14. Alana
Didit take several days for Alana to recover from having Mrs. Miller visit the apartment? Yes. Absolutely.
Did she also spend that time worrying how things were going to be, now that Hudson had fully experienced Alana On Her Period?
So much time.
And so even though she hated uncomfortable conversations, especially with people who she was in consistent close proximity with, Alana decided she had to lance this elephant before the metaphorical pus oozed all over her immaculately cleaned living room.
Hudson’s door was closed when she got home from work that afternoon. His schedule didn’t usually overlap with hers, and he tended to go to bed earlier than she did. He was awake, she could hear him puttering around with…well, she wasn’t sure what.
Holding a container of mini cupcakes she had picked up on her way home as an attempt at bribery, she knocked on his door.
An endless moment later, the door cracked open a little.
“Hi,” Alana said cheerfully. “Do you have a couple of minutes to talk? I brought food bribery.” She held out the cupcakes.
Hudson looked at them, and her, with confusion. “Sure,” he said, and stepped out of the bedroom.
So much for her seeing whatever art project he was working on. Which was fine. It was his safe space, and he could keep it as private as he wanted. She’d just have to wait until he posted a Patreon update.
The living room couch felt smaller than it ever had.
Alana flipped open the container of cupcakes and set it on the coffee table. “I realized after I had my period, that I hadn’t quite prepared you for how bad it would be. Especially that you mostly work from home.” She paused. “And I know you said that things weren’t going to change now, but I just want to make sure that you’re still okay living here.”
“Why wouldn’t I be okay living here?” Hudson asked, looking thoroughly bewildered.
“Because I’m not exactly a low-maintenance kind of roommate.”
“I don’t think I would use that phrase to describe you,” he said. “But then again, I wouldn’t use ‘high-maintenance’, either.”
“What would you use?”
“Can’t say I ever gave it much thought.”
“Probably that I’m a lot,” Alana supplied, holding back the sigh. It was what everyone said about her. It wasn’t wrong, but sometimes it just felt stifling. Like it was a phrase that the people who didn’t want to take the time to get to know her used to brush aside her personality.
“No, I’d say extroverted,” Hudson continued, a small wrinkle forming between his eyebrows. “You love people a lot, Alana. Which is great. I just…do not feel the same way about people. Large groups of people exhaust me. Every time we all go to Nest, I crawl into bed after and want to stay there for like a week, recuperating.”
“How the hell did you work in a cafe then? How have you managed to make any art if you had to people every day?” Alana demanded.
Hudson shrugged. “To be honest, I have no idea. But it’s been a relief to not have to do that anymore.”
“That’s why you went to bed so early every night? I thought you were one of those early to bed early to rise kinda people.”
“Nah, only out of necessity. But that’s why I try to go camping or whatever as often as I can. Even though it’s with other people, I can go off by myself.” His lips twisted up in a half smile. “Such a white guy privileged thing to say, I know.”
“Little bit, yeah. You definitely wouldn’t be the first one dead in a horror movie.”
“Statistically, no.” Hudson examined the cupcakes. “What are these?”
“Bite-sized cupcakes. I got the chocolate variety pack because hard conversations need chocolate.”
“This is a hard conversation?”
“It had the potential of being uncomfortable.”
Hudson nodded thoughtfully. “I guess.”
“So. Just reiterating. If anything makes you uncomfortable or if you need to nest by yourself away from people, you’ll tell me, and I promise I won’t be offended or feel inconvenienced. And if my medical shit is too much, let me know. I promise I’ll be okay. Deal?” Alana stuck her hand out.
“Deal,” Hudson replied, “On the condition if my medical shit becomes too much, also.”
“I thought you were fine,” Alana said. She was definitely not going to start worrying about a world where Hudson was not whole and healthy.
“I am,” he said. “But just in case.”
“Fine.”
“Deal,” he said, and shook her hand.
Did she spend time fixating on the shiver of awareness she felt when they shook hands? No. Like an adult person, one who truly understood the difference between Roth IRAs and 401Ks and had a solid credit score, Alana shoved that interaction out of her consciousness and asked Hudson if he wanted a beer or cider as she went to a seltzer of her own.
“No thanks,” he replied. “It fucks with my medication, so I don’t drink.”
“Okay.” Alana meandered back into the living room, seltzer in hand, and collapsed back onto the couch. “I’m thinking of watching a movie or something. Do you want to join, or do you want me to wear headphones or something?”
Hudson leaned back on the couch. “What movie or something?”
“That would have involved foresight and future planning, and I have done neither of those things.” Alana pulled out the remotes from the side table basket, and clicked down the enormous projector screen that was mounted to the wall. “We have a few streaming services and that’s about it, unless you have any others that you have passwords to.”
