Mid-Afternoon Sun on Texas Sky (15/?)
Title: Mid-Afternoon Sun on Texas Sky
Characters/Pairing: Jensen Ackles / Jared Padalecki
POV: Jensen Ackles
Author's Notes: It’s fiction. That means it’s not real, folks. Jensen and Jared are real people. So is Eric Kripke. The show “Supernatural” is a real TV show on the WB11. If anything else in this is real, I wasn’t aware of it.
This is a sequel to the previously ‘neverending story’, Early Mornings and Late Nights Under Overcast Sky. It finally ended.
Summary: Jensen and Jared go back to Texas for Christmas. Their relationship deepens and they take the next step… pr0n!
Spoilers: none to speak of
-------------------------
Chapter Fifteen: Listening
Rating: NC-17... there’s some m/m slash... some penetration (but it’s not their first time... not yet) ...and a shower scene
Pairing: Jensen/Jared
Word Count: 2,783
Chapter Fifteen: Listening
I find that I’m right in my thinking that he’s not going to tell me what happened at the game. Instead of talking, he wrestles me to the bed, aligns his body with mine so I can feel his need, hot and hard against my thigh. He won’t let me touch him, not over the scars, and not below the waist. But that doesn’t keep him from touching me.
His fingers press and trace and caress and push, feel every inch of my body as hands tangle in cloth, peeling my clothing from me until I’m naked. He’s still fully dressed.
I can’t do this. I can’t let him do this. And it’s been a long time since I’ve had a panic attack, a couple months. I came close to panicking on set twice, but it was more a panic reaction to something that happened than an actual panic attack. They were controlled and easily forgotten. There’s nothing here that would cause me to panic. And the symptoms are unmistakable. My heart racing in my chest, pounding like a bass drum. My breath coming faster, more shallowly. I start shaking, trembling as though cold, and the familiar nausea roils in my gut and stomach as I feel myself slip, fall, tumble headlong into it.
“Jen?” Jared’s got my shoulders, holding on as I tremble and try to pull myself into a ball, panting and sweating and trying to hold my heart inside my chest. I want to nod in response, but I can’t.
Jared pushes off the bed. “Okay… okay, Jenny…” He whispers, fingers gliding over bare skin as he stands, hurries to the bathroom and fumbles in the cabinet for my medication.
He helps me to sit, holds the water to my lips after gently pushing the pill into my mouth. When I come back to myself, it’s where I find myself-relaxed and limp in Jared’s arms, cradled against him, his warmth. He’s wearing his boxers and a tee, nothing else. I’m naked still, lying in Jared’s arms, and my breath is slow and even. Jared’s fingers weave through my hair. “Jen?” He asks, seeing my eyes open.
“Hey…” I murmur, still feeling dizzy and out of sorts. “What happened?” I ask.
“You had a panic attack.” Jared answers.
“I know.” I reply, my voice hollow.
His mouth comes down on mine then, demanding, tasting. “Let me love you…” He whispers. “And… let me know that you love me…” The last part sounds like a plea. I can’t say no, for a lot of reasons, and Jared knows it. “Tell me… tell me that… whatever happens… tell me this isn’t… tell me if I hurt you... I just… want you to feel good…”
“It won’t be rape.” I whisper. But I really do lack the mental capacity to make that decision.
His lips are already traveling down my chin, my throat, to my chest. I try touching, but his hands are fast, come to mine, pin them to my sides. “No.” He says. His voice is soft, a seductive whisper, and it’s a request he makes, but to my drugged mind, it’s a command. “Don’t move.”
I still myself beneath him, still feeling uncomfortable, self-conscious in my nudity while he’s still dressed. It’s somehow more arousing to me, and I wriggle beneath him, whimper quietly when his hand finds my cock, starts stroking me with firm, even strokes, rhythmic and strong, their only purpose is to get me to full hardness. His eyes bore into mine, and I think that maybe he knows I’m naked and he’s still clothed, maybe he planned it, maybe he likes it.
