by Mae, Amelia
“That’s nice,” she says softly.
Then she gets quiet again. As we drive through the narrow side streets, there aren’t any streetlights. And she remains quiet.
I can’t explain it, but there’s something about Jane going quiet that makes me feel like she’s fallen off the face of the earth.
“You’re quiet.”
“I’m always quiet,” she replies. “I’m a quiet person.”
“I don’t remember you being quiet. In fact, I remember you saying a lot of things.”
I’m trying to get her riled up. Fuck, I’ll settle for any reaction from her. This is the adult version of pulling her pigtails, and I’m not above it.
“Nasty, dirty things,” I taunt. “Mostly about how you wanted me to hold you down and fuck you harder.”
“Shut up,” she says, clearly uncomfortable. “I don’t want to talk about that night.”
“Well, too bad, Jane. I want to talk about it. I want to know what happened?”
“What?”
“I went to get us coffee from the place down the street and when I came back, the door was locked and you were gone,” I remind her.
“That’s not what happened,” she argues. “I woke up to an empty bed, figured that you had such an awful time with me that you couldn’t even bear the idea of the morning after goodbye, so you just snuck out like you were ashamed of yourself.”
“I was coming back, Jane. I went for coffee.”
“And how the fuck was I supposed to know that? I can’t read minds.”
“Are you serious?”
“I’m sorry, do I look like a psychic to you?” she spits out. “I get up and you’re gone. Am I really to assume that you took a detour on the way back to bed? I had no way of knowing that, Dylan. I…”
“I left a note,” I tell her sharply, cutting her off.
“You left a note?” she repeats.
“Yes.”
She contemplates this for a second.
“Where?”
“I don’t remember,” I confess. “Attached to your fridge, probably. Maybe on your counter. But I definitely didn’t leave without a goodbye.”
She’s quiet again.
“I didn’t mean to anyway.”
No response.
“You didn’t see it, I’m assuming,” I say softly.
“No,” she answers. “Maybe it fell under the fridge or something.”
“Maybe.”
We pass a few more buildings. A few more blocks.
“It’s that one,” Jane says, pointing at a small two-story building on a quiet street.
I nod. I’m still astounded that after all this time, I’m sitting here with Jane, looking at her little apartment. She’s been right here the whole time.
“Thanks for the ride,” she says.
“Anytime.”
“I guess we’ll be seeing a little more of each other. You know, because of Dean and Kelvin.”
“It’s possible. But I’m on the road a lot these days,” I tell her.
Jane looks antsy. And she still hasn’t gotten out of the car.
“Oh.” She sounds disappointed.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
“I’m sorry, Dylan,” she blurts out suddenly. “I’ve been mad at you for years over leaving without saying anything and then you say you left a note and sure, you could be lying, but I don’t think you’d do that. And now I’ve gone and had a panic attack in front of you and I just… I feel…”
She takes a deep breath.
“I feel more things than I’m comfortable feeling all at once,” she concludes.
“Yeah. Me too.”
She opens the door and starts to get out, but to my complete surprise, she turns back and asks, “Do you want to come in for a second?”
“Yes.”
5
Dylan
Jane waits at the curb while I park, and I follow her up the stairs to her place.
“You live alone?” I ask.
She nods. She opens the door to a one-bedroom apartment and I step inside.
Her living room makes me smile.
Everything in it, from her furniture and knickknacks to her artwork, is a little kitschy and a little shabby-chic. The space looks like someone did their absolute best to make a home out of bits and pieces of nothing. It’s definitely the home of an artsy, creative person and for whatever reason, I immediately feel comfortable here.
It’s a place crafted by someone who needs an escape from the chaos of the outside world. It’s completely Jane.
Her safe space. And she let me inside of it.
Somehow, I get the feeling that this doesn’t happen too often.
“Do you want something to drink?” she asks. “I have hard cider, some club soda, tea…”
“Just water, thank you.”
Her kitchen is just as sweet with photos in cheap wooden frames and lacy curtains over the sink. She fixes two glasses of ice water and hands one to me.
She’s back to quiet, but it’s not uncomfortable this time. Actually, it’s kind of nice. As someone who lives his life surrounded by noise and commotion and people, I rarely feel the way that I do right now. Like I can let out a breath that I didn’t realize that I was holding. Like I can just sink into her sofa and fade away for a minute. Like I don’t have to put on a show or impress anyone.
Or even talk.
Thankfully, Jane says something first.
“Dylan?” she asks. I hear the nervousness in her voice. “What do you think… Um…”
She blushes something fierce, and I know that her defenses are completely down.
“What do I think about what?” I ask.
“What do you think would have happened if you came back that morning with the coffee and…”
I don’t bother pointing out the I did come back with the coffee.
“Or I did find the note. You know…”
I chuckle. “I probably would have pushed for round two,” I tell her. “I love morning sex.”
She almost spits out her water.
