The Christmas lights Rob insisted we decorate my room with twinkle, competing with the dim lamplight. I gaze up from my position on the bed, staring at my ceiling, which resembles a night sky blanketed with stars. Their light is warmer than the far away suns. Or maybe it’s just the season they’re associated with.
In the corner, the little tree he bought brims with State football ornaments and blue and gold garland. I even found a miniature replica of his jersey. It’s still strange to me that he went from being number eleven to number six, but I know it’s practically impossible for players to keep the same number throughout their careers. Still, it seems like a lost piece of history, something only his fans will know as trivia.
I fell in love with the guy who wore number eleven.
The quarterback who insisted on decorating before we even celebrate Thanksgiving is currently hunched over his laptop at my desk, typing away furiously on his latest coding assignment. He’s been mostly quiet in the evenings since our rewind date, even though in the couple of practices I’ve managed to catch, it’s clear he’s taking his frustration out on the field. His stress seems to ratchet up a notch every day leading up to Jackson’s trial.
I see it in the distance in his eyes, feel it in the intense way he kisses me before bringing me to orgasm every night, hear it in the words he leaves unsaid.
“I’m not sure I can buy you an official Heisman nomination, so what do you want for Christmas this year?”
“Hmm?” He looks up from his laptop with the same blank expression on his face that’s been there the past two weeks, clearly not having heard a word I said.
“What do you want for Christmas, Rob?”
He offers me a soft smile that doesn’t reach his blue-green eyes. “Just you.”
Something about the way he says it makes me tip my head to study him more closely. “You already have me.”
He pulls his lips in like he’s physically trying to restrain himself from saying what’s on his mind. “And you’re the best gift I’ve ever been given.”
He turns back to his work, leaving me alone with the thoughts that have been plaguing me since we heard from the DA. The trial is officially a go for next week. Months, years of preparation have been leading up to this. Depositions, briefings of the evidence that will be shown to the jury, witness order, careful coaching from the prosecution about how to anticipate and answer potential defense cross examination, more suggestions to seek therapy.
It’s so close to being finished.
When it’s over, I’ll be able to breathe again.
But not yet. Not quite.
While I still don’t remember a thing about that day, and return to campus from various meetings with the attorneys as confused as ever, Rob comes back agitated, almost as if he’s not anticipating closure, but more grief.
“Rob?”
“Yeah, babe?” He doesn’t look my way, his voice distracted.
“I have something I want to show you.” I stow away my books and laptop for the night, rising from the bed on shaky legs, which approach him at a much slower pace than normal.
I have to do this now. I have to know, so when Jackson gets put away for his crimes, I can finally move on with my life.
“Okay,” he mumbles, still clacking away at the keyboard. “Gimme a minute to finish up here.”
It’s better this way. If I tell him what I intend, and he shuts me down, I’ll never have the courage again.
I already know in the deepest recesses of my heart he’s the only one who will ever get this chance. No one else.
My breath rattles around inside my chest, in discord with my fluttering heartbeat. The sound of my shirt pulling away from my body, then sliding over my head, is so loud, surely it takes a layer of my skin with it.
With trembling hands that fumble far more than they should after years of mindless practice, I slide the straps of my bra down one shoulder, then the next. I have to specifically list the steps in order in my mind as I perform each separate task leading to the end result.
Me, standing naked from the waist up, in front of Rob, who still hasn’t glanced my way.
Goosebumps spread across my naked flesh, hardening my nipples, stretching further the scars I know are there, but refuse to look at. The longer I wait, the more I shiver. The fear of the unknown possesses an icier grip than any winter wind.
My mind races with potential outcomes.
He won’t be able to look. He will. He won’t be able to touch without the barrier of a shirt. Or, he will. He’ll never look me in the eyes again. He will, but with constant pity.
I don’t want his pity. I want his love.
I want to be whole again.
I want him to make me whole again.
I want him to be proud of me for not shying away, for revealing this last secret that’s burdened me for too long.
I want him to hold my hand and stand beside me when I face down the monster who tried to take everything away.
I want him to make me brave when I falter.
Because I know I will when I come face to face with Jackson.
When the people in the courtroom see what he did to me.
But none of them will know what’s left behind. Only Rob and I will know that.
