Status: one and done
Win Some, Lose Some
Win Some, Lose Some
I don't know what is more embarrassing - being swept out of the playoffs or the fact that I'm knocking on her door unannounced and uninvited, in rough shape and with no real agenda in mind. I'm not great with women but even I know this is not the way to win one over.
I ring the bell anyway.
"Sid. Hey."
God, she's beautiful. It's the first thing I think of every time I see her, which is almost every day for six months now. It never fades or goes away - it only gets stronger when she smiles. Her chin-length brown hair is raked to one side, tucked behind an ear and slipping into her bright blue eyes. Somehow she's a little tan already and I wonder if she spends every moment she's not in the arena outside, soaking in the early summer warmth. It would explain why her personality is always so upbeat. Today is chilly - she's wearing jeans with frayed cuffs and a thin, soft-looking heather grey t-shirt with a vintage Star Trek logo stretched enticingly across her chest, boldly going where I have never gone before. Who knows when I'll see her next, since the season's over.
"Hi Kristen," I say.
____
That is definitely the last thing I expected when I opened the door - Sidney Crosby. Especially today. He's got a baseball cap on, as always, now that his hair is long and he has no idea how to make it look presentable. The curls along his neckline are so long they brush the black hooded sweatshirt he's hiding inside. It's open at the front - I don't think they make clothes big enough to zip over that chest. His plain green t-shirt looks happy enough to do the job. Huge hands are stuffed into small pockets, so his arms and shoulders can't relax. He probably can't relax anyway. Dark jeans and sneakers were were afterthoughts but God damn if he doesn't look amazing.
And sad.
It's been a rough week. When I can say that for myself, it means Sid has had a week like storming the beaches at Normandy. There's not a single person in Pittsburgh, maybe the entire NHL, that's had the week Sid's had. From two feet away I can feel his fatigue. Gravity has doubled in my doorway and we're both in danger of sinking into the rain-soaked earth. I don't know what he's doing here but I quickly decide that I don't even care.
I step out the door and wrap my arms around him.
___
Her touch is so sudden I almost burst into tears. Add that to the list of things girls love. Before I can process her movement, Kristen's arms are crossing over my back. I quickly return the embrace, wiggling my hands free of my pockets and folding around her, letting them hang overlapped against her waist. One of her hands dodges my hood and holds the back of my neck, skin on skin, probably the only time we've ever touched that way since the handshake on the day we met.
As close as we can be, she and I both stop moving. The stillness is not awkward though, it's bliss. My clenched muscles and battered limbs are releasing tension for the first time in days. If she disappeared I would melt into the floor and not leave so much as a stain.
She doesn't disappear. After a solid minute of holding me, Kristen slides her hands over my shoulders and down my chest. I stop breathing. Her fingers hook into the pockets of my sweatshirt.
"Come on in."
Her narrow townhouse has two floors. We climb a few steps to reach the first level and she turns left, into the living room, and deposits me on the olive green corduroy couch. It envelops me, the perfect amount of of hold and give, and I nearly groan. Kristen walks off into the kitchen, my eyes follow.
The room is cozy, furnished in the do-it-yourself way I would have expected. The color-and-line canvases on the wall were hand-painted, something off Pinterest. One side table is yellow and the other is white, both painted, but her coffee table is store bought and dark stained. There is a row of tiny vases along the mantle, each with brightly colored paper flowers sticking out the top.
She comes back with two glasses of water and sets them on the table, then goes into the hall and returns with a big fuzzy blanket. I sit straight-backed in the middle of the couch, unsure of where I should be now that I'm here. Kristen smiles as she sits down and leans back against the arm of the sofa, then slides one leg behind where I'm sitting until she's half-laying down.
"Come here."
I don't need to be asked twice. My head goes right onto her chest, my back against her stomach as I recline between her legs and come to rest against her body. When she pulls the blanket over us, she slides her arm back beneath it and rests one open hand on my chest. I'm aware of her breasts and hips and every other part of her I'm touching - the inside of her thigh against my side, her foot tucked in under my knee. I wonder if she'd let me lay here until next season starts.
