Everyone screamed. Some screamed louder or longer than others, but we all cried out. Eventually, only a few sounds remained: Heather’s keening wail in the kitchen, Mari’s sobs, Tyler’s stream of profanities, and Lakshmi’s renewed, desolate moans. The heartbeat pounding in my ears threatened to drown them all out.

Kyle and Blake had bolted from the room to check on their significant others, knocking over a couple of smaller pieces of furniture in the darkness as they did. Meanwhile, Tyler did his damnedest to drink an entire bottle of rum in under a minute. That left me to console two distraught women while trying to hold it together myself. 

I did my best, but it was a losing battle, and ultimately I had to pick one; my devotion to my wife won out over my friendship with Shmi. If I’m honest, a secondary set of factors entered into the equation: between the two, Mari had never been nearly as mentally tough, Shmi’s emotional outbursts over the weekend aside. If either of them would completely fall apart, I’d put my money on Mari. 

Before long, the two couples in the kitchen made their way back to the living room, clutching stubby candles to light the way. Kyle held one, supporting Heather with his other arm; the only words I could make out amongst her gibberings were “my babies.” Gina had the other candle, while Blake carried the box of supplies.

He set it down on the table. “We have candles, but no radio. Other than that, some matches, a first aid kit, a flare gun and some flares, a few bottles of water, and that’s about it.”

“Maybe…” Mari managed to ask, “Maybe it’s just a breaker or something? Just a coincidence?”

“It’s… possible,” Blake admitted. “I don’t think so, though. Look out the window.” Our heads turned as one. Across the lake, we saw only a few glimmers from the town. “Power’s out everywhere.”

“But there are still some lights on there!” Mari persisted.

Shmi quietly said, “Generators, probably. Battery backups, too, maybe; I saw some solar panels when I came through town.”

“How… How long do we have?” Gina asked the question we’d all avoided.

Kyle thought for a moment, then sighed. “I don’t know. There are so many variables. Maybe minutes. Maybe a couple of hours. Not more than that, I don’t think. If we see the dawn, we’ve made it through, but since the power’s off…” His words petered out. “I’m, uh, we’re going to go upstairs. Heather needs to lie down, and I–” His eyes glistened in the candlelight. “I think I do, too.” The two parents, feeling an anguish the rest of us could only imagine, shuffled their way up the stairs and to their room.

Shmi stood after they’d ascended. “I’m…” She stopped, then tried a few more times to form words, tears streaming down her face. Finally, shaking her head, she walked out the front door and down to the dock, where she lay down to stare up at the sky.

After a minute, Tyler groaned, “Fuuuck.” He said everything that needed to be said with one word. Unfortunately, the asshole didn’t stop there, instead boozily chortling, “So, anyone wanna go out with a bang?” while leering at Gina.

Her jaw dropped open; I think mine did, too. He almost managed to get another stupid comment out, but she lit into him before he could. “For fuck’s sake, you idiotic man-child! What the hell is wrong with you? We’re all about to die, and you’re still trying to fuck me? I told you before, it’s never going to happen! Not in a million goddamned years! If the nukes fall and we’re still around, if we’re the last two people on Earth, I still wouldn’t want a goddamned thing to do with a gross, pushy frat boy and his tiny dick!”

I don’t know that anyone had ever spoken to him like that before. Tyler’s stature and pugnacious attitude had let him bull his way through most social situations. When someone scolded or rebuked him, they usually tempered their vitriol–no matter how well deserved–with the knowledge that he stood six foot five and weighed in the neighborhood of three hundred pounds.

“What did you say to me, you gold-digging slut?”

Gina scoffed, “Oh, that’s rich. I signed a pre-nup, while you’ve been riding Blake’s coattails for your whole life, and I’m the gold digger? I’m with him because he’s a real man; you’re just a steroid-addled lapdog. Maybe if the roids hadn’t shrunk your balls, you could manage to get a girl to stick around for more than a month, shrimpdick.”

He took a menacing step toward her, arms raised. “Say that again, you fucking whore.”

Blake growled, “Don’t you touch her, Ty.”

Tyler glanced at Blake. “I’m just trying to look out for you, bro! She’s going to break your heart, just like Jen!”

He shot back, “I don’t need you to protect me!” Coldly, he added, “I haven’t needed you, for anything, in a long time.”

The former linebacker’s face fell. “But… But bro, I just… I…” Blake remained stone-faced, so Tyler instead directed his rage at Gina. “Fucking whore! You ruined everything!” I thought I saw him swipe his hand across his eyes as he wheeled around and stalked through the back door, slamming it in his wake.

Blake took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. Gina put a hand on his shoulder, speaking soothing, low reassurances. He smiled at her, then turned his charming face back on and looked at Mari and me. “I’m sorry you had to see all of that. It’s been a long time coming.”

Chuckling, he added, “Still, he wasn’t entirely wrong. If the end is nigh, I can’t think of a better way to spend the last few minutes of our lives than connecting intimately with the ones we care about.” His gaze rested solely on Mari now. “And I can’t think of anyone I’d rather connect with.”

“Blake…” Mari glanced at me.

“It’s the end of the world, Marissa. Do you want to leave it without knowing you’ve lived your life to the fullest? We’ve talked before about what would have happened if we’d been single back then. Now–”

“Now she’s not single, you asshole!” I snarled.

