Page 44 of Love Again

It could also be that the heater has been blasting for a while, and now I’m so hot I find myself fumbling with blankets, trying to push them away half-asleep and half-awake, still sort of in the dark, trying to figure out where he and I begin and the blankets end.

“What?” Luke’s voice is thick.

“Too hot,” I manage to say like a petulant teenager.

He reaches one long arm and flings the top blanket back. Doubly gifted, he wakes as easily as he goes to sleep, and now he’s ready for conversation. “Listen. I think the storm is over.”

“Okay,” I mumble. The lights in the parking lot are back on, casting a silver light into the room.

Luke rolls away from me, clambers out of bed, and turns off the light and fan in the bathroom. Then he turns off the heat. I watch him, bleary-eyed. Instead of sliding back under the covers, he stands and grabs the rejected blanket from the foot of the bed.

“Where are you going?” Propped up on my elbows, I try to follow him in the semidarkness.

“I can’t sleep next to you like that. Sorry.” Even in the dark, I can feel him looking at me. “I can’t do this. I love you. I can’t pretend not to love you. It’s not fair to you, and it’s not fair to me.”

This sudden admission coming from the dark clears any grogginess away. I sit up and his voice reaches me again.

“Where’s your key card?”

“Why?”

“Why?” His voice is very low. “Do you know how beautiful you are, Devon? In this light—your hair, your skin? I’ve been lying awake next to you for hours, unable to move, just so happy to hold you in my arms.” His voice catches. “And to know, that—that this is something you don’t want. I can’t do this. I’m going to the other room next door.”

Perhaps it’s the darkness or perhaps it’s the sound of his voice wrapping around me that makes my heart feel safe. Maybe it’s the heat of the room or the fact that I can barely see him standing there, the blanket around his waist. The next words that fall from my lips surprise me.

“Stay. Please stay.”

Now that the storm had dissipated, all I can hear is Luke’s breathing, shallow and fast. I feel him move slightly, coming around the left side of the bed. His shape is silhouetted against the window, and the shafts of light falls across his shoulders, playing with the shadows of his muscles.

My own breath shakes, but not from the cold.

My crotch is wet and hot.

He moves silently, puts his knees on the edge of the bed, and lies down next to me on top of the blankets.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” I say. “I didn’t know what else—”

Luke stops my mouth with a kiss, reaching under the blankets, and slips a hand across my chest. His fingertips are cool against my hot skin. Slowly, he traces a line from one shoulder to the other, then drops his hand lower with each pass until he rakes fingers across nipples. I moan and his mouth closes on mine. We kiss gently, and then more fervently until, looking hungry, he pulls away and gasps, stroking some hair from my forehead.

“I’ve missed you so much,” he says, the words coming in a whisper.

I’m wet and my thighs begin to shake. I hate that they do this. I’m not a good lover. But with Luke, it never mattered. He always accepted me and what I could give and what I couldn’t.

We keep kissing and I moan again, and my hips tip toward his. He puts a rough hand on my right hip and pushes me flat on my back again.

He takes that same rough palm and slides it between the lips of my labia. When he pulls back the covers, I’m suddenly exposed, but I don’t care. With both hands grasping my waist, he pulls me to the center of the mattress.

His head is between my legs, and I’m so wet that when he slides two fingers into me and curls a finger around my pubic bone, the slipperiness is exquisite, and I gasp and arch and clutch the sheets.

Luke flicks his tongue over and over, and I flash on all the dreams where this exact same thing happens. In my dreams, he holds me and I nearly always wake crying. After I come and feel my sex squeezing his fingers, his gaze on my body, I lie limply in his arms as he kisses my temples and my cheeks. He drags a hand across my breasts, massaging the little hard points, and I can feel tears start to slip down the side of my face.

The only difference is this is not a dream.

΅

We sleep for another two hours, and then just as the sun starts to pink the sky, we’re awake again, almost on cue. He beats me by about ten minutes, long enough to make a pot of coffee. There are two cheap Styrofoam cups, and the little room smells like a café.

I sit up and pull the blankets around me. He’s wearing his extrication gear. As he hands me a coffee, I comment, “Don’t you look dapper.”