Chapter 40
Emmett
T
he next week is a dream.
Alternating between nights at Drew’s place and nights at mine, I feel myself falling so hard for this girl, I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to spend a day without her.
last Sunday night, I was working at the bar, and I came home to a Drew that I don’t think I could ever get enough of. She had just talked with her best friend, Lacey, and she was so smiley for the rest of the night.
I asked her what they talked about to put her in such a good mood, but she wouldn’t tell me. I was selfishly hoping I was part of the secret she was keeping.
At the beginning of the week, the Drew’s school district sent the email with the plan to return to school outlined. It said that the staff’s first day back will be the following Monday, January 22nd, a full month following the shooting. The students will return the Monday after that if all goes according to plan.
We were at Lenny’s when Drew she got the email, and I could tell she wasn’t expecting the communication when her phone pinged.
I watched her soft grin twist into worry, and she reached for my hand as she read the email. When she went to show me, I could hear that her breathing was getting a little heavy, but her breaths were even and deep.
She was in complete control.
Now it’s Friday, and we have plans to stay in and order pizza. I thought I ate a lot of pizza before Drew, but this girl takes the term “favorite food” to a whole other level. I got a text from her right as I walked into Lenny’s this morning, after I had just pulled myself away from her to get to the bar for a meeting with my bartenders about some new specials as February approaches. Her text said she wanted to watch her favorite movie tonight, Scream, because I told her a few days ago that I have never seen the whole thing, beginning to end.
I check the time and see I only have to get through these next two hours before I can see my girl.
As I ride up in the elevator, I think to myself, how did I get so lucky?
How did I get so lucky to find someone that fits with me so perfectly?
Drew.
This amazing girl who understands me, who wants to know me, all of me, who gave me a chance I probably didn’t deserve. A girl who can’t get enough of me just like I can’t get enough of her.
When I get to her door, I knock gently three times, and then let myself in with her spare key. She started keeping her door unlocked when she knew I would be coming over, and that was not okay with me. I didn’t like the idea that anyone could walk in, so I told her she had to keep it locked.
“You’re a little overprotective, you know that right?” She told me.
“I’m overprotective when it comes to you.”
Later that day, before I was heading out, she went over to the junk drawer in her kitchen and gave me her spare without a word.
I walk through her door to see her reading on the couch. She finished the third book of the series I got for her, so she started different romance series about vampires. But according to her, it’s not as good as the Twilight series.
She’s in one of my t-shirts I left here, wet hair, and no pants, and it’s my new favorite view. This girl has kicked my sex drive into gear, and I cannot keep my hands to myself.
I kick off my shoes and jog up to her, settling between her legs on the opposite side of the couch, expelling a squeal from her. I dig my fingers under the cotton of her underwear and slide them down her legs.
“What do you think you’re doing?” She’s asking, even though she knows the answer, her book is still in her hands.
“Shh… Keep reading.” She hides behind the book as I part her with my tongue, feeling her become wet at my touch. “I’ve been thinking about this all day. Don’t mind me.” I grip her thighs, keeping her open, as I suck, nibble, and kiss the sensitive pink skin.
“I can’t focus when you do that,” she breathes, dropping the book off to the side.
I keep lapping her up, loving the taste and loving the view. Her eyes fall back in her head, her arms gripping the couch. “Then focus on me, sweetheart.” My words always exactly what she needs because I watch as she gets closer and closer before falling apart before my eyes.
I leave her with a few last kisses on her most sensitive spot before standing up, unbuttoning my jeans. I kneel back down, one knee down, one knee up, and I pull her hips to meet me, the couch being the perfect height for me to bring her to a position with her at the edge, and then I sink into her, wet and ready for me.
Still coming down from her first orgasm, I pump into her. “Give me another one, baby.”
She feels like heaven, if heaven was real.
I tighten my grip on her hips, her back arching in pleasure, I can tell she is right there. “You take me so well, don’t you?” I tell her, and she moans at my words.
A few more rocks of my hips, and I’m sending her right into her second orgasm. “Atta girl,” I praise her. The tightening around me is the perfect sensation as I pick up speed, slamming into her.
