by A. J. Pine
My pulse beats in time with the dull throb that reappears in my head.
“And Elaina told you I was gone. She lied to you for me.”
His finger traces along my jawline, then up and under my bottom lip.
“She also helped me find you.”
As he speaks, his finger trails along my skin, down my chin, my neck, stopping where flesh meets cotton at the seam of my tank top. Only because I want to hear what he’s going to say do I bite my tongue, stop myself from begging his hand to keep exploring.
Closing my eyes to collect myself, I nod with an audible, “Mmm-hmmm.” When I open them again, he sports a knowing smile, and I’m filled with an undeniable heat at his awareness of what he’s doing to me, at him enjoying what he’s doing to me.
“I didn’t ask, but she gave me the number of where you were staying, said you’d left it for her in case of an emergency. She said she didn’t know your cell, though, which was a little weird.”
I laugh, and wince at the jolt of movement, the dull throb in my head harder and harder to ignore.
“She doesn’t know how to use her phone. Checking contacts is out of the question. If she doesn’t have me sitting in her recent calls screen, she has no idea how to find me.”
A weak attempt at a smile fails miserably, and he can tell something’s up.
“Hey. What’s wrong?”
It’s not until he strokes my hair off my face that I realize I’m sweating.
“When was the last time you took one of your pills?”
“This morning,” I say, swallowing hard against the increasing pain.
Noah sits up on the edge of the bed, opening the prescription bottle.
“Here.” He hands me the pill along with the glass of water that’s still on the desk.
I take it, remembering it doesn’t kick in for at least twenty minutes, and lie back down with my eyes closed.
“I’m still listening,” I say. “Just avoiding the light.”
“Not much else to tell you, Brooks.” He kisses my forehead. “I finally got up the nerve to call you at your relatives’ house in London. I’d been there almost a week already with Ethan, and I couldn’t bring myself to interrupt your Christmas or Chanukah or whatever it was you might have been celebrating.”
Eyes still closed, I smile. “We’re sort of nontraditional Jews. We hang menorahs from the tree.”
“I called on December thirtieth.”
At this my eyes open. “You knew I was in Hackney?”
He nods. “I didn’t really think I’d find you, but Ethan and I had never been to that part of London, so we figured, what the hell? When I saw Prick, I couldn’t not go in. I mean, how many Ohioans can say they got inked at Prick in London?”
“I’m guessing at least one, if not two.”
“Nah,” he says, his hand finally making its way back to my skin, if only to pull a sweaty piece of hair from my forehead.
Ew. I need a shower.
“Just one. Body art isn’t Ethan’s thing.”
“But it’s your thing?”
“Hey, you’re getting me off topic. Let me finish.”
He kisses me on the nose.
“When I saw you in Hackney, I knew. If your cousin didn’t invite me along for New Year’s Eve, I probably would have told you right there on the sidewalk, outside Bangers and Mash, but you weren’t ready to hear it. So I waited. For a new year, for a fresh start, with you.”
His lips find my eyes again, lids blinking back fatigue.
“And we lasted a whole day.”
“Because of my stupidity.”
“And now?” I drift off, but not before I hear his answer.
“And now I’m done being an asshole.”
I hear his smile but also his regret, and I answer him back with one of my own.
“You’re not an asshole.” My words are groggy. “Except last night. Last night you were an asshole. And then you weren’t.”
“Good night, Brooks.” His lips brush across mine, and I feel the weight of him leave the bed. “I’ll be back soon.”
When I wake again, the sun has almost fully descended. It’s nearly seven p.m. Early enough that noise won’t be an issue. I know what I have to do. In my phone’s contacts, I click on the Blue Lantern and call. He answers on the first ring.
“Hiya. It’s the Blue Lantern.”
“Daniel.” My voice cracks when I say his name. “It’s Jordan.”
After several seconds of silence he asks, “You okay?”
I was expecting anger, not concern. “Yeah, I’m okay. I mean, I’m not. I feel like shit. I’ve got stitches in my forehead and a pretty constant headache, but I feel worse about what I did to you last night. Daniel, I’m so sorry.”
