Third Degree

by Julie Cross

  He hesitates again, and just when I think he may be stumped, I feel first his breath and then his mouth on my neck. I let out a sigh, unable to stop myself.

  “A little further forward,” I manage to say. “That’s the trapezius.”

  He applies a heavier dose of pressure in the new location, and my fists are balled up in the sheets to keep from grabbing on to him and holding him against me like this for the rest of the weekend.

  “I like this kind of tutoring,” I whisper, my eyes still closed.

  Marshall laughs against my skin. “I like this kind of studying.” He leaves a trail of kisses between the previous muscle and a brand-new one. “Pectoralis major, right?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Instead of shoving my top up, like I did to his shirt a little while ago, he carefully rolls the hem up until it’s just under the bottom of my bra. His mouth lands on the ribs on my left side.

  “External oblique?” he says, unsure.

  “Serratus anterior.” I let go of the sheet and touch his hair, combing my hand through it. It’s fluffy and soft.

  His mouth journeys to multiple points across my midsection, with me reciting the muscle name at each spot and him repeating it in that low, sexy voice, half serious and half playful. My heart is racing, my hands working so hard not to take action on their own. He makes his way back toward my neck and I say, “We did that one already.”

  “I know.” He rests his forehead against mine, both of us breathing heavier than normal, and then he lays his hand on my cheek.

  My fingers are itching to grab his face and pull his mouth to mine but I remind myself who’s calling the shots today. And it’s not me. “Did you run out of muscles? Should we move on to bones?”

  In other words, Please don’t tell me the study session is over.

  “Skin,” he says, “Definitely skin.”

  “But skin isn’t—” I’m cut off by Marshall’s gloriously in-control mouth crashing into mine. I’ve been too close to him for too many hours to not go overboard with this new door opening. I wrap my arms around his back, pulling him on top of me, and then my hands slide under his T-shirt, pressing firmly into his skin and easily dragging the material up. He releases his hold on me and breaks our kiss long enough to remove his shirt and toss it aside. I sit up and force him back against the pillows before straddling his lap. I grasp the hem of my tank top, ready to discard it immediately, but Marshall gently moves my hands out of the way and begins to lift the shirt over my head himself. And then our lips collide again when I lean down, our hands moving fast all over each other. I can feel his erection, feel that he’s as turned on as I am right now, but after deepening the kiss, allowing our tongues to tangle together, he grasps my face in both hands, placing two inches of space between our lips. His eyes close and his forehead wrinkles.

  “What’s wrong?” I say immediately. “Are you okay? Am I hurting you?”

  He pulls himself up to a full sitting position, leaving me on his lap, my legs now wrapped around his back. I wait while he grapples for an answer, eyes now open. “You’re not hurting me. I was just thinking … just thinking that …”

  “That what?” I press.

  His fingers slide through my hair and find the back of my neck, rubbing it gently. “That we don’t have anywhere to go for a few days and this doesn’t have to be so frantic.”

  “Right.” My face flames and I move to climb off his lap, but Marshall holds me firmly in place. “I’m sorry. You’re sick and I was trying really hard to let you be in charge.”

  “Who says I’m not in charge?” Amusement fills his expression, and then he pulls our bodies completely together, my breasts pressing against his chest. Even through my bra, my nipples harden from the contact. “And I didn’t mean we should stop. Just that we should fill as many minutes as possible.”

  Excitement tumbles around in my stomach and moves south. Marshall takes his time planting kisses all along the front of my neck, tilting my head back to give himself more access. By the time my gaze meets his and I’m looking into those swirly blue eyes, the amusement is gone from his face. He’s intense and focused and so incredibly hot I can hardly keep either of our pants on. You’re not in charge, Izzy, Marshall is.

  He kisses me again, and those talented fingers unhook my bra. The kiss turns slow and lingering, his hands caressing my back, my neck, moving through my hair, until I’m melting against him. And then I’m lying on my back again, Marshall leaning over me, sliding off my pants, our heads at the foot of the bed. The throbbing in my body is no longer isolated to between my legs but has spread everywhere now as I grip the sheets tighter, working so hard not to shove him onto his back, yank his sweatpants off, and see exactly how turned on he is right now.