Blake shrugged. “Neither are we. That hasn’t stopped us. Come on, Dale, I know you want Gina, and she wants you, too. You don’t have to be afraid about what people will think or worried that you might lose Mari or any of the things I felt when Jen cheated. In a few hours, we’ll all be gone; why wouldn’t you want her–and you–to go out happily? I promise, Gina will give you an amazing experience.”

“Then you can fucking take her to bed instead!”

Gina interjected, “Blake, I really think he doesn’t want to. Come on, honey. You and I can go upstairs together.”

Blake cut her off with an angry glance. “This isn’t about you, Gina. It’s about Mari and what she wants.” He held his hand out to my wife. “No regrets, Mari. No consequences, either. Let’s explore the might-have-beens together, at least for a little while.”

I watched in horror as my wife looked back and forth between the two of us, her husband and her college crush, then with shock as she took a half-step towards him. “Mari!”

She looked back at me, then she took a full step and reached for his hand, her expression embarrassed but resolute. “I’m sorry. He’s right. I love you, Dale, but I need to know. Please, go with Gina and–”

“Fuck you!” Gina said it before I could, albeit to Blake instead of Mari. “This isn’t right! I have never once wrecked a marriage! It’s right there in the fucking name, Blake, ethical non-monogamy! Not ‘fuck whoever regardless of who you hurt!’ Christ, he’s supposed to be your friend!”

I growled, “Not anymore. He’s dead to me for trying to pull this shit, no matter what happens. And if you do this, Mari…” My words petered out. 

What could I threaten, realistically? Divorce? Sleeping with someone else? Violence? The first wouldn’t matter to her if the worst came to pass. The second, she’d encouraged me to do. 

As for the third, I’m just not wired that way. I’m not saying I’d never hit a person to defend myself or someone else, but I’d never throw down just because someone slighted me. I might think about it–fantasize about it, even–but I hadn’t lashed out at someone physically for hurting me emotionally since I was a child. If a friend did something so vile I wanted to hit them, I cut them out of my life instead. If a woman didn’t want to be with me, they weren’t worth spilling blood over. Not even my wife. Violent fantasies whirled through my head as I looked between the two of them, but that’s all they would remain. I wouldn’t let them become more, no matter how I might be tempted. 

Mari avoided my gaze. She knew how much she was hurting me as she and Blake moved to the stairs and ascended, but she also knew that my pain would be the only consequence she’d have to face. Now, I knew that wouldn’t be enough to stop her. Her curiosity trumped any love she felt for me, all things being equal. 

She called, without looking back, “Gina, please take care of him. Make him see this isn’t a bad thing.” She received a full measure of scorn and cursing from Blake’s former fiancée as a reward. 

And then they were gone.

“Dale…” Gina tried the same soothing touch and tone of voice that had comforted Blake.

“Don’t touch me,” I hissed at her. “Tyler’s right. You ruined everything.” She tried to defend herself, but I was too angry to listen. “Fuck you and your ethical non-monogamy, and fuck Blake, and fuck Mari, and fuck Heather and Kyle! None of you have the morals of a fucking alley cat! Just…” I sat down on the couch, sick to my stomach. “Just get the fuck out of my sight.”

Gina hovered at the edge of my vision for a long moment, then she, too, left the room. I didn’t notice which direction she’d gone, only that she had gone, leaving me alone.

In the darkness, sounds became amplified. The same ping of the ball on the bat that I’d heard earlier in the day returned as Tyler once again worked out his aggression. Muffled sobs filtered down from upstairs, those of two parents grieving together. The chirp of crickets and the sounds of the woods at night made their way into my consciousness as well. 

Then, though, came the noises I couldn’t tolerate, a man’s low voice and a woman’s giggle, hushed as it had been when we’d tried to hide our nighttime activities while visiting her parents. I needed to be anywhere but in that damned house, to get away from the woman who had claimed to love me even as she betrayed me with the man I’d thought a friend.

I don’t know why I chose the door I did; it would have made more sense to go down to the docks and sit with Lakshmi. I think, though, that my shame wouldn’t allow that. I couldn’t handle her pity, no matter how well-intentioned it might have been.

Instead, I fled through the back door, choosing an angry asshole over a loving companion. Perhaps we could hit a few balls around, or maybe I could just insult him and hope he pummeled me into unconsciousness; each option seemed viable, given the state I was in.

I hadn’t realized, as all the other sounds filled the darkened living room, that one of them had dropped away. Tyler’s baseball bat lay on the ground, and he was nowhere to be found. As I contemplated his absence, a new sound explained it in bone-chilling fashion: a woman’s terrified cry.

“Stop! Please!” came Gina’s pleas from not too far away. God, I hoped it wasn’t what I thought. Ty had always been kind of a dick when he drank, but I didn’t want to believe he could be that far gone. Then, though, I thought of Blake and Mari; I’d never believe either of them were capable of stabbing me in the back the way they had. If they could do that to me, what could Tyler do to someone he hated? Reluctantly, I picked up the bat. If Ty had gone around the bend, we’d be playing for keeps, and while I might be the second biggest guy at the lake, it was a very distant second. 

