Slow Down (2013)

Slow Down

The music vibrated through their bones. It wasn't loud enough to stop conversations, nor too quiet to be suppressed by them. It was just at the right spot. Dozens of bodies moved so close together that it was difficult to know where one started and the other ended. Their breathing was already shared, even if unconsciously, following the rhythm of the music. It was the most wonderful party of all times.

"But something is amiss" vanity whispered to two of the moving bodies in the crowd. They needed to be seen. They desired to stand out in the middle of everyone. Their hopes were that at the end of the night everyone remembered only the two of them. It wasn't a conscious desire, just a biological need.

Soon they were on the hostess' new coffee table. They danced almost as if in a dream, barely aware of the music in the background. They just knew that it was the best song they had heard in their lives.

Their eyes were locked, but one was always aware of the other's hypnotic movements. No one would be able to explain the connection they had. What was certain was that each completed the other in an almost sinful way and in that moment it was too difficult to keep their bodies separate. Suddenly, the need for an audience disappeared.

"Roof" Sarah whispered, winking the blue eyes before jumping down the coffee table and leaving the apartment, still dancing.

Elena couldn't help but run her eyes over her body while she did that. From the tip of her hair to the ends of her pale legs. "Why did she have to look like this?" Elena's mind screamed in agony. Her body ignored any reasons, putting desire above reason. Her need was grotesque, awakening the most indiscreet thoughts in absurd moments.

Two years ago, Elena had a friend, a confidant, someone she knew upside down and backwards. The proximity led to other things, and on a particularly cold winter afternoon, she realized that she was attracted to the body that slept too close to hers. Now it was as if she didn't know Sarah anymore, as if she would never really know her until she could touch her the way she wanted to. She knew it wasn't passion. It was a craving. Not really "I would die for you", it was "I will die if I don't kiss you right now". She suddenly realized that her feet had taken her to the roof where Sarah watched the stars.

Sarah turned when she heard the footsteps and smiled. Elena was so beautiful that it hurt and the night increased it a million times. The freckles that splashed her shoulders looked like stars, the green eyes shone, sometimes dark, sometimes too light to be so intense and the hair was the color of the dress: black. The biggest disappointment of the family of redheads, in Sarah's humble opinion, made Elena even more perfect.

Elena didn't smile, she looked like she was stuck in a personal hell. It was clear to Sarah what Elena felt. She knew the girl too well for something so obvious to go unnoticed. Sarah loved being wanted in that way, she ran out of breath just imagining what was going on in Elena's head at that moment, but the reason she didn't just go ahead and end the suffering was a little less self-centered: Sarah was afraid to disappoint. Sarah reciprocated Elena's feelings, maybe not so fervently, because she was more of a prude, but it would have to be a rock not to be attracted to Elena. She just couldn't imagine being good enough for those 5'6 of perfection...

Elena had no idea what was going on in her friend's head in that moment. She didn't even want to know, to tell the truth. She pursed her lips hoping for something. That simple movement made something inside Sarah revolve. In a good way. That dryness in her mouth, that urge to sink her fingers into her hair at that very moment; these were all old acquaintances. They had been chasing her for weeks. She even had a name for those symptoms: basorexia. The uncontrollable urge to kiss someone.

"Hey..." the three letters sounded like a request, a plea.

Elena blinked before approaching Sarah "Why did you want to come here?" She said, making a Herculean effort to use her mouth for something other than kissing that neck. "Soon it'll be full up here too."

"I don't care about crowds." Sarah replied with a smile "But I wanted to have you just for me for a minute."

And there she was, saying those things that teased Elena, leaving her on the verge of a crisis. She suspected Sarah's desire, but what could she do about it? Unless things were said out loud, doing anything was out of the game. She didn't know what the past few weeks had meant. Her touch more intense, the habit to run her nails over Elena's skin, the distracted comments about her body. Each time Sarah touched her nose to hers, her entire body vibrated. Elena loved those teases, even if they multiplied her desire. But she was afraid that for her friend this whole thing was just a joke and when it became real, Sarah would run away.

"You're poutty" Sarah said, touching the space between Elena's eyebrows. She slowly ran her nails over Elena's neck before putting her hand down, causing electrical charges in both.

"Just tired..." Elena said, trying to get rid of the frustration with a sigh. It didn't work. Probably after the party she would call one of her exes and invite them to one of the meaningless nights Sarah hated to hear about. "You know when you do something really fun and only when it's over you realize it also worn you out?"

"So you're not having fun anymore?"

Elena shrugged and threw her hair to one side "We're not doing anything right now?"

"Since when do we need to do something to have fun?"

Ever since your silences allowed my imagination to run wild, Elena thought but didn't say.

"Why did you want me up here?" Elena asked again.

Sarah couldn't say with all the words but her body knew. She decided to take her heels off and sun across the roof hiding across the other buildings' shadows.

"It's not funny, Sarah" Elena said, rolling her eyes.

"I'm not trying to be funny"

"I'm too tired to chase you right now"

"I didn't ask you to chase me"

The proximity of the voice surprised Elena. Somehow Sarah managed to hang onto the door of the tool house behind Elena. When she turned around, she was a few inches away from the lips she desired more than anything for the last few months.

"Sarah..." The owner of the name almost imploded hearing the same plea she had made a few minutes prior on the lips of the one she wanted that bad.

"Yes?" Sarah asked, she wanted to hear it more.

Elena made another effort to speak, simply because she somehow knew she was getting what she wanted. "Tell me you want it as much as I do"

Sarah smiling, breaking a little bit of Elena with that movement. She let go of the door and got as close to Elena as she could.

There was no way of knowing who kissed whom.