Kristen carefully takes off my hat and runs her fingers through my wildly unkempt hair. The other hand reaches for the TV remote.
____
He's asleep in minutes. His lips part slightly, revealing the unnatural angles of his remaining teeth. The off-season will be long for Sid, trying to put everything in his face back where it was. I hope that doesn't happen for a while yet. He breathes evenly, chest rising and falling beneath my hand. The blanket is overkill - Sid bleeds heat, soaking my body in I feel relaxed enough to fall asleep myself. I mostly covered him so I wouldn't have to look at his hulking body. A girl can only take so much. The long eyelashes are enough, thick and black against his porcelain skin. I twist another curl of hair around my finger - the longest lock yet.
I wonder why he came here of all places, but it keeps sticking in my mind that Sidney Crosby would have limited options. Any house in Pittsburgh would take him in, certainly any girl under the age of 80. He must not have a girlfriend, I make a mental note. Not that I thought he might be hiding someone away in that Sewickley mansion he's building. The other option is Mario's house, where I know Sid still lives. Probably not a lot of girls get invited back there at all, and it's a big risk to run just for a hug.
An episode of
starts and I don't even pretend it's the best show in the room.
____
Kristen is asleep when I wake. I can tell because her hands are still, both the one at my chest and the one at my neck, just below my ear. Apparently I fell asleep, she must have done the same while she was playing with my hair. I don't want to wake her and I'm too comfortable to move, so I lay in Kristen's lap on her couch in her house and wonder why she let me in.
She's nice. Really nice. At first a few of my teammates were a little too persistent in asking her out and Kristen had to learn to tell them no in a more convincing way. I never asked. No surprise there. Clearly she didn't say no to the guys because she had a boyfriend, or we wouldn't be doing this. I am pretty sure no guy in Pittsburgh wants his girlfriend anywhere near me, just in case. So she's single. And sympathetic. And she's really comfy.
It's warm under the blanket and Kristen's shirt is soft against my cheek. My head lays above her breasts, close to her neck. If I turned my face up and leaned back, I could kiss her throat. I wish I had the guts for a move like that. Instead I just move my hand behind her knee, holding the leg that in turn is tucked under mine. It startles her awake.
"Sorry," I say. She shifts beneath me, so I sit up.
"No no no, cold." She sounds like a kid, with a pout to match. It makes me smile. Kristen moves against the back of the couch and I'm sitting down by her feet. There's plenty of room in front of her to lay down - I just look at the space.
She rolls her eyes. "Did you come here to cuddle or what?"
____
If Sidney came here for something else, I wish he'd let me know what it is. There's only one kind of dream to be had while he's laying on top of me and he woke me up right before the good part. If I fall asleep again I can't promise I won't start living that dream.
His hair falls into his face as he shoulders down into the sofa. My arm fits perfectly into the notch of his waist and he settles back against me - shoving me against the back cushion.
I giggle.
"Sorry," he scoots his hips forward, so far I think he'll fall right off the couch but this thing wasn't built to be wide enough for both his ass and mine.
"Stop." I grab his side - there's no give in that muscle - and try to pull him closer. He relents. I wiggle down a few inches, bending my knees and making room in the curve of my lap for that wagon he's dragging. When I'm finally still, my face is between his shoulderblades.
"Let's switch." He tries to move again but I reach around his waist and hug him. All at once Sidney goes still and I wonder when the last time is this boy was properly hugged. Couch or no, laying down or standing, he is a sponge soaking up all the kind, simple attention he can get. And a girl could do worse that to look at those broad shoulders for a while. I leave my arm around him until Sidney sighs, then I snuggle in a little closer.
The comfort of his body is more than I can stand. My eyes flutter closed again.
___
The guys would love this. I'm curled up with the hottest girl in town, someone they've all tried to get with, and I am the little spoon. I even like it.
God, Kristen is the perfect shape and size. There's just enough of her form plastered to my back - her breasts rise and fall, press and release, with each silent breath. Her slender thighs are long and firm against the backs of mine. Her hand reaches the edge of the cushion just in front of my stomach, so I lace my fingers into hers and fall back to sleep.