“What?” I ask, feigning innocence. “It’s the best. You’ve already been sleeping together for hours. Naked. You’re still kind of in that sex haze from the night before…”
Jane takes a sip of her water and looks at the floor.
“You don’t agree?” I ask.
“I… I’m sure that’s lovely.”
I narrow my eyes. “You’ve never had morning sex?”
She shrugs. “Not really.”
“You’re missing out.”
“I’d never had a one-night stand before you,” she says.
“Really?”
She nods. “Before you there was only my ex-fiance, the one I followed here. Then no one. Then you. Then…”
“Then?”
Now she looks really embarrassed. Like, ashamed embarrassed. As opposed to a shy blush.
“Well, then there were a lot of guys,” she admits.
“Oh.”
I’m shocked. Jane doesn’t seem like the type to sleep around. I’m trying to keep the judgement off of my face, but it’s hard because I hate picturing Jane with anyone else. Especially some guy who would just sleep with her and then walked away like she was nothing special.
Which is probably how she felt after I left her that morning.
“Well…” she says.
“Well, what?”
“Say something, Dylan. You look like your head is spinning. You want to call me a slut or something?”
“Not at all,” I say. “That would be the pot judging the kettle.”
“Huh?”
“Jane, I’ve slept my way through Los Angeles. Maybe even most of the U.S...”
“I don’t want to hear that,” she says, cutting me off. “I don’t want to hear you brag about how many women you’ve slept with.”
“Oh, but you get to brag about your conquests?” I tease.
“They weren’t conquests,” she explains. “They were…
placeholders.”
“Placeholders for what?”
“I don’t know,” she says, thinking carefully. “Something more meaningful, I guess.”
I nod. I get that.
“Were yours… conquests?” she asks.
I laugh at my incredibly asinine choice of words there.
“They were just fun, mostly,” I tell her.
“How did you feel after?” she asks.
“What do you mean?”
“After these guys left, I didn’t like the way I’d feel. It was…”
“Empty?” I supply.
“Gross,” she says. “I’d feel gross.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I mean… no judgement,” she says quickly. “Most people sleep around. It’s just what they do. It’s normal.”
“It’s common,” I correct her, “and just because it’s common doesn’t mean it’s right for everyone.”
“Well, and then I just couldn’t do it anymore. I didn’t like how I felt about myself, so I just… stopped.”
“Stopped…”
“Stopped everything. Stopped dating. Stopped having sex,” she says. “Gave up trying to meet someone altogether.”
“Whoa.” I sigh out sharply. That sounds lonely. “How long has it been?”
“That’s kind of a personal question,” she points out.
“Jane, we passed personal ten questions ago.”
“Fine.” She looks at the floor again and kind of picks at her fingernails. “A little over four years.”
“Fuck.”
It’s out of my mouth before I can even control it, and I regret it immediately. Jane looks like she wants the earth to open up and swallow her whole.
“Yeah, talking about this was a complete mistake, Dylan. I’m so sorry,” she rambles. “Inviting you up here was a bad idea.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
“I don’t know what came over me,” she continues. “I think I’m just feeling really vulnerable right now, you know? I mean, I had a panic attack earlier and now I’m here with you and I don’t know why I’m telling you really personal things. We’re… practically strangers.”
“We have a history.”
“We had sex one time seven years ago,” she points out.
“It was more than one time,” I say, starting to get frustrated.
“But it was one night.”
“We both know that something real happened that night, Jane. It was more than just a one-night stand. I… I’ve never been able to really figure out why, but I’ve never forgotten about you.”
“Me neither,” she whispers, “and I really fucking tried.”
I don’t know what to say to her after that. It wasn’t intentional, but I caused her to hurt. To question her self-worth.
“I’m going to get another glass of water,” she says, standing.
I should leave. Get in my car, drive back to my apartment, and leave Jane to her peaceful life. Let her regroup and rebuild without me.
But instead, I close the distance between us and wrap my arms around her like I’ve been dying to do since I saw her in my living room. She lets out a shaky breath against my chest, and I tighten my grip on her.
I never forgot how perfectly Jane fit against me. How sweet she smelled.
“How about a do-over?” I ask softly.
“What?”
“A do-over of the night we met,” I explain, “but this time, you know I’m coming back with coffee in the morning.”
Jane laughs. “Dylan, I have a coffee maker.”
“Now you tell me.”
6
Jane
I force myself to look up at Dylan, into his ridiculously beautiful blue eyes.
I still can’t believe that he’s here, in my living room, with his arms around me, offering himself up on a silver platter for… whatever I want to do with him. Or to him. With a promise to stay the next morning.
And then what? We hook up, he stays the night, we have breakfast in the morning… and then what?
Well, probably the morning sex that Dylan is so fond of.
And I have to admit that waking up next to Dylan all warm and sleepy and wanting to be inside me first thing in the morning sounds… perfect.
But then what?
I open my mouth to speak, but I can’t make the words come out.
I kiss him instead.
And I guess I do it a little too eagerly because he makes a noise like I’ve caught him off guard and knocked the wind out of him.
