Page 118 of Road Trip to Forever
“One can never be too prepared,” I say. Lola taps my leg twice and I stop immediately, jerking my chin down to stare at her. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong.” Her hands run up my thighs. “I just want you inside me.”
“Iaminside you.”
She laughs and kisses my stomach. “You know what I mean.”
“Go wait on the pillows,” I tell her, taking a step back and taking a deep breath, a lungful of air I’m going to need to survive.
I find the condoms in my suitcase, an impulse purchase when I stopped by the hotel convenience store earlier in the afternoon for a Gatorade. The kid behind the cash register stared at me, probably assuming I’m going to be participating in an all-night sex fest with my hydration and protection needs.
I rip the box open, causing half the packets to go flying across the room. Lola giggles from the bed, and I turn to find her fingers dancing across the inside of her thigh, her eyes on me. She touches herself between her legs and the other half of the packets drop to the floor.
“Watching you is torture,” I say.
“Then stop watching and come join me,” she says.
I scoop up the latex and open the wrapper. I work the condom down my length and make my way back to the bed, kneeling on the mattress.
“Okay,” I say. “But I want you on top.”
THIRTY-THREE
LOLA
My jokes stopwhen Patrick says he wants to watch me.
There’s reverence infused in the words, the sizzling electric heat extinguished and replaced with care and tender compassion.
I nod and let him take the spot against the pillows, waiting for him to get settled before I straddle him, one leg on either side of his hips.
“Promise me nothing changes,” I whisper into the silent room as I hover above him.
An inch.
That’s all we are apart, mere centimeters away from becoming one. My knees quake and my thighs burn from holding myself up, but I can’t go this final step until I hear him say it.
An inch.
That’s all that separates us from never being able to go back to how we were before.
As I look down at Patrick, his brown hair dark against the white pillowcase and his gaze on me, I know with absolute certainty I don’t everwantto go back to the life we had before. A world where we didn’t touch and we didn’t kiss and we didn’t show each other how much we care.
I want to sprint past whatever final boundary we’re about to cross, barrel toward the finish line, and solidify him as mine forever.
“Lola,” Patrick says softly. “You have my heart. You have my soul. I promise this doesn’t change anything. Tomorrow I’m going to wake up and still feel the exact same about you. Obsessed, if you haven’t been able to tell. I’m never going to leave you, and I also promise to prove that to you every single day.”
He runs his fingers through my hair and rubs my neck, right at the top of my spine, where I feel the pressure melting away with his touch. I think there might be stars in his eyes as he looks at me.
I’ve never had anyone look at me like this before, like I’m the single most important thing in the world. It’s overwhelming and intoxicating in the best ways. I want to get lost in his stare, get stuck in the expanse of green, and never return home.
I know Patrick’s being honest, nothing but truth behind every syllable. He’d tattoo them on his arm or forehead if he could. Maybe he will one day, another addition to his stash of designs dedicated to me.
I’m never going anywhere,he’d write on his skin, the first thing I see when I open my eyes and the last thing I read before I fall asleep, drifting off to dreams of us and the future we could have.
I love you,I think he’d also write.
He hasn’t said it yet, not in a way that’s real and not sleep-deprived, a figment of my imagination, but it’s imminent. I know it is. I can feel it the way you can feel a storm rolling in. Hyper-awareness of your surroundings. Nerves alight with anticipation. Those three words hover between us, just barely out of reach and waiting for the perfect moment to release themselves into our world.