I dream that we're doing this: Kristen and I just cuddling, only we're also a couple and I can touch her easily, without thinking or worrying. I the dream I hold her small hand all the time and she loves to gently drag her fingernails against my scalp, sending goosebumps down my neck, which she follows with her lips, hooking the collar of my t-shirt just an inch lower and placing her lips softly to the skin hidden there.
I wake to her moving again, and feel her fingernails grazing right behind my ear.
"You talk in your sleep," she says quietly.
I also get hard in my sleep, so it's a good thing she's behind me or the little spoon would be getting some unwanted action. It would be unwanted, right? Her fingers are strong, massaging as well as scratching, then giving the upper curve of my ear a squeeze. Involuntarily to turn my face into the pillow, exposing more skin and hair and begging for her attention. Kristen obliges. I can't see her face but I wonder if the look on it is pity.
____
Curiosity is killing me. Sid was mumbling in his sleep, nothing intelligible, but it make me want to soothe him. Plus his hair is thick and soft and glossy the way only a boy can have, just to make girls jealous. Again he responds to my touch almost magnetically. There are things beyond the individual losses of this series that are weighing on the huge shoulders currently occupying my entire field of vision.
"Are you okay?" I ask quietly.
He sighs and we both feel it. His voice is tired. "Yeah. Sorry. I... I don't know why I came here."
My hand goes still against his skin. "I'm glad you did."
"You're so nice," he chuckles.
"You're just tired."
He turns his head - he can't look back and see me, but it's enough to know he tried. The outline of his profile is perfect: solid brow, straight nose, pillowy lips. "You must think I'm a loser, showing up like this."
"Then imagine what you're going to think of me."
"When?"
"When I invite you upstairs."
Those perfect lips twitch into a smile.
____
The word zings right down my back.
Still I say, "You don't, I mean I didn't... that's not why I...."
"Relax," she tells the middle of my back. "You can keep your pants on. But you're making me sleepy as there no room on this couch for me and your ass." With that she swats me playfully, grabbing whatever she can and hauling herself up. Tousled hair covers one of her eyes - she had bed head. Because of me. I look up at her and the urge to kiss her nearly makes me faint.
Then I'm following her through the house, carrying the blanket and climbing toward what I can only assume is her bedroom. Sure enough - the second floor is a bedroom. It's still half the size of mine but the idea of an entire floor of a house being dedicated to all the things we could do in her bedroom makes me weak with desire. Not a great way to be feeling right before you climb into bed with a girl who just told you to keep your pants on.
The duvet is navy and white striped. Kristen has enough pillows to sleep on - three, exactly - not a whole army of decorative pillows that I cannot understand. She walks to the bed like it's everyday she invites someone up here. It had better not be every day.
She slides across and stretches out, laying on her side and facing me. I nearly trip trying to catch up. Then I'm next to her, on my back, spreading the blanket over top of us. I expect Kristen to curl into my side and lay her head on my shoulder - that's what girls always want to do. Not her. She moves up high, slides her arm under my neck and wraps around me. Her chin rests against the top of my head. I turn into her, hugging her fully, and her top legs goes over my hip. We're tangled up together like we really mean it.
I briefly wonder if she thinks so little of me as a potential lover that she has no hesitation about bringing me to her be and getting into a compromising position. Could I be that unworthy? Am I that unappealing to her? The hem of her t-shirt has crept up and rests below my fingers, well north of her waistband. Call it a test but I turn my hand up underneath it, palm against the smooth bare skin of her back.
"That's better," she says.
____
I need something to do with my hands, so I wrap them around Sidney's neck and shoulders because they are as far as I can get from his lap and still be here. This is no time to be treating him like a sex toy - he came here for my help, I think. If he wanted to be groped he could have knocked on any door in town. He probably has other girls he calls for that.
Still there's no denying that everything about him turns me on. He takes up a pornographic amount of space in my queen size bed. We're not so much cuddling as I'm climbing a tree, wrapped around an upper body twice the size of mine. It's much easier to do this in bed - along with a lot of other things. I'd better not roll in my sleep. If he ends up on top of me it'll be a race to see if I suffocate or orgasm first.
