Through Glass (6 page)

The palm of Cohen’s hand was a white hot heat against my skin as he cradled my neck. His hand slid down my arm, his fingers trailing over my skin in heated pricks until he reached my hand, his fingers tracing the fresh lines on my skin before he wrapped his hand around mine. It was a normal enough action between us. It was one of those things we had always done, those subtle, meaningless gestures as friends. However, I could tell that this time was different. I could feel it in the warmth of his fingers, the softness of his touch. He wasn’t merely grabbing my hand for a quick reassurance, he was holding it. I could see it in his eyes, something had changed.

My heart thumped once in recognition of the difference and I fought to keep my breathing regular. Cohen’s fingers intertwined with mine as he brought my hand up to his face, my eyes lifting in surprise to look at him. I tried to keep a bland expression in my eyes, but I couldn’t do it. My heartbeat was thumping too heavily as I felt his warm breath travel over my skin. My stomach knit together as his lips made contact with my fingers, the wetness of his kiss seeping into my skin as he pressed against me. The touch triggered an electric surge that moved through every nerve-ending in my body. It tingled and burned inside of me, causing my eyes to widen at the sensation.

He smiled and continued to press his lips against my skin as the surges of excitement pumped through me. He wasn’t stopping and neither was my heart.

Cohen said nothing; he just sat there with my hand enclosed in his. My heart still beating so fast my blood was running a marathon through my veins. Everything inside of me pulsed and grew until I could feel the emotional pressure push against me, warning me of some internal implosion that was about to occur.

I don’t know if it had been one minute or twenty, but I couldn’t take it anymore. I couldn’t wait. I didn’t care about friendships and “friend-zones” and loss. I cared about Cohen and how his touch made me feel alive; how everything in me felt like it was on fire.

I cared about how I needed him right then.

I didn’t say a word; I didn’t wait for my mind to talk sense into me, to beg me to stop. I just moved, leaning into him until I could feel the warmth of his breath on my lips. The heat pushing me over the edge as I was lost. There was no stopping me. I leaned in and pressed my lips to his.

The gentle pressure of my lips against his was a pulse of white hot desire through my body, my entire soul breathed out in joy at the touch, as if I had been holding a deep breath of expectation for years and I didn’t know it. I wasn’t the only one.

I had expected him to pull away, but he didn’t. He leaned in, his lips pressing into mine as he kissed me back, as he savored me. His hand moved back up to my neck, the heat from his skin igniting a pleasure to move through me that I didn’t know could exist. I sighed and leaned into him, the pressure of his hand against my neck increasing as his lips parted just enough to breathe me in. For me to breathe him in as well.

He pulled me into him. My fingers wrapped around the cotton of his t-shirt as I answered the call and moved closer, needing to feel his heat. Needing to feel him. He kissed me like he longed for me, as though he had dreamed of me. I kissed him back the way I had dreamed of doing. With every touch of his fingers against my skin, I felt everything loosen inside of me. My heart rate was a tumult, but my mind was clear and it rejoiced in the dream I was now experiencing.

My hands moved from the fabric of his shirt, wrapping around him until I found his back where his shirt had already lifted from my desperate clawing. My hand fanned across his lower back, his lean body hot and smooth to the touch. His lips pressed against mine while his tongue dragged across my lips as his hand slid down my spine and the rippling pressure shook through me.

A deep, needy groan spread from my toes, rippling through my body wildly as my own hands wrapped around his arms in an attempt to bring him closer.

Instead of moving closer, though, he moved away as his lips left mine. The loss of contact leaving me gasping and panting. My body seized and tightened as I longed for the perfect drug that had just been ripped from my grasp.

“You have no idea how long I have wanted to do that,” he breathed into me, his words labored as his lungs tried to regulate his breathing.

“I think I have some idea,” I said, my words separated by my unstable breathing.

I tried to focus on finding my breath, in making my lungs work properly, yet not really caring if they did or not. My heavy breaths mixed with his and he pressed his forehead to mine. My own emotions remained jumbled inside of me in the firework of an explosion that had spread through me at the kiss. The heat only growing in my desperation for more.

“I wanted to take you to Sadie’s. I wanted to kiss you then,” his voice whispered against my skin, the heat from his breath enticing me back to him.

“Why didn’t you?” I reached up, my fingers brushing against the rough growth on his face.

I asked the question, but I didn’t wait for an answer. I didn’t really care to hear it. I couldn’t help it, I wouldn’t wait. I leaned forward and pressed my lips to his; once, twice and each time he met me with pressure and desire that only matched my own.

“I was seventeen and really stupid,” he breathed between the kisses that I littered over him.

I could agree to that. Stupid was one very accurate way to put it. I’d had the opportunity to let his stupidity dwell inside of me, but I didn’t. The electricity and need that still thrummed through me made it impossible for me to care.

I moved in his arms, my head angling enough to coax his lips back up to mine.

I felt his breath, shaky and heady against my skin as he contemplated; no, as he tried to control himself. I didn’t care. I listened to the need inside of me and pressed my lips against his, the deep groan that flowed from his throat only deepening my desire for him.

His arms reached out and pulled me into him, but the action was too much and my body fell off the barstool in an uncomfortable and highly embarrassing display.

I caught my footing quickly. My body straightening as his arms came to catch me.

