Page 18 of Way Down Deep

Would it be slow as molasses, or fast and frantic and grasping, like the thrashing of a drowning man? I can’t even guess, and that makes me want to imagine it all the more.

Are you there, stranger? Reading every line as it makes your phone shiver or ping?

Tell me what you imagine.

9.53pm

I love that you know the song.

That you know I want sting when I say bitter.

And that you described all of that to me. Oh, your descriptions are blissful. I can almost see that glinting, can almost hear the sound of ice against glass. Every word you just said sunk me deeper into that glowing light and the heat of some summer we’re not actually in. Into those kisses, heavy with alcohol and sweet with cinnamon—because that’s what I taste like.

Always cinnamon, from the sugar on cookies or the centres of sweets.

And I would be frantic, definitely frantic. There is no way I could be slow with something like kissing. Not after so long imagining what it would be like. Not when I’ve seen it a thousand ways through the TV screen but never actually felt it. Just hearing you suggest it is enough to make me feel half starved—greedy for something slick and soft against my lips.

For hands, too, would there be hands?

I want there to be hands.

In my hair, on my back, on me all over.

You’d feel me shiver if you did. Hell, if you strain hard I’m sure you could feel me through your phone. My teeth are practically chattering; there are goose bumps all over my arms. Like I’m afraid almost—though maybe I am? It feels like terror, this terrible charge running through me. It makes me want to burst out of my own skin.

And once I had, I would run to you.

Tell me that you would run to me too.

10.26pm

I could run to you. Our bodies could meet with a force that borders on violence, charged with ferocious desperation.

Or I could be still as a rock, watch you running. Watch you growing closer, closer, features coming into focus, and brace myself like I was standing before a rushing wave, and let you crash over me, drown in all that need and curiosity.

Or I could come up behind you in a quiet room or a crowded train station or a damp and lonely park. Curl a palm around your shoulder and turn you, slowly. Study the surprise and recognition in your eyes for a long breath before I brought my mouth down on yours.

What color are those eyes? Don’t tell me brown, blue, green, hazel. Be specific. Tell me maple syrup, tell me the sky in winter, sea glass, bay leaf.

And yes, there would be hands. Before our lips ever meet, there are hands.

Mine are homely, my fingertips dry and hard as horn from playing the guitar.

One is on your throat, thumb on your jugular so I can feel your pulse, fierce and frantic. The other thumb is at your temple, fingers in your hair, palm covering your ear so it rushes like the ocean.

What does that hair feel like?

And your hands. Tell me about them, stranger. Tell me what they feel like and where they are on me. Where they are and where they don’t yet dare to go.

10.43pm

The train station, yes, I want the train station. Your mouth on mine before we’ve even had a chance to be awkward with each other. No stuttered hellos and shaking of sweaty hands. No remarks about the traffic getting there or the delays on platform three. Just your mouth, and then that warm pressure. Those hands where you said they would go.

I’ve often imagined someone touching me like that. Cradling my head, my throat, holding me in place for a kiss. Somehow I always thought the reality would be his hands held loosely at his sides. That he wouldn’t have enough imagination to do anything more, unless the more was groping my breasts or tugging off my underwear.

I’m under no illusions about real life.

And yet you make me believe in something so much sweeter.

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