Then he slips his hand under my shirt. At least I know I'm not the only one thinking it.
We lay there for a long time, pretending to sleep. I wonder if he knows I'm awake. Boys are too big, too heavy to fake sleep - they never get the breathing right. It's intensely comfortable though and my mind wanders until I'm so zoned out I may as well be sleeping.
____
Kristen is awake. She's in my arms, in bed, in a house that we have all to ourselves, and I lay there doing nothing. I don't even talk. I'm more calm and relaxed than I've been in months, it should loosen my tongue. More than anything I don't know where to start. In case she thinks I'm sleeping, I move my hand lightly along the hollow of her spine.
She jumps. Hard. If I wasn't holding her she might have gone right off the bed. My arms lock and Kristen laughs, going limp.
Not that, anything but that! I think.
But she says, "I'm ticklish."
And I'm half-hard at the word.
Careful not to move my hands, I ease up on the tightness of my embrace. She inhales deeply, restoring calm in herself. For me it's just a movement of her perfect breasts much too close to be ignored.
"Sorry," I tell her.
Kristen presses a kiss to the top of my head. A kiss in this situation should be a green light but it feel chaste and comforting, not erotic. Her fingers wind back into my hair, the way they'd done downstairs, like she's untangling the layers of tension that surround me. I take a moment to slow my blood and try not to be indecent around the lady. When she reaches the long hair at the base of my neck, she gives up and rubs her fingers into the muscles at the base of my skull.
I moan softly. Soreness is everywhere, so universal that I don't feel individual spots of it until one gets tweaked. Her touch finds a weakness and it lights up red.
Kristen moves, climbing out of my arms. I start to protest but she's not going away from me. She's going over. Her legs quickly straddle my side then she's behind me, and I haven't moved. Her hands gently press my head forward then her fingers find that same weak spot again.
Pain splashes through the surrounding nerves, fading to a hot glow. It's just one inch on an endless
map of my body. Kristen could work at me for a lifetime and not get every spot - but I'd sure enjoy if she tried. She press the same spot on the other side of my neck and I moan again.
____
I kissed him. It was just the top of his head but I just kissed him... and nothing. I thought he was making a move with that hand under my shirt - maybe I scared him, but he tickled me. We're still in bed together, and unless I'm really mistaken something is happening here. I crawl over to his other side, anxious to use my hands on him even if only to help. That's what he needs most.
Then he makes that noise, the uncensored sound of affirmation. I am helping him. So I put my mouth to the place my fingers had been.
He flinches, as strongly as I had before. My lips stick to the spot and I kiss the ache at the back of Sidney's neck as hard as I'd been pushing with my fingers. His skin is smooth, the silky fall of his hair brushing my cheek. His frame is huge beside me and I think my little kiss could never have an impact on all of that.
When Sid turns, I know I'm wrong. A little bit is a lot more than he ever gets. His eyes are more gold than brown up so close. His attempt at a playoff beard is less patchy when you can't see the whole thing.
"I can't," he says.
"Okay." My voice is pleasant, but I snap the word off in panic. He didn't want that. I didn't mean that. There's no way to take it back, twisted together as we are. I read the sign wrong, I swung and I missed and now I'm out. My heart races. That happened so fast.
Sid grabs my arm and holds. "I mean, I haven't. Kissed anyone. Since my jaw."
"Oh." All the blood that drained away from my heart comes rushing back like a tidal wave. Mistake? Not a mistake? Leaving or staying? Stopping or going? The confusion must show on my face because Sidney puts his big, hot hand on my cheek.
"Hold still."
I do. Eyes open too, and Sid does the same. He slowly lowers his face to mine and I'm nervous. I want to crush my regular, boring mouth against his legendary one, close my eyes and disappear inside the way we've been lying together for hours. Just before our mouths touch, Sid's dark eyes flutter closed.
It's a stomach-dropping, heart-stopping, brain-melting kiss. Just a closed mouth, soft press of his lips to mine but if I weren't laying down I would definitely swoon. After a few moments, Sid blinks his eyes open. When he smiles you'd never know his mouth was a mess.
