Free Sundry Days by Donna Callea Page B

After we eat, she lies down and puts her head on my thigh. I lean back on one elbow, and stroke her short red-brown hair. It’s shorter than mine, and dust and sweat make it seem more brown than red tonight.  We’ve been riding all day. She’s tired. Her face is streaked with dirt, but it’s a beautiful face. The most beautiful I’ve ever seen, sunburned nose and freckles included. I want her. I don’t care about her period, or about blood, or mess, or how dirty we both are. Thinking about that isn’t stopping me from thinking about being naked with her.  I want to touch her all over. I want to put my hard, stupid, throbbing penis where it wants to go.
    She turns her head toward the part of me that’s totally beyond my control, and she notices.  How can she not?
    “Oh, David. My poor David. You want to have sex with me now, don’t you? You can’t help it.”
    “I can help it. We’ll have sex like you said, when your period is over and we get cleaned up.”
    “Does it hurt, being so big and stiff like that?”
    “It’s okay, Rebekah. Let’s not talk about it.”
    “I’ve never seen a penis. Well, I’ve seen little Ethan’s when I’ve changed him. Can I touch you there?”
    “Holy Designer, Rebekah, you’re going to kill me. If you touch me, I’ll spurt out all over you, and it’ll be a lot worse and more embarrassing than your period. I can tell you that.”
    “I’m sorry, David. I should know better. I’ve had instructions on penises in pre-marital counseling. I know how they work. But knowing and being with you now are two different things.”
    She sits up. I lie back, and turn my head away.
    “David,” she says, “pull off your pants.”
    “No. Are you crazy? This is hard enough, no pun intended.”
    “Yeah,” she says. “I can tell.”
    There’s nothing funny about our situation.  But we look at each other, and we can’t help it. We start laughing.”
    “Pull off your pants,” she says when the laughter subsides. And this time I do.
    “Your shirt, too.”
    I comply.
    “Look at you,” she says.  And she just stares at me for a while.
    Then she pulls off her shirt and unwraps the scarf she’s got tied around her breasts. But she leaves on her pants.
    I look up at that always hidden part of her, and I want, more than anything, to lose myself inside of this girl—this woman—who is my Rebekah.  That’s not going to happen. Not now. I know that, and I try, without success, to get the message from my brain to my penis. Rebekah doesn’t understand that she’s torturing me. It’s not her fault.
    I try to focus on the deep red marks where the edges of the scarf had flattened her. They look almost like scars running across the fullest part of her.  But all I see is how beautiful she is. More beautiful than I can bear.
    I can’t swallow. I can’t do anything but lie there, staring up at her, as she sits on her haunches, naked from the waist up, staring down at me.
    She begins to trace my shoulders and my collarbone lightly with her fingertips, then my chest, and down to my hip bones—but not my penis.
    “What if you touch me, just my breasts,” she says softly and seriously, “and I’ll touch your penis. Maybe that can be enough for now.”
    Without waiting for an answer, she takes one of my hands and puts it over her breast. I feel the softness of it. I touch the hard, dark little bud that’s her nipple.  And I think I’ll die if I don’t have her. 
    But before I can die, she leans into me, and we kiss—a deep, tender kiss—while she puts one of her hands over my penis.
    Now I’m going to explode.
    But not yet.  Please, not yet.
    Rebekah lies next to me on the tarp, and we writhe around with our hands on each other and our mouths joined.
    Then she rolls on top of me, squirms down a bit, and now her lips are on my neck. It’s as if she has me pinned down, except that she’s small compared to me. I could push her off in an instant, if I could move.
    She holds my