Chapter 7 Rowan

IT'S ALMOST ELEVENo'clock when we get back to Neil's dorm room, after we've gone full AP Lit, analyzing the musical and all the ways it compared to the play.

"I'm sad I don't get to meet your roommate," I say as Neil shuts the door behind us and flicks on the lights. Skyler went home for the weekend, he informed me when I arrived earlier. "Although if it means we have the room to ourselves, maybe I'm not sad at all."

Five years ago, I was in New York with my parents for a book tour, but the reality of being here with Neil is almost too good. He navigated the streets with a tentative confidence, as though wanting to prove that he knew where he was going as he squinted down at Google Maps. It was adorable, the fact that he wanted to impress me. There was some envy, too—because I'm jealous of this entire city, these skyscrapers and streets and subway cars that get to wake up with him every day.

Part of me was worried he'd judge the note from Professor Everett, an imperfect record to begin my college career. We always kept pace with each other so evenly, but he's no longer my competition. I shouldn't be shocked by the feedback, given how I stared at that blank document until my retinas burned, finally dragging out sentence after agonizing sentence. She'd said no more than a thousand words. Mine was barely three hundred.

At first I wasn't sure why I brought it with me, but as he read it, I realized it was because I needed someone to process it with. Someone who understands me, who knows how out of character this kind of feedback is. And how much it might sting.

The joy on his face as he read my writing and then Professor Everett's note was so far from disappointment that I wasn't sure why I second-guessed it. He didn't tell me I was overreacting, or that I'd do better next time, or that her note wasn't really that bad. He knew exactly why it upset me so much.

Even better: the joy on his face when I mentioned Europe. Something we can look forward to later, when all of this feels too difficult.

Right now, though—right now he is all mine.

I unbutton my corduroy jacket and step out of my boots, the fact that we are truly alone for the first time slowly sinking in. Neil watches me. Swallows hard. As much as I love him in a denim jacket, I also love the way that jacket looks draped over the back of his desk chair, allowing me to take in the lines of his body for the first time all day. A simple black button-down, open at the throat. The freckles and features I've missed.

He is so lovely, especially with his messy hair in slight need of a haircut. When I slide my fingers into it, he lets out this low hum. His eyes fall shut for a moment, his hands settling at my waist on his exhale. Thumbs stroking along my skirt.

"I'd be lying if I said I hadn't been waiting all day for this," I say.

"Try all month." With a wicked, heavy-lidded look, he draws me even closer, one hand trailing up my back. "And the best part is, we can't be interrupted."

That rush of freedom turns everything more intimate. Slowly, I take off his thin oval glasses and place them on his desk before I kiss him, properly kiss him, for the first time in weeks.

It's slow, deep, the kind of kiss that tells the other person you have all the time in the world to keep kissing them like this. His tongue slips inside my mouth, teasing. A soft bite on my lower lip, and then a harder one, because this is something I've just recently learned I like and he's determined to make up for lost time. That sigh in his throat is one I feel deep in my bones, beautiful and satisfying and perfect.

The last time we had sex, a stolen afternoon in my room while my parents worked from a coffee shop, knowing we probably wouldn't have another opportunity for a while, he just stared at me for a long time, like he was trying to memorize every detail.

This time, we have a full weekend ahead of us.

Before we go any further, though, he pauses. He cradles my jaw, his thumb skating along my cheekbone. His eyes, blazing and intense, with always, always that underlying softness to his expression. "I love your face. Every part of it. It wasn't enough seeing you over video—I don't think there are enough pixels in the world to do you justice." A kiss lands on the tip of my nose, as though he knows it's something I used to be self-conscious about. He's never shy about his compliments, but this one feels different. Weightier. "You're a thousand times better in person."

After that, neither of us cares to slow down for very long. Our shirts land on the floor, my tights tangled with his jeans. Then I climb into his bed with bare legs, and he slides in next to me, lining his body up with mine.

"Small bed," I remark.

"I don't see anything wrong with that."

He traces his fingertips along the seams of my bra before removing it, and I arch my back into him as he kisses my neck, my chest. I stroke my hand along every cluster of freckles. His skin is so warm, as though every possible emotion is pulsing right beneath it. Lust. Sweetness. Admiration.

At the beginning of our relationship, he was shy and sometimes uncertain, and watching him gain confidence, even in the limited time we had together over the summer, has more than surprised me. But maybe it shouldn't—if there's something Neil McNair isn't instantly an expert at, he naturally wants to excel in it.

His breathing grows more ragged as I push my hips against his, his teeth landing on the soft skin of my shoulder, and this is one of my favorite things about him: how he begins in this undeniably wholesome way, until the sensation becomes too powerful and he gives in to the basest parts of himself. I cannot get enough of him like this, acting purely on instinct. On desire. Losing himself in me, simply feeling. Contrasted with the buttoned-up, glasses-wearing guy with the massive vocabulary—it's about the hottest thing I can imagine.

"Not yet," he says, and I can tell it's taking every ounce of self-control to utter those words. His hair is already wild, a flush spread across his cheeks and down the column of his neck. "We don't have to rush."

"I know, I know. I just missed you."

