Rafael was making love to me, and it felt electric. The emotional tether that had always existed between us simultaneously fortified and ignited like a flame in that moment. The fierce, raging, hot love I felt for this man was almost too much. It overwhelmed me. My desire for him had the strength to consume rational thought and turn me needy and desperate for his touch.
I pulled him closer as I gasped, the emotions running so deep and so hot. His face glistened with sweat as he loved me—really loved me—filling me with him in that hot room where nobody could judge us. Nobody could take this moment away. It was terrifying and liberating. Giving your heart to someone is the most terrifying thing you can do, and I was giving mine to Rafael.
Rafael’s eyes softened, absorbing the enormity of what was happening between us. Our foreheads connected, and he whispered, “This. I want this forever, Cody.”
I couldn’t speak. I just mewled into this mouth. It was impossible to get any closer, yet I still wanted to be closer to him. I wanted to be his.
“I love you so much, Rafael,” I said.
“I love you, Cody.” His eyes clenched shut. “I’m close,” he said through heaving breaths.
My moans filled the space. “I need it. I want you in me, Rafael,” I whined
“Oh, fuck!” He came inside me, and the warmth of his release filled me up. I didn’t always feel it like that. Only when Rafael had worked himself into an absolute frenzy did his orgasm come out with the strength of a speeding bullet.
With our foreheads still connected, we breathed in each other’s exhalation.
Rafael looked into my eyes as he gripped my length and stroked me. I held onto his shoulders and let his entire aura envelop me as he brought me to orgasm.
He grabbed a towel tossed on the floor from the night before and cleaned me off.
My arms wrapped tighter around him as I closed my eyes. The past few days—scratch that—life had taught me that everything can change in the blink of an eye, so I savored that moment between us. With him still inside me, my body joined with his; I savored it like it might never happen again.
Rafael
I sat at the tiny table for two while Cody puttered in the kitchen, making pancakes.
It dawned on me that I didn’t have any dreams. I slept so peacefully. I didn’t always have them, but I expected a big one after the boat incident with Cody.
I didn’t know what it meant. Had I conquered something? While my gratitude for Cody’s survival was enormous, the guilt that I couldn’t save Mattie remained.
I sat at the kitchen table, trying to understand how I felt about everything. Cody must have sensed me spiraling.
“Talk to me. What’s happening?” Cody set a stack of delicious-looking pancakes on the table. He’d gone through so much, yet I still made the whole thing about me when I wept on him like a baby. He didn’t need this.
“Nothing. Just…you know…replaying the craziness of it all.”
Cody cocked a brow at me, an incredulous look on his face. “Don’t. Rafael, you can’t hide shit like this. We can’t help each other if we don’t talk to each other.”
Well, look at you being all emotionally mature and shit.Cody’s near-death experience seemed to have brought about some sort of enlightenment or emotional intuitiveness. Why the hell hadn’t I developed any of that?
“It’s-this is hard, Cody.” I didn’t want to say what I was feeling. What if he misinterpreted it? What if he thought I regretted saving him and not Mattie? That wasn’t the case at all. I wasn’t enough that day and didn’t know if I could ever be enough. I protected Cody yesterday, but what about next time?
To say that Cody looked at me with trepidation was quite the understatement. I could see it all over his face. He was bracing himself for some bullshit, no doubt expecting me to try and underplay this morning or push him away. I had established a very unhealthy pattern of pushing Cody away, and I could feel him bristling with emotion as he awaited my following statement. I hadn’t precisely formed some beautiful or poetic way to talk about everything happening inside me, so I bit the bullet and blurted out, “It feels wrong feeling good.”
Cody’s eyes widened. His mouth opened and closed a few times before finally saying, “Tell me more.”
Fuck, really? I hated this. “I feel so good with you. I’m so un-fucking-believably grateful that you’re okay—”
Cody interrupted, “I’m okay because of you. You know that, right?”
I shook my head and dismissed him with a hand, “You can swim. I’m sure you would have been fine.”
“No. Rafael, I blacked out when I hit the boat. I woke up when you pulled me out. It was you pulling me out and the air hitting my face that turned my system back on. You saved me.”
In theory, I knew that, but hearing him say that out loud, knowing that the impact knocked him out like it had Mattie, made the air leave my lungs. I didn’t want to cry in front of him again, but I just couldn’t help it. It was all coming out now, and I couldn’t stop it.
“That’s what I mean.” I could barely speak, the sorrow clogged my throat, and each word I uttered needed my help pushing through all of the emotion. “I-I just wish I could have done it for him, too. That sounds so shitty. I am so grateful that you’re okay, but I couldn’t be there for him and it feels so fucking wrong to feel relieved that you’re okay when he’s dead.” I hated the words spilling out of my mouth. Would Cody never get the version of me he deserved? “I’m an awful fucking person.” I wasn’t good enough. I knew it yesterday, and it was fucking true. He should find someone else. Someone who can give him the love he deserves. Not this broken, fucked up mess that sat before him.
