Erotic Fiction

The Friction of Needing

Twenty-five pounds topless, fifty for nude.

Malcolm McCullough rubs off the last of the silver on his scratchcard. He could use a little luck: money got so tight when his hours were cut, Ruth had to go back to work. She’s maintaining their slightly reduced lifestyle by waitressing five evenings a week.

With Ruth working, Malcolm has to make his own dinner, and eat alone. She comes home late, dog-tired, interested in nothing except showering and sleep. Her weekends are taken up with chores and early nights ahead of another hard week. They haven’t made love in nearly five months.

Maybe if he hits the jackpot she could quit her job and they’d have sex again.

Ruth McCullough sighs and wipes down the table, ready for another guest. It’s exhausting work, but sometimes she gets a good tip.

Malcolm wins!

It’s only five hundred pounds; not a life-changing amount, but perhaps a sign his luck is changing. It might even be enough to take a weekend break with Ruth… except she’d probably be just as tired in a rural retreat as she is in their suburban semi.

He remembers Tony in Sales telling him about some shady establishment on the industrial estate. If he went to the big Tesco and got his winnings paid out in cash, he could tell Ruth he’d only won two hundred and fifty. She could buy something nice for herself, and he could go to Midnight Oil and get laid.

Malcolm pulls up outside the studio unit with the sexy silhouettes in its whitewashed window. Guilt has been nibbling away at his resolve since he made his decision, but it bites hard when he sees a red Clio parked across the road. Ruth has a similar car, and he really doesn’t want to be reminded of her right now.

When he walks in, a bored woman at reception looks up from her phone to recite her script. “Twenty-five pounds topless, fifty for nude. If you want anything else, that’s extra; pay the girl.”

Malcolm counts out five notes, each of them bearing Jane Austen’s purse-lipped disapproval. He doesn’t care about Jane’s opinion: what she’s paying for promises more enjoyment than reading.

The receptionist hands him a towel. “Room two. Mercedes will be through in a few minutes. First time?”

He nods.

“Strip, shower, lie back and relax. You’re in capable hands.”

She didn’t need to explain. Malcolm knows how this works, because Tony described his visit in lurid detail, and he knows what an extra two hundred pounds will buy.

Ruth prepares for her next customer. She’s tired, and her back aches, but she smiles anyway, because customers like to see a smile.

Malcolm strips in a cramped room that’s little more than a cubicle with plasterboard walls. He throws his clothes on a chair beside the padded table, takes four fifty-pound notes from his wallet, places them on top of his boxers, then steps behind a plastic curtain for a cursory shower.

He lies on the table, his damp towel draped over his crotch, fantasising about Mercedes. In his imagination she is young, exotic, sexual: everything Ruth isn’t.

Ruth heads to her third client tonight, hoping he only wants a rub down.

Malcolm’s door opens, and Mercedes enters. For a second he sees Ruth — her hair, her eyes — but this girl is ten years younger, with perkier tits.

She’s business-like: she sees the cash first, and stuffs it in the pocket of her kimono. She takes a condom out of her other pocket and sheds the gown.

Her breasts are a silicone lie, as obviously false as her name and what she says when she lifts Malcolm’s towel: “Oh my god, you’re so big!”

Mercedes rolls the condom on, climbs onto the table, and mounts Malcolm. She rides him vigorously, making noises no more convincing than her words.

Malcolm is feeling the warm embrace of a woman for the first time in months, and it leaves him cold.

Ruth’s client reminds her of Malcolm, but fitter. This guy’s probably a businessman, and a successful one judging by the expensive suit left neatly folded under his two hundred pounds. He hasn’t covered himself with his towel, because he has outsized confidence.

Ruth takes his cash and shucks off her kimono, grateful she used plenty of lube. She puts a condom on him, climbs onto the table, and mounts him gingerly.

She rides this customer slowly, sensually, because he’s hitting all the right spots. For once, she’s relaxed and enjoying her work.

Malcolm is not enjoying his ‘massage’. He’s distracted by the sound of authentic pleasure coming from the other side of the flimsy partition. Ruth used to moan like that, twenty years ago: low, guttural satisfaction.

He closes his eyes and tunes into those noises, dredging up memories of his wife making them, imagining he’s fucking her.

As the woman next door orgasms, loudly, Malcolm fills his condom. The moment he comes, his masseuse dismounts and goes.

Malcolm, overwhelmed with guilt and post-coital tristesse, wipes himself on his towel, dresses hurriedly, and leaves.

Ruth showers, then goes back to room one to clean it up, ready for another client. Her last one left a hundred pound tip and his business card, with “You’re a natural. You deserve better. Call me.” scrawled on it.

She’ll put half the tip in her secret stash and give fifty to Malcolm. He can go to the match this weekend; they’ll both enjoy that.

When Malcolm gets home he showers, heats up a frozen pizza, watches a Jason Statham movie on Netflix, then goes to bed, alone.

Ruth takes another shower when she gets home; her sixth tonight. Malcolm’s left a wet towel on the bathroom floor, which surprises her, but only because he always showers in the morning. She’s also surprised to find him asleep; lately he’s been pestering her for sex whenever she gets home.

She slides in bed beside him. He smells of bergamot and peppermint, and she wonders what scent he washed off in the shower.

She falls asleep thinking of the business card in her purse.

Marsha wrote the above story for the Fiction Marathon writing competition last year. She got through to the final and won the competition with the story below: