Chapter Three #2
The overhead lights flicker again, this time accompanied by a dull clunk near the door, as if someone in the hallway kicked it in passing.
Fisher gets up to investigate. “You’re not being very reassuring,” I scold him, intending my words to be playful, though I am starting to get a little freaked out.
He’s between me and the door, so I can’t see what he’s doing, only hear the handle rattle. There’s another thunk and it takes me a minute to realize that was the sound of him dropping his forehead against the door.
“Elle,” he says, “we’re locked in.”
At first I’m sure he must be joking, though it doesn’t seem like the kind of joke he would make. I reach for my phone to call campus security, momentarily forgetting I don’t have a signal. There’s a crackle in the air, followed by an audible zing as the power cuts out again.
Only this time, everything goes down and stays down—mainframe, monitors, phone, lights—and we’re left in total darkness.
Now, when you hear the phrase total darkness, you might be thinking of, say, how hard it is to see anything in your bedroom if you get up to pee in the middle of the night.
But I’m betting there’s a seam of light under the door, or a streetlight outside your window that your curtains don’t quite block out, or something electronic—the power signal on your TV, even a smoke detector—that gives off the tiniest glow.
Total darkness is different.
My phone might as well be a brick; even the flashlight function won’t come on. I can’t see my hand in front of my face—and I know, because I try. I blink, waiting for my eyes to adjust.
They don’t.
When a disembodied smile appears a few feet away, I think to myself with surprising calmness, I’m hallucinating.
But gradually I realize it’s the same smile I’ve been looking at for half an hour.
Fisher must have turned away from the door and the maniacal grin of the Cheshire Cat on his shirt glows in the dark.
I stretch out my arm and move toward that cartoon smile like it’s a homing beacon.
When my fingertips collide with Fisher’s chest, he hisses in a startled breath at the abrupt contact.
“Sorry,” I mutter automatically and start to draw back my hand, but he catches it in his fingers—a little clumsily, because everything’s harder to do in the dark—and then, to my surprise, pins my palm to his chest.
It’s true what they say about your other senses being heightened when one is lost, because I’m hyper-aware of the texture of the screen-printed design on his shirt. I feel the curve of his pecs, too. And beneath that, the pounding of his heart.
“Don’t be,” he says, in a gentler voice than I’ve ever heard him use.
I curl my fingers against him and whisper, “Fisher? I’m scared.” This scenario has all the hallmarks of a disaster movie: we’re trapped, and since it’s Friday night, no one is likely to come looking for us for days.
He wraps his other arm around me and pulls me close for reassurance. His warm breath tickles my scalp when he promises, “We’ll be all right.”
“You don’t know that,” I point out in a voice that’s dangerously close to a whine. At the same time, I snuggle deeper into his strong, pine-scented embrace. Fisher might have a knack for getting on my last nerve, but right now, I appreciate how he’s trying to make me feel safe.
I’m not sure how long we stand like that, just holding each other. Time loses all meaning in total darkness; it’s as difficult to judge the distance between minutes as it is to judge the distance between anything else.
So I can’t exactly pinpoint how long it takes for a simple reassuring hug to become something more.
“Elle?” His breath strikes my cheek. “Should we be doing this?”
“What’s one kiss between friends?” I say, stretching onto my tiptoes.
I feel a hint of wetness, like maybe he’s licked his lips. “But we’re not friends.”
And really, I can’t argue with that.
All the ordinary first-kiss awkwardness is made worse by the fact we can’t see what we’re doing.
His lips collide with my nose, and when I’m trying to wrap my arms around his neck and pull his head closer, I stick my finger in his ear and then knock his glasses off his face.
“Oh, sorry,” I say as they clatter to the floor. “I hope they’re not broken.”
Beneath my hands, I feel him shrug. “Right now, I really don’t care.”
Finally, our mouths find each other. His prior concern about my too full lips seems to have been forgotten. He kisses me like he’s been waiting an eternity for this moment: he’s reverent, sweet, and hungry all at once.
With gentle pressure, he steers me backward until my back is against the door and I’m pinned between unyielding metal and his hard body. Honestly, it’s a relief, the sensation of being anchored to something solid when you’re surrounded by a sea of black.
