𝐀𝐢𝐧'𝐭 𝐒𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐭

Chapter 60: I Could Get Used to This

16 August, 1960

The sound of one bird's squawk was enough to jolt her awake. "What... the hell..."

It did not sound like a bird was supposed to sound, and, while part of her was still bugged for being startled awake, she also had half a mind to check that the bird was indeed still alive. Not exactly the greatest omen on a day like today.... Oh, today. It had hit her. She'd remembered.

The mysterious light prying at her tightly shut eyelids was sunlight, she realized as she opened them. Craning her head to see out the window, the sky was indeed blue, and clearer than it had been in days. A breeze came through the window, which had been open all night, sending her suddenly shivering, and it didn't take her long to recall that she had no clothes on.

Hurriedly she squirmed back under the blankets, but quickly eased up when she remembered the sleeping boy still beside her. John's arm stayed firmly wrapped around her waist, his warm hand resting on her bare abdomen the way he liked, his feet and legs stirring as she moved.

Bracing herself with a deep breath, she glimpsed his still slumbering face. For a moment she begrudged herself for how much she loved watching him, how much she loved to just let her eyes browse his sleeping features. He wore a different expression when he slept, one that she never saw when he was awake. She longed very badly just to kiss his eyelids, his soft little-boy eyelids, smooth and pale, lined with his light eyelashes... but doing so, of course, would wake him up.

Her eyes wandered over his bold aquiline nose, his thin yet soft cheeks, his endlessly bushy auburn eyebrows, before at last settling on his lips. His thin little lips that she loved so much, parted slightly as he slept, the lips that after today she wouldn't get to kiss for a very long time.

But there was nothing stopping her now. She lowered herself, feeling oddly like a prince in a Walt Disney motion picture, and brushed her lips to his, savoring the rush of pleasure that washed over her as she did. The feeling was fleeting, but she wished she could jar it and preserve it for whenever she wanted. It was a feeling that could heal her from anything, that she knew she'd miss during the year, when she was most stressed and he wasn't there to talk to.

John stirred, twisting his lean shoulders with a grunt before his eyes fluttered open, his thin lips immediately curling into a smile when he saw her.

"I could get used to this."

She snickered. It was ironic, it was painfully ironic, and he knew it - but somehow he still managed to make her grin.

"If ye don't mind, Fin, I'd like to stay right here with ye all day. Or a week. We'll stay in bloody bed for a week, just you an' me."

She allowed herself to ponder it for a minute. It did sound nice... and it sure felt nice the way his hand slid its way down her leg. But she couldn't let herself be tempted with the thought. It was no use pretending there was an alternative; in a few hours the van would be here - then they'd have to get out of bed.

John chuckled as she nestled her head into the crook of his neck, his arms wrapping snugly around her shoulders.

She cleared her throat. "Ye gonna wear the same dirty clothes as yesterday, then?"

"Was thinkin' of just walkin' home starkers, actually."

"Yeah, because that wouldn't alarm Mimi at all..."

"Not in the slightest."

She turned to him. "You've got a real mouth on ye, y'know tha'?"

He shrugged. "S'news to me."