Fire Flies Read online

  It was a random Wednesday and the park was pretty quiet. I work shifts and his schedule was mostly weekends so our schedules were blending nicely. We rented bikes and rode some of the park trails, challenging each other, crashing through some underbrush and scaring a raccoon family… and Darren. The look on his face was priceless when this raccoon mamma got on her hind legs and yelled at him. I laughed so hard I cried. He got a little upset with me for that, but I apologized and he saw the funny side. Darren spotted a Bald Eagle flying over by the river and signaled for me to be quiet, then took my hand. I dropped my bike beside his on the side of the trail and let him lead me to a little grassy nook on the side of the river just off the trail. The eagle was on the opposite bank. He saw us and ignored us; we were no threat. The eagle had caught himself some lunch. We couldn’t see what he had but he was tearing chunks off it. Darren sat close to me on the grass, still holding my hand, his arm against my arm and we watched the eagle for a while. I laid back in the grass looking at the sky. There weren’t any clouds to speak of, just vapor trails from passing airplanes. I had never flirted like this before. Darren lay beside me for a while, then trying to be casual, leaned up on his elbow to look down at me.

  “I think I like Florida,” he said. He leaned in and kissed me gently.

  “Hmmm. I think I like Seattle,” I flirted back. I watched my reflection in his sunglasses as he came closer. We made out for a while, laying back in the grass until it started getting too hot…in more ways than one.

  I jumped up and yelled “Race ya!” and ran for my bike. Back on the trail, we raced back to the parking lot. By the time we got there we were scratched up and dirty but not done yet. We rented kayaks and paddled the Loxahatchee River for a couple of hours, splashing each other a little bit to cool down and wash off some of the dirt. We were taking an easy paddle, just meandering through the channels off the river, when we saw a couple of gators sunning on the bank. It was the first time Darren had seen gators in the wild.

  “You’ll get used to seeing them,” I told him. “They’re opportunist hunters but usually not aggressive towards people”. He still looked a little intimidated so I decided to play with that just a bit. “Then again, last year there was a story about an attack in Orlando. You remember that right?” I didn’t give him a chance to reply. “When the little toddler was taken by a gator? They go after little dogs or even kids sometimes if they have a chance.”

  Darren looked suitably horrified.

  “Think about it, vacationers think the whole state is Disney and magical and nothing bad can happen. They don’t educate themselves about the wildlife. Rattlesnakes, gators, black widow spiders and scorpions all live here.”

  “Wow, maybe I don’t like Florida so much after all. I had no idea you could die that many ways. We don’t have all that back in Seattle.”

  “See what you’ve been missing City Slicker! Don’t worry, I know how to save you.” I laughed.

  “Save me? How about protect me so it doesn’t happen in the first place?”

  “Naw, I am much more of the rescue type. Where’s the fun in prevention? That would make me obsolete, wouldn’t it? What would you need me for?”

  “Oh, I can think of a lot of things you might be useful for…” His lips turned up slowly into a smile. “Like making me dinner and bringing me a beer!”

  “Next gator we see I am tipping your canoe buddy!” I laughed and splashed him with my paddle. “No, I promise I will behave, I was kidding… honest!” He paddled over and awkwardly leaned in for a kiss almost tipping both of us. “Miami Fire have an excellent serpentarium and anti-venom lab. We should go sometime. It’s really cool, I took a class with them last year,” I said.

  “Uh no, nope and never! You are on your own for that adventure little lady. No way am I going near any venomous snakes.” He faked a shiver. “I’ll just have to trust you to save me if I get bit.”

  On the drive back to Boynton, we were both sweaty and filthy. Tired but wired with this current running through us. It would be the first time I made a choice to have sex and not just go through with it through a sense of duty. Everything was going according to script, our relationship was like a romantic comedy and I couldn’t imagine that our first time would be less than perfect. It would be romantic and beautiful. Darren was special and I liked him a lot. He didn’t pry into my past or talk too much about his. He treated me like a lady and respected me. There would be music and candles and we would just fit together like two pieces of one that were always meant to be. Maybe we would cry just a little afterward when we lay in bed draped over each other.