His hand that isn’t busy below my waist comes up and slides into my mouth. “Suck them...” He whispers breathily. “Get them good and wet, Jen…”
The tone of his voice sends a shiver up my spine, and I track the length of each of his fingers with my tongue, licking and slurping, and it sounds wonton and slutty to my ears, mixed with my moans as Jared stills his hand, palm warm over my balls, and fingers tracing the skin between my balls and my hole.
I whimper, thrust into his hand as I work my tongue between his fingers, saliva slick and smooth in my mouth. He grins, shifts his hips so I can feel his own erection against mine, feel his hips pressing mine into the mattress. “Relax Jen… I’ll get you there…” He murmurs, and pulls his fingers from my mouth.
I’m pretty incoherent, beyond words, so I grunt in assent to his request, still wriggle underneath him, trying to get some friction against my painfully hard cock. His hand comes to rest on my hip as he kneels up slightly, and I give a small sound at the feel of cool air against the heat of my groin. His other hand, wet fingers and all, slides between my legs, pushes up until his fingers spread my ass cheeks, and his middle finger presses slowly against my ass hole, slides inside with minimal resistance thanks to my own spit.
I shift under him, a small movement away from him, and my hips pull up, my muscles push at his finger, try to push him out. I whimper when he keeps his hand firmly against my ass, gasp when he crooks a finger inside of me, because that hurts. “Jare…”
“Shhh…” His voice is soft and soothing to my drugged brain, relaxes me. “It’s okay, Jen… I won’t hurt you…”
I twist my body beneath his when he moves his finger, pulling out, pushing tentatively back in. It doesn’t really hurt so much as it’s foreign… uncomfortable. It’s not entirely unpleasant, but I’m not ready to say that I like it, either.
“Shhh…” He soothes. “Just lie still Jen… lie still for me…”
My body stills almost immediately, and I can feel a second slick finger pushing gently at my opening until it slides in alongside the first. That’s more uncomfortable, but Jared told me to lie still, so I do, whimper quietly and shift, writhe in spite of myself beneath him.
“Relax, Jen…” He murmurs, and I can feel his fingers moving inside of me, slowly, from side to side moreso than in and out. My muscle relaxes and contracts, again and again. He’s stretching me, slowly opening me, adjusting me to the feeling of having something inside of me. And it’s starting to feel good.
When I groan in pleasure more than discomfort, his voice comes as a low whisper beside my ear. “Fuck yourself on my fingers, Jensen…”
I swallow nervously, and my cheeks flush at his language, and at what I’ve been told to do. It sends a jolt of electricity to my cock though, and my hips twitch, a fast up and down motion, and I’m able to feel his fingers still inside of me. He still scissors them, back and forth, back and forth, and it no longer hurts.
“Come on, Jensen…” His other hand slides around to fist my dick again. “I want to see you come all over yourself… with my fingers in your ass…”
“You’re… a dirty man, aren’t you, Jared…” I manage, as I lift my hips once, experimentally, until I can feel only the tips of his fingers inside of me, then push back down until his fist presses warm and solid between my cheeks.
“When it works…” He whispers. “Come on, Jensen… fuck yourself on my fingers…”
I slide up the sheets and back down, slowly at first, faster when his hand pumps my dick at a speed to match mine. “Kinky bastard…” I whisper, but it’s not an accusation made in anger.
“You like it…” Jared whispers. “When I talk to you like this…” He crooks his finger inside of me as I move, grins when I suck in a breath, let it out in a small cry. “Come for me, Jensen…” He urges, tightening his hand just enough on my dick to hold me back that extra second. “Come for me…”
And I do, shooting thick bands of come between his fingers, over my chest. He continues moving his fingers inside of me, sliding his other palm over my balls until I’m done. I’m limp against the mattress as he pulls his fingers from my body, slides his tongue up the length of my spent cock, earning a whimper from me.
He swipes fingers through the come on my chest and feeds it to me, kissing me as I lick his fingers, swallow down the thick and bitter fluid. “Sleep, Jensen…” He whispers then, slides his spit-clean fingers over my eyelids, closing them.
I’m aware of him getting up, but not of him climbing back into bed beside me. When I wake up in the morning, I’m wrapped in his arms, my back to his chest, one of his arms flung warm and heavy over my waist.