Hudson scanned the options. “I think I have a few more,” he said. “JP has all sorts of random streaming services. Gets it when he works with people.”
“I work in IT,” Alana said glumly. “I don’t get presents from clients.”
“I worked in a cafe,” Hudson replied. “I barely got tipped.”
“You’re also an artist.”
“No fancy presents for doing that.”
“Yet,” Alana said.
“Yet,” Hudson agreed.
Alana scrolled through Netflix, looking for something to watch.
“Would you mind if we watched something ocean-based?” Hudson asked. “The piece I’m working on now is for a marine conservation society’s main office and nothing seems to work.”
“David Attenborough, a World War II naval film, Jaws, Sharknado, Moby Dick, the new Little Mermaid, the old Little Mermaid, the Magic School Bus episodes under water…” Alana trailed off. “What kind of ocean?”
“Magic School Bus episodes?” Hudson repeated.
“Oh, don’t tell me you don’t occasionally watch TV shows from your youth as a desperate attempt to soothe your adult woes with misplaced nostalgia.”
“Um.”
“Could be just me, then.” Alana gestured. “What kind of vibe are we working with here, Hudson?”
“I’ll probably end up falling asleep halfway through whatever it is.”
Alana eyed Hudson’s long body and then the couch. “Uh. I don’t think that’ll be too comfortable for you.”
“I’ve slept on much worse. Don’t worry about me.”
Alana eyed him suspiciously. “No need to be a martyr.”
Hudson gave a bark of laughter. “I promise you, that is not going to happen.”
Alana took a sip of her drink and shrugged. “If you don’t make decisions, I’m making one.”
“Go for it.” Hudson leaned back on the couch, looking a little less like a mannequin someone had placed in a showroom for beautiful men on quirky pieces of furniture.
Alana scrolled through and found a documentary about people who lived on sailboats full time. After a quick Google to make sure they didn’t die horribly in a storm at the end of the movie, she pressed play.
Twenty minutes in and Alana had finished her drink and was realizing all she had eaten today were the two mini cupcakes she had during her conversation with Hudson, and she was starting to feel a little wobbly. Not anything that would inhibit her ability to make good decisions, but just enough that she was starting to get ideas.
Hudson, despite his claims earlier, was not asleep at all. In fact, he was watching the movie with an intensity that Alana wouldn’t have minded being directed toward her again.
(It was probably her hormones, she rationalized. She always got hornier the days before her period started. Maybe her body was just trying to get her to eke some joy out of the same organs that would very soon make her life, once again, a living hell.)
The couple on screen talked about how they had quit their jobs so they could live on a boat full time, and how they made their income sharing their adventures with people who lived vicariously through them.
“I dunno if the thought of living on a sailboat is appealing,” Alana pondered. “Like, in concept, being able to spend as much time at the beach seems like a dream come true but also, I don’t know how seasick I get. Not to mention I’d have to learn how to do my own nails and we’ve already walked down that terrible path once.”
“I’m not sure if it makes more sense for the long term to be living on the ocean or on land,” Hudson replied. “But I don’t think there’s space on that size boat for the size of some of the projects I’ve made. Not to mention I’d probably die. Or just be in incredible pain.”
“Yeah, the whole ‘not fully able-bodied’ thing really does fuck up all my delusional life plans.”
“Why does it not surprise me that there are others?” Hudson asked.
Alana shrugged. “Because we’ve met once or twice? Honestly, it’s not like any of them are real. They’re just…happy little daydreams to keep me moving along, you know? Kinda similar to the little daydream storytime fantasy things you tell yourself before you go to sleep?”
Hudson’s gaze sharpened. “I have no idea what that means.”
Alana almost dropped her seltzer. “What do you mean? Is that not a thing that guys do?”
“What are you talking about?”
Alana was too surprised to filter what came out of her mouth next. “You know. The little sex stories you sometimes tell yourself to get off before you go to sleep. A little porn, starring you and some mystery person. Why are you looking so confused?”
“Is that a thing you do?” Hudson asked.
“I literally just said it was. I mean, not every night, but just sometimes. Doesn’t everyone?”
It was at that moment when Alana realized just how small her couch actually was when she and Hudson were both sitting on it, and just how close they were. How close their faces were.
“What kind of things do you think about?” Hudson asked. His voice, if possible, was pitched even deeper than it usually was.
“Not medieval sex things. Or Regency. I tried after that weird ass conversation we had about bad medieval porn but then my mind latches on to random details and then the next thing I know I’m down a google rabbit hole, learning about sewage systems in Medieval Europe, which is not the point nor purpose of the pre-sleep bedtime story that I tell myself.” Alana put down the seltzer on the little side table. “You still haven’t confirmed that it’s also a thing that you do.”
