Page 25 of Moist!

chapter two

MIA

Two years of celibacy, and I’m so tightly wound, even my sweat is getting me off.

I jog furiously in place as another heavy bead of sweat falls from the nape of my neck.

The perspiration slides beneath the back of my spandex bra top and moves between my shoulder blades before running down my spine.

Then, finally, it dips under the waistband of my matching shorts to drop between my ass cheeks.

My body hasn’t been touched in such an intimate spot in so long, I shiver despite the thick heat of the Louisiana swamp.

I’m desperate for my vibrator, but I’m pretty sure I’m one marathon session away from blowing a fuse. So instead, I drop down into push-ups, certain all I need to do is exhaust every muscle in my body. Then, I will no longer be tormented by the slickness of my own sweat.

“I’ve been turned on over less,” I mutter to myself.

When I first got into town, I met up with the local coven.

It was only good manners to introduce myself to the other witches in the area who I’d be studying with for the next few months.

But the very second thing I had done was stand outside a bakery for a good twenty minutes, staring at the fresh beignets in the window, imagining them to be the pillowy chest of a man.

The powdered sugar was a light dusting of chest hair, the crispy golden exterior the tough muscle of his body—I bought a half dozen.

They were delicious, but my thighs still ached to grip tightly around some thrusting hips.

Lately, all I’ve been is aching and throbbing, trying to hold on to the last shred of my sanity preventing me from texting my ex back.

“Get it together, Mia!” I grunt through my push-ups.

Working out in nature was supposed to be peaceful. Instead, all this quiet has my mind running through every failed hook-up I’ve ever had, trying to figure out why my skills in divination seem to utterly fail when it comes to my own love life.

I came here from Los Angeles to hone my skills with the local coven specializing in divination, yet here I am, so hopped up on unused sexual energy, I’m surprised I haven't already worked my way through every dating app.

I permitted myself only one app when I arrived.

“I cannot be this pathetic.” I add ten more push-ups to my reps.

My wrist buzzes several times in rapid succession, and I nearly fall out of position trying to see what new match I received.

“Of course,” I sigh, my pitifulness confirmed when my hopes are deflated seeing Drusilla, my high priestesses, pop up on the small screen instead of the dating app.

I reach for my phone to read her messages and spot the backlog of texts I meant to reply to.

Dru: How is the new place?

Dru: This trip is going to be good for you! Violet read it in the cards.

Several more buzzes, and the messages get increasingly more desperate.

Dru: Answer me so I know you aren’t dead .

Dru: Goddess help me, if you don’t answer, I will get on a plane.

I met Dru while I was attending art college and answered an ad for a room for rent in her East LA home.

She said my aura was chaotic, but she could sense we had a lot in common.

I moved in the next day. It wasn’t until about a year into our friendship, when I’d barged in on her performing a spell in the kitchen, that I found out she was a witch.

A month later, she helped me unlock my own powers.

Resting in the grass for a moment, I reread Dru’s messages and type back.

Mia: Sorry, MOM! You could’ve astral projected yourself here already and been done with it.

Dru responds immediately, ignoring my suggestion.

Dru: FINALLY! How are you? And answer me QUICKLY.

How am I? Grouchy, horny, dead tired of staring at another dating profile with “moderate” listed under political affiliation…

Sweat drips from my chin to pool in the dirt below me.

Mia: I’m moist.

Mia: And not the good kind of moist.

I set my phone down and return to my push-ups. Seconds later, I feel another buzz on my wrist.

Dru: *frowny face emoji* So no new prospects yet?

Determined to, at the very least, get a decent pump, I hold myself in a plank position and use the voice-to-text feature to message back.

Mia: Unless you count a drunk fan boat operator who ditched me for his even drunker buddies, I’d say when I read my stars for the trip, they lied to me. The only males who are attracted to me are the gnats.

I laugh, but then I realize the bugs that had been swarming around me when I first neared the water’s edge are nowhere to be found. There were birds and frogs too, I had heard them, but oddly, the swamp is now silent .

Another buzz at my wrist pulls my gaze from the still water’s edge back to my phone.

Dru: The stars don’t lie.

Mia: They do to me.

When Dru first took me under her wing, I took to divination faster than any other magic.

I was predicting career advancements and love matches for my coven sisters, but when it came to discovering my own future, I never seemed to ask the right questions, and I never received an accurate answer. This time isn’t any different.

Forcing myself deeper into my push-up, I bring my ample chest down to graze the wild grass beneath me.

It tickles my belly and is cool against my hot skin.

My eyelids drift close for a moment, relaxing into the touch.

