Ella's Twisted Senior Year(37)
I pull away, gasping for another breath. “Want to take this to the couch?” I whisper. He makes some kind of grunt of approval and his hands slide down my legs, lifting me into the air. I wrap my arms around his neck and hold on tightly as he carries me over to the couch, which is officially my favorite place in the house. It’s where all of our best make outs happen.
Ethan turns until his calves touch the couch and then he sits, with me straddling his lap. I dig my hands into his hair, pushing the black waves away from his face.
“Don’t give me that smirk,” I say, pressing my fingers over his lips. “Just because I’m sitting in your lap doesn’t mean you’ve won.”
He squeezes my butt and gives me this dirty look. “Kind of seems like I won.”
They say it takes fewer muscles to smile instead of frown and right now every muscle in my face isn’t strong enough to keep my smile away. I roll my eyes. “Fine, maybe we both won.”
He pitches forward and places an open-mouthed kiss on the nape of my neck. Like magic, my body responds by melting all over the place. “I thought you didn’t want to be with me,” he says, giving me this cocky grin before going in for another kiss.
“I said maybe after high school.”
He frowns. “I don’t want to go back to being enemies, Ella. I don’t even want to be friends. I want to be us.” The sincerity in his eyes nearly cripples me. “I want to be together. I’ll even go to prom with you if you want.”
“Whoa, that’s—that’s a big idea.” I focus on playing with his hair so I don’t have to meet his eyes. “I don’t think we’d make it out of there alive if we went to prom together. Kennedy would shiv me with her high heels.”
He blows out a puff of air. “Maybe she’ll be over it by then. If we’re lucky, she’ll have a new boyfriend and will have forgotten all about us.”
“Maybe,” I say, letting my fingers trail down his bare chest. My touch leaves a path of chills on his dark skin. It doesn’t seem like the right time to tell him that prom isn’t really my thing. I’d rather just make out and forget about all of the things that suck, starting with prom and ending with photo shopped pictures of me in embarrassing situations.
My fingers reach the waistband of his flannel pants and Ethan takes in a sharp breath of air. His eyes close and I slide my hands back up, not ready to take anything to that level just yet. I kiss him slowly, enjoying every second of being with this boy, no matter how many pieces of our lives don’t exactly fit together. He manages to taste like cinnamon even when he’s not chewing gum and I am positively certain that the fresh scent of a boy straight from the shower is the greatest smell on earth.
Ethan’s hands slide up my sides, his fingers slipping under my camisole top. My breath hitches as his fingers rise slowly, meticulously, closer to my breasts.
Every nerve in my body is on fire and I can feel, with a little bashfulness on my part, exactly how turned on Ethan is right now. I freeze, my breath catching in my throat. Our lips are together, our bodies so, so close. His hands around my ribcage and mine wrapped around his neck.
“I don’t think I want to take this further,” I whisper, my cheeks burning so much that I bury my face in his shoulder, not wanting to look up and giveaway how pathetically unexperienced I am. “I’m sorry.”
His hands slide back down and settle over my hips, on top of my shorts. “Don’t be sorry,” he whispers into my ear. “This is all up to you. I won’t push for more than you want.”
I swallow and sink into his embrace, letting my face rest on his collarbone. “Thanks.”
Ethan lets out a slow breath and laces his fingers together, stretching them out and popping his knuckles behind my back. “Shall we watch something stupid on TV to cool these raging hormones?” He asks it in a terrible British accent and I laugh. The tension in the air evaporates and I slide off him, sitting in the corner of the couch but keeping my legs across his lap and my arm around his shoulders. We fit together perfectly in this position.
Ethan finds something on TV and we settle into a comfortable silence. The pieces of our lives may be scattered all over the place—college choices, popular friends, and ex-girlfriends—but none of that matters when we’re here in the rec room. Here, we fit together like the two kids we used to be. He is the yin to my yang, and all of those other silly cliché phrases to describe the one who gets you as much as you get them.
My heart ricochets around in my chest when Ethan strokes my hair and I revel in the smell of his body wash. We don’t have everything figured out yet, and there are still some dragons to slay on the journey of becoming an official couple, but this night—this night might just be perfect.
I close my eyes and fall into a comfortable sleep, the sound of Ethan’s heartbeat my lullaby.
Chapter 21
Mrs. Lockhart cooks dinner for all of us on Friday night. She makes a big deal about how she’s finally off work on a weekend night and how she’d like to repay my mom for all of the home cooked meals she’s supplied lately. Ella and I come down from the rec room after doing our homework and fooling around (okay mostly fooling around) and we immediately give each other wide eyed, unbelieving looks when we realize Mom’s normal healthy food isn’t on the menu tonight.