6. Ned

I rolled on top of him, his hips shifting underneath me so I could fit.

"You need a bigger bed."

"Not really. It's not like I bring people here."

"You brought me."

That made him laugh.

"Yeah. Not much choice. It was either that or let you get eaten alive out there."

"I feel like a bloody tourist."

"Cover your skin after dusk, idiot."

"Really?"

"Well, apart from right now."

There it was. The twinkle in his eye. The Teddy I remembered had been so shy. This Teddy, though… His stubble scratched my chest as he gently moved and sucked my nipple into his mouth, his warm tongue circling the delicate skin, following up with a nip of teeth on the hardening bud. A moan escaped my mouth.

"You still…bottom?" I huffed out. I wanted inside him. I wanted to make it right this time. Make him scream my name. I hadn't known what I was doing that first time.

"Yeah. You know what you're doing these days? "

"Sorry." I still smiled. "At least I didn't scar you for life."

"Nah. You were okay." He gave my other nipple the same treatment, sending shivers of sensation through me as those big, rough hands cupped my ass, tugging me closer. He obviously liked that. "I couldn't walk properly for a few days. It hurt like hell whenever I tried to sit down. Fucking Tv cable."

I'd forgotten how funny he was. How his face just opened up when he smiled.

"Sorry. Dry fucking isn't…great, but I was desperate."

"Yeah. We both were. But you know? It was good. It was actually really good, despite all that. When you're eighteen and the hottest bloke on the planet offers himself up to you—well, I wasn't going to say no, was I?"

"I wasn't that hot."

"You were, trust me, Ned. You were scorching. And then you ripped that nice cock of yours out, and…yeah."

"Nice cock," I mumbled, a little blush warming my cheeks.

"Maybe you wanna stick that nice cock of yours in my mouth?" he suggested.

I'd been to try to steer the conversation back on track, but maybe less talk was called for. Less talk, more action.

"Is that what you ask your hook-ups for?" I liked the gentle teasing we had going on. It lightened the mood. "Love a bit of cock in my mouth."

"So do I, but since you're too slow…" He smiled and rolled me over onto my back. "You'll just have to wait your turn." Walking his knees up the bed, he leaned forward, dick in hand, and I angled my head to taste him, but I could only reach the tip. He was making me work for it.

He had such a nice dick. Lots of dark pubic hair. Hard, muscular thighs. Yet his stomach was soft, his ass nicely squishy as I grabbed it and leaned up so I could properly suck him.

Teddy. How that shy boy had turned into this…honestly…nice guy was beyond me. He guided his dick with his hand, not going too deep, just right, though he was slick with saliva and I could have swallowed him whole.

I let him go, wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, smiled as he adjusted his stance, holding on to the wall .

Guiding his dick back in, he stroked it gently across my bottom lip.

"You can go deeper." Because, yes please to all of that. "Let me taste you," I pleaded.

He grunted, or perhaps it was laughter at my neediness, but he took me at my word and pushed deeper, gently fucking my mouth. My throat spasmed and constricted around his length.

Relax, Ned. It's just a blow job.

Normally, I would follow that thought up with it means nothing , yank my dick out and get off as some faceless stranger fucked my throat. But I couldn't switch off.

"Nuh-uh." I pushed on him, gently, asking him to stop, and he did straight away, looking down at me, his fingers stroking my cheek, wiping the corner of my eye.

Tears.

Carefully, he lay on top of me, lightly kissing my cheek, his hand around the back of my neck, his nose against mine. "You know, we don't have to do this."

"I know." I looked away, no idea why I suddenly felt so emotional. It was like something had dawned on me, but I didn't understand what.

"But I think we should," he said. "Because if we don't…"

"Yeah?"

"We'll never know how it ended."

Trust him to bring the poetry.

I put my arms around him. I loved the weight of his body on mine. It made me feel safe. The way he looked at me was so soothingly familiar that here were those tears again. The emotion welled up inside of me to the point that I could barely breathe.

"How do you think it will end?" I asked.

"I don't know. How are we supposed to know? Life doesn't work like that."

"Fate," I offered up, and he laughed softly. "Yeah, right. If fate had its hand, the whole world would be a different place. I don't believe in all that."

"What do you believe in? "

Such a weird question to ask, lying here. He slid off me and made himself a comfortable in the crook of my neck, his hand smoothing over my chest.

It was strange how I didn't even care that my dick was soft and flat. So was his, just lying there against me.

