Carried Away

Photo by cottonbro on Pexels

Zara hates mornings. All the same, she figures she should be grateful for them. It’s impossible to know what you love if you don’t know what you hate.

And, Zara loves the night. That’s when time trickles onward into lurid numerals, and the city comes alive with luminous panes and pleasures which echo the stars. Then, Zara stills and basks in the silhouette of her lamplights. There’s something about the hallowed glow they cast. It reminds her of a theatre. It drew her in long before she majored in film studies. Long before she fast tracked her degrees. Zara believes life is like a movie. Hers is a dismal reel. Impossible to live in the moment because it unravels tomorrow by replaying yesterday’s mistakes.

She works hard.

She is independent.

She shines because her mind is alight with prospects in the dark.

This morning, Zara is here to strike gold. Fool’s gold. She finds herself deluged with the waves of her heart. They fail to subside against the quarry of her fantasies.

She needs the real thing.

Well, something real.

Something hot.

And, Zara needs something hot to counter her frigid precision.

Viktor is definitely hot. Tall. Rugged. Svelte cheekbones that carve down towards a hard jaw. A resolute specimen with lustrous, midnight tresses and muscles which pleat his shirt. True to the fulsome shots on his dating profile, dimples take shape when his lips curl.

Zara thinks he looks better IRL. She wets her lips, muses upon what nerves rustle beneath his skin. “Viktor?”

He nods. “Zara?”

“Yes.” The steel of her posture betrays a nondescript workaholic despite her floral skinnies and grunge boots.

Viktor smirks. “You look pretty like your pictures. That’s always nice to see.”

“Thanks,” Zara recovers. She hikes off her aviators, nibbles at their temples as she fingers the bridge. “So do you.”

“I try,” Viktor shrugs.

Not surprising, Zara thinks. He told her that he spent the last six months training for a Boston qualifier. Decided to focus on running because it was cheapest, he said. Oversees is where he does triathlons.

That’s his idea of a vacation.

That’s what set him apart from all the others.

Zara matched with several handsome profiles, but Viktor was the one who stood out. He imparted gems of wisdom when they made small talk. Like how he believed running parallels life, forces us to realize that each and every thing begins and ends with a single step. We take steps when they come, not as we want or expect. No matter how endless anything seems, our lives are the longest things we’ll ever know.

The longest track.

If you can start, there’s a good chance you can finish.

Zara agrees.

Which is why she resolves to see this through.

If you focus on how long the track is, you’d never start.

Zara knows her track. Her mind goes blank, but she pushes on until a detour peeks through what chalk edges the margins.

No end in sight.

No strings attached.

Viktor leans in to stroke the wavy, glossy mane that spills just past her shoulders. He curls tresses behind her ear and admires the black pearls that twinkle. Zara slides her aviators back on. “It’s nice to finally meet in person.”

Nodding, Viktor eyes his reflection in her shades. Zara recalls their DMs and his tokens of interest: the unassuming albeit handsome selfies and the faceless, shirtless ones; then the candid shots of his cock in his fist.

As Viktor leads Zara through his house, she feels the rooms close down to nothing. She registers his bedroom. Along the back wall is a mural of race tags furrowed by the years. Beyond that, the place is sparsely furnished. Just a rustic bed with an embroidered coverlet beside a mauve lamp and nightstand.

“I can make you lunch,” Viktor offers. “Or, I can take you some place for lunch.”

“No, I’m good.”

“So, you’ve done this before,” he nods. “I have to admit, I didn’t believe when you told me…”

“Why would I lie?” Zara looks down. “There’s no shame in — ”

“People who are ashamed run away,” he counters. “And, they keep their heads down.”

Zara snickers. “Is that why you run?”

“I’m not running from something.”

“Neither am I.”

Viktor retrieves a chair from the hall, unfolds it, and inclines her to sit. “Do you do this often?”

“What?” Zara tautens on the edge of the seat.

“Meet people online,” he clears. “Most people prefer meeting in other ways, like at a bar.”

“I guess I’m not like most people.”

His gunmetal eyes are like magnets drawing her in. “Well, it’s good to be different.”

But Zara is too different. She lives in movies. She has yet to live in herself.

Or in the moment.

Zara enacts a script of life rather than the truth of one. Each day, she sets her intentions and plays a role.

The student.

The research assistant.

The playwright.

The ally.

The voice of reason.

Never the lover.

Never lovesick.

Never one for romance and its entrapments.

Except there is a tension between her legs she must relieve. For Zara, this relief takes on a role of its own. Hardly practical or dignified, but rehearsed nonetheless.

Today, Zara will make Viktor a star. His eyes steal into hers as if they can see her every desire and promise to quench them. She returns the look, hungry for what comes next. He clasps at whatever is within his reach, to smooth things away or apart. She reaches out to do likewise.

