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I know what I should do: call Audrey, text Araminta.

But I don’t want totalk. I wanthim.

Guilt tells me I shouldn’t call him, that I can’t just reach out to him when I need him. Caution tells me not to lean on him. But my need is a hungry monster, swallowing everything in its wake.

I type the message quickly, before I can second-guess myself.

Sophie: Comestay the weekend?

And, on impulse:

Sophie: Need you.

The reply comes almost instantly.

Evan: Anything for you x

17

Drowning Man

Sophie

Something’s off with Evan.

I notice it straightaway, even as I pull him into my room. He climbed up to the window even though I told him to tell me when he got here so I could sneak him into the building myself. It’s raining outside: his bomber jacket is already drenched, his wet hair plastered to his forehead and neck. It’s grown a little too long, like he’s not had a haircut since before the last time I saw him. There are shadows beneath his eyes like he’s not slept in days.

“Are you alright?” I try to ask as I push his jacket off his shoulders.

He doesn’t even answer. He catches me up in his arms and kisses me hungrily. His lips are wet and cold—his tongue is hot, his breath almost feverish as he roughly deepens the kiss. I pull away and try to put his wet jacket next to the radiator, but he grabs it out of my hands, tosses it carelessly on the back of my desk chair. He picks me up one-armed and tips me back onto my bed, mouth moving sloppily from my mouth to my chin, my jaw, my neck.

There’s something different about the way he’s holding me tonight, like someone lost at sea clinging to a rope, with the silent despair of a drowning man. His hands grasp me, refusing to let me go.

“Evan.” His name comes out in a hitching sob as he pulls up my shirt. He cups my breasts in his hands, kisses the tender flesh, sucking my nipples into his mouth. There’s a dark, desperate hunger to him that calls to the yawning pit of sadness and need inside me: I arch up into his touch, into his mouth, fingers curling into his wet hair, hips writhing against the mattress.

It’s quick, this time, quick and desperate and a little dirty: Evan kicking off his shoes, pulling his jumper and T-shirt off at the same time while I quickly roll down my tights and underwear. Me scooting back on the bed, him falling down on top of me, bracing on his arms above me like a predator pinning down prey. He sucks pink bruises along my collarbone while cupping me in his hand, fingers dipping between my legs, where I’m already wet and aching desperately.

“C’mon, c’mon,” I hiss against his hair, nails digging into his neck. “Need you. Now.Please.”

Evan pushes up my thigh with his knee, spreading me open for him before thrusting home. A whimper escapes my throat; he plasters his hand over my mouth, stifling my cries. He keeps his hand there as he fucks me in complete silence, eyes burning into mine, his breath a sharp low hiss.

He comes with a strangled grunt, one hand still on my mouth. Afterwards, we lie together for a moment, sweaty foreheads pressed together, bodies still entangled.

“I needed that,” I whisper when I’ve finally caught my breath.

“I know.”

We shower together, squeezed into the small stall. I stand in a blissful, lazy haze as Evan washes my hair, my body, betweenmy legs. He rinses me off, and I let him. I let him towel me off. I let him dry my hair, then brush it. Back in my room, I pull on his sweatshirt, and I’m rifling for some underwear when Evan pulls me away, firmly closing the drawer.

“Back on the bed,” he commands in a low voice. “I’m not done with you.”

I let him push me back onto the bed, reaching for the hem of his sweatshirt. Again, he stops me with a firm hand.

“Keep it on,” he says. “I like you in it.” He pushes me back, forcing me to fall back into my pillows, and he props my naked thighs on his shoulders. “Makes you look like you’re mine.”

I am yours, I want to say, but then his mouth is on me, and the terrible, unexpected truth that I am his is swallowed up into a hot, wet chasm of pleasure.

Afterwards, we lie togetherin bed, the teddy bear relegated to the desk chair to make room for Evan’s big body. He lies on his stomach and I’m on my side, tracing invisible patterns on the broad, smooth expanse of his back.