Chapter Eleven
I let my hand slide down the length of her arm with my head still resting on hers. We were so close, closer than perhaps we had ever really been before. I was close enough to feel her tears on my lips and her shallow breath on my face as she made an effort not to open her eyes.
I closed my own eyes and swallowed hard, giving myself a chance to think for a second. It wasn’t out of sadness or anything like that, it was fear, because somewhere within me, somewhere so deep that I couldn’t even hope to try and fight it, I knew I was about to do something which one way or another, would change my life forever.
I brought my head away slowly which forced her to open her eyes and look at me. Her eyes were a little bit red from where she had been crying and her waterproof mascara was threatening to streak but it didn’t matter. Her hair wasn’t as perfect as she would have liked it to have been, it was a little bit messy and un tame, but even that didn’t matter.
Because in that one moment, when I looked at her and she looked back at me, she couldn’t have looked more beautiful if she tried.
It was a cliché but I really was breath taken, and for a long moment I did nothing but stare at her. Eventually I let my hand find hers and intertwined our fingers together. She looked down at our inter laced hands and then looked back up at me, deep in to my eyes, questioning my move.
“Cheryl?”
Her voice was a whisper as it came out, and I could see the vulnerability wash over her face as her eyes pleaded with mine to either let go or do something.
If ever there was a time to walk away from anything, especially something so big that you knew it would change everything, now was that time. I could have just let go of her hand and walked away, our friendship would have repaired itself in time.
But I didn’t.
Our lips connected as I leaned in and used my free hand to brush the hair out of her face. I could feel her hesitate beneath me before she returned the kiss, letting her soft, plump lips explore my own.
I moved my hand down to her neck and deepened the kiss. She let a soft murmur escape from her lips as I used the weight of my body to push her back gently on to the sofa, and in that one moment I knew that I needed her.
I needed her more than I had needed anyone in my life.
She pulled me closer to her as she lay down on the sofa, her grip was firm and determined but I knew that deep down, she was just as scared as I was as I let my tongue dance over her lips before she kissed me back with a passion and intensity that I didn’t even know was possible.
She broke away from the kiss first and I could feel her fingers brushing my loose hair from my face.
“Cheryl?”
Her tone was filled with uncertainty and I shook my head lightly, silently telling her not to continue with what she was going to say, because I knew exactly what she was going to say.
She was going to ask me if I was sure that I wanted to do this, and with all the honesty I had, I wasn’t really sure of the answer.
I knew I wanted her then, at that precise moment in time, there was nothing else in the world I wanted. But what about afterwards, what would happen then?
It was that which she wanted to know, and that was the only thing I couldn’t tell her, so instead I shook my head and replaced my lips on hers, letting my hands wonder down the smooth lines of her body until I reached her waist.
I manoeuvred myself on to the sofa and somehow managed to find myself on top of her, and for the first time it occurred to me that the line had been crossed.
