Page 17 of The Spiral
Chapter 7
Jack
My dick throbs. It throbs with the proximity of her, the smell of her, and the taste of her. It doesn’t matter that I haven’t kissed her, or that I’ve held back from doing so. It also doesn’t matter that I’ve gone out of my way to say her name repeatedly, trying to dismiss Selma from my mind. None of it has worked. She is Selma. Everything about her. The way she smiles, the way she groans, the way she grips me, and even the way she frowns and berates, not knowing she is doing it.
She’s still doing it now as we near Atlanta.
She’s frowned most of the journey and stayed quiet, occasionally trying to pull her soiled skirt further down her legs as she drives the car just as Selma did.
“Where do you live?” I ask.
She doesn’t answer, just reaches over and taps the address into the GPS then sits back again and looks out of the window, ignoring me. I sneer at her attempt to pretend this isn’t happening, annoyed by her denial. She has no reason to be in denial about wanting to fuck. She’s following human nature’s natural process. It’s inevitable.
I stare over at her lips, watching them mould themselves up into a knowing grin, one that reminds me of Selma’s coy glances after we’d snuck out somewhere.
“If it makes you feel any better, we could pull over and get the fucking out of the way.” She twitches her lips, reminding me of Selma even more.
“I’m not available for only that,” she counters, still gazing outside. “And as you say, you’re not available for anything other than that, are you, Jack?”
I look back at the road, irritation biting into every part of me at the thought of not being able to touch her again.
“What if I was?” She turns back slowly, a coy glance at my mouth before she turns to look at the destination again. “Something more ongoing.”
I glower at my own words, considering what the hell I’m doing. This isn’t real. She isn’t Selma. She’s just a woman who looks like her, walks like her, even talks like her, and apparently drives like her, but I can’t rid myself of the desire to lie in her arms and remember a life before this one. “I’d like to see you again.”
“Would you?” she replies, looking shocked.
“Mmm. See how much dirtier than mildly grubby we can get you.”
“Because I’m not grubby enough already,” she says, snickering and brushing at her skirt.
“Not nearly enough, Madeline,” I reply as we drive into suburban back streets. “But I want an honest answer to something first.”
“Hmm?”
“Who did that to your face?” She immediately turns her body back to upright and looks out of the window again, clamping her mouth closed as she does. “I don’t care, but I do want the truth either way. It’s what I’ll want from this arrangement. Truth.”
“Arrangement?”
“Yes. Arrangement.” She nods a little, nothing more, and then clamps her mouth closed, effectively trying to end the conversation. “That’s all I can offer, Madeline.”
“Right.”
Dread fills me as I watch her face disengage, but my statement isn’t about her, it’s about me. It’s the only way I can see this working because desperate as I am to see her again, there has to be a way of separating Selma from Madeline. Dirty and rough is the only way I can think of. Making love to my dead wife isn’t on the fucking cards. It can’t be.
I’m so engrossed in looking at her I nearly miss the brake lights in front of me, as the car comes screeching to a halt. I’m about to get out and shout at the idiot when I notice others getting out of their cars, too, all looking upwards.
“What the hell?” I hear her say, as her door opens. She gets out and begins walking away, stripping her feet of her shoes as she does to hurry her pace. I get out, and instantly notice the vast plume of black smoke billowing out into the sky from the next street over. “That’s on my street. That could be my house.”
I race after her as she takes off along the pavement away from the smoke, her skirt hitched up above her knees. And a short distance later, I catch up with her as she rounds to the left, careering into me and picking up her pace again as she keeps looking upwards.
“Shit, that’s… Oh my god!”
I’ve never seen a woman run so fast. She sprints round to the right, hitching her skirt higher and letting her shoes go behind her. “CALLIE!” she calls, her feet furiously chasing the ground as we near the house alight with flames. I grab at her, stopping her from going onto the front lawn and yanking her back to me. “CALLIE!” she screams again. Black smoke plumes into the air, choking us of oxygen as I try to pull her struggling frame away from the building. She screams again as heat assaults us from every angle, sparks jumping from the flames. I tug her more forcefully, pulling her back into the crowd of people that have come for the show. “CALLIE!” She pushes at me. “Get the hell off me,” she spits, fighting in my arms and twisting her body to kick out at me. “My friend’s in there. Get off me.”
“Madeline, you can’t—” She slaps out at me again, her arms flailing and shoving for all she’s worth. “Look at the fucking thing,” I snap, shaking her body to get her back to reality. It doesn’t stop her, and now her eyes are streaming with tears of frustration, too.
“CALLIE! CALLIE!” she calls over and over again.