Page 53 of Moonflower
“Draw me like—”
“CORA GRIMM YOU SHUT YOUR FUCKING MOUTH RIGHT NOW.”
She burst into a fit of cackles, holding her stomach and kicking her legs.
“You think you’re so funny,” I grouse.
“I doooooo!”
Rolling my eyes, I settle back in my chair. “Hold a position or I’m not going to draw you.”
With a gasp, she settles down. “How much time do we have?”
“As much as we need. Wild understands.”
I sketch her form lightly, focusing on the shape of her body. The details will come later. Right now, I just want to get her general position down. There’s no way I’ll have the patience to finish the whole drawing this morning. But I can get enough down that I’ll be able to finish the rest later.
As her form appears on the paper, I say, “Tell me what you’ve been up to, Moonflower. I want to know what’s been going on in your life.”
“Not much, honestly,” she says. “School has taken up a lot of my time. Plus working as a nurse’s aide. But I like some of the people I work with, so that’s nice. Still tiring.”
I nod, silently urging her to continue.
“Making friends has been nice, though. Even if it took me a while to get a hang of it. Lil, Imani, and Brooke have been really supportive. They were all friends before, but I don’t feel like the odd one out, you know?”
“That’s good, Cora. I’m glad.”
Do I wish she would’ve relied on us for support? Of course. But I can’t change the past. All we have is right now and whatever our future holds.
“And you?” she asks quietly. She squirms, rubbing her thighs together. My pretty Moonflower is getting impatient.
Good. I want her soaked and desperate by the time I’m done with this drawing.
“You heard some of how I’ve been. But other than that, things are going okay. Mom and Dad are more supportive of me being an artist than they were originally.”
She grins. “That’s awesome.”
“Yeah. Now I just have to, you know, actually draw.”
Biting her lip, she nods. She doesn’t try to offer advice or solutions. She just listens as I continue talking about the projects I abandoned. Everything has been too much. Even now, I’m wondering if I’ll be able to finish this drawing when I come back to it another day. The inspiration will be gone, and it’ll probably pull me into a bad mood because she’ll be five hours away.
By the time I’m done talking, she looks worried, so I give her the best smile I can manage. “I’ll go to the doctor’s appointment, Cora. Even if I try not to, there’s no way Wild would let me miss it. And I’ll . . . I’ll talk to my doctor about getting on meds or something.”
She nods. “And I’ll always listen when you need me to, Ez.”
“I know.”
Once the general sketch is done, I can’t wait any longer. Cora’s naked body is too tempting, spread out on the bed and begging to be touched. Besides, I don’t want her to keep worrying about me. That’s not how today is supposed to go.
Abandoning my sketchbook and pencils, I crawl on top of her. I immediately regret not taking my clothes off first, but I’m not leaving her. So I kiss her, covering one of her breasts with my hand and squeezing.
“Not fair,” she protests, tugging at my shirt until I help her get it over my head. Then her hands run over my chest.
Cora has touched my bare chest plenty of times. We used to go swimming almost every day when we were kids, and Wild and I loved throwing her in the water. But this is different. Now, her touch burns, like she’s branding me and making me hers.
I have been for years.
One of her hands slips into my sweatpants and boxers. When her fingers wrap around my dick, I groan into her mouth. Never in a million years will I get enough of this. But somehow, I force myself to pull away.