supplicium post mortem

m4w – 46 – MOMA Lobby

Yesterday, 11 AM, you leaned against the wall of the MOMA lobby, breaking the spine of a paperback book as you held it with two hands and read it, scowling. You wore a gray skirt that fell just above the knee, your calves bare and sexy-as-hell, a black top zipped up the front, and, incredibly, gray ankle socks with black oxfords that seemed lost outside the schoolroom. I would have been happy to flip up that skirt and learn more – if it doesn’t brand me a pervert to say so.

You consulted your wrist-watch eleven times in seven minutes, your scowl giving way to an expression that struck me as bereft. I felt you needed a hug, possibly several. Your party was late, your mobile phone unhelpful. You chewed the inside of your mouth and tried in vain to read. Who would stand up someone as adorable as you, miss? You wore no makeup, your hair careless and natural; the way you bore your disappointment showed you’ve no idea how attractive you are.

When you sank to the floor and put your head in your hands, I lost my self-control and asked if you had the time. You answered in a voice too confident for the red eyes. You look like you could use some diversion, from the paperback, the rotten dates, the confident voice. What about a walk in the park with me? In the Rambles, you don’t have to pretend.

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This is the last week of Midweek Missed Connections! Thanks to everyone who joined in over the last 12 weeks, in particular PapaTomLA, who made so much hay from real Craigs List adverts.  What is Midweek Missed Connections?

Read other missed connections this week:

• PapaTomLA

Welcome to the last week of Midweek Missed Connections.Twelve seems to be a good number, so this will be the last week of the Midweek Missed Connections challenge. Hope you enjoyed it. If you never got to give it a whirl, this is the moment! Optional setting this week: the lobby

What is MMC? Finish anytime Wednesday and post the link here or on Twitter (@caseydamnmorgan). Spread the word and have fun!

Life can be so routine that you imagine nothing will ever happen. Six o’clock, evening commute, people funneling out of the subway, alongside the health-food store, back to their apartments. Me, going roundie-mcblock with the dogs; you, emerging from the train. We exchanged glances as one does with a thousand strangers in this town. A mere detail in the unchanging monotony of too-slow life.

What stood out was your Aran sweater. It’s September, and no one’s wearing sweaters yet. I’ve always liked woolen sweaters on tall men, the way they sit upon a broad, flat chest. You were tall, slim but not lanky. You noticed my wolfhound, then me. We exchanged an almost-smile, the shy grimace of urban passings. Your sweater had already entranced me, making my mind pucker – like lemon, salt, and tequila to a mouth – at the bizarre sight of those leather elbow pads sewn into it.

Rounding the corner amidst hipsters and their phones, I imagined how it might feel to be across your knee. No role suggested itself, curiously, just the palpable urge to be held quite firmly by someone tall and fit, your woolen sleeve across my waist, a foretaste of rock-solidness. I imagined how your bear hug might feel. Does it show, how very hug-deprived I am? Last night I remembered the safety and satisfaction of sinking into bed with my husband. Rock-solidness now a dream, recalled by you and your sweater in the corridor of a nondescript evening commute.

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Come write your own missed connection – real or fantasy, who will know? Post the link today (Wednesday) here or on Twitter (@caseydamnmorgan). What is Midweek Missed Connections?

Read other missed connections this week:

• Jessica wrote a post today which described an awesome midweek missed connection, though I’m sure she wasn’t attempting this challenge.
• PapaTomLA

Welcome to Midweek Missed Connections! Optional setting this week: the corridor

What is MMC? Finish anytime Wednesday and post the link here or on Twitter (@caseydamnmorgan). Spread the word and have fun!

Did I see you at the pump yesterday, out of the corner of my eye? Your red Music Man t-shirt: “Trouble.” Your beat-up cargo shorts? How could I be sure, as I clenched the nozzle, that you wouldn’t emerge from the store bearing cheetoes and a cup of coffee, thick as oil?

I’ve pumped up seven bike tires, four inflatable mattresses, seventeen gas tanks. I’ve grown used to doing the driving, all of it, all the time. I’m used to walking the dogs, month in and out. I can handle all the chores, the garden, the grilling. I found the drill. I’ve grown used to having the bed to myself even if I still keep to my side. I’ve grown used to our rings on my right hand where they don’t belong. I don’t want to be used to any of it.

