Skin on Skin (12 page)

But he didn’t let me jerk him off.

“
I want to taste you, Lola.
” His words made my limbs tingle in anticipation as if I were about to have a stroke.

Nacho undid my jeans, and I slipped out of them silently while enjoying the cool slide of the denim. The air trembled slightly above my exposed legs. Nacho’s teeth were immediately at my panty line, and he deftly used them to pull off my underwear. My discarded panties rolled up at my toes.

When his eager mouth returned, my hand was clamped over my curly mound like a shell. He tried to nudge it out of the way with his nose, but I only allowed a quick slip of his tongue through a crack in my fingers. Determined, his tongue tried once more to break through the seawall. Again, I teased him and let him just barely make contact with my pearly pinkness before clamming up again.

I started to laugh, enjoying this little game of mine, but Nacho shot me a look—his lips drawn into a serious, thin line—that meant business. Softly, my hand dropped away like a falling petal. His tongue provided the pistil to my denuded flower.

His tongue flickered in and out. Everything began to feel swollen: his tongue swelling inside my opening, the rim swelling to encompass the tongue. The tightness of all this engorged flesh was almost too much to bear, and I groaned. Providing momentary relief, Nacho moved up to my clit with cooling licks. But then his fingerlike tongue began to tickle my hyper-sensitive clit, and I began to giggle uncontrollably with girlish pleasure. Nacho responded by shoving a finger inside me, where it found a slick fit. This silenced my laughter, and now I gasped tight little gasps each time his finger poked that burning little bundle of nerves tucked up inside my pussy.

“
Nacho!
” My breathing quickened into a pant, though it was he who was licking me all over like a dog. His thirsty tongue lapped up pools of my naked body, which undulated from his finger-fucking.

“
I want to taste myself on your lips.
” I pulled his mouth to mine and attempted to suck away any lingering traces of my pungent taste. His cock, with its pestering hard-on, pushed into my thigh. I grabbed it; its powerful rigidity required a firm grip as I stroked the shaft. I had the reckless urge to stick it where his finger delved.

I wondered if he would want to. Fuck, that is. I sought his eyes, but they were closed in a grimace of pleasure. I slowed the rhythm of my hand so that he would open them. When he did, they glinted like narrow shards of glass.

His face was strange and mysterious to me in the hovering darkness. Heavy shadows hung to his cheekbones sculpting his face like a Mayan mask. Another hard shadow chiseled his jawline with masculine precision. His stone features were breathtaking in the menacing light, and I wanted his rock hardness to melt into my molten center.

“Nacho, I need you to fuck me.”
The need felt like hot lava dripping down my body. Then I realized that Nacho had come on my ribs.

“I
s this going to stain the tub?”

Verónica lowered my head over the rim of the bathtub to apply the remaining purple lather of black dye to the base of my hairline. We were going to a party in a few hours.

“I don’t think it matters.” With a gloved hand, Verónica turned my head toward the urinelike stain on the bottom of the tub.

I could never understand how she could take baths in our tub, allowing her dimpled flesh to lie against such a foul-looking and mysterious stain. When I showered under our weak, detachable showerhead, I did everything I could to keep my feet from touching that stain. This often involved a superstitious dance around it like children do to avoid the ubiquitous cracks in the sidewalk for fear of breaking their mothers’ backs. My cousin, on the other hand, religiously took a bath once a week surrounded by votive candles lit to the Virgin of Guadalupe and fecund mounds of bubble bath voluptuously covering her naked parts. Often, she wanted company while she took her baths, and I would perch on the closed toilet seat and talk to her until the bubbles began to dissolve into clear water. At that point, I would discreetly excuse myself from the room.