I wriggle out from under his arm, careful not to wake him, and make my way to the shower. Memories come back as flashes of color, pictures and images and a bit of streaming video. Did I really fuck myself on Jared’s fingers? Did I lick my own come from his fingers? There’s spunk left, dried and flaking on my chest, and it seems to answer my questions as I scrub at it with a soapy washcloth. I wonder if it should bother me more. All of this, that is. I wonder if it’s wrong that none of this bothers me quite as much as I think it should.
Hot water washes away the soap, relaxes tense muscles in my shoulders and my back, and I close my eyes for a minute, let myself go completely under the spray.
Hands slip-slide across my shoulders, down my back, wrap around my waist and tug me back against solid warmth that could only be Jared. His fingertips dance across the slippery skin of my belly, and I grab his wrists, stopping him from going any lower. “Jare…” I whisper. I still haven’t opened my eyes.
His breath comes, humid and warm against my neck as he makes a sound in his throat that says he heard me, and to go on. I’ve stopped his hands from their exploration, but now I can feel his length against me, resting above the curve of my ass, in the small of my beck. His legs step into mine, skin-to-skin, and the water soaks us both.
I manage to twist myself around in his arms to face him, so we’re chest-to-chest, legs still taking up the same space, feet sharing the tiles beneath us. I glance down to see his erect cock, dark and reaching for the smooth skin of his belly, drawing attention from, not to the scars that mar an otherwise perfect body.
He won’t look at me.
“Jare…” I whisper his name again, lift my hands from his, not surprised when his now freed hands find their way over my hips to cup my ass, fingertips tracing the crease between butt and thigh. One of my hands blindly reaches for, and finds the heavy scar on his abdomen, when he opens his mouth to protest, my other hand presses gently against his lips. “Listen to me, Jare…” I whisper.
He stares down, won’t look at me no matter how hard I try to catch his eye. Finally, I slide my hands up to his face, cup his cheeks, and draw his face down just enough so I can touch my lips to his forehead, speak into his skin. My fingers brush against dripping locks of hair as I start talking, and I’m aware of every word, the way my lips move across his skin.
“Jare… you may not want to look at me… and you may not want to talk to me… and… that’s fine.” It’s really not, but I mostly want him to listen to me right now. We’ll work on the rest of it after that. “…but at least listen to me… Just please listen.” My hands slide along his cheeks until my fingers knot in his hair and my thumbs press near his eyes. I can feel his eyelashes, wet with either water from the shower or tears. I choose to believe it’s water from the shower, because no matter how much it’s happened now, no matter how many times I’ve held him, seeing Jared cry never gets any easier.
I kiss his forehead, and that’s when I realize that I haven’t thought this out very well at all. I really don’t know what I’m going to say to him. Or how. I could tell him I’m proud of him… could tell him I love that he’s comfortable touching me…but then, there’s always that ‘but’. And I don’t know if Jared would really be okay with it right now. I walk on eggshells around him. I hate it, and at the same time, I wonder how I ever became capable of it, because I’m normally the bull in the china shop when it comes to emotion so to speak. I stand there, fingers in Jared’s wet hair, lips soaking the water from his forehead, silent and still for a very long time.
“Wow you had a lot to say.” Jared murmurs dryly.
I smile into his skin. “Sorry, Jare… God I’m sorry, Jare…” And I’m kissing down his face, lapping at the dripping water. The shower is still on, the water still surprisingly warm, though not as hot as it once was.
“Jen?” He pushes at me, just until I pull my face away from his, and he looks into my eyes. “Jen, why are you sorry? What can you possibly be sorry for?”
I reach over and turn the water off with one hand, reach and grab two towels with the other, hand one to Jared. I wrap the other around my waist, step out of the shower and sit on the toilet, run my hands through my hair. “This isn’t exactly… easy… for me, Jare…” I sigh. “Sometimes… sometimes I still worry… I still wonder if I’m really what you need… if I can give you… the time and the space… and if… if I’m…”
Jared squeezes himself onto the toilet seat with me, his towel-clad hip and leg pressing close to mine. He reaches up one hand to rest it on my opposite shoulder. “Jen…” He whispers, lifting that hand to my head. His fingers are as light as feathers in my hair, plucking lightly at the short strands. “Jen… you’ve been… you are… everything I need.”
