Ghost in His Eyes

by Carrie Aarons

  I lace my hand in his and wordlessly bring him with me into the house. As we walk up the stairs, I can feel Carson’s pulse jump under my fingers. Sensual energy surrounds us like mist on a rainy day. With each step, my legs shake a little more. My core feels every move, like he’s already touching me.

  By the time we step onto the second floor, he’s already coming for me. Our bags drop to the floor as he takes me in his arms.

  “The things you do to me, Blake …” He breathes his words into my mouth before capturing it, and stealing my air.

  He’s the only boy I’ve ever kissed, and I’m the only girl he’ll ever taste. We make promises with our lips, teeth and tongues, chanting them as our connection deepens, and hands start to roam.

  “I love you …” The whisper is a prayer off my lips, into his heart.

  He’s heating my blood, bringing me to a boil and we aren’t even skin-to-skin. Over the years, we’ve had to teach each other by touch and words. Neither of us has ever been explored by anyone else, and we’ve grown from fumbling teenagers to loving partners. I know the way he comes undone, and he knows how to be patient and thorough with me. Carson can set off every nerve ending, and make my body feel like an exploding star.

  He presses his forehead to mine. “Let me slow down, or this is going to be over way too quickly. I got you something.”

  With a gentle hand, he sits us down on the floor and reaches for his backpack and then mine. I can’t see what he’s pulling out, but I help by dragging the blankets out of my bag.

  “You stay here and look pretty.” He winks, and hands me one single sunflower.

  My jaw drops a little, because while I wished for it, I didn’t know if he would do anything romantic. But I guess that’s the best kind, a completely surprising romantic gesture. Especially since he knows that sunflowers are my favorite, and they rarely grow this time of year.

  “Where did you even find this?” I smell it and smile.

  Carson spreads the first blanket on the rough wood floor. “I have my tricks.”

  He spreads the next one over the top of the first, and then folds the third over top, to cover us if it’s cold I assume. It’s dark besides the clear moonlight, which illuminates the room due to the missing walls.

  So I’m again pleasantly surprised when Carson pulls two candles and a pack of matches out.

  “Wow, this is romantic.” I genuinely mean it.

  He doesn’t take his eyes off of me as he lights them and sets them far enough away from the blankets. “I want this to be special for us.”

  My cheeks go pink, I can feel it.

  When he’s finally done fidgeting with the bags, he crooks a finger at me. “Come here, beautiful.”

  I stand, setting my sunflower down and crossing to him. In nothing but a T-shirt, shorts and converse, there isn’t much standing between he and I.

  I initiate, tentatively setting my lips against his and tasting the familiar. But there is also something new there, something I’ve yet to experience.

  Our gentle kissing leads to inhaling, trying to talk in the language of unspoken sentences. My hands move to his clothes, needing to feel the skin beneath. In what seems like a matter of seconds, I’m bare for him, moving to the blankets. We’ve never been fully undressed for each other, and it’s intimate and scary. But underneath the fear, there is love and desire threatening to burst out.

  “I love you forever, Blake Sayer.” Carson is up on an elbow, his naked chest leading down to one of the most beautiful parts of him. A part that will soon connect us, that will tear the last shred of separation between us.

  His hands mold me, reducing me to a panting ball of need. His fingertips spark against me, and my ears ring with the sounds of his breath and the nighttime echoes of the forest below.

  Time ceases to exist as I take him in my hand, working over his manhood like he’s shown me. A muttered curse, a moan out of my own throat. Our noises and pleasure meld into one, this base that we’ve already taken a familiar but exciting place.

  “I’m ready.” My voice conveys more confidence than I feel.

  But I am. My body is rocking like I’m caught in a riptide, and he’s the only one who can right me. Take me back to land, or help me lose myself in the abyss forever.

  Carson looks at me a moment, our eyes connecting and conversing in a way that words simply could not. He reaches for the condom he set on the edge of the blanket, and I watch him roll it on, scared but also with anticipation rolling through my chest.

