16. Chapter 16
Noah
I lie sleepless in bed, smiling. I hardly ever smile, so something must be wrong, but if so, it’s wrong in a good way.
Asher is asleep beside me, and I’m with him, inside him .
He let me enter him, which I never dared hope I deserved.
I still don’t feel like I deserved it, but right now, it doesn’t matter.
Amazingly enough, Asher seemed to like it too.
I pleasured us both; I made him come, and I transferred my bodily fluids inside him, and he let me.
I roll toward him, spooning him this time instead of the other way around. I nuzzle into his hair, hugging him close, smiling into his neck.
What a strange feeling—the one that’s coursing through me right now.
I feel like I want to give him everything.
My life, my body, all he’d accept, and he doesn’t even have to give me anything in return, as long as he’s here beside me, our naked bodies pressed together, the air thick and still scented with what we’ve experienced.
Even the smell of his hair is enough to make heat stir between my legs again. I press myself closer, unthinking, just letting my body lead my actions, allowing it to crave what it craves, and it craves Asher. It craves him so much.
He’s still slick between his legs, where I entered him, and I guide myself there, not trying to enter him again, but just wanting to feel the ghost of how it felt to be inside him—how warm it was, how tight, how inviting?…
“What are you doing?” Asher mumbles sleepily, but he doesn’t move, doesn’t pull away.
“I’m just feeling you. I’m just holding you.”
“Yeah, sure. Just don’t try to fuck me again.”
“I won’t. But can I just?…?keep feeling you like this?” I slide my hardness between his cheeks, and I keep smelling his hair, wanting to feel him all over. It can’t be more than an hour or two since we had sex, yet my body feels awakened, ready for more.
Asher groans. “Fine. Just don’t try to put it in. I’m sore.”
“I won’t.” I keep rutting against him, sliding into that warm place between his cheeks. I want to feel more of him, but I know he’s sleepy and perhaps not as awakened as I am.
“You want to get off? Fine.” He rolls to his stomach and tilts his ass into the air. “Just do it like this. It’s easier.”
I climb over him eagerly, straddling his thighs and sliding my cock between the mounds of his ass. I reach for the lube and pour some into his crack.
“What are you doing?” he hisses, looking behind his shoulder. “I told you not to?…? oh .”
I knead the flesh of his ass as I slide my cock between his cheeks, eased by the lube. I let the head skirt across his hole, teasing him there without slipping inside.
“Oh,” he gasps. “That feels?…?kind of good.”
I grip his cheeks and part them wide, seeing the evidence of my entry in the reddened rim of his hole. I let the head of my cock slide over it again and again.
“Fuck, Noah.” He sucks in a breath. “Okay, okay, you can fuck me, just be gentle, okay? Not all the way inside either.”
“Just the tip?”
“Yeah, just the tip, oh?…?oh fuck .” Asher fists the sheets as I slide inside, gentle, like he urged me, letting just the very tip of my cock breach his hole.
“Like that?”
“Yeah?…?Yeah, like that.”
I rock in and out of him in shallow thrusts, still gripping his cheeks and holding them apart, feeling them flex under my fingers.
“That’s it. Just relax for me, Goldilocks. Let me inside.”
“I?…?I am?…?fuck.” He gazes back at me, cheeks red and lips parted. “Are you going to come soon?”
“Yeah. Just hold on for a little bit longer, okay?”
He whines in reply, gripping the sheets so tight his knuckles whiten.
“You’re doing so well,” I praise, sliding my hand over my shaft as I bury my cockhead into him, watching the rim of his hole expand, hug the tip of me, and retract once more when I withdraw. It’s mesmerizing, that sight, and my breath heightens as I inch closer and closer to release.
“Please,” Asher whines.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, just?…?please come, and then make me come. I want to come, Noah.”
“You can come like this. Just rub yourself on the sheets.”
“I?…?I can’t.”
“Touch yourself, then.” I grab onto his hips and lift him onto his knees. “Like this.”
He reaches a hand under his body and does as I tell him.
“Okay?” I ask.
“Yeah. Oh fuck, Noah?…”
I enter him once more and delight in his choked whimper, but I make sure to keep to shallow thrusts, not letting the thicker part of my shaft inside.
Like that, it doesn’t take long for us both to reach climax.
Asher gasps helplessly as I thrust deeper into him by accident, flooding his insides with my cum.
When it’s over, I roll off him and lie by his side.
He sends me an accusing glare. “That wasn’t just the tip.”
“Sorry,” I mumble. “I didn’t mean to.”
“Yeah, sure,” he mutters, still glaring. “So when are you going to let me fuck you instead?”
“You’re the one who said you needed a break.”
“Yeah, well, now I need another one.”
“I’m sorry.”
He sighs and turns around to spoon me. “Stop saying that. It’s okay.”
Strangely enough, this position feels even better than when I’m spooning him. It feels?…?safer, having him touch me on his own, of his own will. When he lifts his hand—now unrestrained by chains—and puts it lightly around my throat, it feels even better.
“Let’s sleep now,” he says. “And don’t wake me up again; I need some rest if I’m gonna be able to fuck you tomorrow.” He gives my throat a squeeze, thumb digging into the edge of my jaw. “Okay?”
“Okay.” I smile into his touch, and we curl up in fetal positions, our bodies aligned and content.
I’m so glad I didn’t go through with what I was about to do in the forest. I’m so glad I stayed, and I’m so glad Asher did too.
In the kitchen the next day, I whistle a tune Auntie used to sing while I made her breakfast. She used to reach up from her wheelchair to touch the length of my hair that flowed down my back. “Such a handsome young boy you’ve become, Noah,” she said with a smile.
For the first time since she passed, the memory of her doesn’t sting like a thousand needles piercing my heart. I’m okay. Auntie is gone, but I have someone else now.
