Page 37 of It’s Me, but Different

Wrapped in a towel that smells like expensive fabric softener, I slide my palm over the glass and clean a circle on the fogged surface. I observe my face, and it's like finding myself again. Water still drips from my hair, my chest and cheeks are flushed, my eyes bright. And I see myself… I see myself alive. More alive than I've felt in a long time.

The sound of soft knocks on the door startles me.

“Esme?” Sloane's voice sounds muffled through the wood. “Can I come in?”

My heart speeds up again, but this time it's not just from surprise. If she knew what just happened in that shower.

“Oh, wow!” she murmurs, looking me up and down, as if devouring me with her eyes.

“I just got out of the shower,” I apologize.

“The kids are with River,” she announces without preamble. “They're going to make cookies until dinnertime.”

“Oh, okay,” I respond, not really knowing what to say, suddenly too aware of how Sloane is looking at me. “And what are you doing here?”

“I wanted to see you,” she admits, stepping closer and placing her hands on my waist. “I wanted… I wanted to make sure you're okay after this morning.”

“This morning?”

“Ana Sofia falling. I saw you very scared. I know that since you lost Luis, anything that happens to the kids must multiply your anxiety by a thousand.”

Her words hit me straight in the heart. For two years, almost no one has really understood that constant overprotection, that feeling that if I let my guard down for just a second, I could lose the only thing I have left.

“A little,” I admit in a whisper. “But I trusted the perfect person to take care of her.”

“You're... you're beautiful wrapped in that towel,” she hisses with slightly labored breathing.

“Yeah? Well, I'd say you're taking it off with your eyes.”

“I'm doing much more than taking off your towel with my eyes,” she admits, raising her eyebrows and letting out a small breath.

“Better like this?” I ask, letting the towel fall at my feet and standing completely naked in front of her.

“Much better,” she sighs, moving closer to kiss my neck.

I respond by brushing my lips along her jaw, covering her with small kisses while feeling how her pulse speeds up against my mouth as she gets more and more aroused. Somehow, there's something special about this intimacy we're rediscovering, as if we're both painfully aware of what we lost once and desperate not to lose it again.

Her heart beats erratically when I unbutton her shirt and slide my fingertips along her sides. She arches her back, feeling my thumbs slipping under her bra. Each gentle brush of our lips reminds me how much I want to have her naked body under mine. I don't want to run from what I feel for her anymore. I want to enjoy it.

Sloane unhooks her bra to rub her breasts with mine, lightly scratching my shoulders, asking for more.

I whisper her name against her throat, tasting her skin, losing myself in the warmth of her body pressed to mine. Each kiss, each caress, weaves our previous story into something new, perhaps stronger and more mature.

She laughs while struggling to take off her pants and underwear urgently, without stopping kissing until we can barely stay standing.

In the dimness of my bedroom, her tanned skin seems to glow as I trace the curves of her body with my fingertips.

Sloane closes her eyes and sighs, feeling my lips on her throat before claiming control.

“Your nipples are like chocolate chips,” she murmurs suddenly.

“What did you say?”

“They're small… and round… and brown… and delicious,” she continues while leaning down to lick one of them.

I just laugh.

“I'm not sure how to take that, Sloane,” I joke. “But continue.”