Jack didn’t have to ask me to stay over that night; I wanted to do it and sensed his own desire without a word having been spoken. Ava went to her room to change clothes, ashamed of the dirt and tear stains on her shirt despite our assurances that we didn’t care.

When she re-emerged, we sat together on the couch and watched a nature documentary, the easy proximity of our bodies all the more valuable for having nearly lost our bonds in the morning. Ava didn’t want to talk about it, but I knew something had changed in Jack.

From the moment when he’d arrived on my doorstep, I could see that he’d realized he’d been pushing me away. Sure, I’d been frustrated with him before Christmas, but seeing him with all hope lost was an experience I wouldn’t soon forget.

So I was glad to be close to him, whatever our differences had been days earlier. In the harsh, blinding light of today’s panic, we’d seen we needed each other.

I was happy with Jack, really and deeply comfortable.

He relaxed into Ava’s return, though I could still see caution in his eyes whenever she got up from the couch to go to the bathroom or to find a snack. Once we got hungry enough, Jack ordered an excessive amount of pizza and continued the television binge with blankets piled high. Ava fell asleep in Jack’s arms, a sight that warmed the deepest recesses of my heart.

He carried her to her bedroom with the ginger touch of someone in complete awe of their love. Ava’s eyelashes were so dark against her skin, her breath rising and falling gently, almost imperceptibly. I watched the two of them go with a smile on my face, and when Jack came into the living room after tucking her in, I was floored by the emotions in my chest.

Jack was so good to her. He was so tortured, yes, but he was also good to me. And what’s more, I wanted to be with him. Not as neighbors, not as fuck buddies, not even as tentative lovers with a burgeoning relationship.

I loved him, and I wanted to be with him seriously. He must have noticed the passion in my eyes because he gestured a shushing, quiet finger to his lips and then grinned at me conspiratorially. With little warning, he scooped me up in his arms and carried me to the bedroom, staring deeply into my eyes with a hunger that set my body aflame.

“I’m sorry,” he said to me in a hushed voice after he put me down on the pillowy bed. “I don’t want to talk right now, even though I’m sure we could use it, that I could use it after the hell of a day we just had. I want you too badly to focus on anything other than how I’m going to fuck you right now.”

If I hadn’t already been entranced by his eye contact, the intensity of his gaze now would have left me smouldering. It was boring into me, electrifying each and every square inch of my skin with goosebumps of anticipation. And his words, god, his words were like a potion I drank in with a thirst I hadn’t known I could quench.

Maybe I couldn’t.

But I’d try, desperately, passionately, to slake it with Jack. As he waited for me to respond, I stroked the length of his back, from the tight and corded muscles in his upper shoulders down to the sensuous curve of his ass. The way he was formed shouldn’t have been allowed in human men. I wouldn’t have been surprised if someone told me he was a god, incarnate.

“That’s fine by me,” I whispered, hearing the lust in my voice as clear as day. I’m sure Jack did too, based on the lowering of his eyelids and smirk that spread on his face while he listened. “We have all the time in the world. Talk can come later.”

“You’re right,” he answered, “Talk can come later, but you should come first.”

And with that innuendo he dipped his head to my shoulder, biting at the flimsy material of my shirt to expose delicate skin. Soon, he was rubbing his broad palms over my body, stirring desires that responded eagerly to his touch. The want, the need I felt at his proximity was overpowering.

Jack was so solid, so lithe in his actions despite his size, that he felt like a fantasy come to life. I knew that what fuelled his touch was more than just lust now, as surely as I could tell that my own feelings had clarified themselves today. While we were kissing like we were teenagers hellbent on making the most of a quiet moment alone, we also channeled an intensity of emotion into each gesture that went far beyond the physical.

With each kiss on my lips, my neck, I felt Jack’s tenderness. As his hands roved along my body, I could sense the craving he had for my company, my emotional support. Though not quite a need, it was certainly more than just our baser instincts. We gravitated towards each other endlessly, spinning through a world of feelings while we touched.

Jack slipped my pants off, lingering over my inner thigh so that his beard teased my sensitive skin. He raised one of my legs up, running his hand down my shin and following it with kisses. My nerves hadn’t felt so alive in what seemed like eons, the intensity of the experience heightened by the danger of the morning.

We were reunited in some way, reconnected with stronger bonds. I wanted him to always be touching me, always with his warm breath tingling against me. Jack’s eyes shimmered with a lust that I felt inside myself, too, the twin of his own longing. And his jeans were strained with the hardness that seemed to keep growing, almost impossibly large.

“I missed you,” I murmured, not meaning it in quite the sense it sounded. To be honest, I was referring to his cock, though the words could have doubled for a representation of my emotions too. With my right hand, I stroked a pathway up the inner line of Jack’s jeans, making my way to that formidable bulge with eagerness that made me feel like it was my own Christmas morning.

He was my present, ready to be unwrapped.

Jack’s eyes fell shut and he groaned while I touched him through the thick fabric, and he leaned his pelvis into the contact to feel it all the more readily. When he reopened his eyelids, we were locked in a gaze that shortened my breath even more.

He was so beautiful, so stormily, passionately radiant. From his thick, dark hair all the way down to the strength and width of his thighs, I loved the very picture of him. It was almost too good to interrupt.

Almost.

