Coffee Shop Chronicles: Are You the Trusting Sort?

Corner Bakery Café

Horsham, PA

Billy Joel had it right: it’s always been a matter of trust.

3:43pm

cellphone manA strange little coffee shop that is, or was once, a restaurant. This place serves the typical coffees and latte espresso drinks, but it also offers a choice of real food, not just the token pastries. I ordered my sandwich and soup at the counter like I’m at fast food restaurant, but the staff delivers it to your table or booth. This place has booths. They look comfy, red leather-ish, but I’m at a four-person table. There’re just a few other people in here, so I don’t feel guilty taking up the room. I see the employees bussing other tables, a strange mix of customer service.

The guy behind me is the only other business-y person here. I know he’s a “professional” because he’s been on his cell phone since he arrived. I’ve refilled my coffee twice; he hasn’t stood up yet. Doesn’t he have to use the bathroom?

“My wife can tell you better….”

He’s got a small briefcase at his side with a thick black leather day planner of sorts. He wears a blue button-down shirt. A bag of chips with his sandwich, not baby carrots. An iced drink not hot, and a tablet-type laptop he’s working on.

“I’m a relationship guy myself….” I overhear.

I can tell that.

 

3:56pm

He finally hangs up his phone and walks away, leaving all of his stuff on the chair. He’s not careless; he’s natural.

There’s an unwritten code of trust in coffee shops—don’t touch other peoples’ stuff. It never crosses my mind to do anything like that. I guess he feels the same way. It’s also echo-y empty in here now, safety in no numbers. Regardless of how many people are in a room, I, leave my computer and my bags open while I stand, stretch or go to the restroom. I recently started putting my laptop monitor to sleep when I step away. Not that I’m writing secret recipes of potato chips, but I feel protective of my writing these days.

Being casual with my stuff does not mean stupid. I always carry my purse and cell phone when I walk out of site. My purse holds the important things in my life: car keys, wallet, Office Guys, writing journal and lip balm. After that, everything else is replaceable. Losing my current writing drafts, my photos, and those expensive power supply plugs would suck–especially since I haven’t backed up my work in months–but I don’t need to pack up and carry all my stuff when I walk 10 feet away.

I learned the potential danger of having my purse out of site years ago while grocery shopping in New Jersey. I was digging through a pile of apples when this guy walks up behind me. “You shouldn’t leave your purse unattended in your shopping cart,” he said, startling me. “Anyone could walk off with it.” Like he could have, I thought. I thanked him for that advice and continued shopping with my purse on my shoulder. Because of that, I always carry my driver’s license and credit cards close to me. My laptop and pens are worth money, but they’re really only valuable to me.

Is it because laptops are so cheap these days?

No, there’s just this hands-off vibe, this respect for other patrons. Haven’t found it in any other stores, food places or restaurants. Just coffee shops.

Is it the clientele? Does the cost of drinking expensive coffee give you higher morals? Are people too wrapped up in themselves, like Cell Phone Guy behind me? Maybe we’re all too intense on working that few can’t be bothered with thievery?

Is it the neighborhoods which coffee shops live in that breed safety? Even in a questionable strip mall like this one, where the coffee shop is on an exposed corner next to a European wax salon and a chain Mexican restaurant, I feel secure.

Is it exclusivity? Remember, this coffee costs money. People like Mr. Cell Phone can afford it. Even me, a freelance writer, I splurge for the luxury of space to write.

Is it chain store vs. Shop Local mentality? I would never leave my valuables in some McFastfood joint, for example, but I’m not threatened in coffee shops whether it’s an independent store, a local chain or a big name chain. I have no paranoid delusions, no sense that somebody’s watching me. There’s just something about the atmosphere, the expectation.

From One Extreme to Another

“Kalamazoo to Timbuktu.” That song, recorded in the ‘50s by Mitch Miller, linked two locations together because of their individually unique names. Michiganders, like me, recognize the name of one city and wonder about the other. Where in the world is Timbuktu? Does it really exist? Or is it just part of an expression that we say when we’re exaggerating about a far-away place?

Those of us who think about Timbuktu envision a made-up land where no one lives; there are no roads, no public services, no bathrooms, no grocery stores or cushy conveniences for miles around. A place so remote, we relish the peace and quiet that we think we’ll find. We mention to friends of our upcoming travel plans by saying, “We’re goin’ to Timbuktu, in the middle of nowhere.”

