8 nights in hell [Billie Eilish]

NIGHT V.5: kiss one another

• pov: Billie •

Even back in Mara's room under the shower I could not completely relax. The events of the past nights, worrying about Mara, running from the cops and confronting Ricky, it all crashed down on me. But it was over. That was the comforting thought I held on to. Yet each time I closed my eyes under the hot stream I felt like the violins from the Psycho soundtrack screeched right in my ears.

I left the shower, dried off and dressed myself for bed. After wrapping my hair in a towel I gave myself a quick glace in the mirror. Suppressing a yawn I ran my fingers over the bags under my eyes. Besides the obvious tiredness I could see something else in my face too. Something like certainty. I smiled at my reflection and left the bathroom.

The room was dark except for the soft blue glow coming from the window. Mara was laying on her back in the middle of the bed, one arm behind her head, the other holding her phone. Without needing to talk about it we had gone to her room in silent agreement.
I finished drying off my hair and left the towel on a chair before I lay down next to her with a sigh.

"Everything ok?" she asked, putting the phone on the nightstand, before pulling me to her side.

I nodded and scooted closer. "What about you? You good?"

Mara smiled a little and turned on her side so we were laying face to face on the bed. Her expression softened when she reached out to brush a strand of wet hair out of my face. "I am now."

Her cheeks were still flushed from the hot shower and her eyes dark as they looked back and forth between mine. With a serious expression she traced my jaw with her fingertips. The touch was light as a feather but my heart still skipped a beat.
I let out a long breath, finally relaxing. We just stared at each other like that for a long moment. I took my time memorizing her features as if I did not already know them like my own. It had been weeks yet I was still working out the exact color of her iris. There was warm caramel in the center, then green and grey with flecks of gold, fading into a dark blue at the edge. I could only ever see the details when I was this close. Whatever this shade was it was breathtaking.

I would not have minded staying like this forever but after a while Mara's hand slid down my arm to my waist before she rolled on her back, pulling me on top of her.

By the time she leaned up to kiss me my heart was hammering in my chest. We were not rushing it. Her lips moved softly against mine in the dark as if we had all the time in the world. Both her hands came up to frame my face delicately before moving past my ears to hold my hair out of the way.

I felt her breath falter when took hold of her jaw and deepened the kiss, allowing our tongues to dance. She winched when I kissed her a little too hard and I remembered her split lip as the faint taste of iron mixed between us.

"Sorry," I whispered.

Mara shook her head and sat up, taking me with her, before she crashed out lips together again. Her hands found my waist and their way under my oversized t-shirt when I settled on her lap and crossed my legs behind her back to adjust to the new position.

There was heat pooling into my stomach when her hands slowly slid up my bare back. It was a low kind of heat, the kind that lasted, the kind that could be ignited into a consuming fire at any moment. It was the kind not easily suffocated.

We broke apart to breathe for a second and I lifted my arms over my head to help her take off my shirt completely. Automatically I let my head fall back when she started exploring the newly unveiled skin. Mara trailed kisses down my throat, over my exposed shoulder and peppered them along my collar bone. My breath got uneven as her teeth grazed against my skin before she ran her tongue over the bite mark she had left.
She looked up and our eyes met as she moved lower and her lips closed over the nipple of my left breast. The contact took the air right out of my lungs.
Her hand mirrored the swirling motion of her tongue on my right side, causing shock waves of pleasure erupting through my entire body, flooding me from my core to my fingertips.