The new moon offered no light. If I’d had to make my way through the forest, I don’t know that I could. The stars twinkled away overhead, though, and as my eyes adjusted, they provided enough illumination to make out two forms next to the old woodshed, one almost monstrously large in comparison to the other. 

Approaching as silently as I could, I prayed that any sound my footsteps made would be hidden by Gina’s plaintive begging. I made it within a few yards before Gina spotted me, her eyes pleading for help. Tyler’s voice, malevolent with drunken rage, threatened, “Shrimpdick, huh, bitch? I’ll show you a fucking shrimpdick.” Gina’s repeated cries for him to stop hadn’t slowed the hulking brute, but her struggling and the liquor he’d imbibed earlier did. Tyler had ripped open her shirt and pinned her to the shed with one massive paw around her throat, but the other couldn’t seem to work out how to open his belt. 

With one hand, I motioned for her to remain calm, but she tensed as I raised the aluminum club. Tyler noticed her shift from actively fighting to sudden rigidity, but too late to change the outcome in any meaningful way. As he started to turn, my swing caught him across the jaw instead of the back of the head, but the effect was the same: Tyler lay on the ground next to the shed, unmoving but still breathing.

Now freed, Gina howled with rage at her attacker’s inert form, kicking him in the ribs and the balls. I didn’t stop her. Instead, I first opened the door to the woodshed, only then trying to get her to stop. Knocking him out was one thing, but killing an unconscious man was another. Still, if he woke up, I didn’t want him roaming free. “Help me get him inside.” Gina took one last kick, then grabbed his other arm, pulling as best she could. 

I don’t know if it was adrenaline or just the extra help, but he felt a lot lighter than I expected as we dragged him into the darkened wooden shed. She spat on him, then left without looking back. I started to leave as well, but at the last moment, I paused. As a final nod to our once-friendship, I rolled Tyler onto his side in case he vomited while unconscious. That done, I exited, closed the doors, and wedged the baseball bat into the outside handles. 

Gina shivered in the late summer lake air, from both the chill and the adrenaline. She awkwardly tried to cover her nakedness, but Tyler had torn her shirt to shreds. I removed mine and handed it to her; she took it with a grateful, mumbled, “Thanks.” Slipping it over her head, the shaking woman asked, “What are we gonna do if he gets out?” In answer, I grabbed the handle of the wood-splitting axe lodged in a nearby stump and yanked it free. She paled, but nodded as I held it up for her to see.

A light briefly blinded us before Lakshmi gasped, “Dale? I thought I heard screams. What–” She took in the whole scene and stopped, then addressed Gina. “Are you… okay? Did I, um, interrupt something?”

Gina seemed to crumble all at once, tears spilling down her cheeks as the adrenaline began to wear off. She sobbed, “D- Dale, he s- saved me. Blake and Mari went upstairs together, and we all yelled at each other, and I came out of the house and- and- and Tyler attacked me and… and…” She gestured at the barred shed door.

Shmi’s eyes went wide as she finally understood what she’d stumbled upon. “Oh, my God. Oh, my God! Come on. Let’s get you back inside. Dale, can you–”

Shaking my head emphatically, I cut her off. “No. I came out here to be alone, and I’m not going back in that goddamned house.” I extended the axe to her, handle first. “Especially not carrying this. I don’t know what I’d do if….” I shook my head once more. “Just… Just take her back inside and make sure she’s safe. I’m… I’m just… I’m gonna go… somewhere.” A wave of exhaustion passed through my body, and I felt too tired to speak further. 

Shmi took the axe with her free hand and said, “Okay. I will. Just… Please, promise me you won’t do anything bad. To yourself?” I nodded yes, not sure if I’d told her a lie or the truth even as I did. “Go to the dock. I’ll come see you in a little bit, okay?” With a noncommittal shrug, I trudged away toward the lake. It was either that or into the woods. Of the two, the lake would at least offer the best view of Armageddon.

Once I reached the end of the dock, I stood there, my feet halfway off the edge, for a good, long time. All I had to do was let them slip the rest of the way off the planks and then swim as far out as I could. We were all going to die, so why wait? Why sit with the knowledge that my wife didn’t love me as much as I loved her if no dawn lay past the horizon? 

If she’d cheated on me at any other time, at least I’d have known that I could build a new future without her. I would have had enough time to grieve my marriage and come out the other side. The idiocy of powerful men thousands of miles away meant I wouldn’t get that now. Instead, I’d only get the suffering, without the growth.

“No,” I said it to myself, and to the lake, and to the idiots that had destroyed my world, both the ones wearing generals’ stars and the backstabbing trash in the house behind me. If grief was all I got, then so be it. I would bear it like a standard, watching the night sky until an artificial sun fell to Earth and burned my sorrow away. 

With that decision, I kicked my shoes off and sat on the edge of the dock. As the waters rippled around my toes, I remembered my family vacations to campgrounds, trips chosen for their lack of expense as much as the majesty of nature. 

I wished I could call my folks one last time to tell them I loved them, or my sister to tell her how proud I was of her for getting her M.D. I wondered if she was okay, manning the emergency room she worked at as the world went mad. I hoped so. “I love you,” came the words, evaporating into the air around the lake, spoken in the hope that some magic might carry them to the people that mattered most.

Lakshmi sat beside me, beers in hand. “I love you, too.”

