Chapter 15 #5
“Like this?” Mitch gestured at an empty tin can covered in Christmas stickers. A piece of frayed red felt was glued to opposite ends and looped over a tree branch. Inside the can was a small stuffed cardinal that had somehow appeared among their Christmas decorations years ago.
“Yeah. Old cans, broken down cardboard, hangers, construction paper I’d steal from school. Whatever we had. They got a bit more sophisticated as I got older and we could afford to buy stuff.”
Mitch walked around to the other side of the tree where Alex had hung his zombie Santa octopus and pointed at it. “If you think this is sophisticated, you’re seriously demented.”
“Yeah, okay, fair point,” Alex conceded.
Mitch took his time, admiring every ornament, grimacing at some, laughing at others, asking for the story behind certain ones.
Alex sat and let him talk out his nerves.
For his part, Alex’s nerves had solidified into certainty.
He’d been nervous before because of his lack of experience, but if the past few days had told him anything, it was that he wanted Mitch to be his. Badly.
Eventually, Mitch sat next to Alex and mirrored his position so that they faced each other on the couch. Mitch’s gaze dipped to Alex’s mouth, but as much as Alex wanted to, he didn’t respond to the clear invitation.
He did, however, place a hand on Mitch’s knee because he was dying to touch him. “I want to talk to you about something.”
“No.”
Alex jerked back. “No?”
Mitch shook his head, curly hair falling over his forehead. “Nope. You said crafts then kissing. We’ve done the crafts, so it’s on to part two of tonight’s festivities.”
Amused by him, Alex said, “That so?”
“Mm hmm.” Mitch shifted closer, just a little.
Want gnawing at his stomach, Alex yanked on a lock of Mitch’s hair. “But I need to talk to you about—oh! It does spring right back.”
“What did you expect? It’s hair, not a pipe cleaner.”
Somehow they’d shifted closer when Alex wasn’t paying attention. Mitch ran his fingers over Alex’s stubble. “You need to grow this out,” he whispered.
“I will.” Anything. Anything for you.
Mitch’s breath warmed his lips. Wanting him even closer, Alex moved his hand from Mitch’s knee and palmed Mitch’s lower back, drawing him closer.
Startled, Mitch’s breathing hitched and his hand landed on Alex’s neck, warm and firm.
They were almost chest to chest, and Mitch’s breathing sped up.
Alex was hyperaware of him, of how close they were, and every coherent thought flew out of his head.
Light-headed, limbs tingling, Alex closed the last inch of distance between them.
He wanted to savor this moment, commit it to memory, so he took his time.
He kissed the corner of Mitch’s mouth, a barely there kiss that had Mitch sucking in oxygen.
Then he kissed the other corner, and Mitch’s hand tightened in Alex’s hair, making him groan.
“Fuck, Alex,” Mitch whispered hoarsely.
Alex kissed Mitch’s eyebrow, the skin beneath his eyes, his cheekbone, tasting Mitch, memorizing him. Mitch’s free hand snuck under Alex’s T-shirt, and when Alex froze at the foreign sensation of someone else’s hands on his skin, Mitch pulled back enough to meet Alex’s eyes. “Okay?”
Alex expected the touch to feel unfamiliar and uncomfortable, but it didn’t. Not at all. He nodded once, definitively. “Okay.”
Mitch’s fingers were at once firm and sure, and soft and tentative.
Alex’s skin broke out in goosebumps and he shivered involuntarily.
Tilting Mitch’s head back, Alex placed tiny kisses on the underside of his jaw, painting a trail down his neck to his collarbone.
Mitch mumbled something and hung on to him, breathing hard, fingernails digging into Alex’s back.
And then, as if a switch had been flipped or they’d telepathically mutually decided, their lips finally met.
They didn’t inhale each other—but it was close.
Alex had kissed all of three people in his life, including Mitch.
The first had been a girl he’d sort-of-but-not-really dated for a couple of months in his freshman year, back when he’d been trying to pretend that he was a normal, horny teenage boy.
The second was a guy he’d made out with at a club in Rome on his graduation trip with JP and Jay.
He’d been drunk enough not to care that he was kissing a total stranger, and that said stranger kissed with too much tongue and not enough finesse.
Neither of those people had done anything for him. In fact, until right this moment, Alex had hated kissing.
The craving and want that hit him as he kissed Mitch floored him. He wanted to leave fingerprints on Mitch’s skin, to run his fingers through Mitch’s hair, to hold him close and assure himself that Mitch was real and his.
They were all legs and arms as they clutched at each other, tangled up on the couch.
Mitch tasted like hot chocolate and he licked his way into Alex’s mouth with a level of skill that had Alex tightening his hold on him.
To Alex’s surprise and pleasure, Mitch wasn’t all tongue.
In fact, his tongue was a secondary character in this book called Kiss Alex’s Brains Away.
Alex tore his mouth away for a much-needed breath of air. Mitch’s lips travelled down the side of Alex’s neck, up the other. He nuzzled his cheek against Alex’s, making Alex groan.
“I like your beard,” Mitch muttered.
“I noticed.”
Mitch pulled back minutely and opened his mouth to speak, but a yawn big enough to crack his jaw seemed to take him by surprise.
Alex patted his butt. “Come on.” He placed a small kiss on Mitch’s jaw. “Let’s go to bed.”
Instead of getting up, Mitch snuggled into Alex, his head tucked into Alex’s neck. “But I want to stay right here.”
“Okay.” Alex fell back on the couch with Mitch lying half on top of him. There really wasn’t enough room, but he covered them with the throw and tucked Mitch into his side. “Better?”
“Perfect,” Mitch said into Alex’s neck.
With arts and crafts supplies still scattered on the table and the Christmas tree lights shining cheerily, they fell asleep curled into each other and only woke briefly in the middle of the night to crawl into Alex’s bed, where they promptly went back to sleep with Mitch in Alex’s arms.