The Night Superior Watched Us Come Apart

The belt snapped on the state truck just past Cascade River, a slap under the hood and then nothing but wind. Highway 61 was empty, black water one side, spruce the other. Reed had summer keys to a fisheries cabin above the harbor in Grand Marais, so we walked the last mile with Superior sanding our faces. I had turned thirty-four in August. He was thirty-one, thick through the shoulders from hauling nets, and he had been looking at my mouth since Two Harbors.

The cabin was cedar, one scarred table, a woodstove, and a sleeping alcove behind a curtain that didn't quite meet. It smelled like old coffee and the cold green of the lake. He built the fire while I stood dripping on the mat. When the birch caught, light jumped along his forearms and the worn thermal stretched over his back. He stood up into my space and neither of us moved.

I said it before I could make it polite.
- I've wanted my hands on you since we left the harbor.
- Then put them on me.
- You sure? Long day. I don't want a maybe.
- I'm sure. Sober, thirty-one, and done pretending I don't watch your mouth. Lock the door.

I threw the bolt. When I turned he was peeling the thermal off, stomach tight, a dark line of hair running into his waistband. I put my palms on his ribs. His skin was stove-hot in the middle and chilled where the wind had lived in his clothes. He kissed me open-mouthed, coffee and lake air, stubble lighting up my lip. I got his belt open. He got mine. Boots hit the wall. The stove popped like it had an opinion.

He spoke against my throat.
- Bed's behind the curtain. After that I don't want talk. I just want you.
- Same. Stop me if anything's wrong.
- I won't need to. Come on.

The alcove barely held the iron bed and a wool blanket that smelled like cedar and storage. We got the rest of our clothes off without looking away. His cock was thick and flushed, heavy in my hand, the head wet when I thumbed it. He pushed me down onto the blanket. I took him in my mouth slow, lips stretched, salt and heat on my tongue, one palm braced on his thigh so I could feel it jump. He threaded his fingers into my hair and held, not forcing, and rocked in shallow strokes while I sucked him deeper. Spit ran down my chin. The head nudged my throat until my eyes watered and I still wanted the next inch, the weight of him filling my mouth, my jaw already promising to ache at breakfast.

He pulled out shining and kissed that taste off my mouth, then put me on my back. His mouth went down my chest, teeth on a nipple, tongue in the groove of my stomach, stubble burning a path. Then he swallowed my cock in one hot slide and my hand hit the rail. His throat worked around me, wet and tight, nose to my belly, one broad hand pinning my hip. Pleasure climbed fast, a bright wire from my balls up my spine. He came off with a filthy sound and licked the underside slow until I was shaking, leaking on his tongue, open-mouthed at the cedar overhead.

He found the unscented lotion on the sill and warmed it in his palms. I drew my knees up. His fingers were blunt and patient, circling, then one thick finger sinking in while his other hand stroked my cock messy and loose. A second finger burned the good way, stretching, curling until he hit the spot that kicked my heel into the mattress. He worked me open until I was pushing back on his hand, cock smearing my stomach, the stove ticking and the lake hitting rock under the bluff. Then his fingers left me empty. The head of his cock pressed there, wide and steady. I bore down and he sank in, inch by thick inch, burn melting into weight when his hips met me and we both shook.

He held still until I rolled my hips for more. Then he fucked me in long strokes, almost out and driving back in, the iron frame ticking on cedar. Each thrust shoved a sound out of me I didn't try to hide. Sweat gathered on his chest and dripped onto mine. I hooked my calves over his ass and took him deeper, the angle mean and perfect, his cock dragging that spot until my vision softened. He folded me tighter and the pace went harder, skin slapping, lotion and my own slick making wet sounds in the small room. His fist found my cock and stroked in time, rough palm, tight grip, thumb smearing what I was leaking. I came first, sudden, striping my chest and his wrist, clenching around him so hard his rhythm broke.

He drove in deep and stayed, hips jerking, and I felt him pulse inside me, heat spreading, his forehead dropped to my shoulder, his whole body shaking through it. We stayed locked while the lake worked the rocks. When he eased out I felt the loss and the wet slide, messy and real against my thigh. He brought a cold towel from the kitchen tap and cleaned us without fuss, then got under the wool and hauled me into his chest. His heart was still hammering. Superior kept hitting the bluff in long black beats. I slept with his hand spread over my ribs and the taste of him in my mouth, already sure morning would not put any of it back in the box.