My bubble-gum-pink-painted toes sink into the ground, causing my steps to drag and forcing me to sashay so I don’t kick up sand. It’s cool on my bare feet but not cold. With each step, I make my way deeper into the dark, only pausing to look over my shoulder once.
It’s strange how lives intersect and collide. Something monumental is about to happen to me, but it’s just a regular Saturday night to someone else. It almost makes what I’m about to do seem insignificant, and I guess, in a way, it is. Millions of people do it with strangers every day. It’s not anything transcendent.
It’s just sex, no big deal—a physical transaction. A regular Saturday night. But a tiny piece of me still kind of wishes that it was magical or even earth-shattering. Just like a part of me wishes Hogwarts was real or that lying in the sun would turn my ginger skin tan and not into cancer.
I blame movies. The ideas about the “sexiness of sex” being sold are so false. I know because my dumbasses made me watch way too much porn over the last two weeks. Piper called it a CliffsNote for my “snack”—the grossest name for my vag.
And even the stories I’ve heard, once they both started having sex last year, cemented the facts. Sex is awkward, sometimes uneventful, and not like the second installment of the movie After…there is no Hero Fiennes Tiffin in real life.
There’s only a Hunter—hot AF, doesn’t read, but wants to eat my snack.
I shake my head with a chuckle, pulling myself out of the kind of thoughts I lose myself in way too often, and shift my head back to the darkness.
Circling around to the front of the tent, the heavy canvas fabric that’s usually tied off is closed for privacy. Crap. He beat me here. I stare at the front, rolling my shoulders, hopping up and down like I’m prepping for a fight. Be casual. Be cool. Don’t be yourself.
Am I ready? Yes. Am I really? Yes.
Okay. Game time.
The waves crash, mixing with the music from the party as I slide my hand between the draped material, pulling the front back just enough to duck inside.
My voice is barely above a whisper. “Hunter?”
It’s pitch-black, only a beam of moonlight coming in from a slit at the top, turning a shadowed figure from black to dark gray.
“Hunt—”
Faint noise slowly seeps into my ears, growing louder, crawling underneath my skin, spreading heat through my body. It’s wet and sloppy like— Oh my God.
My entire body freezes, eyes wide, and panic sets in. The scene on display in front of me slaps me square in the face.
A guy’s hand is dug into some girl’s hair, gripped so hard that his knuckles are white. The front of his jeans hangs open, the silver buckle on his belt making a clicking sound each time he shoves his hips forward.
I blink a thousand times, feeling stuck, fixed on what’s happening as he groans, making my body tense as I press my lips together.
He slows her movements, groaning, “Fuck, yes. Suck it,” boring into her like the world has disappeared. But I see and hear everything. All the filthy sounds of arousal dripping and slapping from her mouth with each thrust.
He shoves deep inside her mouth, rhythmically, breath ragged.
“Take it. Fuck, yes. That’s it. Gimme that fucking throat.”
The command in his voice pulls a whimper from the girl on her knees, triggering him to move faster, grunting, rutting into her, making her take it deeper without any gentleness or remorse. God, he looks like an animal.
That’s the only way to describe it because I’ve never seen anything like this. This isn’t a blow job. He’s fucking her mouth.
My eyes won’t budge. And my feet won’t move. Not even when she gags. His breath becomes ragged as she bobs her head faster and faster.
“Yeah, baby. Hollow those cheeks. Suck that cock, slut.”
Another moan has her hands gripping his hips, mine doing the same to my jeans.
“Yeah, you’re a dirty bitch. You like to gag like a little whore, don’t you.”
His head drops, and I imagine his eyes growing heavy, jaw slack as I lick my lips, lost to the sexual carnage.
The muscles in his forearm strain with ferocity as he presses himself forward, swaying, lost to the feeling. My teeth find my bottom lip, watching as he lifts his chin, displaying his angular jaw.
Aggression oozes off him as he grips her hair harder, using her to get off without restraint.
My chest rises and falls as stars begin speckling my vision. His other hand grabs the chair in front of him, making it rattle just as a raw, animalistic growl erupts from his throat and the face hidden by shadows leans into that damn moonlight.
West.
Dropping my shoes, my hands slap over my mouth as I stumble backward out of the tent. A string of “I’m sorrys” leaving my lips.
Holy shit. My mind can’t catch up as I make a hasty escape, stumbling over myself, traveling further into the dark toward a group of rocks on the beach.
I whisper to myself, head swinging around, only half looking to see if anyone is witnessing my spiral. “Jesus Christ. What am I doing? Oh my God, Sutton. What the fuck?”
Did that just happen?
My body’s still flush, warm in places it shouldn’t be. I can’t see Hunter like this. For fuck’s sake. I’m so out of my depth.
The thoughts in my head refuse to calm down as I rake my hand through my hair, the other reaching for my cell phone, pulling it from my back pocket. My breath is moving too fast, keeping my chest from slowing down. Fuck. Am I going to hyperventilate?
A huffed laugh leaves me as I talk to myself again. “Oh my God. Get it together, hypochondriac weirdo.” But humor swings back to panic just as quickly. My hand comes to my chest, rubbing a tight spot in the middle as I put my other hand down on my knee, bending over to take deep breaths.
The cell I’ve brought to my eyes spotlights my face as I blink, beginning to calm as I scroll the messages looking for my group chat. I let out a deep exhale before I stand.
Holy hell. I’m going to need a Snuggie, eight bags of chips, and three days of true crime shows to counteract this train wreck of a night.
Impatient thumbs hover over the keyboard as I wander around in a circle, trying to figure out what to text Piper and Aubrey, still saying shit under my breath. “Oh yeah. Let me lose my virginity in a tent. Sure. Who cares? It’s not a big deal. Gah, you fucking loser.”
How am I supposed to be ready for sex in a cabana with Hunter when I’m about to have a fucking heart attack over a blow job I wasn’t even giving?
Me: Code Blue. Plan B. I don’t care what. But get me out of here. Burn the house down if you have to. This is a Liam Neeson Taken kind of situation. Help. Me. Hos.
I’m staring at the screen as laugh emojis fill it.
“Assholes.” I groan.
Me: I just watched West get a blow job…
Nope. Delete. That dies with me.
The cell in my hand drops to my side as I tip my head toward the sky littered with tiny, bright explosions. The white dots twinkling down mock me with their perfect existence.
I wanted to see those—just not like this. Fuck my life.
Closing my eyes, I take one last deep breath and open them to stare at the moon. That globed, elegant, bold full moon is nothing but a curse. Nothing good happens when a moon like that is out because it’s the only thing allowed to be beautiful, so it curses all the moments that could be.