Page 50 of Love Out Loud

Chapter 18

Lennon

I awake in a haze, a warm kind of comfort settling my heart and soul. I don’t know why I feel so relaxed and content, but I burrow into my pillows to try to keep this feeling going for just a little while longer.

It only takes another minute or so for my senses to fully power up and, with them, my memory. My eyes fly open.

I kissed Lark.

I kissed Lark.

I kissed Lark.

Doesn’t matter how many ways I say it to myself, it happened. I draw my lips around my tongue so I can taste them, and sure enough, she’s lingering there. She tastes like she feels—all buttery sweetness and nostalgia, citrus and sunshine.

I fell asleep to a montage of memories of her, and the one thread running through all of them was a vague understanding that I’ve wanted to kiss her since even before I could even name the feeling.

It was worth the wait.

And she’s still here.

The anticipation of seeing her this morning has me jumping out of bed and quickly pulling on a shirt and gym shorts so I can burst through the door. I feel like a kid with a crush who’s excited at even just the possibility he might lay eyes on her. Actually, I feel like I used to in those early days after just having met Lark at Drama Club—bounding to school early in hopes of seeing her before classes started, hanging around late for a few extra minutes with her before she headed home.

She’s already sitting in the kitchen when I burst through the door, her hands cupped around a mug. Her expression brightens when she sees me, though I can tell she’s been gnawing at her bottom lip and there’s still a crease between her eyebrows as if she had been frowning.

“Please don’t say it was a mistake,” I blurt out. The urge to slink back into my room and hide for the rest of the day slams into me, and if it weren’t for the way she rolls her gorgeous lips between her teeth to bite back a laugh, I probably would have.

“I don’t think it was a mistake.” She’s calm, but her voice is edged with humor. “But I guess I don’t have to ask how you feel about it.”

Before my sleep- and lust-addled brain can even register that I’ve moved, I cross the room and pull her up and into my arms. She doesn’t hesitate to lift her face to me, and our lips meet in a deep kiss.

When I was a teenager, my mom had these fancy measuring spoons that had a tongue-and-groove pattern on the handles. They also had magnets, so if you put one near the other, they’d snap together with a satisfying click. I fidgeted with those things often, especially when my parents were gone. Lark and I would sit at the table in silence, and I would pull the spoons apart and snap them back together over and over again.

The way Lark fits with me reminds me of those measuring spoons. Her body meets mine with the same satisfying snap, and mine turns concave to mold around the curve of her breasts, the swell of her hips.

And yet it’s not enough. I ache for her to be closer, to give me more, even though she has given me everything that matters for the past twenty-five years.

Lark Caspian is mine, and I’m never letting her go.

A thud sounds several times at the door, then again. I try to swim up through my consciousness and back to reality as I reluctantly part my lips from hers.

“Expecting someone?” Lark’s voice is husky and sensual. It draws me back in. I’ve waited twenty-five years for this. Whoever is at the door can wait another minute.

Unfortunately, the pounding pulls me right back out. I slump forward with a frustrated growl. A musical giggle rises up out of Lark’s throat. I want to know what that sound tastes like and swallow it. I want to make it mine.

The knocking comes again, more impatient this time, so I untangle my hand from Lark’s hair and pull open the front door.

I immediately wish I hadn’t. Because standing just on the other side of the threshold are my parents.

My mother is standing with her arms outstretched like she’s expecting a hug. My dad is grinning like a fool. Both of their expressions falter when I cannot so much as muster up a hello, let alone whatever fake exclamation of joy they were expecting.

They don’t drop in on me often, but it has happened a handful of times over the past few years—usually when they’re on their way somewhere else. A wind carries them in for a few hours, then out again. And every time, it dredges up old emotions and leaves me wrestling with them for days. Will they stay this time? Do I want them to? How long before I see them again?

I sense Lark behind me before I feel her hand on my back, warm and reassuring. “Sage. Arlo. What a nice surprise!”

Mom’s eyes light up, and she turns her still-outstretched arms in Lark’s direction. “Lark! Baby! I had no idea you’d be here, too.” She brings Lark into a tight hug and sways her back and forth. I finally wrap my head around the situation enough to shake my dad’s hand and motion him into the apartment. Much to my chagrin, he picks up a duffel bag that had been sitting off to the side and drags that in with him.

“Oh, this is so wonderful,” my mom is saying as she and Lark join us in the living room. “We haven’t seen you in ages. Are you living in California now? How is that little girl of yours? Is she here, too?”