(Moderate NSFW warning.)

The air hung heavy with want. She sat on my lap, grinding her ass into me as I groped for her, pulled at her shirt, moaned my desire into the fabric draped over her skin. Weed buzzed in my nerves, frayed the edges of my mind. I pressed my forehead to her back and could smell her intoxicating aroma, grew drunk off the desire to have it wrapped around my senses. I bit and rocked against her, but her clothes did not taste of her. I could not abide that. I needed to taste her. 

I bit again and slid my hand up along her chest, relishing in how soft she was, enthralled by the weight of her breasts in my hand, enraptured by the way her nipples rolled between my fingers. She was the wild forest made woman, the strength of her muscles not unknown to me, the ferocity of her teeth a welcome companion. She bore within her the hunger to make me prey, and the softness to ease any fear. Her wisdom humbled me, and the sound of her laughter made me wish to tie myself to her forever. She was the wild forest made woman. And she let me touch her. 

How had I not sat and relished her? How had I not committed to memory the feel of her body against mine, the way chest sloped, the broadness of her shoulders, the way her hair fell across her open shirt? How had I not stared at her, why hadn’t I pushed against the internalized fear of judgment, why did I listen at all to the whispers of sinful condemnation whenever I found myself gazing too long? She rested as a beacon of beauty and she granted me the honor of being her partner. I wanted nothing more than to kiss every inch of her soft, strong body.

A chain slipped in the hands of my mind. It nipped at my skin as the links caught upon my flesh. My inner self paused to look at her palms, where the imprints of crimson circles swelled against her skin. I did not realize I had been holding something back. I did not realize I kept a lioness chained. I did not realize until I finally let go.

With the beast free, I found myself grasping at Leora with stronger desire. With a thirst for her unparalleled to what I ever experienced before. I was blind to myself, unable to form coherent thoughts other than one, which boomed within my skull: please turn around and kiss me. Please touch me. Please let me touch you. 

Louder and louder it roared. I clutched her breasts and played with her nipples. I reached between her legs. I humped her with a deep, primal need to have her buried in me. I needed to please her. I ached for her to please me.

She stood abruptly, climbing off me with an exhale as she moved to turn off the lights in the house, to shift us to the next stage. The beast sat perplexed for a moment, terrified it had done something wrong before reason soothed its aching pride and whispered nothing was the matter. 

Get up and move as well. 

I heeded this call, rising and moving to the other room to remove my contacts. But the distance from my love offered room for me to think, and for me to spiral. 

I planted my hands on the bathroom sink and looked at myself in the mirror. My eyes stared back, wide and bloodshot from weed. I saw the drawn lines on my face, I saw the shift in my expression as I attempted to push against the whispers raging within my cranium. The slight tilt in the lips, the way my jaw set – the way my brows began to furrow in focus. 

I ran my hands down my cheeks and moved to the bedroom, sitting on the mattress. I pressed my body against the soft fabric sheets. I gripped the pillow to steady my mind. And still, those that once chained the lioness and gave me her lead, came marching back as phantoms. 

A woman shouldn’t lust. 

This is obscene and unseemingly – you should be ashamed of yourself. 

It’s foolish to lose control – what if you do something reckless? What if you upset her?

Haven’t you already?

Haven’t you startled her as your mood changed?

It’s bad enough you love sex. And now you’re asking for it? You’re a deviant. 

Did you see how you grabbed her? How you wanted her? You’re fucking disgusting. 

A woman should not initiate. 

A woman should only submit. 

I stood again, realizing I found myself trapped. I needed to move. I moved towards the bedroom door. Leora played music out there – music she no doubt wanted me to experience with her. But I found myself frozen by the frame, hesitating just out of her view. I wanted to go to her. My logical mind bade me to step through the threshold. I needed something solid to bring me back. I needed to communicate. I needed her. 

But the beast grew ashamed of itself. The lioness tucked her tail and inched back into the shadows, and I found myself following, moving instead to the other side of the room, gripping the wall in hopes it would be a suitable stand-in for the woman I loved.

It was not. 

