“Walk me home?”
I pulled back, searching her face. “Of course. You know you’re welcome to stay if you’d like to. No funny business, I promise.”
“I have to get home.”
“Okay.” I held my hand out and helped her to her feet. She went to her purse, checked her phone, and then popped a mint into her mouth.
“Are you dating anyone?”
“I thought I was dating you?” she said.
“Right. We are dating. Very slowly.”
“Are you pressuring me, Matthias? You were more patient as a twenty-one-year-old. What happened?” There was amusement in her tone.
I laughed. “Well, I didn’t know what I was missing then. Now I do.”
We left my loft and I walked her home. When we got to the stoop of her brownstone, I turned to her. “Want to get dinner Friday?”
“I’d love to.” She leaned up and kissed me for a long time. “I had fun tonight.”
“Me too. It was the best PG experience I’ve had in a long time.”
“The explicit language, provocative dancing, finger sucking, and drug use are surely worth a PG-13 rating,” she said, before leaning up and pecking me on the cheek one last time.
“Night, Gracie.”
“Night, Matty.”
I walked home, got into bed, and fell asleep with a smile on my face.
ON FRIDAY, Imade a reservation at a little Japanese place within walking distance of both of us. When I got to her brownstone to pick her up, she was waiting for me on her stoop, wearing a leather jacket and a dress that reminded me of the one she used to wear in college that drove me crazy.
“You look great.”
“You do, too.” She linked her arm in mine as we walked, and we talked about our week. We ate sushi, drank a lot of sake, and I fed her from my plate. After dinner, we ended up at a bar that had a band playing gospel and blues rock. There were periods that night when we said nothing to each other and just moved to the music and then there were times when we were laughing hysterically and yelling over the music.
By eleven, we were totally tipsy. When I kissed heroutside the bar, she broke away first and pulled me down the street. “Where are we going now?”
She turned, grabbed my face hard, and kissed me again. “My bed, Matt. That’s where we’re going.”
My heart thumped wildly at the thought. “Good idea.”
I followed her up the steps to her front door, trying desperately to keep my cool and not look overly eager. When we entered her apartment, I had to squint through the darkness. I turned around and watched her silhouette, lit only from the streetlight coming through the window next to the front door. She threw her keys on the entry table, then her jacket. She kicked off her shoes, pulled her tights off, then lifted her dress from the hem, over her head, and threw that aside, too.
My jaw was on the floor.
I caught her as she jumped into my arms and straddled me, her hands diving into my hair, her sweet lips on my mouth. I walked backward down the dark hallway to a stairway and looked up. “No, my room is here. End of the hall to the left.”
Pressing her against the wall, I kissed her from her mouth to her neck to her ear and back to her shoulder where I tried to catch my breath. When I set her down, she reached for my shirt and pulled it over my head, then took my hand and led me to her bedroom.
Standing near the bed, she tugged at my belt, fumbling with it.
“Slow down, Gracie.”
“No one has ever said those words to me.” She undid my belt and pulled my pants and boxers down as I kicked off my shoes. She was different from college Grace. I could see that now. She was more confident, more self-assured.
I took her face between my hands. Even in her dark room, with little more than the glow from the streetlights streaming through the window, I could see that her eyes were bright, brilliant, and full of wonder. “I want to slow down, otherwise this won’t be fun for you,” I said.