I laughed, embarrassed, as I took the proffered bottle. Then I looked at her and felt silly for being embarrassed. “I was just thinking about… everything. Everything that’s happened and everything that’s… that’s going to happen. Wanted to tell my folks I loved them. My sister, too. And… Well, and you. The important people in my life.”

Shmi smiled sadly and opened her mouth to speak, then took a drink from her bottle instead. We sat quietly for a time before she said, “It’s funny. I had just decided to finally be… fearless, I guess. To live my life as if it was the only one I had. And now…” She shook her head and took a long pull on her beer.

While we sat, I toyed with my wedding ring, twisting it on my finger as I sometimes did when thinking about a problem. As my friend drank and looked out at the lake, I pulled it off and held it up to the light, examining the so-called symbol of eternal devotion, its endless loop promising so much. That left the empty part in the center, though. That’s the problem with symbols: they can mean whatever a person decides they do.

“Are you still planning to…” I laughed, thinking how ridiculous the question was in light of current circumstances. Rephrasing it, I asked, “Would you still divorce Olivia, even though she might not have been bullshitting you about why she stayed home?”

“Absolutely.” She didn’t even take a second to answer. “Her bailing on the trip was the straw that broke the camel’s back, but all…” She waved her hand around vaguely. “... this doesn’t change everything that came before. Are you…” Her features darkened in a mix of anger and sorrow. “Would you? Divorce Mari?”

“One hundred fucking percent. There’s no coming back from what she did.” I swallowed a mouthful of my draught, then clarified my statement. “If… If I wasn’t here, and this all happened, and if we both somehow survived, and if I found out about it later, I’d try to look at it as… I don’t know, finding comfort where she could. It might hurt, but I could maybe get past that, you know? 

“That’s not what happened, though. She looked me right in the goddamned eye and went upstairs with him. So, yeah. I’d divorce her this fucking second if I could.”

Lakshmi slipped wedding and engagement rings off her slender, dark fingers, then showed them to me with a conspiratorial smile. Her head jerked toward the lake. “To divorce?”

I grinned, the first honest and wholehearted smile I’d had all night, and reared my arm back. She did the same. “To divorce!” Our hands flew as one, and the symbols of our shattered marriages arced over the dark waters, landing with tiny splashes and sinking below the surface, never to return.

Shmi chuckled. “Damn, that felt good.” 

She drank another sip of her beer, then looked over at me, a melancholy expression on her face. “I never told you how I came out to my parents, did I?” Another chuckle. “No, of course I didn’t. I never told anyone all of it.” Lakshmi’s dark eyes found mine, a sheen of tears filming them. “Can I… I want to do one brave thing before I go. Will you help me do that?” 

“Of course, hon. I’d be honored.”

She swallowed and nodded, then looked out toward the town with its handful of twinkling lights. “My folks… They had an arranged marriage. Appa came over here as a professor, and Amma was pregnant with me when he did. They loved each other, after a fashion, but it wasn’t the kind of love you see in the movies or fairytales. I think that’s probably part of why I was so vulnerable to Liv’s lovebombing. It’s funny, but I don’t think I realized that until just this second.

“When I was a teenager, they came to me and told me they had arranged a marriage for me with a nice young man from another well-to-do family. At first, I didn’t know how to respond. It was just so surreal. Amma’s pretty conservative, and the arranged marriage thing worked out well for her, so her wanting it didn’t surprise me too much. But Appa… he’s progressive, even for here in the States. I figured she’d probably argued him around to it, but still, to subject me to this bizarre throwback? It just made no sense to me at all.

“I fought and fought with them about it. Even flew to Mumbai and met the guy and his family, so I could say that I wasn’t just dismissing the idea out of hand. He seemed nice enough, but…

I chuckled, “But you’re gay.”

Lakshmi hesitated. “That’s, um, that’s what I told them. Amma was livid. Appa supported me; I found out later that he’d loved a girl before Amma, and, like I said, they’d never been in love. I think he was looking for an excuse to keep me from having to go through something he hadn’t wanted to as a young man, and that gave him an out.”

She swallowed again, looking down. “That’s all it was, though. An out. For me, I mean. I lied to them. I like girls, but I don’t just like girls. I like guys just as much, if not more.”

“What?” A nervous laugh animated the single word.

Tears rained down onto her lap. “I lied to them, and then… and then, I’ve lied to everyone ever since. I decided to push the other part of me down until college, figuring I’d find the time to…” She laughed sardonically. “To come out again, I guess, once I was there.

“But then I got a girlfriend, like, the minute I got to college, so I didn’t see the point. She and I were together until the end of sophomore year. I stayed at school over that following summer, plugging away at extra courses so I could graduate earlier, and then… Then I met you.”

She wiped her tears away with one hand, then placed it on my shoulder, staring at me as she insisted, “Please, please don’t think I’ve carried a torch for you all these years or anything like that. When I say that I love you, I mean as my friend. It wasn’t… God, I don’t want to make this weird. Weirder.” Shmi laughed again. “Weirder than the end of the world.

“I’ve lied to everyone my entire adult life, and I’d like to tell someone the truth, finally. As I said, don’t take this the wrong way, but that night, the one where we went to the party, and you met Mari, I really did mean for it to be a date. I was going to try being… me. The real me.