I set a bowl of pasta covered in alfredo sauce and ham on the kitchen island, where Asher sits on a barstool.
“Hell yeah,” he says before digging in. His hair is still a little ruffled from my hands in it, and he looks a bit tired with dark bags under his eyes, but fuck is he beautiful.
He slurps up the sauce and the pasta, and I end up barely able to eat from my own plate, not wanting to miss a second of looking at him.
“You’re a good cook,” he says.
“I know.”
He chuckles. “Well, as long as you know.”
When he’s finished his plate and I’ve forced myself to eat a half dozen bites, I reach out a hand and slide it into his hair. He stiffens, eyes flitting to my hand, but then he relaxes into it and lets me pet him like a dog.
“You like doing that, don’t you?” he asks.
“You like it too.”
“Do I?” He smiles, but it’s a weak, affected smile, nothing like his sarcastic smirks. “Maybe.”
I keep petting him for a few moments before I let my hand fall and trace his lips with my thumb, intending to wipe away the residue of his meal, but he seems to interpret the touch differently, given the way his mouth curls into a knowing smirk.
“So,” he drawls, “when are you going to let me fuck you?” His eyes twinkle as he observes my reaction, and my cheeks burn at the heat of his gaze. He makes me feel so much; it’s unnerving.
“Later. We should take a bath first.”
“Together?”
I shrug. “Why not?”
Asher reaches over to my abandoned plate, grabs a strand of spaghetti, and slurps it into his mouth. “Let’s do it, then.”
He hops off the barstool, and I follow him downstairs.
I like having him roam freely in the house; I like seeing him enjoy himself.
Had I known he would have stayed if I uncuffed him, I would have done it sooner, but this is all still so new between us, and I still have difficulty navigating our relationship.
Not only that, but Asher’s feelings toward me in general.
I don’t dare ask. All I can do is try to give him the affection I so want to give and receive in return.
Asher fills the bath this time. Getting undressed in front of each other is more awkward for me than it is for him. As usual, Asher is completely unbothered by his nudity, and he smirks at my obvious discomfort.
“It’s okay,” he says. “Nothing I haven’t seen before.”
“I’ve seen you undressed more than you have me.”
His smirk falls, and a shadow passes over his face. “Yeah, well, I didn’t have much of a choice back then, thanks to you.”
Unable to muster a reply, I swallow against the knot forming in my throat and get into the bath, and Asher follows. While he hisses at the heat, I surrender to it, sighing and relaxing my muscles. We sit facing each other, our legs touching under the water.
“I made it too hot,” Asher complains.
“It’s fine.”
He raises a brow. “You seem like the kind of person who’d have cold baths. You know, like those cold plunges. You’d just sit in them like a psycho and enjoy it.”
I try for one of his teasing smirks. “Maybe it’s because I’m not a whiny little child, like you.” My face is accustomed to not exposing any of my emotions, but Asher is so animated in the way he talks, and he must be rubbing off on me.
“Fuck off,” he snorts and splashes me with water. “My skin is gonna burn right off.”
“You’ll get used to it.”
We lapse into silence for a few moments.
Asher glances down into the water while I keep my gaze firmly on him.
After a while, I reach for his hand under the water.
He startles as I grab it, but then he flicks his gaze up to me and smiles a shy smile.
Suddenly, I find it hard to breathe. He entwines our fingers under the water, still with that shy little smile on his face.
His cheeks turn red, and he glances away. “Stop looking at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you like me.”
“But I do like you.”
He snorts, staring down into the water. “You liked fucking me?”
“I did. But I don’t just like having sex with you, Asher; I like you .”
His cheeks flush again, and he refuses to meet my gaze. “I like you too.”
I smile and squeeze his hand under the water, unable to believe my luck, wondering what I could have possibly done to deserve this.
Every moment with him is a moment to treasure.
Time disappears when we’re silent like this, just enjoying each other’s company, each other’s touch.
In some ways, it feels even more intimate than sex.
Craving more closeness, I slide forward and spread my legs around Asher’s body. He inhales a sharp breath as I lift my free hand to touch his cheek, sliding my thumb over his cheekbone.
“Do you remember this?”
“Yeah,” he whispers. “Yeah, I remember it.” His hand comes out of the water to touch my own cheek. “Like this, yeah?”
I nod, struggling to speak. That first moment in the bath, when he touched me of his own volition, his eyes as soft as his touch?…?It means so much to me. More than I can ever hope to explain.
“I’m glad you’re here, Noah,” Asher says, looking steadily into my eyes. “I’m glad you stayed.”
“Me too.” My voice chokes up with unshed tears, but there’s no reason to be sad now, so why do I feel like crying?
He slides his hand down my cheek, my jaw, and finally, he fits it around my throat. “I don’t want to feel like that again,” he mumbles. “Ever.”
“Like what?”
“Like you’re gone. Like I’m alone. Can you promise me I won’t?”
“I?…”
The hand around my throat tightens. “Promise me, Noah.”
My gaze falls along with my hand on his cheek, and for the first time, that grip feels suffocating. “I can’t.”
I always say the wrong things, but I have to tell him the truth.
This new state of being—where I don’t feel like I’m unwelcome in my own life—is so unfamiliar, so pristine, and it still fills me with disbelief.
I cannot promise Asher or myself a future of always feeling that way, just like he can’t promise me he’ll never use again.
I want to tell him all this, but I can’t find the right words or the right way to say them, and as the seconds pass, the unspoken words die in my throat.
“I’m sorry,” I mumble, and even that seems the wrong thing to say.
Asher’s expression darkens. His hand falls from my throat and dips into the water. “Come on, then—let’s wash up. I’m ready to fuck you now.”