  Instead, I think about Marshall standing close behind me, both of us staring at the dartboard in the common room, and the way he spoke directly into my ear, instructing me to stop thinking so much, to allow my body to take over. I close my eyes and enjoy the heat of his mouth pressing against my neck, my collarbone, my breasts—lingering on each nipple—and then my stomach. His lips touch all around the edges of my panties, causing me to wriggle and my grip to tighten on the sheets. His fingertips are a light whisper on my skin when they hook into the waistband of my underwear and carefully slide it down around my ankles. Cold air comes between us for a second and then Marshall is lying beside me, his legs now as bare as mine.

  His places a hand between my breasts, his fingers splayed over my heart. “I know you might not believe me, Izzy, but you have a very good heart. I don’t think you need to change; I’ve never thought that. You just need to let people in.”

  I stare at his face, a lump forming in my throat. “You mean people like you?”

  “Yes.” He slides his hand up and his thumb brushes across my cheek. “People like me.”

  “Is that what you want?” I ask, my voice shaking with both tears and all this pent-up sexual energy.

  “Yes.”

  Marshall is rarely a man of one-word answers—quite the opposite—but tonight he cuts himself off at a simple yes and proceeds to kiss me so gently, so directly, I’m in all new territory. I can’t do anything but follow his lead, my entire body willing to give in to whatever he’s offering.

  After a few more minutes of being subjected to all this not-sex, he finally retrieves a condom but hesitates before opening it, looking me over carefully. Asking permission. I start to reach and help him slide it on, but pull my hand back, giving a tiny nod instead. The second before he enters me is stretched out to infinite fragments of seconds in which I replay all twenty-eight times I did this with Justin and all seven times with Sam and how I didn’t trust either of them to make it good for me. How I took over and made sure it was good. But that isn’t how you let people in. Trust is what Marshall’s talking about. He wants me to trust him. He wants me to give him some part of myself, like he gave me by letting me in his room this weekend, letting me see this less healthy, more vulnerable Marshall.

  But there’s nothing unhealthy about his male anatomy, and the sound that escapes my lips when he pushes inside me is enough to get a smirk from Mr. Not-So-Vulnerable-Right-Now. But he’s quickly back to being serious, capturing my mouth in a kiss that completely frees me of any urges to take over. I’m all yours. Do whatever you want with me.

  Arms are around me, hands in my hair, lips moving across my cheek, over my neck, and I’m thinking about poetry, about Edgar Allan Poe and words that move like waves, people who move like waves together, and all the non-words we can make with our bodies.

  Marshall freezes his movement, his arms holding me tight.

  My eyes fly open and I whisper, “What? What’s wrong?”

  His gaze meets mine, and I see vulnerable Marshall again. “I need you to say it.” He bends down and presses his mouth to mine. “Say that you want more than this. With me.”

  I reach up and touch his face with one hand. This is the opposite of the parting moment I had
with Sam. The opposite of my last conversation with Justin. I was wrong to place Marshall in that category, to assume I’d started the same pattern all over again. He’s an open book, and while I don’t know what I am, I want to be like him, too. And that’s really all he asked of me—to want more, not to promise that I’ll succeed at it. He hasn’t asked me to promise him anything. I pull his mouth down to mine again, giving him another kiss. “I want more with you,” I whisper against his lips.

  He pushes himself in deeper causing my insides to tighten in anticipation. His speed increases, both of us gripping each other tighter until I’m completely consumed by orgasmic distractions. He must have been able to feel the tightening effect of my orgasm on his penis, because a long string of curse words escape his lips and then his mouth is crashing into mine again, his own orgasm pulsing inside me. Then both of us go completely limp. With Marshall’s weight on top of me, my chest can barely rise and fall at the rapid rate it wants to, but I don’t want him to move. I grip the back of his neck and wrap an arm around his waist, holding him in place. Marshall buries his face in my neck, pressing dozens of tiny kisses into my skin.

