CHAPTER 29
I don’t know if I dozed off for five minutes or five hours but it’s almost pitch-black and Archie’s arms are still around me.
I want to run away but he’s so warm and he smells so nice and …
Wait! There is something poking my back, and—oh shit!
I quickly spin around and my forehead bumps against Archie’s.
He blinks awake. He must have dozed off too.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asks groggily.
I cannot possibly admit what I was thinking about. ‘I’m cold,’ I whisper. It’s true. I’m still freezing. It’s why I can’t move away from him. He’s protecting me from hypothermia. My hands are balled at my chest and my fingers are like ice.
I see Archie smile in the filtered moonlight. He reaches for my hands, slowly uncurls my fingers and wraps his own hands around them.
‘Is this better?’ he asks.
My eyes widen. I should move away right now. I should make haste. I should run for the hills. But the truth is, it is better. He’s so warm and—oh. Archie shifts against me, and yes, ladies and gentlemen, I can confirm: this is not a drill.
I quickly take stock of the situation: it’s late at night, it’s the weekend, the New Friends Game has ended, Boss still hates Archie, Archie still hates Boss, I’m still supposed to hate Archie but maybe I … woah.
Archie weaves his fingers between mine so they’re interlaced now, and for some reason this feels more intimate than anything we’ve done before.
My heart skitters. He can probably feel it vibrating through my chest. His eyes are shimmers of onyx, and we’re so close that our foreheads are almost touching.
My lips are in danger of collapsing into him.
If I breathe I will kiss him, and I don’t know what to do, because I need to breathe, right?
Or do I? I can’t remember. What were the rules of this game? Are we still playing it?
‘Millsy.’ His voice is lower than a whisper. It’s the blink of a star. It’s like I never heard it. My eyes are straining to make out the contours of his face. Our hands are still woven together, and I don’t know where I finish and he starts.
I decide I’ll close my eyes and drift off again so I won’t have to deal with this.
Everything is warm. It feels like clouds, a lullaby, a heated blanket and a dreamless sleep.
Archie shifts so he’s flush against me and …
I inhale sharply because suddenly it’s abundantly clear: I am not asleep, I am awake.
I tug my fingers from his grasp and twist them through his hair.
His lips brush mine and something metaphysical stirs in my body.
I arch my back and suddenly there is an exponential rush.
His hard-on presses my thigh, his earthy citrus scent floods my senses.
Our hands scrape over every piece of each other that we can find. Skin, fabric, hair. We are ravenous.
‘Archie,’ I gasp, as his mouth coasts a line from my ear to my collarbone. ‘I should have told you before but …’ I gasp again as his palms run featherlight over my breasts. ‘… you are surprisingly excellent at kissing.’
‘Shhhh, Millsy,’ he rasps, pulling my hips closer to his.
I whimper in pleasure and feel his lips curve against my skin at the sound, and god, I love knowing I can make him smile.
My hands skim the stubble on his jaw, his teeth bite my lip. I want every sensation to last forever but I also need more of him. My legs part to invite him closer and his mouth moves more urgently against mine.
I can’t believe how well we do this. We are so attuned to this cat-and-mouse game that our bodies are perfectly in sync. When he shifts, I slide; when he dips, I rise. We are Olympians, Archie and I. We are at the top of our game.
My nipples pinch as I arch into his chest and I’m suddenly very aware that I am one hundred per cent braless right now. As though the thought has floated from my brain into his, his hands slide up my T-shirt.
‘Millsy,’ he murmurs.
I grunt something incomprehensible. We should not be talking. The Olympic judges would deduct points for talking. We can communicate via kissing.
On cue, his mouth finds mine again. I grind my hips against his.
Actually, I do really want to talk to him—to discuss the parameters of what we’re doing: is it still a game?
Are there rules? Is there a time limit? Is this a grace period?
—but more desperately than that, I want to dig into him.
Feel everything. My fingers dip into the waistband of his pants and my heart flutters triumphantly when I hear him moan.
I’m being outrageously unsubtle but not a flicker of embarrassment crosses my mind. I am a woman possessed by a feverish, raging want.
We’re lying on our sides, pressed against each other but it’s still not enough. Archie’s muscly thigh levers over me and my mouth responds with a message: more. I need to feel his whole weight. Obligingly, with one deft flick of his arm, he flips me onto my back.
‘Yessss,’ I breathe in sweet relief. That’s what I wanted.
I feel the crease of Archie’s smile against my shoulder and I grin back through the shadows. Inexplicably, I want to cackle. This is FUN.