He bends to place a kiss on my bare shoulder. “You’re all I need, Jen…” He whispers.
“Sometimes…” I whisper. “Sometimes… I wish… you’d let me touch you… the way you touch me…”
“I’m… I’m not…” He stiffens next to me, but doesn’t pull away. “…the… they’re… ugly…” He manages slowly.
I catch his cheek, turning to him. “Jare… they’re not… you’re not…” I kiss his mouth quickly, and take his hands in mine. “You have to know by now… that I want to touch you… I want to touch you… want to show you…”
“…show me what?” he whispers, low and husky, close to my ear.
“…that I…” I can’t say it. I swallow hard. “…that you’re beautiful… …that… …that your scars don’t matter to me…” And they don’t. They’re just a part of him.
“…they remind me…”
“I know they do… and they always will…” I push long hair behind his ear. “They always will, Jare… you have to be better than those people… you can’t let what they did to you… ruin your happiness… ruin… this.” I whisper, leaning in to kiss him.
There are tears on his cheeks when I pull away from him, sucking his lower lip into my mouth before letting it go with a soft sound. He looks down, almost shyly, bites his lip. “I wonder sometimes if they didn’t…”
“Jare…” I have nothing else to offer but his name and my arms, my shoulder… nothing more than myself. And I don’t know if it’ll be enough. “Jare…” I hates that he feels that way. “…they didn’t… you’re stronger than that, Jare… you are.”
“They broke me…”
“Which means you’re not beyond repair.” I say firmly. “They didn’t ruin you, Jare… They didn’t.” I hope I sound believable enough. “You’re stronger than that, Jare… You’ll be okay…”
“You’ll fix me?” He sounds so broken, so hopeful. I hate it.
“I’ll try.” I whisper. I can’t make him a promise I don’t know if I can keep. I pull him close, hold him tightly.
-------------------------
Characters/Pairing: Jensen Ackles / Jared Padalecki
POV: Jensen Ackles
Author's Notes: It’s fiction. That means it’s not real, folks. Jensen and Jared are real people. So is Eric Kripke. The show “Supernatural” is a real TV show on the WB11. If anything else in this is real, I wasn’t aware of it.
This is a sequel to the previously ‘neverending story’, Early Mornings and Late Nights Under Overcast Sky. It finally ended.
Summary: Jensen and Jared go back to Texas for Christmas. Their relationship deepens and they take the next step… pr0n!
Spoilers: none to speak of
-------------------------
Chapter Fifteen: Listening
Rating: NC-17... there’s some m/m slash... some penetration (but it’s not their first time... not yet) ...and a shower scene
Pairing: Jensen/Jared
Word Count: 2,783
Chapter Fifteen: Listening
I find that I’m right in my thinking that he’s not going to tell me what happened at the game. Instead of talking, he wrestles me to the bed, aligns his body with mine so I can feel his need, hot and hard against my thigh. He won’t let me touch him, not over the scars, and not below the waist. But that doesn’t keep him from touching me.
His fingers press and trace and caress and push, feel every inch of my body as hands tangle in cloth, peeling my clothing from me until I’m naked. He’s still fully dressed.
I can’t do this. I can’t let him do this. And it’s been a long time since I’ve had a panic attack, a couple months. I came close to panicking on set twice, but it was more a panic reaction to something that happened than an actual panic attack. They were controlled and easily forgotten. There’s nothing here that would cause me to panic. And the symptoms are unmistakable. My heart racing in my chest, pounding like a bass drum. My breath coming faster, more shallowly. I start shaking, trembling as though cold, and the familiar nausea roils in my gut and stomach as I feel myself slip, fall, tumble headlong into it.
“Jen?” Jared’s got my shoulders, holding on as I tremble and try to pull myself into a ball, panting and sweating and trying to hold my heart inside my chest. I want to nod in response, but I can’t.
