Chapter Twenty Eight
All I know is heat and sweat when I first wake up. Noah is against me, unmistakably, in this tiny single bed he's too large for. His feet are hanging over the frame and if it wasn't for such a stark difference in our tans I wouldn't know where my limbs began and his ended.
I pull my numb arm out from underneath him and shaking it over our bodies. The movement must startle him because his grip tightens around me, his head going further into my hair.
I take the time to look around his childhood bedroom. Though there isn't must to see - grey everything, grey everywhere. Not a photo of little Noah to be seen. I do spot a poster of his own car sellotaped to the side of his desk though, worn and brown around the edges to display the age.
His hips press into me. A hand I hadn't realised was pasted between my thighs wriggles.
"How long have you wanted your car, exactly?"
It takes a few seconds before his reply comes. I imagine him blinking sleep out of his eyes and trying to register how we're in bed together - just as I had done when I first woke up.
"Too long."
"You're not one of those guys that wants to fuck their car, are you?"
A snort. Even though I can't see him I feel the roll of his eyes down to my toes. His laughter vibrates against my back and his exhale of breath is hot on my ear.
When he replies, his voice is coarse from sleep and laced with seduction. "I don't think it'd even turn you off if I was."
I flip around in his arms. My eyebrows raise at the obvious attempt to put his erection between my thighs when I do. I roll my body onto his but hover over where he'd like me to sit.
"What if I'm not into car boys?"
I take in this lovely picture as I get my answer. Face mused with sleep, hair messy and pulled in every direction, skin glowing under the warm light spilling through the curtains.
"Then you're doing a really bad job of turning me down."
"I'm trying," I coo.
A flash travels across his eyes.
I've never seen this particular smirk across his lips, the challenging glint that shines in each of his features, as his fingers appear at the back of my knees. Nails gently scrape at my skin, up and down, as slowly as his eyes rake across my body.
"Are you?" He muses.
His fingers travel slightly higher.
I nod.
"You're really trying?"
Nail scrapes against the very top of the back of my thighs. I lower myself slightly, hyper-aware of our naked bodies, even more aware of his desire for me just below my own body. If I just scoot down a bit further...
He turns my head towards his. I hadn't realised I was looking down between us.
"You can answer me."
Spoken so sweetly, so innocently, like I don't know what his true motives are. A pulse travels the length of my body, an ache between my legs hammering so intensely I wonder how he doesn't feel it perched underneath me.
"I'm really trying," I whisper.
My body lowers a fraction more.
His nails still lightly caress the back of my legs. The curve of his mouth sweeter than honey. That glint in his eye tells me that he's winning whatever game I've forgotten we're playing.
"Trying to do what?"
Fuck. His cock is right there - right below where we could connect, arching up like it wants me to -
His hand grips my chin again and lifts my head up towards him. I meet his own eyes with my wide ones, gulping.
"To do what?" He repeats.
What am I trying to do? What were we even talking about? Why aren't his hands letting me move my hips down that last tiny fraction so that I can feel every inch of him pressed against me, so that I can make this game fair and empty his head too.
"I'm trying..."
I've completely forgotten. I can't think of anything else but that playful glint and getting him inside me right this very moment.
He hums, eyes following mine when I try to look between us again. I notice his entire torso is tight, like he's about to snap too but he's physically restraining himself from doing so.
I force my body down, using the wetness that's pooled against my core to guide the tip of him where I want it. His sounds mirror my own - beautiful, lovely sounds that I should be storing away so I can access them whenever I want.
"You're trying to let me down gently, angel."
"Oh - yeah, that." I nod, looking between our bodies, at where the head of his cock is sinking into me. At his abs that are practically shaking as he tries to hold himself back using the only muscles he knows how to control. "Is this working?"
He groans as I sink further.
"Now?" I ask, breathless. "You're meant to look sad if I'm letting you down gently."
"I'm devastated," he groans, eyes squeezed shut as my thighs spread wide against his body. I lift myself up gently and drop back down, rocking back and forth. "Really, really sad about it."
Every movement I make is as slow as the last. The bed frame groans under the movement we make and I go slower to accommodate it. His eyes bore into mine, that glint still present. I place my palms on his chest and continue rocking my hips.
Noah's touch is everywhere. Between my breasts. Curled in my hair. Spreading my legs. But he doesn't once start rushing me, just continues staring like I'll disappear if he doesn't watch me closely enough.
A loud clang of pans startles our eyes apart.
