Page 59 of Call It Desire
I just start at the bottom and decide to work my way up.
Not wanting to turn lights on to draw attention to myself,I use my phone flashlight to skulk through the first floor. The first floor of the library is mostly technical texts, research books that I haven’t ever spent much time with.
Eerie silence greets me, despite the quiet slap of my feet against the carpeted floor. Once I’ve swept the first floor, I take the staircase to the second floor. I hope Reid doesn’t make me look through all five floors only to find out this is thewronglocation and he’s actually waiting for me ass up somewhere else. As I sweep the second floor, I think about the last few weeks with Reid. He’s becomesucha good boy for me when he’s not hissing and spitting. I kind of want to take him home to meet my parents… and Ama. I want him to meet my family because he’s my family now too. Reid’s the one. No one else will ever match my crazy beat for beat but him. I think if I asked Reid to kill for me, he would, which is exactly the energy I’ll need for this fucked-up world.
Imagining Reid in my parents’ kitchen is easy, him helping my mom make dinner as my mom shares stories about me running naked through the neighborhood as a toddler. God, I want that so bad. I’m going to ask him the next time I see him. If I can fucking find him.
The emergency lights flicker on the third floor, making my breath hitch with the promise of finding Reid. It’s still hush-quiet, but I can feel Reid close by, it’s hard to explain. When he’s near me, my body knows. I make my footfalls quieter, make my big body less conspicuous as I dip between the rows of books to hunt him down. The gentle flick of pages being turned reaches my ears as I edge toward the table he sat at all those weeks ago.
He’s so fucking beautiful. He hasn’t dyed his hair since we met, so there’s a hefty growth of dark auburn at his roots. The hairs curl behind his ears, almost too overly long, falling intohis face when he hunches down further to continue to search for whatever he wants to find in the book on the table. His thin fingers pause on a page, eyes crinkled at the corners as the very hint of a smile tips up his lips. He feels me too. We’re connected like magnets, close proximity will always bring us together.
Reid sighs in frustration at not finding what he’s seeking and stands abruptly, the chair scratching roughly against the carpet. I watch, heart pounding, as he heads the opposite way to return the book. He’s dressed in my favorite outfit. Dark skinny jeans with a maroon sweater that shows a peek of his shoulder when he lifts the book to clutch it against his chest.
I dip into another row to keep my eye on him as he moves through the rows to find another book. Pausing halfway through the row, I watch as he lifts onto his tiptoes to return the current book, fingertips dancing across the books on a lower shelf as he drops back down to the soles of his feet. Even that is fucking elegant. He has no idea how much he’s bewitched me. I think if I told him, he’d snarl and tell me to suck his dick, which I happily would, just to make him feel wanted.
He moves toward another row, but I don’t think I can wait one more second to have him in my arms. Not to fuck him, not to suck his dick, but just to hold him and smell the warmth of his skin at the crook of his neck. Oh, I’m in so deep there’s no coming back.
I sneak up behind him as he pauses at a shelf to stare up at a book he can’t reach even on his tiptoes. Coming up behind him, I lean up and tap the offending book.
“This one?”
Reid tilts his head backwards to stare up at me, light blue eyes and pale skin, all sharp edges and desire. I don’t give afuck about the book. I drop my hand to curl my fingers behind his ear, holding his head so that he can’t pull away.
“I wanted to wake up with you,” I murmur close to his lips.
Reid smirks as he melts back against me. “Isn’t this fun though?”
“I’m cold.”
“I’ll warm you up,” Reid promises.
And then he crashes his lips against mine. He tastes like those damn cherry candies he’s always sucking on, but no cigarettes because he hasn’t smoked since the blowup with the twins. My good boy. I own Reid’s mouth with my own, laying claim to him with my kiss.
“This is fun, but I really just want to take you home and fuck you in our bed,” I say, sounding like a beggar even to my own ears.
“You’ve turned into a romantic so fast,” Reid notes, not sounding remotely irritated though.
I nuzzle against the crook of his neck, my favorite spot on his body. Minus his ass. Kissing his pounding pulse, I curl my hands against his arms and hold him close to me where he belongs.
“I love you, Reid.”
“I love you too, Dante,” Reid says easily, like it costs him nothing.
“I wanna take you home over spring break to meet my family, to meet Ama.”
Reid turns around in my arms to blink up at me, confusion, fear, and a little love shine in his eyes. “Really?”
“Yeah, will you come?”
Reid looks down at his feet, his telltale show of vulnerability. “I can’t fly… we’d have to drive.”
“I’ll buy a camper. I don’t give a fuck.”
Reid chuckles, deep and low, before tilting up onto his tiptoes to kiss me soft and slow. “Alright, Dante. You can take me home. Well, over spring break, and now, because it’s quite cold and I think I need you to warm me up.”
My chest overflows with love and desire for him all at once. Wrapping my arm around his shoulder, I guide him down the stairs and out to the car with a grin on my face that feels natural, and real.
The snow fallsaway after a few days, the air heating up enough to melt the slushy piles of snow scattered around campus. We’re still in the throes of winter. When winter softens, maybe I’ll whisk Reid away for a romantic stay in a cabin, just the two of us. Trudging out of the engineering building, I amble toward the math building to find Reid. It’s easy for me to spot him in the distance, my eyes just naturally fall to him whenever they can. He’s lying on his stomach in the quad, a blanket tossed over the still too-cold grass. Nobody else is out there, only Reid as he waits for me.
Two hurt people in a broken world finding one another at the exact right time. Maybe life is more than a string of happy accidents, maybe it’s purposeful. Because I can’t imagine a world where I’m not meant to find Reid, to love him, to hold him down and fuck him until he cries. The sun breaks through the clouds at the exact moment Reid lifts his head from his sketchbook to lock gazes with mine.
Reid promptly flips me off, happily returning his attention to his sketchbook.But the telltale smirk curving theedges of his lips tells me absolutely everything I need to know.
I think I’ll call it love.
THE END…for now.