“Ooh, sorry.”
Dylan doesn’t say anything. He takes my face in both of his hands, his rough palms on my cheeks, and stares down at me like he wants to consume me.
“Let me do this right, Jane.”
And he dives in and kisses me like he’s trying to erase the memory of every other kiss I’ve ever had. Like he’s trying to make me remember how it felt to kiss him the first time.
I lose myself in his kiss. And he keeps going.
He parts his lips, and I do the same, making room for his tongue. I make a surprised sound against his mouth as he picks me up and helps me get my legs around his waist.
Fuck. Dylan Cotter is hard for me.
I kiss him harder, sucking on his tongue and scraping my teeth against his lips. He groans and I do it more. I want him louder. Hungrier. I need to know that he wants me. So I do everything I can think of to fucking defile Dylan Cotter’s mouth.
“Damn, girl,” he hisses, “where did you learn to kiss like that?”
I want to say something sexy or witty, but I’m not that quick with my words, so I pull him back into another fiery kiss before I do something stupid. Like talk.
“Bedroom?” he pants.
I point down the hall and he manages to carry me to the bedroom and open the door while keeping his lips glued to mine. He practically throws me down onto the bed and climbs on top of me. I pull him down even more with my legs, grinding against him.
“You’re hard,” I point out. Sure, it’s obvious and maybe a little stupid, but I’m not in control of my mouth right now. I’d be embarrassed at how breathy my voice is, but I can’t process embarrassment.
Only want.
“Hard for you,” he groans, rolling his hips against mine for emphasis, letting me feel every last inch of him.
“Ugh, that’s going to feel good without clothes.”
I feel him smile against my mouth.
Then he shifts back to his heels and reaches behind himself to pull his tee shirt over his head with one hand in an effortless movement that leaves me face to face with his beautiful chest. I reach up and touch him. Because I just… have to.
I pull him down for more kissing. He strokes my sides as he guides my tank to up my body, and I try to keep myself from giggling because I’m disgustingly ticklish and I don’t want to ruin this by laughing like a lunatic.
He notices anyway and lets his fingertips trickle down my ribcage.
The noise I make is somewhere between a laugh and a moan.
“Love that,” he whispers. “Make that noise again.”
He doesn’t wait. He has his fingertips retrace their path across my body and I’m even louder this time.
“Oh, Jane, I’m going to see how loud I can make you,” he seethes.
Dylan slithers down my body and undoes the button on my jeans. Then the zipper. He kisses my stomach, and my breath hitches, becoming even more sharp and shallow as he dips his tongue into my belly button. He toys with the skin below, kissing, sucking and biting as he slips my jeans down over my ass and rucks them down my thighs.
“I’m going to see how wet I can make you,” he whispers.
“Ungh.”
It’s not sexy, but it’s what comes out.
He chucks my jeans to the ground and hovers over my panties, stopping to rest his chin on my pubic bone. I feel his exhale against my skin and it makes me shiver.
“God, Dylan,” I groan. My stomach muscles tighten. My head rolls
back.
“Open your eyes, Jane.”
I didn’t realize I’d closed them. But I look up to see Dylan with this hungry look on his face, and I feel like I might melt into the mattress. He’s breathing harder as he crawls up towards my face and drops his lips to mine, delivering quick, teasing kisses, pulling away quickly before diving back in for another. Driving me completely out of my mind.
“More,” I beg. Christ, my voice is raggedy.
Dylan looks like he’s trying not to laugh.
“Arms up over your head,” he orders. “Help me get this off.”
I wiggle out of my top and that too gets tossed to the floor. Dylan cups my tits through my bra and squeezes. He brings his mouth to the space between them and drops a kiss there. As he inhales, he drags his thumbs across my nipples and I let out a hissing sound that makes him raise an eyebrow.
“You like that.” It’s not a question.
I nod. “They’re, um… sensitive.”
I arch up a little so that he can undo my bra. He brings the straps down over my shoulders slowly and pulls it off, leaving me topless underneath him.
“Fuck,” he sighs, sucking in his bottom lip like he’s about to feast on something delicious. “Those are new.”
I will never truly understand what possessed me to pierce my nipples. I think that I just saw a picture of a woman with them done and decided to go for it. I probably don’t seem like the type to do something like that, which is kind of why I’m so proud of my secret little piercings. Then again, I’m sporting an entire arm of tattoos, so…
Dylan touches the metal stud and my nipple hardens instantly.
I whimper. My eyes start to close, but I force them open.
He does it again. And again. He slides the little bar back and forth.
“You… you like them?” I pant.
He grins like a kid on Christmas morning. “When did you do this?”
He doesn’t stop playing with them and, oh my God, it feels good.
“Year ago, maybe,” I grit out.
“Fuck,” he groans. “I want my mouth on these. Right fucking now.”
He takes my right nipple into his mouth and swirls his tongue around the bud, sucking the metal, and grazing it with his teeth.
“Am I the first guy who’s ever done this?” he asks.