I don’t want to be alone right now.
“Elio?” I bite my lip, twisting my fingers together in my lap. He pauses, one hand on the door of the linen closet as he turns to face me.
"Yeah?"
"Will you—" I stop, suddenly embarrassed. "Will you stay with me tonight? I don't want to be alone."
His eyes widen, and I see the struggle play out on his face. He wants to say yes—I can see it in his eyes. But he also knows it's a bad idea. Knows that being in close proximity to me, especially in a bed, is asking for trouble.
We both know it. But I’m telling the truth—I don’t want to be alone.
"Annie—"
"Please. I won't—I'm not asking for anything except for you to just… be there. I just need to know you're there. That I'm safe."
The plea does it. I see his resistance crumble. "Okay,” he says finally, letting out a slow breath. “But I'm sleeping on top of the covers. Deal?” A small smile twitches the corner of his mouth, and I feel something inside of me melt.
I nod, telling myself that this will be fine. "Deal."
—
Except keepingour distance proves to be impossible.
We start out on opposite sides of the bed, me under the covers and Elio on top of them, with at least two feet of space between us. But I can't sleep. I'm too aware of him, too aware of his breathing, the heat of his body so close to mine. It’s been a long time since he’s been this close to me.
He snuck into my bedroom once, when we were seventeen. We lay on top of the covers, not touching for a long time, just breathing each other’s air. We knew how much trouble we’d both be in if we were caught—Elio more so than me. He didn’t even kiss me that afternoon. But I saw it all playing out on his face, every thought, everything he was imagining.
This feels like that. Except now, we’re adults. There’s no parent to catch us, no older brothers to walk in on us. No one is going to stop us if we touch. I don’t know if that’s better or worse.
What I do know is how the memory of what Desmond did is still making me feel. How no matter how many times I shower, I can’t get him off my skin. And I wonder if there’s a different way. A way to erase his touch by replacing it with the one that I want.
"Elio?" I whisper into the darkness.
His voice sounds thick when he answers. "Yeah?"
"Are you asleep?"
"No." A pause. "You okay?"
"I can't stop thinking about Desmond. About what he did." I curl onto my side, facing where I know Elio is even though I can't see him in the darkness. "When he grabbed me, when he—touched me—I felt so powerless. So scared."
I hear Elio shift, and then his voice comes closer. "I'm sorry, Annie. I’m sorry that… there’s no way I could have been there. No way I could have stopped it from happening, but I still… I wish I could have.’
"Of course you couldn’t have." I reach out blindly and find his hand. There are calluses on his fingers. His hands aren’t as soft as some men’s. Not as soft as Desmond’s were, and I like it. I want a roughness that I’m asking for. A man that I know I want instead of one I’m unsure about. "But I need—I want to replace those memories with something else. Something better."
"Annie." There's a warning in his voice. "We talked about this. We can't?—"
"I'm not asking you to sleep with me," I say quickly, although just the thought makes my entire body flare with heat. But I know what that would mean—Elio taking my virginity. It would mean something for us, but it would mean something more for Elio’s place in this world, too. If Ronan found out?—
But I don’t want to think about my brother right now.
"I'm just asking you to touch me,” I whisper. To make me feel something good."
His voice is tight, almost strangled when he speaks. If I reached out and touched him, I know he’d be hard. The thought sends a thrill through me. "That's still crossing a line."
"We've already crossed so many lines, Elio. What's one more?" I pull his hand to my waist, holding it there. "Please. I need this. I need you." I chew on my lower lip, my fingers caressing the back of his hand. “It’s nothing we haven’t done before.”
I hear him swallow hard. He knows I’m right. This is where we stopped, right before he left. His hands on me, mine on him. Never our mouths, never anything further than that. Kisses and touches. As much pleasure as we could give each other without crossing a line that we couldn’t come back from.
