Red Lights

I’d fallen asleep at Dylan’s house the night before, after a long movie marathon and a late night of watching Dylan and Tyler act like giant children over the rim of my beer. I couldn’t really remember what time the last movie had ended – we’d been hanging out all night on the couch and Tyler had turned to his room halfway through the last film – only that I knew I was too tired to drive home. So when Dylan stood up, reaching for my hand, I took it and let him throw an arm around my shoulder and lead me to his room.

It wasn’t that I hadn’t spent the night before, because I had. There were times when I didn’t feel like leaving and he didn’t make me. Other time when after a night of drinking, I knew I was better off to just stay put. So I stayed, changed into one of his old t-shirts, and crawled into his bed.

I woke up when the mattress started moving under me, my body shifting slightly. Upon opening my eyes, I realized it was still relatively dark in the room, the light coming in through the blinds making the walls and air appear a murky grey.

My eyes fell shut again, my body too drowsy to wake up.

There was movement again, but I ignored it, until I felt a sharp pain against my side. I opened my eyes just as a body fell over mine, crashing onto the floor.

I sat up just as Dylan rolled over onto his back, his legs stretching out in front of him. He groaned, his eyes pressing shut. It took a moment for my mind to catch up to what had just happened.

I couldn’t help but laugh, which got me a sharp look that was probably meant to send death beam through my eyes.

“I’m fine,” he said, sounding kind of breathless, his voice low and gravely. “I’m totally fine, thanks for asking. I just really had to pee, no big deal. I didn’t ask to die today. Please, don’t act so concerned.”

I laughed harder, burying my face in my knees. Dylan groaned again. I took a deep breath, trying to stop myself. He was starting to sit up on the floor, slowly.

“Oh my god,” I said, the last syllable soaking in laughter. “Why am I even with you?”

“The sex,” he said, standing up off the ground. “Definitely the sex.”

I rolled my eyes, a retort on the tip of my tongue. We weren’t even having sex yet. I swallowed my words, however, knowing that his best friend, Tyler, was only a doorway and some feet away and always, always listening. If he was awake, he was listening. And I mean, we weren’t having sex, so saying it aloud for his roommate to hear would have probably killed his ego even more.

Sure, my virginity was a thing of the past, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t have rules. (Not that Dylan didn’t make me want to shave a little time away from them.) I mean, I had to literally put a shirt on him the other day. Like a child, one arm through the shirt sleeve, then the next, before pushing it over his head and pulling it to cover his whole chest, tugging it until it lay across his waistband. Restraint was a whole new thing that I had to learn if I was going to date him and follow the rules I’d set for myself. It was like my grandpa used to say: “What kind of man am I if I can’t follow the guidelines I’ve set for myself?”

It was hard. Like, really, really freaking hard, but Dylan knew how I felt about it. And if we got to that time, to that point, all the waiting wouldn’t matter anymore. But only time can tell.

I was happy he was at least joking, though.

“I’m sorry,” I said, reaching out to run my hand over his arm. “Are you okay?”

He nodded, taking a seat on his bed by my crossed legs.

“Yeah, I’m alright. I just… apparently wasn’t awake enough to crawl over you?” He groaned. “I just wanted to peeeeeee.”

“Go pee,” I said, gently pushing at his shoulder. “Go pee, then we’ll go get breakfast or something. Yeah? Go pee.”

He nodded, finally getting up to leave the room. After the door shut behind him, I threw the sheets and blankets off of me, swiveling my legs around to reach the ground. I couldn’t remember exactly where I had left my clothes the night before when I had changed. The dim light of the room wasn’t helping at all, so I got up to turn on the light just as the door opened again, Dylan shutting it behind him.

“So what do you want for breakfast?” he said, walking around me as I flipped the light on.

“I’d like for you to not smack my butt,” I said, turning to glare at him as he smirked from his closet. He’d done it as he walked by. His hands were cold.

“Then put some pants on,” he mumbled, pulling a shirt off a hanger to change into.

“I would if I could find them!”

He just chuckled, pulling his new shirt on over his head. Then he went to his drawers, found a new pair of jeans.

“They’re on the desk chair,” he said, nodding his head toward the other side of his room. Then he dropped his pants.

My pants were in fact on the desk chair, which was hiding from the light coming from his window. I wiggled into them, zipping. Then I turned, looking for my shoes.

“Shoes are by the door,” he said, taking a seat on his bed to start tying his own. I looked to the door, then him. He looked back, then clarified. “The front door.” I nodded.

The living room was quiet, which was odd, considering Tyler was in the room.

“Hey,” I said, walking past him towards the door. My sandals were definitely there, right next to an old, worn pair of flip flops and a pair of sneakers.

“Hey,” he said. I grabbed my shoes and went back to where he was, taking a seat on the edge of the couch near his feet to slip on my shoes without tripping. He was sprawled out on the length of the couch, on his back, staring up at the ceiling.

“Whatcha doing?” I asked, turning slightly toward him once my shoes were both on.

“Thinking,” he said, softly, his voice sounding far away.

“Okay, what the hell,” I said, my hand falling on his calf. “Are you okay?”

He lifted his head, chin pushing into chest, and looked at me with his big brown eyes. “Uh, yeah,” his voice muffled by his position. “Why?”

