I cut my steak slowly, watching as the juices spread across the plate. “So, what are your songs about?”
She pauses before taking a bite. “Well, love, I guess. Lost love. Impossible love. Unrequited love. I write a lot of love songs. Penny – she’s my friend, she works at the restaurant with me – she says I’m a hopeless romantic. I’ve watched pretty much every rom-com going, and I’ve read quite a few romance books too.”
“Lost love, unrequited love,” I murmur. “Are the songs about anybody, in particular, maybe a boyfriend from high school?”
She laughs drily. “I never had any boyfriends in high school. Maybe when I was younger, but nothing you’d call a relationship. It was silly kid’s stuff. So no, it’s not about an ex-boyfriend.”
My body stirs as I dare to wonder, to hope if this means what I think it does.
Could I be that lucky?
Could my woman have never been with another man before?
That would make her truly, completely mine.
“This is embarrassing,” she says, after taking a bite.
“What is?”
“The songs… well… I didn’t plan on telling you this. Or that I had a crush on you.”
She’s staring down at her pizza, a tremor in her voice.
“Whatever it is, I promise I won’t judge.”
“They’re about you, a lot of them,” she says. “I don’t mean I reference you specifically or anything like that, but when I write them… I guess I picture you in my head.”
She said love songs. That seems more serious than a casual date, a casual hookup.
“Is that weird?”
She finally looks up at me, the movement seeming like it costs her a big effort.
“No,” I tell her. “I like the thought of it, you sitting alone in your bedroom – possibly wearing those PJs you had on the other night – getting all excited as you write your songs. I can see you now, chewing on the edge of a pen, your hair all wavy and beautiful around your shoulders.”
“You like my wavy hair? I always think it looks messy.”
“It’s beautiful. I love how messy it is. It makes me want to run my fingers through it, grab a big handful and guide your lips to mine.”
“I thought you were going to call me crazy,” she murmurs. “It’s a lot, hearing that somebody is basically obsessed with you.”
“Is that how you’d describe it?”
She nods shortly. “Yeah, I think so. I’m such an idiot. I didn’t plan on saying any of this.”
I can hardly hear her words as desire pounds through me, a drum beat, smashing in my chest over and over.
My manhood pushes achingly against my pants, the helm almost painful, my shaft buzzing as though in anticipation of her hand, her mouth, her sweet hot hole.
“You don’t have to be embarrassed. Not with me. Not ever.”
We go on eating for a little while, sinking into a comfortable silence. We exchange a lot of eye contact, silent messages passing between us, as though the force inside me and the force inside her are communicating, calling out to each other.
“Are you going to tell me something nobody else knows, then?” she asks.
I bite down on my steak, hard, slicing clean through it. The moment where I was going to tell her seems far away now, distant, the boiling compulsive feeling no longer as dominant. It’s still there – urging me to do it – but I can’t stop thinking about the worst-case scenario.
It's a testament to how badly I need this woman in my life, the fear I feel at the thought of her leaving.
“Very few people know that my parents died in a car crash when I was seven. I was in the backseat. They were killed instantly but I was, miraculously, unharmed. I was trapped, though. I was there for hours. I was… I saw them, smelt them. I—”
Gripping the edge of the table, I lean back and let out a long breath.
Where the hell did that come from?
I never talk about this, and now it’s like I’m back there, trapped upside-down in the backseat, crying as the tears run down my forehead and my skull fills with pressure. It’s like it’s happening all over again.
Billie has cracked me open, exposed raw parts of me I thought long buried.
“I’m sorry.” I grin away the pain. “That’s not something you want to hear over dinner.”
She takes my hand and then leans forward as she slides her touch up my arm and finally cradles my cheek. She holds me firmly. “I’m so sorry that happened, Aaron. I knew you grew up in the system. But I didn’t know why.”
I shrug. “It was a long time ago. Plus I never talk about it. But maybe that’s why…”
“Why what?” she urges.
I laugh gruffly. “Look at you, Billie. You’ve turned a grumpy asshole who never talks about his feelings into a feeling-sharing machine. How have you managed that, eh?”