A Beginner's Guide to the American West ✓

chapter forty-two

f o r t y - t w o

*

I am utterly spent. I have nothing left to give. I can barely breathe right, splayed across the bed on my back, chest heaving and brain whirling, my whole body rendered limp and useless and slick with a sheen of sweat. Arjun collapses by my side and I roll over to kiss him, my leg hooked over his waist, until I forget how to breathe and I have to break away.

"Now I get what all the fuss is about," Arjun says, sucking in a deep breath and letting it out hard. He grabs a tissue and pulls off his condom and kisses me again, and when he moves, easing me onto my back and looming over me, the bed knocks against the wall we share with Carrie and Ade.

I didn't notice that when I was wrapped up in him and only now does a flicker of embarrassment sink in: they probably heard everything. Every grunt and groan and gasp, every bump of the headboard against the wall.

"If they're in their room, then they definitely know what just happened," I say.

"I don't give a fuck."

He leans over and kisses my chest and my neck, his hand in my hair, and I can feel that he's ready to go again, pressing against my hip. He's breathing hard, his chest grazing mine each time he fills his lungs, but he's not done. Third time's a charm, I think, when I touch him and he gasps.

The first time was as expected, considering I was already fit to burst and it was his first time having sex: desperate kissing became fumbled groping, until he pushed into me and I almost came right then. It didn't last long before Arjun sank onto his elbows and apologised, and I kissed him and laughed as I told him that he lasted twice as long as my first time.

Lily and I were both awkward fifteen-year-olds wit raging hormones and it was a miracle it wasn't over the second she touched me. Arjun laughed when I told him that and he nuzzled my cheek, touching me as he kissed my jaw and I pulled his bottom lip between my teeth, almost biting straight through it when he pushed me over the edge.

The second time blew my mind, when he took me in his mouth and explored with his hand after he asked what I liked, and I told him, and he did exactly that. After I showed him the ropes, he took swift control with soft hands and a hard body, and I couldn't keep quiet when he filled me for a second time. I learnt with George that I enjoy myself a lot more if I'm not trying to stifle every noise, and I could stay quiet with what Arjun was doing to me.

Now, after fifteen minutes of recovery – lazy kissing and trailing hands and conversation quieter than our groans – I reach for the box on the bedside table and Arjun takes out a condom, but I take it from his hand. When I roll it on him, he lets out a shuddered breath and presses his mouth to mine as he sinks into me. My back arches, an involuntary cry of pleasure leaping from me as he steals my breath.

When I get it back, I take control and push him onto his back so I'm straddling him, his hands on my hips and his eyes, wide and ecstasy-filled, fixed on mine. He has marks on his back from my fingers digging in to pull him close, crescent bites from my nails almost breaking his skin when I came for the second time.

A couple of minutes in, I hear unmistakeably similar sounds coming from next door, the room belonging to Carrie and Ade. Muffled bumps and moans that should be a turnoff, but they have the opposite effect: I drop my hand and Arjun pulls me down, his arms wrapped around me.

"Is that turning you on?" he asks, and I can't lie because it's really fucking obvious that it is. I nod. He swallows hard and arches up to meet me, wrapping his hand around me with a slow stroke, and he whispers, "Me too."