October 21, 2009
Fiction
Waiting for a Train
I was in a train station way out in nowhere. It was a flat place with some mountains cloudy in the distance. Trains went by once a day each way. The station was so small that the same man sold tickets and candy. I had a ticket already and two heavy pieces of luggage and a long wait before my train.
Now in Boston you can see everyone you know in the space of a week, even if they aren’t supposed to be in the country, and not be surprised. This was not Boston. I didn’t expect to see another soul on the platform.
Least of all a once-lover. I don’t think he was expecting to see me either. I didn’t ask why he was there, just gaped open-mouthed at his familiar lean form, the long ragged hair with the blue streak. He had told me he never dreamed, and when we broke up I had nightmares about the things he said he feared the most.
The first time we fucked was the night of a rainy day. I don’t remember that as well as what we did in the empty house while waiting for the oil delivery. There was no furniture but a bean bag and some boxes of peoples’ books just carried up the stairs and left there. Rain had soaked into both our leather jackets. We embraced, then kissed and bit, he leaning way down to reach my mouth. Nervous, because of what we planned to share later. He tasted sweet, intoxicating. On his knees he could kiss my breasts. I braced my legs wide and my back against the wall. He stood then, grinding his knee up against my clit under the obstruction of my jeans until I dripped and then began to shake, sinking my teeth down into his shoulder through the leather. My bones turned to rain when I came. His thin arms, all muscle, held me hard against the wall until I could stand again. Then he stepped back, gave me one silly grin, and collapsed on the beanbag chair. We laughed until the oil truck arrived.
We were older now.
Even before the shock of recognition wore off, I knew what to say.
“I was good and I did what you wanted. I didn’t call you. I didn’t send mail. I didn’t try to find you. I knew if I tried to find you, you’d never come back.”
He held out his hand. We left our luggage on the platform and found a grassy spot behind the station. I was painfully conscious of how much more I knew than the last time I’d had him, and how little it was going to matter. He took me on my back, wrapping a hand tight around my mouth, letting me chew on the flesh. I absorbed his heat into me. He made no sound when he came. He never did. I couldn’t even tell.
Eventually I had to roll over sticky and half-undressed and grass stained and listen to his train pull out, steel wheels shrieking on steel rails.
I could do it again. I wouldn’t try to find him, and he’d return.
• • •
’s tarot cards told her she would never have a normal life. So far they have been one hundred percent correct. Circlet Press published her chapbook, Mate: and more stories from the erotic edge of SF/Fantasy in 1992. Mate is now available as an e-book from Circlet Press. Her novella, “The Memorial Garden,” is available from Torquere Books (http://www.torquerebooks.com), and her kinky fantasy novel Wishbone is forthcoming from the same. Visit her web site at http://laurenpburka.circlet.com to catch up with her latest projects.
