“Touch me. I don’t care how. I just need to feel something right now…”
she can’t sleep. heat gathers in her throat, restless on the sheets as she reaches for a body that isn’t there and her hands fall upon empty space. they were getting good at this game, locked in orbits that would shadow but never touch, the two of them in a constant dance, each hunted by that which they couldn’t have. one touch was never enough ; it had to consume them and a kiss could never be just a kiss, for thea would let herself drown in it. the sofa seemed like a truce. a no-man’s land, where they’d be safe from the idea of it, but close enough that come morning she wouldn’t have to miss the sight of him bed-haired and searching for coffee, nor would he have to wake without her pouncing onto his chest to throw him awake, her hands in his hair and promising croissants in bed. but now, hours later, while the night whiled on and the dawn began to break over the far side of the island, she found herself needing the press of his back against her chest, her arms curled around him, the safety of sleeping in numbers.
still, she refuses to move. until the urge weighs so heavy against her ribcage that it feels like it could burst out of her chest like in alien, and she’s throwing herself from the sheets, closing the distance between the bed and the door, throwing it open to find him there on the other side, eyes wide, like the two of them at once had both been struck by the same idea. for a moment, she allowed the silence to hang like a dropped coin, bright and sharp. with her lips still parted in shock, thea hung in the door-frame face-to-face with the boy she’d been seeking, struck with the know edge he’d been seeking her, too, and yet too cowardly to reach out her hand and break the space that stretched into miles between them, until—
"touch me. i don’t care how. i just need to feel something right now." she doesn’t have to be told twice. vera’s light across the landing’s off — she’s been out for hours — but still it’s with the haste of a woman half-starved that thea pulls him into the room, and presses him flush against the door as it closes. her hands on his chest feel nervous somehow, and as she pushes onto her toes, noes brushing against his, her lips only hover a breath away from his before she fudges, kisses the space between his eyebrows instead, kisses each eyelid in turn and the tip of his nose as she pulls him towards the bed, the two of them tumbling headlong into sheets, into pillows, into uncharted territory, hands tugging at his shirt as her lips find his neck, and her teeth, and her hands, and she’s climbing on top of him to kiss every inch of skin she can find. “kiss me.” the words fall from her lips without grace, catching on her tongue, the beginnings of a prayer, and it’s only when she opens her eyes and sees all the places her lips have stained him pink that the only place left is his mouth, still pale as ever, her hands balled in fistfuls of his shirt. “kiss me,” she repeats, more desperately, her hands sliding down to his hips. “i can take it, i promise. i don’t even have to kiss back. i just want to know how it would feel. just this once.”