29. Tom Cobalt #3
This soft moment passes between us, and I’m flooded with joy. All the other feelings recede: the anxiety, the panic, the fear.
I have no regrets.
Not one.
Then Phoenix says, “You taste as beautiful as you look, nepo baby.” Before I can really process the compliment, he’s climbing off my bed.
“Your turn?” I ask him, lifting my Calvin Klein waistband back to my hips. I sit fully upright.
“No, I already came.”
I smile. “In your pants—?”
“In my fucking hand.” He’s searching my room for a towel, and when he whirls to me, I tell him before he can ask, “Bottom left dresser drawer.”
Phoenix cleans off after locating a hand towel, and curiosities ignite in my brain. Was he stroking himself at the same time? How did I miss this?
“Were you jacking us off in unison?” I ask him outright. “To the same rhythm?”
Another smile hooks his mouth. “I knew you were out of it, but damn.”
I glare. “I was there,” I defend. “I was just—”
“It was hot. Seeing you lose your shit over me.”
“Yeah, you were the cause. This is all your fault.” I’m smiling more seeing his lips stretch higher.
He comes closer with the towel. “I was using the same rhythm. You need a replay?”
“From a different angle,” I nod. “Where I can see everything.” Mainly you.
“We’re not filming ourselves, man, so maybe concentrate more next time.”
Next time. “Presumptuous. This could be the only time.”
His jaw tics a little.
“I’m joking, dude.” I start to frown. “We’re still at a yellow though.”
“That’s fine. I honestly didn’t think you’d change the speed.”
My heart skids when he wipes my abs with the towel and places a slower kiss to my lips.
He lingers near my mouth for a beat. “We kissed,” he says. “I made us come. So now what? You think mass flooding is next? Solar flares? An alien invasion? Or just the end of the band?”
“A weak ass melody.”
“Oh.” He nods, unsurprised.
“Weaker bridge into the chorus.”
“Hmm.” He sucks in a breath through his nose, then kisses me again, unafraid.
I feel heady. “Just, you know, the deterioration of all I know and love.”
“Yeah.” He pushes off the bed, crossing the room to toss the towel in my hamper. “I’ve read enough dystopian novels to know we’re fine.”
“You obviously haven’t read enough Greek mythology.
” I rise just to zip my pants. “The whole Trojan War was started from a kiss.” Thankfully my dad is not here to correct me and say the original text wasn’t a kiss—yeah, yeah, yeah.
But in one translated version, Paris kissing Helen provoked the jealousy of a god and subsequent bloodshed.
“Is there a god watching that’ll smite the world because I made out with you?” he asks. Okay, he does know his mythology.
I scratch my brow. “Maybe.” Then I freeze. Fuck, the door is unlocked—I never locked the door! I bolt to it, then flip the latch and bang my head against the wood, exhaling a relieved breath. No one walked in on us. There is a higher power looking out for me.
Confirmed.
Phoenix is already slipping his arms through his shirt and retrieving his journal that’d fallen on the floor. “Can I use your bathroom?”
“Yeah.”
He exits into the hall, and once he’s returned, I’m clothed like we didn’t just perform a carnal act on the bed where we plan to work. Fears try to infiltrate, until Phoenix starts talking chords, keys, music.
I smile down at the sky-blue guitar against my chest. What if hooking up isn’t as much of a distraction as I thought it’d be? My smile fades at another thought, and I cut him off to ask, “What happens when the album is done?”
“We go on tour.” He reads my expression fast, since I was referring more to what just happened between us, then he adds, “No sleeping with other people on the road. You want to be fucked, nepo baby, I’m right here.
” His attention descends back to his journal.
If I want more, it means switching to a green light.
How will I know if I’m ready for that?
It’s nearing dinnertime, and we’re struggling with the seventh song. I could so easily correlate the lack of progress with the fact that we just crossed a major boundary together.
But I’m not going to. We’ve hit two-day roadblocks before. An eight-hour struggle doesn’t mean I screwed the band. If anything, it’s making me dig into the chorus to prove to myself our physical connection isn’t the problem.
“This still isn’t right,” Phoenix groans, scratching out three lines in the journal. He ends up ripping the page and balling it in his hands.
His fingers and the edge of his palm are stained with red ink. His pen burst open about an hour ago. It looks like a full-on murder scene on my bed, and he apologized exactly once for ruining my comforter. Especially when I told him I could afford five hundred of them.
“Thank you for reminding me you’re rich,” he snapped.
“No problem.” I looked at his stained hands. “Who uses red pen anyway? Other than teachers who grade papers.”
“Me.” He rubbed his jaw and smeared ink on his skin.
I’m blaming the pen and not Phoenix for the few times my concentration left my guitar. Like right now, I keep eyeing his face, his arms, his hands. Each red stain signals my brain to “look here,” but I had issues not staring at him before we hooked up.
Phoenix lets out a frustrated breath and rips another page. “We need to start over. This isn’t working, and we’re losing time.” He checks his phone. “Your brother should be coming home soon, right?”
“Don’t worry about that. You can meet Ben and stay for dinner.”
His body sags in relief, tension slipping out of his muscles.
I didn’t realize how much he was stressing.
Then he slings his head back with another groan, “Fuck. I forgot.” He cups his phone again.
“I have dinner plans with my parents. In a couple hours, actually.” He’s texting.
“I can’t get out of it. I already rain-checked them last week. ”
After my parents met his parents, I asked my mom how the meet-up went. She just said a stilted, “They’re overprotective.”
“But like in a good way?” I pried.
“In a way that does not concern you. Just focus on finishing the album with him. Let me and your dad focus on his parents.”
That didn’t bode well.