Girl on the Net

The next chapter of this story happens when I’m probably in the middle of a breakdown. Perhaps it’s the way my life has been lately – an agony of paranoia and mistrust – that’s causing me to make some dodgy decisions. But this particular decision led to something good, I think. As helpful as it can be to hear ‘I love you’ in times of hardship, ‘I trust you’ healed my heart right now.

We’re naked together, he and I. His body’s warm and soft beneath me, his cock’s hot and hard in my hand. He kisses with gentleness, but holds me in a way that seems urgent, as if the yearning I feel for him is matched inside his own heart, beat for beat.

“You taste so good,” I tell him.

He says, “same.”

He tastes the way I remember, my Big Ex. He smells deliciously like he used to as well. We tesselate neatly, he and I. We may be rusty after four years apart, but our love carved deep lines into each of us: we’ve not forgotten how well the pair of us fuck.

This familiarity and comfort will always be hotter to me than novelty. This shared understanding that feels like reading minds, but is really just experience. Years and years of practice till you know exactly when and where to apply precise touches. Specific words. All the little details that will make someone shudder and come.

I am having a breakdown, I should make that perfectly clear. When my mental health collapses or my life somehow implodes, occasionally I let all the protective barriers fall to pieces along with my heart. Right now I’m ignoring the rules that tell me I should not do this or that, and embracing instead the idea that – fuck it – I want to. Better that, I think, than let restraint drag me into self-hating darkness. In the absence of anyone to stop me, and the pulsing background desire to do something far far worse, I allow myself to make questionable decisions: I start smoking again, I take pills to help me sleep, I stop eating proper food. I go for drinks with my Big Ex, whose wit and playfulness reminds me of things I’d been missing. I’m yearning for the comfort of someone I can rely on – after many months of deception, I crave trust.

I don’t know any of this when I set out that afternoon to meet him, but I realise it later – in bed with this man I can trust. A guy who hurt me, sure, but who always told the truth.

I swore not to have sex with him – remember that? I promised myself and my friends that we would not shag. Forgetting, of course, that the true danger comes not from sex, which is easy and cheap, but from comfort.

Familiarity.

Connection.

The conversation we had flowed so freely I barely noticed when each of us finished our drinks. The chapters in our lives that had been written in the last four years made a fun, meandering duet. Passing the flow of conversation back and forth to ask about this or that relative, or hobby, or friend.

He has kind eyes, my Big Ex. Kind eyes, beautiful hands, incredible chat and jokes – fuck, jokes! We lament past dates with people who don’t understand the importance of a punchline. Neither of us realise that it’s started pouring rain.

We go back to his place for food.

I’m having a breakdown.

His flat is the same as it always was, with a few new toys to play with. An extra rug, the odd scented candle, fresh notes on the whiteboard. But otherwise it – like him – is exactly the same. Am I the same, too? I can’t be. I have three new tats and a lot more trauma, for a start. He might be the same but surely I have changed?

My phone automatically connects to the wifi.

I’m having a breakdown.

I’m adamant that we won’t be having sex, but it turns out sex is not the danger.

We order food, and while it’s waiting we make drinks. I stand a little too close to him in the kitchen – because the space is small or I’m trying to get more of his sexy, familiar scent, or both. When he turns to grab a glass, he’s suddenly within touching distance. Looking down at me with kind eyes and that playful smile and a decade of familiar, nostalgic comfort.

Restraint shatters into atoms, and we hug.

I’m having a breakdown.

We keep hugging. His arms around me and mine round him, my face buried in his shoulder and his in my hair. We press our bodies together, firm but never oppressive. On and on and on, until we’ve lost all sense of time. We tesselate. We hold. We each try not to have

I’m having one.

a breakdown.

Now we’re naked together in bed, as we’ve not been for almost four years. I want him inside me so badly I’m weak at the thought. I am no longer worried about the fallout from fucking him – that danger has long since been eclipsed by the far-more-powerful hug.

If there was a desire I should have denied myself, that hug was it. But we’re beyond it now. We’ve held each other, we’ve kissed, we’ve laughed and laughed and laughed in ways I have not laughed with another man since… well, since him. The ache for connection is sated, the peril has long since been literally embraced, so why bother denying ourselves the pleasure of a fun, familiar fuck?

I want to climb up on top of him, straddle his cock, let myself take the full length inside me. Give in to the need to come round it, hard, as he calls me ‘good girl’ like he used to.

Do we trust each other to do this? Can I trust myself to do this?

Later this weekend, he’ll offer to help me with something deeply personal. A thing I’ve only ever let two people touch in my life: this website. As I hand him the reins he’ll check in. Gently. Like establishing consent with a nervous lover, he’ll ask me:

“Are you sure?”

And the tone of his voice will resonate with sincerity – with the weight of this responsibility – so I’ll reply, immediately:

“Yes. I trust you.”

We’re naked together, he and I, and I’m definitely having a breakdown. But in that moment I remember that one good thing about breaking apart is you’re meant to be kind to yourself while it’s happening. What greater kindness could I give myself than the pleasure of falling into this man’s welcoming arms? Of letting myself grip him with my thighs and kiss him with eager lips? Let my aching wet cunt envelop his perfect dick…

I roll on top, and we kiss some more. I feel his cock pulse against my thigh and I am so eager to slip it straight inside me. But breakdown or not, I’m a cautious soul, so I ask if he has any condoms.

Or if…

…perhaps…

…we could…?

He doesn’t look shocked when I nudge at the topic of bareback – he knows me too well. Just whispers that he has all his tests. I tell him “same,” and then ask if he wants to see mine.

He grins. We kiss.

“I trust you.”

“Same.”

You want porn here, some of you, and I get that. I’ll write that part later if I can, but for now I wanted to capture the trust. The power of remembering what it feels like.

Perhaps it’s irresponsible of me to write this. The comfort and familiarity is just one side of our story, after all, and it’s one I’ll never share in its entirety. But fuck it, I’m being kind enough to let myself take a brief holiday in the past. Slip into the hot tub of these warm, soft feelings. After months spent struggling to untangle what was real from what wasn’t, this unflinching trust felt incalculably precious.

Healing.

When we hug goodbye on Sunday (a farewell that turns into brunch and then drinks… then a spliff and… oh fuck it why not hop back into bed for a cuddle), I check in to see how he’s feeling.

“You OK?”

“Yes, you?”

“Same.”

I didn’t expect to be OK, but I’m pretty sure I am. The guy who deceived me only succeeded because he convinced me that I was untrustworthy. That I should question my own feelings and memories before I ever looked outside for the truth. So being held by someone who extended the trust I deserve felt powerfully good, and the fact that he gave it so freely helped me to heal. Perhaps I trust myself a bit more than I did at the start of that weekend.

So when we hug on Sunday morning – that not-quite-goodbye that turns into one more precious day – I ask my Big Ex the ever-burning question:

“Can I write about this?”

A pause, but it’s a short one, and I hope you can guess what he said.

A ‘yes’ followed swiftly by:

“I trust you.”

NHS mental health crisis support, if you’re having a breakdown as well.