I slide my bare skin over the surprisingly firm plants, pressing into them ever so gently.

It teases so lightly, too lightly. I need to feel more… I need…

I need to stop turning myself on, or I’m going to have carpal tunnel from how often I get myself off.

My smartwatch beeps, this time as the heart rate monitor tracks my rapidly increasing pulse. Picking up my push-up speed, I pretend it’s just the workout and not the potential for being alone the rest of my life doing a number on my stats.

It’s not like I can’t get a date. I get plenty of offers, and there is a long list of unsatisfying lovers I could call day or night for a one-night stand. But I don’t want another night with a man who thinks a good date is one where he can vomit his life story without me getting a word in edgewise.

I’m not bitter. My friends are in amazing, supportive relationships. Dru can’t keep her hands off this gorgeous woman she just started dating a few months ago.

It’s not them—it’s me. Whatever internal compass people have that points them toward the right person is all fucked up inside me.

The arrow is spinning and spinning, and I spent the better part of a decade trying to go in every direction it pointed, running headlong into men who never asked me any questions about myself, let alone make sure I came just as often as they did.

My sex life always seemed to follow the same script: little foreplay and a quick finish for him.

My chest feels so damn heavy, and the unease of it travels through my limbs.

Needing something to ground me, I dig my hands into the ground, gripping the grass and thick stems of vines.

I hadn’t noticed the pretty, dark green vines before.

They feel cool compared to my warm skin, oddly firm.

Resting on my knees, I run my palms over the greenery and let myself pretend it’s someone else touching me back, someone who knows to ask what I want and then do exactly that, without stopping?—

“V-crunches! V-crunches will help!”

I panic-roll onto my ass and assume the position—balancing on my behind, I lean back and lift my legs. I crunch upwards, keeping my thighs slightly separated so I have space for my soft belly to go when I deepen the exercise.

“One.” My stomach muscles contract, then slowly, I release, concentrating on my form and not the foliage that caressed me so gently.

“Two.” I contract again, engaging through my core and deep into my pelvic floor, rooting myself to the ground.

Two. Two years, I’ve gone without sex.

Slowly, I release my body and stretch my legs out while still hovering above the teasing tips of the grass and vines.

“Three.” I crunch again, feeling all my muscle control go straight to my pelvis, so all that concentration on working my body goes straight to my core. A spasm shudders through my pussy.

Oh Goddess, NO!

Determined to maintain my focus on my workout and only my workout, I repeat, “Three.”

Three years since I had a partner who could occasionally give me orgasms.

“Four.” My stomach muscles contract, bringing me up once again. I aim for a deeper burn, going slower, controlling my movements, but I’m overwhelmed by the feeling of my cunt tightly clenching. I can’t focus on nothing else.

“Shit,” I gasp.

My clit pulses with awareness, my pussy clenching down on nothing. I try to ease myself back to the ground, but my body is so tense, it holds the desperate need deep inside me. I want to relax, I need to relax, but to move would be to feel more.

I’ve orgasmed from deep workouts before, if I found just the right position, and I seem to be in the right one now.

Would it be so bad to come again?

No one is around. I hadn’t seen a single soul since I jogged along the swampland. The world is so quiet, the grass soft, the vines tingly against my skin. I’m slick with sweat, so moist everywhere now, the good kind of moist.

“Five.” I crunch up. Five years since a partner reliably got me off.

“Six” Another crunch, and another spasm courses through me. My pelvic floor is so firmly engaged.

The soft cotton of my panties sticks to my wetness. The fabric pulls against me as I shift, and now, the panties are tight along the seam of my pussy, pressing down on my clit.

“Fuck,” I groan, my nipples hard under the restrictive fabric of my sports bra.

The top has a front zipper—it would be so easy to palm one of my breasts and squeeze.

My fingers itch as they grip the metal pull. As I tug downward, I hear a toad croak. I hadn’t noticed when, but the birds have started singing again, and a mosquito flies overhead.

The still world is suddenly moving, and… what the hell am I doing trying to get off in the middle of a swamp?

“Goddess help me!” I shout. My breath is heavy, my chest and cheeks flushed pink as I scurry out of the v-crunch position and roll onto all fours, trying to catch my breath.

The birds have stopped their singing.

“Do not stop, human,” a voice booms from behind me.

“Fuck!” I nearly jump out of my skin, twisting around to see who else is there. The unsecured zipper pull of my sports bra inches its way down my chest as I spy nothing more than a massive tree or a bush behind me. It wasn’t there when I started my workout. “Who’s there?”