Jared pushes off the bed. “Okay… okay, Jenny…” He whispers, fingers gliding over bare skin as he stands, hurries to the bathroom and fumbles in the cabinet for my medication.
He helps me to sit, holds the water to my lips after gently pushing the pill into my mouth. When I come back to myself, it’s where I find myself-relaxed and limp in Jared’s arms, cradled against him, his warmth. He’s wearing his boxers and a tee, nothing else. I’m naked still, lying in Jared’s arms, and my breath is slow and even. Jared’s fingers weave through my hair. “Jen?” He asks, seeing my eyes open.
“Hey…” I murmur, still feeling dizzy and out of sorts. “What happened?” I ask.
“You had a panic attack.” Jared answers.
“I know.” I reply, my voice hollow.
His mouth comes down on mine then, demanding, tasting. “Let me love you…” He whispers. “And… let me know that you love me…” The last part sounds like a plea. I can’t say no, for a lot of reasons, and Jared knows it. “Tell me… tell me that… whatever happens… tell me this isn’t… tell me if I hurt you... I just… want you to feel good…”
“It won’t be rape.” I whisper. But I really do lack the mental capacity to make that decision.
His lips are already traveling down my chin, my throat, to my chest. I try touching, but his hands are fast, come to mine, pin them to my sides. “No.” He says. His voice is soft, a seductive whisper, and it’s a request he makes, but to my drugged mind, it’s a command. “Don’t move.”
I still myself beneath him, still feeling uncomfortable, self-conscious in my nudity while he’s still dressed. It’s somehow more arousing to me, and I wriggle beneath him, whimper quietly when his hand finds my cock, starts stroking me with firm, even strokes, rhythmic and strong, their only purpose is to get me to full hardness. His eyes bore into mine, and I think that maybe he knows I’m naked and he’s still clothed, maybe he planned it, maybe he likes it.
His hand that isn’t busy below my waist comes up and slides into my mouth. “Suck them...” He whispers breathily. “Get them good and wet, Jen…”
The tone of his voice sends a shiver up my spine, and I track the length of each of his fingers with my tongue, licking and slurping, and it sounds wonton and slutty to my ears, mixed with my moans as Jared stills his hand, palm warm over my balls, and fingers tracing the skin between my balls and my hole.
I whimper, thrust into his hand as I work my tongue between his fingers, saliva slick and smooth in my mouth. He grins, shifts his hips so I can feel his own erection against mine, feel his hips pressing mine into the mattress. “Relax Jen… I’ll get you there…” He murmurs, and pulls his fingers from my mouth.
I’m pretty incoherent, beyond words, so I grunt in assent to his request, still wriggle underneath him, trying to get some friction against my painfully hard cock. His hand comes to rest on my hip as he kneels up slightly, and I give a small sound at the feel of cool air against the heat of my groin. His other hand, wet fingers and all, slides between my legs, pushes up until his fingers spread my ass cheeks, and his middle finger presses slowly against my ass hole, slides inside with minimal resistance thanks to my own spit.
I shift under him, a small movement away from him, and my hips pull up, my muscles push at his finger, try to push him out. I whimper when he keeps his hand firmly against my ass, gasp when he crooks a finger inside of me, because that hurts. “Jare…”
“Shhh…” His voice is soft and soothing to my drugged brain, relaxes me. “It’s okay, Jen… I won’t hurt you…”
I twist my body beneath his when he moves his finger, pulling out, pushing tentatively back in. It doesn’t really hurt so much as it’s foreign… uncomfortable. It’s not entirely unpleasant, but I’m not ready to say that I like it, either.
“Shhh…” He soothes. “Just lie still Jen… lie still for me…”
My body stills almost immediately, and I can feel a second slick finger pushing gently at my opening until it slides in alongside the first. That’s more uncomfortable, but Jared told me to lie still, so I do, whimper quietly and shift, writhe in spite of myself beneath him.
“Relax, Jen…” He murmurs, and I can feel his fingers moving inside of me, slowly, from side to side moreso than in and out. My muscle relaxes and contracts, again and again. He’s stretching me, slowly opening me, adjusting me to the feeling of having something inside of me. And it’s starting to feel good.
