Page 12 of Darien
FIVE
It was not the first orgasm Noah had ever had. It was not even the first one he’d ever had with another human being. But it was, by far, the most intense, most perfect pleasure that he’d ever felt, and he closed his eyes and tried to calm his heart, his breathing, tried to force the sweat on his skin to dry.
It was just sex, he told himself, closing his eyes, refusing to let himself look at Darien, forcing himself to roll over onto his back, to refuse the comfort of Darien’s body. Just sex. Not something he should be letting his hopes be brought up over. He hardened his heart, not just making it stony but encasing it in steel.
The thing with Darien, though, was that he’d always been good at getting around any walls that Noah did put up. He was going to have to guard himself carefully, and when Darien put his head on Noah’s chest and snuggled up to him, he knew that more than ever. Because even with all of his care, he couldn’t stop his arm from slipping around Darien’s shoulders, and he couldn’t help but hold him close.
“Why are you here, Noah?” Darien, predictably enough, was the one who broke the silence. He had never been exactly comfortable with it, always seeming to feel the need to chatter away, to fill the silence, whereas Noah was completely happy just to sit and wrap himself in the quiet, bask in it.
But Darien didn’t mind that Noah was quiet, and Noah didn’t mind that Darien wasn’t. It was just one of many ways in which they’d been compatible, and one of the many reasons that it had hurt so much to lose him.
Noah stayed silent, and his eyes stayed firmly shut, eyelids closed enough that only the faintest reddish light filtered in through them and under the seam. How was he going to navigate this without sounding desperate? Without it coming off like, well, as if he had moved across the country and changed schools just to be closer to Darien?
That was, after all, exactly what he’d done.
“Like, are you going to go back to Boston? Stay here? What about school?” Darien chattered on, his hand sweetly on the curve of Noah’s waist, thumb rubbing little circles into the sensitive flesh there. “Why did you come here?”
Noah finally opened his eyes, his hand slipping down to rest on Darien’s fingers, stilling them. It felt too good to have him touch him like that. Like Darien wanted him, like he felt more for him than he did.
So he stopped that intimate caress and forced himself to look into Darien’s eyes.
“I transferred to UCLA,” his voice was brisk, like it was no big deal, though they both knew that it was. Darien would know, if he thought about it, how much work Noah had put into making that happen. Noah hoped that he wouldn’t think about it, because then the inevitable questions would come.
“Why?” Darien asked, and Noah couldn’t help the way his own lips twitched just a little bit with amusement. Darien hadn’t changed that much, not as far as he could tell. Maybe he was a bit more confident, but he was just as curious as ever, if not more so.
“They have a good medical school there,” Noah told the other man, and it wasn’t even a lie. “Very prestigious. It will look good to have it on my resume.”
“Oh,” Darien said, and was it Noah’s imagination or did he sound just a little bit disappointed? Maybe he’d expected Noah to make an idiot of himself and throw himself at Darien, beg him to be with him.
The scary thing was how close Noah could see himself coming to do just that if he wasn’t careful. So he would be. Easy, right? He’d been careful his whole life. It surely wouldn’t be that hard for those habits to carry over.
“Well,” Darien rallied quietly, “If you’re going to be around, then maybe we could … I’d like it if …” Darien stammered, and Noah searched his face, trying not to find it as absolutely adorable as he honestly did how Darien tripped over his words.
No one could be as sweet as Darien pretended to be. So as long as Noah could keep that in mind, well, there was probably no harm in enjoying it, he figured. Darien was so positive most of the time, and Noah found it incomprehensible but fascinating. Strange, but so good to be around.
“What is it, Darien?” Noah asked, and there was a sort of pleasure to watching the poor man squirm around, he had to admit. Maybe that made him some sort of bad person, but there it was.
“Since you’re going to be around anyway, do you want to, you know, hang out? Maybe go out sometimes?” Darien finally managed to put out not only one, but two, full sentences, and Noah had been trying to figure out if Darien had changed more or stayed more the same, but that was another mark in the changed column.
The old Darien would have stammered adorably for a few more minutes. Noah sort of missed that, though he had to admit that it was at least sort of nice that he could get out the words sooner, so Noah could know what he was trying to say.
For a moment, though, once Darien had suggested it, Noah hesitated. Did he want to jump back on this roller coaster? Did he want to put his heart at risk, this time knowing what he was getting into?
He could hesitate all that he wanted, though. The truth was, he knew very well why he’d come here, and even if UCLA did have a good medical program, there was no way in hell he would have moved clear across the country just for that. Darien seemed to have bought it, but Noah knew better.
He had made his choice that day when he had started the process to switch schools. There was no turning back now. He wasn’t sure how, exactly, but he knew for a fact that he did want Darien in his life. Maybe just as a friend. Maybe as …
No. Just as a friend. What was he, insane? Did he want to deal with anything else? Dating had never been anything that appealed to him because he focused so much on his school, and Noah was probably the worst person in the world that he could date.
The truth of the matter was, though, that Noah had been miserable without Darien. Why else would he have left everything behind just to have a chance of being able to see him again? Friendship was far, far better than nothing. And it was all he could risk.
“I would like that,” Noah finally admitted, and admitted, too, that the feeling which filled him from head to toe when he saw the smile on Darien’s face, that feeling was delight. Once, there hadn’t been much that Noah wouldn’t be willing to do to see that smile, and those habits didn’t die easily, it seemed.
Unspoken between them was so much. Noah figured that there had to be only a few weeks left in Darien’s contract. So what was he going to do? Would he sign again? A year ago, Darien had said that he had signed for a year, but that he might sign up for another one.
But that had maybe been enough, at least for now, the things they had done. In an afternoon, they had utterly swept away all past limits, stepping over a line which Noah was fairly certain they would never be able to step back across.
It was irresistible, though. Noah knew very well that he was an insect, drawn to Darien’s flame, and he knew that Darien could burn him up far too easily if Noah didn’t take great care.
