Page 108 of A Bookish Story

When we’re just outside my room my fingers fumble with the card key. I have to try twice. It’s Ryan who takes it from me and gets the door to click open.

I suspect he’s as nervous as I am. I mean, we’ve both written these scenes and the expectations are high. Are we as good as our writing would reflect? Those scenes take forever to get right. I don’t want my first love scene with Ryan to go by the book. Instead, I want to feel his warm bare skin against mine. I want to kiss him forever. I don’t know which one of us is going to take the lead but I vote him.

Ryan doesn’t disappoint. We’ve no sooner shut the door when he’s got me against it, kissing me everywhere. He’s not shy. He kisses the column of my neck, the pads of my ears, anywhere bare skin is exposed.

“I love you, Luci. So much.”

“I love you, too,” I say.

He unzips my dress, pulling the sleeves down my arms, and kisses my shoulders. Then he drops to his knees to kiss my now-bare stomach. Heat pulses through me and I pull him up and lead him to bed. At this point, we’re removing our own clothes to go faster.

“I’ve waited so long for this,” I breathe, letting my unzipped dress fall to the floor.

“Not longer than me, I bet.”

“Yeah? I’ve wanted this since the moment you came to my shed, apologizing and begging for my help. You are so sexy when you’re sorry.”

“I’m going to remember that,” he says, his warm hand pressing against my bare thigh and making me tingle. “But I’ve wanted this since you mistook Henry for me and told us both your life story.”

This surprises me so much I blink. “The moment we met?”

“Well, I’m a guy. And you’re very hot.”

“I thought you found me annoying.”

“No, that was you. You found me annoying.”

“Just grumpy.”

“Fair.”

Now neither one of us is either grumpy or annoying as we roll under the covers to discover each other in a brand-new way. There’s zero hesitancy and no holding back. We’re passionate and delicious and glorious and everything I’ve ever fantasized.

But the rest, folks, is fade to black.

Use your imagination.

EPILOGUE

SIX MONTHS LATER

“Are you done?” I ask Ryan.

He rubs his temples. “No, I’ll never be finished. It’s hopeless. These revisions are killing me. How can I reduce my word count and also add in more emotion? I’m a writer, not a magician!”

He’s so cute, just shy of shaking his fist at the heavens.

“You always say that, baby.” I stand behind him, rubbing his tight shoulders.

Life is never smooth when Ryan is revising but we’ve devised a system.

It became necessary to implement one, since for the first few months we lived together in my she-shed. We do love each other, intensely, but every writer needs elbow room. Some days I write at the coffee shop, and other days Ryan does. We have our established work hours and we’re strict about those. If Ryan or I are having a tough time letting go of a scene, one of us will shout, “And…end scene!”

The agreement is we stop then, wherever we are in the manuscript.

It works because we both need balance and also it helps that we like each other…a lot.

Our days consist of the work that we love, eating takeout, going for long walks, reading books, watching movies, and hanging out with Sofia and her latest boyfriend. Many nights we wind up at Abuelita’s for dinner with Eddie and my mother where we all watch telenovelas. Ryan and I are both fascinated with the melodramatics and lie in bed many nights analyzing how we could layer in more emotion to our stories.