“Shite, Jordan. You’re hurt because I walked away, but I wasn’t going to let you do what you were trying to do. I’m your friend, aye?”
“Yes. Yes, you are.”
“Remember that the next time you get pissed.”
“I will.”
“Right, then. Apology accepted.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
“Then, can I make one request, as a friend?”
“Aye.”
“Will you promise never to hang mistletoe in the pub again, even if it’s Christmas?”
“It’s a deal.”
“Good.”
Duncan and Elaina sit in the kitchen as I shuffle toward the shower. Elaina nods her head at me.
“Are you alive?”
“Yes,” I say, “but it feels like barely.”
“Good!”
“Good that I am alive or that it feels like barely?”
“Both.” She doesn’t hold back her Elaina smile. “Get clean, and then I will make you a coffee.”
I laugh, the sound of it beating in my head. Elaina’s coffee might be exactly what I need.
The shower is tricky. I assume I’m not supposed to get my stitches wet, so I do my best to keep my face out of the spray zone. When I’m done, I feel slightly more human. I throw a cardigan over my fresh tank-and-yoga-pants ensemble before heading to the kitchen. Instead of Turkish coffee, Elaina has tea and a roll of Hob Nobs waiting for both of us.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Eat. You’ve been in that room all day. With a boy. You must be starving.”
I bite into one of the biscuits, knowing I’ll eat half the roll if I stay here long enough.
“It wasn’t like that.”
“I know. I did not hear any noises through the wall. It is disappointing.”
“Elaina!” She shrugs. I shift my focus to the previous day. “I’m sorry, by the way, for my behavior last night.”
“Whatever. We do silly things for love. Look at me? I now snog a man-child in a skirt.”
We both laugh, but I don’t know how to respond. There’s no way this thing with Noah can be considered love. Not yet. Can it? Technically, it’s only our second day together, punctuated by months of wanting, at least by me.
“Hey, you, the thinker?” She’s waving a hand in my face.
“Yeah?”
“Stop all the analyzing, and enjoy yourself already.”
There’s a knock at the door. “Oy! It’s open!” Duncan yells into the hall.
“You knew about London, and you didn’t tell me.” I’m not angry, but I want to know why she never said anything. I wonder if things would have been different if Griffin hadn’t been here, if we wouldn’t have lost so much time.
“I knew he had the phone number, but I never knew if he called. I figured by the way you two came home attached at the mouth that he probably did, but I could never be sure. And then, the next morning, when the shite hit the fan, what would have been the point? It only would have made it worse for you.”
As she says this, Noah appears in the kitchen entryway. He holds a laptop. I hold my breath. He came back.
His hair is damp and dark, waving a bit against his temples a
nd at the bottom of his neck. I smile at his heather-gray T-shirt and plaid flannel pants.
“Figured if you were awake you might enjoy a movie.”
“You got sleep clothes,” I say.
“And Dead Poets Society,” he says, patting the laptop. “And a toothbrush. And jeans for the morning, in case I fall asleep during the movie.”
I grab a Hob Nob and stand up, breaking off a bite and placing it in his mouth while my fingers linger on his lips. Then I kiss him as I speak.
“Oh, you’re falling asleep here, all right.”
He shrugs, and I mouth a thank you to Elaina as I pull him out of the kitchen and back to my room.
Spring
“Don’t go fighting against the spring.”
E. M. Forster
A Room with a View
Chapter Twenty-six
Our first official week as a couple is pretty tame, waiting for the stitches to dissolve and the headaches to subside. Both happen the following Saturday.
Noah and I show up at Oliver’s flat for scene rehearsal, and everyone is shocked to see me bandage free. The stiches are gone, the wound fading to a small pink scar. According to Noah, I signed my own medical release, which means my parents were kept out of the incident. But there’s no way they’ll miss the scar.
Noah and I have been well behaved in class, and if we gave any hint that anything was going on between us, the group took no notice. After our first run-through, though, the cat is out of the bag.
