Page 73 of Down Bad

Shoulder to shoulder.

Barely enough that I can feel his breathing every few seconds.

Maybe I was wrong.

This room is doing something to us both. Something neither of us have noticed yet.

Is this permission? Is this what he’s telling me? Or have I been coming on too strong, and he doesn’t want his rejection to seem too harsh, so he’s rubbing up on my shoulder? You know, the way you pet a cat you just yelled at without meaning to.

Except I’m not a cat.

And I’m not gonna make him do anything he doesn’t want to do, either. Even if we’re flirty. Even if we both had just half a drink and know exactly what’s going on in this thunderstorm room.

And it sure isn’t any fucking thunderstorm.

I turn to ask him if he wants to just head back.

He turns, too.

And grabs my face.

And puts his lips right on mine.

For a second, I don’t move. I think I forget how to. His hands are warm against my cheeks. Soft, too.

Lips barely touching mine, like he’s still waiting.

For what?

Instinct catches up with me, and my hand slides up the inside of his jacket. Then the other. His jacket slides off his shoulders and hits the floor in a crunch of soft sound. His hands slip down my face and give my own jacket the same damned courtesy.

Sorry, boutonniere-he-just-fixed.

He grips me by the shirt, surprising me. I do the same. We’re stumbling away from the couch, him moving backward, me going into him, an awkward, blind chase as he keeps kissing me, one dig of his lips at a time, over and over, as our fingers fumble through the buttons of our stupid shirts. Tugging and unraveling our ties.

He lets out the smallest breath against my mouth.

“I know,” I breathe back, like he said something.

Then I’m catching him as if he just fell—he didn’t—and down to the rug I gently place him. My shirt came off at some point. His is opened, but still on, and when I look at him, I find his hair an adorable mess. So much for fussing with that all evening, too.

“God,” he groans against my lips.

My fingers leave his face, drag down his body, hook into his waistband, and without any help from my eyes, pure instinct, I undo his belt and get his pants down. He kicks them the rest of the way off as I start opening my own.

We’re no longer gentle at this point.

There’s no hiding the fact anymore that we want each other.

I hover over his face with my own, catching his eyes. He looks happily out of breath, even without smiling.

I bring my hand back to his face.

He parts his lips, as if looking for my fingers.

I don’t know why, but I bring them to his mouth.

And he lets them in.