Shine On

Harper dropped her bags onto the floor after she walked into Rupert’s house. She was here. She did it. After 2 weeks of feeling nervous and unsure, she was finally in London. She looked around the living room, taking in her surroundings. Every thing looked the same from when she was last here during the summer. She hadn’t realized just how much she missed being in his house until she stepped foot in it.

She felt arms curl around her waist from behind. “Are you all right?”

She turned around to face him and clasped her hands together behind his neck. “I’m wonderful.” She replied smiling up at him. “Thank you.”

“What for?”

Harper shrugged. “For wanting me to be here.” She furrowed her eyebrows and bit her lip after, noticing how weird that sentence sounded. If he hadn’t told her he wanted her to be here, she wouldn’t feel comfortable moving back to London for a semester. For that, she felt the need to thank him, as odd as it sounded.

Rupert chuckled. “There’s no reason for you to thank me, love. I should be the one thanking you for wanting to be here. So...” He began as he raised his eyebrows. Harper giggled a bit. His hundreds of facial expressions always made her giggle. “when do your classes start?”

She toyed with the top buttons of Rupert’s plaid shirt, unbuttoning and buttoning them back up again. “I think they start in one week.”

Suddenly, she felt Rupert’s lips crash into hers. Instead of the usual sweet, light kisses he gave her, this one was filled with passion. “Good.” He whispered in between kisses with her bottom lip between both of his. He sucked her bottom lip before skimming his tongue along the curve of it, then slowly slipping it inside of her mouth. Harper could feel her heartbeat ad breath quickening with each second. She let her tongue explore his and her fingers hooked onto his belt loops. She felt him gently pushing her backwards with one hand supporting her back and the other grasping her hip. It wasn’t until a few long seconds later, Harper felt a wall against her back. Rupert’s hands remained in place as their kiss continued only getting heavier as the time went on. Harper’s mind went fuzzy. She couldn’t comprehend any thought process. Her lips and hands seemed to be doing all of the thinking. She felt her hands move from his belt loops back to the top buttons of his shirt. She felt herself beginning to undo the first couple before she realized what she was doing. Her lips pulled away from his abruptly.

“I’m...I’m sorry.” Rupert breathed pressing his forehead against hers. His hand moved from her back to beside her head on the wall, supporting his weight.

Harper sighed and tried to catch her breath. “No, no. You’re fine. You’re...better than fine. It’s just...”

“Are you okay?” He asked. His breathing seemed to be at relaxed now. He tucked her hair behind her right ear and brushed his thumb along her cheek. Chills went from Harper’s cheek all the way down her spine.

She furrowed her eyebrows and bit her lip. She was nervous to say the least. “It’s just...” She began with hesitation, toying with the buttons on Rupert’s shirt again nervously. Her voice was quivering. “I’ve never...um...never...well...you know.” She couldn’t seem to find the right words to say or seem to get them out of her mouth. She was completely inexperienced. At first it wasn’t her choice, no one would ever go farther than a make-out session with her in high school. Then as years went on and she saw the regret a lot of her friends felt after sleeping with so and so, she was glad she wasn’t that type of girl. As she got older, she took pride in wanting to wait for the right guy, a guy who was crazy about her and vise versa. She wasn’t one to give up something that was so special to her, even though it wasn’t for many other girls, to someone who would hurt her one day. But then Rupert came along, now she was in London partly for him. Things were getting serious. Of course their long and passionate kisses would eventually lead up to this. She could feel her nerves getting tighter and her heart beating faster and not the fast speed she enjoyed. What if it was a complete turn off for him. What if it changed his opinion of her. What if he didn’t want to sleep with a girl who didn’t have experience.

Rupert stopped her from fidgeting with his shirt buttons and took her hands in his. Their fingers intertwined as he brought their hands to his sides and swung them back and forth slightly. Harper stared down at their hands, she felt as if she was going to throw up. She shouldn’t have stopped the kiss. She shouldn’t have even told him, they could have just went right along with what they were doing. She would have been okay. She heard a low sing-song moan escape Rupert’s lips before feeling him kiss the top of her head. Her stomach did a flip.

She leaned in and rested her head on his chest. She could hear his heart beating quite rapidly. Her own heart melted knowing that it was beating for her. She could feel her nerves calming down with every beat of his heart drumming into her ear. He enveloped her in his arms and pulled her closer so her whole body was against him.

“You’re okay, love.” He whispered reassuringly.

Later that night, Harper was snuggled up into Rupert’s chest while he engulfed her in his arms, her missing puzzle piece. This time, there was no talk about sleeping arrangements. The both of automatically knew where Harper would be sleeping which made Harper feel almost complete and happy.

“Why didn’t you tell me before?” Rupert asked, his voice low and raspy from not speaking for a while.

Harper sighed knowing exactly what he was asking about. “I don’t know. It never came up before I guess.”

He placed his finger beneath her chin and lift her head up so she was looking up at him. Then his hand immediately went back to her side. “But if you told me, I wouldn’t have made you nervous.” There was great remorse in his voice. He genuinely felt bad for what happened earlier.

Harper propped herself up on her elbow and faced him. His face looked sad and ashamed. She shook her head. “No! You did nothing wrong! It’s my fault for not letting you know. I guess I was just scared about what you would think of me.” She leaned down and placed a light kiss on his lips.

He seemed to feel better from the look on his face. A smirk appeared on his face, the same smirk that always made Harper’s stomach do summersaults. “Sweetheart, I’ve told you nothing you could say will change anything. You don’t have to be nervous or shy around me. I’m the one who usually holds those traits.” He chuckled a bit. “I actually find it quite charming. You’re not like most girls.” He leaned in and kissed her lightly, as if he was afraid he was going to break her or make her nervous again. The two of them rolled over so Rupert was lying on his back and Harper on her stomach on top of him, their lips still connected. After a few seconds, Rupert broke the kiss and clasped his hands together resting him on the small of Harper’s back. He grinned up at her. “I’m not going to lie, knowing that you’re new to this kind of makes me more nervous.”

Harper giggled. “You’re nervous?! Try being the girl.”

Rupert chuckled nervously in return. “That’s exactly why I’m nervous. The last thing I want to do is hurt you.” Seriousness glazed over his face immediately.

Harper gave him a reassuring smile. “I know. Knowing that it’s going to be you makes me feel better about it, because of that.”

“You can trust me, you know that, yeah?” He raised his eyebrows waiting for am answer.

Harper couldn’t stop smiling. “As long as you know you can trust me too.”

Finally, a smile appeared on his face again. He nodded and leaned in once again for one of their usual sweet and long kisses.