Page 42 of Undefined Terms

I move, up the bed. My back against the headboard. The cheap one, the creaking wood. Celyn shifts, turns. The legs uncross and then Celyn’s facing me, close, the knee touching my thigh through the jeans.

‘Hi,’ Celyn says.

‘Hi.’

‘You smell like the site.’

‘Sorry.’

‘Don’t apologise for that. Ever.’

My hair’s still damp from the shower. Celyn reaches up. Pushes a curl off my forehead.

A hand finds my face. Celyn’s thumb settles at the corner of my mouth.

I kiss Celyn. The lip tint tastes like nothing, waxy, faint. The mouth underneath tastes like tea and Celyn. The stubble scrapes my chin. Light, not the rough drag of three days. Barely there. My hand goes to the waist, the flannel shirt, the gap where it’s open. The skin. Warm. The ribs through the bra.

Celyn’s hands pull at my shirt. I lift my arms, the shirt goes. Then the palms are flat against my chest, fingers spread against my skin, the look intent.

‘You don’t have to know what you’re doing,’ Celyn says. The voice low. ‘Just feel.’

I want. The wanting is a noise in my body, in my hands, in the base of my spine. I’ve wanted before. Women, pubs, the back of a cab. This isn’t that, hands shaking. Mouth dry. Can’t remember how clothes work.

The flannel shirt. I push it off. It drops. The bra, black, the elastic tight. Celyn’s collarbones, the dip between them. The chain, silver, thin. In the dip.

‘You can take it off,’ Celyn says.

I find the clasp, at the back. My fingers are too big for this, thick, calloused, built for rebar clips not bra clasps. I fumble. Celyn laughs at my fingers.

‘Other way.’

I unhook it, the elastic releases, the bra falls. The chest flat, pale skin, smooth. The nipples small and dark. The stubble on the chin above and the skin below.

I put my mouth on the sternum. Feel the bone under the lips. The heartbeat, fast. Getting faster. The skin smells like sweat and something under it I can’t name. I kiss along the rib. The left one, down. The stomach, flat, the muscles tight, the line of dark hair. My mouth follows the line. Celyn’s fingers tense at my nape.

‘Ron.’

I look up. Face above me. Mouth open. Lip tint gone. Kissed off, on my mouth now probably.

‘I want you,’ Celyn says. Simple. Like ordering tea.

‘Yeah.’

‘I want you.’ Celyn’s fingers tip my chin up. The eyes holding mine. ‘I want you to fuck me. If you want that.’

The voice doesn’t waver. But the hand on my face does, one tremor, quick, gone. Celyn’s thumb presses harder against my cheekbone. Holding on.

My stomach drops.

‘I want that.’

‘Have you done this.’

‘Not like this.’

‘Okay.’ Celyn sits up. The hands on my belt. ‘I’ll show you.’

Jeans, both. Under Celyn’s, the knickers, black, lace, the pattern against the hip, the elastic cutting the skin, the dark hair visible through the fabric. And the stubble, and the flat chest, and the lace, one person.