“Eugene, Blue’s takin’ her break,” I shouted to him where he was slingin’ beers behind the bar.
He only shot me a warnin’ look. “Don’t have sex in my office.”
“Wouldn’t dream’a it,” I promised ’fore we disappeared through the door into the hallway.
“Aaron! You can’t speak to my boss like that.”
I shrugged, haltin’ at the break room when I heard the sound’a women’s voices inside and turnin’ instead to open the door to the storage room. It smelled like beer and damp woodinside, an oddly pleasant combination especially underscored by the sweetness’a Blue’s perfume.
“Why are we in here?” she asked.
“Privacy,” I said a moment ’fore I crowded her into the wall and claimed that pink mouth the way I’d been hankerin’ to since the first moment I saw her that night.
She tasted like bubble gum, the cool metal’a her Medusa piercin’ a sexy contrast to the warmth of her slick tongue. Her surprised reluctance melted in a moment, her tray clatterin’ to the ground at our feet so she could sink both hands in my hair and pull me even deeper into the kiss.
It took all my willpower to break our mouths apart and even then, I dragged my lips down her throat to her collarbone, nippin’ at the skin there in a way that made her nipples bead behind the thin cotton’a her shirt.
A groan worked its way outta my throat, but I was too excited to see her unwrap her present to give in to lust first.
“Open your gift,” I told her, still placin’ open-mouthed kisses along her throat.
I could feel the vibration’a her laughter beneath her skin. “I will if you stop kissing me, but I don’t really want you to stop.”
“Greedy girl,” I teased, palmin’ one’a her heavy breasts to feel the hard peak’a her nipple and tweak it between two fingers. “Be good and open your present, Blue, and I’ll be sure to give you another after you do.”
Her eyes were blown straight to black beneath that long fringe’a lashes when I stepped back to hand her the three-foot package I’d leaned against the door. My heart fuckin’ ached to see the way she stared down at it, a kid on Christmas who’d never been given any gifts ’til now.
Suddenly, I was fuckin’nervous,and I was never nervous.
The gift felt silly, really, not real art, not real expression like a poem or a paintin’, but it was all I had to give. All I was reallygood at besides fixin’ up a bike or car, or talkin’ my way into people’s lives or makin’ someone laugh.
And I wanted her to have this ’cause what gift could I get a girl who couldn’t show she was startin’ to become mine?
The rush’a blood in my ears was almost loud enough to drown out her sweet little gasp as she tore open the paper and revealed the bouquet’a flowers I’d made for her.
Bunches’a blue and pink flowers tied with a bow all in neon coloured tubin’ against a clear acrylic base.
“Aaron?” she breathed, lookin’ from the sign up at me.
Wordlessly, I took it from her and plugged it into an outlet near the door, restin’ it atop one’a the many kegs’a beer in the store room. With a flick’a the light switch, the room plummeted into darkness lit only by the pinks and blues’a the neon sign.
I walked back over to Blue, where she stood frozen against the wall, starin’ at the sign with her hand in front’a her parted mouth, eyes made neon by the lights I’d bent into shape for her. I pushed a lock’a electric blue hair from her cheek so I could palm it, tiltin’ her head up for a small kiss.
“Wanted to buy you flowers, but I knew you couldn’t take them home with you, so I figured this would have to do,” I explained.
“They’re so beautiful,” she whispered thickly, damp eyes reflectin’ the shape’a the flowers in the dark as they stared up at me almost helplessly. Her fingers reached up to cling to the shirt beneath my cut. “No one’s ever made me something before. Let alone something so lovely.”
Somethin’ unlocked inside my chest like I’d been given access to a previously closed chamber of my heart. At that moment, I would’ve reached inside my own chest to gift that to her if it meant keepin’ that soft look’a reverent joy on her face.
“I’m glad you like them,” I said a little awkwardly ’cause there was this strange heat in my cheeks and angst in my bones that seemed like…bashfulness, and I wasn’t used to it.
“I love them,” she corrected, gettin’ on her tiptoes so she could haul me down for a kiss. “Prettiest flowers I’ve ever seen. Where did you get them?”
The back’a my neck itched with heat, so I scrubbed at it as I pulled away. “Uh, I made ’em.”
She blinked. “You actuallymadethat? Like with your hands?”
The chuckle dissolved the last’a my uncharacteristic shyness. “Yeah, Blue. It’s a hobby’a mine, I guess you could say. Makin’ neon art. Eugene was actually the one to teach me. Half the shit on the walls in the bar is mine.”