This might not be the smartest thing two allegedly smart people have ever done, but I promise you, no matter what a careful, reasonable person you are, if you find yourself in a similar situation and it feels like the world might end at any moment, you aren’t going to play it perfectly safe.
We’re all mad here, as the Cheshire Cat says.
I tilt my head to give Fisher greater access as he slants his mouth over mine, licking into me before dragging his lips along my jaw and down my throat.
He’s tall, six foot two at least, and I’m not, so he has to hunch over to reach me.
But just as I start to feel a little sorry for him—he can’t be comfortable in this position—he problem solves: his hands skate down my body, and he grips my thighs just below my butt and, with a sexy grunt that has nothing to do with effort, hoists me up to straddle his waist.
I guess I always thought that kind of maneuver only happened in romance novels. After all, it requires a lot of athleticism, especially from the partner doing the lifting.
But it’s immediately clear to me that Fisher does not skip leg day.
Holy shit, this is hot. In my wildest dreams I never imagined this side of him.
Even through my jeans, I can feel his arousal.
As his tongue strokes deeper into my mouth and his fingers dig into my ass, I run my hands over his arms, his shoulders, his back, every inch of him I can reach—mostly to keep myself from grinding my pelvis against his.
Just as I’m on the verge of surrendering every shred of good sense, the room whirs to life around us in a chorus of buzzes and beeps.
We’re both breathing heavily—me, more than him, which is ridiculous given that he’s literally holding me up.
The overhead light is blinding, and I flail with one hand to find the switch next to the door and turn it off.
Even then, we’re no longer in the dark.
After a minute, we slide apart. He doesn’t let go of me until he’s sure I’m steady on my feet. Then he flips the lights on again to search for his glasses.
They landed on the floor a few feet away, evidently unharmed.
At least he snatches them up without comment and crams them on his face in passing as he makes his way back to the desk.
Still leaning against the door, I watch in disbelief as he sits down and begins to type.
A moment later, the mainframe shuts down again and its blue glow fades away.
“I had to stop it before it tried to reconnect automatically,” he explains, sort of speaking over his shoulder but not meeting my eye. “Don’t want the whole thing to get fried by another power surge. Under the circumstances, a hard reboot is a big risk.”
Hard reboot feels like a nudge-nudge, wink-wink comment on where things might have ended up if the lights had stayed off a little longer. Is the big risk part a reference to us?
Anyway, he’s got his wish: no AUSTEN-C until at least Monday, because I haven’t the faintest idea how to restart the thing on my own.
Finally, he gets to his feet. “I should probably apologize. For, um …”
“There’s nothing to apologize for,” I insist automatically, and to my surprise, I mean it—though I find myself wondering whether he’s ever said sorry to anyone before.
His eyes, which had been downcast, shoot to my face. Relieved? Appalled? I really can’t tell. He clears his throat. “Then if the, uh, if the door’s unlocked, we should go.”
“Oh. Um. Sure.” And I thought things had been awkward in the dark. “Let me just grab my laptop.”
He reaches behind him and holds it out to me. Our fingers collide, and I know it’s a cliché, but I swear a spark passes between us. It’s a miracle my computer doesn’t go crashing to the floor.
As soon as I take it from him, he steps past me to open the door. “I’ll, um, I’ll call facilities services on Monday and have them take a look at this lock. It should really have some sort of failsafe mechanism.”
He’s waiting for me to leave, but I don’t immediately move. Are there guidelines for how to say good night after a mind-blowing maybe-apocalypse make-out session with someone who, until about an hour ago, you thought you couldn’t stand?
Finally, he says, “I should get back to work.” I imagine the IT help desk phones lit up after that power outage and nod my understanding. “I’ll see you around.”
His voice rises a little at the end, but it’s not really a question.
It’s clear we both intend to do everything in our power to go back to avoiding one another …
even if the reasons for doing so feel a little fuzzy around the edges at the moment.
Tonight was the epitome of a one-time-only, extenuating circumstances kind of thing.
I listen to his footsteps echoing down the corridor, followed by the clang of the stairwell door.
As I stuff my laptop into my bag, I realize the “More Pride, Less Prejudice” sticker is gone—I guess the adhesive was in worse shape than I thought.
Disappointed, I smooth my thumb over the place where it used to be, feeling not even a trace of sticky residue. Like it was never there.