Daddy issues || h.s

4.7

The hotel room was small, wooden furniture scattered across the floor, a bookshelf, a dresser, a bed, a plush green chair. That was all their world consisted of in that moment, or maybe not quite everything.

The shower fell quiet, only the drum of the rain and the hum of the wind remaining. He heard her skin drying, and imagined her wet hair clinging to her neck, her black eyelashes graced with droplets of water, her cheeks flushed from the heat. His heart beat in his chest as he imagined it, but then the door opened, and he didn't have to imagine any more.

She stood before him, her golden hair darkened by the rain of the shower, only a white towel draped about her body. He smiled at her, and walked over to her. A big hand caressed her cheek, his fingertips drying her skin the way he had dried her tears.

"You." He said and let his lips touch her forehead. "Are." He kissed her cheek. "The." He kissed her neck, brushing away her hair. "Most." Goose bumps rose on her skin as his lips touched her. "Beautiful." He kissed her collarbones. "Person." He kissed her heart. "In the whole world." He kissed her soul. "Inside and out." He kissed her lips.

The white ribbons that tied them together felt soft against their skin. It wasn't tight. It didn't draw them together. It was just there, adorning their hearts as they pulled each other together. She embraced him, felt his muscles beneath her palms and heard his heart beat against her lips. She kissed him. He kissed her. She kissed him.

And as they fell back onto the bed, the wind broke out in song, and the roots of the cherry blossom tree creaked.

She pulled his shirt over his head, and he threw the white towel on the floor. She laid beneath him, completely naked, her sun kissed skin pulsating with the light of her life. New artworks had appeared on her skin, new freckles and new scars. He kissed them, he kissed them all, as if his lips were a paintbrush and her body a canvas. Her name fell from his lips and landed between the sheets as his pants went down, down, down on the floor. There it lay, while a storm swept by outside and a warm summer breeze blew about the room.

They heard the wind blow as their bodies moved in unison, and it did in no way resemble the hazy way in which they moved. There was no violence in their actions, only loving embrace and soft kisses. Her hands stroked his back, leaving behind nothing but the ghost of her fingerprints, and he caressed her breasts, feeling the soft skin and silvery scars beneath his fingers.

"I'm not," she whispered in his ear as the flowers inside of them rustled in the slight wind. "I'm not the most beautiful person in the whole world. You are." She kissed him again, their lips once again dancing the light red waltz as they loved, and in that moment, it felt as though nothing had changed. It felt as though they were back in her room, when the yellow paint hung wet upon the walls, and the flowers were just springing out. It felt just like it had done the first time: like the flowers would never die.

The storm raged on outside, and the summer breeze blew across their bodies as they trembled in pleasure. Every fibre in their body shone in the soft light of the small hotel room, and every star in their mind glowed with the feelings they held for each other. It was too perfect, too much, to heavenly, and so, by the sound of his name leaving her lips, they let go, and the summer breeze blew out of the room.

Her breath returned to her, and she could feel the familiar contours of his body so perfectly against hers. A hidden smile played upon his lips. She was so close he could count her eyelashes if he wanted to, and so he did.

"One, two, three." He said, his fingertips stroking her feathery lashes. She let out a small laugh and asked: "What are you doing?"

"I'm counting your eyelashes." He answered, his eyebrow knitted together as he kept counting.

"May I ask why?" She said, and felt his hand slide from her face and into her hair.

"Because, Adelaide, this summer I found myself laying in a bed, feeling nothing but cold nothingness where your body was supposed to be, and suddenly I could not remember what your lips felt like or how many freckles used to adorn your face. I could not remember what your fingertips felt like against my skin or how your face crinkled when you smiled. I could not remember the sound of your voice, and I regretted not memorizing every single inch of your features, of your body and of your mind. So that is what I am doing right now, memorizing you, because I don't ever want to feel like that again." He said, and she felt tears sting in her eyes. The rain had found its way inside the room.

"You don't have to do that Harry," she said and kissed him. "You don't have to do that, because I will never let you feel that way again. I will never leave you again" He pressed her against his body, and felt her breath against his chest as the wind sang them to sleep by the tones of a stormy lullaby.

Miles away, in the garden of a house they knew so well, a cherry blossom tree was ripped up by its roots, but they were too far away to hear the sound.