She’s my heaven.
“Fuck.” I groan, releasing inside her. She lets me every time, always giving me a flutter in my stomach at the thought of filling her up.
Her hold on me is growing more every second.
We eat our pizza on the couch, laughing at the fake blood and how the nineties style is making a comeback. She tells me how she and Lacey used to fight over who was better looking: Skeet Ulrich or Matthew Lillard, her vote being for Skeet Ulrich.
Just like her, the night is perfect.
Perfect until the movie ends, and we get into bed.
I noticed she has been quiet since we laid down, and I need to know what is going through her mind. My arm is around her, her backside flushed to my front.
I kiss her on the shoulder. “Is everything okay?”
She turns to face me, tears welling in her eyes. “What if I can’t go back?”
My heart breaks, and I know she is talking about school, about her classroom.
“One day at a time, “ I remind her. Just like she told me her therapist says. She has been going to therapy every Tuesday, adding an extra session this past Thursday with the return to school being in just a few days. Drew says hearing the phrase helps when she feels herself getting anxious or nervous or when the thoughts of the shooting flood in.
I wipe away a tear that runs loose from her eye with my thumb, bringing her in closer to me, just to hold her. “I know it doesn’t feel like it now, but you can do this.” I rest my chin on the top of her head, feeling her breath against my chest.
“But, what if I don’t want to?”
“What do you mean, sweetheart? You love teaching. You love your kids.”
I think of all the stories she has told me about her kids and the wonderful chaos that takes place in her classroom. She once told me that she loved her students so much, and it gave her a glimpse of the love a mother has for her children. I remember my stomach flickering at the comment of her being a mother, a foreign scene of us with a mini-Drew playing through my head for a brief moment when she explained this to me.
Drew has taught me so much about the education world and the work that teachers do, and it has made me fall for her even harder, seeing the passion in her eyes as she talks about it, the love in her voice when she tells me the stories, even the ones about the amount of penises she finds drawn in all the crooks and corners of her classroom.
I thought I had an idea about teaching before I knew Drew, remembering the stories my grandma would tell me, but I truly didn’t understand how people could do it until I watched Drew light up when she talked about her students.
“I know,” her voice breaking, “but—”
“But what?”
“But, I’m scared.” It’s all she says, but I know the statement holds more. Of course she’s scared. Scared to go back to somewhere she used to call her “happy place,” but it now reminds her of the most horrific day of her life.
“It’s okay to be scared. You went through something terrible, horrible. These feelings are perfectly okay.”
“I know.” She sniffles before continuing, and I give her a kiss on the top of her head. “I just keep going back and forth on whether it’s worth going back.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, what if I’m not cut out for this. I can’t imagine going back and telling the kids we can go back to normal when I don’t even think I believe it myself.”
She’s right.
What is normal after experiencing what her and her students experienced that day?
I pull her into me even closer, wishing I could take all the doubt she is having away. “Let me take you to school on Monday.” She pulls back from my hold, just a little, to meet my eyes.
“I don’t think we can have visitors in the building. Not after what happened.”
“I’ll wait for you outside. I’ll be there whenever you need a break or fresh air. Or this,” I kiss her, feeling her smile against my lips.
“I have an eight hour day with only an hour for lunch. The students won’t be there, but I’ll be in meetings all day, and—” I stop her with another kiss.
“I have nowhere else I need to be. I’ll be there, just in case you need me.”
“I don’t want you to feel like you have to do that.”
I pull her into me. “Sweetheart, I wouldn’t offer unless it was something I was willing to do. Plus, you’ll be the one doing the hard work. I’m just there to cheer you on.”
Her had nuzzles more into my chest, and I rest my chin on the top of her head. “Thank you,” she whispers.
I kiss the top of her head and draw mindless circles on her back with my fingertips. Her breathing becomes a little more even, and the tears dry.
Against my chest, her breaths become deeper. “Drew?” I whisper, making sure she is asleep.
The words flow off my lips easily, knowing she can’t hear me. “I think I’m falling in love with you.”