Fate Interrupted

26. Explanation

Ren

The rain is coming down in sheets outside my window as I finally come to after my heady post-orgasmic haze. I'm nestled under his arm with my head on his chest, listening to his labored breathing slow.

He'd gone hard at the end and made me get loud before he blew us apart—sending a king tide of pleasure flooding through me, shattering us into millions of euphoric pieces that slowly fluttered down and come quietly to rest. I smiled as I realized I couldn't wait to do it all over again.

"What do you want to do on your birthday?"

"Um... stay inside and have sex all day might be at the top of my list right now," he says, smiling his lopsided smirk again.

"Oh yeah?" I bite my lip to keep a huge grin back.

"That and just lie here in bed with you. Dolce far niente," he says in Italian, and my heart swoons to hear him speak it again. It didn't happen often. In high school, he said he understood it more than he could speak it. I wonder if that's changed.

"What does that mean?"

"It's an expression that means the sweetness of doing nothing."

"I like that," I smile. "But I think I'll need to eat at some point. Should we go out to dinner tonight?

"Order in?" he suggests, raising his eyebrows like a cute puppy dog.

"It's your birthday. Chinese?"

"Perfect," he says, threading his fingers through mine and holding our hands up to see them twined together once more.

I notice his tattoos again. His left forearm hugging my shoulder, is somewhat covered with soft gradient lines from just above his wrist to 3/4 of the way to his elbow, making a sleeve in what looks like waves. The right arm, which is holding mine up at the moment, just has one simple one on his inner wrist—an arrow with a semicolon and a cuff at his upper bicep.

"I like your tattoos. When did you get those?"

He drops our hands and rests his wrist face down as if ashamed.

"Oh. Various times over the years."

Now I'm curious. "So... what's the significance of them?"

"Um, this one," he says, pointing to his sleeve, "Is currents. I've always loved the ocean—as you know, surfing and living so close to it all my life. And to me, it signifies life's ebb and flows... um, if, if things get to be too dark and deep sometimes, it reminds me it's only a matter of time till the tide changes again."

"Wow, that's amazingly... poetic, Gio. I love that. What about this one?" I point to the wrist with the arrow, now positioned face down on the bed.

"That one is also special to me, but maybe I'll tell you about it later," he says.

My finger grazes over a band with a flying bird interrupting the lines. "Okay. What about the band on your bicep." 

He blushes slightly. "That's the first one I got when I was eighteen. That... that one's about you."

"About me?" I repeat, stunned.

"Um, a band represents a loss, but the loss is incomplete... and you're my bird who flew away, so..." he swallows hard.

My heart beats faster at that, and I brush my fingers over the lines, and he closes his eyes against my touch. My insides tingle strangely—that was quite a bittersweet thing to hear.

"The unbroken second band is for my mom," he adds, looking away.

Oh, Gio! My heart throbs for him a little bit more.