The Space Between Us

There’s not much to do for me here. I could hang out in what they call the crèche, helping with the little kids, but the stench of cloth diapers gets to me after a while. I could help in the gardens, weeding and stuff, but it’s the hottest summer on record for like, twenty years, and it’s just brutal out in the fields. And for what? I don’t even like tomatoes.

I’m like that girl in the song in that movie, the one about the family that sings while they escape from the Nazis. I’m sixteen, going on seventeen, and I don’t have a TV, a computer or a phone, and there are tons of younger kids here and lots of adults, but there’s only one other girl my age and we don’t get along. Her parents live here full-time, and she acts like that makes her better than me, when really I think it should be the other way around. She thinks Adam Ant was in Culture Club, and I know that’s a little old school for some kids, but still.

So I spend my time hanging around the garage. It’s loud in there with the clanking of tools, but Vic’s got a radio he tunes to classic rock. My little brother, Cap, hangs out here, too. He’s better with cars than I am. Well, fact is, Cap’s kinda fucking brilliant. I can replace a windshield wiper, that’s my accomplishment of the summer, but Cap can practically rebuild an engine.

Vic never acts like I’m in the way, though. He’s patient, showing me what parts go where and how they all fit together. He’s got grease in his knuckles and under his nails, even when he wipes them with the scraps of T-shirts he keeps in a big box on the workbench. Sometimes, when he uses the back of his hand to wipe his face clear of the sweat, he streaks his face with grease, too.

Today Cap’s gone swimming with some younger kids over at the gross pond that’s full of algae. They took a picnic. Healthy foods like hummus and pita and cucumbers grown in the gardens here. I’m dying for a cheeseburger, milk shake, fries. I’m wasting away here this summer, frying in the heat, mind numbed from all the smiles everyone has. I want to scream.

So I do. Really loud and hard, my fists clenched, eyes closed. I stomp my feet, one-two, in the dirt outside the garage. And I kick it. I stub my toes inside my old black Chuck Taylors against the barn siding. And then I lean forward to rest my head against the splintery wood and think about how there’s only a few more weeks left. How usually I’m sad to leave The Compound, but this year I can’t wait.

“C’mon. Can’t be that bad.” Vic’s leaning in the doorway, a wrench in one hand and some grease along his forehead.

“I’m fucking bored.”

Vic shrugs. “I’ll put you to work, Tesla. You know I will.”

That’s the reason why I came here. Because he’ll put me to work. And because maybe he’ll take his shirt off when he gets too hot, and I can watch the sweat run down his back, between the dimples just above his ass. Vic wears his jeans low on his hips and cuffed above his big black motorcycle boots.

Vic makes me lie awake in my bed at night, shifting restlessly in the sticky summer air.

I know all about sex. Everyone here does it with everyone else. Nobody talks about it, but it’s no secret. And if you think it’s gross to think about your parents doing it with each other, try thinking about them doing it with other people. Sometimes more than one at a time. Along with peace and love and organic veggies, there’s a whole lot of fucking going on at The Compound.

I know all about it, but I’ve never done it. Boys in my school don’t appeal to me. Too young, too immature, and besides, I go away for the whole summer. That’s prime boyfriend-girlfriend time. The one time last year I tried going out with a guy, I came back to school in the fall to find out he’d spent the summer dating his way through the entire cheerleading squad. First of all, I’m so not a cheerleader. Second, I guess I couldn’t blame him. A girlfriend who disappears for three months isn’t much fun.

I work next to Vic all that long, hot summer afternoon. We’re fixing an old Impala that doesn’t look like it’ll ever run. He does take his shirt off, and I pretend I’m not staring, but we both know I am.

“Fuck.” He growls the word when the wrench he’s holding slips and clangs against the metal.

I use that word all the time, but something about it freezes me now. I’m standing too close to him, at his side, our hips touching as we lean over to watch him twist something with the wrench. He says it again, lower.

“Let’s take a break,” Vic says.

In the small back room there’s an ice chest full of cold beers and a couple of Cokes. Vic takes the beer and hands me the soda. I think for about half a second of asking him for a beer, since even though I’m underage, stuff like that mostly goes unnoticed at The Compound. But I hate the taste of beer and wouldn’t be able to drink it, anyway.

