by Locket, V.
Hansel began to slow. His grip on me loosened. And then he collapsed.
I pushed his body beneath a log, then climbed on top of him. “Hansel, are you alright?”
He rested his mouth on my neck. “You’re so stupid. Why didn’t you go with him?”
“I couldn’t leave you.”
“You should have left me.”
“I love you.”
He held me close, as if his life depended on it. “I can’t go on. You should go ahead.”
“No,” I whispered.
“Please Gretel. Go for me.”
“No!”
“Gretel—”
“I said no!” I could feel his heart beating so quickly beneath my cheek. “I already said I wasn’t leaving, and I’m not. I’m never leaving you again. I love you.”
Slowly, his hands moved over my back. “You’re so stupid,” he whispered, and then his hands went lax and he stopped moving.
“Hansel?”
No response.
“Hansel?” I whispered desperately, pushing myself up.
He was still. Even his chest didn’t move. My fingers flew to the side of his neck. He still had a pulse. He’d just passed out. His body was hurt and...And I was so stupid, far more stupid than he’d accused me of being, because I was on top of his battered chest.
I rolled to his side. I didn’t dare touch any part of him beyond his hand. I didn’t want to hurt him anymore. I tried to remain as quiet as possible, to make myself as small as possible. I closed my eyes and imagined myself as patch of moss, growing beneath a log. Moss did not hear the angry shouts of men. Moss did not listen to their footsteps with a pounding heart. Moss didn’t care. But, though I tried, I could not expel the fear from my heart.
I’d look up to see the pastor’s sneer as he pointed a torch at me, alerting the mob of screaming, twisted faces to where I was, only to wake up in a cold sweat, shivering in the mud, with Hansel’s unconscious body beside me. We were still alive and together, if only for a few moments. Maybe if we lied here long enough, the rest of the world would forget us.
But then I’d hear an animal moving in the grass, an owl landing on a branch overhead, or a man’s shouts as he trounced through the woods. Adrenaline would course through my body, changing every shadow into a man’s shape. I’d shiver, chewing through my lip, but wouldn’t allow myself to make a sound. The only thing I could do—the best thing I could do—was lie in silence and wait for them to pass.
Chapter 7: First Morning
Gretel
IT WAS DAMP WHEN I WOKE, and dark. The forest was always so dark that one could not see the sky above. Still, some golden light filtered through the thick canopy of branches, illuminating a world that was beautiful, rotting, and cold.
“You’re awake.”
I looked beside me and saw my Hansel’s face. Both his eyes were black. His lip was busted. There were deep bruises on his cheeks and neck, and even more frightening, deeper ones on his body.
“Hansel,” I whimpered. Looking at him made my chest ache and the pain in my hands and limbs more acute.
He leaned forward and held my hand tenderly. He couldn’t close it completely. “I can’t believe you’re here.”
I gulped, gripping his broken, swollen hand. “How long have you been watching me sleep?”
“I don’t know.” He gave me a dopey smile. “I guess a long time.”
“Have you heard anything?”
“I think they’re gone.”
For a moment, I looked away and shuddered. I wish I hadn’t. Immediately, darkness filled his eyes as we both silently remembered everything we’d left behind.
“I’m sorry, Gretel.”
“It’s alright.”
“No it isn’t. I should have never touched you, but...” He leaned forward. “I’m glad you’re here,” he whispered as he gently pressed his lips to mine.
He ran his hand up my arm but did not break the kiss. His lips were full and soft, coaxing mine open as a warmth filled me. It was so different from the dark need that had overtaken me when we fucked in the church, his bedroom, and the shed, though just as consuming. It was just different—delicate as a budding leaf, and it made my body tingle and feel new, until I forgot the coldness of the forest and everything we’d lost.
“What was that?” I murmured, breathless.
“Kissing. You know, what a guy does when he wants to court the woman he loves.”
I swallowed. “I don’t think we should be doing this. You’re hurt—”
He laughed, and the sound was unaware and full of happiness. It reminded me of how he used to be when we were kids. “I’ll never be that hurt.”