I couldn’t help the gasp that escaped me when Jack’s fingers met my bare skin, tracing delicate rivers up my thighs to the thin fabric of my underwear. He pulled them aside gently, bringing me into the open so that he could touch me, a light butterfly contact that shimmered along my body from where his fingers lay.

I took his other hand and kissed each finger, in awe of the sheer pleasure of even that simple action. When he moved his fingers with more rhythm, I gasped again and took a finger from his free hand into my mouth, tasting the lightly salty flavour of his skin. He met my gasp with a groan, dipping his head down and kissing me briefly, shatteringly delicately.

My hips rolled against my will, desperate to make him kiss me more, lick me until I came beneath him. But he had other plans.

Jack pulled me by my hands, sitting me up in front of him. We both worked to remove my shirt and bra, leaving me unencumbered and ready for his attention. I felt my nipples tingling as they were exposed, firming up to the air outside my clothing. Jack palmed one of my breasts with an expression of adoration on his face.

“Perfect,” he murmured.

On most days, I would have argued with him, deflected the compliment in some way because my self-esteem was still recovering. Today, though, I felt different. Grounded. I let his admiration wash over me, warm me and help me feel loved.

I could love myself, too. As well as him.

It shouldn’t have felt like such a revelation, but sometimes we have to take what we can when we can. And I was ready to feel good about myself. Finally, after so much anxiety, so much doubt in the face of divorce and breakdown, I felt acceptance. My own light shining from somewhere deep within, stoked by Jack but also by its own forces.

“Thank you,” I said, feeling bold to accept the compliment verbally with no equivocation. He smiled in response, somehow knowing that it was a big deal to me. I was glad.

Our smiles joined each other as we kissed, drawing closer, bodies eager to be at one. I laced my arms around Jack’s neck and eased myself onto him, sitting face to face so that we were intimately connected, every breath, every movement visible.

He breathed a warm, appreciative moan, his hips meeting mine in a gentle rhythm that stirred pleasure deep within me.

This was what we could be. This was how our bodies could make us feel, soaring above the daily concerns of our lives, frozen in some blissful place where we could be at ease, be happy, know that we were loved.

It could have been one minute or twenty that we moved like that, kissing and dancing together in the trance of our happiness. Jack’s face was close to mine, his eyes a shiny blue that glowed brighter than I’d ever seen his eyes, cheeks flushed from the pleasure of our movements. His tongue swirled in my mouth while he thrust inside me, pulling me closer to his chest with those welcome palms of his.

In a daze of absolute bliss, I felt my back arch and I came, head tossed behind me and mouth gasping for air. Jack held me, kissed my neck, guiding me through the intensity of feeling as if he wanted to support my every last twitch and moan. He was there for me.

When I found myself back in my body, descending from the peak of a dazzling sensation, Jack’s eyes were dark with lust. He moved inside me like he wanted me to come again, but my body was spent, happy to relish in the motion. I smiled at him, feeling yet again the spark of our connection when our eyes met. I hesitated for a second, biting my lip.

I was slightly dizzy from how much I was enjoying myself, Jack’s hands on my back warm and comforting. I felt safe. Peaceful.

This was perfection.

Soon after, Jack’s body made its way into his own climax, biceps taut as he gripped my shoulders, helping me move up and down in his lap. His hand found the back of my neck and cradled me, pulling me in for a kiss just before he burst. It was earth-shattering, the twitch and halting breath intoxicating to me like nothing else on this earth.

He came within me, our bodies so linked that each breath we took was in sync, each touch a connection that felt permanent. The sweat lightly beading on Jack’s forehead was met by my own dewy flush, and we panted in the aftermath, happier than we’d ever been.

And that was just the start of our life together. I knew that I wanted more, hoped that he did too. I kissed his firm lips and stroked my hand down the side of his cheek, never breaking the moment by looking away from his shatteringly blue eyes.

“Jack, I love you,” I said. The hammering of my heart in my chest at that point could have broken a rib. It seemed impossible, a pace that would lead to ruin if I didn’t voice my feelings.

The effect on Jack’s face was worth it. His eyes widened, the pupils softly dilated in those azure irises ringed with deep, dark lashes. The lines around his eyes tightened as he smiled, blinking rapidly as if shocked.

Maybe he was.

But he shouldn’t have been surprised. I’d told him already, and besides, it was as clear as the fresh new snow that began falling that evening, dusting the landscape. He inhaled slowly, bit his lip, and answered me.

“I love you too, Charlotte. You…”

He paused, his voice contorted with some choked emotion. I tried to ignore the watering at his eyes, because he was plainly embarrassed by the intensity of his reaction. Jack soldiered through the wavering of his voice, picking up the thread he left off.

“You saved me,” he said.

Stunned by his sincerity, I did the only thing I could think to do: kiss him and draw him in even closer, my arms squeezing with the feeling I wished to convey.

How could I? It was all too much.

And yet the simplicity of the truth seemed most fitting.

“Jack, you’ve saved me, too,” I said. “I feel like I didn’t know what happiness was until you. I’ve learned some new, precious feeling just from being around you. And I never want it to end.”

He let a tear drip down the side of his face, frowning slightly as he felt it tickle his beard.

“So let’s make sure it doesn’t,” he said. “As best we can.”

I would be incapable of describing the way the next few hours passed, because it was entirely a blur of elation. We whispered ideas and plans to each other for the future, marvelled at the strange, beautiful curves and details of each other’s bodies. Beneath it all was a current of love, newly made, freshly promised, and running through our every interaction.