  “You’re the only one, Blake.” He nods as he moves between my legs.

  Words fail me, because there is no set of perfect syllables to string together right now. The emotions cloaking us, like the blanket he wraps around his shoulders, create a little world where only the two of us exist. I feel so big, infinite under the stars that peak out from the clouds in the night sky.

  Carson connects us, his skin laying over my own, as I feel him nudge at my entrance. I’m slick with wonder, with love and all of the other feelings clogging my throat. One hand goes to his cheek, the other his chest. If I can just feel him under my fingers, if I can capture this moment and catalogue it for all of time…

  A tightness and a muted pain hit me straight to the core. It feels like a rod, swift and hard, is pushing through me, and that I’ll never be able to accommodate it.

  “Just look at me, baby.” Carson grunts, and I find those dark brown eyes.

  “Ahh …” I try to tell him, and he covers my mouth with his lips.

  His tongue is distracting, the soft strokes and gentle nibbles focus my brain away from the invasion below.

  And when he comes back up, with a tic in his jaw, I realize I no longer feel the bite of pain. In it’s place is a fullness, but one that I crave. One that I never knew my body was made for until right now.

  “You are …” Carson breathes through his nostrils, and I know he’s having as hard of a time as I am.

  With what to say. Because words fail this moment. What’s happening between us is bigger than language, deeper than simple letters.

  Our bodies move together, writing the rhythm of our love like the tide of the sea that laps quietly outside. We never break eye contact, and it’s never in a million years how I thought it would be.

  Soft and slow but intense and deep, his body explores mine. My heart flutters with each pulse of his hips, and his eyes flash each time a moan escapes my throat.

  When we finally fall, plunging into the same crystal clear ocean of overwhelming bliss, it’s done clutching each other for dear life. We ride the wave, the look in his eyes tattooing itself forever in my memory.

  Never in my life did I know there could be a feeling such as this. And as we came down, feeling each other’s skin like it was a brand new texture, I knew that I would crave this forever.

  20

  Carson

  Besides the place that I hadn’t gone back to yet, Blake and I shared another spot in the Outer Banks that had a special meaning.

  The Currituck Beach Lighthouse rose one hundred and sixty-two feet into the air, dusk setting in all around it. The brick and black wrought iron structure was beautiful, an Outer Banks landmark. And also one of the places that Patrick Sayer loved to take us when we were kids.

  I’d texted Blake earlier in the day, asking her if she’d like to meet out here. It was one of the places I’d been meaning to visit since I’d gotten back, and it held memories for us.

  “You brought dinner. Good dinner.” Blake eyed the bag in my hand as I walked up to the base of the lighthouse.

  “I figure if we have to work for our food, it better be some good stuff.” I hold up the bag from Land & Sea, one of the high-end restaurants on this end of the Outer Banks. In the bag I carry rests two containers of paella, a vat of lobster bisque, two waters and utensils.

  I didn’t say anything to Blake, but for me, this was our first official date in ten years. We were alone, at a spot that meant something to us. I’d gotten expens
ive food, and I planned to get her talking more once we got up there. It was a big risk, but maybe by the end of the night she would let me kiss her the way I’d been dying to ever since her birthday.

  “How was your day?” I ask as I open the lighthouse door for her, directing her to the steps.

  I may have been gone for a decade, but I still had connections. My father just happened to be very good friends with the family who now managed the lighthouse upkeep, and he may have slipped me a key. We were the only souls in the place at six p.m. on a Wednesday, and I liked it that way.

  “Good, I worked on the books for Beachsiders, the local clothing boutiques. And then I took Rhett for a long walk, and we saw one of the big colts. He loves them, gets so excited when one of them takes the time to look his way. I swear, that dog would lick a burglar and then make him a cup of coffee.”

  Listening to her talk about her dog puts a smile on my face. “Note to self, get in good with Rhett.”

