Don't Pester The Ski Patrol • L.S.

10

I wake up a little sticky, a little sore, and a lot alone.

I sit up from underneath the throw blanket and my head is pounding. I'm used to this feeling, admittedly, but I don't think I drank enough to feel hungover. I think this is a combination of being deliriously infatuated and sleeping on Harry's naked chest on a couch all night.

As I take in the early morning mountain sun, I realise I'm wearing Harry's sweater. I don't remember putting this on, which means he somehow had to put it on me without waking me up. The idea of this makes me grin like an idiot; he wanted to keep me warm even if I didn't know it. I hold the collar of the shirt to my nose and breathe in the smell he left on it.

And of course, this is how he finds me. This is the work of a truly unfortunate force.

"Uh, hi." I greet, trying to hide what I was doing, but the way he's smirking at me tells me I didn't do a good job. "Good morning."

"Morning. Like the sweater?" He grins, stepping out of the kitchenette in an apron and sweats.

Bastard. He is a bastard. Bastard boy. I'm burning this ski lodge to the ground.

"It's warm. And it smells like you." I confess, seeing as I have been pigeon-holed by the Cheshire cat.

"Hmm," he hums, coming over to me and standing above me. He takes my face into his hands and leans down to kiss me sweetly. I smile into it; I can't help it. I am filthily putting my open, pliant mouth on display for him like I'm sixteen and don't know what I'm doing. I haven't even brushed my teeth yet.

"I like you in my sweater," he says against my mouth. "And I like you in me."

Well, excuse me. Where is the bashful young father and ski patroller that I had known so dearly? Has he been an imposter for this boy of certainty above me?

"Hmm." I grin, because I'm a subtle flirt; you have to earn my bouts of shameless admiration. I then add, "You smell sweet."

"I'm making French toast." He tells me. "Sorry if you have an aversion to it; it was all I had."

I could live like this. God, I could live like this forever.

"Now, what have I done to deserve such a warm wake up?" I tease.

He shrugs as he peppers slow, gentle kisses on my face. "Be you. Be nice to me. Be hot."

"Hot? That's new."

"New to you. Certainly not new in my head."

"Oh? And what goes on in your head about me?"

He kisses my forehead, and pulls back. "Toast is burning." He taunts deliberately, leaving me with nothing but the silhouette of his back as he walks back into the kitchenette.

I have never felt so glorious and drowsy with affection in my almost twenty-six years of existing.

Okay, to be fair, it's a low bar - I usually have a very strict protocol when it involves hookups. For starters, I whip out a non-disclosure agreement (the all-captivating NDA) before I even reciprocate anything. You think it'd kill the mood, but it really doesn't stop anyone - besides, there is no 'mood' for me. It's just two people getting each other off.

It's also that not everyone who has sex with me is doing it because they're attracted to me, and I can accept that. A lot of people do it because they think, somehow, they'll get on the show if they become my sex toy - which is not true, and it hasn't happened, and it will never happen. I never sleep with the same person more than once, and they can't even go bragging about it because of all the paperwork I make them sign. You call it paranoid, maybe, but it's essential when everyone is looking for a way to make you look bad. I like to avoid the he said/she said, and I don't apologise for that.