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It’s always been the same. That relentless, terrible feeling, like I was going to leap out of my skin when I was touched, but I forced myself to get past that. I didn’t want to date for the obvious reason that it wouldn’t mesh with my lifestyle, but maybe that’s an excuse I’ve always used to protect myself. I was still a guy with needs. Needs that were at odds with not wanting to be touched in any way. I don’t know. It didn’t make sense, as I don’t know where it came from. I guess from living on the streets and the times my dad laid into me with his fists when I was growing up. And also how any touch I’d had before Scarlet, who was the first person to ever hug me that I can remember, just set off warning bells in my head because touch meant danger and pain. It meant that I was going to get the shit kicked out of me for creeping into the wrong alley, have my few possessions stolen, or be taught a lesson in toughness by the father who was supposed to care for me. My own mother never touched me. I can’t remember her playing much of a role in my life at all. I guess my dad saw to it that she wasn’t around to soften me or make me weak.
“Alden?” Azalea whispers my name, slamming me back into my body. I bring a hand up without thinking and graze my finger along my bottom lip. “Oh my god, did I have pickle breath?”
Her smile is soft. She’s no longer angry with me, and I think we’re both confused about that, but there are other things hanging thickly in the air between us, inhaled with every ragged breath. Things like want, desire, need, and attraction that the brain can’t process or understand. I guess I felt that last night when I carted her over my shoulder and when she was pulling me from the pool. It started out as a prank, but her touch didn’t cause me pain or harm. She wanted to heal. Her touch was like fire, burning away my fears and healing up the gaping, wounded parts of me that I didn’t know were there.
Kissing her last night made everything fade. It didn’t have to make sense. I don’t know why I did it, but I didn’t expect it to feel so right.
“If you…if you think you might want to kiss me again, I should probably go brush my teeth.”
“But I have pickle breath too. It’s alright.”
“So you do want to kiss me again?”
She turns scarlet. “Can you just not be obnoxious for one second?”
“Sorry, I wasn’t trying to—”
She leans in and takes my face again, cradling it in her hands before she kisses me. The second her mouth presses up against mine, everything else becomes secondary. My past, the reasons I should be using more self-control, everything. Kissing her is fire. It’s the most potent buzz in my veins that I’ve ever known. It’s electric, but it also feels safe and right. Kissing her is pure bliss.
Her lips are full and lush, and she clearly knows how to kiss. I’m afraid that maybe I’d be a fumbling imbecile without her leading. She does that thing again where she takes my lower lip between her teeth, but then her lips bracket the sting as she suckles it gently. It makes my whole body tingle. I feel like I could leap straight to the ceiling and swing off it wildly, letting out a cry of surprised elation.
She guides me gently, coaxing me until I respond. Her hands find mine wrapping around her waist, and then she clasps hers around my neck, digging her fingers in just hard enough into the back of my neck that it burns, but not in a bad way.
There’s a strange sound, and it takes me a minute to realize that it’s me. Growling. I think it’s a growl. It’s a deep noise reverberating against her lips. Suddenly, I’m picking her up, her legs locking around my waist, and we’re moving. Moving away from the door and up, up the stairs toward my room. Her tongue sweeps inside my mouth, and my legs nearly buckle on the stairs. She doesn’t taste like pickles or cheese. Rather, she tastes like sweet honey and dark red wine. I think she would taste that way, utterly intoxicating, no matter what she ate. She nips my lip between her teeth as I clear the bedroom, and this time, my knees do give out. I nearly drop her but make it, stumbling over to the bed. I half drop her, half collapse.
As she tugs me down, it strikes me fast and hard that I haven’t done this in a very long time. Thoughts rocket through my head. Thoughts like manscaping, chest hair, smelly pits, pickle breath, swass—all the insecure words that make me panic.
