Chapter
Everett
I was already awake and watching her when Brynn sighed awake. Her eyes fluttered open, and she smiled at me from the other side of the bed.
"How are you feeling?" I asked anxiously. There was always that moment, afterward, when I wondered if I'd taken it too far. Her skin wore the roadmap of last night's adventure, but she smiled sleepily and stretched her arms over her head. "Good," she said. "Sore, but good."
I leaped from the bad. "I'll get you some coffee," I said. "I bet you like it way too sweet."
She wrinkled her nose adorably. "I bet you like yours way too bitter," she shot back, softening it with a grin. "You don't like to make anything easy on yourself."
Her words rang in my head as I headed downstairs to start the coffee and rummage through the refrigerator for a breakfast. The word easy was not one that was in my vocabulary. Saying what I wanted to do, what I liked, was the hardest thing I'd ever admitted to myself, much less admitted to someone else. Somehow she was making it easy. This all felt so completely normal, and acceptable.
And what was more, I was finding myself wanting to spend time with her, even when we weren't in the bedroom. Last night's party at her friends, I'd seen her as I rarely did, and she let a wall down that had been erected so long ago.
All at once, I was filled with an almost frenetic need to keep her here, to stay with her, to spend all my time watching her, studying her, trying to understand how the thing I'd denied myself so long was now something I was allowed. Fuck, something that was even celebrated.
I needed to know how it was that this could all be so okay.
I heard the sound of her bare feet against my stairs, and she emerged into the kitchen wearing one of my undershirts. It barely covered her ass cheeks, and I was hard for her once again. I seemed to be hard for her every waking moment of the day.
"Good morning," I said, handing her a mug. "I basically emptied the entire sugar bowl in here."
She smiled and took a sip. "Wow, you aren't lying," she said, licking the sweetness off of her teeth.
"You know I don't believe in half measures," I told to her.
She looked at me, and then smiled and took another sip.
I set my mug down on the counter. "So. I was thinking."
"Oh no, that sounds dangerous," she deadpanned. "You didn't hurt yourself, did you?"
"Haha. Very nice. I'm going to steal that line and use it to bust on your brother."
"Ugh," she winced. "What do we tell him?"
"Well?" I took a deep breath. "That's part of what I was thinking."
She looked at me attentively.
"I was thinking that we did this all backwards."
"Huh? How do you mean?"
"This." I moved my hand in a circle to take in her in my t-shirt, freshly fucked and staying the night. "We haven't taken the typical route to a relationship."
"Sure we have, just with a few..." She bit her lip and touched her wrist. "Side trips?"
I grinned. "I don't know what kind of guys you've dated in the past, Brynn. But most relationships don't start with fucking in closets at parties."
"It was a good start," she protested.
"Oh yeah, don't get me wrong, it was a great start. But... it was backwards."
She raised an eyebrow. "Are you telling me you want to... date?"
"Isn't that what normal people do?"
"How the hell would I know?" Brynn laughed. God I fucking loved this girl.
"Well okay, fair enough. But I want to take you out for a night on the town. I want people — besides fucking Gabe Foster — to see us together."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah. I want to show off my girl."
"Your girl," she repeated liked she liked the sound of it. I sure as hell did.
I reached over and kissed her. "Meet me in the town square tomorrow. We can walk around, find a place that's not too crowded."
"That'll be a chore. It's the Fourth of July week."
"We'll find something," I promised her. But even if we didn't, I still didn't care. I was just eager to be seen with her, to hold her fucking hand in public. To be boyfriend and fucking girlfriend. To have something I never thought I could have. I looked down at my feet for a moment, trying to hide how overpowering it was to want something that was so innocent. So... normal.
She made me feel right.
She made me feel whole.