The Fear of Falling

by Amanda Cowen

  The living room is empty and dark. The dining table is littered with empty beer bottles and wine glasses, with lipstick stains on the rim. My eyes scan the kitchen island and see dirty plates and empty pizza boxes. The porch light is still on outside the back deck, illuminating the hot tub and night sky. I slide open the patio doors and hear a thunk.

  What the-?

  I step outside to see Ryan, slouched on a patio chair, tossing rocks into a planter a few feet away. At first I think I’m seeing things, until he glances over at me, his dark brown eyes connecting with mine. There’s an energy zooming through my body, and I think it’s the relief of knowing he’s still here.

  “Ryan?”

  “Hey,” he breathes, sitting up straight.

  “What are you doing out here?” I walk toward him.

  He hums and looks up at me.

  “What?”

  “I could ask you the same question.”

  “Except I asked you first,” I sit down on the empty chair next to him. “I thought I heard you leave with Tiffany.”

  “Nah. She left with Sophia and Kale.” He tosses another rock toward the empty planter and sinks it.

  “And you didn’t want to go with them?”

  “Nope.”

  “She still seems pretty into you,” I suggest.

  “Where’s Liam?” he exhales, keeping his eyes focused in the distance. I’m reminded again of how nosy he is, and how he manages to turn conversations in his favor without me realizing he’s doing it. Not this time though. I’m completely aware of it.

  “Sleeping,” I tell him.

  “And yet you’re wide awake.”

  “It’s not his fault I couldn’t sleep,” I say.

  Ryan looks away from me. One look at him and I feel like I’m losing my mind – and I’m not even bothering with denial. Being near Ryan – even when he’s being a complete wiseass – obliterates any other worry I could possibly have, and sitting with him alone on the deck like this makes me lose all coherent thought. I can smell his familiar scent of sandalwood shampoo and soap. And something inside me flips a switch. A switch that tells me this – being with Ryan - is what I want. It terrifies me to no end.

  “Ryan— “I start, but stop myself. We stare at each other in the muted light of the single bulb above the patio doors, the energy between us only becoming more electric. It’s probably best that I go before I do or say something I may regret. “I should go back inside. Get some sleep,” I say, standing up.

  “Ella, wait,” he scratches his jaw, then tilts his chin up at me. “Sit with me.”

  My stomach flips. “It’s late—”

  “Stay,” he interrupts in a tight whisper. “Please.”

  I close my eyes. Hearing him ask me to stay is half of what I’ve wanted him to say, and half of what I was most afraid to hear. I feel his fingers weave between mine, and my heart races as I look back at him. When I sit back down, for a moment I think he’s going to kiss me. For another moment, I want him to. I lean back into my chair just to give us both a little space.

  “How was the movie?” His question hangs in the air. I know he’s prying again.

  I glare at him. “I know what you’re doing.”

  “What?” he asks, contrived innocence on his face.

  “You are desperate for details.”

  “Can you blame me?” he laughs. “The entire time I was in Australia, Liam had zero game with the ladies. I’m just surprised that you, of all people, are enjoying the whole ‘heart on his sleeve’ vibe he gives off. I’m just wondering how he’s making out.”

  “Maybe you should ask him, then.”

  His eyes locked with mine. “Do you actually like him?”

  “Well, yeah. He’s attractive and nice…” My voice trails off. I really hate that I’ve let myself get into this conversation with Ryan. “Now do me a favor and explain to me why you care.”

  “Because…” He scratches the back of his head, and takes a deep breath before his words pour out in a breathless tumble. “Because I don’t want you fucking Liam, okay?” And from the slight shake of his voice, I can tell he’s not kidding.

  Of all the asinine chauvinistic – who in the hell does he think he is?

  “Jesus, Ryan. How dare you even think you can tell me what to do?” I groan. “This has to stop.”

  “You’re right,” he sternly says. “You and Liam have to stop.”

