𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐎𝐋𝐎𝐑 𝐎𝐑𝐀𝐍𝐆𝐄

REFLECTION

His brothers had always talked about how different it would feel.

Tito had said you would never want to let the girl go; Jackie had contended, "Well, that depends"; Marlon had agreed with them both, and Jermaine, the bluntest of them all that day, had simply said: "Look, all that needs to be said is that once you get it, ain't no going back. You'll want it all the time."

That'd been years ago, back when he'd been a few weeks shy of his 16th birthday.

It'd been a pep talk of sorts, one of many of his brothers' embarrassing ways of trying to convince him that the journey to manhood was a whirling path of wonder, not the spiraling descent into immorality that the Church had made it out to be.

He remembered how he'd groaned, how he'd rolled onto his side, covered his ears, and started a silent prayer. Not to protect him from their words, no, but a prayer for forgiveness, one that would grant him leniency for all those nights he'd already spent in bed toiling with questions on how it would feel to know someone so closely, so intimately.

Little did he know, those questions would be answered in New York, and they'd come in the form of a woman he'd met nearly a decade before on a wintry day in Detroit.

He could see Diana as she'd been then, a radiant beauty decked in pure white, the pinnacle of a night rife with splendor and delirium. Then he saw her as the woman she'd been Friday: beautiful, graceful, an otherworldly figure swaddled in light blue silk and shimmering moonlight. He could see her face, gentle and drowsy. Could feel her lips, first parted in a playful simper at the base of his jaw and then tracing an idle path along the perimeter of his stomach.

Absently, his hand slipped underneath his shirt. His fingertips grazed his waist and traced a line to the center of his abdomen until it reached his navel.

Ever since their first kiss, daydreaming of her had become a mainstay, an unshakeable habit that had only grown worse now that they'd reached this new realm of... Well, he wasn't sure.

"What are you thinking about over there?"

He blinked, suddenly remembering where he was.

Yes, now was not the time to be reminiscing. Not when he was sitting right in the middle of the studio, and surely not when Diana was a mere foot away, her eyes watching him closely, lips curved upward in a small, tired smile.

"Nothing," he replied. The word nearly clung to the roof of his mouth.

She pursed her lips and leaned forward in her chair. "Sure seems like a whole lot of nothing."

"I'm just a little tired," he replied. Only a portion of the truth, of course.

Despite the look in her eyes, she didn't question him. Instead, she only nodded, standing. "We should probably turn in for the night. This week's gonna be busy. We're going to need as much rest as we can get."

It was late. Later than usual. Filming had been particularly grueling and makeup had been even worse. After what seemed a lengthy 4 hours instead of 2, Michael had finally trudged his way out of his dressing room and found Diana sitting out on the main floor nursing a headache. He'd sat down across from her, ignoring the ache in his back, the tiredness behind his eyes and the butterflies in his stomach.

Diana, as per usual, seemed to defy all logic. She was calm, composed, warm and quick to laughter. Almost blasé. He wasn't sure how she did it.

Together, they made their way down the hallway, parting ways when they reached their dressing rooms. He was shrugging on his coat, bag swung haphazardly around his neck, when he heard the clanking of her heels from behind.