As our mouths meet again, I have the same thought I had that day in Fatima’s storeroom. This is more than kissing. This is foreshadowing something. If two people can kiss this well, imagine what else their bodies can do together. Another thought bulldozes in: Why the hell am I still clothed?
Archie’s words are muffled against my skin. ‘Millsy, are we doing this?’
I’m not sure what the rules are, but I am very clear on what’s next on the flowchart. I press him back slightly to give myself some space, grip the hem of my borrowed hoodie and T-shirt and pull them off over my head. I nod once, smiling. ‘You and me, Archie.’
I have possibly never said anything more outrageous in my life. I almost laugh.
Archie grins, sliding his fingers down my bare sides. ‘That is such good news.’
He sits back for a moment, his eyes tracing a reverent path over my body. His breathing is low and heavy. Mine is nonexistent. I wish he would come closer. I want to feel the solidity of him on top of me, against me, inside me, but for a moment he’s immobile.
It takes too long—in a similar timeframe, I could probably write four press releases, the foreword for the annual NAPLAN compendium and squeeze in a viral TikTok moment—but finally, finally, he pulls off his T-shirt.
He lowers himself to kiss me gently on the lips.
I feel giddy with lust. Drunk, almost. My fingers grab at the fabric of his pants and he lets me peel them off so I can run my hands over all his skin.
I kick off my own pants and when I’m done, he rolls me on top of him.
His hands move firmly up my thighs to my waist and I squirm in pleasure.
Then suddenly, his grip releases. He’s still touching me, but his fingertips are light, almost floating, as if there’s a forcefield between his skin and mine.
He’s teasing me and I can’t stand it. I want to be grabbed, taken. I want him to want me like I want him. He’s fire and I’m ice; I’m melting, he’s winning. I tug him close and sink my mouth onto his.
‘Archie,’ I moan between kisses. ‘You need to open up your toiletries bag now.’
‘You went through my stuff?’ He’s breathless.
‘You knew I would.’
‘I did.’
His hand reaches blindly in the dark for his bag and while I’m impressed by his commitment to multitasking, it’s ruining our momentum. I grab my phone and turn on the light.
In a matter of seconds, I hear the rip of foil and I pray to god it’s not a packet of Earl Grey tea. I kill the light. He’s above me again. I can feel every part of him; he’s so close, he’s almost there, and my tiny mind can’t stand the wait.
‘We’re doing this,’ Archie says. It’s half-statement, half-question.
‘I know,’ I exhale, levering myself towards him.
My skin hums a symphony, my brain is a supernova, my mind is spinning into a parallel universe, leaving trails of glitter and stars, but my body is nowhere but here: in this tent with Archie, surrounded by mud and other tents and legions of people as busy and exhausted and proud and blissful as we are.
When he moves inside me, he’s slow—he’s gentle. He’s so, so gentle, and I feel every inch of him. A tiny moan escapes from my lips. I hadn’t expected it to feel so tender. It feels like satisfaction, it feels like relief, it feels like living.
Archie moves his hips slowly, his eyes locked on mine. The intensity of his gaze makes another unexpected pleasure ripple through my chest. ‘Archie,’ I gasp, as I angle my body against his. ‘This really raises the stakes.’
His eyes rake over my body. ‘Millsy, with you, the stakes are always high.’
‘That’s how I like it,’ I grin.
Archie grins back. ‘Me too.’
We move fast then slow until I’m almost losing my mind, but then we’re going fast again.
My fingernails scrape his back; his teeth find my skin.
There’s nothing gentle happening now. I want more and more and more.
Sometimes the way he looks at me makes my heart skip and I have to close my eyes and smile to hide how fluttery I feel, but at other times I forget and our eyes connect and a flicker of a crazy thought forms like a hologram in my brain before I can blink it away. My breaths start getting shorter.
‘Like this?’ he asks, rolling against me.
‘Yes,’ I pant. ‘Oh god, yes.’
I grip his arms. I can’t hold on any longer. I unravel first and then he’s unravelling too, and as we grip each other, grinning into each other’s damp skin, that irrational flicker of a thought resurfaces, but now it has shape and depth, as though I could hold it.
Archie wraps his arm around me and draws me in for an exhausted, lingering kiss.
Strands of my hair are stuck to my forehead and I don’t bother brushing them away.
I let myself sink into him and curl my head into the crook of his neck, deciding that for just one moment, I’ll let myself think this crazy thought, and then, when the sun comes up, everything can go back to normal.