by J. Nathan
“Why?”
“Because not only does the idea scare the hell out of me, but I haven’t figured out what I want yet.”
“Fine. Not tonight. But this year.”
I nodded. “This year.”
***
We made our way down the hallway toward my dorm room a couple hours later. My nerves were in my throat. I wanted Chase to stay the night. I knew he was feeling serious about us. He was trying to make my wishes come true—and he wasn’t pushing me to sleep with him. Which just made me want him more.
I punched in the code, and my door unlocked. I pushed it open and before I could switch on the light, I stilled, my eyes taking in the battery-operated candles placed all around my room.
Chase slipped his arms around me from behind and rested his chin on my shoulder, taking in the twinkling candles.
“You did this?” I said, my mind blown.
“I had a little help.”
I spun in his arms and draped my arms over his shoulders. “Valerie?”
He nodded, his blue eyes extra clear with all the candlelight.
“This is one of the nicest things anyone has ever done for me.”
He lifted a brow. “Nice?”
“Everything you’ve done for me has been amazing.”
“I like amazing,” he said, moving forward so I backpedaled into the room. I giggled as the door closed behind us and Chase leaned in, pressing his mouth to mine.
I arched into him and deepened the kiss, feeling it all the way down to my toes.
He pulled away much too soon and linked our hands, leading me to my bed. He sat first, pulling me onto his lap so my legs dangled off one side. “I haven’t given you your present yet.”
“There’s more?”
He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a small black velvet pouch.
My heart fluttered. “What is it?”
He smiled. “Just open it.”
I nodded, eager to see the contents. I reached my fingers inside and grasped something small and delicate. When I pulled my hand out, a sparkly silver necklace dangled from my fingers. I held it up so I could examine it, noticing the mason jar charm hanging on the chain. “Oh my God. I love it.”
“I saw it and thought it was meant for you.”
“Here.” I handed it to him. “Would you put it on me?”
He took it from me and clasped it behind my neck, examining it on me. “Perfect.”
“Hold on.” I attempted to climb off his lap, but he held onto me. “I’ll be right back,” I explained. “I’ve got something for you.”
“It’s not my birthday.”
I cocked my head, my silent plea to be released.
He relented.
I slipped off his lap and kicked off my heels, padding over to my closet and digging in the back. I unrolled the jeans where I had stashed my mason jar and walked back over to Chase.
He looked at the jar. The one he’d seen in the coffee shop that began his wish-granting mission.
I nudged him over. “Let’s lay on my bed so I can show you.”
He smirked. “I like where this is going.”
He kicked off his shoes and we both sat against my pillows along the wall with our legs outstretched in front of us. I unscrewed the top of my mason jar and held it out to him. His brows shot up. “You sure?”
I nodded.
His eyes lit up as he reached in and pulled out a paper, unfolding it like a kid on Christmas morning. “Visit a fortune teller.”
I plucked it from his hand and tossed it into the air. “Done.”
He smiled as he pulled out another paper and unfolded it. “Have a picnic on the beach.”
I plucked it away and tossed it to the floor. “Done.”
He pulled out another. “Pull an all-nighter with a hot guy.” He smirked. “You game?”
I nodded.
He placed that paper down beside him and pulled out another piece and unfolded it. “Go blonde.” His eyes cut to mine. “Oh no you don’t. I love your hair the way it is.”
I smiled, loving how comfortable things between us had become.
He pulled out another piece of paper and unfolded it. “Lose my virginity.” He stilled the second the words left his lips.
Nervous laughter escaped me. “Chantel wasn’t lying. She definitely went through my jar.”
“She had no right to,” he said, folding up the paper and lowering it beside him.
A long silence passed between us.
“Is that a wish you’re going to grant me tonight?” I asked.
He tipped his head, his eyes pleading with me. “Soph.”
“Chase,” I mimicked.
“As much as I’m enjoying making your wishes come true, I don’t want to rush you.”
“You’re not rushing me if I’m asking you to.”
He scrubbed his hands up and down his face. “Listen, it’s not easy being the gentleman in this situation because, I gotta tell you, I can’t stop thinking about being inside you. How you’ll feel and how you’ll sound when I’m doing all the things I want to do with you. But…”
“I don’t need you to be a gentleman. I just need you.”
“Soph, being someone’s first is a big responsibility.”
I crawled onto his lap and straddled him, my knees on either side of him. “I’m twenty. I’ve waited to feel the way I feel when I’m with you. That can’t be wrong.”
He dragged his fingers through his hair, confliction written in every crease on his face.
I cupped his cheeks between my hands, the end-of-day stubble on his jawline prickling my palms. “I’m ready,” I assured him.
He huffed, and I couldn’t tell if it was out of frustration or waning control. He lifted me off his lap and threw his legs off the side of my bed.
Uh, oh.
I straightened my dress and sat back down where we’d been sitting. I stared up at him, feeling anxious, afraid he was going to turn me down.
He reached behind his neck and pulled his shirt over his head.
I released a slow shaky breath.