  “How about you?” I lift my hand out to help her onto the first step.

  It’s two hundred and twenty-one steps to the top, and I want her to be comfortable for the journey.

  “Well, I had a budget meeting with some of our investors. Which was as rousing as it sounds. And then I watched the horses on the motion-activated cameras we had installed in the woods. I love studying their patterns and movements. When I’m with the horses, or doing something for them, that’s when I’m happiest.”

  We crest another flight, making our way up the winding staircase. “Are you finding that running the business isn’t everything you thought it would be?”

  I shrug as we climb. “Not exactly. Don’t get me wrong, I love coming into the family business and trying to help it thrive. But … paperwork and file keeping was never me. It will never be me. It’s something I rush through to get to what I’m really passionate about, and I’m not sure that’s a good thing.”

  I don’t know why I’m telling her this, except for the fact that she was always the best listener.

  “Well, I’m sure your father didn’t enjoy certain aspects of the job. You could always talk to him about how he balanced it.”

  Looking at her, her cheeks a little pink from the exhausting climb, my lips tip up in the corner. “You were always the smartest.”

  “No, you and Joel were smart. You just never used logic. It was always reactions first.”

  It’s the first time she’s spoken about Joel to me in a manner that is cordial. I don’t want to press it, but it feels good to talk about him. I rarely ever get to.

  We travel the rest of the way in comfortable silence. When we finally arrive at the top of the lighthouse, the sun has painted the sky reds, oranges and yellows. The view is breathtaking; it sweeps over Corolla, the town, the parks below, and out towards the ocean. The vast, endless sea that undulates and flows just like the lives of the people living on this peninsula.

  “I forgot how gorgeous it is up here, I haven’t been to the top in forever.” Blake holds her hand like a visor against her forehead, blocking the sun from her eyes.

  “Remember when we used to think this was the highest point of the earth? I remember thinking that we were kings and queens up here, looking out over our kingdom.”

  Her hand grips the rail next to mine. “In a way, we were. Back then we thought we were invincible. It’s a naïve, powerful feeling to think nothing can touch you.”

  I nodded without looking at her. “I guess the universe had its way of teaching us that lesson.”

  I hadn’t meant for things to get this heavy, but our issues hung between us like dusty, old coats needing to be taken out of the closet.

  “If that’s the case, then the universe gave me extra credit.”

  Turning to Blake, I saw the frown marring her beautiful, peach lips.

  “Your father?” I had to train my eyes not to look away from her. I owed her this, to be brave and present when broaching these hard subjects with her.

  She sat, her back leaning against the brick lighthouse as the sun dipped below the sea. I joined her, setting the food down and out of my mind for now. I didn’t touch her, didn’t want to break her thoughts or the moment.

  “After Joel died … well, you know my dad was always lonely. When my mother left after we were born, he tried his hardest to focus on us. To be happy and present, and most of the time he was. He was the perfect parent. But I always knew, deep in my heart, that he missed her. That there was a part of him that could never recover from her betrayal. And so after Joel died, it was like his entire heart, and personality, went with him. He couldn’t eat, he couldn’t speak. He rarely left the house. I would find him standing in random rooms, just crying. Hyperventilating, as if the thought of breathing without Joel on this earth was a travesty. I understood it, but we couldn’t both break down. Someone had to take care of us.”

  “So you did.” I picked up her hand, now understanding where her cold demeanor had come from.

  From a young age, Blake had been independent. With no mother in a household of men, she’d adapted and learned to take care of everyone. I’d seen it when we were kids, and as we’d grown into more over time. But to take on her grieving father and put her own sadness to the side … it was no wonder she’d spent so much time stuck in a place where ghosts haunted her waking and dreaming hours.

  She shrugged, an errant tear rolling down her cheek. With my thumb, I caught it, and pressed the salty liquid to my own lips.

  “I had to. And it kept me from thinking, from sinking into my own pit of despair. If I focused on him, on getting my father to live for just a little while longer, then I didn’t have to address my own issues. But eventually, it took him.”

