Louisiana is not an easy place to learn hard things about yourself. So you leave. You keep coming back, of course, because this is home and the more you tour, the more you see, the more you need something that makes sense to come home to.
It doesn't get easier when your boyfriend, your sweet adorable famous boyfriend who's never even tried to get past second base with you, gets drunk one night and tells you he can't stand the taste of pussy. He says it just like that, knowing you'll make the face you're making but not knowing that it's also because you're not really upset he hasn't tried to get to third and now a few things make more sense out on the road, too.
And even though what he says next is that he gives the best blowjobs this side of the Mississippi -- and you have to stop and remember where you are, and it's California, so you guess maybe boys in New York are a harder sell -- even though he's being twitchy and loud and you know that means he's worried you'll say something mean, really all you can think about is those four words. The taste of pussy.
They echo in your head like the reverb of your own voice off the back of an arena, like when you sing in the shower cause it actually sounds good there without any tape or effects or backup. When you and Justin have a stupid fight three weeks later because you're pissed he wants to go to a premiere with Lance and the guys instead of with you, he says, "You can't even sing," and you want to call him a stupid fag but that doesn't feel fair.
And the thing is, you know you're not a great singer. You know it's not the thing you're great at. You know you're a great dancer, but Justin's a great dancer, too, so somehow that doesn't count. You think maybe you're great at getting people to look at you. And one night, when you're not in Louisiana, you think what you could be great at is loving the taste of pussy. You almost can't even say that to yourself, not any of the words, not even the word "taste" anymore, not without blushing. You try, in the shower, to whisper it. Then you turn the water on hot and let the hard spray soak your face.
*
It turns out you can talk to Lance about it, which you think is pretty funny all things considered. But Lance actually slept with a few girls back in Mississippi and understands how out on tour things look different, and you have to talk to someone or you might explode for real.
"I've never," you say, and you're not even playing, you're stone-cold sober and it's eleven in the morning before a charity event but you've said it and it's out now, all of it, you've never but god do you want to.
Lance grins like he's your brother and you made a jump shot on the first try. "You and Justin, knowin' what you want, damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead," he says, but you don't know what he means. He puts a hand on your arm. "Baby, I think he's scared to see girls naked, you know? I think that boy was maybe fifteen, maybe, the first time he jumped up on me. And I know I wasn't the first."
Well goddamn, you think. So maybe J doesn't know what he's talking about.
*
The thick oil they use for the video shoot won't wash off, not after three showers and scrubbing and experiments with cold cream and rubbing alcohol. All that and you're still shiny.
So is Tina. She's in your room because you're supposed to have girl time, away from the bodyguards and Wade and Justin and everyone else. There are other girls in the hotel with you but they're happy to tag along with the boy dancers to a club. Fag hags, you call them behind their backs, but according to Lance you've got a boyfriend with a mouth like a Hoover, so maybe you don't have room to talk.
Girl time means a facial even though you usually have people do that for you now. But it's more fun like this. So, the plan is facials and maybe a movie and lots of giggling like you're just two normal girls and it's your bedroom and not a rented penthouse that looks like all the other penthouses. You think maybe after the facial you could take a bubble bath, and maybe Tina would think that was fun. Just a taste, maybe, of something you're suddenly not sure how much you want or how great you'd be at. But you want a taste. All day, cameras and costuming and Wade yelling at the dancers and then you'd pant and thrust and Tina's breasts were pushing up against your arm and you'd think, taste this.
You'd tasted yourself a few times, before, and since Justin said it, more than a few. Just checking to make sure you remember. Just wondering. But you're pretty sure Tina would taste different, because she smells different, she's got this cinammony musk in her hair when she hugs you and you wonder if she tastes like that. You hope she does.
Tina's a dancer, really only a dancer, she sings backup but not very well. Even you can tell that. And she's kind of little, about your size, and she's the kind of dancer who likes to walk around naked and show off her body, even though some of your other dancers are young and kind of Christian and not like that. You've been trying not to look. Except you think maybe she wants you to look, like now, when she washes off the apricot scrub and drops her terrycloth robe with the hotel logo on the floor of the big sparkling bathroom.
"Do you think they have bubble bath?" she says, and you look, bending down on your knees and tearing through the overstuffed basket of toiletries under the pedestal sink. You're still wearing a tank top and matching underwear but your breasts almost fall out of the top because of how you're leaning. Tina's running the water and looking back over her shoulder at you and the air gets thick with steam or maybe something else. Anticipation, you think, except maybe that's a song JC wrote and not a real thing that happens.
Tina's not wearing a stitch. The tub is set into a raised tiled shelf and she's got one hand up on the pink wall for balance as she dips a toe in to check the temperature. You don't mean to look, but you think she wants you to and anyway when you sit back on your butt with the Champagne-shaped bottle of bubble bath, she's at eye level. You think if there weren't bath salts and lotion and conditioner all over your lap you'd be able to smell her already. Her pussy. You keep wanting another word because maybe that one's J's, but the others are all wrong. Taste. Pussy. You want it.
You swallow and your mouth is dry and scuzzy like day-old Pepsi. You wonder if it will be like kissing, like how after a while all the lips and tongues taste the same, warm and kind of bitter. You hope it's more than that. It's like you've been waiting forever for this, to be this close, and you should be nervous or at least a little unsure that it will go how you want but instead you're staring at the skin on Tina's inner thigh where it's taut, holding her toes poised over the steaming water.
"Gimme that," Tina says, holding out a hand with short, bright pink nails. They've got glitter polish on them, too, which you didn't notice before, and you wonder if any of it will flake off inside you.