  I was falling in love.

  The tension in the car was fierce. We got back to his place and decided I would take a shower first since ‘women always take so long getting ready’. His apartment was neat and spotless. Quite a contrast to the guys at the station who could be such slobs. The bathroom was huge, clean, and functional but bland. I’m not usually the snoopy type but I was curious. His medicine cabinet was just the usual stuff, Aleve, Aspirin, tweezers, Zicam, band-aids and nail clippers. No prescription medications. In the cabinet under the sink, there was bleach, razor blades, extra toilet paper, sunscreen and cleaning supplies. His razor and toothbrush were beside the faucet. The soap dish and toothbrush holder were silver, plain, simple.

  I showered quickly. I always do. In my house growing up, it was a good idea to keep myself covered whenever possible, especially if my brother Sam was around.

  I had brought a cute little summer dress to wear. It was a bright sunset orange color that could work for you if you had a good tan. It had little spaghetti straps and was high at the neckline, the back was completely open with a loosely draped look. It was shorter than I usually wear, but when you are as short as I am you have to do what you can to make your legs look longer.

  My greatest weakness is shoes. Fancy, frivolous, completely impractical shoes! I had a fabulous pair of Christian Louboutin heels that I had never worn out. They were soft black leather with pointy toes, a red sole and a silver tip on the end of the 3-inch heel. I got dressed and applied just a little eyeliner, eyeshadow and mascara. I was in the guest bedroom which was empty of furniture, but Darren had brought in his full-length mirror from his bedroom for me to use while he showered. I had my long dangle earrings; they were just a few simple strands of silver with a little sparkle running through them. I finished working the pomade into my hair and was just putting on my lip gloss when I heard Darren get out of the shower. So much for women taking so long to get ready.

  I sauntered into the living room, pretending to finish putting in an earring just as he came out of the bathroom. His mouth dropped open and he just stood there staring at me. I went all coy. “What? What? You hate the dress? Too much?”

  He was wet from the shower and wearing a towel wrapped around his waist. I was staring a little myself. After a minute he smiled a wicked sideways smile. “Well don’t just stand there go get dressed! I am starving.”

  I gently pushed him toward his bedroom. His skin was hot from the shower with just a touch of sunburn on his shoulders from our day at the park. He was starting to get a nice tan now that he had been here for a month. Not too much sun in Seattle. His back and shoulders were nicely toned and I could feel the muscles of his back as I urged him towards the bedroom.

  I plopped myself down on the new sofa and pulled out my cell phone from my little black clutch purse and took a quick pic of the incredible view from the floor-to-ceiling window in his living room. He had sheer drapes with chrome accents diffusing the light just enough and still maintaining a masculine feel.

  He took me to Prime Catch for dinner, a seafood restaurant on the Intracoastal Waterway in Boynton Beach. We got a table right on the water under a canopy that offered welcome shade. We were lucky there was a little breeze off the water, which made it just right. They had glass fishbowls on the tables with tiny fish in them. The fish had
an electric blue stripe on them. I don’t know anything about fish, but they were adorable. There was a light under the bowl that lit it up as it got darker, the little fish casting moving shadows across the table linen. Prime Catch has a great wine selection, so Darren had a couple of glasses of Castle Rock Pinot Noir to wash down his prime rib. I went with the Scottish salmon and we both made really bad attempts at Scottish accents. Since the only one I could think of was Mrs. Doubtfire I tried not to laugh as I told him, “Eat up laddie! That’ll put hair on yer chest!” My attempt at Scottish was so bad Darren struggled, and failed, to hold in the sip of wine he had just taken. He spat some out as he laughed. He tried to grab his napkin but some wine made it on to the hem of his white linen shirt. I asked the waiter for club soda and, using my napkin, dabbed some on the wine stain. When I looked up he was watching me intently.