  After several minutes, he reluctantly rolls off the bed to discard his condom and put his boxers back on. Then after some careful searching on both our parts and lots of laughing, he finds my panties tangled in the comforter on the floor and wiggles them back onto me. I don’t think we’ve hit that holy-shit-we-just-had-sex moment yet, because both of us are way too calm and comfortable.

  Marshall flops back onto the bed, at the top this time, and reaches for the comforter on the floor and then for me. I study him again before lying beside him and placing my ear to his chest. He’s back to that sickly pale color and his face is tense with pain.

  “We probably should have waited a couple of days to do that,” I say, lifting my head and studying him with more concern than before.

  “Probably,” Marshall says with a short laugh. “But it was so worth it.”

  I sit up and push the sweaty hair from his forehead. “When’s the last time you ate any actual food?”

  His eyes flutter, like his eyelids weigh too much to hold them open. “Saturday, I think.”

  “Saturday?” It’s Friday. My stomach ties into knots, but I take a deep breath and think before speaking. I’ve already pissed him off enough this weekend. “Is there anything that sounds good to you? I could go out and get something for both of us.”

  He fumbles around with his eyes closed and eventually finds my hand, lacing his fingers through it. “Will that make you feel better?”

  Yes, I almost say but then I realize that this is probably what Marshall does for his mom and his sisters—he ignores what his body is telling him and he makes decisions that will make them feel better. That’s why he’s here and not at home this weekend. “Not if it’s going to make you feel worse.”

  His eyes fly open, flashing me a look of gratitude. “It will. I’ll be okay without eating. It’s the only way to really get myself back to almost normal. I’ve gone three weeks without food before and I was fine.”

  The idea of two more weeks of him not eating—he’s probably down seven or eight pounds already—nearly sends me into a panic, but I breathe slow again and nod. The logic is there. “It gives your digestive system a chance to rest, the inflammation a chance to calm down. But I’m not used to you skipping meals. Usually you add extra meals, like your second dinner.”

  Marshall laughs, his eyes closing again. “It’s awesome when I can look at food and not imagine how painful eating it will be. I take advantage when I can. But losing a bunch of weight sucks. I worked my ass off all summer for these muscles and the extra twenty pounds, so trust me, I’ll eat something soon, okay?”

  “What about Jell-O?” I can’t let it go. “Or soup?”

  “Sure, that’s fine,” he mumbles. “Nothing red. Once I puked up red Jell-O and my mom called 911, convinced I was bleeding internally or some shit like that.”

  That explains why the red Gatorade has gone untouched.

  “No red Jell-O,” I repeat. “Got it.”

  My hands are shaking again, realizing what we just did and the fact that he’s still very sick. Does that make me a horrible person? Marshall is apparently determined to convince people he’s much healthier than he really is, so maybe it’s not my fault. Not completely, anyway.

  But holy shit, we just had sex. While he was extremely sick and after I told him that genetically I have a high probability of going crazy someday. Maybe I’m not the only odd one in this relationship.

  Holy shit, I think I’m in a relationship now. That’s what I agreed to, isn’t it?

  Chapter 18

  @IsabelJenkinsMD: Coffee won’t sober you up. Might counterbalance the sedative effect of alcohol, but your BAC isn’t changing without time to metabolize.

  When I get back from the store, carting bags of non-red, non-solid foods, Marshall is seated at his desk, head resting on his arm, a prescription bottle placed in his line of sight.

  “We’re having a staring contest,” he says when he sees me. “I’m not sure who’s going to come out on top yet—me or the steroids.”

  I deposit the grocery sacks onto the bed, pressing my lips firmly together so that I can keep my promise and not overwhelm him with medical opinions. He knows what he’s doing. But then I notice his bare back and I’m crossing the room in two long strides, studying the new red splotches and bumps forming on his skin. “What the—”

  “That bad, huh?” Marshall asks.