“We’ll get it working. We’re a good team, you and me.” Vic tips the beer in my direction.

I care about a thousand things more than I give a damn about that car. One of them is the way Vic looks at me. Or doesn’t look at me, which is closer to the truth. I don’t want to be on a team with him. I want him to notice me.

From outside in the garage, the Rolling Stones start singing about painting a door black. Vic’s fingers thrum against his thigh as he lifts the bottle to his lips and tips back his head to swallow. The bottle sweats, wetting his fingertips. His throat works.

I want to lick the hollow of his throat. I want to run my tongue along the curve of his collarbone. His shoulders.

Suddenly, I want.

This time, I don’t glance away when he looks up to see me staring.

Vic licks his lips.

He could easily push me back when I cross the short distance and stand between his legs. It would’ve crushed me. Probably made me unable to make the first move again for the rest of my life. But he doesn’t push me away when I stand, my calves pressed against his, then my knees on the inside of his thighs.

It’s hot in this room. Stifling. Sweat sheens Vic’s upper lip, and I don’t think about anything but leaning forward and tasting it. My tongue slides over his salty flesh, and my lips brush his.

It’s too much, I know. I’ve made a mistake, gone too far. Vic’s older than me. Has never even flirted with me. And I’ve kissed only a couple boys, nothing like this. Bold and free and wild.

Vic doesn’t stop me. His mouth opens under mine. His hands go to my hips, just above the waistband of my jean shorts and below the hem of my T-shirt. At the touch of his fingers on my bare skin, a soft sigh slips out. I’m sure then he’ll push me away. Maybe laugh.

I end up on his lap. We kiss for a long, long time. His tongue strokes mine. It’s better than I thought it would be. Under my butt, I feel him getting hard. My heart pounds faster than it ever did while I watched him work with his shirt off.

I’d do anything for Vic right now. His zipper’s undone, my hands inside his jeans, before I even know what I’m doing. Then he stops me with a hand on my wrist. Not pushing me away, just holding me still.

“Tesla.” His voice is low and growling, the way it was earlier when he cursed at the wrench.

I don’t want him to tell me we should stop. I shift against him, my fingers curling around the unfamiliar thickness of his dick. I ache to stroke him, even though at the same time, I’m afraid I won’t know how.

He groans when I move my hand.

That’s the first time I understand the power of giving someone else pleasure.

I move again, exploring his length as best I can with his jeans in the way. The couch creaks and complains beneath us as we shift, until somehow we’re stretched out side by side, Vic’s hand at the small of my back the only thing keeping me from falling onto the dirty concrete floor.

We kiss harder. Our teeth clash. Somehow, I manage to get his prick out from his jeans. I’d put it in my mouth if I were brave enough, if I could figure out how, but for now I’m satisfied just with moving my fingers up and down. When I touch him, Vic shudders. He tastes like sweat and beer, and somehow I don’t mind the taste when it’s on his tongue.

I’m so caught up in figuring out how to jerk him off, I don’t notice at first that Vic’s got his hand down the front of my shorts. But when his fingers stroke over the front of my panties I discover exactly why he shuddered. His hand moves. One fingertip circles slowly, slowly, pressing against me through the cotton. Then faster, until I gasp into his mouth.

I know about sex, but I don’t know about this. All I know now is that the hot, thick feeling I get when I watch Vic work with his shirt off is building up between my legs, in my nipples. Crazily, in the soles of my feet.

We’re not even naked. We don’t even get that far. Vic and I kiss and kiss and kiss. My grip stutters on his dick, but his doesn’t falter against me. When he slips his fingers inside my panties, directly on my skin, I think I might die. A couple minutes later, when he pushes one finger down inside me, then up again, when it moves in slippery circles on my clit, I do.

Or at least I explode, which I imagine might feel the same. It feels so good I shake and push my hips against him, needing something but not sure exactly what. Vic knows. His fingers move a little faster. Then faster still.

And I … I am surging along on this wave of pleasure that’s so strong I can’t decide if I never want it to end or if I can’t stand another second of it.

