so fancy! i know the terminology but i appreciate how thorough you are

  i can mostly agree with this, but im not sure i can edge every day...illness, RL stress, etc...whats the rule on that?

  She had an eight-hour full-face electrology appointment coming up and she knew from experience sex would be the furthest thing from her mind for a day or three.

  The response came very quickly, and that made her feel...weird, thinking about him on a different floor in the same building. Knowing he didn’t know.

  I can be reasonable. 7 edges a week, not necessarily once a day. If an issue goes on longer than a week we can discuss it in our check-ins. And safewords are always an option, of course.

  Do you always type like that? Or is it just for me?

  She snorted.

  No, I don’t always type like that. I actually have to fight the autocorrect to do it. But my earliest kink experiences were on IRC and other chatrooms, and that environment teaches you how to send subtle cues through your formatting and typing style. If you use capital letters people think you’re a Dom.

  It doesn’t cause me problems unless I’m being a pervert and playing at work. Code switching is hard. >_<

  I can live with 7 edges a week.

  The next email took a little longer.

  Ah, I see. That *would* be awkward. (Someone mistaking you for a dom. You typing like a needy sub at work is funny to me, I’m afraid...not that I want you to get in trouble.)

  I wanted to make an addendum to our agreement:

  b) I will allow you to renegotiate the terms of the agreement during check-ins.

  c) Since these renegotiations will be sexualized and in a power exchange environment, you can of course always use your safeword to request a non-coercive renegotiation at any time.

  How does that sound?

  Fucking hot, is how it sounded. sounds great Sir, thank You, she typed, throwing in a little extra capitalization courtesy of IRC etiquette. She bet he’d get a kick out of it.

  Good. If you can, I’d like you to edge right now to seal our agreement. I know you’re at work...

  She froze, then typed furiously.

  Like in a public restroom? Like me, a trans woman, masturbating in the women’s public restroom in the building where I work?

  Almost instantly:

  Shit. Never mind.

  She exhaled and closed her browser. The whiplash of feelings was making her feel queasy and—now her phone was ringing. She grabbed it and headed for the door, not answering until she had stepped out into the hall. “Hey.”

  She heard a door close over the line. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t think.”

  “It’s okay,” she said, trying to keep her voice neutral.

  “It isn’t, is it?”

  “No, it really is.” Calm. Calm. Calm. This is a perfectly normal boundary. This doesn’t have to be a trans thing.

  She heard his sigh. “I’m sorry. I’ve got a lot to learn. That was a really foolish thing to say.”

  She suddenly felt like she weighed a hundred tons. She wished she could sink through the floor. “You shouldn’t have to do research to—” She bit off date and replaced it with, “talk to me.”

  “And you shouldn’t have to educate me,” he said. “I’ll do better.”

  “I could get arrested,” someone said, and she realized it was her. “Like if a cis girl did that and she got caught it’d be embarrassing but I’d go to jail. I’d be on Reddit. I’d be the example TERFs bring up for the next hundred years.” Her voice was coming out quick and angry and she barely recognized it as herself.

  “I’m sorry,” he said again. “I’m sorry I said it. I’m sorry the world is like this. I’m sorry I don’t know what a turf is in this context. I’m sorry.”

  This is another reason it’s good you’re not serious about him, said her most hateful inner voice. “I... I have to go back to work.”

  “I know. I—” A pause. “I’ll talk to you later.”

  “Yeah.” She hung up and stared at the wall for a long moment before heading straight to the elevator. She punched the button for the fourth floor.

  Asshole! You’re such an asshole, he’s been so careful mostly, he’s always checking in on you, why are you such a bitch, you should’ve just done it, you should’ve lied, you should’ve just gone to the unisex bathroom upstairs, you pathetic self-destructive hateful bitch.

  She needed to make this right...and now, first, she had to tell him they worked in the same company. Why had she waited? Fuck!

  She knew her appeal lay in being easy, undemanding, accommodating. Uncomplicated—or at least, in discreetly keeping her complications to herself. Now she was going to blow all that up, and if she’d told him sooner, at least she could have staggered it out. Maybe then she would’ve had at least a hope of keeping him.

  On the fourth floor, her badge worked to get into the tech staff a
rea, but she realized she had no idea where the CTO’s office was. This space was smaller than the tenth floor, which was completely rented out by her company, but she still couldn’t exactly go door-to-door through the offices. She froze in the doorway like a deer in headlights.

  “April! Hey! What are you doing here?”

  She flinched, then realized, Fatima. It was Fatima. “Did you want to go to lunch today? You usually message first.”

  “Yyyyes,” she said slowly. “Let’s go to lunch.” That was the moment when she truly decided she wasn’t going to tell him. She realized now she had obviously already been considering it; it had been three days and she was still sitting on it. Now she committed. It was like lighting a very long fuse, and like all truly self-destructive acts, she found a purity and an inevitability to it that felt peaceful.

  Someday he’d find out, and this would all be over. She didn’t see how their fragile arrangement could survive it all. She couldn’t change that.

  But it didn’t have to end today.

  “You don’t have your purse,” Fatima pointed out.

  “Oh. Shit.”

  “I’ll ride up with you. So, what’s going on?”

  She blew out a breath as the elevator climbed back up. Of course Fatima could see through her to the storm raging in her skull. She wished she could talk to Fatima about this, but that was a nonstarter. Not only would it mean revealing what kind of freaky stuff she was into, but Fatima probably worked fifteen feet away from Dennis’s office. She pivoted to something else that was worrying her, that would pass for the reason she was off-balance.

  “John says he wants to promote me this year. He already discussed it with Mr. Graham.”

  “Well, that makes sense. You’ve been in your role a couple years now. It’s good.” Fatima studied her face. “Isn’t it?”

  She looked around the tenth floor, eyes peeled for co-workers. “Let’s talk about it at lunch.”

  She’d been on this team since she moved across the country; the switch from consulting to operations required it, and she’d been happy to get out of New Haven. She liked what she did, mostly. As a consultant, she’d worked with Medicaid health care providers to help them take advantage of federal opportunities for funding. Now she did the operational work involved in submitting those cost reports.