“Masturbate?” Hudson’s eyebrows raised. “You want me to confirm that I masturbate?”
Alana was not going to look over at Hudson’s crotch. She was going to be responsible, and respectful, and not a horny?—
Fuck.
She was definitely not the only one who was turned on by this conversation, and by the proximity.
“Well, saying it like that, I would assume you do. I mean, I assume most people do. Not that I necessarily think about just like, random people masturbating…” Alana trailed off. She was not making any of this any better.
“But you do think about me.”
“Uh. I plead the Fifth.”
“I don’t know if you can use the Fifth Amendment to get out of admitting sex thoughts, Alana Bruckner.” Hudson was right there.
Right. There.
“And when did you become a constitutional scholar?” Alana shot back. She was not going to touch him. She was going to keep her hands to herself, and she was not going to fuck up the next year of her life by shamelessly throwing herself at Hudson Miller, no matter how close he was and how turned on he was and how good the sex had been.
She was not going to touch?—
Hudson placed a hand on her arm. “Do you really want to argue about this one?” he asked, his voice slightly deeper than usual.
Not that she noticed.
Not that the sound of his voice, all growly and deep, went straight to her pussy.
No.
Definitely not.
Alana shrugged. “Up to you.”
“If I was to, say, consensually reach my hand into your pants right about now, what would I find?” Hudson asked.
“A pair of underwear?” Alana tried.
Hudson smiled slowly. “Oh, so we’re playing like that today. Excellent.”
Alana all but batted her eyelashes up at him. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You forgot to put on a bra, Lana, and I can see the outline of your piercings.”
“Oh. Uh. My bad?” she offered.
“That didn’t seem like a very sincere apology.”
“You insinuated that you’d be putting your hand down my pants. How sincere exactly is this apology supposed to be?”
Hudson smiled, slow and sultry. “Well, it depends on how you want to apologize.”
Alana did some quick internal emotional calculations, and then decided not only to fuck it, but to fuck Hudson. She’d deal with the fallout on a day that wasn’t today.
Today was for pushing Hudson to see how far she could go before he snapped. And she was very excited for him to snap. If Connecticut had been any indication, it was going to be glorious.
“What if I decided that apologizing just wasn’t on the menu tonight?” Alana asked, meeting his gaze. “What if I just…didn’t feel like feeling sorry?”
“Well, that’s not very polite.”
“I can’t say that anyone’s ever accused me of being polite,” Alana replied, laying a hand on his arm. “And I don’t really think you’re going to be the one to uncover the polite part of me.”
Hudson’s eyes gleamed. “I don’t know, Alana, I think I can find politeness. Somewhere.”
“Questionable.”
Hudson leaned forward until they were breathing the same air. “Do you know what’s considered polite?” he breathed.
“Using the correct fork?”
“Saying please.”
“…oh.”
“Oh is right.” Hudson hovered over her. “I think there may be a few pleases in you.”
“I don’t know where you heard those rumors,” Alana panted. If he didn’t touch her soon, she was going to explode.
“A little birdy told me.”
Alana was now lying all the way back on the couch with Hudson hovering over her. “Yes?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, if you don’t touch me soon, I will scream.”
“Wrong yes,” Hudson said, lowering down enough for her to feel just how much he wanted to be there with her. “But a good starting point, I think.”
And then he kissed her.
God, she had missed being kissed by Hudson. Had she admitted to anyone how much their wedding kiss haunted her dreams? No. Absolutely the fuck not, because that would be admitting that she had any feelings for Hudson that weren’t just casual and that was not going to happen.
But she missed being kissed by Hudson, and had she even been kissed by him often enough to miss it?
“We have a problem here,” Hudson said, pulling back from her a little.
“Do we?”
“I can hear you thinking,” he said, dipping his hands below her shirt. “Which means it’s both too loud, and you’re not distracted enough.”
“I did warn you that my brain goes down rabbit holes.”
“Let’s see what we can do to keep it from swan diving in, shall we?” Hudson grinned.
“I feel like you taking off your shirt would help.”
Hudson paused.
“Orrrr, if you don’t feel comfortable doing that, that’s also fine?”
“How about,” Hudson said, tracing circles on Alana’s stomach, “we go to a bedroom instead, and not try to have sex on this couch?”
“I’ll let you know,” Alana said, “…actually, I haven’t had sex on this couch, so I don’t know what the experience would be like. But maybe a different time.”
“We’ll add it to the calendar,” Hudson said. “But I have a few more questions about this whole ‘pre-bedtime sex fairy tale’ that you were mentioning, and possibly the only way to have all those questions answered is for me to do some sincere investigative journalism.”
“Uh, not consenting to being recorded.”
“God, no. I was thinking more of the having you demonstrate, and then I can ask follow-up questions.” He reached out a hand to help her up. “You know. For science and shit.”