  I tear my eyes from his and look down at my bare feet on the deck, letting the heavy drumming of my heart take over my senses for a second. “No. This has to stop,” I say, quickly pointing to him and myself. “You’ve been pulling some weird bullshit lately. Why are you letting a little sex we had months ago complicate our friendship?” He doesn’t say anything, but his lips form a sly smile. “You really need to stop confusing our awesome friendship with weird sexual feelings.”

  “I wouldn’t define the way you screamed my name ‘weird’.” His eyes are aflame with amusement, and his words tumble out again, but this time in a long and animated string.

  Why is he doing this? Why is he trying to ruin our friendship? At least I have the decency to swallow my feelings and attempt to walk away.

  “I’m going back to bed.” I stand up again, this time with purpose.

  “Listen, I don’t know what to say to you, or how to say it,” he says in a shaky voice. I turn around, only to be drawn into his anxious and conflicted eyes. “I’m perfectly aware Tiffany wants to fuck me. And I have no idea why I stayed behind. Or why I feel this hammering in my chest whenever Liam touches you. But what I do know is I don’t want you fucking anyone else.”

  “You need to stop creating something out of nothing,” I say, breathless.

  He takes two steps toward me, pressing the length of his body so close to mine I can touch him.

  “So you’re okay with me going to Tiffany’s hotel room to fuck her tonight?” he whispers against my lips. “Would that mean nothing to you?”

  I swallow hard, unable to look at him. “Imagining you with her makes me sick.”

  He smirks and slips his hands around my waist. “Okay. If that’s how you feel, let’s agree to not fuck other people.”

  I laugh nervously. “Oh, I see. Because I feel that way, we shouldn’t fuck other people.”

  He tilts his head and smiles shamelessly. My insides immediately turn to mush. “Ella,” he whispers, slipping a hand between us to slide a palm up my shirt. His simple touch causes a wave of warmth to spread through my bloodstream. “We shouldn’t. We should just fuck each other.”

  My chest squeezes at the earnest vulnerability in his whispers. I sharply inhale before pulling away. “That’s a terrible idea. Friends with benefits never works. Look at us,” I say, waving a hand between us to further prove my point. “And we’ve only slept together twice.” He watches me, that smirk still on his face as I continue to ramble. “Imagine what kind of damage a third, fourth, or even fifth time would do. We could end up hating each other and lose every shred of our friendship. I don’t want to complicate things anymore than we already have.”

  I thought my speech would make me feel better, but it doesn’t. It actually makes me feel worse, like I am trying to convince myself of something I have no control over.

  This pull between us is consuming every jagged breath I take, and I know he feels it too. He takes two steps closer, his eyes sweeping over my face. I want to take two steps back, but I can’t. I’m frozen in place.

  “You know how I know we aren’t a terrible idea?” he whispers. “Because all the things I want to hate about you, I don’t,” he says, his voice low. He sweeps a thumb over my lips, his eyes blazing into mine. My heart comes alive under his touch.

  “What are you talking about?” I nervously laugh again, as he presses into me. “All the more reason to remain friends and stop complicating things with feelings.”

  “You know what I really hate?” he asks, ignoring me. I take another sharp breath as his hands slide up and over
my chest, around my shoulders and higher, cupping my neck. “You talk with your mouth full all the time. If someone ask you a question, just swallow your food first before you answer.” There’s that smile of his again. “Is it really that hard?”

  Okay, so that’s how it’s going to play out. Fine by me. I can give it back to him just as hard and he knows it. A warmth spreads through me and it turns almost immediately to a hunger so hot, my legs grow weak.

  “Oh, yeah? Well, I hate your stupid love for Star Wars,” I tell him, my voice shaking. “It’s so cliché. And that ugly t-shirt you own with Yoda on it.” I clear my throat and give my best Yoda impression. “Wrong to dress like a twelve-year-old boy, is it when you are an adult. Hmmmmmmm.”

  He stares at me fiercely. Both of us are breathing heavily. Normally, he would burst into laughter at my Yoda impression, but this time he doesn’t. His eyes move up my body, darkening as they travel. My heart begins to pound. When he looks at me like that, I want to push him back onto the chair, slip onto his lap, and kiss him.