But Timbuktu isn’t a popular destination for tourists. The city rests at the southern edge of the Sahara Desert in the country of Mali, and it has always been very hard to get to. Instead of planes, trains, and automobiles, think: boats, camels, and twenty hours in a four-wheel-drive vehicle. Without the benefit of that last luxury, early seventeenth century explorers were lured to their deaths by the legendary “city of gold.” Most of those adventurers were massacred and others died as a result of the harsh desert environment—particularly, scorching sun and no access to fresh drinking water. Timbuktu was, and is, nothing less than a tumultuous place in West Africa.

Gold is still associated with Timbuktu. Along with cotton, it accounts for 80% of Mali’s earnings from exported goods. But possessing an abundance of one of the earth’s most valuable commodities has not protected the country from poverty. Mali is among the world’s twenty-five poorest countries.

Part of the poverty problem began seven hundred years ago when Timbuktu’s resident king, Mansa Musa, gave away tons—literally, tons—of painstakingly-mined gold during his journey to Mecca. He gave so much to the poor as he encountered them along his route that the precious metal quickly lost value and the costs of other goods escalated. Today’s descendant residents of Timbuktu are so mad over the king’s actions that they won’t even speak his name. They blame him for having carelessly ruined their economy.

Control of Timbuktu repeatedly toggles amongst various militant groups and the Malain government. In 2012, Peter Gwin reported for National Geographic News that “Islamists have enforced a Taliban-style interpretation of sharia.” The extremists destroyed tombs and stole ancient manuscripts. They also “broke down the sealed holy inner door of the 15th-century Sidi Yahya Mosque” which as Gwin further noted: “according to tradition, its opening would bring the end of the world.”

During the terrorists’ occupation, girls in Timbuktu couldn’t go to school and women had to wear burkas. According to Gwin, one father lost his twelve-year old son to the Islamist army. The young boy was tricked. He thought he would earn a bag of rice for his family by performing “manual labor at the Islamist base in the center of the city.” When the father found out that his child had inadvertently signed up for holy war, he tried to reason with the commander that his son was needed at home. In response the father was told, “You may have his body when he has fulfilled his duty to Allah.”

Tumultuous.

The U.S. Department of State names a number of the threatening operatives that are active in Mali. They include “al-Qaida in the Lands of Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), Ansar al-Dine, the Movement for Oneness and Jihad (MUJAO), and extremists tied to Al-Murabitun.”

Now there’s another group: Emirate of the Sahara. On January 16, 2016, they kidnapped a Christian surgeon and his wife from Burkina Faso—another of the world’s poorest countries. Dr. Ken Elliot and his wife, Jocelyn, moved there forty years ago to provide medical care to those in dire need. The kidnappers were suspected to be transferring the elderly couple, who are in their eighties, across the border and into Mali. Negotiations resulted in the release of Jocelyn on February 6, but little is publicly known about Dr Elliot’s current condition. Needless to say, he remains in great peril.

KellyDeadwood-2016-2Feb-StatueOfLiberty

This month, we Americans look at our history. February–Black History Month–is a time when we think about where we came from and where we are headed. Black or White, Christian, Muslim, or other, how blessed are we to be able to openly pray for an end to evil, violence, oppression, and hatred?

Hot Blacktop Ch. 8 – Twisted Metal

Mature Content. Sienna’s hands shook. She was tired, but she needed to finish this necklace. The silver metal fired orange as Sienna soldered the second medallion to the first. She hadn’t slept well the whole week, and her mind still stuck on Saint’s words as she left him at the Speedway.

Rotating her shoulders, she glanced at the jewelry that lies on a velvet pad, the fruition of a week’s worth of work and worry. The designs were good even if her creative drive came from the ride she’d taken with Saint. All she’d thought about the past week was him. The way he made her feel, the things he said to her, or did, the flowers and short notes that hadn’t stopped since the first. There was no possible way to forget that he wanted her. He didn’t need to continue the romantic barrage, but she secretly loved it. Sienna couldn’t ignore their chemistry any longer. Even now, thinking about him got her stirred up.

