Page 95 of Chaos
Her eyes search mine, yellower than usual in the morning light. “I feel like there’s something bothering you.”
I set the painting down on the side table on top of a stack of books about carrier pigeons and military strategy, and take a deep breath, preparing to tell her. She’s going to be sad, and mad, and she’s going to argue. But I have to go, and she can’t leave Sheila.
“Is it about the sex?” she asks.
“Huh?”
“Is that why you’re being weird? Because I keep … waking you up. Or because it’s been different? Rougher? I just … I think I’m angry.”
I brace myself. “At me?” I’d get it if she blames me for not finding her sooner.
“No. Not at you.” She sets the boots carefully down on the floor by the bed, and snuggles back under the covers against me. “When it’s quiet, memories of … Scraggle and Ben take over. And I … sometimes I use sex to work through them.”
That makes sense. After Sochi, I ran. A lot. In three or four months, I lost thirty pounds to cardio. It was compulsive.
“You could have told me.”
“I didn’t want to trap you in that hell with me.”
“I’d rather be with you in hell than have you there alone.” I look down at the same time she looks up, and her nose, chilly from the cold air, slides along mine, with a rush of face cream and girl shampoo smell. “Does it happen when we talk?”
“No.”
“Then we could talk?”
“Like sex talk?” she asks teasingly, and her lips, as they touch mine, are so soft. All of her is. The opposite of me. Round where I’m hard, and smooth where I’m not.
She curls her tongue along my upper lip, delicate fingers sliding up my chest, the taste of her, long johns so thin under my fingers they’re barely even there—it’s potent, heady as a drug.
The need to be inside her hits so badly it’s an ache somewhere between my throat and my balls.
I’ve never wanted anyone like I want her.
I was indifferent before the plague. People flickered in and out of my life, commercials for something I didn’t want or need.
But now …
I’m supposed to be talking. Sex talking. What do you say during sex?
“I like these pajamas,” I decide to start with that. “I’ve been wanting to peel them off you all morning.”
Very slowly, I roll her onto her back, sliding a knee between hers, unhook a button, both of us breathing hard as wafts of cold air swirl under the covers as I get to the bottom one.
Her breasts are heavier than I remember, fuller in my palm.
Her hips rise up.
“So pretty. So fucking pretty.” I whisper into her skin. She hasn’t let me do this since we got back, and I’m half afraid she’ll stop me any second. I don’t want to make any sudden moves as I trace my lips down her neck to her shoulder, lower to her breast. “You’re doing so good. So beautiful.”
Her hips rise up as my hand slips lower, down below the final button, between her thighs.
“You’re everything I need.” I scoot lower, taking her breast in my mouth.
“Wait,” she whispers. Her hands press into my shoulders and bat up and down slightly. “Wait.”
“What?” I force my eyelids open.
“Wait, wait, wait.” She yanks the gaping neck of her long johns over her breasts. “Stop.”