When I groan in pleasure more than discomfort, his voice comes as a low whisper beside my ear. “Fuck yourself on my fingers, Jensen…”
I swallow nervously, and my cheeks flush at his language, and at what I’ve been told to do. It sends a jolt of electricity to my cock though, and my hips twitch, a fast up and down motion, and I’m able to feel his fingers still inside of me. He still scissors them, back and forth, back and forth, and it no longer hurts.
“Come on, Jensen…” His other hand slides around to fist my dick again. “I want to see you come all over yourself… with my fingers in your ass…”
“You’re… a dirty man, aren’t you, Jared…” I manage, as I lift my hips once, experimentally, until I can feel only the tips of his fingers inside of me, then push back down until his fist presses warm and solid between my cheeks.
“When it works…” He whispers. “Come on, Jensen… fuck yourself on my fingers…”
I slide up the sheets and back down, slowly at first, faster when his hand pumps my dick at a speed to match mine. “Kinky bastard…” I whisper, but it’s not an accusation made in anger.
“You like it…” Jared whispers. “When I talk to you like this…” He crooks his finger inside of me as I move, grins when I suck in a breath, let it out in a small cry. “Come for me, Jensen…” He urges, tightening his hand just enough on my dick to hold me back that extra second. “Come for me…”
And I do, shooting thick bands of come between his fingers, over my chest. He continues moving his fingers inside of me, sliding his other palm over my balls until I’m done. I’m limp against the mattress as he pulls his fingers from my body, slides his tongue up the length of my spent cock, earning a whimper from me.
He swipes fingers through the come on my chest and feeds it to me, kissing me as I lick his fingers, swallow down the thick and bitter fluid. “Sleep, Jensen…” He whispers then, slides his spit-clean fingers over my eyelids, closing them.
I’m aware of him getting up, but not of him climbing back into bed beside me. When I wake up in the morning, I’m wrapped in his arms, my back to his chest, one of his arms flung warm and heavy over my waist.
I wriggle out from under his arm, careful not to wake him, and make my way to the shower. Memories come back as flashes of color, pictures and images and a bit of streaming video. Did I really fuck myself on Jared’s fingers? Did I lick my own come from his fingers? There’s spunk left, dried and flaking on my chest, and it seems to answer my questions as I scrub at it with a soapy washcloth. I wonder if it should bother me more. All of this, that is. I wonder if it’s wrong that none of this bothers me quite as much as I think it should.
Hot water washes away the soap, relaxes tense muscles in my shoulders and my back, and I close my eyes for a minute, let myself go completely under the spray.
Hands slip-slide across my shoulders, down my back, wrap around my waist and tug me back against solid warmth that could only be Jared. His fingertips dance across the slippery skin of my belly, and I grab his wrists, stopping him from going any lower. “Jare…” I whisper. I still haven’t opened my eyes.
His breath comes, humid and warm against my neck as he makes a sound in his throat that says he heard me, and to go on. I’ve stopped his hands from their exploration, but now I can feel his length against me, resting above the curve of my ass, in the small of my beck. His legs step into mine, skin-to-skin, and the water soaks us both.
I manage to twist myself around in his arms to face him, so we’re chest-to-chest, legs still taking up the same space, feet sharing the tiles beneath us. I glance down to see his erect cock, dark and reaching for the smooth skin of his belly, drawing attention from, not to the scars that mar an otherwise perfect body.
He won’t look at me.
“Jare…” I whisper his name again, lift my hands from his, not surprised when his now freed hands find their way over my hips to cup my ass, fingertips tracing the crease between butt and thigh. One of my hands blindly reaches for, and finds the heavy scar on his abdomen, when he opens his mouth to protest, my other hand presses gently against his lips. “Listen to me, Jare…” I whisper.
He stares down, won’t look at me no matter how hard I try to catch his eye. Finally, I slide my hands up to his face, cup his cheeks, and draw his face down just enough so I can touch my lips to his forehead, speak into his skin. My fingers brush against dripping locks of hair as I start talking, and I’m aware of every word, the way my lips move across his skin.