Sienna lay the tip of the soldering tool against the short lip where the stone would sit, and dabbed it with solder to hold another petal in place. With everything that had happened between her and Saint since they met, she was glad she could concentrate enough to adapt the designs that blazed through her mind after their ride. Their ‘stargazing’ not at all influencing her mad dash to draw. “Right!” She snorted.

Arriving home that night of the ride, images of new jewelry had been a saving grace. Trying to sleep had been useless, so she holed up in her design studio, to draw the barrage of images for a new jewelry line. The only reason she’d stopped was the sun had peaked over the hillside, washed the landscape with a warm fiery red, and her stomach growled.

She’d rubbed her eyes and stretched her back and stared at the flashes of color and metal on vellum she’d drawn. It was her best work. Sienna took a nap after she ate and jumped in to start sculpting each form at Twisted Metal, her and Meg’s jewelry store. And now it was the end of the week and Sienna was wrapping up the last piece in the series getting ready for the next phase.

Each piece in some way came from the shape and contours of materials on Saint’s bikes, not just the one they rode last weekend, but the many she’d glimpsed in his garage.

The bottom medallion she worked on was a solid piece of silver about .8mm thick, and the top circle was a play on positive and negative space using the wheels of the motorcycle as her example. In the center, a stone of black onyx would sit and rise above what she was calling petals for a more feminine touch, whereas the medallion she had designed for the men’s line was a bit chunkier and would be held by a leather cord, the onyx an inlay instead. It was delicate but strong, with the look and feel of motorcycle wheels.

After the last connection, Sienna stood and lifted her hands high over her head. She arched her back and then returned her arms to the front and then moved them down to clasp behind her back to stretch her shoulder blades.

Megs poked her head in the back her work studio location. “Hey baby-cakes, how goes it?”

“Just finishing up,” Sienna said scanning to see everything ready for finishing work.

Megs walked over. “Fantastic,” she nodded toward the work and crossed her arms. Sienna watched her head angle this way and that. “Damn girl, this is some of your best work!”

Sienna laughed. “Yeah,” is all she said.

“Sales were great today.”

“With the holidays coming on strong, I’m glad to hear it.” Sienna sat down to clean up some tools and got lost in her thoughts.

There was a tap on her shoulder. “Where’d you go?”

“Nowhere good, Megs.”

Sienna’s friend frowned, and her eyes narrowed. “Your dad was a shit!” Sienna laughed with little humor. Megan came around to Sienna’s back and wrapped her arms around Sienna’s shoulders to link them in front, and her cheek rested next to hers. Sienna sighed.

“I love you. You’re my best friend, Sienna.” Megan kissed her on the cheek and then stood up. “Speaking of happy, have you talked to Saint?”

Sienna put her elbows on the table and her head in her hands covering her face but then turned her head toward Megs. “No.” What Sienna wanted to say was that she’d called him and told him to stop sending all his beautiful presents, the flowers, and poems and that it was never going to happen between them. But somewhere in the middle of the week, she’d decided that she would jump into the deep end of her bottomless pool of lust—she’d convinced herself that’s all it was–and, at least, enjoy the sex. But who was she kidding. She was already emotionally involved. She was always emotionally involved. The damn man was under her skin. “I’m going to call him tonight.”

“Oh, really,” Megs dragged out.

Sienna stood up and gathered her purse and jacket, nodded once toward her friend as if she were still trying to convince herself. She reached to turn off the light, but Megs stepped in front of her. “Megs, it’s been a long day and my back is killing me.”

“Want to go to dinner, have a drink?”

Sienna took a deep breath and thought about her comfy bed and the sleep she needed. But she hadn’t spent a lot of time with Megs that week and said instead, “I could eat.”

“Good. Mexican?”

“Sure.”

When they headed out, she came up short. Saint stood in the showroom. She blinked not sure if he was real when her eyes drifted to the other person that stood next to him, what was his name again. Hot Guy No. 2? She could barely remember the night at the club.

She blinked again and turned when Saint strode toward her.

“Hey sweetheart,” he said and leaned over, drawing his lips softly over hers.

“What are you doing here?”

Saint glanced at Megan, she shrugged and walked toward Hot Guy No. 2. The man she recognized but didn’t know looked at Megs like she was a spoonful of the most decadent chocolate mousse he would soon devour. The heat in his eyes, so similar to the way Saint looked at her, was so strong, it made her tingle in all the right places. “Wow!”

