Chapter 8
8
Haruki - 18 years old
Two months later
W e lay naked, tangled up under the sheets in our air-conditioned room. It feels nicer here than outside in the hot August weather. It feels nicer anywhere with him around. Ever since the luncheon at his house, the two of us have been inseparable. Bryce has been staying here with me at the shady bed and breakfast every night. Despite my objections, he even paid Suzie extra and upgraded us to the nicest room.
I gently trail my fingers along his pecs and down to his abs, earning me a stern look. “Haruki,” he warns. “We don’t have time for this. We still have to go back to my place so I can pack my things.” He tilts my chin up and kisses the tip of my nose. “Besides, I don’t think my dick works anymore. I’m pretty sure this bed is going to break by the time we check out.”
“Your dick works just fine, Bryce,” I say with a smile as I bite my bottom lip.
“Is this your way of telling me that you want to get fucked one more time before we leave?”
“Maybe.” I blush at my own words. Bryce is the only person who is ever direct with me. He doesn’t want to read between the lines. He wants me to spell everything out for him because he wants to understand who I am as a person—my wants, my needs, my desires. Every day I spend with him is another day I get to know him, and myself, better.
“Say it, then,” he teases. “What do you want, Haruki?”
I tuck my hair behind my ear and feel my face getting hotter. “You.” I swallow my pride and repeat myself louder the second time around. “I want you.”
Bryce breaks out into a grin and starts moving his body lower on the bed. “Now, that’s better.”
“I thought you said your dick doesn’t work anymore?” I ask while looking down at him, feeling the tingles of his touch on my thighs.
“My tongue works just fine.” There it is again. The smile that I have to say goodbye to at some point.
His lips start planting slow and gentle kisses on the sides of my thighs, like he is trying to capture the feeling of my skin on his mouth. The last place they make a stop is at the tattoo on my thigh. Bryce parts my legs before licking my opening, dragging his tongue slowly until he reaches my already swollen clit.
Our eyes meet when he looks up. “You don’t have to look away,” he says. “Just enjoy the show.” With our gaze still locked on each other, Bryce puts his fingers into me while he eats me out like this is the last meal he is going to have before we leave for Hawaii.
His tongue enters my opening before moving up and swirling around my clit. I push my hips toward him, begging for more. My eyes can’t stop staring at his head, moving up and down between my legs. A moan escapes when he starts to find a rhythm that matches the buildup within me.
Bryce is still looking at me and I’m still looking at him, those piercing blue eyes getting a full view of my face blushing. “Are you close, Haruki?” I can feel the breath that comes out of his mouth on me. I nod, unable to form coherent sentences, too embarrassed to even speak with him staring.
“Are you going to come for me?” I nod again, a whimper escaping my mouth this time. And with that, Bryce starts sucking on my clit and thrusting his fingers into me deeper, curving them right at the end and pushing them up. Still pinning his eyes on me, he repeats the motion until my legs stop shaking and I stop calling out his name to the ceiling.
“Time’s up.” Bryce chuckles to himself before slapping both of my thighs. “Alright, I’m gonna go shower now. Do you want to join me?”
Putting on his T-shirt, I shake my head. “I think I’m going to pack my things first. It’s quicker this way.”
The moment the door to the bathroom closes and I hear the water running, I grab my phone from the nightstand and check my messages. He always sends me a text around this time. It’s when he gets home from work.
hayaku katte ki te, Haruki-chan (Come home, Haruki-Chan). That’s what he sent me. I don’t know whether I should laugh or cry.
I feel the tears trickling down my cheeks. He wants me to come back, but does he know that I don’t feel at home there anymore? Osaka hasn’t felt like home ever since my mom died. He and everyone else…they will only see me as the unlovable girl with the weird hair. I have nothing to come home to. He made sure of it. He took every piece my happiness one by one until there was nothing left for me there. How dare he ask me to come home now?
Resentment is slowly building up in my body when Bryce comes out of the bathroom in his briefs with a towel over his shoulder. He runs his hand over his wet hair while walking to a chair with his clothes draping over it, but stands still when he sees me.
“What’s wrong?” he asks in a gentle voice, creases forming on his forehead.
My hands grip the side of the bed as I look down at the floor. Haruki, you have to tell him. This thing that’s going on between you two is getting too serious. It’s not a holiday romance anymore. He needs to know.
“I have to tell you something,” I say through tears.
He takes a seat next to me on the bed and places his hand over mine. “You can tell me anything. You know that, right?”
“It’s bad.”
“What could be so bad, honestly?” he asks with a sympathetic but uncertain smile. “You literally saw me crying in the middle of the night because I missed a woman I don’t even remember. I don’t think you can top that off.”
“It’s equally as bad. If not worse.”
His eyebrows scrunch together. Bryce twists his body so that he can get a better look at me. “Okay, now I’m getting worried. What is it?”
“Bryce, I lied to you.”
“Well, that’s not a good sentence.”
After chewing on my bottom lip until I taste copper, I confess to him, “I’m not here for a gap year. Not really.”