“I’m sure that’s what all the best researchers say,” Alana said as she kept her hand in his and headed toward her bedroom. “As part of their hypothesis.” She stopped at the edge of her bed. “You’re wearing too many clothes, Hudson.”
“What’s the normal clothing situation when you think about me?” He leaned against the wall near her bed, and she was going to have to report him to someone. No man should be able to be that effortlessly attractive. It was rude, honestly.
“Significantly less than this,” Alana replied. “Well, except for that one medieval attempt.”
“Tell me about the medieval attempt.”
“Okay, Dr. Freud.” Alana lay down on her bed. “Well, you see, I had a deeply troubled childhood…”
“And one night I decided to fantasize about my husband-roommate,” Hudson prompted.
“That sounds like those weird polygamy cults that have TV shows on TLC,” Alana said.
“Are you purposefully trying to not want me to fuck you?” Hudson asked, starting to laugh.
“Why would you say that?”
“Because now I’m imagining what the TLC version of husband-roommates would be, and I hate it.”
“That feels like it’s a you problem, not a me problem.”
“You know what’s a both of us problem?” Hudson asked, coming to sit on the edge of Alana’s bed. “The train has derailed, and we are careening toward a metaphorical cliff. And once we go over, we’re both going to remember why we shouldn’t be doing this.”
Alana stopped. “Take your shirt off, Hudson.”
“No.”
“Fine, I’ll take off mine.”
“Did I say you could?”
“No, but I said I could.”
“Are you the one driving this train, Alana Rose?”
Why was it so sexy that he used her full name? The only ones who ever did that were her parents when she had been in incredible amounts of trouble, so, not good nor sexy memories. And yet Hudson leaning over her and calling her by her full name…maybe she had more daddy issues than she thought. “I don’t know, am I?”
“Babe, if you were driving the train, we would be doing a Dora The Explorer-esque adventure through a rainforest.”
“You know,” Alana said, stripping off her shirt. “Bringing Dora into this is not helping the sexiness.”
“You know what is, though,” Hudson countered. “Flashing me your tits.”
Alana grinned, smug. “I know.” She reached to cup them. “Aren’t they great?”
Hudson reached over and unclasped her fingers. “Mine,” he said, his voice practically a growl. “For me to touch, not you.”
“Okay, Cookie Monster.”
“Are you just fucking around on purpose?” Hudson asked, leaning down and capturing a bejeweled nipple in his mouth. Alana squirmed, and threaded her hands through his hair. He could stay there forever, as far as she was concerned. “Because,” he said, kissing a line to the other nipple, “it feels like that’s what’s happening.” He latched onto the other nipple, biting at it gently.
“I just…” It was getting hard to think. “I feel like you’re holding…back on me.”
She remembered Connecticut. Hudson dropping the very tight reins he had on his self-control before backing her up against the tree. He had been teetering toward that kind of intensity, back on the couch, but maybe she had been thinking too hard.
Hudson sat back up. “Your toys are in the nightstand drawer?”
“Yes. Why?”
Hudson peeled his shirt off, tossed it toward the chair Alana had in the corner of her room, and opened the nightstand. “So I can run this little experiment,” he said, pulling out the wand. “And we can go back to the main objective of this evening.”
“Which was?”
Hudson without a shirt was illegal. She was sure that somewhere, someone was drafting up a law forbidding him from being so attractive. There were probably provisions and clauses and other legal words she was not remembering now, because Hudson was half-naked and there were more important things for her to focus on, and not trying to remember if the Schoolhouse Rock song had more clues on how said law would be passed.
He turned on the wand and tested it against the inside of his wrist. “Something about you learning some manners.”
Alana eyed him and the wand. “Is this going to end with me begging?”
“Nothing would make me happier.”
“Oh, God.”
“Not yet.”
Much, much later that night, Alana eased herself out of bed.
“How do you have any energy to climb out of bed now?” Hudson asked from where he was sprawled, naked and sated.
“Because I have enough vaginal-based health issues that I don’t want to add a UTI to the list.” Alana grinned. “And if I pee now, I don’t have to ask you if you’re into watersports.”
“Not the sexual kind,” Hudson replied. “But underwater hockey always sounded like fun.”
Alana stopped in her tracks, halfway to her bedroom door. “You made that up.”
“I very much did not.” Hudson inched up on her bed so he was leaning against her four thousand pillows. “It’s an actual sport, played in water.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Want to bet on it?” Hudson asked.
“What do I get if I win?” Alana countered.
“I make you come so hard the neighbors will be concerned,” Hudson said.
“And if you win?”
“I make you come so hard the neighbors will be concerned.”
Alana thought for a second, then walked back to Hudson and stuck out her hand. “Deal.”