Saint chuckled at her barely whispered comment and wrapped an arm around her to pull her close.

“If I weren’t so confident about the way I do it for you, I’d be a little jealous of the way you looked at my friend over there.”

He did that thing again where he kissed her neck, and she shivered. Yeah, Sienna had to concede that Saint really did do it for her.

“You ready to eat, baby?”

“You want to introduce me to Hot Guy No. 2?”

“What did you call him?” he asked with a laugh. But before she could repeat herself he said, “Never mind.” He guided her toward his friend. “Sienna this is Christof Yeager, MOTO Racer Extraordinaire,” he said and bowed with greatt plumage.

Megan giggled.

“Thanks for the intro, my friend. But your bow could be a little deeper,” Christof said with what sounded like a German accent laced with a lot of humor. The man looked back at her with a crooked smile that turned to concern and drawn down eyes glowing a surreal emerald, almost hypnotizing in their beauty. “It’s good to see you’re feeling better, Sienna.”

“Huh?” she stammered. Then Christof smiled, and a lone dimple creased his cheek. Damn he was good looking, she thought and blinked. “That night was awful.” Saint squeezed her closer. She elbowed him so he would give her some space. Christof’s smile grew even bigger as she watched him try and stifle a laugh.

“Ready to go?” Megs asked. Megan had scooted away and was just now coming back toward them with her purse in hand and stood next to Christof. Not too close, she noticed.

Just then Saint’s stomach let out quite a rumble. She looked at him as her eyebrows shot up. “I take it you’re ready to eat.”

“I haven’t eaten since breakfast.” His lip quirked at the corner. “My board track racer had all my attention today, I was supposed to be going over the Paulson Speedway financials, but I was too distracted thinking about a particular female to crunch numbers today. That would have been a total failure. So it was the café bike or nothing.” He kissed her on the nose and guided her toward the front of the shop. She heard Megan speak to Christof in clipped tones, not catching a bit of their conversation. She would have to corner her best friend for the details.

When they arrived at Over the Border, since it was an unusually warm night, they were able to snag seats on the front patio, and soon, each had a margarita with a lip of salt. “Mmm,” she groaned, then sighed.

“That good?” Saint asked.

“Yeah,” is all she said and went back to listening to Saint and Chris, which Saint called him for short, talk about motorcycles and the racing season. She didn’t understand a lot of what was said, but she enjoyed the way Saint’s voice got excited and the way his laugh rippled across her skin.

When their food came, they dug in and by the time she finished her last bite of quesadilla she was stuffed and ready to sleep. Just as she was about to tell Saint that she really needed to get home, she felt an odd tingle at the back of her neck and looked over her shoulder to see what it was that caught her attention, but when she looked around, there wasn’t anyone there.

“What is it?” Saint asked, his demeanor now totally alert.

“Nothing.”

“Your body says the opposite,” Saint returned. “You tightened up all over.”

She hadn’t noticed his arm around her. It felt natural so natural, unlike the times when Layton had shown similar affection.  “I don’t know.” She looked around. The shadows were deep, hiding anything and everything. “It felt like someone was watching me.” She looked up into his eyes and saw that the lines drawn down with worry. “Maybe it’s Danny.” His eyebrows shot up. Now Saint looked around. He squeezed her shoulder.

“He wouldn’t wander this far from home.”

“Who’s Danny,” Megs and Christof said over one another.

Saint explained how he’d met Danny. Concern lit both their faces.

“We’ve got to get him out of that home.” Saint froze next to her. When she turned toward him, he looked down at her. There was a pain in his eyes, and she thought of his sister. But how did the two relate? Christof looked angry. But why? What was wrong with helping the boy? “You said it was bad, Saint. Right? We can help him.”

“Sienna, there are a few things that you don’t know about Danny’s situation. He didn’t react well when you showed up at Paulson’s.” She was going to tell him they could figure out how to help, but then he put her off and said, “I’ll know how to help Danny.” He sighed. “If he doesn’t want help, though, I can’t force it on him.” Her heart hurt for the boy. Saint stroked her cheek, and it made her feel marginally better. “Come on, I’ll take you home.”

