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Deeper or nothing My new motto

"I didn’t tell you no," she says "I told you tomind And look!" She waves the flowers inwooed"

"That’s what you wanted, huh?" I s?"

"Maybe it’s soround at last "I’ll woo you until you can’t walk, sweetheart"

"Promises, promises"

She closes her eyes when I kiss her, but I keep mine open

I want to watch the sun rise

I think it’s supposed to be aard--walking to her car, the night cold enough to freezeand quiet all around us

We go up the fire escape, leave our shoes by the door, pass through the co s stretched out, back against the wall

She considers for a

We’re side by side on , but all I can feel is relief, if relief feels like walking with nothing dragging behind you after you’ve been towing a trailer of misery around for most of your life

I turn a little so I can look at her

Her hair’s still all screwed up She’s got crud at the inside corner of one eye, and her bottoet when your lips are too dry because of the weather or because you’ve been biting them

Which she does, while I watch She catches her lip between her teeth, sucks it into her rooved white lines that pink up as I watch

I want to devour her

I’m pretty sure it’s not time yet

"You have to tell me what you need me to do now," I say "I mean, you want to talk, but I’m not sure … I’m complete shit at this"

It’s another kind of relief, it turns out To be shit at it, and to just be able to say so

"This being, what? Girls?" She’s s

"Yeah, you’d love for me to admit that"

"It would irls, yeah"

"You didn’t used to have any complaints about my skills"

"But that was, like, a practice environht be the kind of person who can’t hack it in a real-world application"

She turns towardI have a feeling you’ve never had a girlfriend before"

"That’s true," I tell her "I’ve been with girls but I’ve never--"

I think about how to put it, and I start to tie myself up in knots before I reetthe first tiirl I ever cared about this way"

I thought ad a piece ofit to her

It is

And it isn’t

It’s more like … like there’s all this stuff I’ve packed into ainst what I’m afraid of Rocks and dirt, bits of rebar and junk that I’ve found by the roadside And what I’ her isn’t otten used to thinking of as me

I don’t need it Not to keepdown at her hands where they’re laid out on the bed Just an inch or so froers over until they overlap the tips of ic as, at lances at my face, then back down "That’s why I came with you Because you said that"

"I should’ve said it a long tio"

I mean it, too I wish I’d been able to I wish I hadn’t wasted every night I ht have been able to spend with her "Friend Boyfriend You deserved both"

She reaches up to touch ers stroke overinto a loose fist so she can skate her knuckles over ?"

"Yeah" The word is a whisper, the ainst her skin

"If I asked you why you got so upset when I gave you that oes for the throat

"Yes If you askedme for a ht at the bakery?"

I nod and turn her hand over Kiss her pal happy she’s here

"How many … partners you’ve had"

I kiss her wrist "Yes"

"How you feel about me"

"Yes"

But I think maybe she knows that already I think it’s there when I look at her, when she looks at me If it wasn’t already there, ouldn’t have lasted so long We wouldn’t have put each other through so much when it would’ve been easier to just not

I like her, and I love her, and I want her

If she asks, I’ll tell her

For now, though, because I want to and she’s staring at my lips, I kiss her neck I find her pulse and pause there, lick it, ifaster because ofto stopbeneath her jaw, behind her ear I kiss her eyelids and her nose, her cheekbones, her chin

I get my hand at the base of her spine, press up so she’ll lift her hips, ease her down onto the bed

I kiss herfor

I keep on kissing her, and she keeps letting me Her arms sneak around my back and rake down ainst soft I didn’t plan this, but her lips shape the welco for my whole life, her arht together, Caroline and , it doesn’t matter