He strokes the crook of my elbow, where my skin is tissue-paper thin. His fingers draw tiny circles, trace my forearm, brush the inside of my wrist. It’s innocent, his touch, and it’s everything but: stirring and sensual and suggestive. My breath comes rapidly and I’m hot everywhere, tingling from the roots of my hair to the soles of my feet. I’m certain he notices because his face is cracked open like a book, inscribed with words like satisfied and smug and—I think—longing.
I capture his hand, the hand with the gentle, meandering fingers, and realize, mortifyingly enough, I’m shaking. I can barely look at him, barely form a coherent thought. I was never tongue-tied when I was with Kurt, never timid or on edge. I never worried about impressing him or saying the right thing. He was a kind, handsome boy, but he was just a boy.
Mati … Mati is more.
I raise a hand to his cheek, grazing his perpetual stubble. His eyes close and I’m relieved. The way I’m feeling, awestruck and deferential and like I’m seconds from floating away, must be so obvious.
He keeps his eyes shut as I pass my fingers along his forehead, his jaw, his lids. I run my hand through his thick hair, something I’ve wanted to do for eternities. I touch his lips, feather-light, solicitous, attentive, like a kiss. I feel his warm exhale.
He covers my hand with his, stilling it, pulling it down to rest on his leg. He opens his eyes. He looks at me the way he did that first day at the beach, after we slogged out of the water, winded and weary. He looks at me like he sees through me, beyond clothes and hair and flesh—like he sees into me.
“I know what you can teach me,” he says, a rumble of thunder deep in his throat.
I incline toward him, like he’s a magnet and I’m iron. “What?”
His gaze falls, then snaps back to mine. “Teach me how to kiss.”
I retreat, stunned. “But you can’t—”
“I can. I want to, Elise.”
He’s so composed, so steadfast. Meanwhile, my heart’s pounding and my skin’s thrumming and my head’s going crazy. I want to kiss him, too—I’m dying to kiss him—but I wonder if I’m corrupting this boy who’s pure and stalwart, unwavering in his beliefs.
I want to, Elise.
Mati isn’t corruptible. Being here, being together … It’s as much his decision as it is mine.
I bring my palms up to rest against his cheeks. I feel his apprehension, his inexperience, through the heat of his skin, like they’re my own. But he’s wearing a wisp of a smile and, God, he’s looking at me like he longs for me—like he aches for me.
I push onto my knees, matching his height. “You’re sure?”
“I’m sure,” he whispers.
I tilt my head and slowly lean in.
MATI
Her lips feel like flower petals, and taste like syrup— sugar, lemon, orange blossom.
Her kiss wards off evil, worry,
fear.
Her kiss makes me invincible.
This …
This is what I have missed.
This is what I have spent a lifetime without.
This, and her.
When she withdraws, I feel cold and needy.
I want her—
more, always, forever.
She is elemental; she is essential.
Her retreat is cursory, a pause, a breath, a transition.
She moves over me.
She smiles.
She closes her eyes.
She kisses me again, or I kiss her.
We kiss each other— her, me, us.
This kiss is deeper.
Hotter and headier.
Hands and lips,
contented sounds.
Hips and tongues, heavy breaths.
Hair in knots.
Legs entwined.
I could die with the ecstasy of it.
The air shifts.
Her body freezes.
Her eyes fly open, wide and guilty.
I am disoriented, confused,
tumbling through fog.
Why would she stop so suddenly?
And then,
from across the room, a gasp.
elise
“What the hell, Elise?”
I scramble off Mati, off the couch, blotting our kiss away with the back of my hand.
“Audrey!”
“Don’t Audrey me,” she says, storming into the room. She’s wearing her restaurant clothes: black slacks and a white button-down. Her hair’s tied back in a long pony. Her face is aflame. She looks at Mati. No, she glares at Mati, who’s half sitting, half lying on her sofa, exactly the way I left him. He’s gaping at me like, What should I do?
“You’re home early,” I say to my sister-in-law.
She ignores my mindless observation, instead thrusting a finger in Mati’s direction and spitting, “What’s he doing here?”
“He’s…” I glance at Mati again and then, because he’s so surprised he’s petrified, I offer him my hand. He grips it and I do my best to lug his solid frame up. It’d be comical, if every single thing about this moment weren’t completely screwed up. When he’s standing, folded in on himself but a head taller than Audrey and me, I say, “He’s my friend.”
“Your friend? Have you lost your mind?” She’s talking too loud; she’s going to wake Janie. “This is my house, Elise. My daughter is down the hall. You think it’s okay to bring someone like him here?”
I reach out to touch Mati’s arm. He’s trembling, and I feel, suddenly, like I’m going to burst into tears. If I’m embarrassed, he must be mortified. The way Audrey’s talking about him—like he’s a piece of trash I dragged in from the alley—makes my stomach roil.
“His name is Mati,” I say, like an introduction might fix this.
She clenches the strap of her bag. “I don’t care what his name is!”
She’s being so unfair, so spiteful, so mind-bogglingly rude, I feel like I’m addressing a stranger. “Please don’t judge him, Aud.”
Her eyes go wide. She wrenches her bag off and flings it onto the sofa, where it lands upside down, spilling keys and coins across the cushion. “If you don’t want me to judge him, don’t bring him into my house. Into my life!”
Janie’s whimpers drift into the living room.
Audrey yanks her ponytail loose and pushes her hands through her hair. “Great. Because tonight hasn’t been shitty enough.” She launches a look of disgust at Mati, then me. Its impact knocks the wind out of my lungs. She falls onto the couch and starts shoving things back into her bag, her hair hanging limply. She seems a thousand years older than she did when she left for her shift, tired and hopeless, and now she’s sniffling and even though I hate her for the way she’s treating Mati, I still want to hug her.
“I should go,” he murmurs.
“Good riddance,” Audrey mutters. I’m about to round on her, but then she sniffs again and I realize she’s crying legitimate tears.
Shit.
I walk Mati to the door. My heart’s hammering, a residual buzz from that kiss (God, that kiss) and from the shock of being caught, and chastised, and humiliated by the blatant ignorance of one of my favorite people.
Audrey’s tears … they always, always get me.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper to Mati.
He tucks a lock of hair behind my ear, then pulls the front door open. “We can talk later.”
“Soon,” I say, clinging to him. “I’ll call you.”
He nods, extracting his hand from mine with a sad, sad smile. And then he walks out, closing the door gently behind him.
I stay in the foyer for a few minutes, leaning on the wall, catching my breath. I listen to the gut-wrenching anthem of Audrey’s weeping, and then the quieter ballade of her attempting to compose herself. I hear her pad down the hall, the squeaky hinges of Janie’s door, the soft hum of Aud’s voice as she calms her daughter.
God, I’ve made a mess. I should’ve gotten her permission before inviting Mati. Introduced them officially, first. I should’ve kept my hands to myself because if she’d walked in on us talking, she might not have been so shocked. And Mati … he left with sorrowful eyes, his shoulders stooped with distress. I’m to blame.
Audrey appears in the foyer, eyes red, cheeks flushed. “Are you leaving?” she asks, but there’s no venom left in her voice. She sounds drained, like she doesn’t give a shit what I do.
“If you want me to.”
She shakes her head. “Come sit down.”
I follow her into the living room. She sinks onto the sofa, so I do, too, into the corner Mati vacated a few minutes ago. I can feel his lingering heat. I ask, “Is Janie okay?”
Audrey nods. “Just startled. She’s never woken up to yelling.”
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have had him here while you were away.”