Until their clothes lay discarded in a heap.

Viktor asks Zara to keep on her boots. He makes her toes curl when she obliges, easing her thighs apart until she flattens her soles. He palms the undersides of her legs, poising her sex as if it is a cup to drink from. Her sex crescents with heat when his tongue wets the lips. He kneels to take long musky draughts.

Zara stiffens when a finger joins his tongue. She thrusts to meet them both, the swathe of her folds augments his undulations. Some licks later, Viktor guides her to the bed and plies her body until it is in accord with his: breast to chest, belly to belly, clitoris to crown. Until their bodies melt into fingers and tongues, mouths and senses. They seek out one another, languid but restless.

As Zara throws her leg over Viktor’s shoulder, yielding to the hard tongue that flicks miles a minute, she decides to return the favour. Sure enough, she gets her chance when Viktor twitches by her face. She takes him into her mouth. Groaning, he combs his fingers through her hair as she suckles his shaft, lets it coast along the insides of her cheeks. When he reclines, she releases the length to caress the balls. She laves at the base.

Viktor quakes when her tongue strays lower. He reels, then lays back, and urges her to straddle his face. Zara enjoys the warmth of his hands as they shape her rear. As he delves a finger into the tight aperture, another abrade her vulva. The two digits suffuse together as Zara moves into their rhythm. She encloses them, rising and sinking. Viktor feels blithe, pleasurable throbs — once, twice — then stills until her pulse steadies. They withdraw steer her off, lay her down, edge up her legs to her navel. They find their way to her breasts, linger over the peaks as they lick the undersides.

Zara shrinks away, worlds away, dreaming of a timeless film reel. A man and a woman soar, free from the pride that saddles them to high horses as they become one flesh and plunge into libidinous depths. The bodies melt into confused contours. Fire begins to take form as one climbs over the other. The man’s torso falls and emerges as the woman encircles him. The woman licks at the man as if she aspires to devour him. The picture shifts to a turgid cock that impales roseate intimates. The woman is on all fours, staring ahead as she recedes to the thrusts.

Viktor knows this isn’t a movie. He also knows that Zara doesn’t. That’s what drew him to her in the first place. Every girl is an actress. They know and make good use of the best angles. They freshen their makeup as much as their drinks. Zara is different, but she’s no exception. For her, life isn’t an act. It’s a place. Life is a movie in which she resides.

Viktor resolves to expose what lays behind the curtain. He traces every part of her with his tongue, his fingers, and his sex. The latter surely eddies her nerves. Waves of pleasure slacken her, unravel her, to the final frame.

Fast.

Then, faster.

The penis goes into her mouth. It shakes with each kiss. Viktor palms her cheek and reaches over her. He enflames the folds of her sex, spreads them between his thumb and index to peer into their sanguine treasures.

“You’re so fucking good, Zara.”

You’re a star, Zara.

That’s all it takes. Viktor splinters her composure until it shatters and pilfers the ruins. He exposes another side of Zara: the side concealed by the mask of a humourless intellect.

The side that steals past her lips, then every pore in bites and proves too great to swallow.

Viktor caught sight of it. On her profile, in her avatar with that impish smirk. He recalls how she wore a printed T with grey leggings and those same grunge boots.

He tears himself from her side and lays back. His eyes close. He resigns sight for sound. Nothing is heard except suckling and deep, harsh breaths.

The sounds of the penis as it swims within.

And against.

Zara lives to enclose the shaft in her mouth, in her hands, in her breasts.

In her.

In the end, the two of them are as they began. Viktor kneels before Zara. He licks at her sex, plying therein, until it floods around his fingers. Her toes are curling in her boots. When he stands, she draws him into her mouth one last time. She swallows his climax: gulp by gulp, spasm by spasm. Still, some spills over. Her mouth burns even as her tongue teases its corners.

Zara blinks as Viktor retrieves, then hands her a towel. “We should do this again.”

“Should we?”

“I think so.”

“It’s always great the first time,” she shakes her head. “After that, things go wrong.”

“There’s no right or wrong,” Viktor muses. “There’s just choices and consequences.”

Zara stands. “Well, I’m not big on either of those.”

“Which is why you’re online?”

“Pretty much.”

“Now, you’re offline…”

“I’ve still got my profile up.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Viktor strokes her chin. “I like this Zara.”

Offline. Offscreen.

Zara warms as his eyes glitter with pleasure. They shine like studio lights. She feels the tips of her breasts harden and her sex pool. She is overtaken by the compulsion to take each in her hands, offer them, tease them to preface their ovation.

Zara is a star. She strives to efface the actress in her dreams, to outshine her.