The footsteps in the hall yesterday sounded like yours. Even the dogs stood up to listen. They, too, wanted you to walk through the door. They wanted you to put down your backpack and your Post, lock the door, and say Daddy’s home.

Your shoes are waiting. Your shaving foam is waiting. Your bedside drawer is waiting. Even your dirty laundry is waiting.

He sounds like you now, my stepson, more every day. He jokes like you, reasons like you, inflects, strides, and dresses like you. He isn’t you.

I’m not me, either, but I’m living our life. Didn’t I see you yesterday, at the pump, beyond reach?

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Dear me, sorry. And I was all ready to write a fun, sexy one full of lust for a hot young man! Then this happened. Oh, well, caveat lector.

Come write your own missed connection – real or fantasy, who will know? Post the link today (Wednesday) here or on Twitter (@caseydamnmorgan). What is Midweek Missed Connections?

Read other missed connections this week:

• PapaTomLA

Welcome to Midweek Missed Connections! Optional setting this week: the pump

What is MMC? Finish anytime Wednesday and post the link here or on Twitter (@caseydamnmorgan). Spread the word and have fun!

I keep thinking of your face in the rain. Dripping, mud-streaked, flushed on the rugger pitch. Do you remember my hand in the scrum, that afternoon just before I charged you and wound up in the San with my arm in a sling? Everyone knows what goes on when the ref’s not looking, but I’ve always wondered if you knew it was me. I remember how your cock felt inside your shorts. I haven’t been able to stop thinking of it since.

Who was the one to show you what cocks are for? As our changing rooms are worlds apart, you never got to appraise mine. One doesn’t like to boast, but it’s worthwhile I’m told. Some rather incendiary reading material has come my way of late. I can’t seem to stop thinking of it, and you, and what would happen if the two were combined.

I watched you and Rees the afternoon before that night, though you didn’t know it. I still can’t believe it – not what you did, but that you did it with him. I never got to ask you what you saw in him. He’s such a dreary cold shower. The perverseness of it (if you’ll forgive my choice of words) has, since then, driven me slightly mad.

I want to forget your body when they carried you back that morning. I want to forget everything about you. It’s hopeless when I’m asleep, like now. Dreams are the most unforgiving of traitors.

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Come write your own missed connection – real or fantasy, who will know? Post the link today (Wednesday) here or on Twitter (@caseydamnmorgan). What is Midweek Missed Connections?

Read other missed connections this week:

• PapaTomLA

Welcome to Midweek Missed Connections! Optional setting this week: the rain

What is MMC? Finish anytime Wednesday and post the link here or on Twitter (@caseydamnmorgan). Spread the word and have fun!

Welcome to Midweek Missed Connections! Optional setting this week: the museum

What is MMC? Finish anytime Wednesday and post the link here or on Twitter (@caseydamnmorgan). Spread the word and have fun!

w4m – 26/40 – Pen-y-ghent

You pulled me up the last 10 feet of Pen-y-ghent. Me: crazy old rucksack, purple pullover, braids. Weather was closing in, and lots of people were trying to get to the top. The rocks were slippery, and everyone was helping the person behind them. I’m not sure if you remember. It was 14 years ago.

I’ve changed, but not that much. The guy I was with – I married him. I’m widowed now. I remember your lean, suntanned legs, your Irish sweater rolled up to the elbows, and the way your arse looked in those shorts. We talked about you on the way down, discussing what we’d like to see you get. He voted for the cane, as usual, but I rather fancied seeing you grit your teeth over the birching block.

Your weather-blown strawberry blond hair made your eyes look like they were laughing. I can still feel your grip as you hauled me up, rucksack and all. What is it about feeling a man’s strength that raises the pulse, even more than a steep climb in the teeth of a downpour? When I topped that crag, you pulled me into you. Our eyes locked, you grinned, and I thought you would kiss me. All I said was, Thanks. You said, Sure, cheers. I haven’t thought of that day until now. Fourteen years – lifetime – no time. I rather fancy being hauled up something again.

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Come write your own missed connection – real or fantasy, who will know? Post the link today (Wednesday) here or on Twitter (@caseydamnmorgan). What is Midweek Missed Connections?

Read other missed connections this week:

• PapaTomLA