Christof and Saint argued over who would pay the bill. Christof won, Saint told her. She relaxed when Saint got her into his truck, the margaritas, and food making her sleepy. She’d left her car at the store, but Megs promised to pick her up in the morning. Though she was smiling, at the time, with a humorous light in her eyes Sienna was very suspicious.

Saint pulled into her driveway, and she turned toward him ready to say goodbye when he reached out and pulled her close. Or as close as the console would allow. His lips danced across hers so softly that she almost didn’t feel it, but she felt it in other places. Her breath caught in her throat as their eyes met in the almost dark. Stars glittered alongside the moon, and Saint’s eyes joined them in their nighttime folly.

Tonight was a turning point. She was going to push off into dark waters, pray they didn’t pull her under and beat her heart to a pulp. Leave her heart out of it, she kept telling herself. But she knew the truth. She wasn’t going into this focused only on lust. No. She liked him. The conversation was good at dinner. He had talked about teaching racing; his face lit up when he spoke of his students and how it felt when their race times decreased. Saint loved teaching. She could see it in his smiles and the pride behind his words.

“Invite me in, Sienna.” She was about to tell him, yes, but he took her words away as his mouth came down on hers. She opened for him giving him everything. She wasn’t sure who groaned first when he pulled away. “Invite me in,” Her breaths came hard and fast and all she could give was a nod. Before she knew it Saint was at her side of the truck, the door open and her in his arms.

“You don’t have to carry me!” He flashed a smile. She leaned back and looked up at the sky, resigned to his Neanderthal ways. She secretly loved it.

They reached the front door, and he set her down, she pulled out her keys and fumbled them as he came up behind her, dropped kisses and swipes of his tongue along her neck. So turned on she could barely get the key in the lock. They practically fell into the house. He lifted her before she took a nose dive and pulled her back to him. His hands at her hips glided up the sides of her torso under her coat and brushed along the outside of her breasts. She leaned back and let him take over.

Coats hit the floor, and Saint moved them toward the stairs. He didn’t stop touching her. Just before they would have reached her room, he grabbed her hips and spun her around his lips coming down on hers. It wasn’t soft. It was feverish and possessive. What had been building between them for the past few weeks exploded in a torrent of motion, fingers splayed, mouths nipped, kisses deep and wild. His tongue joined the foray, and she didn’t disappoint him, tangling hers with as much force as Saint’s. Her lips would bruise. She didn’t care. Sienna grabbed his shirt, forced him to slide across the wall. They bumped past the door jamb and stumbled through the archway, only to catch themselves when they hit the top of the bed.

Both wrestled for the advantage over the other, arms and legs tangled and laughter filled the room until their eyes met and the heat between them flashed and came to life again. Saint grabbed Sienna’s shirt and pulled it up over her head. He groaned because of what she wore. The sheer red shelf bra had been the only thing clean. It wasn’t her favorite because it made her skin a pasty white.

“Holy shit!” Saint licked his lips. Sienna just about had a spontaneous orgasm from the primal look he gave her.

“Saint?”

He didn’t answer. But he responded to her question, his eyes intent on hers until he closed in on a straining nipple. When his tongue darted out and skimmed across her covered taut flesh, once, twice, all she could do was groan his name. Sienna sank her hands into his hair and held on for dear life. His whole mouth covered her breast, and she arched into him. He sucked harder, and couldn’t help but grind her sex into his hard length through their layers of clothing.

She bit her bottom lip to hold in a scream. He continued to torment her other breast, and she said, “Clothes off, clothes off. I need to feel you.”

“Sweetheart, I’m not done playing yet.”

“Please,” she pleaded. Saint took to her other breast again, but when she arched against his mouth, straining to get closer, his hands went to her back, unhooked her bra and she was bare to him, as he drew it down her arms, well, at least, her top half. She was small, and her hands automatically went to cover her breasts, but he grabbed her hands, and she had no time to react, he pressed her hands above her head onto the mattress. Sienna started to shake from the inside out, the walls of her core pulsing to catch up with the blood that pumped so hard through her veins she thought she would pass out from pleasure.

Saint released his grip, but she wanted his mouth back on her breast and grabbed onto his head. He would have none of that. “Leave them, Sienna. I know what you need.”

“But…” He shook his head.

