“Calm down, Gandhi. Then what happened?”
Tristan chuckled and continued to tell me how she once again ended up on the news. “I didn’t join them that first evening. Not until after I’d spent the evening alone in Marcie’s old bedroom and did my own homework. Monsanto became my new mission, and I wanted to be a part of bringing them down. Only they’re still not down. They’re controlling our food more and more, and nobody even knows about it.”
“Except for me and all the people you tell.”
Tristan smiled again, moving her hand below mine on her stomach. “Yes, but I got to tell a lot more people.”
“And you will. I’m sure of it. Keep going. Then what happened?”
“I made a lot of friends that weekend, and for the first time, I got it. This was the protest my dad spoke of. We weren’t resisting and that threw them off. Even when the authorities wanted us to, we didn’t. We smiled at them, silently sending them love with warm eyes. Most of them were cool, and a couple of them even pulled some of them back, trying to keep the peace, but that’s not what they wanted. They wanted the resistance, but we didn’t give them the kind they wanted. Nobody was angry, they just wanted naturally grown food with the natural resources Mother Nature blessed us with, not genetically modified in a lab and prepared in a factory.”
“These things are not what you think they are. I’m not saying all of them, but a lot of them are provoked by a plan. A publicity stunt so it’ll make the news. This one was that. I’m sure of it. Big companies twist it around, make the protesters out to be the bad guy. They get to do that because they get to control what you see on television. Not you. They can twist it anyway they want and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it. Thank God the Internet is watched more than the news. People are finding things out now. Anyway. Instead of going to this ridiculous wedding, I held a sign that said peace begins with clean food. I sat between a girl named Bobbi and a guy named Henry. He had the most amazing dreadlocks I’d ever seen and he smelled like rain.”
“Yeah, yeah, enough about rain man,” I teased, a simple kiss to the tip of her nose.
That got a loud gut laugh and a stir from Baby-T “Shhh, you made me scare our baby. You’re so jealous.”
Of course that didn’t go unnoticed and I wanted to elaborate on it more, but I wanted to hear the rest of this story first. I loved learning about her past, where she’d come from, how she got here, and who she was, but I also wanted to know if I had a reason to be jealous. It couldn’t be helped. There was always an easy to find thought, wondering where Baby-T had come from, too. Would I run into him, would she tell him, did he even know, would she want him? I’m not going to lie, it frightened the hell out of me. “And then what?”
“I stood back and listened while another car full of cops came, all pumped up on adrenaline, probably from a conniving pep-talk they’d just been given about how we were rioting and obstructing justice. I swear we weren’t doing anything, nothing. No chanting, no marching, nothing. Henry had even struck up a conversation with one of the cops and a few more had gathered. We were getting somewhere. Not only did they stand there and listen to the spiel about a subject they didn’t even know about. The one actually admitted that he thought he was there because we were protesting the stock shares, not the company. That’s what they were told. Of course they believed it. Why wouldn’t they? The news with the sweet old man who they trusted every night at six would tell them the same thing. Ugh.”
“Anyway, we were happily protesting, feeling grateful, and joyful that we were all able to come together and spread a little love along with the truth. That’s when three cop cars pulled up out of nowhere, armed with shields and pepper spray. Don’t ever breathe that stuff. It’s horrible. I thought I was going to die. I’m not saying all cops are bad, but I am saying some of them are just like my mom and Hillary Clinton.”
“What do you mean?”
“Sometimes people get involved with something they think will give them the opportunity to help other people and support change, but it ends up changing them. My mom wasn’t always Vanna Wise. She used to be Savanna Swan, a mommy, a wife, a morning host with her own radio show, a painter, and an activist. Anyway, things got real ugly, real fast. Everyone was choking, falling to the ground, and being pushed back by force, and we hadn’t even done anything.”
“Why?”
“Because they didn’t want us in front of that building. A ribbon cutting was about to go down, and we weren’t wanted in the photos.”