"Works fine," he says, and kisses me again.
_
I ring the bell anyway.
"Sid. Hey."
God, she's beautiful. It's the first thing I think of every time I see her, which is almost every day for six months now. It never fades or goes away - it only gets stronger when she smiles. Her chin-length brown hair is raked to one side, tucked behind an ear and slipping into her bright blue eyes. Somehow she's a little tan already and I wonder if she spends every moment she's not in the arena outside, soaking in the early summer warmth. It would explain why her personality is always so upbeat. Today is chilly - she's wearing jeans with frayed cuffs and a thin, soft-looking heather grey t-shirt with a vintage Star Trek logo stretched enticingly across her chest, boldly going where I have never gone before. Who knows when I'll see her next, since the season's over.
"Hi Kristen," I say.
____
That is definitely the last thing I expected when I opened the door - Sidney Crosby. Especially today. He's got a baseball cap on, as always, now that his hair is long and he has no idea how to make it look presentable. The curls along his neckline are so long they brush the black hooded sweatshirt he's hiding inside. It's open at the front - I don't think they make clothes big enough to zip over that chest. His plain green t-shirt looks happy enough to do the job. Huge hands are stuffed into small pockets, so his arms and shoulders can't relax. He probably can't relax anyway. Dark jeans and sneakers were were afterthoughts but God damn if he doesn't look amazing.
And sad.
It's been a rough week. When I can say that for myself, it means Sid has had a week like storming the beaches at Normandy. There's not a single person in Pittsburgh, maybe the entire NHL, that's had the week Sid's had. From two feet away I can feel his fatigue. Gravity has doubled in my doorway and we're both in danger of sinking into the rain-soaked earth. I don't know what he's doing here but I quickly decide that I don't even care.
I step out the door and wrap my arms around him.
___
Her touch is so sudden I almost burst into tears. Add that to the list of things girls love. Before I can process her movement, Kristen's arms are crossing over my back. I quickly return the embrace, wiggling my hands free of my pockets and folding around her, letting them hang overlapped against her waist. One of her hands dodges my hood and holds the back of my neck, skin on skin, probably the only time we've ever touched that way since the handshake on the day we met.
As close as we can be, she and I both stop moving. The stillness is not awkward though, it's bliss. My clenched muscles and battered limbs are releasing tension for the first time in days. If she disappeared I would melt into the floor and not leave so much as a stain.
She doesn't disappear. After a solid minute of holding me, Kristen slides her hands over my shoulders and down my chest. I stop breathing. Her fingers hook into the pockets of my sweatshirt.
"Come on in."
Her narrow townhouse has two floors. We climb a few steps to reach the first level and she turns left, into the living room, and deposits me on the olive green corduroy couch. It envelops me, the perfect amount of of hold and give, and I nearly groan. Kristen walks off into the kitchen, my eyes follow.
The room is cozy, furnished in the do-it-yourself way I would have expected. The color-and-line canvases on the wall were hand-painted, something off Pinterest. One side table is yellow and the other is white, both painted, but her coffee table is store bought and dark stained. There is a row of tiny vases along the mantle, each with brightly colored paper flowers sticking out the top.
She comes back with two glasses of water and sets them on the table, then goes into the hall and returns with a big fuzzy blanket. I sit straight-backed in the middle of the couch, unsure of where I should be now that I'm here. Kristen smiles as she sits down and leans back against the arm of the sofa, then slides one leg behind where I'm sitting until she's half-laying down.
"Come here."
I don't need to be asked twice. My head goes right onto her chest, my back against her stomach as I recline between her legs and come to rest against her body. When she pulls the blanket over us, she slides her arm back beneath it and rests one open hand on my chest. I'm aware of her breasts and hips and every other part of her I'm touching - the inside of her thigh against my side, her foot tucked in under my knee. I wonder if she'd let me lay here until next season starts.
Kristen carefully takes off my hat and runs her fingers through my wildly unkempt hair. The other hand reaches for the TV remote.
