“Please,” I moan against his lips. So close—everything is so close and nothing matters but this.
He doesn’t even break the kiss when he lines himself up, just slows the twirl of his tongue with mine as he thrusts into me, and the sound doesn’t even make it out of my throat. I'm so shocked at the fullness, tensing around him as pleasure pools, coils around the base of my spine. His hand wraps around my ribcage, holding me in place, and I look up into his amber flecked eyes, lit more by the Christmas lights lacing the roof. His forehead tips against mine, breathes whispering as we lay so inextricably linked, coated in sweat, despite the ice and wind, oblivious to the world around us.
Most shocking is the way I think this has ruined me. I feel him, hold him inside me like this, and can’t imagine that I’ve held anyone else this way. I know I have—it just simply doesn’t matter.
“Is this okay?” he huffs, catching his breath before dragging out, teasing me at the entrance.
“I’ve had better,” I say, eyes falling shut as I moan, trying to separate the heat burning in my core from every rational thought I ever had, but they’re collapsing into each other. The past is rendered pointless and unimportant with every thrust, and it becomes harder and harder to hold the mental line.
“That so?” He shifts so he’s deeper, andfuck—tears well in my eyes and I will them to fall away when I hastily turn my head from him.
I can’t name what I want from this, other than to not know where I end and Andy begins. To feel the inner most part of him wrapped around the inner most part of me.
But what does one do with that? It’s an impossible ask, notsomething you can actually give anyone. It’s tragic and ill fated to want someone like that, but it’d be a lie to say it isn’t what the songs are about. All the best ones.
“Andy,” I whimper, already lost to the wave slowly breaking on my shore. He slides his hands under me, dragging me toward me as he sits up, repositioning himself. He slots himself between my thighs and thrusts from a new angle. My mouth falls open, loses the ability to stay shut, and I feel the start of the fracture, the splintering from the inside out, and he watches, his breaths turning more and more ragged. He flushes across the bridge of his nose, and I know this is becoming unbearable for him, too.
“Tell me this doesn’t feel different,” he dares, driving deeper, burying himself the way I’ve been secretly praying he would.
On its own, my head digs back into the blanket, a throaty moan filtering out of me as I try to tell him it doesn’t, as I try to hide but he’s laid me bare, is thoroughly wrecking whatever resolve I thought I had. I’m pulled taut like the strings on an instrument, seconds from snapping.
“Normal,” I say behind closed eyes, just as a tear trails down into my hairline.
“Fuck, Sloane. Don’t lie to me.” His hand shoots down to where we’re joined and swirls around me. “Lie to everyone else, but not me.”
The demand has me shattering, my pleasure violently rolling through me, undoing whatever was left of my composure, and he sinks back in, leaning down to bring us together, thrusting and working me through my climax as he kisses me like he could do it forever. When he barrels into his, I can’t do anything but hold his gaze, lifting my hips and cradling his jaw before he falls to my side. Our breaths float in theair above us, cold frosty plumes of exhaustion, and we lay there silently. Lost in thought.
The ghost of his touch is still everywhere and I wish on a star for it to haunt me forever. For me to never forget what this was like with him. Then, I turn to face him, nervous about what I might find: insatiable longing, questions I can’t answer, the realization that I wasn’t all I was cracked up to be. I swallow them back, knowing they shouldn’t matter.
“See. Friends.” I try for an easy smile but press my lips together instead.
Andy’s gaze softens as he pulls a blanket over us, scooting closer and running his thumb across my bottom lip. “Whatever helps you sleep at night,” he tells, brushing my hair out of my face, his fingers catching a traitorous tear.
But he doesn’t press, doesn’t push. Doesn’t make me promise or answer anything at all.
Cinnamon sugar lingers in my nose as I help Rebecca, or Becs, slather each sugary spiral with a generous coat of cream cheese frosting. It occurs to me I haven’t had a Christmas like this maybe ever. The warmth of the antique Christmas lights that I was informed have been in Andy’s family since his Grandma was a kid make the apartment feel like a Hallmark movie, so warm that it can’t possibly be reality—but it is, and it’s hard to push down the jealousy that sprouts from the realization that Andy grew up wrapped in all of this love. Something in the way he looks at his mom, looks at his sister, is currently looking at me makes it possible, though.
Carmen’s eyes are glued to the presents lining the edge of the tree as she absentmindedly glides her knife over thecinnamon roll in front of her, the frosting forming a large clump in the center.
“Psst…” I nudge her, her focus snapping back to what she’s doing. Before she has time to smooth the frosting out, Andy snags the roll she’s working on, shoving the whole thing in his mouth. I fight my amused grin, watching too closely as his tongue flicks out to catch the frosting smeared across his mouth.
“Andy! That was mine!” she bemoans, her brother smiling through a mouth full of roll, and she shoves him. “You’re gross!”
He swallows before directing his smile at me, winking, and I know that I’m beet red, can feel it all the way down to my toes. Because I like him.I like him.Not just want him in that passing way you could want anyone who looks like him. It feels like a tangle in my head, this feeling I have for him, in his too warm house, with his too nice family and after last night, that tangle feels like a knot too overwound to unravel anytime soon.
I just smile back, a real smile. And I know he knows it’s real because something softens in his expression, no longer playful but like he’s laying himself raw in front of me, letting me have him if I want him. When he looks at me like that, I find it hard for me to remember the reasons I don’t.
“Can wepleaseopen something?” Carmen’s eyes are giant orbs directed at Rebecca, who hasn’t hidden the fact that she’s thrilled at this obvious pull between Andy and I.
“Fine!” she relents, throwing up her hands. “But only if Sloane opens her gift first.” She gives me this mischievous side eye that reminds me of Mom and I wonder what Rebecca was like when she was younger.
“Oh you didn’t have to—” I stutter but she cuts me off.
“Sloane. It’s Christmas, and in this house Christmas means you get a gift whether you like it or not. Besides, Carm and Iworked very hard on it.” She winks, that playful expression identical to Andy's and I just want to hug her. Something floods my stomach, this strange revelation that this family sees me and wants me here. It’s foreign and feels like a gift in itself.
She takes my hand, pulling me toward the tree, Carm bouncing on the balls of her feet with excitement and I feel Andy’s eyes on me, tracking my movements so closely like he’s scared I might disappear, again. He couldn’t know that I needed this; that since Thanksgiving I’ve felt so lonely, like I could just slip away and, sure, people might notice, but they’d assume it was some marked part of me, some pillar of my personality, and they’d never come looking. I think Andy’s family would look, though. I think they’d want to find me.
I carefully untape the small red package Rebecca fished out from under the tree, giving way to a tiny white box. I open it gingerly and can practically feel the anticipation coming off of Carmen, like steam in a tea kettle about to whistle. Inside is a long thin bracelet, expertly woven with different shades of blue. I swallow a hard lump now forming in the base of my throat.
