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I couldn’t help smiling, too, though embarrassment was still singeing through me. “No, I’d rather you didn’t,” I admitted.
We turned out the camping lantern and got into the sleeping bags, where we lay in each other’s arms listening to the soft sounds of the wind outside. The bed was narrow, so that it was almost like trying to balance on a diving board — but I’d never felt so comfortable or safe in my life than there with Alex’s arms around me, my head on his chest.
He touched my hair as we lay in the darkness, smoothing its long strands across his torso.
“Is it bothering you?” I asked.
“No, I love it; it’s so soft. ” I felt him twining his fingers through, playing with it gently. “I was right, you know,” he said. “Those guys in Pawtucket are complete idiots. ”
I smiled. “So would you have taken me to the prom, if you went to Pawtucket High?”
“Yeah, definitely,” he said. “I bet you’d look so beautiful . . . even more than you usually do. ”
Warmth filled me. I straightened up slightly, trying to see his face in the darkness. “You really think that, don’t you?”
“What, that you’re beautiful?” Alex sounded surprised. “You are. The first time I saw you, you were wearing these pink pajamas and a gray T-shirt, and you were making coffee . . . and I just couldn’t take my eyes off you. ”
I couldn’t believe that he actually remembered what I’d been wearing. “And the first time I saw you, all I could think of was doing this. ” I traced his lips with my finger; he took my hand in his and kissed it.
“So would you have worn a tux to the prom?” I asked as I nestled back against him.
Alex’s hand moved to my shoulder, rubbing it lightly. “Do the guys wear tuxes? Yeah, I guess I would in that case. I’d have to at least try to look as good as you. ”
I imagined him in a crisp black-and-white tuxedo, and smiled as I ran a finger over his chest. “You know that half the girls in school would have been after you. ”
He gave a soft laugh. “If they were into someone who was flunking out . . . I don’t think I’d do too well with having to go to class when a bell rings or caring about homework. . . . ”
“A bad boy — even better. You’d have done well in Spanish class. ”
“If I ever went to it. ”
We lay in silence for a while; Alex’s arms felt so warm and safe that I was starting to get sleepy. “Say something in Spanish,” I mumbled.
He kissed my hair. “Te amo, Willow,” he said quietly.
I came awake, smiling into the darkness. “What does that mean?” I whispered.
I could almost hear his own smile. “What do you think it means?”
I hugged him, kissing his collarbone and wondering if it was possible to actually die of happiness. “Te amo, Alex. ”
You’d think that a cabin in the middle of nowhere, with no TV or electricity, would be a place where you’d start to go pretty seriously stir-crazy soon. But it was the exact opposite. Being with Alex, in a place where we could relax instead of being constantly on the run, was just . . . magical. That first morning, I woke up to find him lying on his side with his head propped on his hand, looking down at me and smiling.
Tingles swept over me; it was like waking up and remembering that it’s Christmas. “Good morning,” I said, drinking him in. His eyes looked almost pure blue in the morning light; there was a faint hint of stubble on his jaw.
“Morning. ” The muscles of his chest moved as he leaned over and kissed me. Long, slow, deep. He smelled of sleep and a warm smell that was just Alex. I felt myself falling.
“That . . . is such a nice way to wake up,” I murmured when the kiss ended.
Alex stroked my cheek with the backs of his fingers. “Not as nice as just waking up and seeing you there, lying beside me. I thought for a second I must be dreaming. ”
“Was it a nice dream?” I asked. I couldn’t stop smiling.
He grinned; his dark hair was rumpled from sleep. “Oh, yes. It was a very, very nice dream. ”
We kissed again. It grew deeper; Alex wrapped his arms around me, drawing me close against him. His back was smooth and warm. I ran my hands over it as we kissed, loving the feel of his skin, and almost went faint as his lips moved briefly to my neck and then found my mouth again. In my entire life, nothing had ever felt as good as Alex kissing me like that. When we finally pulled apart, both our hearts were pounding.
I cleared my throat, skimming my fingers along his forearm. “Alex, you, um . . . you know that I’ve never —”
“I know,” he broke in softly. He reached for my hand, linking his fingers through mine. “Willow, it’s OK. We’ll do whatever you want. I just want to be with you; I don’t care. ”
And I had known that he would say that, but it was still good to hear it. I let out a breath. “Kissing like that is so — amazing,” I said. “Maybe I could just get used to that for a while. ”
“Yeah, OK. ” Propping himself on his elbow again, Alex gazed down at me. He touched my hair, toying with a long strand. “You know, just — being here with you, having you here beside me — it’s incredible. When you’re ready for something more, then great, but I really don’t mind. ”
Love for him rushed through me. “It’s incredible for me, too,” I whispered.
He smiled and tickled my face with the strand of hair. “And anyway, this means that we get lots of kissing practice, right? So you can get used to it?”
The thought sent warm shivers through me. “Oh, definitely. ”
“I think that can be arranged. ” He kissed me lightly and we lay smiling at each other, with the sleeping bag soft around us and the sound of birdsong outside. Sunshine angled in through faint cracks in the cabin wall.
“So what do you want to do today?” said Alex after a while.
“Be with you,” I said promptly.
He waggled his eyebrows at me. “Yeah, as if you’ve got a choice. ”
“Even if I had a choice, that’s what I’d choose. ” I stroked my hand across his chest, savoring the feel of his heartbeat under my fingers. “That’s what I’d always choose. ”
It was so peaceful up at the cabin, with only the mountains and the sky, and the occasional wheeling hawk for company. As the days passed, Alex and I spent so much time just talking — it felt as if there weren’t enough hours in the day for all that we wanted to say to each other, all that we wanted to discover. We both knew that we couldn’t stay up there forever, but I think we both wanted to believe that we could — that there weren’t any angels in the world, any Church of Angels fanatics who were trying to kill us. And sometimes I could actually forget all of that. Sleeping in Alex’s arms at night felt so warm and safe; waking up beside him was like a sunrise inside of me every morning.
He was so easy to live with. We just got along, on the most minor things, like how often we wanted to clean (which was every couple of days or so, when the mess in the cabin started driving us crazy), and who was going to do which chore. Not that there were that many of them. Mostly I cooked — which was just heating up cans — and Alex cleared up afterward.
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