  The chirping of a lone bird above our heads was the only sound for several minutes. I kept my hands wrapped around hers, as if at any moment the lighthouse might tip and she was my only lifeline.

  “They say you can’t die of a broken heart, but I’ve witnessed it firsthand. It’s the most punishing, lonely disappearing act the world could ever sentence a person to.”

  Her words cut straight to my heart, clogging the ventricles with emotion and causing it to stop up for a beat or two. I had been in so much pain after Joel died, after she banished me from our home. But I’d fought through it, alone.

  And I wasn’t ready to talk about it, even though I’d been pushing her to.

  “I didn’t mean for this to be so heavy when I asked you out, but I’m glad we can talk about it. I’m glad you feel open to talk about it with me.”

  Her eyes are shining sapphires when she looks at me. “So this is a date, huh?”

  Her tactic to evade works, and I’ll let her off the hook for now. “Well, I didn’t want to scare you off, but we are on top of a lighthouse and it’s a long way down so I don’t think you’re going anywhere.”

  “Why don’t you show me what you brought to eat and then I’ll make up my mind if I’m staying or not?”

  Flirting. She was flirting with me. And I found it funny that I was blushing a little.

  Clearing my throat and the cobwebs of sadness from the moment, I reached over for the food bag. Unloading the containers, I presented her with one, and set a spoon on the soup container.

  “Mmmmm, paella?! This smells amazing. I’m so hungry.” She dug in, her plastic fork scooping up a clam and some rice.

  “Good to know your appetite is still the same ravenous beast as it was when we were seventeen.”

  We ate for a little bit, inhaling the exotic seafood dish. At one point, I picked up the soup, no longer able to resist it. When I put the first spoonful on my tongue, I sighed because the creamy lobster bisque was just as good as I’d remembered.

  “Give me some of that, you Soup Nazi!” Blake crooked an eyebrow at me.

  “Using Seinfeld jokes to insult will never hurt me, Sayer.”

  Instead of handing over the spoon and the container, and since we were on a date, I ladled up some soup and moved the spoon in front of her mouth. H
er sarcastic expression fell, and was replaced with shyness. I nudge forward, telling her to let herself be vulnerable without actually saying it.

  Blake opens the slightest bit, her tongue peeking out as I move the spoon past her lips. When the soup touches her tongue, she closes her eyes and makes a noise that radiates through me.

  I’m not just feeding her, which is an intimate act within itself. No … she’s trusting me, giving a small part of herself to me. My spine tingles with arousal, with the need to touch her, to do way more than feed her this soup.

  When she opens her eyes, I’m entranced by the blue flecks and gaze of desire.

  “You did that on purpose.” She breathes.

  “But it worked.”

  I put the soup aside slowly, never breaking our eye contact. We move at the exact same time, placing our hands on each other’s faces like they might disappear if we don’t hold them steady.

  My lips meet hers as the last rays of the sun kiss the landscape, and I’m lost in dusk and Blake. She’s everything I taste and the only scent on the planet. First love is an inevitable thing, it lives within your heart for eternity, bound to come back whenever its fire is stoked.

  And with that kiss, we’d solidified our fire, burning like grand flames on the beach in the summer. It’s more than the rushed, hectic encounter we had that night after the sick horse was taken to the hospital.

  It’s a promise, a flicker of hope. That a new era was coming and the tragedy of our past could stay exactly that, behind us.

  21

  Blake

  The sun rose with my mood, and I got dressed to the twinkling rays glowing across my floor.

  Even though I lived among the horses, it was still exciting to go hiking in the lands overlooking the bay. Donning a white long sleeve shirt, blue jeans, boots and a gray fleece parka, I grabbed a small backpack of supplies. When Carson had mentioned hiking together, I'd pulled my old pack from the closet. Water bottles, sunglasses, some granola bars, and other odds and ends littered around the bottom of the pack.