I panted as I looked at my toes, as the beating of my heart slowed, before slowly raising my head to look at him.

The dark pools of his eyes drew me in, the sparkle deep and mischievous. Yet, the wanted desire he had held before had faded somewhat, the fall breaking the spell between us.

He smiled once and lifted my hand again, his eyes shining brighter than I had ever seen them as he pressed his masterpiece—my wrist—against his lips. A small kiss sealing the intimate moment.

I could see in his eyes what neither of us really needed to say.

This was only the beginning.

“Go get ready, Lex.” He pushed me away from him gently with a smile, one I couldn’t help returning. “I’m taking you on a date.”

I turned from him slowly, even though my heart begged me to run back into his arms.

“I’ll be right back to pick you up. I just need to grab your gift from my room.”

I nodded numbly as I made my way up the stairs, the sound of the front door closing loud in the quiet house.

I walked into my room slowly, pressing my back against the door as it closed. The excitement over what had just happened was still trying to leave my body.

My hands reached up slowly to press against my lips, the taste of him still heavy on the now tender skin. My mind ran over the kiss; remembering every word he said, the feel of his lips against mine and the scent of him against me. I replayed them over and over, waiting for my heart to settle, for the need I now felt to slow down. However, it only seemed to speed up, the heavy desire tensing inside of me as the joy at what I had just done filled me.

I had kissed him.

I looked up slowly, my nerves jumping at seeing Cohen standing in his room, his hand against the glass of his window as he watched me in my revelry. My hand dropped from my mouth as I looked to him, surprisingly unembarrassed at being caught savoring the memory. Any other time, I would have been, but no, this felt too natural to warrant embarrassment.

I met his eyes as he smiled, his lips puckering as he blew a kiss to me. My heart turning to mush at the action.

I took two steps forward in eager anticipation, my legs practically vaulting me onto my desk in a desperate need to open the window, to talk to him again. It was all silly really. He would be back in only a few minutes and then we would leave for his art show.

My hand touched the metal clasp to unlock the pane when a blood wrenching scream opened up the air. I jumped at the sound, my already sensitive nerves reacting to the terrifying sound. The scream cut through the bright spring day and let every happy feeling I had felt for the last five minutes evaporate into the bright sunshine.

Except there was no bright sunshine, not anymore.

Everything was quickly darkening, like the sun was setting; as though the sun had fallen from the sky. The shadow of dusk creeped over the houses and lawns, giving them a dark grey cast of night. Shadows stretched before disappearing while the glittering gold of the sun disappeared as the line of darkness came closer and closer.

I looked to Cohen in confusion as to why everything had gone dark, but he wasn’t looking at me. His eyes were focused up in silent horror at something I couldn’t see, something above the house where I knew the sun to be.

Where the sun should be.

Something was wrong. I could see it reflected in the open-mouthed horror that had covered Cohen’s face. My heart beat wildly in encroaching fear as I twisted myself against the window, pressing my face against the glass in my desperation to see what had happened.

I pressed my cheek against the window to look up, I didn’t see the sun; I could barely see the sky. My shaking hand flew to my mouth as I watched blackness, darker than ink, cover the wide expanse of blue above us. It spread over the bright sky like a thousand spiders with their angular legs cutting into the blue, wiping it from existence.

The legs crawled through the brightness of day, cutting into it with jagged motions that crawled over my skin, sending ice over my spine. The black grew and spread, the jagged legs taking away the brightness of the world, leaving us in the dim light of a moonless night; the world cast in shadows of blue and grey.

I couldn’t take my eyes from the horror of the world outside. My mouth opened in silent terror; any thought of screaming had been immediately drowned from the fear and confusion that circled through me.

I watched it, trying to figure out what was going on. Nothing that I was seeing made sense, nothing was right. I froze, fighting a need to run toward it; to hide, to scream, to fight the faceless villain that I was sure had caused this nightmare. It wouldn’t help and so I simply stared at it, wanting to find an explanation, but I already knew that I wouldn’t find one.

In only a matter of moments, the sky was gone. A moving wave of black covering the world above us as the pulsing black mass surrounded us in an orb of silence.

Silence.

The black had sucked the birds from the sky and taken the wind from the trees. In the stillness of my room, the absence of sound was only intensified. I stared out as the light continued to fade, leaving us in the darkness of a cloudy night. The houses looked like haunted trees across the motionless world. My eyes adjusted quickly, bringing the world around me into focus until only the shapes in the distance faded into the darkness.

I kept my face pressed against the glass as the silence washed over me, as my pulse beat loud and heavy in my ears. I waited for the blue to return; waited to wake up from whatever nightmare I was trapped in. It was the only explanation I could think of, the only thing I could grasp onto. I didn’t wake up though, and I knew, in the back of my mind, that all of this was real.

I watched the black, unable to look away, or to even move, before the silence was cut apart by the sound that would come to haunt my world.

A high pitched shriek rang through the silence, the sound a grinding buzz in my ears as I gasped in fear at its sudden arrival. I covered my ears in a panic, desperate to get the awful noise out of my head as I curled into a ball on my desk, my head pressing into my knees. I pushed hard against my ears, but the sound didn’t leave. It only grew until it vibrated inside of me, moving through my bones as it congregated inside my skull.