____
He's asleep in minutes. His lips part slightly, revealing the unnatural angles of his remaining teeth. The off-season will be long for Sid, trying to put everything in his face back where it was. I hope that doesn't happen for a while yet. He breathes evenly, chest rising and falling beneath my hand. The blanket is overkill - Sid bleeds heat, soaking my body in I feel relaxed enough to fall asleep myself. I mostly covered him so I wouldn't have to look at his hulking body. A girl can only take so much. The long eyelashes are enough, thick and black against his porcelain skin. I twist another curl of hair around my finger - the longest lock yet.
I wonder why he came here of all places, but it keeps sticking in my mind that Sidney Crosby would have limited options. Any house in Pittsburgh would take him in, certainly any girl under the age of 80. He must not have a girlfriend, I make a mental note. Not that I thought he might be hiding someone away in that Sewickley mansion he's building. The other option is Mario's house, where I know Sid still lives. Probably not a lot of girls get invited back there at all, and it's a big risk to run just for a hug.
An episode of
starts and I don't even pretend it's the best show in the room.
____
Kristen is asleep when I wake. I can tell because her hands are still, both the one at my chest and the one at my neck, just below my ear. Apparently I fell asleep, she must have done the same while she was playing with my hair. I don't want to wake her and I'm too comfortable to move, so I lay in Kristen's lap on her couch in her house and wonder why she let me in.
She's nice. Really nice. At first a few of my teammates were a little too persistent in asking her out and Kristen had to learn to tell them no in a more convincing way. I never asked. No surprise there. Clearly she didn't say no to the guys because she had a boyfriend, or we wouldn't be doing this. I am pretty sure no guy in Pittsburgh wants his girlfriend anywhere near me, just in case. So she's single. And sympathetic. And she's really comfy.
It's warm under the blanket and Kristen's shirt is soft against my cheek. My head lays above her breasts, close to her neck. If I turned my face up and leaned back, I could kiss her throat. I wish I had the guts for a move like that. Instead I just move my hand behind her knee, holding the leg that in turn is tucked under mine. It startles her awake.
"Sorry," I say. She shifts beneath me, so I sit up.
"No no no, cold." She sounds like a kid, with a pout to match. It makes me smile. Kristen moves against the back of the couch and I'm sitting down by her feet. There's plenty of room in front of her to lay down - I just look at the space.
She rolls her eyes. "Did you come here to cuddle or what?"
____
If Sidney came here for something else, I wish he'd let me know what it is. There's only one kind of dream to be had while he's laying on top of me and he woke me up right before the good part. If I fall asleep again I can't promise I won't start living that dream.
His hair falls into his face as he shoulders down into the sofa. My arm fits perfectly into the notch of his waist and he settles back against me - shoving me against the back cushion.
I giggle.
"Sorry," he scoots his hips forward, so far I think he'll fall right off the couch but this thing wasn't built to be wide enough for both his ass and mine.
"Stop." I grab his side - there's no give in that muscle - and try to pull him closer. He relents. I wiggle down a few inches, bending my knees and making room in the curve of my lap for that wagon he's dragging. When I'm finally still, my face is between his shoulderblades.
"Let's switch." He tries to move again but I reach around his waist and hug him. All at once Sidney goes still and I wonder when the last time is this boy was properly hugged. Couch or no, laying down or standing, he is a sponge soaking up all the kind, simple attention he can get. And a girl could do worse that to look at those broad shoulders for a while. I leave my arm around him until Sidney sighs, then I snuggle in a little closer.
The comfort of his body is more than I can stand. My eyes flutter closed again.
___
The guys would love this. I'm curled up with the hottest girl in town, someone they've all tried to get with, and I am the little spoon. I even like it.
God, Kristen is the perfect shape and size. There's just enough of her form plastered to my back - her breasts rise and fall, press and release, with each silent breath. Her slender thighs are long and firm against the backs of mine. Her hand reaches the edge of the cushion just in front of my stomach, so I lace my fingers into hers and fall back to sleep.
