“I’m a patient man. We’ll see what we can do.”
Morgan slows, testing different rhythms and positions. He wants me on top because he’s worried my back will get sore (and he’s not wrong), but I need the pressure of his weight, I need to feel like I’m sinking. Through trial and error, we find out what my body wants from his, and after pausing a few times so that Morgan can last longer, I eventually sense a wave cresting.
I dig my nails into his hips, bringing him closer to me. Harder but not faster, we writhe together, and ultimately, I suspect my climax is equally credited to the euphoria caused by his words, and not just the way he moves inside me:You’re never getting rid of me.
He’s laid a pillow under my fear, giving it a safe place to land. If he likes me for me, then perhaps it’s safe to like him back.
We kiss anew as joy bursts in my heart. I kiss him and touch him, stroke and savor, until we can’t ignore that we need to clean ourselves up. So we do; then we redress when the heat we’ve generated dims to an ember, and he asks again, hopefully, if I’ve stashed a picnic basket around here.
I rip open a packet of peanut butter crackers. “Sorry, this is all I’ve got left. Somewhere out there, an elephant is enjoying our granola bars.”
“We hallucinated that, right? There’s no way there was an elephant in the woods. We’re inOhio.”
“There were definitely fumes in that hot spring,” I agree. “I bet we saw a funny-shaped tree and somehow convinced ourselves it was…” I trail off as the vivid image of an elephant trampling our tent stampedes across my memory.
“Nah,” we say in tandem. “That was an elephant.”
We split my water, polishing off every cracker crumb. “I still can’t believe that the first time you kissed me, the kiss was on my hand,” he laments. “I’m going to have a stern talking-to with that psychedelic potion.”
“If it helps, I definitely would’ve preferred to kiss your mouth. But I was trying to be respectful toward your father.”
He tucks me up against him again. “What a weird and wonderful creature you are, Zelda Tempest.”
Through the mist that suffuses the mouth of the cave, I notice small, silvery insects weaving. One of them blows into the cave, landing on the rocks close to me. Its wings twitch as it rights itself, and it flies back out to join its friends.
“Those are supposed to be green,” I remark, as Morgan’s arm tightens around my waist. “I think they might be paranimals. Or not animals, since they’re insects. Parasects?”
“Interesting,” he replies distractedly, the rumble of his voice inviting me to snuggle in deeper.
“Want to go have a look?”
“No.” Morgan kisses my neck. “I want to be right here.”
I smile.
And the rain shivers through the trees and the magic burns in my veins and I want to be right here, too.I could live right here, I think.
“Not a bookmark,” he says softly, as I’m falling asleep.
“Mm?”
He smooths back my hair, baring my cheek. I feel the weight of his gaze, and his voice is like melting gold. “If you were a gingersnappus, you wouldn’t transform into a bookmark,” Morgan tells me. “You’d be a galaxy. So bright and beautiful that I could see you from any edge of the universe.”
When I dream, I am in Morgan’s arms, drifting across space, through implosions of stars and the births of planets, through all the constellations inked into his skin.
Thirty-Eight
Run directly through one door and out another in the home, thrice before sunrise, and your True Love will have a lucky day.
Love Magic Misc.,
Tempest Family Grimoire
“You areglorious,”Morgan murmurs to me in the early-morning light, staring into my eyes. “I could look at you forever.”
I slide a palm across his cheek. “Good morning. I’d like to get railed again.”
“So romantic.”