He walked slowly to the foot of my bed. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from him as he grabbed hold of my ankles and pulled me down the bed so my feet hit the end and my back lay flat. I straightened my dress that had bunched up around my hips. He crawled his way over me, kneeling at my hips. He grabbed my wrists and lifted my arms over my head, holding them on the pillow with one hand. “I’m gonna need you to stay still.”
My eyes widened unsure what he intended to do.
“Now, I don’t want to do anything you’re not ready for, but hell, it’s getting difficult to be alone with you and not touch you.”
I swallowed my nerves.
“Will you let me touch you?”
I nodded.
“Down there?”
More anxious than I’d ever been in my life, I nodded.
“I’m not pressuring you, right?”
I shook my head.
His hand released my wrists and he slowly peeled my dress up and over my raised arms, revealing my lacy black bra and tiny black thong. He hissed his pleasure as he tossed my dress to the floor. “God damn.”
Goosebumps raced across my skin.
“No matter what I do, I want your hands up there.”
“Don’t you trust me?”
“I don’t trust me,” he said, no hint of humor in his tone. He lowered himself onto his side beside me. My heartbeat quickened as his hand slipped under the elastic on my panties, sliding down between my legs. My eyes pinched shut and my head pushed back into the pillow as one of his fingers dipped inside me. My back arched off the bed, unprepared for the shock of his touch. He removed his finger and slipped it along my folds. I shuddered as he found my clit, circling it with his finger. I moaned softly as tingles built.
His lips lowered to the sensitive skin beneath my ear and he pressed open-mouthed kisses to my neck.
He circled my clit with his thumb while two fing
ers dipped inside me. I arched off the bed again.
“You okay?”
I nodded.
“Is this good?” he asked.
“God, yes.”
He chuckled before pressing more kisses up and down my neck. And, instead of pumping his fingers inside me, he slid them over my folds, his thumb applying pressure and circling my clit until my entire body tightened like a coil. I gasped quick short breaths as my body threatened to let go. I tried to hold on. Tried to let the feelings build. But, he kept circling, around and around. I couldn’t concentrate. I lost all focus. And, all at once, the coil released, sending tingles rippling out to every part of my body. My entire body trembled, but he didn’t stop circling, milking every last tremor out of me as I rode out the most amazing orgasm I’d ever experienced.
“God, I love watching you let go like that,” he murmured.
“Stop talking,” I said, with my eyes still closed and my body a livewire.
He laughed. “Have you done that before?”
When I finally came back down to earth and dragged in as many breaths as I could muster, I opened my eyes to find him inches away from my face.
“Only with myself.”
He jerked back with wild eyes. “Do you have any idea how hot that is?”
I stared at him, still very much reeling from the experience of having an orgasm with someone else.
“Will you let me watch you?”
“If I decide to see you again after tonight? Maybe.”
He wrapped his arms around me and rolled onto his back, pulling me on top of him. “If you decide to see me again? Were you just using me?”
I finally lowered my arms and slipped them around him, hugging him to my chest. “Maybe,” I teased.
“Well, just so we’re clear. I’m not going anywhere. And, we’ve got all the time in the world to do other stuff.”
I wouldn’t lie and say I wasn’t disappointed because I was completely disappointed, but if I believed his words—believed we had the time he was offering—there was no rush. “This has definitely been my favorite birthday.”
“And it’s not even over yet. We still need to pull an all-nighter. And there are a lot of other things we can do.”
A rush of excitement filled me. Why had I been so let down when I knew for a fact that he had a great imagination when it came to making me feel good.
And by five in the morning, with our eyelids threatening to close, we’d done a number of things I’d never done before. And, while losing my V-card may not have been one of them, it didn’t make my day any less spectacular.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
I stood outside the gym entrance Monday afternoon, watching the people coming and going in workout clothes. As instructed by the mysterious text Chase had sent earlier, I wore shorts and a T-shirt and hoped my reaction to seeing him annihilate that punching bag had given him an idea that included me and some workout equipment.
“Soph.”
I spun around.
Chase approached in basketball shorts and a T-shirt, turning heads as he walked to me.
“Hey. What’s going on?” I asked.
He stopped in front of me, pressing a kiss to my lips. “Okay. Don’t kill me.”
My eyes widened, almost afraid to ask.
He ticked his head to the side. “Follow me.”
We didn’t enter the gym, but rounded the gym until we stood in a grassy area behind the building. The vast area, separated by chain link fences, was filled with fields. Baseball to the far right. Football to the left. And a soccer field in the center with its freshly mowed green grass and freshly-painted white and yellow lines. A couple people—I assumed coaches—stood by the goal talking.
“One of my frat brothers volunteers for the girls’ soccer team,” he explained.
I froze, my heart beginning to thump in my chest as I stared out at the field. “What did you do?”
“He said the team sucks. They’re D3 and haven’t won a game yet this season.”
“What did you do?” I repeated.
“I got you a tryout with the coach.”