“But then we saw Mari, and she asked if I’d spotted any girls I wanted to get with at the party. I could have said something then. When I tried to, though, everything hit me all at once: how my friends would look at me, what my folks would say, would Appa be disappointed that I’d lied to him, would Amma try to get another arranged marriage going, would you laugh in my face, all of it. So, instead of saying something, I did what I always do: I acted like a coward.

“Later, I married Liv, and it was all academic anyway. Whether I was gay or bi, I was still married, you know? I know that’s not really true, because I wasn’t being honest about who I was, but, hey: ‘not true’ might as well have been my middle name.”

She looked away. “If you’re angry, or you hate me, or you wish I’d kept lying or… or whatever, I understand. I’m sorry that I did all these years. I wanted to tell someone…” Shmi laughed wryly. “No, that’s not true, either. I wanted to tell you, specifically you, so badly. I wish I’d told you, once we were real friends instead of just two kids who knew each other from class, but I didn’t want you to have to keep something from Mari.”

I softly said, “Hey, no. I don’t hate you, Shmi. I can’t imagine ever hating you.” She needed to know that, before anything else, especially as I sat with this new knowledge for a little while longer, trying to gather my own thoughts. “I do wish you’d told me, but I understand why you didn’t. Still…” I chuckled. “God, I can’t imagine how different things would have been if I’d known that was a date. I mean, if Mari hadn’t told me that it wasn’t, or if you hadn’t gone along with that.”

Shmi shook her head. “Come on, I saw the way you looked at her, even before she said anything. I figured… I mean, all the other stuff I just said, too, but I figured, why fight if I couldn’t win?”

“Bullshit.” She tried to object, but I kept going. “Yeah, Mari’s hot, but you were my date. Or, you were supposed to be. Or… Fuck, you know what I mean.” This got a chuckle out of her. “I was attracted to you, too, and I was excited to be with you that night. You have no idea the kind of crush I had on you.”

She laughed. “It was mutual, for the record.”

“More than that, though, while I love… loved… Fuck, no, I guess I still love Mari. It wouldn’t hurt so bad if I didn’t.” I shook my head and started again. “Regardless, though, we didn’t have nearly as much in common as you and I do. If… Ah, hell. It doesn’t matter now.”

“What?”

“Things would have been different. Maybe not ‘forever and ever, amen’ different for you and me, but…” I let the words die. Too late for regrets now.

“Yeah. Different… Different would have been good.” She looked out at the water, and I followed her gaze. Only inky darkness and reflected starlight filled our vision, but we shared it together in silence. 

Her voice came quietly after a while. “Can I ask you for one more thing?”

“What?”

Shmi turned toward me. “I want to know… I mean…” She shook her head with a self-deprecating giggle. “God, I feel like I’m back in college, asking you out on a date again. I’ve never kissed a guy, and I’d just… you know, like to see. If it’s different.”

“Really?” Disbelief made it come out as a laugh.

Her face darkened with doubt. “Never mind. It’s- it’s dumb. Forget I–”

“No! No, Shmi. I’d like that. I really would.” 

I turned my body to face hers, and we both leaned in, watching each other as our lips grew closer. She giggled once more with a giddy awkwardness. Our eyes closed just before our lips met, and we both tensed in nervous anticipation.

At first, the best I could say is that it felt nice. No huge electric spark, no thunderbolt, no butterflies, just a kiss from someone who, if I’m honest, I had grown to see as a friend and only a friend over the years. 

Then, though, she pressed her lips a little more forcefully against mine, and I responded. My mouth opened slightly, and Shmi’s did, too. I felt her hand touch my cheek, heard her soft moan, tasted her for the first time. The thunderbolt struck, and Shmi and I fell apart from each other, dazed by its impact. We gasped in unison, laughed in unison, crashed back into each other in unison, our need for each other as inexorable as any force of nature.

She and I had leaned into each other before, our bodies tilting at an angle, to honor the spurious notion that our kiss was only a chaste gift from me to her. This time, though, the distance between us lessened to nearly nothing as she pawed at the ground to drag herself closer to me. It evaporated entirely when I pulled her into my lap.

Her lips left mine as she settled herself against me, straddling me, her skirt riding up. I pulled her to me, kissing and nuzzling at her neck. Shmi’s fingers ran through my hair as she moaned my name, her large, soft breasts crushed against my chest, and I felt acutely aware of the heat of her body, of her weight pressing down on my hardening cock. Her hips shifted back and forth almost unconsciously, grinding against the physical manifestation of my desire for her.

Lakshmi tugged at my hair, pulling me from her neck, then dove in for another deep, long kiss. As our tongues probed each other’s mouths, she took my hand and placed it on her leg, pulling it slightly upward as if to invite me to explore. I took that invitation to heart, rubbing her outer thigh in slow, lazy circles, moving closer and closer each time to her firm cheeks until I could fill my hand with one.  On reaching my goal, I took hold and pulled her firmly against me; Shmi rewarded my efforts with a low, needful groan. 

Taking that utterance as invitation, I helped myself to more. My other hand slid up her back and around the side to lightly cup one of the tits I’d hoped to get a glance of a decade ago, back when we were two kids out on our first and only date. She put her hand on mine, and I feared I’d pushed things too far; instead, though, she squeezed, and I went from cupping to kneading. Her lips fell away from mine for just a moment to say, “Oh, God, Dale, please…” before finding their way back.