He’ll never be able to forget; I’ll never remember. The end of the trial won’t change what happened, but it’ll close out this chapter of our story.
When it’s all over, I want him to kiss me, to ask me to marry him again…and mean it.
With a deep sigh, he saves his work, powers down his laptop, and flips the screen down.
My vision swims, my mind shuts down, and an empty numbness creeps over my skin as Rob faces me.
“Oh my God,” he breathes into the suddenly frozen air.
It’s an out of body experience to watch his face pale, his eyes widen, and his mouth fall open. Seated at the desk, he’s eye-level with my chest, unable to avoid what’s staring him in the face. His Adam’s apple bobs with several thick swallows before he flicks his deep blue gaze to mine.
I hold my breath, waiting for him to close his eyes against my reality, to look away, to throw up like he used to in the days following my attack, but it doesn’t happen.
Only a moment passes, too short to detect what might be running through his mind, before he sweeps his gaze back down, his eyes caressing me with warmth that slowly thaws me.
“My Evie,” he murmurs before reaching for me.
His hands grip my waist, pulling me to him as I stumble. He rests his scratchy cheek against my stomach, wrapping me in his arms.
Anxiety grips me to the point of pain that this is his way of avoiding my breasts. Of avoiding me. He’s only holding me close so he won’t have to see; he’s hugging me out of his old misplaced guilt. I’ll never be good enough, and he’s saying goodbye.
There are moments in our lives that forever imprint, both good and bad. In our darkest hours, we can recall them with startling clarity.
I know, with everything in me, I’ll remember this moment to my dying day.
But I’ll never remember the day I began to lose him.
Just as insane laughter at the irony threatens to spill from my chest, damp breath and soft lips brush across my bare skin.
“I want you,” he whispers. His tongue flicks out to taste me before he trails open-mouth kisses along my stomach. “I need you.” He gazes up at me with a look that borders on wonder. “I love you, Evie.”
Tears prick my eyes. Though instinct tells me to run my fingers through his hair the way he likes, I can’t force my arms to move. They hang limply at my sides, waiting for him to tell me what to do next.
I have no idea what comes next.
Rob stands abruptly. The only things that keep me from falling backward are his arms, which quickly sweep me off my feet. With sure steps, he carries me to the bed and lays me in the middle, gazing at me with more emotion than I’ve seen from him in far too long.
He holds up a finger before retreating to the door, making sure it’s locked. “I am not about to repeat that particular mistake.”
The first nervous laugh bubbles out of me. We’re not out of the woods yet, but it’s a start.
His bare chest is heaving by the time he stands over the bed, his eyes feasting on me until I squirm under his gaze and bring my arms up to cover myself.
He grabs my wrist with a gentle hold. “Don’t. Don’t hide yourself from me.” His eyelids flutter, and he draws a deep breath. “Will you…can I…am I allowed to touch you, baby?”
The words seem to be pulled from him with great pain. He’s breathless, waiting on my word.
I don’t have any words, so I offer a small nod.
He falls to his knees at the bedside, bowing his head almost as if in prayer. Slowly, his fingers curl around the waistband of my pajama pants, and he looks at me with unspoken questions in his eyes.
Another nod, and he drags the material slowly down my thighs until I’m lying on the comforter in nothing but the lacy panties I once tried to convince myself he’d never see.
“You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen,” he swears. “I worship the ground you walk on, and I know I’m not nearly worthy of this privilege, but I can’t not take this.”
His words don’t make any sense, but before I can give voice to my confusion, he descends on me. Hungry lips pull the breath from my lungs as he covers me, leaving every inch of my skin heated under his magic.
His hands cup my breasts with the most loving touch before his mouth follows suit.
Finally, pulled from my trance by a force stronger than my fear, I thread my hands through his soft hair, holding him to me as his tongue traces the grooves in my skin like he can erase my scars if he tries hard enough.
God, I want that, too. Fix me, Rob. Take it all away.
“I want to taste every inch of you,” he mumbles against my puckered skin. “Will you let me do that? Will you let me worship you the way you deserve?”
“I…”
He rises onto his elbows, assessing me. A soft caress of his fingers on my cheek soothes me enough to voice my concerns.