Verónica had always been comfortable with her body, which undeniably had the sumptuous shape of a burlesque performer. When I was barely thirteen, I flew to San Diego to spend my spring break with my cousin. An hour after my plane landed, we were lying on the beach: Verónica in a tiny, lilac bikini that just covered her nubile teenage parts, and I, sheathed in a one-piece that forced me to suck my stomach in. Neither Verónica nor her mother, my tía Coral, who sat in a beach chair just within earshot and slathered with suntan oil that gave her the sheen of a roast turkey, seemed aware of the effect this pubescent display had on the male beach-farers around us. It was I alone who suffered the embarrassment from their shameless stares at young flesh ripening in the sun.

Nevertheless, lying on the silky, blond sand of that southern California beach, I experienced a new sensation of freedom from behind the criminal amount of makeup my aunt let me wear. Liquid eyeliner, which my cousin dexterously applied in the car speeding away from the airport, allowed me to deny with a hard crease of black any man’s gaze. This look I had learned entirely from my cousin. It wasn’t the sight of her Medusa masses of hair that turned, even at that age, that certain part of the male member to stone; rather, it was that subtle turning down of her eyelid, heavy with liner. Her iris would tuck in the outer corner of her eye just as she shuttered her lid and turned away. This left her subject with the bewitching impression of an ancient Egyptian fresco, kohl eyes following the tomb raider wherever he moved.

“You think Nacho will be at this party?” I sat on a low stool in front of Verónica’s vintage vanity. Old photographs of pinup girls, curling with decades of being manhandled and stashed away in attics, were tucked into the frame of the vanity’s mirror.

“I don’t think so. This really isn’t his scene.” I was beginning to think this wasn’t going to be my scene either. Verónica was styling the top of my long hair into a pompadour. A bobby pin scraped my scalp, raw from the harsh dye, to secure it in place. She had wanted to cut Bettie Page bangs, but I insisted that I felt enough like a harlot with my new raven locks. My hair shined like black shoe polish and radiated a chemical perfume that made my eyes water, but I liked the way it hollowed my cheeks and deepened my eyes. I felt ghostly, the way I imagined Verónica did with her porcelain skin. I stared into the mirror, enchanted by my phantom appearance.

“What happened between you and Nacho anyway? He’s been calling you all week, and you haven’t returned any of his phone calls.” Finished fixing my hair, Verónica sloppily mixed herself another drink of vodka and cranberry juice. We were drinking from her retro set of martini glasses. An old record warbled on her player.

“Oh, nothing much. He passed out before anything really happened.”

I thought of Nacho’s back heaving in sleep. It was covered with memorial and gang tattoos. I wasn’t sure which tattooed side of him—his wanton front or his felonious back—I preferred to stare at in my insomnia.

He had hugged me close and his drying cum stuck us together like paste. He told me he was from Hollenbeck. LA. Said he had seen things. His best friend shot dead right in front of him. I had heard these stories before, these midnight confessionals made in my thin arms from boys too macho to look at you straight in the daytime. These tragedies no longer impressed me. I had hardened to them many heartbreaks ago. Fortunately, Nacho passed out midslur before detecting my lack of sympathy.

“Sounds like Nacho. He’s kind of
un borracho
.” Verónica, I knew, had gotten laid that night. I had heard her guest’s baritone grunting, followed by her feline whimpers, through the shoddily erected drywall that separated our two rooms. After they settled down, I lay twisted in my sheets, itching from insomnia and sexual frustration. The apartment was silent from those eased into sleep by their orgasms, and my carnal needs only grew louder. I put my finger on the pulse of my pussy, which throbbed with the beating of my heart. An almost forgotten image of penetrating eyes, dark like smoldering coals, flared in my mind. The tight grip of a hand on a wrench. I found quick release with a couple knowing jerks of my fingers.

“Are you into him?”

“Who?” I picked up Verónica’s eyeliner from the cluttered vanity. I was thirteen again and painting my face in my cousin’s image, trying to transform my small, brown eyes into large, gypsy ones.

“Well, Nacho, of course!”

