They appeared everywhere, nonstop. Whenever I held her hand, kissed her cheek, or touched her in any way, they were there. The words she spoke to me that night in the alleyway.
“Never said I was.”
They haunted me.
“Michael, what’s wrong?” She finally asked on a Tuesday night. I was spending the night at her place (I found myself there more often than not) and our make-out session was getting heated on the dark granite counter top.
“What do you mean?” I asked, fidgeting with the long-sleeves of my favorite knit sweater. It was finally nearing the end of October, and the weather would only get colder. I shuffled away from the counter top she was propped upon and shyly caught her gaze. Her big brown eyes intimidated me.
“You know what I mean…” She said with her head cocked. “Every time we get closer, you always push away,” she folded her hands in her lap and slightly swung her legs back and forth. “It’s almost like you don’t want anything to do with me.” When I looked at her, she had a sad smile on her face. She actually believed that?
“Oh, Michaela,” I sighed, putting my hands underneath the counter top and pulled myself in between her legs. She used this opportunity to place a hand on my shoulder and another on the side of my face. Her touch was so warm and delicate as her fingertips danced across my jawline to my hair and back to my neck again. I leaned into her hand before saying, “I would never want that.”
She tilted her head forward until our foreheads were touching, “Really?” She asked just above a whisper, absent-mindedly raking her fingers along my stubble. “Then why do you always stop?”
I looked down at the neatly polished hardwood floors – so clean and shiny that I could almost see my reflection in them. “Remember that night at Chaude Nouveau?”
“Yeah, why?” She tilted my head up, allowing me to look her in the eyes.
“You told – reminded – me that you weren’t invincible.”
“Just because I’m not invincible doesn’t mean I’m breakable,” she replied sternly and ran the hand that was on my shoulder through her hair. “It’s getting late…Are you ready to hit the sack?”
I’m sure a smile played on my lips as I said, “I’m ready if you’re ready.”
I lifted her off of the counter and she took me by surprise when her feet didn’t land on the floor. She wrapped her legs around my waist and kissed my cheek, “What do you say we finish what we started?”
We didn’t really finish what we started. We ended up getting tangled in limbs before we made it to her bedroom and we just played 20 (or in this case, 72) Questions until we fell asleep. This was a bit of a disappointment for Ashton, because the next morning, he wanted to hear all about the “fun” we had.
“So she didn’t even give you a blowjob last night?” Ashton said in a disgusted tone as we walked from costume shop to costume shop in search of the perfect Halloween outfit for Jennifer’s party next weekend.