I could have stayed that way until the end of time, but she wanted to flex her new fearlessness. When she broke our kiss this time, it was with a playful look in her eyes and a seductive flash of teeth on her lower lip. Her hands moved downwards, then up in a flash, pulling her shirt up and over her head, leaving only a bra to cover her magnificent breasts. 

I leaned back to take the sight of her in, murmuring in awestruck wonder, “Shmi… My God, you’re gorgeous.” Her expression turned bashful; I think she hadn’t expected quite as much of a reaction as she got. I tipped her head back toward mine with a finger on her chin. “Ah, ah. Fearless, yes?”

She laughed loud and long. “Fearless. Right.” My finger traced the catch at the front of her bra, and she shivered, repeating, “F- Fearless.” Her digits replaced mine and opened the clasp. 

The nerdy girl I’d fantasized about in class all those years ago sat up straight, shrugging the straps from her shoulders and proudly displaying herself to me for the first time. Shmi was the absolute definition of a short stack, but back in school, she’d tried to conceal her body beneath shapeless, frumpy clothing. While I’d caught glimpses of it later, especially when she couldn’t hide it during the lazy weekends here at the lake, I could never have imagined its full splendor. Now, seeing her in all her glory, I wondered how she could have ever doubted my lust for her back in the day.

Thick, dark nipples, hard as diamonds, tipped near-perfect spheres of caramel color. They begged to be kissed, and I obliged, taking one of the eraser-sized nubs between my lips and suckling. She cradled my head in her arms and sighed happily, grinding herself against my hard cock once more and luxuriating in the sensations.

When my suckling turned to nipping, Lakshmi groaned, “God, I want you, Dale. Please, please, before…” She left the rest unsaid. We both knew the ‘before’ that loomed, unseen in the night sky above us. A melancholic tone mixed with her lust when she spoke again. “Make love to me. I need to… to know that… that maybe we could have…” 

I silenced her with another kiss. Shmi stood and shimmied out of her skirt and panties, and I took the opportunity to kiss at the apex between her legs. She placed a hand on the back of my head, gasping and crying out as my kiss went from peck to lick. “We… Oh God, Dale, we don’t have time to…” 

Her words didn’t match her actions, though, especially once I placed my hands on her ass and pulled her to my face so that I might worship her delectable quim. She could have pulled away but didn’t. Instead, my tiny goddess ground herself against my face, moaning and grunting as my tongue lashed at her clit, her juices dripping down my chin. “W-wait. S-s-so close. I… I… Dale!” Shmi’s fingers pulled at my hair as she begged and thrashed, then she became a statue for a few moments, orgasm stealing all control of her body. A wail erupted from her lungs, almost mournful, as if grieving all the moments of joy we hadn’t shared together.

She wobbled on unsteady legs until they gave way, my hands guiding her descent into my lap. I cradled her to me, kissing her softly on the lips. Shmi shuddered with an aftershock, then giggled, “You give great head…” With a kiss, a laugh, and a waggle of her eyebrows, she finished, “For a guy.”

I shot her a look of mock outrage, and she laughed even louder, before scrambling off my lap and tugging at my belt. I tried to help her, but she shoved me playfully, grousing, “I’ve got this!” quickly followed by a worried, “Oh no!” as I lost my balance and bonked my head on the dock; I hadn’t expected the push. “Dale!”

I lay on the sunbleached wood and laughed out loud, both at the absurdity of the situation and at the chagrin in her voice. “I’m fine, I’m fine.” Then, winking, I added, “As you were.”

Shmi’s face split into a lascivious grin. A few moments later, she yelled in triumph as my buckle opened, followed by the button and zipper on my shorts. Her hand stroked my stiff dick through my underwear, looking at me as if to make sure it felt good. With my encouraging nod, she returned to her task in earnest; I helped by raising my hips off the dock. 

A cool rush of night air accompanied her success, along with a muted, almost reverential, “Wow.” She glanced up at my face, then back down. “My God, Dale.” I don’t know that I deserved that level of shock. That’s not to say I’m small, but I’m not porn-star-big, either. Still, as Shmi delicately touched and then stroked the shaft of my cock, her hesitant manner and wide eyes made me feel like a modern-day Adonis. “It’s… it’s beautiful.” She looked up at me again, smiling bashfully. “You’re beautiful. All of you.” 

Lakshmi’s hand moved from my cock to touch my stomach and stroke my legs, but her gaze and then her fingers moved back to the object of her desire, delicately exploring its contours. They traced a line up the shaft and to the glans, tickling at the underside, which drew a groan from my lips. Her hand darted away, but I said, “No, it’s good.” I lay my head back on my crossed arms, chuckling, “I’ll let you know if I don’t like something, I assure you.”

That seemed to be all she needed. Her hands touched and stroked the shaft, dipping lower to fondle at my sac, then retreating when I hissed after she squeezed just a little too tight. As if in apology, she leaned forward and placed a kiss on the underside of my cock; that received a much better reception. She giggled at the way I lifted my hips to meet her, then gave a tentative lick at the tip.

As much as it pained me, I grunted, “Shmi, we might not have time to–” which transformed into a loud groan when she took the head in her mouth and sucked on it like a hard candy, tongue lashing at the slit as she did.

