It sounds like a big deal to me. The vulnerability in his voice and the way he’s clutching the comforter as if he’s debating diving beneath it and hiding makes him seem so young. Like a little boy who happens to have a really intense five—or whatever-the-hell-o’clock-it-is—shadow.
“Does anything help?” I ask. I guess I assumed fear wassomething he didn’t believe in, like lasting love or the inherent goodness of others, so seeing him scared like this feels wrong. So contrary to how he presents himself. If I’m sunshine, he’s a constant low rumble of thunder. It’s ironic, really, since that’s probably the last thing he’d want to be.
Even with his eyes closed, his muscles stiffen further as the lightning flashes. “Not that I know of. I usually just have to ride it out if I can’t sleep through it.”
“Okay. Well. I’m here. So I’ll ride it out with you.” I slide my hand over his arm until I locate his fist. He doesn’t put up a fight when I pry the comforter from his grasp and intertwine our fingers. In fact, he squeezes hard when the next round of thunder rolls through the room. Shifting closer, closer, until my body is pressed flush against Hollis’s side, I run my free left hand over his hair. No idea what prompts me to do this except that my childhood dog, King Velociraptor—I sawJurassic Parkfor the first time the day before we got him—used to hate storms too, and petting him usually kept him from whimpering and trying to burrow into the couch cushions.
“It’s okay,” I whisper. “You’re safe. I’ve got you.” Which is also, now that I think of it, what I used to say to my dog.
When the lightning next flashes, I begin to count aloud. “One hippopotamus. Two hippopotamus. Three hippopotamus. Four—”
“What are you doing?” he asks, staring up at me. I’ve adjusted our joined hands so I can prop myself up on my right elbow and lean over him for a better view of his face. I want to be able to watch his expressions, monitor the tide of tension that flows in and out of his jaw. And in this ultra-dark room, I have to be close to see anything at all.
“Figuring out how far away it is. That way you can know when it’s almost over.”
“And? How far away is it?”
“I don’t know. You interrupted me.” I smile down at him, and to my surprise, he returns it with a small one of his own. Not the beautiful full-teeth one when something’s really amusing, and not the begrudging one that only reaches the very corners of his mouth, but something fascinating in between. Something spontaneous and natural.
Hollis’s fingers brush against my cheek. They find a strand of hair that’s escaped from my messy bedtime bun and tuck it behind my ear, careful to avoid the bruise on my forehead—he must remember its location, because I doubt he can see the purple-and-blue splotch in the dark. Then his fingers drift to the nape of my neck. Feather-light, leaving goose bumps in their wake as they travel along my skin. If Thursday night on the police car was eleven, this has to be around thirty-five intimacies. But his jaw is relaxed now, his face no longer frozen in psychic pain, so thirty-five intimacies don’t seem like too many. They may not even be enough, because Hollis’s fingers have ceased their wandering and are now threaded into my hair, warm against my scalp. And they’re pressing, gently, so gently, easing me down until our mouths meet. My eyes flutter shut as the next bolt of lightning illuminates the room. The thunder, when it comes an indeterminate number of hippopotamuses later, is even louder than before. It rattles the windowpanes. Yet Hollis’s only response is to hold me tighter, to kiss me deeper, to—holy shit, to suck on my tongue.
This moment started sweet, but it’s taking a swift turn toward dirty. And I am so here for it. Getting physically involved with Hollis is probably a terrible idea. A total mistake, considering,well... everything. Though it’s not like my track record with casual sex isbad. Mostly because it’s nonexistent. But if I can eat a fantastic slice of cake without wanting to grow old with it, I can do this. How different could it be?
I uncouple my right hand from his left, then lift myself to straddle his hips. My fingers are in his hair, and his are in mine. Except now they’re not. I’d worry he was about to put an end to this if he wasn’t kissing his way down my throat, which doesn’t seem like something someone coming to his senses would be doing. Finally, he’s touching me again, working his fingertips up my thigh at a leisurely pace that’s driving me mad. They’re creeping under the hem of my borrowed T-shirt, and then they’re at the lace trim of my underwear, and then there’s a flash of lightning and they freeze. Apparently, this is where their journey ends. It was fun while it lasted.
“Fuck,” Hollis breathes against my neck. “God, Mill. I want...”
“What, what do you want?”
“I want to touch you. Please. Can I touch you?”
“Yes. Oh my god, yes.”
“Where? Where can I?”
“Anywhere. Everywhere. Just touch me. Please. Or I’m going to... going to melt. And then I’ll have to evaporate, and turn into a cloud, and Hollis, please, please just touch me so I don’t have to be a cloud.”
He smiles and it’s another new one—an achingly soft one that makes me extra aware of every place on my body I want to feel him. “You are so strange and beautiful and... andgood... and I don’t know why you make so much sense when you shouldn’t make any sense at all but, Mill, I need you so much.”
It’s probably mistaken in its lust-addled state, but my brain thinks that’s the loveliest thing anyone has ever said to me. I crash my mouth back down onto his, where we ride out the next thunder boom, his left hand on my hip and his right one now cupping my breast under the T-shirt, thumb stroking my nipple until I gasp. He repeats the action on the other side, and I’m grateful for the symmetry, even if I’m increasingly eager to feel his fingers elsewhere.
“Please,” I beg. “I need—”
“Hmm, I know. You need me here, right?” A fingertip traces down the front of my underwear, making me shiver. He looks up at me, waiting. “Not a rhetorical question, Mill. Talk to me.”
“Yes. Yes, there.”
Hollis’s hand dives under the lace waistband. His fingers easily find the place where I need him, as if they’ve been here before and know the area well, like they’re returning to a favorite vacation destination. Pleasure zings through my nerves, and Hollis’s lips brush against mine, a whisper of a kiss as he slides his hand deeper into the front of my underwear and buries two fingers inside me. My breath hitches, and it makes him smirk.
“Ride my hand,” he orders. “Show me how you like it.”
It feels so good and so right having some part of him filling some part of me that I’m almost reluctant to move. But when he kisses me again, it changes the angle of his hand, and his fingers slip out a fraction of an inch, and my clit drags across his thumb. My body is now fully convinced of the possibilities. I move myself up and down his fingers slowly, aware even in the dark that his eyes are fully focused on me. He’s become immune to the storm that’s still raging outside. And oh god, this is the most gloriously powerful I’ve ever felt in my entire life.
“So you like it slow, huh?” He suddenly plunges his fingers deep again without waiting for me. They move back out, keeping my pace from before, and I focus on the sensation, which feels different somehow, better even, with him controlling it. Maybe because of the way he’s crooking his fingertips so that they drag against every sensitive nerve on the way back out. “Is this what you want?”
“Yes. Yes.”
“Is this all you want? Because I am happy to finger fuck you till kingdom come, Mill, but—”