I could not get myself to leave the spiral. I was dirty. I should be ashamed. I was wicked and deviant and wrong. What I felt – that lust unbridled, unparalleled to anything before, that truth of my desire aimed at the person of my affection – it was sick. 

I believed none of these lies, but still they carried on. My heart thundered in my chest. I found myself realizing how afraid I had become. One more thing to learn about myself – one more discovery to find I had been burying feelings all this time. The depth of those feelings was so vast, so assertive and forceful – how had I managed to hide them from myself? And what would happen when I finally accepted them? If I was more adamant about wanting her touch, if I took charge more often, if I was unabashedly desiring, would that change anything between us? 

A hand touched my shoulder and I knew it was her. I leaned into her touch, and she wrapped her arms around me, guiding me back into the center of the bedroom. I let her hold me until my safety could be reassured once more. 

“What’s going on?” she asked in a gentle whisper. I swallowed thickly. The lioness cowered back further. She will think us foolish. 

“I… startled myself,” I managed. 

“Oh? How so?” 

I stood in silence for a while longer. She hummed a soft, questioning sound, prompting me not to go nonverbal. I took a breath. 

“You can’t laugh,” I murmured. 

“Okay,” Leora chimed. “I am super serious. No laughing allowed.” 

I snickered, fond of how comfortable she managed to make me, even when every desire in my body wished to have us hide out of sight. I rested my forehead against her cheek and took yet another deep inhale.

“I had a lot of fear and anxiety and… guilt come up because of…” I closed my eyes a moment. The lioness urged me to stop. “Because of how much I wanted you.”

“Okay,” she said, her voice holding surprise. “Can we move out there?” 

I nodded, feeling a sense of relief in letting her know. In releasing that burden. In speaking it to the air where it grew to be more weightless. I let her guide us back into the living room, and when she took the couch, I straddled her. I draped my arms around her head. I waited a moment, anxious, worried I might’ve truthfully startled her, or upset her in some way. She ran her hands along my body, gentle, but firm. She touched me and I knew she was not frightened of me. 

I ran a hand along her cheek and kissed her on the lips. She met my affection, dragging me closer, kissing me harder. Our tongues entwined a moment, and when we pulled away for a breath, the lioness found her courage again. 

I grabbed Leora, bringing her back in for a kiss. I pushed, and she leaned against the couch. She rocked her hips into mine, and I matched the rhythm. A pressure formed against my clit, firm and unmoving. Shivers ran up my spine. The lioness surged, unwilling to let this moment by. 

Take, she growled. Take.

I shifted my hips, ensured the pressure be right where I needed. I rubbed myself off against her. My hands on either side of her head kept her steady, kept her near. My kissing turned desperate and hungry. Her movements steadily quickened, until I broke for a breath, found myself digging my fingers into her back to keep hold, and felt every inch of her against me until the climax shattered and the orgasm burst. 

I cried out. The lioness bristled, ready for more. I kept her at bay with the promise I’d let her return shortly. As I gasped and caught my breath, I pulled ever so slightly away to kiss Leora’s forehead.

“What is it you want, honeylove?” Leora whispered, her voice tender and loving. I felt dizzy. Her affection often had that effect on me. With a thick swallow, I tried to find my words. “Do you want to move to the bedroom?” she asked.

I nodded. “Yes.” But I did not move from her lap. I cupped her face gently in my hands and rested my forehead to hers. “Um,” I broached. “I know it’s probably silly to ask but… you’re… you’re okay with me lusting after you?” 

The weight of condemnation dug fangs into my lungs. Guilt and sin and sickness and wrongness all sat upon my ribs and waited for the disgust in her voice.

“Yes,” she breathed. 

And it all fell away. A soft, desiring warmth settled in my chest cavity, rooting out everything within in me that told me I was wrong. I smiled. I smiled, and I wanted to cry. 

It is okay to want her. And it is okay to want her with such intensity that it scared me. It is okay to desire the woman I love. 

I climbed off her, and we met in the bedroom, where the soft fabric of the sheets welcomed us both. With no judgment, with no animosity, with no condemnation. She held me as I came. And I kissed along her neck and shoulders when she orgasmed. 

No shame. No sin.

Just a ravenous sort of love.