22
For someone who prided himself on being in control of every aspect of his life, Henry felt anything but when it came to Jia.
His hands still buzzed as they walked out together. The electric current caused him to extend and flex his hands a couple
times so he wouldn’t reach out for her, wouldn’t pull her back into another room, wouldn’t take her fully, right this minute,
like he wanted. He felt like a sex-crazed sixteen-year-old. He had to have Jia, all of her. He needed her naked and screaming,
riding his cock, and taking it all the way to the hilt as deep as it could go.
Fuck it. He reached out for her hand and wrapped his around hers, leading her back to the main hall. He couldn’t remember
the last time he’d held someone’s hand. It wasn’t an intimacy Henry allowed or enjoyed. But he wanted that connection now.
The first time they’d been together back in New York, he’d taken her home thinking she was nothing more than a hookup, a one-time thing.
But even then, as he’d tasted her to climax and she’d sucked him deep after, as he entered her from above and later behind, as she’d openly expressed what she wanted with More and Harder and moans that could get Henry hard right now thinking about them, he knew he hadn’t gotten enough. He surprised himself
by thinking of that woman the next day and even days after.
What he didn’t expect was how much more he wanted Jia now that she had a name, now as he was getting to know her, now that
he knew what she was capable of. Her kindness was sexy. Her enthusiasm addictive. Her selflessness, her determination, her
joy . . . Fuck, he wanted to be around her all the time. And he wanted her all to himself as soon as he could get her.
There just weren’t going to be a lot of places or opportunities while they both lived with their grandparents.
Henry needed a plan.
When they turned the corner from the kitchen, the party seemed unbothered, having gone on without them there.
Henry walked them up to where his grandfather and Mimi stood. Mimi glanced down at their connected hands and back up to Jia,
her smile stretched wide.
“Um . . .” Jia stuttered.
“We went to get more ice,” Henry said.
Mimi looked around them to the punch table where ice did not magically appear. She nodded. “I see,” she said.
Jia’s face pinkened. “Did you, uh, hear everything?”
Mimi shook her head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. The moment you two walked off, I had everyone turn down their
hearing aids and the DJ turn the tunes up. It’s a party, after all.”
“Thanks, Mimi,” Jia said, rolling her eyes.
Henry nodded, giving a small smile to Mimi in appreciation.
They could keep it discreet and pretend like it didn’t happen in front of their grandparents. Everything was good.
“Tale as old as time. Two kids sneak off and enjoy their first time together. What’s a prom without someone getting lucky,
am I right?” Dennis said.
Henry dropped his head to his chest. Oh god.
“Except this isn’t their first time,” Mimi said.
“Grandma!”
Henry turned to Jia. “You told her?”
“I was having a crisis. The man that fired me was also the man I had mind-blowing sex with? Oh, and he happens to be our neighbor’s
grandson? I think yes, I definitely told her. I needed Mimi’s wisdom.”
“Mind-blowin’, you say? Way to go, Hank. I knew you had it in ya,” Dennis said, patting Henry’s back. His face beamed with
pride brighter than when Henry had graduated law school.
“Come on, Mimi, let’s dance and let these kids get back to canoodling,” Dennis said, grabbing Mimi by the hand and leading
her to the dance floor.
“You know, if you two want some privacy, we can arrange to stay at the prom for another, oh, say, hour or so?” Mimi called
back as she was led away.
“Oh god. I think our grandparents just gave us permission to sneak off and have sex,” she said laughing. The fairy lights
that decorated the room sparkled in Jia’s eyes.
“But apparently just a quickie,” Henry teased. The offer was tempting. But he was going to make his next real time with Jia
better than their first. A hand job was hot. A quickie could be fun. But Henry had something else in mind in this moment.
He pulled her by the hand he was holding and drew her close to him “Shall we?”
Jia smiled and nodded and followed him to the center of the crowd where he put his arm around her waist and drew her against his body. “I thought you didn’t dance,” she whispered into his ear.
He didn’t. But he would.
“I can sway back and forth a little. If that’s enough?”
“It’s everything.”
“Well, don’t the two of you make a beautiful pair,” Betty said as she and Herbert danced past them. Herbert sat in his wheelchair
as Betty pushed and spun them around to the music.
“You two put us to shame with your moves,” Jia said back. Betty’s smile spread across her whole face.
“Are we voting for a prom king and queen? Because I know who I want to win,” Gordon called out from the snacks table.
“Hear! Hear! They’ve got my vote too,” Gladys said, clinking red solo cups of spiked punch with Gordon.
Henry looked down into Jia’s eyes. They sparkled as if she had her own fairly lights that lit up from within. He’d never felt
this accepted and embraced by people as he did by the people of The Sunset. And that included Jia. He pushed back fears of
the other shoe dropping. He quieted the voice in his head that wanted to reason how these feelings were fleeting and they,
as morbid as it would sound, were all on a ticking clock of some sort or another.
Instead, he allowed himself for this night to feel . . . happy. To lend his heart in this moment to someone else other than
just himself.
He bowed his head and met Jia’s lips. Just a soft whisper of a kiss.
And the two of them danced the night away to “Winter Wonderland” on a blistering hot summer night.
With the promise of more to come.