“You’re being weird,” I said, removing my hand and placing it back into my lap. Dylan came out of his room then, shutting the door behind him. He looked like he’d at least tried to fix his hair. That reminded me that I probably needed to look into a mirror sometime before we got to wherever we were going for breakfast. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you like this, is all. Do you wanna go to breakfast with us?”

“No,” he said, his head falling back against the couch cushions again. “I’ll just see you guys later, maybe.”

“Okay, then,” I said, standing up to meet Dylan at the door. He was shaking his keys in his hand, the other in his jean pocket. He opened the front door for me.

“Bye, Tyler,” I said.

“Later, man.”

“Yeah, later.” Tyler said, voice muffled by Dylan shutting the door behind us.

“Don’t pay him any attention,” Dylan said when we were in his car. He immediately rolled down his window, buckling his seatbelt into place. “He’s fine, honestly. He’s just bummed because Seana’s gone for a week with her mom and sisters. He’s done this before, trust me. He’ll survive.”

I just nodded, sitting back in my seat.

“Put your seatbelt on,” he said. I realized then that we were moving, backing out of his driveway. I buckled my seatbelt, resting my hands in my lap. He was driving, but I didn’t know where we were going.

“Where are we going?” I flipped down the visor, examining my reflection in the small mirror there. My hair was manageable, thankfully. I brushed my fingers through halfheartedly, also making sure to clear my eyes of any sleep that had built up over the night and morning hours.

He smiled, not turning to look at me but continuing to watch the road. “Where else? The Waffle.”

I shook my head, mumbling, “You and your waffles.”

“Waffles are delicious. You can’t deny it. And really, it was our first date. It’s breakfast. We can’t go wrong.”

I laughed. “That was not a date and you know it.”

“It so was!” He said, shifting in his seat. I glanced at him. He was smiling, hands loose on the steering wheel. He glanced at me a second. “There was so much tension. So much tension! That’s what first dates are all about!”

“You mean the “wow I really wanna kill this kid and make a run for it” tension?”

“The sexual tension!”

“You’re hallucinating,” I said. “Our first actual date was… I don’t even know, actually.”

“The Waffle.”

“The Waffle was not our first date!”

He laughed. “Do we have a real first date, then? According to your standards?”

“Probably not. I have really high standards.”

“Oh,” he said, flipping on his blinker. “You have such high standards. You’re right up there with Get-Drunk-in-a-Country-Music-Bar and Kiss-A-Stranger-in-a-Cab clouds.”

“You’re a piece of shit,” I said, ignoring him and looking out the window. “You’re trash but I love you for it.”

He only chuckled.

---

After breakfast, we found that Tyler’s car was gone from the driveway. It was quiet inside, the television off. I didn’t care what Dylan was doing; I was going to fall onto his bed and hibernate for a few hours. Or, so I planned.

I crawled into his bed first, until my back was pressed to the wall he slept against the night before. His blankets were cool to the touch, cold and soft against my skin. Dylan crawled in after me, his face level with mine on his pillows.

He breathed out of his nose, his eyes shutting some. He was tired, I knew. We hadn’t gotten a lot of sleep, really, the night before, because we’d been up so late watching movies. Our stomachs were full. His hands were so warm, sliding across his sheets and over my hips as he pushed his body closer to mine.

It still surprised me, how very comfortable I was with him. It had been almost three months since we met, and it hadn’t even taken me that long of a time to get as comfortable as I was now. It was just so easy, all of it. From the way his hands would find mine, or the way my responses to his wit just flowed from my tongue. Even the way our bodies melted to each other in the dark was easy. It was as easy as breathing.

His breath blew across my neck, warm against my skin. My stomach churned nervously. Lips moved across bone, skin, freckles, slowly, surely. I wanted to lay in his bed for a very, very long time, feel his arms tighten over my waist again and again, feel his lips graze my collarbone forever.

Okay, I was exaggerating.

Still, I liked it. I liked him. I liked him a lot more than I had liked my last boyfriend and probably every boyfriend before him, although there weren’t that many. If I was being honest, I probably even loved him.

He didn’t speak. His lips moved across mine. I pulled my hands up, running my fingers across his shoulder and neck, over his ear, into his hair. Pressing my face closer, I breathed him in, mouth open, no longer as tired as I was before. I was energized, filled with this weird, electric buzz of Dylan’s touch.

After a while I just melted into his chest, his arm folding over me as I pressed my face to his neck.

“I really like you, Olivia.”

I smiled in that space between his chin and chest, where he couldn’t see me. I hugged his body closer to mine, my hand smoothing over the surface of his cotton-clothed back. A happy sound bubbled in the back of his throat, his chest rumbling slightly under my own.

His breathing was slowing, his body relaxing even more, his arm getting heavier across my arm and side. I couldn’t see his face, but I knew his eyes were closed, knew he wasn’t thinking, wasn’t worrying, wasn’t fidgeting. He wasn’t completely asleep, he was floating. I was groggy, warm, happy. I was about as close to floating as I was going to get before I floated away completely.

So, before I did, I whispered into the front of his shirt.

“I really, really, really, really like you too, big guy.”

He moved some, and I noticed a slight change in something under my touch. His breathing, his heart rate, I wasn’t sure, but it was there. I laughed slightly, quietly, my eyes closed in the dim sunlight of his room and the warmth of his chest.

“Don’t get excited about it, though.”

Then, I floated away.