I gasp as he slides his middle and forefinger within me, deeper, pushing back.

It feels so good being in his arms and having the water move against our bodies as I force my tongue into his mouth.

In this moment, we’re lost in one another, leaving behind the rest of the world. In the back of my mind, some part of me keeps calling out to remind me about Ty, yet a greater part of me is just consumed with lust and greed like it was when I kept teasing Eric, pushing, urging, insisting.

I knew what I was fucking doing all along, and I could tell with every response, every gaze, every time he submitted, that despite how much we resisted, we would eventually give in to our desires. Once we did, that pent-up tension, that feeling that we had to push away, pull apart, dissolved as we just grabbed at each other’s bodies.

As he makes his way farther inside me, I find myself moaning.

“I want to make you feel so good,” he says.

“Show me how good I can feel.”

As our lips lock once again, a powerful sensation ripples through me.

He caresses up and down my back with his free hand as he continues pushing with his other into me. With a subtle movement, I feel him sweep across some sensitive spot briefly, but then he moves his fingers back to it. He massages ever-so-gently, and a rush sweeps through my body and travels up my spine. Soon, the sensation radiates through my entire body, pricking at my flesh.

My dick is painfully hard, and the intensity of the eruption of energy within forces me to gasp out loud.

“Holy shit…is that—”

“Yes,” he says, his breath against my face. He growls softly as he continues stimulating me.

“God, how do you know where it’s at?”

“It feels softer…tenderer. This is where experience really comes in handy.”

Experience. That’s what I love about him. He has that experience. Whatever we do, he won’t be fumbling around, confused the way I was when I first started hooking up with girls. If he fucks me, he could do it like a pro. He could show me exactly what makes fucking a guy so incredible. I can tell by this sizzling-hot chemistry between us in this moment that he could take me to places I’ve never been before, open me up to a whole new array of sensations.

His lips are against mine in no time before something catches his attention. He turns away, and the pressure on that spot within me dissolves as his fingers pull back.

I follow his line of sight and spot some people—a wife and husband and two kids, carrying picnic gear. They make their way onto the otherwise empty beach.

Eric slides out of me swiftly and pulls away.

I’m on edge, unnerved even. Not at Eric. I understand why he had to do that, but this feeling of disappointment courses through my body. I’m so fucking pissed we had to stop.

As his gaze wanders, shifting around the water like he doesn’t want to make eye contact with me, I know it’s because he feels guilty for what we shared, and he’s thinking about what that means for himself, for his son.

It reminds me of how selfish I’ve been this whole trip. I’ve been pushing and encouraging something we both should know better than to pursue, but the guilty feeling within me isn’t worse than the emptiness I feel for having been stripped of something that felt so delicious and intoxicating while it was happening.

Eric keeps quiet and swims away from me, to the shore.

The longer I’m away from his body, the easier it is for me to come to my senses, to see all those logical reasons why I’m the worst best friend in the fucking world.

An awkwardness lingers between us as we make our way ashore while the family sets up their picnic on the other side of the beach. We don’t chat or exchange eye contact. It isn’t right, because I feel like after what happened in the water, we should be sharing so much more. But shortly after, he suggests we head back to the condo. When we get into the cab, I’m lost in a sea of confusing thoughts. Reminding myself of the facts or issues that stand in the way of me and Eric doesn’t keep me from wanting him. He stirred my initial curiosity, and now that he’s touched upon an answer to a lingering question—about how it would feel—I can’t let this go.

It was so much better than I could’ve imagined, than anything in my research could’ve let me know. I had to experience the way pleasure could move through me, consume me, to really understand what Eric had the power to unlock within me, but now it’s over. If ever there was an opportunity for the two of us to act on what we’re feeling, that was it. Now we’ll go back to the condo, and I’ll spend the rest of the vacation with Ty. We’ll spend our days at the beach and our nights hanging at the bars, me hanging in suspense, fantasizing about the pleasure Eric could have brought me. But instead of pleasure, there will just be more awkwardness between us.

We’ll both know what we felt, but never be able to act upon it.

I’ll go home, filled with this curiosity, this emptiness.

I’ll get over it in time, I know, but I’ll never be the same. I’ll have to try this out with someone else to at least figure out if maybe I’m much more attracted to men than I ever considered. But I feel bad for the poor guy I’ll try it out with, because no matter how good he is, I’ll be wishing he was Eric.

We enter Eric’s condo some time later, and we still haven’t spoken to one another. The silence grates on my nerves since it feels like we have so much to talk about, and at the same time, like the only conversation worth having was finished before it really ever got started.

As I walk into the living area, I can hear Ty in the master bedroom, fussing with what I assume is one of his coworkers on the phone. He sounds frustrated, so I’m guessing he wasn’t able to easily resolve whatever issue had popped up for him with work.

I turn toward Eric, who sets his backpack down by the kitchen island, and for the first time since he pulled his gaze away from me at the beach, he makes direct eye contact. I wonder if he’s worried about me saying something to Ty, about me doing something to fuck up their relationship even more than it already is.

“You know I would never say anything to him about that,” I tell him, because as pissed as I am that we can’t share more, I feel I owe that to him, that what we did was sacred, that I would never hurt him that way.

His gaze lowers to the floor, and he mutters in a deep, guttural voice, “Thank you.”

As appreciative as I am, I can’t help but imagine him using that same tone in a more intimate moment while he’s tearing my clothes off, ready to show me exactly how good it can feel, exactly how good he can make me feel.

His gaze returns to mine, and I detect disappointment in his expression.

There’s a sadness between us as we both seem to acknowledge that this silent communication might be the most intimate moment we’re able to share for the rest of the time we’re around one another.

“It felt…like heaven,” I blurt out softly, because at the very least, no matter what can’t happen between us, I want him to know that much.

His lips curl upward. It’s the subtlest of smiles, but it’s enough for me.

He finally pulls his gaze away once again and heads around me to the guest bedroom.

As he closes the door behind him, the emptiness he left my body with…me with…feels overwhelming.