Page 5

I take his face in my hands and kiss him. Slowly. Like I have time, because I do, because tonight has nowhere to be except here.

He kisses me back, his hands finding my waist, and something held tight in my chest for months finally releases.

His shirt comes off and then mine and then we are on the bed and I take a moment, just a moment, to look at him. The lamp from the sitting room. The lines of him. Jan without the composure he wears everywhere else. He is looking back at me and not hiding any of it.

"You're beautiful," I say. I am done not saying things.

Something crosses his face, not embarrassment, Jan doesn't do embarrassment, but something adjacent to it. Something human and unguarded. He looks away for exactly one second. Then back.

"Thank you," he says. Quietly.

His hands move to my chest, my stomach, unhurried and certain, and I put my hand over one of his and just feel it. Him. Here.

Then he moves down my body and takes me in his mouth.

I put my hand in his hair and look at the ceiling and stop being capable of full sentences.

When he comes back up I say his name and mean everything by it. He looks at me — chest moving, eyes intent, Jan when he has decided something, and then he stops.

He looks at me. Then down. Then back up.

"Jan," I say.

"Yes," he says. Carefully. “That’s… yes.”

A beat.

"Still want to?" I say.

He looks at me like I have asked a profoundly unnecessary question. "Absolutely," he says.

He reaches for the nightstand and hands me a condom. I put it on, come back to him.

"What about…” I stop. "How do I… I don't want to hurt you."

"You won't," he says.

"I want to do it properly. Tell me what to do."

He looks at me for a moment. Then: "I can do the prep myself…”

"No." I look at him. "Show me."

Something warm moves through his face. He reaches for the nightstand and hands me the lube.

"One finger to start," he says. "Slowly."

I do what he says. I watch his face carefully, the moment it shifts, the exhale, his hand finding my arm and gripping it.

"Okay?" I say.

"Yes." His voice is different. Lower. "Keep going."

I keep going. Reading him, watching him. At some point he says another and I add another, slow, and feel him adjust around me and I put my forehead against his shoulder and breathe.

"Ready?" I say, against his skin.

"Yes," he says. "Now."