“That’s shitty.”
“It is, but those are the only protests I’ll attend now. Stooping to any level of inhumanity won’t solve anything, forming gangs to riot and destroy neighborhoods is just plain stupid, and shaking a cops hand and saying thank you feels a whole lot better than pepper spray.”
“And you were in the news again?”
“Yes, but this time both, Clay and my mom were furious with me. They weren’t offering any journalism classes that time. They were pissed. I can remember sitting there, listening to them call me ungrateful, and ridiculous. They were sure I’d done it to shame them, make them look like fools. Like I was the crazy one for holding the peace sign. The papers called me crazy, said I was on drugs, and made up a relationship with Henry, a guy I didn’t even know. That’s when I was sent to Hawthorns, an all-girls school for bad kids. And that’s when I started laying low. I only had two more years to deal with them and then I was going to slip under the radar. It’s worked. I don’t screw with them and their delusional world, and they don’t mess with mine. I’m planning on keeping it that way.”
My eyes glanced to the psychedelic tapestry we used for a curtain while I thought about whether or not I was satisfied with that story. Deciding I was, I asked about Rain Man. “Do you know him now?”
“Who?”
“Henry. Did you keep in touch?”
“No, I have no idea where he is. I’m sure it’s somewhere amazing. He was an amazing guy.”
“But not the guy who dumped his gravy in you to make Tobias?”
Tristan gave me a look like I’d just slapped her, her hand leaving mine and thumping to the mattress. “I’m so turned on right now. Dumped is gravy in me?”
“That’s all I could think of to keep from thinking it was intimate.”
“I was never anything with Henry. He’s just someone who crossed my path because I needed him to. I needed to see that at that time. I needed to see that people still cared, that people could make a difference, that people wanted peace more than war. That’s why we crossed paths, but there was never any gravy dumping, and don’t ever say that again.”
“Where is he?”
“Tobias, he’s not ever coming around. You never have to worry about Baby-T’s sperm donor. He’s dead.”
“Is that lie to protect me or you?”
“Baby-T, so shut up and kiss me. I’m not ending this amazing day with that.”
Of course I wanted more than that, but I wanted to make her happy even more. I rolled my body on top of hers, kicking her leg open with my knee. For just a moment, I steadied my eyes on hers, holding her gaze before parting her lips with my tongue. Things got heated real fast and I wasn’t sure how much more of it I could take; especially when her hips started writhing into the painful erection behind my basketball shorts.
Tristan’s faint moans, the way she dug her nails into my back, her head moving from side to side, begging for my lips on her neck, her fingers lacing through my hair when she wanted our lips to reunite, and the expressions that took over her face were the same way I always explained her. Cosmic, crazy, and euphoric. I was in heaven and hell out at the same time. As erotic as she made dry humping, I wanted more. In a bad, bad way.
My hips continued to meet hers, two forces causing a tsunami of emotions to pass between us, back and forth, from her to me, and back to her. This girl was my everything. This girl was my world. This girl was about to cause my world to explode inside me.
“Jesus, T. I want to make love to you so bad right now.”
Tristan couldn’t hear me for the explosion going on in her. When she didn’t answer, I looked at her face, knowing she was about to find her bliss. It rocked my whole freaking world. Shook it like I’d never felt before in my life. My hips steadied between her legs while I applied ample pressure in a circular motion to her aching nub, bringing her to euphoric pleasure.
Her back arched below me and her head moved in the direction of her eyes rolling back. “Don’t come, T.”
Um…That was a problem. A big problem. Me not finding my high as soon as I witnessed her finding hers made me think about it even more. I rolled off of her, and to her side because breaking that contact was the only way that would be possible. Even though I expected her to protest, I tried anyway. I kissed her as passionately as I could, which wasn’t hard… everything was passionate with her. Nonetheless, I used the kiss as a way to distract her until I had my fingers behind the elastic in her panties.