Her mouth made a loud pop when she released me, snarking, “That didn’t work when I said it, and it’s not going to work for you, either. Now lay back and enjoy your blowjob; I’ve wanted to see what the big deal was about these since high school.” Now, who was I to argue with a young woman’s dreams?

It wasn’t the best blowjob I’ve ever received, at least on a technical level. Lakshmi clearly had learned from porn, and while porn-style BJs can be fun to watch and even receive, she didn’t have the necessary skills to give a great one. She sure as hell tried, though, and it’s like they say: there’s no such thing as a bad blowjob.

More importantly, though, it was for me. As much as she might have wanted to experience the act for herself, she centered my pleasure in that act. The way she looked up at me, watching my reaction with a hopeful expression, moving readily if I applied gentle pressure to her head and paying attention to the noises I made: all showed me she had entirely committed to my pleasure. She worshiped me as I had worshiped her, and with the same fervent devotion. 

If I let her, I believe she would have spent as long as it took to get me off, and she would have let me cum anywhere I wanted. This was a gift from her, one freely given out of love. Because of that, and because of my love for her, I eventually had to grunt, “Stop.”

Lakshmi released me from her mouth with a worried, “Is something wrong?”

I chuckled, “Only that I’m going to cum soon.”

“Oh.” She tilted her head quizzically, then, understanding, said, “Oh! And then…”

“Yeah. Might be a little while.”

She kissed the tip again. “I… If it’s what you want. You already got me off, and I… I mean, I’d like to, but we don’t have to, because this is… It’s so much more than I ever thought and–”

“Shmi.”

“Yes?”

“Come here.” 

She smiled shyly and rose to kneeling. “Would… I’d like you to be on top. Is that okay?”

Grinning, I sat up and spread her skirt across the rough planks of the deck. She raised an eyebrow. “Splinters. Lay down, beautiful.” Her breath caught at the last word. I wondered at her reaction for a moment, then realized that if Olivia had withdrawn from her, she hadn’t heard it nearly as much as she deserved. “You are beautiful, Shmi. So fucking gorgeous.”

As she crawled to the makeshift blanket, Shmi laid a gentle kiss on my shoulder, with an unsure, grateful “Thank you,” that broke my heart. I wanted to grab Liv and shake her for mistreating such a sweet, lovely, giving woman. Instead, though, I would do what I could to treat her as she deserved, at least for as long as we had. 

I waited until my lover lay on her back, arms and legs spread invitingly, and told her again, “You are. You’re more beautiful than I could ever say.”

She bit her lip with an expression half-seductive, half-anxious. “Then show me?”

I knelt between her legs and, taking my cock in hand, ran the tip up and down her slit. “Gladly.”

The head slipped in easily, sliding between her folds, forcing a soft “Oh!” from her lips. When the first few inches followed, she moaned, eyes half-lidded, her hands sliding across my body as if seeking a way to draw me closer. “Oh, God. Oh… Oh, God, Dale, it’s… Oh!” 

As I sunk deeper into her tight sheath, she gasped, making me freeze for fear that I’d hurt her. Shmi’s eyes flew open, searching my face, then looking at me with adoration. She touched my cheek and reassured, “It feels so good, so-“ I shifted slightly, and she moaned, “Perfect. Oh, God, Dale, you feel perfect. Please, more. Don’t stop. I want all of you. I need you.” Her hands stopped looking for a handhold; instead, she spread her arms wide, as if to show she welcomed anything I wished, as long as what I wished was her. “Please,” she repeated, voice smoky with desire.

I leaned over my lover, sliding the rest of my length into her in one smooth, steady motion. Shmi welcomed me into her body, hanging off my neck and kissing at my throat. Her moans became something closer to growls as I began to thrust, slowly at first, then with harder, faster strokes. She angled her hips up to meet my thrusts, crying out, “Please, please, it’s so…. Oh fuck, Dale, fuck, fuck, fuck, it’s so good! You cock feels so fucking good!”

The desperation in her words and the wantonness of her gyrations brought out a new aggression in me. I hooked my arms under Shmi’s knees and brought her legs up, pushing her diminutive body into a mating press. She gazed up at me as I drove roughly into her, fire in her eyes. Any anxiety she might have held had long since fled; instead, she chanted. “Yeah. Yeah. Fuck me, Dale, fuck this pussy, it’s yours, your fucking pussy, y- your… Oh!” 

Shmi gasped as I redoubled my efforts, my body frenziedly obeying her filthy urgings. Her voice soon lost coherence, issuing forth almost nonsense strings of desire, but we’d moved beyond the need for words. There was just me and her, my cock and her womb, the two of us mating under the stars as our ancestors had millennia before.

Still, I reveled in the words she did manage, knowing what they were meant to tell me: of her desire, of her submission, of her devotion. I reveled, too, in my ability to steal sense from her, to render the smartest woman I knew into a glassy-eyed, pleasure-seeking mess of a thing. It was only fair, after all. She’d done the same to me. 

Shmi cried out that she was mine, that I felt perfect inside her, that she wanted me and needed me. Everything she howled to the night sky, I felt as well. The only words my lips could form, though, were her name, and I repeated them like a canticle for the goddess that writhed in my arms. Her voice told me that she was mine. I could only show that I was hers through action. 