“I don’t know.” I wanted to tell her about the boy with the truck, but what could I say? There was no story there, just fantasy. I did have a feeling, though, that Verónica knew him. After all, I had seen him leaving Tito’s the first night I went there, and that was Verónica’s main haunt.

“I think Teddy’s going to be at the party tonight.” Verónica changed subjects as fast as the flitting of her eyelashes.

“Who?” Maybe his name was Teddy….

“The boy from last weekend.” There had been a few in between as well, but as far as I knew, she had only slept with this one. Verónica went out almost every night, whereas I stayed home, exhausted from waiting tables, and asleep by ten.

Tonight, however, was Friday, and Verónica was zipping me up in her red bombshell dress with white polka dots. It was too small for her, but snugly fit my more subtle curves, while cutting dangerously low across my full tits. I tipped my head forward, feeling a bit like a rhinoceros with my styled hump of hair, to apply vermillion lipstick close to the mirror. Verónica slunk up behind me in the mirror and clung to my waist like a kitten trying out her claws. She smiled her vixen smile, and I matched it in the mirror. Our black hair tumbled together, indistinguishable, like shadows in the night. The night was young and so were we. And I knew that somewhere in this same city, a boy was driving a red pickup through streets filled with fog, thick like dreams.

Beer cans were sunk in a bathtub filled with ice like black-market organs. The tiny bathroom was the epicenter of the party. People were packed in like thirsty cattle at a trough. Verónica elbowed her way to the beer supply as I waited by the toilet. I watched her encounter a mosh pit of resistance until she found a narrowing crack between two skinheads, who looked about ready to brawl. She slipped out of sight. A guy with a heavy beard, and heavier bladder, burst through the crowd and began to piss right in front of me. He groaned as he released the stream of a racehorse. I pressed back awkwardly against the towel rack to avoid getting splattered. Luckily, Verónica immediately returned with two cans of beer.

“Gross, Gus!” She addressed the heaving urinator with a rough slap on the back. I winced; he was wearing a denim vest studded with blunt spikes, but, after all, this was a girl who fondled cacti.

“Hey, Verónica! You’re just jealous ’cause you can’t pee standing up. I believe they call that dick envy.”

“It’s
penis
envy, you dick. Way to impress my cousin here.” I waved mutely.

“I’d shake your hand, but I’ve got to shake this first.” Gus grinned beneath his beard, limp dick still in hand.

“Um, it’s really okay.” I shrank back farther into the mildewy towel that hung behind me.

Verónica rolled her eyes and handed me a tall can of Bud.

“Sorry, no Tecate.” I didn’t care. I loved any cheap beer.

“Let’s get out of this piss pit!” Verónica grabbed me by the wrist. We wriggled through the pressing bodies like a tape-worm. I consumed everything I saw: clear-skinned boys with mohawks and gutter-stained clothes, tough chicks with mohawks wearing messy eyeliner and ripped fishnets, skinny boys also wearing eyeliner and fishnets, girls so glammed up they could be mistaken for drag queens, girls with such a smattering of facial hair and small chests that they could be mistaken for pubescent boys. This was nothing like parties I went to back in Tucson.

I touched all of them, indiscriminately brushing up against their flesh in my parasitic path of consummation. Their sweat, like the lubricating trail of a snail, helped me slide past. Excitement pricked my skin with live wires, and my nipples hardened with the heightened awareness that all these bodies were naked and warm underneath their clothing. The beer can in my hand was freezing, but I liked its weight—an anchor to keep me from rising to the ceiling with the coalescing voices and cigarette smoke and loud music.

They were all lined up for us, the boys with jeans cuffed up at the ankle and pomaded hair: the rebel look of an earlier day. They stood against a far wall as if waiting for a firing squad, indifferent, if not defiant, in their casual stances. I looked to my cousin. She was looking at them. Her eyes had hollowed into bullets, and gunpowder filled her heart.

“Shall we?” I gently touched her elbow as if inviting her to dance. She followed my lead.