As he started to lick his way down her body, the starting line each breast again, she let him do what he wanted. She never had it so good, not with Layton, not with any of the other men she’d been with, which hadn’t been a lot. Her fingers clawed at the comforter, his tongue circling each nipple in turn but not consuming each again. She needed to hold onto something or she would lose herself. Was that her that mewed like a desperate animal. “Oh, God!”

Saint laughed and he didn’t stop. He came within an inch of her panty line…wait when did he take off her pants. “Ohhhh!” His tongue touched under the lace that lined her panties. “Saint, please! Do something, anything. I need…”

“I’ll get where you need me to go, but in a minute.”

“No!” Her hands came off the bed desperate to get him naked. How quickly she would do that she didn’t know, but he needed to have fewer clothes on. She reached for his zipper.

He flipped her onto her stomach, and Saint’s body covered hers immobilizing her, she let out a frustrated scream, but then he whispered in her ear.

“Baby. Sienna. I’m gonna fuck you so good, you’re gonna sleep for a week. Let me take care of you.”

Something in her seemed to answer his non-question and her body sank into the bed. He must have felt her relax because he took over her pleasure again. His lips kissed a line down her body starting at her neck and didn’t stop until he reached the divots at her lower back. His tongue circled, and his lips kissed, when he moved his fingers down and caressed the top of her butt and slowly drew down her panties that were just as sheer as her bra, his lips never stopped touching her. She was soaking wet, and Saint had no problem letting her know just how wet she was.

“Mmm,” he hummed along her skin. She was going to die. There was so much pleasure, she couldn’t fathom what came next, and he hadn’t even touched her pussy yet. And then he did. With his mouth. He grabbed onto her hips and pulled her up. “On your knees.” It was then she noticed that his voice trembled. He was affected as much as she. Sienna looked over her shoulder, and he came off the bed and fell to his knees on the floor pulling her back to him in the process, and she had a hard time staying up on her knees. But he took control again, their eyes met, and his mouth was right there, her core spasmed. “Ahhh!” He didn’t let up, the sucking, the laps of his tongue, her juices flowing into his mouth. She was going to die from orgasmic pleasure.

“That’s it baby, rock on my mouth.” Sienna didn’t stop. Saint proved he could rock her world with just his tongue, and she came undone. “Come, now!” He whispered, but she heard.

“Saint! Saint!” His name was a litany of thanks as Sienna’s orgasm spiraled up and coiled tighter and tighter until her body splintered apart. The brittle stability of her control exploded outward like the universe had made a new star. She fell to her stomach.

Her hot breath puffed on the comforter, her hair wet and tangled over her eyes. She body felt heavy and sated, and she couldn’t catch up when Saint grabbed her hips and helped her flip over onto her back again. She looked up at him as he towered over her at the end of the bed, his body shadowing hers as he looked down at her. His fingers grabbed the back of his shirt, and he pulled it over his head. Next off, his pants. Her heavy-lidded eyes tracked every muscle as they rippled, every hard line of flesh that her lips would kiss in mere seconds. There was so much to touch and taste that she didn’t know where to start. She went to sit up, but Sienna froze as he took down his boxers, his hard cock a pulsing beacon. He was thick and long and all hers. She wanted him in her mouth, but before she could scoot to the end of the bed and take hold of his hard length, Saint pushed her back down on the bed and crawled up her body and started all over again. When she had had another orgasm, even better than the first one, she thought she wouldn’t survive the night, but Saint made it clear she would make it through the night and into the morning. At some point, Saint had found a condom and rolled it on. He came down on her body but didn’t enter her right away. He took her lips again and managed to glide his sex across her parted labia, and she couldn’t help the groan that came with the easy glide, she was so sensitive she couldn’t help it.

He continued to rock back and forth, slicking himself up. “Sienna, look at me.” When had she closed her eyes? “Sienna, sweetheart?” When he said her name like that followed by the endearment her eyes fluttered open, and that’s when he entered her. She gasped as he filled her in one easy stroke and held himself fully in her. His groan, this time, matched her own and then he started to move. At first, it was a slow easy slide in and out, but soon it wasn’t about taking his time, it was about the pleasure that was consuming them both. She could see it on his face, his jaw in a tight snarl, his eyes burning for her. She knew what it was to feel that much because he had just taken her on the same ride and he was doing it again. When his hips started to slam into her and his face sank into her hair, and his mouth went to her neck, and his teeth opened to grip the spot he liked to kiss, he was more animal than man, letting his body take over, Sienna couldn’t get enough of it. She had never had a man take over her body, as all-consuming as Saint. It was glorious in its light.