As soon as I felt the patch of hair, she wrapped her fingers around my wrist, stopping me dead in my tracks. I swear that was the hardest thing I’d ever done in my life. It was like Christmas and that one great big present that you know is going to be the best gift ever, but you have to wait for it. You stare it every day for weeks, anticipating, knowing it’ll be awesome.
“I’m scared to do that, T.”
“Why? You’re not bleeding. It’s no difference than my dick pressing into you. I’ll be very gentle. I promise. I won’t put in it you. Let me make you come.”
Tristan stared at me for a moment while she contemplated, but it wasn’t until I moved my hand down that she released the grip on my wrist. I saw stars, I saw the sun, I saw the moon: I saw the Universe. They all collided into one. One giant explosion. I knew she would feel like this, but I didn’t know I would. She was so turned on, and so vulnerable.
“I knew you’d feel like this, T.”
“You have no idea how I feel right now.”
I did know. I could feel it and it did more to me than any other girl ever had. And that’s even knowing I wasn’t getting to third base with her. It didn’t even matter. This was adequate.
As if Tristan’s back arching wasn’t enough, she had to go and guide my fingers, holding three of them right where she wanted them, teaching me how to please her with more pressure and correction of the circular motion. It was my signature move, a half a circle to the left, a half circle to the right, and repeat. Girls loved it. In my head anyway. Tristan guided my fingers, crushing my ego, but it only hurt for a second. The new direction she taught me to please her with overtook my egotistical move when I realized the pattern. She didn’t let go of my fingers until I had it down pat, circling her throbbing button with a number eight. Over the top, right through the middle, to the bottom, and repeat. My new move.
Her body tensed, her back arched, and she jerked to the side, a failed reaction to stop the torture. “Oh, God, Ty.”
I couldn’t help it, I knew she was close, and I wanted to feel it with her. Rising to my knees, I stopped long enough to slide her out of her panties. And just like she taught me, I kept up the motion, only harder and faster until she was spent, toppling on the edge of reality and ecstasy. Carefully, I slid one finger inside her and felt her bliss, closing and pulsating around my finger, my thumb finishing the job. Tristan’s pleasure wasn’t localized to any certain region. Tristan’s pleasure was everywhere, all around her, all around me, through her, through me. An unimaginable explosion, just as intense as the night before, if not more fell upon us.
As soon as her body relaxed from the acrobatic backbend she’d twisted herself into, she jumped up, shoved her tongue half way down my throat a couple times, and practically ripped my shorts down. Talk about chemistry. It was off the freaking page. Way off. With two hands to my chest, she shoved me backwards and took me in her mouth. All the way to the back of her throat and then some. It was amazing, she was amazing, and my life was amazing. I didn’t know what I’d done to deserve her, but I was sure grateful. It was passion and intoxication like I’d never felt in my life, but more. Like flirting with a desire you didn’t know you had. She was my constant, my endless, and I loved her more than life its self, more than anyone or anything.
“T—T. Oh, God, T. You gotta stop.”
She didn’t, not until the very last second. As soon as my own body stiffened, she exchanged her mouth for her hand, her lips suffocating mine while I had something just short of an outer body experience. Wow. Holy mother of all earths. To infinity and back again. No, not back. I couldn’t seem to make it back. I was on a new earth, a whole other world, and she took me there.
Finally, my eyes sort of opened when she straddle my lap and smiled. “I knew you were going to be like this. I just knew it, but it still knocks me off my feet.”
“You? I don’t even know what just happened here.”
“I do. Want to know?”
I knew I was setting myself up for something mystical, but I did it anyway. “Yes, I want to know everything that is in your mind.”
Tristan snickered with that one. “No you don’t want to know that. What do you think your soul is?”
Told you… “Um, a spirit?”