“I would not deny you, but by this good day, I yield upon great persuasion, and partly to save your life, for I was told you were in a consumption.”
“Peace,” he says, in all of Benedick’s good-natured jest, a wickedly delightful smile on his beautiful face. “I will stop your mouth.”
And he does. Standing in Oliver’s kitchen, he pulls me to him, one hand behind my neck, the other on the small of back. My shirt rises above the line of my jeans as I reach for his face, and his pinky grazes the skin that peeks through.
I smile, my lips parting enough to invite him in. Noah holds back nothing, and for a second I flush with embarrassment, but it’s only a second, and then I melt into the kiss, into him, until I hear Emily.
“Bollocks,” she says, both annoyed and astonished. “It is all about Beatrice and Benedick in the end. Isn’t it?”
“With a kiss like that, it would have to be!” Oliver cries before rising from his seat in thunderous applause. “You two have been practicing!”
Though our faces separate, my palms stay on his cheeks, his hands both now on my lower back, where his pinky moves in tiny circles on my exposed skin. He dips his head one last time to kiss the scar above my eye.
“Yeah,” I say, with what is quite possibly the goofiest grin I’ve ever had the pleasure of sharing in public. “We have.”
Noah and I do a lot of practicing over the next few weeks leading to our spring holiday. He knows about my two-year hiatus, which helps him see how unlike Hailey I am, and that I couldn’t have slept with Griffin. I cared about him but didn’t love him.
Neither of us brings up my…uh…situation until the night before I leave for Greece and he for Ireland, the night things get closer to crossing that threshold than ever before.
Elaina and I have an early flight in the morning, so both of us agreed to sleep in our own flat. If one alarm fails, the other is there for backup. Noah and Duncan have grown closer since the four of us have found ourselves either in Fyfe or Carnegie together quite often. Duncan’s going to head to Ireland with Noah, having never been there himself.
Noah and I assume the spoon around nine o’clock. That whole sleep-clothes thing got old early. He prefers to sleep without a shirt. I prefer him shirtless, too. I, on the other hand, have always slept in clothes, a habit I never thought of breaking. When things get heated between us, the tank always goes back on before we go to sleep.
Tonight my back presses into the curve of his torso, as it has nearly every night since February fourteenth. Everything, I’ve learned, is different with Noah. Heightened. My free arm reaches back, fingers tangling in his hair. He traces the line of my forearm to my elbow and then up the rest of the way to my shoulder. It tickles, and I shudder, but I don’t ask him to stop. Softly his fingers dance down the side of my body, ending at the hem of my shirt. I suck in a breath.
“May I?” he asks, tugging at the fabric.
I nod, everything inside me contracting and expanding in unison.
He lifts the thin layer that separates my skin from his slowly up over my head and throws it across the small expanse of the room and into my closet.
“Hey,” I whine. “I’m never going to find that without turning the light back on.”
“Ah,” he says, pressing his lips to my shoulder. “You’ve figured out my diabolical plan.”
His hand comes back to rest on my stomach, but only for a moment before he slides it up to gently cup my exposed breast. A tiny gasp leaks through my parted lips, and my toes curl. This is nothing we haven’t done before, yet something is different, more anticipatory. Maybe it’s the timing. Maybe it’s that we won’t see each other for two weeks. Whatever it is, my nerves are on full alert.
He pulls me closer, lightly squeezing my breast in the process. With an exhale of pleasure, I arch my back against him, feeling him hard against me.
“Brooks,” he says, a hoarse whisper. “God you’re beautiful.”
I push against him again, my motion deliberate this time, and his whisper grows to a moan.
“Brooks.”
His palm flattens against me, sliding down until his fingers dip below the line of my pants. Without him asking, I wriggle out of them as gracefully as possible, though I don’t think he’s worrying anything about grace.
His hand rests atop the thin layer of cotton that separates him from the rest of me, from all of me.
“Tell me again how long it’s been.”
I sigh. “Shut up and touch me.”
“How long?”
This time I groan. “It was two years when I got here, so you do the math.”
