Asking For Trouble Read online

  ‘That’s the one. And when there’s no one there, it’s just litter on the step. Say, an empty binbag plastered into the corner, newspapers that’ve been slept in or on or whatever they do with newspapers. There’s a couple of crushed beer cans, maybe a –’

  ‘It’s horrible,’ I protested. ‘It’s squalid and dirty and –’

  ‘I know,’ he replied. ‘But that’s where I’d fuck you. I’d push you up into the doorway, force your face into the corner. I’d stand behind you and scrabble at your skirt. You struggle but I manage to lift it up and I tug and pull at your knickers, drag them down to your knees so I can see your pale little arse. I penetrate you hard and I warn you to shut up. I give you one thrust, then another and another, pausing in between so you feel every slam of my cock.

  ‘People might walk by,’ he went on, ‘but they’d ignore us. Oh, they might glance over, but they’d know that you were a worthless bit of trash. “She loves it,” they’d think. “Loves every minute of it.” Or they’d think: “She’s asking for it, the cheap little tart. She deserves a good fucking.” And you keep on struggling, trying to escape, get out of that doorway, but it just makes me fuck you harder and faster. You feel my dick banging high into your cunt and you beg for mercy. And I snarl in your ear: “Shut up, whore. You dirty little slut. You want it. You know you do.”’

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ I gasped, partly in shock, but more because my lust had soared violently and my sex was really throbbing. No one had ever spoken to me that way. ‘What else?’ I urged. ‘God, what else? Please.’

  ‘Take your knickers off.’

  ‘Yes, yes.’ I shoved them down my legs and whipped them from my ankles. ‘Off.’

  ‘How are your feet placed?’

  ‘One’s on the sofa. My knee’s flopping against the back, against the cushions. My other foot’s on the floor. My legs are wide open. My skirt’s round my waist. And now I’m pushing – Oh, Christ. My pussy’s so wet, so hot inside.’

  ‘Are you wanking?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, of course I am. I had to stop to take my knickers off, but now I am again.’

  I could hear his breath, light and fast. ‘Where are your fingers, your hands?’ he asked.

  ‘Two are inside me; my left hand – it’s thrusting. My other hand . . . I’m rocking my clit. My clit is so fleshy and hard. Are you?’

  ‘Wanking?’

  ‘Yes. Are you wanking?’

  ‘Yes. Jesus, Beth. The times we’re going to have together.’

  ‘In fantasy?’ I moaned.

  ‘Yes. And reality.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Soon.’

  ‘Oh God,’ I gasped. ‘I’m going to come. Any moment.’

  ‘Have you ever been fucked up the arse, Beth?’

  I couldn’t suppress a tiny gasp of excitement. ‘No,’ I groaned. ‘No.’

  ‘Imagine I’m there,’ he said. ‘I make you kneel on the floor. I make you bend over, your arms and tits resting on the sofa. Your knees are wide apart and I’m raising your skirt, your cute denim skirt, and folding it over your back. I’m being slow and you’re so hungry and urgent. Your arse is bared and you’re jerking it towards me, begging me to fuck you. I slide my fingers into your hot, wet slit. I’m collecting juices to lubricate your arsehole, to open you up so I can bugger you hard, really hard.’

  I made a noise of protest. ‘Why don’t you fuck me?’ I moaned. ‘Tell me how your cock feels inside me, in my cunt, not in –’

  ‘This is my fantasy,’ he whispered, his breath quickening.

  ‘OK. Yes. Go on,’ I urged. My fingers were flying over my clit and I was driving into myself, struggling to slow down because I didn’t want to come yet, not when he was mid-flow.

  ‘So you’re kneeling, bending over the sofa,’ he said. ‘My fingers are just easing out of your pussy and smearing upward, over that ridge that runs from your cunt to your arse. And now they’re rubbing at your arsehole, relaxing you, making you damp and easy there. You’re scared. You think it’ll hurt. It’s too intimate, too private. So you make a move to escape, but I catch you, twist an arm behind your back, press you hard into the sofa cushions, curse you. You can feel my knob against your anus. And now I’m breaking through. My dick’s forcing you open and I’m penetrating you. My cock’s sliding right up there, right into your virgin little arse. All your tightness is yielding, and I’m driving deeper into your dark, dark hole until –’

  ‘Oh Christ.’