“I don’t know. It sounds…gross.”
He collapses against my chest in a fit of laughter, the vibrations of his heavy body rumbling through me as if we’re already connected. He tries to look serious when he raises his head again. “You’ve offered to give me a blowjob how many times now?”
My cheeks flame under his amusement. “I wasn’t really keeping count.”
“A lot,” he confirms, losing the battle to not at least chuckle. “You don’t think that would be…gross?”
I chew my lip, not wanting to admit that yeah, it might be disgusting for all I know. Since he hasn’t actually let me do that for him, I don’t want to give him the impression I never want to at least try.
His expression softens before he kisses his way up my chest to my neck, trailing soft heat along my jaw before landing on my mouth and opening me to him with all the skill he’s learned over the past few years.
“I promise it won’t be gross for me,” he whispers against my lips.
I tense again beneath him. “How do you know? Have you done that before?”
“No, baby,” he promises. “But I know because nothing about you is gross. Your skin is already my favorite flavor.”
“That’s…different.” Wetter. At least it was a few minutes ago…
“If you don’t like it, I’ll stop. Let me try at least? Please?”
A smirk pulls at my lips. “You never have to beg, baby.”
I expect him to laugh at me throwing his words back at him, but he doesn’t.
He places another soft kiss to my lips that leaves me more breathless than a heavy make out session. “Yes, I do.”
With that, he follows his previous path in the opposite direction, but takes his time to lick everything within reach. He clearly wasn’t joking about tasting every inch of me.
His big body somehow maneuvers further down the mattress as he goes until he reaches my stomach, fixing his gaze on me as he carefully pulls my panties down.
“I’m keeping these, by the way,” he tells me with a deadpan expression. “Proof that I actually did get to see them.”
I throw my head back on the pillow with raucous laughter because I’ve had similar thoughts tonight. “We practically live together. You could take the whole drawer full if you wanted.”
He smiles, that full, dimpled smile that makes my heart flutter. “Yeah, but these are the first ones I ever got to take off you. They’re special.”
“I draw the line at you keeping them somewhere on your person during games for good luck.”
“Aww, dammit. How did you know my plans?” He places them on the nightstand instead of throwing them on the floor where my discarded shirt and bra still lay by the desk.
“Because you have these old-fashioned romantic notions of damsels in distress and knights in shining armor.”
He grazes his nose along the inside of my thigh. “I’m no knight, Mrs. Falls. And you’ve never been a damsel in distress. But I do love you with everything I have.”
He moves into position, inhaling deeply as my heart lodges in my throat. “Baby, relax. I promise I won’t hurt you. God, you smell good.”
The first lap of his tongue against me has me internally recoiling in disgust. I hold my breath and squeeze my eyes shut, waiting for the sound of gagging to echo in the room.
“Evie,” he whispers.
I glance down at his eyes peeking up at me from between my thighs, his eyebrows raised like he can read my mind.
“You’re fucking delicious, but I’ve never done this before, so I might not be very good at it. If you don’t like it, tell me.”
I chew on my lip and nod. He’s gotta be lying. That can’t possibly taste good.
Even the moan that travels from his throat to my ears can’t convince me otherwise.
In fact, the longer he goes at it, the tenser I get.
It’s…sloppy, wet, and not at all doing anything for me.
He’s never so much as fingered me. This seems like jumping the shark somehow. I know on average, we’re behind schedule, but isn’t there a natural progression leading up to sex?
The bases analogy exists for a reason.
Start with making out, graduate to groping, level up to dry humping, which we’re already quite proficient at. Next step is hand jobs and fingering. Successful yes to the first, no attempts at the second. So, we can’t move to oral, right? That’s not the order of operations.
“This isn’t doing a thing for you, is it?”
Rob’s dejected voice pulls me from my internal monologue.
I hate to disappoint him, but…
“Um…no. I’m sorry. It’s not.”
“Don’t apologize.” He presses a final kiss to my center, then crawls over me. “I’ll get better. If you’ll let me try again?”
His eyes are so hopeful, I don’t have the heart to tell him no.
“Sure, but maybe another night. It’s your turn.”
“My turn?”
“Yeah,” I hesitate. “Can I try? For you?”