I spun back to face him. “A tryout?” All the reasons that was an insane idea whirled through my mind. “I haven’t played in a year and a half.”
“So?”
“I don’t even have cleats.”
He smiled, probably pleased I was more concerned with my lack of cleats than hauling off and punching him. “So?
“I don’t even know if...” my voice trailed off, not wanting to say what I was really thinking.
He grabbed my shoulders and ducked his head to meet my eyes. “You will be good enough.”
I closed my eyes, pained by the idea of stepping on a soccer field again after such a long absence.
“Don’t let fear of failing be the reason you don’t do something you love.”
I opened my eyes, unsure if I was pissed he’d gone behind my back or overjoyed that he’d do something like this for me.
“It’s just a tryout with the coach,” he assured me. “She just wants to see what you’re capable of. When she heard you were going to play D1, she wanted you on the team without even seeing you play.”
“I was going to play D1. I have no idea what I’d be able to play now.”
“You won’t know until you try.”
I pulled in a deep breath. Could I still play? Would I just be embarrassing myself if I tried out and didn’t make it?
“If nothing else, you’ll know the truth,” he said. “If you still have what it takes, then next year when you’re eligible, you’ll have a spot on the team.”
I tugged the hairband off my wrist and pulled my hair back into a ponytail, knowing this moment could affirm my fears or prove me wrong.
Boy, I sure hoped it proved me wrong.
***
An ice bag rested on my knee as I lay on my bed that night. To say my knee was sore would be an understatement. Since I hadn’t been using my knee in that capacity in over a year, it had been super tight during the impromptu tryout. Luckily, it wasn’t tight enough that I couldn’t show the coach what I could do with a soccer ball.
Though I’d be ineligible to play on the team this year because I was a transfer student, the coach offered me a spot on the team next year, and I accepted.
Knowing my knee was sore, Chase had given me a piggyback ride back to my dorm. The whole way back he told me how awesome I looked and promised to massage my knee whenever I needed him to. That might prove to be more often than not seeing as though I agreed to begin practicing with the team starting next week.
Chase had been right.
I’d been letting my fear of failing hold me back. But the second I had that soccer ball at my foot, I knew playing soccer was what I needed to be doing to make me feel like me again. It was the one thing that had been missing from my life, and I hadn’t even realized how much until that moment.
Someone banged on my door, pulling me from my thoughts.
I removed the ice bag and stood from my spot on my bed, approaching the door. “Who is it?”
“Valerie.”
I pulled it open, and Valerie stood there with tears staining her cheeks. “Oh my God. What’s wrong?”
She walked into my room and dropped down on Chantel’s bare bed, holding her phone out to me. “I’m getting kicked out of school.”
“What?” I closed the door and moved to her, taking her phone and pressing the video on the screen.
“Stand still, pledges!” Valerie yelled at a row of pledges whose faces had been blurred.
The camera zoomed in on the pledges’ nearly naked bodies which had been circled in black marker in various places.
“Let’s go sisters!” Valerie yelled as she paced back and forth in front of the pledges, tapping the areas on their bodies with a yardstick that had yet to be circled. “You missed lots of fat here!”
I switched off the video, unable to stomach this cold version of Valerie on the screen. “That didn’t even
sound like you.”
“Do you hate me?” she asked.
“Why’d you do it?”
“That was last semester’s pledge class. Chantel made me do it.”
“No one makes you do something like that. Especially, if you don’t want to do it.”
We both fell silent. I wondered why she was showing the video to me. Had other people seen it? Is that why she was being kicked out of school?
“During hell week,” Valerie sniffled. “Pledges are barely allowed to sleep.”
“I’ve heard that.”
“And they have to do all sorts of crazy things while they’re sleep deprived.”
“Like allow sisters to circle their body fat?”
“That’s not even the worst of it.” She paused as if she didn’t wholeheartedly want to tell me what she was about to tell me. “They have to tell their deepest, darkest secret.”
“Did you have to do that as a pledge?”
She paused for a moment, then nodded.
“And Chantel records the secrets, amongst other incriminating things, as you’ve seen.”
“Why?”
“So, if any of us step out of line or do anything she thinks looks bad for the Alpha Phis, she’ll expose us.”
I suddenly understood why everyone always treaded so lightly around Chantel. One wrong move and their unsavory behavior or deepest secret would go viral. The juicier the secret, the greater fear instilled in her “sisters.”
I waved her phone out. “Who’s seen this?”
“I’m sure everyone by now, including the dean.”
“So, why’d she leak it?” I asked.
Valerie cocked her head, as if I should already understand.
My eyes widened. “Because of me?”
“What was it she said?” Valerie asked. “Payback’s a bitch?”
“That was directed at me.”
“By releasing the video, she hurt both of us. She knows we’re close. If I get kicked out, you lose a friend.”
“And if you don’t get kicked out?”
“Well, then, she’s making sure I won’t tell you things.”
“What kind of things?”
She shook her head, scared of whatever it was she wasn’t saying.
I knew better than to push her. When I’d pushed her, she’d disappeared.