He teases, his fingers sinking below the hem. I put my hand on his wrist, coaxing him to slide down farther. My breaths grow shallow at his touch, at having him so close to where I want him. He moves with me, but only for a second. Then his hand stalls.
“Then you won’t mind waiting a couple more weeks.”
I let out a gasp, one completely devoid of pleasure. A rush of insecurity creeps in. It’s been over two years, and Logan was my first. It’s not as if I’ve ever been well-practiced at any of this. What if he thinks it’s going to be awful?
His mouth rests right by my ear now, his warm breath and the faint smell of mint, and him, intoxicating.
“Because I don’t want to rush this, to be with you for the first time and not be able to keep you with me all night and into the next morning and the day beyond that. In fact, I think I’m going to need you to pencil me in for an entire weekend.”
The idea of such a weekend sends a shock of pleasure through me, but then it falters. I can’t look at him, but I have to ask.
“Is it because it’s been so long? Are you worried it won’t be, you know, up to your expectations?”
“Brooks.” His voice tries to soothe me as he cups my cheek, turning my face to his.
I try to read his dark-blue eyes, but again I’m paralyzed by all the reasons why, on the night before we’re leaving each other, he doesn’t want me the way I want him.
“You still want me like that, don’t you?”
Again he says my name. “Brooks.” But this time there is a soft pleading, the hint of restraint.
He pulls my bare leg up over his, though the bottom half of him is still covered in flannel. Then he kisses me hard and unrelenting, his tongue grazing my teeth and parting them to enter my mouth. My breasts are firm against his skin, his stomach a smooth muscular coil. His hand runs up the back of my thigh, entering my bikini briefs from the b
ottom. I inhale, a sharp breath of bewildered pleasure, as his finger slips up and inside of me. “Does this answer your question?”
Our mouths collide again, the delicious taste of him filling me—everything Noah filling me—until I know, without a doubt, that he is worth the wait.
“Yes,” I answer, the word no more than a breath. “Yes. I daresay it does.”
Slowly his hand slides up, tickling my abdomen, but I don’t care. I don’t laugh. Instead I’m hungry for his skin on mine, the more I get, the more I need. When I reach to reciprocate, he presses against my hand.
Both of us tease the other with touch. His lips explore every inch of my exposed skin until my body is wrapped in his kiss, and I can’t imagine being anywhere but here, with anyone but him.
“Noah,” I whisper.
“Brooks,” he whispers back.
“I don’t want to say good-bye.”
For several seconds he says nothing, his hand sliding my bangs from my face.
“I know,” he says, his lips finding mine again. I don’t realize I’m crying until he wipes the first tear away. “I know,” he says again. Neither of us means tomorrow, but we don’t say it. We don’t have to.
That night I break the habit of sleep clothes. Other than a pair of boxers and bikini briefs, we are a tangle of arms and legs, of skin and lips, of magnificent sleep and the heartbreak of waking and parting.
How will I say good-bye for real and not shatter into a million pieces?
Because, of course, I’ve known the whole time. I am in love with Noah Keating.
Two weeks in Thessaloniki, Elaina’s gorgeous waterfront city on the mainland of Greece, should have gone by in a flash. Crystal blue skies, the hilly plains and plateaus of white buildings and terra cotta roofs, the squat cylindrical stone of the White Tower—I would have to recollect all of this through pictures on my phone. Though it is still not warm enough to swim, Elaina and I spent days walking the pale sand of the beach outside the hotel restaurant her family owned. I tasted the most gorgeous feta, drank banana juice, and finally succumbed to Turkish coffee. I marveled at Elaina’s dog, Bromios—a cockapoo ironically named for the Greek god of fear—who only understood Greek, Elaina being the only one in her family who speaks English. Still, I felt welcomed and loved by her mother, father, brother, and grandmother, and I knew being there is what sealed the deal for her family to say yes to our plans of summer travel. But always, always, my thoughts turned to Noah. To seeing him again, to ending the two-year dry spell not with Mr. Right Now but with the guy I’m in love with, and then leaving him right when we’ve finally found each other.
