Page 80 of A Winding Wave of Magic
“It’s shut down for upgrades. People seem to think we’re going to cause a black hole eventually.” Jonathan shook his head, rubbing one hand over his temple, as if the thought of that response gave him a headache. “There are too many sorcerers there for that to happen. But I wonder…if maybe I can find it…See what it is I’m talking to…perhaps I can figure out how to speak to it the right way. The way everyone once could. I wonder if it might tell me what to say.”
He looked up from the carpet, and his eyes were suddenly quite big. I was reminded of the look a few of my freshman students would get when they discovered something new. The look that I had undoubtedly had the first time I had read Yeats. Hope.
“It sounds childish, I know.”
“Not at all,” I replied as I stretched out beside him, my head propped up by one hand as I balanced on my side. “The world could probably use a little more of your brand of optimism.”
He rewarded me with a bashful half-smile that made my skin flush. He really was extremely handsome, even with a patchy, four-day stubble growing around his chin and the hollows under his cheekbones.
His face was maybe a foot from mine, and it was hard not to stare at the simple curve of his lips, which seemed all the more sensuous in the flickering light of the fire. Unbidden images of pressing my mouth to his raced through my head, followed bya number of other ideas that included taking off his shirt and pulling him on top of me.
It was death that did this to people, wasn’t it? I remembered reading somewhere that death was an aphrodisiac, junk psychology that said people subconsciously wanted to assert their right to life upon the loss of someone close.
Or maybe it was the wine. Or the heat of the fire. Or the miniature rainstorm in the middle of my living room.
But looking at him, with his half-smile spreading into an adorably full one, eyes closed like a cat napping in a band of sunshine, I was able to ignore any of my usual reservations.
I had felt lonelier in the last week than I had at any time in my entire life, confronted with just how isolated I was. There was no one left for me but my flighty, estranged mother and a friend I saw only sporadically. And apparently, this strange, moody sorcerer, who had just offered an intimate vision of the world that I had never imagined, had the ability to make that loneliness disappear.
Stretched out on Gran’s rug, he looked like he belonged in the house, belonged in the conversation. Despite our bickering, his enigmatic nature, and his mysterious connections to Gran’s death, I felt more at ease with Jonathan than I had with anyone for a very long time.
Jonathan’s eyes opened and focused on mine. I swore I could feel the same kind of desire emanating from his body, even through his continued efforts to barricade his thoughts. His gaze flickered over my face and settled on my mouth.
You can’t live unless you live, I thought.
He wanted it too. I knew it.
So I bent down and pressed my lips to his.
25
NURTURE OR NATURE
You’re a man like me, tormented with thirst.
— EOGHAN RUA Ó SUILLEABHÁIN, “FRIEND OF MY HEART”
Fear.
It wasn’t attraction or lust or enjoyment or anything remotely positive that galloped through my system as our mouths touched. All I felt in that brief moment of contact was panic.
Even worse, it wasn’t mine.
And maybe revulsion too, or was it just my imagination? The kiss—if you could call that mildest brush of the lips—was so quick. Jonathan practically flew across the room into a compact crouch, his big green eyes wide and feral as he swore in a language I didn’t recognize.
“Okay. Okay. Whoa.” Still sitting on the rug, I held out my hands, like I was soothing a horse. “Jonathan, I’m sorry. I read the situation wrong.”
He glowered at me. “You certainly fucking did.”
The disgust in his voice made me rise with a scowl. “Hey, there’s no need to be an asshole about it. I was apologizing to be nice, but you said yourself you shouldn’t lie to a seer. And I wasn’t the one staring at my lips like they were Jolly Ranchers.” Maybe I was being stubborn, but I didn’t think I had beenthatoblivious.
He stood too. “I—I—” He rubbed viciously at his mouth while he stared at mine all over again.
No, I definitely wasn’t mistaken. Which meant something else was bothering him.
And something was bothering me too, I realized. There was something familiar in the kiss, in the raw energy, however fleeting our connection was. As Jonathan continued muttering something about a wrong impression, I turned it over in my head. I obviously hadn’t kissed him before—I hadn’t kissed that many men at all, for that matter, so that wasn’t something that would skip my memory.
His energy was distinct, sure. Layered and complex, as if he had several lifetimes sequestered within him. I remembered that odd sensation from Gran, too…one that I’d always written off as the wisdom of her years. But Jonathan was so young. Not more than a few years older than me.