  ‘Until I’m lodged. I’m right up you. The whole length of me is stuffed in your backside. I’m rock hard. It’s the deepest thing you’ve ever felt. As I pull back –’

  ‘Oh, God. I’m coming. So close.’

  ‘Yes. Think of it. Of my prick –’

  ‘Yes, it’s fucking into me. Oh.’

  ‘Into your arse, Beth. Over and over, pumping to the hilt. Your arse is so smooth. It’s slipping along my prick, really squeezing me as I thrust. You’re so hot, so snug, and you’re screaming and howling. I shove high and hard, faster and faster. You’re so stretched. God, you’re so fucking stretched, Beth. Really tight. Oh fuck.’

  ‘Yes, oh God, yes. Now. I’m . . . I’m . . . now . . . Ah. Ah. Oh, Je–’ My orgasm lashed out, full force. I panted, gasped, moaned and cried.

  ‘Oh Christ,’ he rasped. ‘You sound so fucking beautiful. Oh, fuh – aaah.’ He made a long, low groan that twisted to a noise of near-pain. Then it sank into a rumbling sigh. ‘Ah, yes,’ he said softly, his breathing shallow and faint. ‘Ah, yes.’

  I couldn’t speak.

  Sometimes when I come I feel so shocked afterwards. I feel dazed and numb, like I’ve just been assaulted, like I’ve been picked up and hurled down. I felt like that then: shocked and stunned. The fact that I’d just mutually orgasmed with a stranger down a phone line probably had something to do with it. But it was ecstasy and its aftermath that left me truly reeling.

  ‘You OK?’ he enquired in a murmur. ‘Nice?’

  I still couldn’t speak.

  ‘Beth? You still there?’

  I managed to say, ‘Mm.’

  ‘You OK?’

  ‘Mmm.’

  ‘You sure?’

  I took a deep breath and told him: ‘Words fail me.’

  He gave an appreciative half-laugh, half-snort. Then he fell silent.

  We were like that for a while, quietly recovering, ignoring phone etiquette, which demands someone make a noise.

  Eventually I said: ‘OK. I’m OK now. I’ve got my words back.’

  ‘So,’ he began, ‘you’ve never had anal sex?’

  ‘No, never.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Dunno. Just haven’t. I’m quite happy with the orifice I’ve always used, thanks.’

  ‘Do you like the idea of it?’

  ‘I . . . I don’t . . . You tell it very nicely. But –’

  ‘I can do it very nicely as well.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Let me. What I just did in fantasy, Beth, let me do it in reality. Let me fuck –’

  ‘You’re moving too fast,’ I cautioned. ‘Slow down.’

  ‘Is that no, then?’

  ‘Slow down means slow down,’ I replied. ‘Call me old-fashioned but I generally like to meet a guy before I agree to drop my knickers, let alone offer up my arse to him. My virgin little arse.’

  ‘How very principled,’ he said. ‘We should meet.’

  ‘I might not like you in the flesh.’

  ‘Hmm,’ he said, as if he were thinking it over. ‘Maybe not. Perhaps we should leave it here then. We met on an abstract plane, fantasised, and it was perfect. Finito. Nothing after that to taint the memory.’

  Was he serious? Was he trying to call my bluff? I desperately, desperately wanted to meet him, and I knew I’d like him in the flesh. I’d only said I might not just to tease him. I was simply playing, ever so slightly, hard to get. I didn’t expect him to take my words at face value and back down. I’d expected him to banter, to pe
rsuade me that he was stunningly beautiful and well worth meeting.

  ‘Maybe you’re right,’ I said, praying that I wasn’t taking too big a risk. ‘End on a high note. Finito.’

  He paused. Then he said, ‘Yeah, it’s probably best. And it’s probably best not to discuss it too much. It’ll only bring the high note down.’

  Silence. In my head, I screamed and cursed.

  ‘Well then,’ he began, in a signing-off tone. ‘I enjoyed our little chat.’

  ‘Yeah, me too,’ I said, feigning casual brightness. I struggled to think how I could rescue the situation, how I could ask for more of him without losing face. I didn’t want to appear too keen, especially when he was so infuriatingly cool. An idea came to me and I blurted it out: ‘You should send me a photo.’

  ‘A photo,’ he echoed. I heard that smile in his voice.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said hurriedly, trying to make amends for my eagerness. ‘I mean, it’s not fair if we end it here, not fair on me. You know what I look like – at least, I assume you do. I’ve only ever seen you from across the street. I can’t . . . I think of you as a faceless man. It’s not fair. That’s how I’ll have to remember everything – this, the fantasy, the things you –’

  ‘Is that how it was for you?’ he asked, still smiling. ‘In your imagination, were you buggered by a faceless man?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said.

