The Baker's Husband

*This one's for anyone who's ever felt like they had to compete with a partner's past. Thanks for reading, hope the flour and pine smell works for you.*

We got to the lodge around four on a Friday, late enough that the light was already going orange in the trees. Stu killed the truck engine and just sat there for a second, grinning at the place like it was an old dog.

"Home sweet death trap," he said. "Dad built this in eighty-seven. Don't lean on the porch rail."

"Is that where Antonio fell off it?" I asked. It came out before I could stop it.

Stu looked over at me. "Antonio's never fallen off anything, babe. He's a mountain goat."

"So you've said. You've said a lot about Antonio."

I'm Bradley, by the way. Twenty-three, baker, married two years. Stu's thirty-two and spent his twenties apparently sleeping his way through half the county. I knew that when I married him. Knowing it and thinking about it at two in the morning are different animals.

We hauled our bags inside. One big room, woodstove, gun rack, a bed that could sleep four if you stacked them. Stu got the stove going while I unpacked, and I kept the questions coming like I was loading a magazine.

"How old was he when you two, you know."

"Twenty-six. I was twenty-eight. One time, at Adam's party. Why are we doing this?"

"Doing what? I'm just asking questions."

"You're interrogating a cabin." He stood up, wiped his hands on his jeans. "Bradley. Look at me."

I looked. I'd been looking, that was the problem entirely. Antonio had come up exactly once in our marriage, a story Stu told at a cookout, and my brain had turned it into a highlight reel.

"He's a friend," Stu said. "He's coming by tomorrow with firewood, and that is the plan in its entirety. You're what I picked."

"Picked makes it sound like a dog show."

"You know what I mean."

I didn't, actually, so I went to the kitchen counter and started making bread dough, because that's what I do when I'm upset. Kneading is cheaper than therapy. I got about two minutes in before I dropped the whole bag of flour, and it went up like a small white bomb, all over the counter, all over me, all over the dough.

"Great," I said. "Fantastic. This is who you married, Stu. A man who flour-bombs your family cabin and grills you about your ex-hookups."

Stu came around the counter and stood there looking at me, white dust settling on both of us. Then he kissed me. Which he's allowed to do, he's my husband, but it still caught me mid-rant.

"Okay," he said, pulling back. "New plan. Forget the bread."

"The bread is ruined anyway."

"The bread is fine, you panic-knead beautifully." He took my hands, both of them, flour and all. "Here's what I think. I think you've been comparing yourself to a bunch of guys who don't exist anymore. So how about I teach you how men do it out here. Slow. Everything explained. You ask for what you want and I give it to you. Sound good?"

My face was probably doing something embarrassing. "Like a lesson?"

"Like a lesson. First one's free."

"Well it better be, I'm married to you."

"Cheapest husband I could find," he said, and kissed me again.

***

He didn't rush anything, which was new for me, because Stu at home is usually a man with places to be. Out here he took his time like he was being paid by the hour.

"Shirt first," he said, and undid the top button. "Slow, so you feel every button. That's the point. Out here nobody's in a hurry, there's no bar closing, no clock. Just us and a stove."

"You're narrating."

"I'm teaching. Arms up."

I got the shirt off and he ran his hands over my chest, flat palms, unhurried.

"Feel that? Pressure, not scratching. Most guys your age grab like they're trying to put out a fire. Slow hands say I'm not going anywhere."

"Is that from the guide manual?"

"Chapter four." He worked the belt of my jeans loose. "Now here's your first real lesson. I'm going to take these off, and then you're going to tell me one thing you want. Out loud. Full sentence. Guys who grew up hooking up casual learn to talk, because you have about nine minutes and a truck. You never learned, so we're learning now."

"You're really enjoying this."

"So much," he said, and he wasn't lying, his voice had gone low and pleased.

The jeans came off and I stood there in the firelight feeling sort of absurd and sort of thrilled at the same time. He sat back on the edge of the bed and looked at me the way I look at a finished cake.

"Okay," he said. "Ask me for something."

"I want you to touch me."

"Where? Be specific, Bradley. This is the whole lesson."

"My cock," I said, and it came out rougher than I planned, which seemed to interest him.

"Good boy. See, the world didn't end." He wrapped his hand around me, slow from base to tip, thumb dragging over the head, and my knees had some opinions about it.

"Stu..."

"Talk to me. Does that work?"

"Yeah. Yeah, keep doing, oh. Okay. That."

"See, you're a natural." He kept that slow rhythm going until my hips were doing the work for him, and then he stopped, which felt like a crime.

"Why'd you stop?"

"Because I asked you a question and you forgot it existed. What do you want next? Full sentence."

"I want your mouth," I said. "On me. Please."

"There it is. Was that so hard?" He leaned in and took me in, and I grabbed the edge of the bed because the floor was suddenly theoretical. He's good at this, he's always been good at this, but he was slower about it now, showing off less, working me up in easy stages, tongue and lips and that flat steady pull, and every time I got close he eased off.

"You're edging me," I managed. "On purpose."

"Chapter seven. I want you lasting, not sprinting. We've got all night and no flour casualties."

"Don't say flour right now."

He laughed around me, which should have been a mood killer and instead nearly finished the job. He pulled off with a slick sound and stood up, already shirtless, that broad chest and the few gray hairs he pretends aren't there.

"Last part of lesson one," he said, pushing me back onto the bed. "You tell me when you're ready for more. Not when you think you should be ready. When you are."

"I'm ready."

"You don't even know what for yet."

"Then tell me what I'm ready for, smart guy."

He smiled and reached for the bag by the bed. "Now you're getting it."

He got the lube out, warm from the room, and poured some in his palm. "Lie back and let me do the work. Breathe when you feel it. That's it." His fingers were slow and patient, one at a time, and he kept talking the whole way through, quiet stuff, nothing important, just his voice in my ear while my body figured out what was happening.

"You're doing great," he said. "Half the guys I knew never got past the grabbing stage. You're already further along than any of them."

"That's because they didn't have a teacher this pretty."

"Flattery gets you chapter eight." He worked me open until I was squirming, then sat up and rolled the condom on, and I watched him do it because I'd earned the right to stare. "Now. Table or bed?"

"Table," I said, before my brain checked in. "Wait, why did I say table?"

"Because you wanted to say table. Come here." He walked me the two steps to the kitchen table, the one I'd been kneading on an hour ago, and bent me over it with a hand flat between my shoulder blades. The wood was cool against my chest. "Hands where they are. Tell me if anything's wrong and I