When it’s over and I can focus again, when I can breathe, I blink up at him. My hand is sticky, lying flat on his hard belly. His fingers have stilled between my legs, though my clit is thumping with the beat of my heart. I’m not exactly sure what happened, but I know that whatever it was, I can’t wait to do it again. Looking down at me, Vic licks his lips and smiles. Despite my earlier fears, he doesn’t laugh.

But I do.

Chapter 5

I woke up laughing and coming at the same time. I hiccupped, my eyes flying open, my fingers clutching the tangled mess of my sheets that told me I’d had a rough night. I cut off the laughter by sealing my lips together, but nothing stopped the surge of pleasure that ripped through me, not entirely unwelcome.

A wave of guilt followed it.

I hadn’t thought of Vic in that way for a long time. Now everything was turning upside down and sideways. My body ached from being twisted in the sheets, and it was still a few hours before I had to get up and take care of some things before it was time for work.

I’d only just closed my eyes and started to drift when the two small bodies pounced on me. It wasn’t unexpected, but it was alarming. I shouted before I could hold it back, then fell onto my pillow with a groan and a hand clapped over my eyes.

“Guys, please,” I begged. “Go away.”

“Turn on ‘toons? Peeze,” said Max, who had good manners only when it suited him.

His sister, who fancied herself far more mature at four than any baby two-year-old could ever be, poked him. “Please and thankyouverymuch!”

“Thankyouverymuch,” her brother said. He smelled of wet diaper, a stench that reminded me too much of crèche duty at The Compound. “‘Toons?”

I shifted, bunching the cushions and pillows so I could sit up. “How is it that the two of you can operate every electronic device in this house, but not the television set?”

“The memote,” Max explained patiently. “Mama says don’t touch the memote.”

Of course their mother didn’t want them messing around with the remote—it was a complicated and expensive thing that operated all their dad’s complicated and expensive audiovisual equipment, including the television, the TiVo, the sound system and the Wii. It was supposed to make everything easier because you needed only one piece of equipment to operate everything in the rec room, but it was for adult use only. And since I was the closest adult, I was the one the kids came to.

“What’s Mama and Daddy doing?” I was afraid to look at the clock, but the light shining through my window meant it was at least past six. “Getting ready for work?”

“Mama’s in bed,” Simone said, self-important with this knowledge. “Daddy said to leave her alone so she can sleep.”

Max had something to say about this, too, accompanied by a sour look that said exactly what he thought of the situation. “Baby.”

“Just give me a few minutes, okay?” I begged as they bounced on me. “I’ll turn on the cartoons in a minute. Can’t you play with your toys or something?”

They had plenty of them, spread all over the floor in the very places I usually wanted to walk in my bare feet when the lights were off. I’d been lamed by Legos so often I’d taken to shuffling along the floor with each step, much the way they tell you to walk along the sand where there are stingrays so you can push them out of the way rather than step on them. That was what my life had become—shuffling to avoid the sting.

They could play with their toys, but it turned out the screeching that went along with the game was worse than the mindless blather of cartoons. No more sleep for me, then. I scrubbed at my face and turned everything on for them, settled the remote high on the shelf where they couldn’t be tempted to reach for it, and made my careful, shuffling way up the steep and uncarpeted stairs to the kitchen.

Which was bright. Too bright. I flung a hand up against the glare and blinked fast, but tears still burned in my eyes, so I had to rub them again. My vision blurred and cleared.

“Rough night?” Vic asked from his place at the stove, where he was cooking what I assumed to be eggs, since that was what he had every morning. “You look like shit.”

“Feel like it.” I slumped in one of the hard wooden kitchen chairs and put my head in my hands. The ends of my hair tickled my nose until I pushed them back, and I looked up to see him laughing at me. “Fuck you, Vic.”

He turned back to the skillet. “Want some eggs? I’m making toast for Elaine. You can have some.”

He shoveled scrambled eggs onto a couple plates and added toast as it sprang up from the toaster, then put both on the table and took a seat across from me. He’d forgotten forks, which was typical Vic, so I got up to grab them. It was my turn not to look at him.

He didn’t ask me any questions, and I offered no answers. We ate in companionable silence broken only by the ticking of the wall clock and an occasional burst of excited laughter from the rec room downstairs. Vic finished and took his plate to the dishwasher, then spread the extra toast with a thin layer of butter. He added a can of ginger ale and a straw to the plate, but I stopped him before he could leave the kitchen.

