The Night We Stopped Pretending

The rain arrives without warning, a sudden pitter-patter against the windows of his apartment, and I stand facing the door, like I’m getting ready to leave—not really the door, like the exit, but something more dangerous. He’s behind me, so close I can feel the heat radiating from his body, yet he doesn't touch me. Not yet. The space between us vibrates with all the words we've never spoken, all the feelings we've carefully suppressed within the framework of our civilized meet-ups.

"Stay the night," he says.

I turn to face him. His eyes are bright, and I wonder if mine mirror his—if he can see in them the same hunger, the same desire, the same inevitability that I see reflected back at me.

"I should go," I say, but my body contradicts me, swaying slightly toward him, like a flower bending toward light.

"You should," he repeats, and there's something bitter in his voice, something that tastes of all our shoulds and shouldn'ts and all the practical reasons we've built up like walls between us.

"What's up, Daphne? Why’d you come over?”

“I came over to visit you, to see if you wanted to go out for some Starbucks or something.”

“Daphne, what do you want?”

What do I want? I think to myself, but the question dissolves before I can answer. How can I explain to him that I want everything? That I want him, but without all the emotional hangups. That I have my own thing, and I don’t want that ruined.

“Oh, Ethan, I’m just trying to take it slow, that’s all. I kinda like it here where everything is still possible, and nothing is ruined yet."

Ethan moves to the window, and I watch the play of shadows across his back, the way his shoulders carry some invisible weight. "I think about you," he says, staring out at the rain. "All the time. In meetings, in the middle of the night, when I'm supposed to be thinking about a thousand other things. You're there, Daphne. I can’t have a thought without you in it.”

I walk up behind him and wrap my arms around him, pressing myself against him, feeling his solidity against my uncertainty, caught between impulse and restraint. "I know," Ethan, I whisper. “Don’t you think I haven’t noticed the way you always look at me when you think I'm not paying attention?”

"Do you?" He turns, and his face has this look, like something I've never seen before—not quite pain, not quite anger, but something that contains both and exceeds them. "Do you know what I go through every time you leave? Every time we pretend this is just friendship, just intellectual companionship, just two people enjoying each other's company?"

I open my mouth, but no sound comes out. What can I say? Yes, I do know what he’s going through, because I’m going through the exact same thing. Every goodbye feels like a small death? I've become an expert in longing, cataloging every touch, every glance, and every moment that might sustain me through the days until I see him again.

"Come here," he says, and it's not quite a command, not quite a plea, but something in between that I can’t resist.

I press into him. He doesn't touch me immediately. Instead, we stand facing each other, breathing the same air, existing in the same space where everything seems like it’s about to change. "Tell me to stop," he persists, his hand rising slowly, tracing the curve of my hips, yet still giving me time and a little space to move away, to refuse, to maintain this facade of “us being just friends,” convincing ourselves that that’s all we were and nothing more.

But I don't tell him to stop. I can't. Because beneath all my fears and reservations, beneath the practical concerns and the what-ifs and the buts, there is this: a desire so fundamental that it feels like the only truth. So I let go.

Ethan brushes my cheek with the back of his hand. It's such a simple gesture, and yet it feels more intimate than anything I've ever experienced. His fingers trace the line of my cheekbone, and I realize I'm trembling. I’ve never been this close to a man.

"You're shaking," he says, and there's wonder in his voice, surprise that he's gotten this far with me.

"So are you," I reply, because his hand is trembling too, and somehow this vulnerability—this mutual terror—makes everything more precious, more real.

When he kisses me, it begins as a question. His lips brush against mine softly, tentatively, asking permission that I grant by pressing my mouth to his, by opening to him, by finally allowing the wall between us to crumble.

Then, as the kiss deepens, I feel the rush of everything we'd been holding back—the shared moments of passion and laughter, the stolen glances and lingering touches, the regret of all the times we'd parted without saying what we meant, without giving in to the feelings we had for each other. It's a kiss that carries the weight of all the desires that we keep suppressed—a kiss that shows our true feelings for each other.

His hands are in my hair now, fingers threading through the strands with such exquisite tenderness that I feel myself unraveling, becoming liquid under his touch. My hands clutch at his shirt, pulling him closer, trying to eliminate even the whisper of space between us.

The taste of him—something indefinably him, familiar despite this being our first kiss—stirs a recognition within me, filling my senses until the world outside becomes just a blur. The rain, the apartment, even time itself—all of it recedes until there is only his mouth on mine and his hands holding me as if I were the most precious thing on earth.

He was the first to pull away. I wanted the kiss to stretch into eternity. I can feel tears on my cheeks, though I don't remember starting to cry.

"Don't," he whispers, thumbing away the tears. "Don't cry."

"It's just... too much. You're too much,” I gush. This feeling is too immense for me to contain, too profound for language to capture. It spills out of me in tears and in this desperate need to stay close to him, because separation will only make me want him more.

"Stay with me tonight," he says again, but this time it's different. This time it's not a request, but a laying bare of a need that matches my own.

"Ok, but I'm scared, Ethan." I’m scared of being this close. I mean, we haven’t known each other for very long. What if you’re a serial killer, or a bone collector, or collect dead insects, or something like that?”

“Seriously, Daphne! Do I look like I collect bones or dead insects?”

“I guess not,” I chuckle.

"I’m scared too, Daphne. "But I'm more scared of letting you go, of losing you.”

Outside, the rain continues its percussion against the windows, but inside, we stand in our own weather, our own climate of desire and fear and tentative hope. He kisses me again, softer this time, and I taste promise in it, and risk, and all the messy, beautiful complications of letting someone matter this much.

When we finally move apart—just enough to breathe, to see each other clearly—I notice that the rain has softened to a whisper. Or perhaps I've simply stopped hearing it, lost as I am in this new world we've created, this fragile, fierce thing that exists between us.

"I'm glad we did this, Ethan. I'm glad we stopped pretending."

"Me too," he says, and he pulls me close again, not for another kiss but simply to hold me. So I let myself be held, let myself rest against him, let myself be his, let myself finally fall in love.