Page 47 of Dance of Defiance
As if any touching whatsoever after what just happened makes it more than a biological need to get off.
It makes it…intimate.
With aguy.
“Don’t touch me.”
I want it to sound like a plea, like something Ineedhim to hear, and moreover need him to understand. But it comes out all wrong.
It doesn’t sound like a plea.
It sounds like a fuck you.
“Huh,” Val grunts. “Well,that’sfun.”
I squeeze my eyes shut, desperately trying to find a way to explain.
But that ship has sailed.
“The fuck is your problem?” Val mutters.
“Just…don’t fucking touch me, okay?!” I blurt, my nerves shattering. “Understand?”
Val smiles coldly at me. “Yeah, fuck-head.”
“I mean it?—”
“I fucking heard you the first time!” Val snaps. “It’s just a little hard to take you seriously when you’re still hard and you’ve gotcumon your lips.”
My face burns like the sun as I bring up a shaky hand and quickly wipe it across my mouth, smearing away the evidence. I adjust myself in my shorts, feeling the horrible awkwardness that this moment has become descending over us.
“I’m leaving.”
“Yeah,got that,” Val says blandly. “Bye.”
I turn to go, my pulse jumping erratically. As I reach for the door, Val sighs heavily behind me.
“Look, Roman?—”
I don’t mean to do it. But I’m in such a state of confusion and shock, and my system is flooded with so much dopamine, that when his hand lands heavily on my shoulder, I react as if I’m in the ring with him, not like we just shared a sexual experience.
The way I whirl toward him is more a muscle spasm than anything else. And when I feel the crunch of my elbow slamming into his face, fresh horror washes over me. The color drains from my face as I stare in shock at the blood gushing out of Val’s nose from where my elbow crashed into it.
“Thefuck, Roman!”
“Shit, Val! I’m?—”
“I did say I heard you the first time, fuckhead!” Val spits, snatching his towel off the ground and storming right up to me, blood trickling over his mouth and turning his bared teeth pink and red.
I flinch, my eyes wide as I stare at him, mouth agape.
“Val, I?—”
His finger jabs my chest violently.
“Figure your fucking shit out,asshole.”
He kicks open the door to the steam room and storms out.