“You go ahead. I’ll take it to her.”

He looked again at the clock. Though he has a couple of good guys working for him, he still does a lot of the mechanic work himself. He likes to be open for people who need to get in before work, and he likes to leave early to spend time with his wife and kids before bedtime. Vic is an awesome husband and dad.

“Thanks.” He grabbed his jacket and shouted a goodbye down to the rec room, waited the few minutes while his kids pounded up the stairs to grab him around the knees and burrow against him. He tousled their hair, squeezed and kissed them, then pried loose their clinging fingers and sent them back down to rot their brains with animated mayhem.

For me, Vic had no kiss, no hug. We got over all that a long time ago. It didn’t affect how we were now, didn’t make it awkward or anything like that. It wasn’t a secret from Elaine. But we never spoke of it, and anyone who didn’t know would never have guessed that Vic and I had once sort of been lovers.

In their bedroom the shades were drawn, but Elaine had turned on the nightstand lamp. The base of it was shaped like a ballerina, her head obscured by the shade, which was patterned with toe shoes. It was a really ugly lamp, but I guess Elaine loved it.

“Brought you some toast.”

She let out a sigh. “Thanks, hon.”

I sat on the side of the bed and gingerly handed her the plate, which she balanced on her belly, just beginning to mound. She looked pale, her eyes shadowed and her hair lank. I was pretty sure I looked the same, if not worse, and I didn’t have a sea monkey in my belly to blame.

She nibbled a bite of toast. “Kids watching TV?”

“Yes.”

“Vic off to work?”

I nodded. Elaine grimaced, and I handed her the ginger ale with the straw. She sipped at it and sighed again.

“Pregnancy,” she said, “sucks.”

“I believe it. I’ve seen you through it two and a quarter times, remember?”

She sipped again, her throat working, and looked at the toast but didn’t take another bite. “I know it’ll pass in a few weeks. Or a month. And then I’ll have a few months of being able to eat whatever I want.”

“And then you have that labor to look forward to,” I said without even cracking a grin. “Bet you can’t wait for that.”

Elaine managed a small smile. “At this point, maybe the kid’ll just slide out.”

“I think that doesn’t happen at least until kid number four, if not five or six.” I smoothed the comforter between my thigh and the edge of hers.

“Bite your tongue.” She looked aghast, but since I knew she’d already said if they were going for three they’d have to commit to trying for four, the look had to mostly be fake.

Elaine was planning to have this kid the way she’d had Max and Simone, at home. Here in this bed, as a matter of fact. Without drugs. She was going to have a doula and a midwife, the same ones who’d delivered the other kids, and she’d already started putting together all the supplies she needed for her birth plan.

Personally, I thought she was nuts. Give me the sterile green walls of a hospital room, a masked doctor with a needle, and a full-on epidural the moment the first contraction hit.

“So, why do you look like shit?” Elaine said around a bite of toast. Some color was coming back into her cheeks. She might actually keep it down.

“Someone’s kids woke me up too fucking early.” I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Have a headache. Want more sleep. You need more reasons?”

“I guess that’s enough. Sorry about the kids. I’m sure Vic sent them down. I’d have told them to play in their rooms.”

I laughed at that and we shared a look. “Ri-i-i-ight.”

She laughed, too, but as if it pained her. “What time do you have to go in to work?”

“Not until three.”

“You can nap before then. I’m taking them to playgroup around lunchtime. You’ll have the house to yourself.”

“Ahh, sweet freedom.” I tapped my chin with a finger. “Should I run around naked first? Or drink milk right from the carton? Or both?”

I was glad to make Elaine laugh, especially if it kept her from feeling sick to her stomach. If my feelings for Vic had always been and would always be complicated, I had no issues about my love for Elaine. She was the older sister I’d never had—the sort I tried to be, though I figured I’d never get the hang of it the way she did.

“Did you put your list by the phone?” she asked with another sip of ginger ale, another bite of toast. The first piece was almost gone and she was looking even better. “I’m going to the store later.”

“I can go if you want. Run out before work.”

“Could you?” She appeared relieved. “I hate to drag the kids with me.”