  ‘You’re right,’ he replied. ‘It’s not fair. So you want a photo to imagine it all anew?’

  ‘I’m just curious. I’d like to know –’

  ‘OK, I’ll send you one. And if you like the look of me, we can meet. Is that a deal?’

  ‘Sure,’ I said, trying to be offhand.

  ‘There’s one condition,’ he said. ‘You’ve got to send me a photo of you.’

  ‘I haven’t got any. Not recent ones. They’re all –’

  ‘Have you got a camera?’

  ‘Yes. No. I mean, I have, but it’s fucked. The wind-on thing got jammed. It won’t –’

  ‘I’ll get one to you. A camera, I mean.’

  ‘What? Don’t be ridiculous. If you want a photo, I can just go to a booth. I’ll send you four and –

  ‘No, I don’t want passport nonsense. I want a photo you wouldn’t put on your mantelpiece. I’ll send you a Polaroid.’

  ‘Of you?’

  ‘No. I mean I’ll send you a Polaroid camera. Then you can take the picture and get it to me quickly. Deal?’

  ‘What . . . What sort of picture will you send me?’

  ‘One I wouldn’t put on my mantelpiece. Deal?’

  I hesitated before making my wary reply: ‘OK. Deal. But really, you don’t need to get me a cam–’

  ‘Bye, Beth,’ he said. ‘See you soon.’

  ‘Oh, OK,’ I breathed, shocked by his abruptness. ‘Bye.’

  Chapter Four

  FOUR DAYS LATER I got my camera. The postman brought it – and just seeing my address in Ilya’s handwriting was a thrill.

  When I find somebody interesting, for whatever reason, and I don’t know much about them, then the tiniest snippet of information becomes valuable. It was the same at school. I adored a guy in the year above me. I was nothing to him and we never spoke except once, when I seized a chance to say, ‘Oi, you – you’ve dropped your pen.’

  But I knew a hell of a lot about him: shoe size, phone number, date of birth, number of goals scored for the school team and – best of all – his timetable, off by heart. I would live for those changing-classroom moments when we’d pass in the chaos of the blue-blazered corridor.

  I had a shoebox for storing souvenirs of my fantasy-boy. On the lid I wrote his name (beautifully felt-tipped, of course) and inside I kept my diary (‘Saw him today after double Physics. He had white socks on again. He looked well gorgeous,’ etc.). I had a couple of chocolate wrappers, that I, lovesick in his wake, had scrabbled to retrieve when he’d chucked them away; I had bus tickets that added up to 21; I had a cigarette butt, although I was never really sure if his lips had touched it; and – oh – I could have had his pen if I hadn’t, in a spasm of hope, shouted after him.

  I’m supposed to be older and wiser now, but that teenage neurosis returned when I clasped my package, all wrapped in brown paper. Ilya’s handwriting was a delight – something tangible, more proof that he existed – and it added to the little I knew about him.

  I’m no graphologist and I didn’t look for clues in his writing. I was simply satisfied to see it: thin and angular, enigmatically scruffy.

  If I’d had a shoebox, I might have kept the wrapping. But, instead, I hurried upstairs to my flat and tore open the parcel. My new bulky camera came with a note. It read:

  Tease me. Make sure your photo lands on my doormat this Friday. I’ll make sure you receive mine, same time. No waiting to see what the other one sends. Synchronicity or nothing. If you change your mind, don’t want to send anything, then we’ll just forget everything, past and future. I won’t contact you again. Won’t watch you. Promise. And the camera’s still yours. Enjoy.

  Ilya.

  Friday. That meant Thursday post, first-class. Morning post to be safe. Unless I posted it by hand. No. Supposing I met him at the door? It would ruin things, make it all awkward. I read his note again. ‘Tease me.’

  And I remembered what he’d said on the phone: ‘A photo you wouldn’t put on your mantelpiece.’

  I lay naked on my bed, chin cupped in my palms, pondering the lewd photos scattered across the duvet. They were all of bits of my body: close-ups of an erect nipple; my cleavage in a push-up bra; lots of open-leg shots, some off-centre, some OK. It’s tricky when you can’t use a viewfinder.

