Sheltered(31)

He left it hanging in there, for her to pick up. She wasn’t sure she could, however. He’d brought Chinese food. He had a bag, with, like, overnight things in it. He probably had his toothbrush in there, for God’s sake.

“Just tell me if you want me to go,” he said, and again she wondered what he’d been about to say. Lately I’ve just been thinking that maybe…

“I don’t want you to go.” She pushed several unidentifiable things around her plate with a fork. He had chopsticks, and he used them as if he’d been doing it since the age of five. “This all just seems so…”

“Overwhelming?”

“I was going to say nice.”

He considered, as he expertly maneuvered his food around.

“You mean the bad kind of nice though, right?”

“I mean the kind of nice I’m not really familiar with.”

He didn’t do what she expected him to once she’d said it, however. She thought it sounded mean, somehow. Rude, even—like the words she’d spoken in the grass. I have to be home by four, so get the fuck off me.

But he just reached over and put a hand on her shoulder. On the back of her neck. Rubbed there, until all her muscles turned to jelly.

“I want you to be familiar with it,” he said. “This is how things should be.”

She imagined him coming home every night with a bag of food. Getting the plates, rubbing her neck, saying soft things. Did other people do that stuff, all the time?

“I’m not even familiar with this food. Yesterday I had tomato sandwiches for dinner. With tepid water. And the tepid water was the most interesting part of the meal.”

The hand dropped away, but he had the most awesome smile for her instead. All the way across his face, with teeth and everything.

“Here,” he said, then identified a few of the various elements on her plate. Mostly it seemed like a lot of pork, but it didn’t taste like pork, in her mouth. It tasted like having an orgasm.

“Holy crap.”

“Did you just say crap?”

“I might also say damn. Do you eat this stuff all the time?”

She tried to eat another forkful without seeming like a starving person.

“Sure.”

Well, of course he did. He used chopsticks and knew what everything was called, and oh—he had that Chinese restaurant across from him. Oh Jesus, he had that Chinese restaurant across from him. She stopped with her fork halfway to her mouth.

“This isn’t the place that chops off the chicken heads, is it?”

He touched his tongue to his upper lip. Of course he meant it as an amused sort of gesture—quite obviously so. But somehow it didn’t translate to her pleasure centers that way. Her pleasure centers just said, Oh, so you want us to wake up, now? I guess we can manage that.

“If I told you it was would you stop eating?”

He was teasing her. Actually teasing. Weird, that it felt like a relief after Monday’s conversation.

“Probably not.”

He shook his head, still amused in that lovely, heated sort of way.

“It’s not the chicken head Chinese. Eat your food.”

She did. In fact, she did more than that. She licked her plate, and then the insides of the containers, and then finally her sticky, sauce-covered fingers. Of course she hardly realized he was watching her until that last one, but it didn’t embarrass her as badly as it probably should have done.

Instead she curled her tongue around one fingertip, heart suddenly giddy in her chest. Was he watching her in…you know. That way?

“Tease,” he said.

So maybe yeah. He was watching her in that way. She looked a mess and most likely had sauce all around her mouth and all down her top, but he was watching her in that way.

“Come here,” he said, but it was him who leaned forward over the table. Him who cupped the side of her face and drew her close, quite suddenly, and kissed her.

Only he didn’t exactly kiss her. He licked the corner of her mouth instead, where there was most likely sauce. He licked it and licked it, and then once he was done cleaning her in a way that made her go all weird inside, he pushed his lips against hers, hungrily.

He tasted like that spicy thing, again. Stronger though this time—so much so that she had to ask.

“What’s in the food?”

He pulled back—a little breathless. A little curious.

“Why?”

When he kissed her this time, she felt it go all the way down through her body. He just did it so lazily, as if they had all the time in the world. He could touch his mouth to hers then pull back, then start all over again.

Things were better, with more time.

“Because you always taste that way.”

“Like stale Chinese food?”