Page 123 of The Sound Of Us

Sheathing himself, he lathers us both with lube. I can’t help noticing that he uses far more lube than is necessary. His way of protecting my body as much as he can, maybe. I swallow a lump in my throat. How is this man real?

Our bodies ready, Eli slides into me, inch by inch. I can take him, but he’s still careful, his movements slow.

His breathing escalates and I see how much he’s struggling to keep himself together. I’m gripping him tightly, sucking him into my channel and holding him there like a prisoner. But still, he won’t push in.

My heart sings for Eli’s care. For the care he gives me without me asking for it, so I wrap my legs around him, digging my heels into his lower back and urging him forward. Asking him to take my body. To take his pleasure because it’s the least I can do for him, for what he’s given me. My nails scrape down his back, telling him in every way I can how much I want this.

Finally, finally, he’s all the way in.

Eli slides in and out of me, his dick grazing my prostate, taking me to the edge of the universe and then flinging me back to earth when he slides out.

It’s only when I’m clawing at him, my shouts vibrating in my throat and screaming against his fingers wrapped around my flesh there, that Eli lets go and truly fucks me.

My cock slaps against my stomach with each hit from Eli’s pistoning hips. My shouts join his and then—

I join the stars, flying through the blackness, exploding into innumerable pieces of iridescent light. Eli comes hurtling after me, and together we fall.

If this is what home feels like, then I’ve been homeless my whole life.

Chapter 63

Axel

He has a piano in his home. A baby grand, similar to the one he’d had transported to Mrs. Johnson’s house months earlier. I hadn’t noticed it earlier because it was on the other side of the living room, off to the left. If you sat down to play at night, you’d be able to look outside and count the stars.

Now, dressed in Eli’s clothes—a pair of navy blue sweats that ride low on my hips and a t-shirt—since I arrived here with only a pen, notebook and Ben’s prom suit on my back, I take a hesitant step forward toward the piano.

Has he always had it here? Does he play, too? Surprisingly, it never came up in all our time in River Valley.

Eli comes up behind me, wrapping his arms around me. I sink into his embrace. It can’t be real, this. My life could not have changed so drastically in a matter of hours. I feel like I’m on a different planet. It’s so quiet here. Not just the environment. In my head too. I never knew how noisy it was inside my own mind until now. Until its absence provided an unfamiliar sense of safety.

I turn in Eli’s arms, looking curiously between him and the piano.

“It’s for you,” he signs.

“You didn’t have to do that,” I say.

“Play for me,” he signs and then, taking my hand, he leads me to the piano and urges me to sit. With tentative fingers, I play. A simple tune I’d learned on YouTube. Eli sits next to me and places his hand on the side of the piano while I play.

Pepper finds us and settles next to Eli on the floor. I swear she and I are going to fight over Eli. She’s as smitten with him now as she had been the very first day she almost went under his wheel.

Sometimes, when I look over at Eli, I find him watching my fingers move over the keys. Other times, he watches my face and I can’t help meeting his gaze. The calm I find in him is mostly unsettling. Like I… miss… the chaos.

Eli retrieves his phone from his pocket and turns the lit up screen to me. It’s an article from some medical society site.

I stop playing and take the phone from him.

The article is about small steps to take when coming out of an abusive relationship. There’s a list: have supportive people around you, try to recall what you loved doing for yourself before the abuse started, reconnect with old hobbies. Talk about what happened with people you trust. But the one that stands out for me the most is: create a boring, predictable routine.

And so that’s what I do.

Eli helps me. More than I ever expected.

I feel like a burden sometimes but Eli makes it hard to maintain such a mind-set. I can’t imagine how much his family must have loved and believed in him that he has such a firm hold on… well, himself. I’m in awe of just how put-together he is—mentally, I mean. I feel like a psychotic fool sometimes. Eli is what people grow up to be when they have parents who love them and nurture them. He’s the evidence of what happens when human beings just do what’s right for the people they love.

I was convinced he would find a way to end the relationship after I told him everything. What he did instead was ask me if we could do therapy together. To which I agreed because I believed in such things but could never get myself to seek it out in River Valley. I also grabbed the chance for one-on-one therapy, where it’s just me.

Dr. Shashi is working with doctors from the hospital here. I learned that he never told Frank anything about my relapse. Frank had just put two and two together and let me believe Dr. Shashi had told him. Frank hadn't even known for sure about the cancer when he announced it to me. The cruelty astounds me.

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