He readjusts on top of me, bending to kiss my waist, my stomach, my hips. "Could I…?" he asks, and presses a kiss to the front of my underwear. Then another one, lower this time, the heat of his mouth finishing that silent question.

"I've never—" I start, because even though Neil wasn't my first, that's one thing I haven't done. Not with him, not with anyone. "Are you sure you want to?"

The look on his face makes me think I've asked the most obvious question in human existence. "Rowan. I wanted to all summer. I don't think… I don't think there's been a time I haven't wanted to."

"Then—yes," I breathe out, wondering if he can hear the longing in just those two words. Because suddenly it's all I can think about, and I am absolutely desperate for it. Even when a past boyfriend offered, I was never fully comfortable. I didn't want to be that exposed.

There's none of that self-consciousness now.

He hooks his thumbs around that last bit of fabric separating us and pulls it down my legs, and then, because he's Neil, folds it neatly on top of our tights-jeans pile. My breathing is already heavy as he settles himself between my legs.

The sensation is all warmth, a new kind of intimacy that tugs at something deep in my chest. I'm half sitting up on my elbows, watching him, but soon my muscles can't take it and I let myself sink into the mattress, head dropping to the pillow.

But after a few minutes, after the initial surprise of it wears off—and then longer than a few minutes, as he tries to find a rhythm—my mind starts to wander.

To my next creative writing assignment, and whether I'll be able to conquer the blank page.

To my train on Sunday, and what time I'll have to be at the station so I don't miss it.

I squeeze my eyes shut, willing myself to stay in the moment.

He keeps going, and while all of it feels good, none of it feels amazing, exactly. A new kind of frustration.

"Is it still okay?" he asks.

"Yeah. Yes. Just…" I'm unsure how to vocalize it. Even during our first time together I was able to guide his hand. For some reason, maybe because this is new territory for both of us, I'm now at a total loss.

"Oh," he says, that single syllable containing so much disappointment, his face beautifully flushed. Ever gentle, with the way his fingertips skim up my thighs, thumbs brushing my hips. "We could try something else?"

All summer, we were dying to be alone. And now that we are… what, we've got performance anxiety? I'm distracted in a way I hoped this trip would clear up. I want to be here, with him, and yet my mind is in a hundred other places.

Then, just as I'm reaching for his shoulders because he feels entirely too far away from me, a fire alarm goes off.

We bolt upright.

"Um," I start as the alarm blares, because the timing? Could not be worse.

Neil practically leaps off the bed, handing me my shirt before reaching for his own.

"It's got to be a drill," he says as he opens up his closet, tossing me a pair of sweatpants because I'm sure he knows putting my tights back on would require some serious acrobatics.

We have to take the stairs, six flights down with the rest of the dorm, some students in pajamas and some of them looking like they were mid–party prep. All of them looking pissed.

At almost midnight, New York is disorienting. A haze of noise and bright lights, cars honking and sirens in the distance, people laughing and shouting and pushing past us on the sidewalk. It takes me a few long moments to get my bearings.

I hug my jacket tighter around me, shivering, before Neil pulls me closer. It could be worse, though: there's a girl out here in only a robe and flip-flops, her hair soaking wet.

One of the RAs jogs over and addresses the group.

"Looks like someone burned popcorn in the microwave and set off the alarms," he says, which elicits a chorus of groans. "They'll let us back inside any minute."

It is, understandably, a challenge to get back in the mood when we return to his room twenty minutes later.

"I'm sorry," I say when he closes the door. "Not about the fire drill, about—before."

A little furrow appears between Neil's brows. "You have nothing to be sorry for. I'm sorry."

I shake my head, unsure why I couldn't have just been more present, a twinge of guilt settling low in my stomach. "It's fine. Really."

"I'm just happy to be spending time with you, whether we have clothes on or not." His arms come around me, mouth grazing my ear.

Because of course he's sweet about it.

"I love you," I say, having missed the way his features go soft when I say it in person.

"Adore you."

As nice as it is to fall asleep together and wake up in the same bed, the awkwardness of last night continues to weigh on me Saturday morning.

Last night, he tucked my body against his and we watched part of The Force Awakens because we've been making our way through the Star Wars franchise since the beginning of summer, when Neil was shocked to learn I'd never seen any of the movies.

The rest of the weekend, we play tourists at the Museum of Natural History and the Statue of Liberty, two things he's been saving so we could do them together. When we get back to his dorm that night, I tell him I'm exhausted and he agrees, which is true, but I'm also worried about what might happen if we try anything again.

Maybe that first time, with all its beautiful imperfections, was so lovely that nothing can measure up.

It's a thought I wish I could banish as soon as it enters my mind. We already had our big romantic moment on the last day of school, our epic love story that ended with both of us admitting our feelings for each other after years of animosity. We fulfilled the trope, in its most basic terms: we started out enemies and became lovers. We gave the speeches that characters deliver in all my romance novels. The declarations of love. Period, underlined, THE END in big bold letters.

What comes after that?

Sunday afternoon, when Neil drops me off at Penn Station after a farewell bagel, I find myself wondering, as the train pulls away, why I miss him more than I did three days ago.