You give her the bottle and she unscrews it one handed and upends the whole thing into the water. You pull yourself up by gripping the edge of the sink. You turn down the lights so you can see out over the city skyline through the big window. Next to the outlet there's a switch and the jets rush on like a geyser and Tina gasps out loud and then laughs. Decadent, you think. That's what a laugh like that is called in a romance novel. It's a long, low throaty roar and she throws back her head and pretty brown curls dance across her neck. You're wet right through your underwear. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.
She steps into the tub and slides down into the foamy froth. You're naked in about three seconds flat, panties catching on your ankle and you shake them off with a quick kick and climb into the opposite end of the bath. It's a big tub to go with the big room in the big hotel and you kind of miss the old days when everything was closer together. The water just covers the bottom of your breast when you're sitting and you scoot down and then back up so your nipples are wet and start to harden in the cool air.
Tina's still shiny and there are bubbles clinging to her throat where she ducked down, too, and then her little foot is bumping up against your knee. You smile and call her baby and then she comes forward to kiss you, soft and sweet against your lips. When she opens her mouth you push your tongue in because this is the easy part, this is the part you know plenty about. It's nice, but it's not what you want. You push against her, against the weight of the water on your back and she glides into your lap, slippery and smooth and your breasts touch. She's running a hand down your stomach and flicking it against you and when she puts a finger inside you come almost right away with a little grunt, and it's good, but you know it's just the first time, you can make yourself come at least six or seven times in a row if you pay attention and really the rest of them can wait.
She bites your shoulder and you lift her by the hips. She's so light and little, especially in the water, and it's easy to propel her backwards, back to the other end of the tub where there's a little tiled seat built into the basin. You kiss down across her collarbone, down between her breasts, one hand cupping each. Her skin is slick with soap and oily with shine and under those layers it's almost leathery under your tongue, moving across her tight muscles with your licks but always coming back into place. Her nipples are so hard it looks like they hurt and when you lick one she arches her back and moans really loud.
You've never made anyone moan before. You flick out your tongue again and she purrs your name this time and puts a hand on your neck and slides a curvy calf between your own legs so you're riding it, buoyant and weightless. You want to be a mermaid, you want to be Ariel with human gills so you can do it right there, like that, under water, eyes open and hair flowing around you as you taste her. You think you've always gotten to be everything you wanted and it's a little frustrating that you can fly across a stage but not breathe underwater. And then you just put your hands on her hips and pick her up, one smooth move like it's a pas de deux and you're the stem, until her butt rests on the edge of the flat counter.
She lies back and you start kissing somewhere around her ankle. You think the hero in a Harlequin would do this really slow, would make sure to get every inch of skin, but you can't wait that long, she's all spread out in front of you and her hair, right there where you want your mouth to be, is wet and curly and her knees are open enough that you swear you could almost see up inside her. So you glide up past the knee, up a tanned thigh, up along a fine hairline scar you know she got climbing fences like a tomboy when she was twelve because you have one like that, too, almost in the same place. You remember how when she showed you there were a couple curls peeking out the edge of her white cotton underwear.
Now she's naked. For you. Waiting. You don't want to wait anymore. You pull back for a second and she paws at your head, fingers sliding roughly through your hair and getting caught and you say it again to yourself, except this time it's I love the taste of pussy. You start with little kisses up at the top and work your way down, down, across pulsing red nubs of flesh that seem to push back against your mouth, and it's still kind of soapy and you have to stop once to pull your own hair out of your face and she holds it back for you, gently this time, and you bend in again. It's kind of like kissing, and it kind of tastes like a mouth, a soapy mouth -- pussy, pussy, pussy, you think, that's the kind of mouth that gets washed out with soap but oh jesus this is the hottest wettest place you've ever even dreamed of drowning in so you shout over it, into her, speaking in tongues like a holy roller and you swallow and push inside, talking and singing, singing at the top of your lungs some song, some national anthem you hadn't even known existed.
Right now you are Aretha fucking Franklin and you've got Tina's ass in your hands and her pussy in your mouth, in your nose, under your eyelids and she's past moaning now, she's thrashing and you're holding on and she yells your name so loud the window shakes. She pulls hard on your hair, really hard, and then she kicks your shoulder and falls back on the tile and says your name again, low, just, "Britney, oh fuck, oh baby, fuck," over and over and you're still kissing, you're still licking her thigh where it's wet with thick clear juice and you love the taste of it, you never want to eat anything else ever again or brush your teeth and then you sit back and say it out loud.
"I love the taste of pussy," you say, feeling your chest blush, all that and still you have to push the words out, and she laughs all decadent again.
"No shit, honey," Tina says, still breathless, reaching out a hand to you and you drag her back into the cooling water. She slides her legs around your waist and hangs her head over your shoulder like a rag doll. You close your eyes and half-heartedly lick at the hollow under her ear until you realize, you pull the words out of the fuzz, that your tongue is tired. You're tired. You bury your nose in her hair and run your wrinkled fingertips over her smooth back.
You think maybe this is your calling, that all the talent shows and record producers and photographers and interviews were just so you'd be brave enough to do this. This, you think, is what you can be great at. This is what you want to be famous for.
Justin has no idea what he's talking about. He has no idea what he's missing, you think. No idea at all.
END.
Credits: Dar's lyrics. Brit's own title. The ddddirtypop collective, especially Sandy, my equal opportunity smut enthusiast. And this owes quite a debt to Wax's Imprint.