  I wondered what would land on my doormat Friday morning. He was bound to send me a photo of his erect cock. What else did a bloke have that could be classed as non-mantelpiece fare? What would his prick be like? And would he take the picture from above? Or hold the camera in front?

  And what should I send him?

  I reckoned my pouting-vulva shots were probably the best. Before my photo session, I’d given myself a vicious bikini line and snipped at my pubes, leaving just a sparse triangle of light-brown hair. I’d also masturbated. So in the snaps my sex lips stood out proud and plump, flushed and glossy.

  Yes, I thought, I’ll send him one of those. They were brazen and fearlessly explicit. And he probably thought I wouldn’t dare. He’d taken the lead so far: spying on me, phoning me, encouraging me to talk dirty.

  I wasn’t going to carry on playing catch-up. If he wanted to swap intimate photos then I was damned if mine was going to be subtle and coy.

  So that’s what I did. I chose my favourite snatch-shot and posted it.

  Oh, silly me.

  He was bare from the arse upward, his naked back facing me. His olive skin was overlaid with a sheen of dark bronze, and he was perfectly muscled: sinewy, work-strong contours rather than vulgar brawn. His black hair was cut in a grade-two crop and the suggestion of skull beneath was menacingly beautiful. His head was slightly turned, eyes downcast, mouth set in a firm line. You could see an ear, jawline, a high cheekbone, and part of a big hawkish nose.

  His left arm was angled at the elbow; his hand was in front of his body. It looked like he was wanking, oblivious to anyone else.

  It was, quite simply, the horniest photo of a bloke I’d ever seen. It was so intimate and erotic, so utterly free of any macho ‘get an eyeful of this’ nonsense. And gazing at it made me feel like a voyeur, peeping at a private, blissful moment.

  I felt a sudden stab of jealousy. This was not a photo he’d taken himself, not unless he had one of those self-timer things and the patience for a lot of trial and error. Who had taken it? Who else had seen it?

  It wasn’t fair. I wanted something that was for my eyes only, something to equal the Polaroid I’d sent him.

  The more I looked at Ilya’s picture, the more I began to regret my own gynaecological effort. Right at that moment he’d probably be smirking int
o my glistening pink crack. How unimaginative of me, how stupidly dull and tasteless. I’d revealed far too much and had given him nothing – just a bog-standard, two-a-penny beaver shot; the kind of thing any old wank mag could provide him with.

  Once again he’d outmanoeuvred me, this time with subtlety.

  ‘Nice photo.’

  I smiled ruefully into the receiver. ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘I’m better in the flesh.’

  ‘Likewise,’ he replied. ‘So now what?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You agreed to meet up if my photo appealed. Did it?’

  ‘Yeah, sure. Though I think you cheated a bit. Compared to me, to my photo. You kept yourself well hidden whereas I was very –’

  ‘Open.’

  ‘Ha, ha,’ I said. ‘How amusing. I was going to say honest and upfront. So I think you cheated. I mean, you might have a great arse and everything but, for all I know, you could have a tiny little prick.’

  I wasn’t going to reveal how delicious I found his photo, nor how dismal I found my own. I’d psyched myself up for his phone call and I wanted to appear sassy, so very proud of my gaping-wet-pussy shot.

  ‘Is that all you’re interested in, Beth? he asked. ‘My prick?’ There was a faintly challenging note to his smiley voice.

  ‘Yeah,’ I lied. ‘We haven’t really bothered with small talk, have we? It’s been sexual from the word go. Why change a winning formula?’

  ‘Hmm,’ he said, as if mulling the idea over while not quite believing me. ‘Is that what you want then? For us to be just sex?’

  ‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘Just sex. Pure, unadulterated, meaningless sex.’

  I hadn’t really given it much thought up until that point. While I’d thought about him a lot, too much, I hadn’t really thought about ‘us’.

  Oh, there’d been a thousand fantastical moments of ‘us’, but they were just isolated incidents. I was constantly playing ‘what if . . .’: What if that’s him at the door? What if I phoned him and said come round and fuck? What if he’s seriously kinky and wants to chain me up and whip me?

  But all those ‘what if’s didn’t add up to a greater whole. I hadn’t envisaged anything so concrete as an ‘us’, as a relationship with, for God’s sake, a future. And when Ilya said ‘us’, I felt a pang of disappointment. It sounded so mundane and couplish. I was enjoying our tantalising phone calls and risque photos. I wanted more of the same.