I feel like I come back down the Earth all of a sudden. I can feel Noah's heavy breath under my hands, the stretch in my leg muscles, the fullness of him pulsing inside me.
He looks at his closed bedroom door and then back to me, as if he's debating continuing anyway.
"I didn't..." I wave a hand to the closed door. My internal freak out could start any minute now - his parents possibly just heard us having sex, possibly sabotaged us on purpose so they didn't have to hear. "I'll let you down gently later?"
"Gently?" He breathes. "By then, you'll have to let me down pretty strongly if you want to get the message across."
I lean down to kiss him, clenching around him when he groans at the movement. He bucks into me once, solidly, and then lifts me off quickly - like ripping off a plaster. The hiss that follows is similar.
We dress, pee - separately. Although I use his toothbrush. The boundaries of whatever-this-is seem both confusing and nonexistent. And then Noah begins to lead me downstairs; towards what I can only assume is his mothers singing.
I half hide behind him as he wordlessly steps into the living room. My eyes are as wide as saucers - I didn't brush my hair, I still smell like sex, I don't even know if Matt has met his parents - but Noah seems easy and carefree as he strides into the conjoined dining room.
The cat, Bites, still lies on the table. This time, however, he has the company of Noah's father.
It must be his father - the hair is the same if only slighter darker. His skin is the same olive tan shade and when he turns back and smiles at the two of us, I understand where Noah's killer grin came from.
The singing from the kitchen continues.
"Madelaine," he greets immediately, like we've met before and I'm here all the time. His faint Italian accent takes me by surprise. "My son told us you might wind up here one day this week."
I look back to Noah. I expect him to be embarrassed about it, to see a blush rising up his neck, but he just smiles and leans in to stroke the cat.
"My wife is just dying to meet you," his father muses.
I'm in some sort of alternate universe. Or I'm still asleep, curled up in Noah's arms on that too-small bed. This is impossible.
I should be panicking.
I should be throwing up on the floor in front of them or running out of the house scared because of the implications of that sentence. I shouldn't be blushing myself. I shouldn't be hearing the word boyfriend circling around in my thoughts as clear as day and wanting it to be true.
I've never felt more like a girlfriend. I've never met the parent of a someone I'm seeing who's heard about my existence before.
I don't throw up or run away.
I lean into Noah's side and smile back.
"I've been excited to meet the two of you as well," I return, which only widens his own smile. "I've heard you're a chef?"
His parents are dream-worthy. Perfect parents leading perfect parent lives, as if they were written by a scriptwriter for a TV show.
They met while she was on holiday in Italy; he was visiting family.
She taught him to ride a motorcycle and they had a three month long holiday travelling his parents' home country. A summer fling.
When she returned to England she hadn't even given him her number. Only a vague idea of the University that she attended and her library schedule. It took him less than a week to work out where to find her, and they dated for only a year before he proposed. Noah came three years later. Planned.
They hold hands under the dining table as we eat breakfast.
His mother is beautiful too. All hard angles and soft gestures - rough around the edges. She asks Noah about his work while his father and I talk about my own. She's made eggs but insists that her husband should've cooked instead as his eggs are 'to die for.' He says he'll make them next time.
Noah takes away the dishes and puts them in the dishwasher when we've finished eating. I should panic that he's gone, because maybe they'll be a lull in conversation or a look I don't quite know the meaning of, but it's difficult to panic in the face of his ever-smiling parents.
His mum even asks me about my work on the Christmas campaign. Says that Noah pointed out the advert when it came on TV a few nights ago and he told them I made it.
His hand appears on my knee when he returns. He strokes it with even circles, listening to me talk and letting me lead the conversation. His parents have to open up the restaurant soon - they ask us if we'd like to have dinner together there later that evening.
Boyfriend.
The word rings in my head.
We agree to dinner.
Later, after I've helped his mum tidy away the pans from breakfast and his dad and I have talked about my rugby games in University, his parents leave.
Noah fucks me against the tiled wall of the bathroom, watching me the entire time, making me cum first, talking in my ear like I'm the best thing he's ever come across in his life.
He brushes out my wet hair with a comb he uses on his own.
We go shopping for something I can actually wear to a restaurant, flirt in shops, get ready together, and neither of us mention Matt once.
He holds my hand as he drives me to the restaurant.
He holds my hand as the server shows us to our table.
He kisses my knuckles while his mother slides in the booth opposite us and begins asking about our day. When our food comes his father joins us, still in his chefs clothes, and grills us on his new menu items.
I can't help myself. That night I sleep at his parents house again.
·─────?? ??─────·