Tristan rolled her eyes, wiping her soiled hand on my tee shirt. What the hell? “You’re not even trying. It’s pure energy. Shards all vibrating at a certain frequency. A powerhouse of pure love vibrating at the soul frequency,” she explained, her lips moving closer and closer to mine, her words, dark and sultry. “Most people never find that tone, that linking of soul energy. It’s in this moment that we’re given the opening to connect on the same frequency as the cosmic beat, and it’s only achieved by making love to a soul mate or a twin-flame. The moment our souls collide into one, the same rate as source.”
“I have no idea what the hell you just said, but it makes sense, and it sounded sexy as hell.”
“Did I tell you how much I loved you today?”
She did. She said it all the time, but I only mentioned one instance. “Yes, right after I said that cheesy thing that I can’t remember now. Something about falling. My brain’s still a little foggy from all the bliss, and energy stuff, and I love you more.”
“Impossible, and I remember. You said, don’t ever stop doing that, the falling part. You’re in love with falling in love and so am I. I won’t stop letting you fall if you don’t stop letting me fall. Deal?”
“Deal. You’re amazing.”
“You’re a-work in progress-mazing.”
I laughed and kissed the tip of her nose. “I think I heard amazing in there somewhere.”
“You did. I love you, Tobias.”
“I love you, too.”
“I’m going to go out and pee and wash my hands. Get Baby-T. Let’s go to sleep now. That did me in.”
I sat there staring after her briefly, still smiling, still falling.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Just like the night before, I lie awake, watching her sleep with Baby-T in her arms. My mind was as full as my heart, and unlike Tristan, I was unsure of what to do with all the energy. Sleep didn’t come easy for me these days, but it was okay. I never felt tired or exhausted from lack of it. Tristan kept me from being tired, my high on life speed; my world.
I was sure I hadn’t been asleep more than an hour when I opened my eyes to her crawling out of the van with T-Man. “You okay?”
“Shhh, yeah, I’m fine. He just ate. I tried to get him to go back to sleep, but he’s not having it. I think he wants to watch the sun come up. We’re just going to go meditate for a while. Go back to sleep.”
“Do you want me to come?”
“No, we’re fine. Sleep, love.”
I smiled and dropped my head back to my pillow.
The next time I woke, it was daylight, the sun was high, and Tristan was once again missing, but I could hear her talking. Seeing Baby-T right beside me, I knew she wasn’t talking to him. His little bod
y squirmed right next to mine, squeaks sounding exactly like the pet snail on Sponge Bob with every twist. “Hey, buddy. Good morning. You’re awful alert today. Did you sleep okay, huh?” I was pretty sure this baby was the cutest kid in the entire universe. No doubt about it. Hands down, he was his own kind of amazing. Every day, I watched him grow and do new things. It amazed me to see the change in such a short time. He was staying awake more and more, he startled at loud noises, and this morning, he found his thumb. Now that was adorable.
Needing to piss, I scooped him up and kissed his soft head. I opened the door to Tristan, counting money on the picnic table with Toni, surrounded by…I wasn’t sure what. Our portable picnic table was full.
“What is this, Tristan?”
Her hair flipped when she turned her head, a smile as big as Texas plastered across her face. “This is what I woke up to. Payday from last night. There’s eight hundred nine bucks here.
“I’m going to give Annie and Teddy-Bear the money for the twins to go to Camp Wanda for a week. Hi, baby, what are you doing? Did you find your thumb?”
I looked at Toni before saying something I shouldn’t have, not quite understanding. She’d just told a field full of people that she was flat broke a month ago and now she wanted to give it away? Made sense… A smile as I made my way to the bathroom tent was all I gave. Toni stayed until ten, talking to Tristan about things her and I couldn’t talk about because I didn’t know. Tristan had a way that made you question everything, even your existence and Toni got it, too.
They talked their foreign language for nearly an hour before she left. “I’ve got to go guys. Thanks for letting me hog your baby for an hour. He’s so perfect. I call dibs on him when you do your session with Keisha.”