Chapter 34
Aoi
The sound of sheets ruffling and muffled sobs jolts me out of my sleep.
Blinking like a frog, I kick the blanket off me and glance at Andrew who is visibly having a horrible nightmare. Worried, I get off the bed and rush to his side, sitting down on his bedside and reaching for his shoulders.
“Andrew, wake up,” I whisper, gently shaking him.
His entire body trembles as he violently jerks under my grip, tears streaming down his face. “No, stop! Please, don’t!”
Face pale as a ghost, he jolts awake and almost bumps into me, gasping for air with bloodshot eyes. He’s drenched in sweat, glancing around himself and shaking his head as though he’s in some sort of denial. I cup his cheeks and caress them with my thumbs, soothing him as he blinks in disarray.
“Aoi?” he mumbles, lips parted and eyes wide open, scanning my face for answers. “Is it really you? You’re real this time?”
This time? This sort of thing has happened before?
I nod, brushing his tears off with one hand and pushing away the hair sticking to his forehead with the other. “I’m here. Everything is fine now. It was just a nightmare.”
His terrified expression softens as he registers my words.
He slowly leans his forehead against my chest, embracing my waist. His grip on me is almost desperate, nails digging into my side as though he fears I may disappear if he lets go.
Instinctively, I wrap my arms around his shoulders and stroke his back like I used to with-
This again? Why do I keep thinking about this familiar presence? Lately, I’ve been feeling so many déjà vus to the point it’s becoming annoying.
I feel him inhale my scent as the tension in his body fades and he melts into my touch.
“Sorry,” he mutters so softly that I barely catch it.
“It’s okay.” I stroke his head while he nuzzles against my chest. “Do you want to talk about it?”
He shakes his head, slowly detaching himself from me and I instantly feel the loss of his warmth. “Just need you here.”
“Do you want me to sleep next to you?” I ask, cupping his cheeks and he leans into my palm, nodding faintly.
I climb into the bed next to him and lay my head down on the second pillow as he settles back down on the mattress.
I almost forgot I’m not wearing anything under this damn bathrobe and I’m becoming awfully aware of it now.
But Andrew needs me right now, so I won’t fuss about a bit of embarrassment.
We remain silent, staring at each other in the pitch-black room barely illuminated by the fragmented rays of moonlight shining through the sides of the curtains.
“Thank you,” he mutters, attempting a smile. “I’m sorry I woke you up.”
I gently brush a dried-out tear from the corner of his eye and lift myself up to place a faint kiss on his cheek. “It’s nothing.”
Before I can lay back down, he cups my cheek and gently strokes it with his thumb. Lazily, his gaze drifts over my features like a cat gaping at a butterfly. Our lips hover over one another’s as my heart elicits a furious beat in my ribcage.
“No, it’s everything,” he whispers. “You’re everything.”
Our lips lock in a tender and unhurried kiss filled with comfort and warmth, unlike the lust I’m used to.
His free hand finds its way at the back of my nape, his fingers stroking my sensitive flesh like a forgotten melody played on an ancient piano.
Shudders run down my spine with each brush of his tongue exploring what his words couldn’t find.
I find myself inching closer to him, desperately wishing I could crawl into the hidden parts of his soul and take root inside, so nothing will ever tear me from him.
A current buzzes deep under the surface, murmuring sweet promises of eternal faith. The intensity of that need forces me to break the trance as I pant against his sweet lips.
No one has ever kissed me like that. I’ve never been touched with so much delicateness and filled with painful love and affection. Nor has anyone ever shown gratitude and loneliness through such doting and sincere gestures.
His eyes flutter open and meet mine, making me drown in an eternal sea of autumn leaves. “I love you.”
“Andrew…”
“I’ve never loved someone the way I love you.” He shifts under the covers, raising himself over me, his knee resting between my thighs. “I understand the meaning of life because I met you.”
My chest hurts. It constricts under his tender gaze and yet I relish this ache. It’s so different from what I usually feel when I’m wallowing in my own despair.