“Actually,” he drops his gaze briefly as a low chuckle escapes his swollen, shiny lips. “I…kind of need to go take a shower now.”
“Why? You showered after conditioning this morning…”
Oh.
“If you thought I was lying, I wasn’t. That was really good for me.” He frowns. “That makes twice now it wasn’t for you, though.”
“It’s really okay, Superjock. Honestly, maybe if you hadn’t been making me come every night for the past few weeks, it would’ve worked. I’m kind of…spent?”
He smiles, a weird sort of caveman pride shining in his eyes. “You don’t have to stroke my ego, Mrs. Falls. I wasn’t good enough for you tonight, but I’ll take that and learn from it. Practice makes perfect.”
My tongue trips in my mouth. “You’re going to practice?”
He laughs at the undoubted horror on my face. “On you, baby. Only you. There’s not another woman in the world I’ve even thought about doing this with.”
I relax under his weight, only to tense again. “Am I…still good enough for you? Now that you’ve seen…”
His hands cup my cheeks, and his gaze bores into me. “Eísai i pio ómorfi gynaíka ston kósmo. Do you understand now?”
You’re the most beautiful woman in the world.
“I’m gonna go take a quick shower.” He leans in for a kiss.
I pull back. “Fuck, no. Just because you liked it doesn’t mean I will.”
He laughs as he climbs off the bed. “Shower, then brush teeth. Got it. Don’t fall asleep without me.”
As if I could. Not in the bed at least.
After he closes and locks the door behind him, I climb under the sheets and blankets, wondering what the hell is wrong with me.
I might be inexperienced, but I hear other girls talk. Having a guy go down on them is supposedly the holy grail. Not only do most guys not even want to do it, but it’s better than actual sex if the whispers I’ve heard are to be believed.
Maybe the stress of the impending trial is getting to me, too.
Lost in my own thoughts for who knows how long, I’m just getting ready to head to the closet when my door opens.
Terror seizes me, freezing my muscles in place until Rob’s soft voice breaks through.
“Baby?”
I clear my throat until I’m sure I can speak. “Yes?”
“Can I…never mind.” He crosses the room in quick strides, shutting off the lamps but leaving our Christmas lights on.
“What, Rob?”
He’s holding the blankets in one hand, poised to climb into bed, his hair still damp from his shower. “I…it’s not fair of me to ask after tonight, but I was wondering…”
I roll onto my side to face him, the sheets sliding against my naked body. A smile pulls at my lips. His shy side will never cease to make me love him more. “What were you wondering?”
He looks away, furrowing his brow. “I want to…sleep naked with you. If that’s okay.”
Part of me warms at the thought he wants to make himself vulnerable, too. The other part of me realizes that where I’m scarred, disfigured, and imperfect, he’s utter perfection.
“Okay.” The word slips past my lips. Truth be told, I want to feel him naked against me. To shed our old barriers before we cross over into this new phase of our lives together.
He takes a deep breath, and drops the blankets. Slowly, he pulls his t-shirt over his head. That would have happened anyway. He never sleeps with a shirt on. Another deep breath, and he pulls his pajama pants and boxer briefs down in one quick motion like he’s ripping off a bandage.
He stands before me completely naked and beautiful.
The muscles of his body are bathed in a stark relief of shadow and warm, soft light. Rob Falls is a work of art.
“This is…” he shrugs, but doesn’t meet my gaze. “…me.”
Instead of adding to his obvious discomfort, I pull the blankets back for him to climb in beside me. He does so like he’s leaping from the gallows after a pardon, quickly gathering me into his arms and pulling the blankets up around us.
Once we’re situated into our normal positions, he breathes an audible sigh of happiness. “I’ve waited for this.”
“Sleep? You usually do pass out much earlier than now.” He’s so fun to screw with.
He doesn’t laugh, just kisses my forehead and snuggles closer. “To feel you skin to skin against me, with nothing between us.”
I place an answering kiss against his neck, breathing in the scent of freshly showered Rob. “You feel like home.”
The same as he’s always felt, but…better. More.
“I love you, Evie.”
“I love you, Rob.”
I’m not sure who falls asleep first. All I know is that I haven’t felt this at peace in such a long time.