Drake
“Are you really sure about this?” I asked.
“Of course,” Rafael said. He paused and went up on his toes to kiss me before carrying on his way, supporting the box with both hands. I watched him with a mix of jealousy, guilt, and fear. I should have been helping. He was doing all the work. Was this the right way to start our lives together? To make him resent me because I wasn’t doing anything to help?
“I mean, really?” I said. It wasn’t as though I had a lot of furniture or boxes, but still. I grabbed one of my chairs with one hand and followed him; it was just about all he would let me do. My arm was strapped across my chest, where he knew I wouldn’t be tempted to use it.
“I’m sure, dumbass,” Rafael said, putting the box down on his living room table with a sigh and turning to flick me on the bicep. “Stop trying to talk me out of it.”
“That’s romance for you,” I said, affronted. “I call you Raf, and you call me dumbass.”
He chuckled. He smoothed his hands over my biceps and shoulders, soothing me. “I don’t have any doubts about us,” he said. “Do you?”
“No,” I admitted.
It was only the voice in the back of my head that did. To be honest, it was the voice of everyone else, not my own. It was the voice of everyone I knew who would have said, isn’t this a bit soon? Aren’t you crazy to move in with, work with, and thoroughly depend on someone who you’ve only been seeing for a few weeks?
But Rafael was right. The answer to both of those questions was no; I didn’t have any doubts. We were meant to be.
And even if we weren’t, if this was all a mistake… it wouldn’t take much to extricate ourselves from each other. A new start with a new job and a new apartment in a new town – I’d done it before. It would hurt, but if I needed to, I could do it.
And if I didn’t need to?
This would end up being the best decision of my life.
“Are you sure you don’t think it’s too soon?” I asked, just because I had to ask him one last time.
“Who cares about the timing?” Rafael shrugged. “You don’t have anywhere to live. There’s no point in you spending money on a hotel or renting someplace awful just to get a roof over your head when there’s enough room for you here.”
“I shouldn’t have told the landlord I was leaving,” I sighed. “I just… before you came and told me about Grey, I was convinced I’d made a mistake and I had lost my job for good. I thought I needed to minimize the amount I’d owe in future rent, and get out of Dodge.”
“Well, I’m just glad I caught you before you did that,” he said with a grin. “Look, if it turns out that it’s awful or it is too soon, you can just move back out. Okay?”
I nodded, glad he was seeing the same side of things that I was. At least we were on the same page.
Truth be told though, on my side at least, I didn’t think I was going to ever want to move out. Not unless we were both moving out together to get a nicer place.
Because Rafael already felt like home, and I never wanted to give that up.
“Is that everything?” Rafael asked, looking around with a raised eyebrow.
“Yup,” I said with a shrug. “I already downsized once when I moved down here, and again when I got out of the first place I was staying. I’ve been traveling around for work for years, so I never allowed myself to build up a huge amount of stuff I was just going to have to get rid of anyway.”
Rafael barked a laugh. “That first night you came over, I was afraid you were going to look around at how basic my apartment is and judge me,” he said. He shook his head. “I didn’t realize we were exactly the same.”
“Well, maybe we’ll start changing that,” I said. I slipped an arm around his waist, looking around at the small living room: my stuff next to his stuff. “Start putting down roots.”
“Yeah?” Rafael asked, tilting his head.
I nodded. “Yeah.”
He looked back at the view. “I think I’d like that,” he said. “It might be nice to have a reason to want to come home.”
“I can think of one or two,” I said with a crafty look.
He caught my eye and rolled his own, but he grinned and played along anyway. “Like what?”
I leaned in without another word and captured his lips, one hand sliding behind his neck to hold him in place as I took my leisurely time with him. There was no longer any rush. Neither of us had to get home for the night, and as for work, well, we were both going in together.
We had all the time in the world – and I was going to take it.
I undressed him slowly, sending gooseflesh up his arms as I smoothed my fingertips over his skin. He shuddered with need and overwhelm as I drew him through to the bedroom, the only place not now covered with my boxes, and pushed him to sit on the edge of the bed. Between his knees, spread wider, I got down on my own and took him into my mouth.
Our eyes locked as I sucked him torturously slow, watching his hands fist in the sheets, flushes running up his neck and onto his cheeks. He moaned and said my name and begged, and even though I wanted to draw it out, I couldn’t help but give in. He lay in front of me on the bed and I lined myself up against him, taking a second just to admire the sight before me, recording every millimeter of him in my memory.
This was the kind of day I would want to remember forever.
I moved inside him and he clung to me, desperately, his fingers leaving marks on my arms. I bent over him, over his cocked legs, until he was pretzeled in half to accommodate both of us, and kissed him as he panted for breath. Sweat slicked both of our skin as he twisted under me, spinning himself around and up on all fours, looking over his shoulder with the most enticing look I had ever seen in my life.
That was when I knew.
Everything was going to be okay.
We christened every room in the small apartment that night, between trying to shift boxes to the right places and ordering pizza, eating it in front of a shitty movie that neither of us was really watching, and turning in for the night – or what was supposed to be turning in.
And if anyone noticed how tired we were the next morning, or how stiff our legs were, they doubtlessly ignored it in favor of the blindingly bright smiles we couldn’t stop wearing – or the way we moved in the kitchen like two halves of the same whole, anticipating each others’ movements flawlessly, like two people now become one.