Page 110 of Backslide
This girl is it for me.
But I can’t worry about that now—not when she’s here in the flesh, all the flesh, directly in front of me. Like a fucking impossibility. The least likely gift.
Nell tugs at my sweatpants impatiently, at the knot in my drawstring. And even as she sighs against my skin, she says, “Were you worried someone was gonna break into your pants? Were you worried there was going to be a robbery?”
“You can never be too safe,” I smirk.
“You can definitely be too safe. For example, right now.”
She pulls uselessly at the knot, gives up, and rolls on top of me, kissing down the side of my neck, then moving lower on my chest, dragging her insane body against mine, making me fucking crazy.
My dick has never been so hard.
I sit up to untie my pants. She yanks them down and off. Then, pushing me down on my back again, climbs up toward me on all fours.
Then, as she narrows her eyes, with aching slowness, she lowers herself onto me, so we are fully fused. She gasps as I groan. And then there’s no holding back.
We rock against each other, harder. I want this to last forever. But nothing does.
And right now, I have a job to do.
I wrap my arm around her and flip her onto her back. She presses her face into my neck. Sighs my name.
I’m not that fumbling teenage boy anymore. And I need to show her.
22NELLIETODAY
I wake up in the morning, tangled up in Noah. I am dazed and toasty. And it’s a stellar way to start the day.
Today at five p.m. is Cara and Ben’s big un-wedding party—the culmination of the whole trip. If the song on the Saturday itinerary isn’t “White Wedding” by Billy Idol, I’ll eat every single oyster in the cooler myself—shells and all.
Outside, the sun is clearly shining, blasting through the windows like it’s finally back from vacation and it’s got some stories to tell. The storm is over.
It was a long night in all the best ways. And, on top of being… on top, I feel like it was really cathartic too.
We got resolution. We got satisfaction.
Sleep is overrated.
This felt like the kind of night that’s an end and a beginning. And considering how formative my relationship with Noah was—or first love always is—and how long I carried anger toward him, and maybe myself, this feels like a major step forward.
So, I am bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.
The day is rife with possibilities. Possibilities that extend beyond this hotel room, all the way to my life in NYC. My friendships, my work, the bodega cat—what’s next.
In the dark last night, while I traced my finger back and forth across the scar by Noah’s knee, we talked and talked and talked; we ate Charleston Chews and drank cider at midnight; we did other things that will haunt—and sustain—me for the rest of my days. Things that make me blush in the light of day.
But now it’s the morning after.The day after. That sounds so ominous.
Clearly, neither of us is making breakfast—because we got no skills. And that leftover pasta should be put out to pasture.
Plus, we have oysters and cheese to ferry back. So we can’t linger in bed forever.
I sigh, burrowing for a blissful moment further into both the plush bedding and Noah. Press my front into his side. His body is warm with sleep.
For one more brief instant, I am an ostrich with my head in the sand.
Though I have done a good job—by my standards—of pushing questioning thoughts of the future out of my head until now, they’re starting to pop in, uninvited. They carry casseroles of chaos, twelve-packs of panic, cases of doubt.
