She Keeps Me Warm

12

Her office feels calmer than it ever has before. The whole day feels calm. There are no stressful deadlines or urgent emails...There are instead dates to meet and concerned cliental. Her entire perspective for the day has changed. Her morning cocoa tastes sweeter, the sun toastier, and her apple crispier. This morning is magic.

"Should I be concerned that you have a joker smile going on? You smile, Hollis, but this is horrendously, and I cannot stress this enough, grossly saccharine. Too saccharine. Look at you! You have that grotesque smile going on. Your face is glowing. Your lips are all sw--," Betty slammed her body into the chair opposite Laura's desk. Her eyes were sparkling with curiosity, devilment, and Spielsdorf famous intimidation. "Nothing like good sex to put a girl in a good mood!"

"Ssh!" Laura scurried to close her door before anyone else heard Betty's outburst. Not like anyone else would care as much as Betty Spielsdorf. "Do you have any other volume besides megaphone?"

"Not until you spill the deets!" The blonde leaned forward in her seat.

"Not happening." Laura slank back behind her desk, rolling her eyes at her curious friend.

"Come on, Hollis! You didn't let me in about the night of the storm or the move. I've been itching to know what that woman's house smells like! Have I grilled you about any of that?"

"Only every single day." Laura made a show of banging her head against her desk.

"Okay! But I'm willing to let all of it go in exchange for details of your sexual encounter with CEO Snazzy Pants." Betty was vibrating with excitement. Laura had been bursting at the seams since she got up this morning. She wasn't sure if this was the right thing to do or not. Telling Betty would be like telling Danny or Perry or Laf. It'd make it more than she let herself think it could be. Maybe it should.

Reluctantly, she raises a warning finger at her eager friend, "This does not leave this room."

Then she dove into her and Carmilla's history, from the fake engagement to the thunderstorm and everything in between and after. It came tumbling out like wishes in the wind, and Betty never lost interest. Laura described her first time seeing the house, how Mattie built it and gave her the tour. She described her first night. She gave Betty everything she'd been keeping to herself for the past few weeks. By the time Laura stopped talking her mouth was dry and her cocoa was cold.

"Wait! Hollis don't forget the sexy part! You can't tell a story and leave out the climax!" Betty whined. She was so engrossed that somehow she managed to pull a protein bar from what could've been thin air. It was dangling from her mouth by this point.

"Well," Laura took a cool sip, "that's because it didn't happen."
Betty's look of disappointment and horror would have been hilarious if it weren't for the specks of chocolate and peanut butter that drizzled across her face as Betty rushed forward with the loudest whisper-yell in human history.

"ARE YOU KIDDING ME?"

Laura wanted to more than anything; and, in all fairness they were close. Laura didn't even stop Carmilla. Carmilla stopped Carmilla. She felt ready. She felt more than ready. She'd have done it herself if she didn't already know what it felt like; and it probably would've been redundant. But nothing happened. Carmilla stopped. She just stopped.

They'd gone so far, further than Laura ever expected to go. Carmilla was on top of her, shirtless, kissing her lips, biting her neck, making every nerve in her body beg for more. Her skin burned with the need for hands on her in the most sacred of places, places she'd spent years guarding because her farther promised her they were her biggest strengths and greatest weaknesses; and those weaknesses get exposed quicker than the strengths reveal themselves. But here she was, craving for those places to be taken residence by one Carmilla Karnstein.