  “And I’d lose my mind if I had to fall asleep to your teeth-grinding every night,” he whispers against my ear. “It’s like a sander on metal all night long. Get a mouth guard already.”

  I tilt my head upward to meet his eyes. “I hate how you never wash a damn dish. If you use a dish, clean it. It isn’t going to wash itself.”

  He gives me a devilish half-smile then steers me to my right, walking me backward around the corner of the house. He stops only a few steps before it, cupping my face. “Oh, yeah? Your knees are still chubby,” he says.

  “Oh no, you didn’t.” I eye him suspiciously until I see an impish flicker on his lips. My chest squeezes, knowing he’s still playing with me, challenging me the way only he can.

  His lips are now barely brushing mine. “Yeah, I did…” He looks down at me from under the heavy fall of his hair over his brow, then tilts my head back, his hand on my jaw. “…Bestie.”

  Silence stretches before us, the sound of waves crashing against the sand and the outside world barely registering my consciousness.

  “Oh yeah? You have no idea what else this tongue can do,” I whisper. “And now, you never will.”

  I push away from him slightly, but he doesn’t let me get away that easily. He braces his hands against the brick wall, trapping me.

  “We’ll see about that.”

  He pulls me into him and kisses me, one palm pressed against the small of my back and the other, twisted up into my hair. He starts slow, almost uncertain if I will kiss him back, teasing my lips until I give into him, my tongue slipping inside and curling over his.

  Growling into my mouth, he deepens the kiss and pushes me forcefully against the wall. He reaches up and removes the elastic from my hair. Our kisses are erratic, then rough, coming together and pulling apart, hands grabbing each other’s hair and tongues sliding against each other. I gasp as he bends his knees slightly and slides a hand under the waistband of my pajama shorts.

  “Ryan,” I moan, wrapping a leg around him and digging my heel into his thigh.

  “Ella,” he exhales heavily into my mouth. Looking down at my leg and cupping my ass with his hand, he gives it a rough squeeze. “You have no fucking idea how much I want you. I can’t stand not being inside you.”

  I look at him, willing rational thought to penetrate my clouded brain. Am I really about to have sex with Ryan for a third time? Is this what I want? Can I just let him have my body like this again and hope nothing changes between us in the morning? I am so overwhelmed, I am trembling. Rational thought is quickly abandoning me as I feel his hand run up my neck and into my hair.

  I stare into his eyes, pull him into me by his shirt, and slide my tongue into his mouth, groaning as his palm presses against me. My decision is made, and once again I find myself lost in Ryan as we stumble into an enclosed gazebo surrounding the hot tub.

  Our kisses grow longer and deeper, gaining urgency with every inch of skin covered. He lifts my t-shirt over my head and tugs my shorts down, kicking them off to the side. I pull at his shirt and yank down his shorts to explore the smooth skin over his ribs, the sharp definition of muscle at his hips, and the soft trail of hair urging me down to his navel and lower.

  Without another word, he slides his fingers inside me and kisses me along my neck, only adding to the pleasure. I am lost to everything but him and these: the feel of the air against my skin, his ragged breathing, the heat of his kisses, and the thought of everything waiting for us outside the gazebo doors. I lose sight of the morning yet to come, short of the consequences we will face. Everything slips away until there is nothing left but the lowly beating of our hearts.

  Chapter 16

  I wake up to the shifting of a swing and the sound of squeaky rings as Ryan climbs out of the hammock.

  Dim sunlight filters through the windows of the gazebo enclosure. My eyes blink open, trying to make out the shape of the objects near us - the doorway, the hot tub, his silhouette gathering his clothes off a nearby bench. My heart seizes. The gazebo smells of sex. Ryan and I can feel myself growing dizzy from it, from his proximity and the memory of him inside me all night long. My arms, legs, and stomach are weak at the sight of him. Our night together comes crashing back in waves. My muscles feel like rubber, my body heavy and wanting to sink back into the hammock. There is a deep, unfamiliar ache between my legs, and I stretch, squeezing my thighs together to feel it again, to know I’m not dreaming.