I dream that we're doing this: Kristen and I just cuddling, only we're also a couple and I can touch her easily, without thinking or worrying. I the dream I hold her small hand all the time and she loves to gently drag her fingernails against my scalp, sending goosebumps down my neck, which she follows with her lips, hooking the collar of my t-shirt just an inch lower and placing her lips softly to the skin hidden there.
I wake to her moving again, and feel her fingernails grazing right behind my ear.
"You talk in your sleep," she says quietly.
I also get hard in my sleep, so it's a good thing she's behind me or the little spoon would be getting some unwanted action. It would be unwanted, right? Her fingers are strong, massaging as well as scratching, then giving the upper curve of my ear a squeeze. Involuntarily to turn my face into the pillow, exposing more skin and hair and begging for her attention. Kristen obliges. I can't see her face but I wonder if the look on it is pity.
____
Curiosity is killing me. Sid was mumbling in his sleep, nothing intelligible, but it make me want to soothe him. Plus his hair is thick and soft and glossy the way only a boy can have, just to make girls jealous. Again he responds to my touch almost magnetically. There are things beyond the individual losses of this series that are weighing on the huge shoulders currently occupying my entire field of vision.
"Are you okay?" I ask quietly.
He sighs and we both feel it. His voice is tired. "Yeah. Sorry. I... I don't know why I came here."
My hand goes still against his skin. "I'm glad you did."
"You're so nice," he chuckles.
"You're just tired."
He turns his head - he can't look back and see me, but it's enough to know he tried. The outline of his profile is perfect: solid brow, straight nose, pillowy lips. "You must think I'm a loser, showing up like this."
"Then imagine what you're going to think of me."
"When?"
"When I invite you upstairs."
Those perfect lips twitch into a smile.
____
The word zings right down my back.
Still I say, "You don't, I mean I didn't... that's not why I...."
"Relax," she tells the middle of my back. "You can keep your pants on. But you're making me sleepy as there no room on this couch for me and your ass." With that she swats me playfully, grabbing whatever she can and hauling herself up. Tousled hair covers one of her eyes - she had bed head. Because of me. I look up at her and the urge to kiss her nearly makes me faint.
Then I'm following her through the house, carrying the blanket and climbing toward what I can only assume is her bedroom. Sure enough - the second floor is a bedroom. It's still half the size of mine but the idea of an entire floor of a house being dedicated to all the things we could do in her bedroom makes me weak with desire. Not a great way to be feeling right before you climb into bed with a girl who just told you to keep your pants on.
The duvet is navy and white striped. Kristen has enough pillows to sleep on - three, exactly - not a whole army of decorative pillows that I cannot understand. She walks to the bed like it's everyday she invites someone up here. It had better not be every day.
She slides across and stretches out, laying on her side and facing me. I nearly trip trying to catch up. Then I'm next to her, on my back, spreading the blanket over top of us. I expect Kristen to curl into my side and lay her head on my shoulder - that's what girls always want to do. Not her. She moves up high, slides her arm under my neck and wraps around me. Her chin rests against the top of my head. I turn into her, hugging her fully, and her top legs goes over my hip. We're tangled up together like we really mean it.
I briefly wonder if she thinks so little of me as a potential lover that she has no hesitation about bringing me to her be and getting into a compromising position. Could I be that unworthy? Am I that unappealing to her? The hem of her t-shirt has crept up and rests below my fingers, well north of her waistband. Call it a test but I turn my hand up underneath it, palm against the smooth bare skin of her back.
"That's better," she says.
____
I need something to do with my hands, so I wrap them around Sidney's neck and shoulders because they are as far as I can get from his lap and still be here. This is no time to be treating him like a sex toy - he came here for my help, I think. If he wanted to be groped he could have knocked on any door in town. He probably has other girls he calls for that.
Still there's no denying that everything about him turns me on. He takes up a pornographic amount of space in my queen size bed. We're not so much cuddling as I'm climbing a tree, wrapped around an upper body twice the size of mine. It's much easier to do this in bed - along with a lot of other things. I'd better not roll in my sleep. If he ends up on top of me it'll be a race to see if I suffocate or orgasm first.
Then he slips his hand under my shirt. At least I know I'm not the only one thinking it.
