We were a depressing pair.
“Is it me?” I knew I’d lose my nerve if I looked at him so I stared at a spot on the floor. It was pink, dyed from the spilled nail polish that I’d gotten on my twelfth birthday. Back when things were easy and all I wanted was to have pink nails like the girls on Disney channel. “Do you think, maybe if I looked different, wasn’t scared all the time or wasn’t so — young?” I almost choked on the word. “Do you think it would be better?”
Cursing, Sergio made his way over to me. His heavy body leaned against mine, and then his hands were on my face. “Look at me.”
With a deep breath I looked up.
His eyes penetrated.
They searched.
They yearned. “You are beautiful. Young, yes, but still beautiful to any man who’s lucky enough to have his sight. I would change nothing about you. Because you’re perfect just the way you are.”
“I’m scared of guns.”
“I guessed that.”
“I don’t even watch violent movies.” I confessed, embarrassed that I’d even asked him to go to a horror movie only out of a need for distraction.
“Not a shock.”
I just kept talking as he held my face. “I’m insecure.”
“People who appear confident usually suffer the most from insecurity.”
“I don’t know how to fight.”
“All humans are born with the basic instinct of fight or flight.”
I tried to hang my head he wouldn’t let me.
“I can’t kiss.”
He smirked. “Are you done yet?”
“And I’m a virgin,” I blurted. “Now I’m done.”
“You’re wrong about two things.”
His eyes dropped to my lips. “First, you aren’t a bad kisser; you just need practice with someone when he’s not being a jackass.”
“And second?”
His smile didn’t quite reach his eyes, but something in his face, in the way his fingers dug into my skin, spoke volumes about the intensity behind his gaze. “You won’t be a virgin for long.”
I opened my mouth to respond.
Just as his lips slammed against mine.
Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth. Turn melancholy forth to funerals. The pale companion is not for our pomp. –A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Sergio
INTUITION TOLD ME to hug her, hold her close, and tell her everything was going to be okay.
But then I’d be lying.
And I prided myself on my honesty, on my ability to take the reality of life and deal, even though the days were filled with horror and bloodshed, because at least I had that, right?
My truth.
I couldn’t hold her close, not the way she wanted.
I couldn’t love her, not the way she deserved.
I could offer comfort, physical comfort.
But if she wanted emotional warmth — she was going to be disappointed. All I had to offer was me.
An empty shell.
With a confused heart.
A broken head.
I kissed her — I was doing that a lot lately, maybe my body was already on board with something my heart wasn’t ready for, or maybe…
Just maybe.
It was her.
Not me.
Maybe I’d been looking at the entire situation like a selfish bastard, because it wasn’t just my life.
But hers.
And I refused to be the reason that she felt like her life was over. I’d already dealt with that pain, that tragedy, where someone innocent died too young.
There are physical deaths.
And there are spiritual ones.
Only a damned fool would say they were different. They were one in the same. After all, death— —is death.
She kissed me back, her lips parted as a salty tear met the fusion of our mouths.
In a flurry of sudden movement, Val shoved at my chest and then slapped me across the face.
I was too stunned to do anything except touch the throbbing skin on my right cheek.
Nostrils flaring she gripped me by the shoulders, her mouth nearly touching mine as she said in a clear voice. “First kiss. Remember? And each time it’s out of pity. You asked me not to look at you with pity, can you at least do me the same favor? And stop kissing me every time I either piss you off or start crying? We do have to have…” She gulped.
“Sex.” I finished for her.
“That.” Another nervous swallow. “So you can’t go around just… I don’t know.” Her cheeks turned red. “Please?”
“Not sure what the meaning was behind that last sentence, but…” I smiled and tugged her body against mine. “I’m going to do it again.”
“The pity kiss?”
“Fresh out of those.”
“Oh.” Her eyes widened. “Oh so, a… yes, that would be…” She bit down on her bottom lip, and immediately my eyes zeroed in on how beautiful her mouth was. Damn it, I wanted to taste her.
And then it hit me.
Almost sucking the breath straight from my chest in one staggering swoop.
I wanted.
To kiss her.
I wanted.
I wanted.
Something.
The numbness was leaving, the familiarity of it being replaced by white hot need and damned curiosity.