  What exactly do we do now? Do we pretend like nothing happened? Do we confess what we’ve done to our friends? Do we talk about what this means? How does this work? Because I’m pretty sure that if I sleep with him once, it’s a mistake. Sleep with him twice, that’s drunk sex. Sleep with him a third time, it’s intentional. And the worst part is we didn’t just have sex once last night and part ways. We had multiple rounds, had orgasm after orgasm until our legs gave out, followed by cuddles, pillow talk, and drifting off asleep together.

  Even without looking at a clock, I can tell it’s still very early in the morning. The ocean is calm. Birds are chirping. The air is fresh and cool. I watch Ryan as he slides on his t-shirt, retrieves his shorts, and attempts to lace through his belt. His hair is in a sexier disarray than usual.

  When he catches me staring, he kisses my palm and collarbone, then rests his forehead against mine. He leans away and we stare at each other quietly for a few moments.

  “Are we really doing this?” he asks, his smile causing the dimple on his cheek to appear.

  “Doing what?” I ask, even though I know exactly what this means. I just want him to be the one to say it again.

  “Have awesome sex with each other,” he whispers, his lips ghosting along my neck. “I thought we agreed to have the best of both worlds last night.” He runs his hands under my pants and presses his palm between the damp lace between my legs. “Friendship and sex.”

  I pause and feel goosebumps rise along my skin. Okay, I may have agreed to that idea during pillow talk. My eyes close and I let out a low moan as his fingers move slow circles and tease along the edge of my panties.

  “Well, Ryan,” I say, my breath warm against his hair. “Monogamous sex with someone you enjoy spending time with sounds a lot like a relationship.”

  “Not if we both agree we don’t make it one.” His fingertips move up my arm and slide onto the back of my neck, holding me still. “We can just have a little fun, can’t we?”

  I felt a lot of things last night, mostly in the lower half of my body, which clearly clouded my judgment. But now, sitting here, feeling things on the upper half of my body – like my head – I think that even though our sex is, hands down, the best sex I’ve ever had, the risk to our friendship is too great to realistically keep this up.

  I let out a shaky laugh, and I push him back a fraction. “I feel like I need to be the realist here and remind us both a little fun could ruin everything.”

  He tucks my hair back behind my ear and presses his mou
th to mine. I hesitate weakly against his lips before giving in to him slowly. My body gives up fighting, and I can’t get close enough.

  He pulls away slowly from our kiss, and our eyes lock. “We’ve done it before – had sex and remained friends.” He runs his lips down and across my collarbone to my shoulder. “What could go wrong?”

  “You're clearly going to fall in love with me,” I joked, but my voice was still shaky.

  “Oh, really?” He smiles, his eyes twinkling with amusement. “Then how about if one of us feels something more, we stop?”

  A long moment passes before my eyes meet his.

  “Well, it won't be me,” I tell him.

  “It won't be me either.” He looks at me so calmly, with no emotion visible in his features. “But you need to end things with Liam.”

  I hold his gaze for a moment before I answer. “Once again, you asking me not to see Liam anymore sounds a lot like a relationship.”

  “I’m not seeing anybody,” he says sensibly, his brows furrowing. “It’s only fair you aren’t, either.”

  The gazebo is suddenly too small. We glance at each other in an uncomfortable silence.

  I’m thinking this is a huge mistake.

  Then again, memories of last night remind how in tune my body is with Ryan’s body. Our sex is like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. It’s not just sex. It’s intimate and raw, and I’ve never been so sexually aware or in sync with someone. And don’t even get me going on how his lips feel on mine. The electricity when our mouths collide sets my heart on fire.

  But when I hear him demand that I end things with Liam, him not wanting to commit to something more than sex with me somehow seems unfair. Like I’m just a sex toy for him to pass the time with until someone better comes along. Like a Tiffany, or an Alodie.

  “Listen, you can have more fun hooking up with me than you could ever have with Thor,” he says, stating his case. “But I don’t want you fucking him too when you’re with me. Just the thought of him touching you…” He takes a deep breath. “I don’t think that’s too much to ask. Now give me your word, or say goodbye to my anaconda.”