chapter 5
1917 Words
LORI
He pushed in deeper. He went in slowly and gently. But no amount of gentle could prepare me for the way it felt.
I gasped.
It was too much. I felt too full. Like my body was trying to stretch around something it had never even imagined could fit. I dug my nails into his back and whimpered against his shoulder.
Jason froze.
His voice was a whisper against my wet skin. “Too much?”
I barely nodded. My legs trembled.
“I can stop,” he said, still inside me but unmoving, holding himself up like he was scared to crush me. “Say the word, Lori. I’ll stop.”
But I didn’t want him to stop.
“I-It hurts,” I whispered. “But I don’t want you to stop.”
His eyes found mine, all soft storm and burning restraint. He leaned down and kissed my lips, my cheek, my forehead. Then my lips again. Slower this time. Like he was trying to speak through it.
“You’re okay,” he murmured between kisses. “I’ve got you.”
His hand slid between my fingers, interlocking. Then he started to move again, he was slow and steady, like the rhythm of a heartbeat. My body tensed, then relaxed. The pain didn’t vanish, but something else rose up through it. A kind of aching heat, spreading from my core like waves rippling in a dark lake.
I moaned into his shoulder. My breath hitched. He moved again and again.
He was so warm. His skin, his hands, his breath. Every inch of him felt like fire under water. And when he held me—tight, like I was the only thing anchoring him—my whole body sighed into him.
“It’s okay,” he kept whispering. “You’re doing perfect. You feel… God, Lori, you feel so good.”
I whimpered again, not from pain this time. Something different. Something sharp and hot...
My arms clung around his neck. His thrusts stayed slow, deep, unhurried. The shower was still running, warm streams dancing over our skin, and the tile beneath us felt like a distant planet. I was floating, drowning then rising and breaking.
His hand stroked down my thigh. Up my waist. Over my cheek. He kissed me again then pressed his forehead to mine.
I whispered, “Jason…”
“I’m right here,” he said. “I’m not going anywhere.”
And for a second, I believed him.
By the time he finished, I was trembling but it was not from cold, not even from the ache blooming low in my belly. It was from everything I didn’t have words for. My lips were parted. My breath came in soft, dizzy gasps. My whole body felt like it had been unraveled and sewn back together with him in the seams.
Jason pressed one last kiss to my temple before lifting me in his arms again. Water still ran down our skin in tiny trails, dripping to the floor. His arms were warm. The towel he'd wrapped around me earlier was nowhere in sight.
He carried me out of the bathroom and into the bedroom like I weighed nothing.
The bed dipped under our weight. I didn’t let go of him.
His fingers brushed damp strands of hair from my face. “You sure?” he asked again, even now, even after everything.
I nodded, dazed. “Please…”
Jason kissed me again, slower this time, like he was savoring the way I tasted. His mouth moved against mine like he had all the time in the world.
I opened for him again. Welcomed him.
His body settled between my thighs, and I wrapped my legs around him without even thinking. My thighs shook as he entered me again, carefully, as though I were made of glass.
It was still sore. I still winced. But it was easier this time.
He rocked into me like the tide. My back arched into him. His lips trailed across my jaw, my throat, the soft dip above my heart. His hand gripped my waist.
“I’ve got you,” he murmured again.
I believed him.
Our bodies moved like they were made to fit. He made no sound except his breath in my ear and the quiet groans he tried to hold back. I clung to him like he was the last thing tethering me to the world.
I felt everything.
When I finally shattered around him, it was silent. Like rain falling on a still lake. Like a wish whispered into a storm. I buried my face into his neck and let the tremors run through me.
Jason kissed my cheek. My collarbone. My mouth again, barely brushing.
He pulled out carefully, kissed my forehead, and wrapped me in his arms. He didn’t say anything. Just held me.
I woke up to light.
Like actual sunshine creeping in through the cheap white blinds of my dorm window, slicing across the room and landing right on my face. I blinked and rolled over, groaning a little because everything… hurt. Not in a bad way, just… sore. Like I’d run a marathon or been hit by a truck. A very hot, very naked truck.
My arms stretched out. But the space beside me was cold.
Empty.
I sat up fast. My chest clenched. The blanket slipped down and I realized—oh my god—I was still naked.
Naked. In bed. Alone.
My brain kicked on like someone poured ice water into my skull.
Where was Jason?
I looked around like maybe he was just in the bathroom or standing off to the side or leaning against the wall but no, he was gone.