  “I thank you, Lassie,” he said. He was obviously trying to be serious and sexy, but the accent was so bad we were both roaring in laughter again. By the time we made it to dessert, we had laughed ourselves out. We smiled at each other and held hands under the table.

  I was choking down a yawn around 9 pm. I had never felt so relaxed with a man. Darren took care of the check and ushered me to the car, holding the door open for me. Again I was perplexed at the extravagant BMW that he drives, given his job. I wasn’t used to being treated like a lady. Keith was the only man I ever knew who had that kind of chivalry and respect but I was so young and so scared that I didn’t notice it much at the time. It was only experiencing this again with Darren that I gave a thought to how kind my foster dad had really been.

  In the car on the way back to his place, the atmosphere was charged. He reached for my hand blindly while keeping his eyes on the road and accidentally touched my thigh. I put my hand over his and guided his fingers to the inside of my thigh for just a second or two, smiling to myself as I heard his breath catch. Then I entwined our fingers and moved our hands to rest on the center console. He rubbed his thumb back and forth along the back of my hand. I was wide awake again and the anticipation was palpable.

  I have quite the imagination, especially sexually. I would never, ever act on the images in my head, but it gets me aroused thinking about all kinds of crazy stuff. Sometimes I watch porn when I’m alone. I imagined Darren stripping me naked in the middle of the produce section of the grocery store and taking his time choosing fruit and veg to use on me. I had seen that in a porn film once. I must have been biting my lip because he looked over right then.

  “Oh my God, Kris you look scared, please don’t be scared.”

  He was so serious and tender, I laughed. I turned off the radio. Then I told him what I was thinking. He let out the tiniest little groan. I smiled to myself.

  We stumbled in the door of the apartment, reaching for clothes and dropping things along the way. It was romantic, but starting to move too fast. I wanted slow and seductive, soft and sweet, not reckless desperate heat. I tried to push him away to slow down.

  I said, “Stop.” I know I said it, but there was no stopping him. By this time we were both in our underwear. We were at the end of his king-sized bed. I wanted this, but I was starting to freak out. He pushed me onto the bed.

  That’s when he said, “You like it a bit rough don’t you.”

  I closed my eyes to stop the tears. This wasn’t going to be my magical moment. I should never have told him the fantasy. It was my fault. It was always my fault. I was so tired of it being my fault.

  As he leaned over me, he pushed my legs apart and roughly entered me. I tried to sit up and in doing so leaned forward. I guess he thought I was trying to make him go deeper. He groaned and thrust all the way in. I yelped a little bit, which he took as further encouragement. He lifted my legs up around his waist. His eyes were closed. He wasn’t seeing me; he was lost to me.

  It wasn’t romantic and tender, not the slow soft seduction I had imagined. I thought if I could just sit up with my legs wrapped around his waist, I might be able to reach my shoe. I did. I slipped it off and held in my hand…like a club.

  “I DON’T LIKE IT ROUGH! I NEVER LIKED ANYTHING ROUGH’ I screamed in my head as I brought my treasured shoe to bear on his head. Just before the heel connected with his skull, he saw it coming and moved sideways. The heel hit him in the neck instead.

  He dropped like a stone.

  I thought he was dead. I rolled him onto his back. His eyes were huge and staring at me. He was breathing on his own, but it was shallow. I knelt beside him, then scooted backwards away from his accusing eyes until my bare butt hit the wall where he couldn’t see me.

  How could it have gone so wrong so quickly? I didn’t mean to hurt him, I just wanted him to stop. I asked him to stop, I tried to push him off. What was I supposed to do? Shit! I still had the shoe in my hand. I dropped it like it was a rattlesnake.

  I slowly moved back across the carpet back towards him. He turned his eyes toward me without moving his head. His eyes were filled with tears.

