by Alicia Housman
(11/12/03)
When I think of Shawn, I think of him buying me ice cream. That's how we met. It was a bitterly cold day. I was sitting at the bus stop, crying because I had lost my wallet and couldn't get home, and he came over and sat next to me.
"Hey, what's wrong?" he asked. I told him. "Come on. I'll get you some ice cream and pay your bus fare, Okay?" I stopped crying and looked at him. "Why?" I asked. He smiled. "Come on," he said, and took my hand.
Shawn taught me how to trust.
He bought me ice cream, coffee toffee ice cream, and made me open my mouth, close my eyes, and wait for the first spoonful. He made me wait what felt like a long time. It was probably only a few seconds, and then he slid the spoon into my mouth. Coldcoldcoldsweetcoldsweetcoldsweet until the sweet overpowered the cold. It was better than a kiss. He got himself mango-lime sorbet, and let me do it to him.
We ate the ice cream on the long bus ride home, trading spoonfuls. He got off when I did, and we walked around for a while, finishing the ice cream. It buzzed in our mouths with the cold. We talked about ice cream flavors, the new Julia Roberts movie (he loved her, I hated her), pizza toppings, how dorky our parents could be….
By the time we parted at Grand Street and Hoffman Avenue, we were best friends. I gave him my number and he gave me his. He called the next morning.
"Want to get some ice cream after school today?"
I said yes. He went to a different school, and we arranged to meet at the same ice cream place near the bus stop at four o'clock. I was fifteen minutes early, but he was already there.
"Hey," he said. I slid into the booth across from him. And we began to talk.
Shawn taught me how to trust.
And it went on like that. We ate ice cream, trying every flavor Betty's had, and talked.
Until that one night.
"Do you know what I want?" Shawn said. "When we're walking down the street together, when we're deciding on ice cream flavors, when you're telling me about the movie you saw or the biology lab you have due, I want everything. I want you to trust me. I want everything from you."
I sat in silence, and he held out his spoon. I opened my mouth and let him slide it in but didn't close my eyes. I looked at him.
"Come on," he said and took my hand.
He didn't need to ask. I kept my eyes open. I had said yes in that purest of languages.
Shawn taught me how to trust.
He brought me to his house. We stood in the entryway, and he laid his hands on my shoulders. He ran his hands over my arms until he held my wrists loosely. His hands dropped to my waist, and he began to peel my sweatshirt off. I loved that sweatshirt, it was grey from washing it too many times, and the seams were falling apart, and you couldn't read the lettering on it anymore, and it was soft and cuddly and warm, and I let Shawn take it off me.
He ran his hands over my breasts, covered only by my bra, and down the curve of my body until he reached my waist again. He let his fingers and thumb encircle my wrist again, only the left one this time, and pulled me gently after him into the house.
His bedroom was at the back of the second floor, and I stumbled on the stairs once. He caught me and led me in. He finished undressing me, the sound of the zipper on my jeans loud in the silence broken only by our breathing.
He let his fingers trail over my body, exposed now to the open air, and my head fell back. He held up a finger and slipped out, his feet making the softest of tattoos on the steps. He came back holding two cartons of ice cream.
Shawn opened one, and coated his hands with it, hissing at the cold, and reached for me. I knew what he wanted. I dropped back onto his bed and closed my eyes. He made me wait. He made me wait longer than ever, so long that I opened my eyes, questioning him, and then he grinned and touched my nipples.
He wanted my eyes open.
I watched him. His concentration so complete, his focus on me so total, that any shyness I had had disappeared under his gaze, so hot on my skin, so cold with the frozen liquid. I gasped when he touched me, even though I knew it was coming.
He slipped his finger into my mouth, and it was lemonade sherbet. The acid made the muscles in my jaw clench and my mouth flood with saliva.
His tongue swept over me, rough like a cat's. He darted in and out and over me and spread the ice cream over me. I could tell that he was dizzy with the combination of tastes, the lemonade sherbet and my skin and the salt on it and the wetness between my legs.
He urged me higher, the cold making my muscles clench and tighten. My body arched, I couldn't breathe, and he stopped. He stopped. He stopped! He stopped, and held out the other ice cream toward me. He pulled his own clothes off, and I sat up, almost painfully. The cold had held my body in thrall for so long that the muscles had cramped, and it was hard to move.
I spread the ice cream on Shawn's body, not watching where my hands were, letting them drift over the melting ice cream and his skin, my eyes locked on his as he floated on the same overarching pain-pleasure that had taken me. His eyes were unfocused and he gasped as the ice cream dripped onto his cock.
I gripped him, moving my hand over the hot skin, slicking him with ice cream. I mixed the sweet cold ice cream with the salty white fluid at the tip and couldn't believe how honest a taste it was. The true taste we had been searching for all that time arguing over flavors.
When he reached out and touched my hand, I stopped. I didn't know what he wanted. He smiled, his eyes focusing on mine. And I remembered.
Shawn taught me how to trust.
And then he tied me up. Tied me up and fucked me. His cock was curved and slender and touched every edge of me. He was fucking me as though he was drowning, and I came so hard I nearly blacked out, and then when I could breathe again, he held out the rope towards me. He didn't say anything. Neither of us had said a word since we left our ice cream at Betty's to melt.
Can I do this, I thought. Can I do this to Shawn.
Shawn taught me how to trust.
I took the thin cord in my hands, and began to loop it over his wrists. I touched him everywhere. I knew that we were alone in the middle of a cold expanse of silent glittering ice with enough rope. I tied him up and kissed him.
We had never kissed before.
As our lips touched, he cried out. I stopped, and he moaned against my mouth. I smiled and kissed him again. The ice cream left in the carton was melted, but still cold, and I scooped it up and put it in my mouth and slid it into his, using my tongue to coat the inside of his lips. I untied him, and he looked at me. I smiled at him, and he smiled at me, and we took a hot, very hot, shower together, and walked to the bus stop together, holding hands.
We stood there together, holding hands, and he sighed. "Friends?" he said. "No," I said. "No," he said. "More?" "Yes," I said.
And we kissed again, the cold disappearing as our mouths stayed together sharing warmth.
Shawn taught me how to trust.
