“Sometimes… Sometimes I’m convinced I don’t deserve to be loved or liked. Sometimes I just feel like no one loves or likes me. I know that isn’t true, most of the time, but it doesn’t change how my head or body reacts. My mind thinks that if I get ahead of it, I can save everyone. I didn’t, though—Not this time.”
“There isn’t anything to save me from.”
“I’m embarrassed,” she breathes.
“Why?”
“I came to your place raging with jealousy,” she murmurs. “It wasn’t a good look.”
I kiss the base of her neck. “It was an incredibly sexy look.”
She laughs and I continue to pepper kisses up and down her neck. Then we sink back into comfortable silence, exhausted and spent. I hold her close and tight, hoping this is exactly how I die.
“Natalia, are you okay?”
“I honestly thought I was doing something helpful,” she says. “I thought that it would be good for you to see that you have options beside me.”
“I don’t want options.”
“Let me finish,” she mutters. “It wasn’t a good idea, I see that now. I hurt you. I hurt me. I’m sorry I was so… stupid. If it makes you feel better, I told my therapist what I did and her reaction was professionally unpleasantly truthful.”
“You know, I’ve never done that before,” she whispers, her finger tips brushing up and down the length of my arm.
“Which part?”
“The…” Natalia shrugs, her face flushing nearly red. “Boob thing.”
“Boob thing?” I laugh softly and she turns her body away from me. I pull her back around with my arm around her waist until she’s facing me again, a slight pout on her lips and brows low. “It’s okay. If you never want to do it again, we won’t. I only want to do what you want, Natalia. If you feel good, I feel good.”
“Really?”
“Yes, sweetheart,” I say. “I don’t expect you to do something with me that you don’t enjoy.”
“The same goes for you,” she tells me.
I smirk. “I enjoy everything with you.”
“Hmmm,” she hums and brushes her lips over my jaw. “I should go.”
“You don’t have to,” I say.
“Okay.” She smiles. “Okay, I’ll stay for a bit.”
“You never have to leave.”
Natalia nods, a frown trying to dominate her face.
“Are you still mad at me?” she whispers.
I exhale through my nose. “A bit.”
“I’m really sorry,” Natalia says, her lip beginning to quiver. “For making you go on that date. I shouldn’t… I don’t know why?—”
“You really hurt me, Natalia,” I say, my hands searching for hers and pulling her leg over my hips. “I didn’t want that. I only did it for you because I thought that it was what you wanted.”
“I thought it was for the best,” she says. “But I don’t think it was.”
“It wasn’t,” I whisper. “It hurt. I know you. I know your mind. I know your reactions. I know why and when you shut down, and I know you’ll come back to me. I know that you sometimes control your reaction to things, but I also know that you’re genuinely sorry afterward and eat yourself up with guilt. But this hurt me.”