“I know you do.” She always came home with junk cereal and sugary snacks when she took Max and Simone with her, and though I was a fan of Marshmallow Mateys myself, I liked it much better when my financial contributions to the household budget came home in the form of food that didn’t add to the bulges I worked hard to get rid of. “I’ll go. No problem.”

Elaine reached for my hand, surprising me. “I’m so grateful you’re with us, Tesla. You know that, right?”

There are a lot of women who wouldn’t have opened their homes to some girl their husband had finger-banged on a grimy couch, much less treated her the way Elaine has always treated me. If anyone was grateful, it was I. Without Vic and Elaine, I might’ve been on the street. No, not might’ve. Definitely would have.

Still, I shrugged off her compliment because I recognized the sheen of tears in her eyes. Elaine was superemotional, more so when she was pregnant. I didn’t want to start the day with tears. I was feeling a little too fragile myself.

“Slave labor,” I told her. “Live-in babysitter. Toilet scrubber. What’s not to love?”

She squeezed my fingers, knowing me too well to be offended. “Well. We do love you, Tesla Martin. Don’t forget it.”

I couldn’t forget it and wouldn’t have wanted to. I untangled my fingers from her grip and held out my hand for the plate. “Done?”

She sighed heavily and nodded. “Can you check on the kids for me? I’m going to get up and get in the shower.”

“No problem.”

My phone was beeping with a missed text message by the time I got back downstairs and made sure the bratlings hadn’t destroyed anything too badly. It was simple, two words: Call me.

I thumbed in the number as I kicked dirty laundry into a pile. “Cap. What’s up?”

“Vic leave yet?”

“Yeah. Maybe half an hour ago. Why?”

“Some lady’s here, says her appointment was for seven, but—” My brother broke off. “Shit. Oh, well, never mind, Vic’s here. She’s going to chew him a new one.”

“Vic can handle it. Hey, do you think you can take a look at the Contour sometime this week? It’s still making that weird noise.”

“Which one?”

My car was so old, held together with dreams and diarrhea, as our dad would’ve said, that it made any number of weird noises on a regular basis. But this one was really strange. I imitated it. “It’s like a wah-h-hm wham-m-m. Like the Tardis. Fuck you, Cap.”

My brother had burst into laughter. “What’s it sound like again?”

“You heard me the first time.” I was laughing, too. I love and hate that about him, how he always makes me laugh. “Can you? I forgot to ask Vic.”

“Duh, of course. Bring it in whenever.”

“Sure, I can do that,” I said, “but I don’t have time to wait around all day for it.”

“Jesus, Tesla, you’re a pain.”

“If I have to leave it, I’ll need something to drive.”

Cap made a strangled noise. “Of course you will.”

I grinned into the phone. “So?”

“You can borrow my car. If you have to,” he added quickly, “which I’ll make sure you don’t.”

Cap has a sweet ride, a restored 1978 Mustang that growls when you hit the gas. He’s spent more time and money on that car than he’s ever spent on a woman, which is probably one reason he’s single. Or maybe it’s the fact he’s in love with his roommate—who’s a woman, by the way, but who seems totally oblivious to the fact that my brother thinks she walks on water. Which is his own fault, since he won’t tell her.

But then, who am I to give anyone advice about relationships?

“I’ll bring it in,” I told him. “And later I’ll bring you some chocolate cake from the coffee shop. How’s that?”

“Not a great trade. But okay.”

“Later,” I told him, and hung up.

Chapter 6

I fucked the Murphy brothers for about a month and a half before I discovered something important. I loved having two cocks to suck and stroke, one in my pussy and one in my mouth—though never up the ass. They didn’t ask, and I surely didn’t offer. I’m not certain any of us thought such a thing existed outside of porn movies, anyway, and we were so gorged full on everything else we were doing that adding that forbidden thing didn’t even seem necessary.

More than just the physical aspects, the bonus of two sets of hands and tongues, I discovered I enjoyed the attention of two. If one boyfriend was good, two would be better, right? Except it wasn’t like the three of us could go sashaying down the halls in school, all of us holding hands or making out at our lockers the way everyone else did.

“Pick one,” Chase said. He was in an old recliner in their parents’ basement, feet flat on the floor, his hands on either side of my head, his dick in my mouth.