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“You do?”
“Yeah,” he said with a sigh. He yawned.
“Tangles and briars, you are going to go to sleep.”
“No,” he said, shaking his head. His eyes were closed, though.
“You are,” she said.
“Mnm mmm,” he objected, but there was another yawn.
It was quiet.
“So, how do you get it?” she said.
“Get what?”
“You’re the one who said that you got it.”
“Oh, right.” Another yawn. “So, it wasn’t about dominance entirely. Sure, we were playing that, like you were playing at telling me what to do, and I liked it, fuck I liked it. I can imagine you in, like, a bun, and glasses, and a suit, like—”
“Seriously?” She was grinning.
“What? You don’t like that?”
“I mean, I didn’t say that,” she said.
“You can tell me what to do any fucking time,” he said, and the smile on his face was slap-happy, as if he was drunk on her.
She bent down and captured his lips with hers. “You didn’t finish what you were saying.”
“Oh, right.” He yawned again. “But we both had to decide to play. So, that’s, um, that’s a different thing. We go into that together and it creates this bond between us? That’s not dominance, that’s togetherness. It makes us, well, us. I mean, I think we’ve been us for a long time, Essence, but it made us even more us. Do you know what I mean?”
“I actually do.” She lay her head down on his chest.
He stroked her hair. “I’ve been in love with you for years.”
“No, you haven’t,” she said, going stiff. “Really?”
He was laughing.
“Me too, maybe.”
“You don’t have to say it back. It’s different now, but… it’s still not real. I think it could be real, though, but it would take time. It would take risk. It would take…” He yawned again, stroking her hair. “I don’t know, but I want to do whatever it takes.”
“Don’t go to sleep, Decker,” she said. “We’re still talking.”
“I won’t,” he said.
But in two more minutes, his breath had gone even and deep.
“Decker?” she said.
No answer.
12:32 a.m.
DECKER SAT UP straight in bed, which was when he realized he was alone.