“I call the one on the right.” He had icy blue eyes. She could have him. I didn’t trust eyes that blue, believing them to reveal a cold heart.

My arm slipped easily around her waist, which was elongated by a slim, black dress that gave way to nest of ruffles midthigh. I steered us on our wayward course, but nearly shipwrecked before reaching the wall. Emerging from the shaky light of the adjacent kitchen, the boy with Elvis hair appeared before me like an apparition of the King himself. His pompadour, so black it gleamed blue, was slightly messy, as if a girl had carelessly run her nails through it. He joined the pack of boys, and they greeted him with a subtle tinge of deference. Leaning against the door frame with ease, he raised an arm to hold on to the molding as he spoke to the boy with icy eyes. His bicep bulged like a python post–feeding frenzy, his tattoos providing colorful scales.

My knees began to wobble as if I had sea legs. I was so close now that I could reach out and put my hand through his pale skin, which was virtually translucent in the faulty light.

“What’s up, Neil?” Verónica was touching his shoulder, which apparently was solid. The girl knew everybody.

His dark eyes passed over her like nightfall and dawned on me. He saw my tight bodice, bound in polka dots, that practically served him my tits on a platter. He saw my long, black hair that tickled my ribs and that only his surpassed in sheen. He saw my thin, exposed limbs flushed with the heat of the party.

My eyes were watery as if drunk on tears. We were practically eye-fucking right in front of Verónica. I think she noticed.

“Uh, Neil. This is my cousin Lola. She’s visiting from Tucson.”

“Hey, I’m Neil.” His handshake was assertive. My hand fell limp, fainting in his grip.

“You look familiar. Have we met?” He asked this with teasing eyes that refused to reveal whether he remembered me from outside the garage.

“I don’t think so. I’m Lola.” I liked this shiny-eyed game of ours. It was dangerous, like playing Russian roulette with a well-greased gun. It would make me drink too much because I couldn’t trust the feeling of being this alive.

Verónica intervened.

“Hey, Neil, have you seen Teresa?” He frowned slightly. I hated seeing those bee-stung lips turn down, even for a moment.

“Um, no, I haven’t.” Verónica looked around, distracted. His eyes began to wander the crowded room as well. I had to come up with something fast. I took a quick chug of beer and blurted out:

“Do you own that red ’51 Chevy pickup?” Both he and Verónica turned to me in surprise.

“Yeah, I do.” He looked amused, and it encouraged me to continue.

“I’ve seen it around the neighborhood. The ’51 is one of my favorite old trucks.”

“Really?” I had him snared. Now I only had to reel in my net.

“Yeah, totally. Do you still have its original six-cylinder motor with a four-speed transmission?” Not only could I walk the walk (twitching those slim, red-clad hips of mine), I could talk the talk.

“Actually,” his voice had this deep frequency that began to vibrate something loose in me, “I’ve replaced it with a small block 350.”

“So, do you have stick or automatic transmission?”

“Automatic, but I drive it like it’s my stick.” I giggled dumbly. I was tipsy. He was smiling a crooked smile that was more like a smirk. His teeth were straight and a little smallish. He seemed impressed by my basic mechanic knowledge.

“My dad owns an auto shop in Tucson. I grew up around a lot of lowriders,” I explained.

“Cool.” He was a man of few words, but our eyes continued their tireless foreplay, establishing all that needed to be said.

I finished my beer with a slight gasp for air. My whole body was thirsting.

“Can I get you another beer?” There is nothing more attractive than a man attentive to your needs.

“That would be great. Thanks, Neil.” His top lip curled into that sultry, asymmetrical smile of his upon hearing his name.

“I’ll be right back. Don’t move.”

I watched him enter the kitchen with a slight swagger in his square hips and a slight lurch in his square shoulders. Everything about his build was hard and long. I could detect the absolute firmness of his torso underneath his somewhat tight, black T-shirt, that kind of firmness some covet in a mattress but I covet in a man. That kind of firmness that doesn’t give.