We lay there for a long time, pretending to sleep. I wonder if he knows I'm awake. Boys are too big, too heavy to fake sleep - they never get the breathing right. It's intensely comfortable though and my mind wanders until I'm so zoned out I may as well be sleeping.
____
Kristen is awake. She's in my arms, in bed, in a house that we have all to ourselves, and I lay there doing nothing. I don't even talk. I'm more calm and relaxed than I've been in months, it should loosen my tongue. More than anything I don't know where to start. In case she thinks I'm sleeping, I move my hand lightly along the hollow of her spine.
She jumps. Hard. If I wasn't holding her she might have gone right off the bed. My arms lock and Kristen laughs, going limp.
Not that, anything but that! I think.
But she says, "I'm ticklish."
And I'm half-hard at the word.
Careful not to move my hands, I ease up on the tightness of my embrace. She inhales deeply, restoring calm in herself. For me it's just a movement of her perfect breasts much too close to be ignored.
"Sorry," I tell her.
Kristen presses a kiss to the top of my head. A kiss in this situation should be a green light but it feel chaste and comforting, not erotic. Her fingers wind back into my hair, the way they'd done downstairs, like she's untangling the layers of tension that surround me. I take a moment to slow my blood and try not to be indecent around the lady. When she reaches the long hair at the base of my neck, she gives up and rubs her fingers into the muscles at the base of my skull.
I moan softly. Soreness is everywhere, so universal that I don't feel individual spots of it until one gets tweaked. Her touch finds a weakness and it lights up red.
Kristen moves, climbing out of my arms. I start to protest but she's not going away from me. She's going over. Her legs quickly straddle my side then she's behind me, and I haven't moved. Her hands gently press my head forward then her fingers find that same weak spot again.
Pain splashes through the surrounding nerves, fading to a hot glow. It's just one inch on an endless
map of my body. Kristen could work at me for a lifetime and not get every spot - but I'd sure enjoy if she tried. She press the same spot on the other side of my neck and I moan again.
____
I kissed him. It was just the top of his head but I just kissed him... and nothing. I thought he was making a move with that hand under my shirt - maybe I scared him, but he tickled me. We're still in bed together, and unless I'm really mistaken something is happening here. I crawl over to his other side, anxious to use my hands on him even if only to help. That's what he needs most.
Then he makes that noise, the uncensored sound of affirmation. I am helping him. So I put my mouth to the place my fingers had been.
He flinches, as strongly as I had before. My lips stick to the spot and I kiss the ache at the back of Sidney's neck as hard as I'd been pushing with my fingers. His skin is smooth, the silky fall of his hair brushing my cheek. His frame is huge beside me and I think my little kiss could never have an impact on all of that.
When Sid turns, I know I'm wrong. A little bit is a lot more than he ever gets. His eyes are more gold than brown up so close. His attempt at a playoff beard is less patchy when you can't see the whole thing.
"I can't," he says.
"Okay." My voice is pleasant, but I snap the word off in panic. He didn't want that. I didn't mean that. There's no way to take it back, twisted together as we are. I read the sign wrong, I swung and I missed and now I'm out. My heart races. That happened so fast.
Sid grabs my arm and holds. "I mean, I haven't. Kissed anyone. Since my jaw."
"Oh." All the blood that drained away from my heart comes rushing back like a tidal wave. Mistake? Not a mistake? Leaving or staying? Stopping or going? The confusion must show on my face because Sidney puts his big, hot hand on my cheek.
"Hold still."
I do. Eyes open too, and Sid does the same. He slowly lowers his face to mine and I'm nervous. I want to crush my regular, boring mouth against his legendary one, close my eyes and disappear inside the way we've been lying together for hours. Just before our mouths touch, Sid's dark eyes flutter closed.
It's a stomach-dropping, heart-stopping, brain-melting kiss. Just a closed mouth, soft press of his lips to mine but if I weren't laying down I would definitely swoon. After a few moments, Sid blinks his eyes open. When he smiles you'd never know his mouth was a mess.
"Works fine," he says, and kisses me again.
_