He directed my hands to his chest, to his shirt. I think he wanted me to remove it.
I shook my head. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You won’t. You can do anything you want to me, and it won’t hurt. I promise.”
My body began to shake. “Then come over to me.” I directed his body on top of mine, and slowly undid his pants as he took off his shirt.
There were bruises all over his torso, dark and thick like a stormy sky. I almost touched them, then stopped, because I’d been the cause of all of this.
He caressed my cheek. “Don’t look like that, Gretel.”
“How can I not? Look at what they did to you because of me.”
“No, it wasn’t because of you. None of it was. It was all because of me.”
He parted my thighs slowly, and I braced myself for the pain that would come.
It didn’t.
“I’ve been horrible to you,” he said. “I didn’t allow myself to love you, and I didn’t want you to love me. I wanted to push you away and hate myself. I wanted that hatred to be more than my desire for you so I wouldn’t have to face it. None of that matters anymore.” He gripped my knee. It tickled a bit, and I smiled.
“That’s more like it.” He lowered his head down my thigh, trailing it with kisses until he reached my cunt.
He kissed me there, too. Slowly, he pressed his lips to the top of my slit, and that familiar ache returned. This time it was brought on by sweetness—so much sweetness that I didn’t think I could stand it. I felt every hesitation, every breath, every movement. He barely touched me, and yet it was more intense than when he’d stabbed me with his fingers. I fisted his hair as he rolled his tongue around my cunt and then pushed it into me. I arched my hips into his face. The tip of his nose hit the top part of my cunt and I cried out in ecstasy.
“You taste so sweet,” he said, moving his head away. He dipped a finger deep inside me, and my cunt closed around him. He pulled it out and ran it over his lips.
“What about you?” My voice was strained and husky.
His gaze faltered. “You still want me?”
“Of course. I always want you.”
I moved my hand to his pants. His cock was already hard, and I grabbed it, pulling him towards me.
Hansel breathed deeply, unevenly. His eyes glazed over, and that familiar darkness possessed him as he pushed his cock to my cunt. He slipped in, all the way to the hilt. He wrapped his arms around me as I cried out.
Then, he began to move slowly—making love to me, he called it. His hands grabbed mine and held them over my head. He kissed me as sweetly on my jaw, my neck, and my breasts. I pulled my legs back tight, then wrapped them around him. I locked my ankles together at the small of his back, pushing him further into me, as if I didn’t want him to ever remove his cock from inside me.
Then again, perhaps I didn’t. Even though I tried to hold him steady, his hips rolled into mine, impaling me on the forest floor. The scent of him, a bit salty and as dark and complex as the mossy ground, filled my lungs as I cried out his name. He didn’t muffle my voice. He seemed to like it—how I begged him to go faster. He liked pulling his cock out of me, slowly, before complying with my request and pushing it back in.
Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore.
“Cum for me a
gain, Gretel. Let go for me.”
I did, convulsing around him. That mounting, sweet ache spilled out over my body. His hands let go of my wrists and he held down my hips, thrusting faster. I dug my fingernails into his back, pulling myself tighter for him.
He sucked in a breath, shut his eyes, and collapsed by my ear, groaning. He kissed my ear and left his cock inside me. I liked that—feeling as if we were one person, as if nothing could ever come between us.
“I want to stay this way forever,” I whispered.
“So do I, and we can, now.”
My eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”
“Because out here no one outside the village knows us, so we are no longer brother and sister. I’m just a man who loves you—who wants to spend the rest of his life with you.”
His words were like a drug. My body felt giddy and blissfully weak, and my throat tight. For a moment, I could do nothing but listen to the silence of the forest. “Really?”
He propped himself up on his elbows and nodded, smiling. “Really. No one knows our secret, so there is no longer any secret to keep. All they will know is our love for each other.” Then he laced his fingers in between mine, kissing each fingertip. “I’ll never let anyone hurt you again,” he vowed.
I rested my head on his shoulder, near his heart, and listened to it slow as the warmth from his body warded off the cold.
***
THE END
***
V. LOCKET
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