At last, she regained a measure of intelligibility, her eyes widening as she approached climax. “Oh, God, Dale. Fuck me! Please, baby, I n- need you, need… Oh, God, so g- good- I- I- Fuck, I’m c- c- cum–!” The last of her words cut off as orgasm robbed my mate of her ability to speak.

Her pussy, already tight, clenched around me, trying to milk me dry. I fought it at first, wanting to take her to another peak. As she regained speech, though, my lover huskily ordered, “Cum, baby. So good to me, Dale, your cock feels so, so fucking good. Let me be good to you, too. Cum for me, please? Please? I want to feel you, all of you; I want you to fill me up; I want– Oh. Oh!” 

She gasped and smiled as the throbbing inside her turned to pulsing, spurt after spurt of my semen painting her cervix. “Oooh, baby, so warm. Oh, Dale, I love it, so warm inside me. I love you. I love–” She froze, words catching in her throat once more, this time from fear.

I kissed her worries away. “I love you, too, Shmi.” She clung tightly to me again, as if trying to merge her body with mine.

We stayed that way for a little while, until the hard wooden planks made my knees and elbows ache. I rolled off of Shmi and pulled her into my embrace, her body spooning against my side. We stared up at the stars together, panting in between exchanging small, affectionate kisses.

After a while, she said, “I’m… I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For… God, this is all so fucked up. I love you. I do. But I shouldn’t have put that on you, because I don’t even know…” She groaned in frustration, unable to summon the words that would make me understand. “I love you, Dale. I don’t know what that means, though, whether it’s that you’re my friend that I love and I was really having a good time with you or–” I kissed her again, silencing her for a moment, but she started up almost immediately once I pulled away. “No, Dale, please, I–”

I kissed her once more, then headed her off before she could start again. “I love you, too. It means… It means what it means. Even if we…” I sighed. “If, by some miracle, we see tomorrow, we can worry about it then. Right now, though, I know that I love you and that you love me. I know that both our lives are kind of fucked up. I know that I couldn’t stand losing you, whether that’s as my friend or… or something more, if that’s even possible. And I know that, right now, I can’t imagine anywhere else I’d rather be.”

She propped herself up on her elbows and smiled at me. “Really?”

“Yeah. If it is the end of the world, you’re the person I want to be with.” I brushed a strand of hair away from her face and kissed her softly. “Whatever we might have been, or whatever we might be, right now, we’re us, together, and that’s the closest thing to perfect I can think of.”

Lakshmi frowned deeply. “God, I wish I’d said something back then.”

I nodded sadly. “Me too. But you didn’t, and we led different lives than we might have. The thing is, though, they led here. I could mourn what might have been, or I can appreciate what is, and right now? I’d rather do the latter.”

Her brows knit together in deep thought, then she slowly nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.” After a little peck on the lips, she cuddled back up to me. A minute or so later, she asked, “Say it again?”

“What?”

“‘I love you.’”

I chuckled. “I love you.” 

She squeezed me tight and let out a little contented sound. “I love you, too.” Her fingers traced lazy patterns on my skin, sometimes tangling in my chest hair or skimming down towards my groin. Shmi giggled, “God, I can’t believe… That was incredible. So different. In a good way, though.”

“Even if I only give good head ‘for a guy?’”

“I was kidding! Sort of. I mean, I only have a sample size of one, you know?”

I snorted, “Okay, dork.”

“Hey.” She looked up at me, tilting her head for a kiss, which I gladly granted. “It was great. Full stop. Different, like I said, and more… aggressive than I’m used to. But still really good.”

Chuckling, I said, “It’s okay. You can give me pointers. You know, assuming.”

“Deal. I, ah, I doubt I was as good.” With a devilish smile, she asked, “Will you do the same for me?”

“Hey! You were great… for a lesbian.” She smacked my chest, fake outrage on her face. “I assume, I mean. I only have a sample size of one!” 

This led to playfighting, with her lightly slapping my arms and chest, and me restraining her, then an awful lot of kissing. Eventually, she felt my hardness against her hip and asked, “Again? I want to be on top this time, you vicious brute.”

I rolled onto my back, and she knelt astride me, riding me with slow, gentle movements. My right hand went to her hip while the left massaged her beautiful breasts. I murmured affection and praise, telling her how beautiful she was, how sexy, how loved and cherished. She looked down at me, returning the same, the two of us the only thing that mattered under the star-specked dome overhead. We had mated like animals before, but this time we made love. When she came, I did as well, filling her for a second time, before she slumped down onto my chest, where my arms encircled her as if she were a treasure to be protected. Which, of course, she was.

Shmi snuggled into me. “Yeah, I could definitely get used to this.”

“Me, too.”

She paused. “Do you… I know, let’s enjoy the time we have, and I want to do that, but if–”

A flash of bright light blinded us. We closed our eyes. Shmi called my name, and I hers. I held her as tight as I could, rolling to one side as if my body could shield her from the blast wave coming to tear us apart, or the heat that would burn our flesh to cinders. I couldn’t; I knew that. Some deep instinct, though, told me that I must protect my mate. I felt her tears on my chest as she sobbed; I imagine she felt mine as well. Together, we awaited the inevitable.