Him. Me.

Ted and Ned.

"I don't know what I believe in anymore," I admitted. "I used to believe in finding someone and spending the rest of my life with them. Shit like that."

"Fairy tales." He smiled, kissed my chin, brushing his lips across the stubble. "Stories for kids to believe in. Real life is very different."

Like I didn't I know that.

There were old comics on his shelves, faded posters on the walls, like time had truly stood still for the past ten years and we were still eighteen.

He'd been a vision of teenaged hormones, every part of him something I'd wanted to get my hands on. My mouth on. My dick inside.

I hadn't lied when I said I'd been inexperienced, taking him like that.

"Sorry, again—you know, for that time ten years ago."

"Nothing to be sorry about. Not every nerdy misfit gets to have all his naughty fantasies fulfilled in one fell swoop. Pushed over the sofa by the hottest exchange student was right up there in mine. Stop apologising. It wasn't like…"

I had to laugh in wonder at how easy this was, why I didn't feel more awkward. This wasn't a hook-up. It sure had felt like one earlier on, but it didn't now. Not at all.

I'd forgotten how light the summers were here, where the night never really arrived, just soft, dusky light coming through the thin curtains, the air still, like everything had been turned off. Apart from a sheep bleating in the distance.

But I remembered this. How it had felt lying beside him. I truly had been swished back in time.

"You know. That first time…"

"Yeah? "

I loved how he talked to me. How his arms held me. I shuffled a little until we were where I wanted us to be, with my head on his shoulder, my hand on his chest.

"I was so in love with you, and I was getting desperate. You know what we were like. You were really quiet. I wasn't, but when you were around, I couldn't open my mouth. It seems really stupid now, but my whole year just…revolved around you. I would go on long walks so I could get to the top of the hill and stand there, hoping to catch a glimpse of you. Sometimes you sat out there on the veranda with your dad. Other times…I don't know. I liked feeling close to you."

"Sounds like you were stalking me."

He was smiling. I could feel it in the way his lips touched my hair, delivering soft kisses.

"Maybe I was. Eighteen-year-old me had no clue. And then…you know."

"You walked behind me all the way home."

"Yeah." Now I was the one laughing—in embarrassment, coupled with a bit of shame and a whole heap of arousal. I remembered it well. "Most frightening thing I've ever done, following you inside."

I lifted my head and looked at him, really looked at him, stroked the contour of his jaw, relishing the tickle of the soft stubble, the curl of his mouth as he smiled.

"You haven't changed at all. Still a smooth talker."

"I know. That's how I get myself laid." I grinned. Lies. All lies.

"I just use apps, like a normal person." He brushed his hand down my arm, raising goosebumps.

"You said you weren't on any apps."

"I'm not on any apps here ."

"Then where?" I had to ask, though I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

"Wherever. Take myself off for the weekend. Take in a concert or something. Book a cheap hotel room. Find someone who will fuck me senseless for a few hours. Shower. Come home."

I wanted to tell him off for…I didn't even know what for. But I knew the drill. I did it too, always thinking it would make me feel better about myself. About the world. It never did .

"Are we going to fuck or what? Because…" He tapped my nose with his fingertip. "If this is my one chance to have my way with you again, I'm surely not going to say no."

"This is not a hook-up, Teddy." I tried to sound stern, but he just laughed and leaned in to kiss me.

"That's exactly what it is," he whispered. "Ten years later."

I hadn't expected his words to hurt because I kind of knew already what a massive mistake this was. But still, he wouldn't let me go.

Wrapping his arms around me, he pressed his lips hard against mine, grinding into me, and then kissing his way down my chest before he rose, smiled. Winked as he shuffled down further.

He took me deep, leaving my arms flailing through the air, hitting the hard headboard with an alarming thump. His head bobbed somewhere at the edge of my vision as my dick gently swelled under his tongue.

Finally, against all my better judgement, I allowed myself to relax. I'd said the words, and he'd accepted my lame excuse of an apology—he'd even offered his own, in a way. Like we agreed.

He'd said it didn't mean anything, yet the way he kissed up my chest, the way his eyes met mine, that small smile on his handsome face…I was drowning in the waves of feeling—his, mine, I had no idea.

"Wanna fuck me?" he asked.

"Hell, yes!" I said, and we rolled over, two grown men in a small single bed. He moved exactly where I needed him to be, lying on his back, his legs up over my shoulders as I mauled his mouth, my tongue down his throat. I had to splutter a little laugh because I'd done this last time too—kissed him so hard he'd almost choked.