And it was light. She was out of the dark. Saint had brought her out of the dark she’d been trapped in for too long. But as her mind spun she got lost in her fear. Did he really want her or was he using her for his pleasure? Saint must have felt the change in her because his mouth came off her and he lifted his head and looked down into her eyes. There was too much there, in his stare, and she tried to shut him out, but Saint held her chin in his fingers, the fierce gaze he set on her never leaving her, forcing her to match his stare. A tear spilled over onto her cheek, and he caught it with a finger and started to move again. It was slow, in and out, his focus never leaving her, with each heated press of his hips meeting hers she became lost to him. Soon, too soon, her orgasm was just out of reach again, the walls of her core dancing with each thrust from Saint. His length surged deep inside her over and over, the kinetic energy between them almost a wild thing now. Flesh against flesh, the grunts that came from him and Sienna, the slick skin under her fingers, the only thing that existed in her world was this man inside her.

“Are you ready to come for me again?”

She nodded, but her mind screamed that she needed to hold on longer, her head moved back and forth now. This might be the last time they would be together. People didn’t stay around to be a part of Sienna’s life. she wasn’t worth the time. Saint would leave.

“No Sienna,” he grunted on another push and a groan followed as her inner walls gripped him so hard that Sienna thought she would have lost it, but somehow she pulled it back, waiting for Saint, his voice somehow grounding her. “I want to hear you say it aloud. Say it,” he finished as he gritted his teeth.

“Yes, I’m ready to come,” the words a breathy entreaty that thickened the air in the room. “Make me come, Saint. Make me come.” When the words ended, Saint gripped her hips and lifted them to bring her closer. He slammed into her harder than she thought possible and that’s all it took. He held tight to her hips and ground down on her pussy making her clit flair, hot, cold, she didn’t know. She went off the edge of the precipice she had been hanging on and fell. Her backed arched and Saint held her tight, grinding against her taut nub when his cock started to pulse inside her, his roar, one of satisfaction and that of a conqueror.

They panted in time with one another when Saint came down on her rolling them both to their sides. He wrapped his arms around her, and she felt safe for the first time in her life. But could she trust the feelings he brought to her. Could she trust him? She shook her head.

“You okay?”

She burrowed into the pillow making it seem like that’s what she’d been doing in the first place. Sienna didn’t want to answer because she didn’t know if she was or would ever be alright again.

Saint pulled away and got up to take care of the condom. “Sienna, baby?” he asked once beside her again.

Still she didn’t speak.

He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close. He kissed her at the base of her neck where his teeth had gripped and controlled her. Silent tears ran hot down her cheeks and she shivered in fear of what came next?

 

Chutes and Ladders—Plotting for ages 3-100

gameGames teach the mechanics of plot. A player begins Chutes and Ladders on a path with some ladders up and some chutes down. The sequence of action and consequence is plot, pure and simple.

Same Game Different Century

The Milton Bradley game comes from an ancient Indian game called Snakes and Ladders. In Moksha Patam, the game follows Hindu philosophy and morality lessons with few ladders for virtues and many snakes for vices. Salman Rushdie wrote in Midnight’s Children about the game as “the eternal truth that for every ladder you hope to climb, a snake is waiting just around the corner, and for every snake a ladder will compensate.”

Mastering the Game

Snakes are consequences for vices such as disobedience, vanity, vulgarity, theft, lying, drunkenness, debt, murder rage, greed, pride and lust. These plot elements sound like the playbook for Netflix’s House of Cards. In the television series, plot twists are the norm, and consequences rarely weigh on the characters’ decision to act. Character development and flaw emerge as the driving force for plot (see Plotting for the Flaw). In House of Cards, each character’s manipulation, deception and corruption goes without consequence, until the proverbial house of cards tumbles to the ground.

