She lifted her head to look at me, her expression surprised.
“Sorry,” I said.
“That’s okay. It felt really good.”
Swallowing hard, I ran my hands through my hair. It wasn’t just that massaging her leg was arousing. It was. But I had weeks’ worth of pent-up desire begging to be set free.
“Are you all right?” she asked, bending her knees and drawing her legs close to her body.
“Yeah, fine.” I walked aimlessly around the living room. “I just need a minute.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I’m good.” I ran my hands through my hair again while I paced. Maybe I needed a cold shower. Did that actually work?
She watched me with concern, and I stopped, looking her in the eyes. I opened my mouth to reassure her that everything was fine. That she didn’t need to be worried. But that was not what I said.
“I want you, Pen. I want you so fucking bad. I keep trying to tell myself I shouldn’t. I can’t let it happen again.”
“That’s what I keep saying to myself, too.”
It wasn’t helping to hear her admit she’d been thinking about it, too. “Exactly. You’re my best friend. And it’s great being roommates. So, we can’t…”
She shook her head slowly. “No. We can’t.”
“Because if we did…” I wasn’t sure how to finish. Because if we did, what?
“If we did, we’d probably do it again after that.”
“Exactly.”
“Because it was… Well, I don’t know about you, but it was really good for me. I didn’t have a chance to tell you that, and it seemed like it would be weird if I did. But it was amazing.”
“Right?” I asked, my voice enthusiastic. “It was the best.”
“The best? Really?”
“Oh yeah.”
She hesitated, her lips moving, but for a second, no sound came out. “So it was good for you, too? Not just average?”
I rubbed my hands up and down my face. “Pen, it was incredible. There’s nothing average about you.”
She tucked her hair behind her ear. “But of course we can’t do it again.”
“Right, no. We can’t.” “Because…”
She didn’t finish, and I was having a very hard time remembering why.
I moved over to the couch and lowered myself down next to her.
Her eyes were on mine as I put a hand on her knee. “This would be a bad idea,” I said, my voice low.
“Very bad,” she whispered.
“Friends shouldn’t do this.”
She shook her head slowly, but a flush crept across her cheeks.