  He whispered, “Kris, what happened? I can’t move. You need to call 911”.

  He could only speak in short sentences because his breathing was so shallow. I couldn’t call 911. Was he crazy? I could see the headlines: ‘Local Firefighter clubs boyfriend with designer shoe.’ I would lose my job. I could go to jail. I couldn’t let that happen, I couldn’t go to jail.

  I told him I could handle this, that it would be ok. Suddenly I was ashamed of my nakedness and I rummaged through his dresser to find a t shirt. I went into the living room and paced in front of those lovely windows. Then I freaked, what if someone saw me at the window. I needed to calm down and think. I handled stuff like this every day for a living. I could take care of him. I had to take care of him.

  When I had calmed a little I went back into the bedroom. Darren was just the way I had left him. I started asking questions. I told him I needed to know where his ironing board was and if he had duct tape or painters tape. I talked him through my plan and explained what I was doing just like I would with any other patient. I went to work, improvising as necessary. I got multiple pairs of socks and stuffed some in one sock, then repeated this with another sock. I put these on either side of his head, covering his ears, and used painters tape to secure his head in place on the ironing board. I stuffed more socks into the gap until I was sure his head wouldn’t move easily.

  Neck stabilized. Sort of.

  I did my head-to-toe patient assessment. As I palpated his neck I realized it was fractured at C5, the fifth cervical bone in the spine. A spinal cord injury at just that point could cause priapism. A huge boner! I looked down, yep. He definitely had priapism. Now that I wasn’t freaking out so much, I realized his predicament. Just a little while ago I was at his mercy. I started to giggle, then laugh. I could have sex with him and I would be the one in control. Maybe I could have my magical moment after all. I could make it like the movies. Take two!

  I set about making the room as romantic as possible. I draped a pale blue summer cotton shirt over the lamp because of course, he didn’t have candles. That was a huge disappointment. I really thought he would have had candles. I put my iPhone on speaker and chose a classical piano playlist. I took my time with him and enjoyed every inch of him.

  I was taken by surprise when it happened. My first orgasm. What a rush! Now I understood what all the hype was about. For ten seconds I had zero thoughts in my head. I was totally and completely focused on the electrical charge that was coursing through me, waves of it leaving me breathless. Darren didn’t come, but I would take care of him better next time. This time was all about me. Maybe for the first time in my life, it was all about me. If he had just slowed down when I told him to. If he had played his part it would have been fine.

  He should have bought fucking candles.

  I was 28 when I moved to South Florida from Seattle. I was never afraid of hard work, although my Dad would disagree. My da
d and my uncle grew a coffee company from nothing to a strong competitor in the home of Starbucks…blah blah blah… I had been hearing his story my whole life although I didn’t see much of him. He was always busy working so it was Mom who raised me and my sister. Mom did spoil us a bit, but only to make up for him being MIA. So I wasn’t kidding when I told Kris I wasn’t really a caffeine fan. I just wasn’t being 100 percent honest with her.

  I was a bit of a rebel. And I was spoiled. Mom gave in to me every time. She always defended me when I got in trouble. Nothing really bad. Pot smoking, bar fights, the usual stuff boys do. I don’t have many memories of my dad when I was a kid. He worked his ass off building the business while Mom worked her ass off raising two kids.

  My sister Loren was always so obedient; the perfect daughter. Good grades in school, never in trouble, always dated the jocks. Fell right into line and graduated college and stepped right into her place in the business. They expected me to do the same. College, for me, was a blast, I partied my way through it. I truly think my degree was bought because I certainly didn’t do enough to earn it. When I finally got out of college I wanted to explore the world. I worked for the company for two years but I hated every minute of it, wearing a suit every day, barely enduring stupid board meetings. The salary was nice. I bought my BMW within a few months of starting. I would take off at lunch time and go surfing or meet up with the boys for day drinking.