She could have walked around the bed to her side. But no. She had to move her body over mine.
I close my eyes and count to ten.
Why am I like this?
I’ve never been this nervous with a girl before.
But this isn’t just some girl. It’s Natalie.
She gets settled under the sheet, doing this little shimmy thing and pulling the comforter to her neck before she turns to her side and looks at me.
Good. Okay, yes, she’s covering herself up. She’s hinting that all is a no-go and the “just friends” agreement is still on.
What if I’m overthinking all this? What if she’s totally fine with just being friends, and I’m the only one with this new buildup of tension because we know we like each other but are doing nothing about it?
“Tobias.”
Her soft voice cuts off my rambling thoughts. “Yeah,” I say with a slight squeak as I curl onto my side to mimic her position. Our faces are lined up with each other.
She laughs. It's a sleepy laugh, and it might just be my new favorite thing about her.
“Tell me about your notes.”
“You’re tired,” I say, reaching out to tuck a piece of hair behind her ear so I can see her face better. “Get some sleep.”
“I can’t sleep,” she whispers, moving herself closer to me.
My mind focuses on the heat of her skin near mine, how her shorts are barely shorts—yes, I saw them when she got in bed—and how I love every minute of it when her bare leg sneaks out of the covers and brushes mine.
Don't even get me started on the scent of the lotion she clearly applied to her body before going to bed.
What is that, vanilla? Cupcake? It smells fucking delicious.
“Why not?” I ask.
“I’m thinking about this book.”
“Yeah? Do you not like it?”
She shakes her head. “No, I like it a lot, and I love that I’m writing it with you.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“I just …”
“You can tell me.”
She looks down for the briefest moment before her gaze collides with mine.
“I just wrote a scene, and I thought of you the entire time.”
Fuck.
She bites her lip.
I do my best to breathe casually, but she dropped a bomb on me, and my brain is starting to short circuit. The first place it cut off is my dick, which is very alert now.
Natalie was thinking of me in a sexual way.
