His Arms, Her Comfort

Chapter 5

The world had stopped moving. Everything had frozen in time. The surroundings had become a blur. From as far as he could tell, his senses had stopped working. He couldn't feel anything – except for the weight of her lips on his.

The contact lasted just for a moment – 2 seconds to be precise – but he felt like he had grown familiar with her lips. Their taste was mixed with salty tears and sweet...apples? Or was it some sort of candy?

He didn't know – and he didn't care. The sensation itself was amazing, so he continued exploring her, pushing the boundaries of the friendship they once had...

...until she suddenly pulled away, leaving him empty and withdrawn.

"Sorry! Oh – I'm so sorry!" She sniffed, hastily wiping her tears. "I don't know what came over me. I didn't mean to...kiss you out of nowhere –"

"Oh no. It's okay, Hermione," he said, still in a daze. "It's fine."

In reply, she smiled sheepishly at him. She had never felt this embarrassed in her entire life. Here he was, the boy of her dreams, and she had flung herself at him like a nobody who had lost her bearings.

Well, she didn't expect her first kiss with him to be this...sudden. He must have hated it.

She didn't know how wrong she was...

Her brief kiss had awakened something inside him. A gnawing in his chest...as if he had finally found what he was looking for. The missing puzzle piece. The key to the locked case of his heart. And he needed more of it.

"Would you mind if we...did it again?" he asked tentatively.

An awkward silence followed his words...broken only after she gave a low chuckle, her cheeks hurting from blushing too much. She couldn't meet his eyes as she answered. "No, no. Of course not..."

Without thinking, he smiled a little. Her shy demeanour. Her bashful face. The way she had averted her eyes – she was so different from his so-called girlfriend. From every other girl he'd ever met. He loved how she was flushing crimson. It made something flow through him...light as a breeze but daring like a wild broomstick ride. As he watched her, the corner of his mouth turned up in a crooked smile.

Fuck boundaries. She was his, and he was hers.

Feeling brave all of a sudden, he edged forward, his eyes on her face while she kept hers on her slightly trembling hands.

She didn't know why he was making her so nervous. Couldn't understand why his mere presence was making her shake like a leaf. Or why it had created this queasy, upside-down feeling in her stomach – as if she was soaring high and dropping through a free fall at the same time. The feeling...it was incredible, and she smiled despite herself.

Maybe it was because he was him.

Her sudden little smirk made his heartbeat quicken. He could see she was scared of what was going to happen next. But the smile showed how she was enjoying it, too.

Just like he was.

He stepped closer to her until there was no distance left between them. He placed his palms on her waist once again, but he was persistent this time – way more than before – so he pulled her to himself, the sudden move making her gasp and hold the tendrils of his sweater to avoid tripping over. Out of instinct, her eyes met his. She could see desire and longing in those beautiful irises. His passion was mirroring hers.

And that made her little smile develop into a wide one.

Her hands inched upward to rest on his shoulders, her fingers grazing his firm skin underneath the fabric. His own dug into the soft skin of her waist, which he could feel through the thin material of her shirt. His pulse sped up as he leaned down to link his forehead with hers. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, basking in his homely scent and his protective aura. She was ready. He could take her as he pleased because she was his and no one else's.