  I gently glide my fingers over a couple of the bumps, feeling the texture. “Kind of. But it is a symptom of Crohn’s, and it’s also proof that you’re in a full-blown flare-up right now.”

  “I know.” He sighs, continuing to stare at the bottle. “I hate these pills. They suck ass.”

  “I know.” I don’t know what else to say. I’ve never taken oral corticosteroids, but I do know the side effects can be very difficult. I comb my fingers through his hair and then lean down and plant a kiss on the side of his neck.

  “It’s my birthday tomorrow,” he says. Then, after glancing at the digital clock on his desk, he adds, “Actually, in three hours.”

  “I know that, too.” I read it in his medical file. It’s weird that we almost have the same birthday. If things hadn’t been so up and down with us over the past week, I would have suggested a joint party or something.

  “I should be out legally purchasing alcohol and getting completely wasted like every other just-turned-twenty-one-year-old.”

  “And I should be experiencing college for the first time and not the third. I should be struggling with calculus or biology, struggling to choose a major …” I continue moving my fingers through his hair and bend down again to kiss a part of his shoulder not yet affected by the rash. “But I guess we don’t get to be normal with everything.”

  “True.” Marshall gives me that sexy half smile, then raises his head and opens the bottle of pills, popping two into his mouth and washing them down with blue Gatorade. “Happy birthday to me.”

  “Wait, I have presents …” I head back over to his bed and dig through the bags, pulling out two items and displaying one in each hand. “Two-ply ultra-soft toilet paper and flushable personal wipes.”

  He laughs and shakes his head. “Old-people toilet paper and baby wipes. Thanks, Izzy.”

  “I thought about Depends, but they weren’t on sale.”

  He snatches the toilet paper from my hands and then winds up and throws it at me. “If I felt better, I’d seriously tackle you right now.”

  “That could be fun.” I rip open the package of toilet paper and pull out a roll. “I’m totally stealing one of these for the girls’ bathroom. I’m tired of that crunchy generic one-ply shit.”

  Marshall stands up, pain flitting across his face from the effort, and moves slowly around the room, gathering his “birthday presents” and clean clothes before heading into the bathroom for a shower. While he’s gone,
I get everything unpacked and microwave some chicken noodle soup and set green, blue, and orange Jell-O cups onto the table next to his bed. My first-aid kit is spread across the bed when he returns.

  He eyes the scattered medical supplies and freezes in the doorway. “Uh-oh, I sense some dorm room surgery about to happen, and since no one else is around, that must mean I’m the victim—I mean patient.”

  My eyebrows shoot up. “You mean like the surgery we did earlier?”

  Marshall laughs, a grin spreading across his face. “Okay, that wasn’t too bad.”

  “I’m looking for topical steroids for your rash.”

  “That’s not nearly as interesting.” He joins me on the bed and looks at the Jell-O cups but doesn’t touch them.

  I hand him the container of soup and a plastic spoon. “It’s way more liquid than solid.”

  He stares down at the bowl in a similar manner as he’d done with the bottle of pills. I finally locate the topical steroid cream and watch Marshall swirl the spoon around, never lifting it to his mouth.

  I begin dotting the ointment over each red bump on his back while he continues not-eating. “Just try it. What’s the worst that could happen?”

  With a heavy sigh, he lifts the spoon and eats. I feel an immediate rush of relief, seeing actual nourishment entering his body.

  The relief lasts exactly one hour.

  I think Marshall would have liked to have hidden the details from me, but with the dorm so quiet tonight, there’s no mistaking the sound of gut-ripping vomiting. As soon as I hear it, I’m on my feet, hesitating at the door of the guy’s bathroom, before charging in. Fortunately, it’s much less disgusting in here than I’d imagined with eight college guys sharing a bathroom. Marshall looks about ten times sicker when he finally emerges from the stall and leans over the sink, splashing water on his face.

  “Can you grab my toothbrush?” he asked, his voice hoarse. “Top shelf.”

  I reach up and fumble around with the items on the highest of four shelves, feeling for a toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste. I hand it over and wait for him to finish, then hold his blue towel out for him.