Page 70 of Forbidden Fruit
My ex-wife is back and I’ve never been so depressed. I don’t even know where to start to bring back light into my life. Even Vanessa’s isn’t enough to help me. Not that it was ever fair to ask her to do that for me. To be my ever guiding light, my beacon in the dark. I wanted her to be so much. Now, I’ll just bring her down with me.
Monica will use anything against me, I just know it. The way she first told me she wanted to sleep with other people, then how she left never to return for eight months. There are only so many reasons she’ll be crawling back now.
The fear of losing the best thing I have in this life, of losing my children, freezes me to the bed, and adds to the heavy weight of my pain. Every movement is sluggish and costs me.
I don’t even know why I’m like this. It started in high school, where dark thoughts like a blanket invaded my brain and the most simple tasks seemed like climbing Mount Everest. It never abated, but I learnt to live with it. To ignore it. To repress it.
When I thought I found a life partner, I first did everything I could to hide it. Then when I thought she could help me carry the burden, she made me feel shame and disgust that coats my skin even now. But Monica was right. I’m unfit to be a father, tooweak to care for them, too soft to give them what they need. I don’t deserve them.
I don’t deserveher. But she keeps basking me in the rays of her sunlight.
“Lino,” Vanessa calls out for me, but I don’t turn. “Lino,please, look at me.” I could never resist her sweet begging. It takes a tremendous effort, but I will my body to obey and turn to face her, looking down at where our hands link towards our stomachs. She’s a magnet I can’t help but be drawn to; my selfishness truly knows no bound.
Her soft hand lifts my chin so I can meet her eyes. Her irises are dark in the low light of the room, but they’re filled with love. I can’t look away.
“You’re not unfit or weak or unlovable, or anything that vile woman ever said to you.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there to defend you,” I tell her. When I heard Monica, it was like everything she ever said to me came flooding back and drowned me. How Vanessa stays with me after I’m so incapable is beyond me.
“Don’t be. I can defend myself. I’ve met bigger monsters.” She smiles sadly. “I love you and I will be there for you, whatever you need. But you are depressed. I’m not a doctor, so I don’t know anything except what I read online. You need better help that I can provide.”
I cling to her, burrowing my head into her chest. “You’re all I need.”
“As sweet as the words are, you know that’s not true,” she says, and I feel her conviction all the way to the marrow of my bones. And I know she’s right, I just don’t know where to start. Why would now be any different? “You need professional help, someone you can talk to who can give you perspective, to untangle how you feel. Me and the children won’t go anywhere. But you need to do this for yourself,andfor us.”
My throat clogs and a visceral need to escape takes hold of me, but I refuse to let it. I nod and kiss my girl, pouring all my gratefulness into it.
The strange thing about depression is that it’s so invisible, it can look like it’s absent. And it comes and goes as it wishes, leaving behind the anxious wait for its return. Especially as I grow harder against Vanessa when she climbs on top of me, settling her hips over my groin. I could almost believe I dreamt the whole morning.
“Stay with me,” Vanessa whispers against my lips as she moves her hips, bringing me back to the present moment and to her. She’s all I see and I cling to the vision of her perfect face hovering over me and hiding us between the curtains of her long chestnut hair.
“Let me be inside you,u mo sole. Let me show you how grateful I am for you,” I plead with a strained groan.
She pulls her dress over her head, her bra and panties the only thing separating our skins. With deft fingers, she draws down my pyjama pants just enough to free my cock and slides her panties to the side. She straddles me and moves me inside her slowly, letting us take our time. I remain still and let her take what she needs from me. As she grinds her clit against my pelvis, pleasure shoots up my spine. My body doesn’t allow my mind to take over and back to that dark place;shedoesn’t allow it. I focus on her, my thumb gliding against her wet clit in the pattern she loves so much.
I throw my head back and close my eyes in bliss, but Vanessa takes hold of my hair at the top of my head and pulls me back to look at her again. My eyes fly open and my mouth stays slack in awe.
“Stay with me,” she repeats. Love bleeds through her body and I obey, letting her guide us to our peak. With the steady rhythm of her hips moving back and forth, and the warmwetness coating my shaft, I come in bursts, my eyes never straying from the goddess on top of me. I drink in her cries of pleasure and let them drown the sorrow in my soul. For a moment, she’s all I can think about, all I can see, taste and feel, and it’s glorious.
The high is intense and I’m grateful for it. Yet I know it's a bandage. And I need to take care of the source. I caress her cheeks when she comes down from her orgasm. “You deserve so much better.”
Her answer is immediate, coming from deep within her soul, leaving no space for discussion. “I deserve to be a good partner to the man I love, who would do exactly the same for me,” she proclaims.
She gets up and opens the curtains without another word. I groan like Dracula caught in the light, and Vanessa's soft laugh echoes through the walls of the room, darkness receding ever so slightly in her presence. “Let’s get you showered, my love.”
The nickname is new, and my cheeks taint with a blush.
“You’re adorable when you pout.” She smirks, levity building in my chest once more at her teasing.
“I’m not pouting and I’m not adorable,” I grumble more to have her tease me some more than because I think she’s wrong.
She rolls her eyes and walks to the en-suite, discarding her underwear, my cum sliding down her inner thighs in the most primally pleasing way. I can’t get enough of that view and if I want to see it for the rest of my life, I have to seek help beyond simply ignoring my issues.
When I enter the shower, Vanessa holds out her hand and I frown. The warm water sluices down her breasts and I follow a drop that falls to her navel before it dips down to the curls at the apex of her thighs.
We don’t talk, and she has me sit on the small bench. She lathers my skin with soap, then washes my hair, her fingersmassaging my scalp in delicious circles. I clench my teeth hard not to cry, but once again, she reads me like I’m her favourite book.
Our gazes meet, hers shining with unbound adoration, mine, uncertain but hopeful. Tears I didn’t know I could release fall to my cheeks.