“Jare… you may not want to look at me… and you may not want to talk to me… and… that’s fine.” It’s really not, but I mostly want him to listen to me right now. We’ll work on the rest of it after that. “…but at least listen to me… Just please listen.” My hands slide along his cheeks until my fingers knot in his hair and my thumbs press near his eyes. I can feel his eyelashes, wet with either water from the shower or tears. I choose to believe it’s water from the shower, because no matter how much it’s happened now, no matter how many times I’ve held him, seeing Jared cry never gets any easier.
I kiss his forehead, and that’s when I realize that I haven’t thought this out very well at all. I really don’t know what I’m going to say to him. Or how. I could tell him I’m proud of him… could tell him I love that he’s comfortable touching me…but then, there’s always that ‘but’. And I don’t know if Jared would really be okay with it right now. I walk on eggshells around him. I hate it, and at the same time, I wonder how I ever became capable of it, because I’m normally the bull in the china shop when it comes to emotion so to speak. I stand there, fingers in Jared’s wet hair, lips soaking the water from his forehead, silent and still for a very long time.
“Wow you had a lot to say.” Jared murmurs dryly.
I smile into his skin. “Sorry, Jare… God I’m sorry, Jare…” And I’m kissing down his face, lapping at the dripping water. The shower is still on, the water still surprisingly warm, though not as hot as it once was.
“Jen?” He pushes at me, just until I pull my face away from his, and he looks into my eyes. “Jen, why are you sorry? What can you possibly be sorry for?”
I reach over and turn the water off with one hand, reach and grab two towels with the other, hand one to Jared. I wrap the other around my waist, step out of the shower and sit on the toilet, run my hands through my hair. “This isn’t exactly… easy… for me, Jare…” I sigh. “Sometimes… sometimes I still worry… I still wonder if I’m really what you need… if I can give you… the time and the space… and if… if I’m…”
Jared squeezes himself onto the toilet seat with me, his towel-clad hip and leg pressing close to mine. He reaches up one hand to rest it on my opposite shoulder. “Jen…” He whispers, lifting that hand to my head. His fingers are as light as feathers in my hair, plucking lightly at the short strands. “Jen… you’ve been… you are… everything I need.”
He bends to place a kiss on my bare shoulder. “You’re all I need, Jen…” He whispers.
“Sometimes…” I whisper. “Sometimes… I wish… you’d let me touch you… the way you touch me…”
“I’m… I’m not…” He stiffens next to me, but doesn’t pull away. “…the… they’re… ugly…” He manages slowly.
I catch his cheek, turning to him. “Jare… they’re not… you’re not…” I kiss his mouth quickly, and take his hands in mine. “You have to know by now… that I want to touch you… I want to touch you… want to show you…”
“…show me what?” he whispers, low and husky, close to my ear.
“…that I…” I can’t say it. I swallow hard. “…that you’re beautiful… …that… …that your scars don’t matter to me…” And they don’t. They’re just a part of him.
“…they remind me…”
“I know they do… and they always will…” I push long hair behind his ear. “They always will, Jare… you have to be better than those people… you can’t let what they did to you… ruin your happiness… ruin… this.” I whisper, leaning in to kiss him.
There are tears on his cheeks when I pull away from him, sucking his lower lip into my mouth before letting it go with a soft sound. He looks down, almost shyly, bites his lip. “I wonder sometimes if they didn’t…”
“Jare…” I have nothing else to offer but his name and my arms, my shoulder… nothing more than myself. And I don’t know if it’ll be enough. “Jare…” I hates that he feels that way. “…they didn’t… you’re stronger than that, Jare… you are.”
“They broke me…”
“Which means you’re not beyond repair.” I say firmly. “They didn’t ruin you, Jare… They didn’t.” I hope I sound believable enough. “You’re stronger than that, Jare… You’ll be okay…”
“You’ll fix me?” He sounds so broken, so hopeful. I hate it.
“I’ll try.” I whisper. I can’t make him a promise I don’t know if I can keep. I pull him close, hold him tightly.
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