The Parallel Plot Game

Beyond the character contributions to plot, the game board offers second attempts and alternate possibilities—both forms of parallel plots. For example, every child playing this game, has counted the spaces to the next ladder and hoped to roll that exact number. Often, the die indicates a number short of the goal, and the outcome of the game changes. When I missed a ladder, or even worse when I landed on the long slide back to the beginning, I thought what if . . .  what if . . . I had rolled one space more.

The What If Game

The movie, Sliding Doors, is the one space more plot. The film shows two alternate realities based on either catching a train or missing it. Children’s books, such as Goosebumps by R. L. Stine, try this format with choosing different outcomes by flipping a coin, but the choice is one or the other. Sliding Doors shows both outcomes at the same time, jumping between each version in a confusing medley of scenes from the beginning of the film until the ending. As with other parallel plots, the emotional highs and lows are braided and mirrored with the two plot lines (see Paula Picked a Plighted Path . . .). With characters in common, the two plot lines—although parallel and in alternate realities—occasionally trip over each other in theme and traipse into the same settings at even the same times. While this film’s structure rates high for creativity, the challenge is how to bring two stories spiraling in different directions back together at the end. In this film, the solution is a similar event in the same setting with alternate outcomes—life or death. Another example of alternate realities is Maybe in Another Life by Taylor Jenkins Reid which shows alternating chapters of the protagonist’s choices.

The “Back to Square One” Game

In the “back to square one” scenario, a player is trapped and stuck in a repetitive loop of one ladder and one chute. What happens the second time around? The same events? Different? In the movie Groundhog Day, this different perspective occurs and reoccurs as a form of parallel plots. The protagonist tests the limits of his actions (vices) in a seemingly endless cycle of romantic comedy consequences of the “boy loses girl” variety. Eventually, the character decides to use his recycled groundhog days to improve his behavior (virtues), and the character arc takes him to the romantic comedy conclusion of “boy gets girl.”

The Next Generation’s Game

My basement is fertile ground for role playing games such as Grand Theft Auto. In GTA IV, the gamer chooses one of three characters, one of three parallel plots. Video games intensify the game playing experience of previous generations. Readers from this generation will expect parallel plots and creative structures beyond the basics of story.

Story Starters, Part 3

“Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those who do not write, compose, or paint can manage to escape the madness, melancholia, the panic and fear which is inherent in a human situation.”–Graham Greene

Have you ever found yourself with the wrong friends? A fur hunter in the 1800s was severely injured after a bear attack. Because one of his hunting companions didn’t want to be burdened with continuing to drag the dying man through the brutally cold, uncharted wilderness, he buried the wounded man alive. Wrong companions, riveting adventure. The Revenant is based on a true story of perseverance.

What if you felt that you were born in the wrong body? In the early 20th century, artist Einar Wegener was married to Gerda when he began to realize that he was a woman in a man’s body. With the love and encouragement of his wife, he eventually sought gender re-identification surgery to become Lili Elbe. Wrong body, passionate love story. The movie, The Danish Girl, is loosely based on a true story.

Have you ever found yourself in the wrong place at the wrong time? The nine year old son of a Nazi commandant living near a Jewish internment camp approaches the camp’s wire fence and befriends an imprisoned boy his age. Eventually the Nazi’s naive son crawls under the fence to join his new friend in finding the boy’s lost mother. Wrong place, wrong time, heartbreaking fictional story. The first draft of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas was written by John Boyne in two and a half days.

What would you do if you felt an attraction to someone of your same gender? Carol, an older, soon-to-be divorced mother of one daughter, is attracted to Therese, a young salesclerk and aspiring photographer. A developing romance between the two women in the early 1950s showed the harsh consequences of their love affair. Wrong time, strained relationship. The movie, Carol, is a story based on the novel, The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith.

Have you ever questioned the word of authorities? A Nigerian forensic pathologist’s research on severe brain injuries or chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) causes an uproar in the world of American football. The National Football League questions his findings as Dr. Bennet Omalu questions the NFL’s lack of concern for its players’ wellbeing. Wrong concerns, on-going controversy. The movie, Concussion, is a true story based on the research of Dr. Bennet Omalu.

Consider now what you see as the wrong company, physique, location, relationship, focus, or any other wrong that you see in the human condition. As a writer, you can analyze, portray, or correct what you see as wrong. Don’t just think about it. Write about it. Are you game?