Gone.
Panic rose so fast I almost choked on it.
I pulled the blanket around me and stared at the crumpled towel on the floor. My clothes were scattered. My bra was hanging off the desk chair like a ghost of last night, and my underwear—Goddess, I couldn’t even see them.
“What did I do?” I whispered.
The memories hit all at once. His hands on my skin. My legs wrapped around his waist. His mouth on my throat. His voice whispering how good I felt. Me—moaning. Touching. Begging him not to stop.
Oh my god.
I gave him everything.
Every inch of me. Every broken, bruised, still-bleeding part.
And now he was just… gone?
Was it even real?
Was he real?
What if I just made it up because I was lonely? Or because I wanted to be loved so badly I couldn’t even tell the difference anymore?
I looked down at myself, the blanket slipping off my shoulder. There were faint red marks on my hips. On my neck. My thighs. My chest.
I felt humiliated and it was not because of the s*x exactly but because I thought it meant something. I let myself believe, for one single second, that I mattered to someone.
I buried my face in my hands.
And for the first time since I’d walked in on Valkyrie and Mabel, I actually wished I could disappear.
I stumbled out of bed like I wasn’t even in my body.
My legs were sore and shaky, and my head felt stuffed with cotton. My hands trembled as I grabbed at my clothes, pulling them from the floor one by one. My jeans were inside out, my underwear was missing for a full thirty seconds, and my shirt had this stupid wrinkle across the middle that wouldn’t go away no matter how much I tried to smooth it.
It didn’t matter.
I was too busy trying not to cry.
I tugged my bra on—still damp from last night—and my arms got caught in the straps. I cursed under my breath, yanked it around, shoved it into place. My chest felt too tight. My throat burned.
I looked over at the bed.
The sheets were a mess. The pillow he used had an indent in it. The blanket still smelled like him—like forest air and warm skin and whatever that smoky cologne was he always wore.
I wanted to scream.
Why did I let it happen?
Why did I believe it meant something? Why did I think that just because he was kind and strong and looked at me like I was more than just broken glass pretending to be whole, that it meant he’d stay?
I could hear Valkyrie’s voice in my head.
"You're nothing to me, Lori."
"I never wanted you."
Was Jason just another version of that? Another boy who got what he wanted, said the right words, and then vanished?
I shoved my arms through my hoodie and yanked it over my head. My hair got caught, and I didn’t care. I tugged it until it fell loose around my face. My eyes burned. My heart burned.
Everything burned.
I grabbed my shoes and sat on the edge of the bed to pull them on. My hands were shaking so hard I almost missed the laces.
The silence was awful.
I looked around one more time. Hoping maybe I missed something. A note. A message. Anything.
But there was nothing.
Just silence. And the heavy, aching truth that I gave him everything and woke up alone.
I stood up, heart pounding.
“I’m such an i***t,” I whispered.
Then louder: “So. f*****g. Stupid.”
I didn’t know where I was going but I had to get away from my dorm room, get away from the memory and his scent. I don't have a class till 2pm but I doubt I'd be able to attend and stomach facing everyone. My mum was right, coming here was not a good idea.
I flung the door open and stepped into the hallway, hoping—praying—that no one would be outside. That the universe would at least give me that. One tiny shred of mercy. But of course not.
There was a girl down the hall, fiddling with her locker. Her head turned as I passed. Her eyes went from my flushed face, to my messy hoodie, to the mismatched shoes I’d pulled on in a panic. She didn’t say anything, but her eyes said enough.
I walked faster. My legs still ached. My body still remembered him. And that made it worse. It made it so much worse.
I pushed through the exit and out into the morning air. My eyes stung instantly, but it wasn’t the sun—it was the pressure. The heat crawling behind my face like it wanted to explode out of me.
But I didn’t cry, I didn’t let myself. I just walked down the path, past the statue of Alpha Caelorus. Past the courtyard where I used to eat lunch with Mabel before she ruined everything. Past the academy steps where Valkyrie once waited with his hand out and that stupid smile that I used to think meant something.
I just kept walking.
People looked and whispered. I didn’t slow down. My heart felt like it had been ripped out and replaced with a hole. A big, stupid, aching hole.
And the worst part? I wasn’t even mad at Jason. I was mad at me for letting him in. For thinking someone like him could ever want someone like me.
“I gave him everything,” I whispered, my voice barely holding together.
- Writer