"Lube," I whispered. His hands were already guiding my ass.

"Ned," he breathed.

"Yeah?"

"Just fucking…"

I hadn't noticed. The wetness of his eyes. How he …

Oh, hell.

"Just fucking do it. Like last time."

Hell, yes.

I spat into my hand and held him down, shoving his hips so they were just the way I wanted them. Wanted him. And me. Like this.

"I want to feel you for days. Make me remember you, like this. Like it was."

The rational part of me wanted to protest, scream at him, tell him off for being irresponsible and downright stupid. I'd hurt him.

I was already hurting him. Just like he was hurting me. Stabbing my insides like the sharp knife he was.

"Please," he whispered.

I spat again, smeared it all over his hole and pushed in with two fingers, moving inside of him, scissoring, being too rough, but he moaned, egged me on.

"Just…do it. Make me feel you."

I grabbed his leg and shoved my knee under his hip, my breath hitching as I guided my dick towards his entrance. Pushed. Hard.

He was nowhere near ready.

I didn't think I was either, but I pushed, and he roared, his hands holding me in place, begging me to do it. Ned. Please.

I did. I pushed, ruthlessly forcing myself inside of him, and he took me, welcomed me, the movement of his lips against my cheek telling me all the little words I needed to hear.

"Yes. Fuck. Harder. Move. Fucking move, Ned! "

It hadn't been like this last time. I'd have remembered. I hadn't been this desperate. My hands cramping around his face as my nails dug into his skin. My teeth against his teeth, panting furiously as he roared into my mouth.

He'd told me to fuck him, and fucking we were, the world around us full of grunts and roars, the bed creaking dangerously underneath us.

"I don't care if you break the fucking bed, Ned. Give it to me," he hissed, his fingers digging into my neck, my arms. " Fucking hell."

I had no words, honestly, with my face pressed against his neck, licking the sweat from his skin. I bit down. Hard. I would bruise him. Mark him. Make him mine.

I couldn't even fathom which sounds came from me and which ones he was gifting me. Moans. Words. All simply becoming part of whatever this was.

It was just him and me, our bodies fused together with nothing between us.

"Neeed," he whined. I silenced him with my mouth. Held him down as I started to lose my mind. The familiar static filled my head as my thighs sang with exhaustion and I dropped down onto my elbows, with him impossibly squashed underneath me.

"Come with me," I whispered. "Come. Make this worth it."

I'd meant one thing. But the other was right there, slapping me in the face with reality as I shot a painfully cruel load inside of him.

An orgasm making me cry out in…everything that this was.

Loss. A huge, unbearable loss of everything I had ever wanted and knew I'd never have.

Something like…this.

I couldn't even function. Couldn't think. I'd lost all ability to speak as he gently uncurled himself from underneath me, his arms never losing contact with my skin, his mouth still gently pressed against my cheek, my neck, my shoulder, as he once again let me settle against his chest.

He smelled of sweat. Of life. Of everything that this place was.

He smelled of something, and the only word forming in my head was one that made me want to scream in frustration.

This wasn't my place. This wasn't my home. I didn't belong here any more than that big fat fly buzzing in the window, desperate to escape back out there into the light.

I closed my eyes, concentrated on the sensation of his fingers dancing over my skin.

"Ned?" he asked softly.

I nodded. I had no strength for anything else .

"When you wake up? Just leave. Don't make it into anything more than it was. Don't leave your number. Don't look for mine. Just…let me have this. Like it is."

The words hurt me more than I could stand, a sharp pain in my stomach, insistent and brewing as he pressed kisses against my forehead and held me gentler than anyone had ever held me before.

I couldn't give him any reassurances. I could only lie there and hurt.

In the morning, I wrote him a note—a load of bollocks that I scratched out with the blunt pen on the kitchen table.

There was a cat sitting in the window, a half-drunk cup of coffee on the side. Things I wanted to take in but wouldn't allow myself to remember.

Instead I wrote on a small piece of paper from a notebook words I would no doubt regret. Another ten years of wishing I could tell him things I would never get to speak out loud.

A love letter to the trees that surrounded this place, the air that was full of the morning warmth we could have shared, the cups of coffee I could have made him, the kisses I would have left on his skin.

I scrunched up the paper, threw it in the trash.

Then I pulled up a blank sheet, and let the pen write for me the only words I could think of.

Wait for me.