I feel alive. This ache means my heart is finally beating again. Not because it needs to pump blood to keep my body functioning, but because it can feel his love and has decided to answer him in a way my words could never.
He lays his weight on top of me, his torso pressed firmly against mine as he blesses me with another kiss. This time, it’s an apology and I wish I knew what he meant by that.
I reluctantly push him away, breathing hard and trying to regain my senses. “I’m sorry but we shouldn’t…”
“Don’t be.” He smiles but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “I’ll wait as long as it takes.” He places a final kiss on my greedy lips. “Can I hold you while we sleep? I’m scared I’ll have another nightmare.”
I nod and snuggle up to his firm, bare chest when he lays down on his side, relishing the sensation of his muscular arms wrapping around my shoulders and holding me caged in his embrace as he murmurs a faint thank you in my ear.
This feeling is so foreign and yet oddly familiar as though during a part of my life this is how I slept every night.
Feeling wanted and cherished.
But that’s how I know it’s a figment of my imagination because I haven’t been held for the mere purpose of sweet comfort in more than sixteen years.
Andrew has this strange ability to awaken slumbering emotions in me and melancholic memories that I would rather remained buried for eternity.
“You still owe me a secret.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Have you ever been in love?” he asks, tracing circles on my shoulder.
“I once thought I had,” I admit. “There was once a man that kissed my loneliness away every night as he held me in his arms. But I soon realized he didn’t love me like that.”
“Like a lover?”
“Like an equal."
“Oh.”
“An individual rather than an extension of himself. But I don’t think he’s ever seen me as more than something to possess. I’ve wanted his approval and affection all my life but after my last attempt, something clicked in me.”
He watches me attentively, tangling his legs with mine. “What is it?”
“I’m nothing if I’m not serving someone’s needs.”
He stops his soft movement on my shoulder and tips my chin up to meet his gaze. “You’re beyond extraordinary and there is no reason why you would need to be useful for your existence to have importance.”
“I wish I could think that way. Your brain must be a soft cloud of sunshine if you can say such things and easily believe them.”
I hate how self-deprecating I am, and I’m sure he must be annoyed and repulsed by my attitude. He must be trying to suppress his frustration because there’s no way someone as perfect as him would love every ugly piece of me.
“Maybe your mind is just clouded with fear,” he murmurs against my lips, and I shut my eyes at the feel of his breath. “You deserve to be loved for who you are. No one in the world can tell you that you don’t matter unless you mean something to someone. All that matters is you, Aoi.”
“Andrew…”
“You’re everything.”
I want to believe him. If what he says is true and I am more than a tool to fulfill other’s needs, then why is it so hard to believe?
“To whom?” I ask despite my better judgment. “Do you say that because of your feelings for me? Don’t you think that proves my point? That I only exist to fulfill someone else’s needs?”
He shakes his head and leans his forehead against mine.
“I don’t want anything from you that you’re not willing to give me out of your own will, Aoi.
You own me. All of me. My heart, my body and my soul.
Even without me to love you, you exist in abundance.
In every corner of the world, I see your smile, hear your laughter and find your mark of kindness.
You don’t need to be something you’re not, for the sake of being loved. ”
“But what if I want that affection? What if without it, I don’t know how to exist?”
A soft smile curls his lips as he intertwines our fingers.
“Then I will shower you in so much love and affection until you feel so utterly loved that you won’t ever need to question your worth anymore.
And once that’s done, believe me, you’ll realize how perfect you are.
” He kisses the back of my hand. “You’re enough.
More than enough. You can’t imagine how proud I am of the person you’ve become. ”
How can it be that the words I’ve always wanted to hear, are spoken by a man I have met barely a few days ago. And why, when all I try to do is run from what I truly want, does his soul sing to me?
“Do you love me?”
The smile he offers me is so radiant I almost wince. “More than anything in the world, my Paradise.”
I like the sound of that. The idea that my mere existence is enough for him.
His Paradise.
He doesn’t want me to fulfill his needs, doesn’t want to own me. Just to be mine.