I Will Run To You

Two In Love Should Confess

Buffalo, New York
Sunday, July 3, 1983
(1:30 am)
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"The body never forgets trauma."

The words of an article Stevie had once read in the waiting room at the dentist about muscle memory came strangely to her mind as she stood on tiptoes in the elevator and kissed Lindsey as if her life depended on it.

The article had talked about muscle memory, and how the body stores traumatic events as the brain does, creating a sense memory and a muscular response when stimulated by things similar to the traumatic event.

I wonder if that theory works in reverse, she thought as Lindsey's mouth attached itself to her neck and her arms tightened up around his. This is the opposite of trauma and every muscle in my body remembers. It's like we never stopped.

"Stephanie..." she heard him whisper into her hair in between kisses, backing her against the elevator wall and trapping her in his arms as he attacked every inch of her skin he could find with his mouth. "My beautiful Stephanie...oh God I love you...I've missed you so fucking much, baby, I..." He completed that sentence by sinking his mouth into her collarbone and then up the side of her neck again, leaving little bites in his wake, breathless and hungry like a man possessed.

Stevie tugged at his hair in an effort to get him to return his mouth to hers. He did, just about swallowing her whole as he kept her pressed against the wall of the elevator, and they were so lost in a tangle of limbs and tongues and hair and occasional gasps of air that they barely took notice of the fact that the doors had opened onto her floor. They somehow managed to stumble out of the elevator, locked together as he backed her towards the door to her room which she realized she needed a key to open. She fumbled in her purse until she found it, nearly dropping it before Lindsey took it from her trembling hand. He wasted no time getting the door open and then said, "You're crazy if you think I'm going back to my own room tonight, Stephanie."

Stevie's response was to fling her arms up around his neck, followed by her legs wrapped around his waist, and he carried her that way into the room, kicking the door closed with his foot and turning the lock before his mouth descended on hers again. He kissed her more tenderly now on their way to the bed, which had been turned down by the hotel staff and topped with red rose petals. It wasn't until Lindsey had gently deposited her onto the bed like a baby in its cradle when she became aware of the rose petals that surrounded her. Turning down the bed was a service she was used to, but regarding the flowers, she looked up at Lindsey as he hovered over her, stroking her hair, and said, "Is this a bed of roses I'm lying in right now?" She asked the question dreamily, her eyes fluttering closed as he began stroking her cheek with delicate fingers.

Lindsey smiled down at her, his fingertips passing lightly over her heavily made-up eyelids. "Anything for my sweet girl," he said, and he leaned down to kiss the tip of her nose after playing his fingertip gently along it. "I'm not new, Stephanie." He grinned at his own joke before kissing her lips just once, ever so softly.

"Mmmm...call me that again," Stevie said as he began to brush his lips against her forehead, encircling her entire face in his arms to begin kissing it.

"Call you what, angel? Stephanie?" He was kissing softly along the side of her cheek in between his words. "That's not new." He had told her in 1966, the first night they met, that he preferred Stephanie to Stevie because her name meant crown.

"No..." Stevie giggled, leaning onto his kisses which tickled a bit. "Sweet girl...that's new...I love that. I think that's my favorite thing you've ever called me...so sweet."

Lindsey stopped kissing her face and looked down into her eyes. He began brushing her bangs back with his hand. "Sweet girl," he whispered down against her lips, and then captured them in his for a kiss so warm, so tender, that he heard her whimper into his mouth. She wrapped all four limbs around him, urging him closer to her, pressing herself up into him for some kind of relief, feeling his hardness against just the right spot and remembering how easily they had once come together, fitting perfectly like puzzle pieces without even having to try. The scent of the rose petals mingled with the scent of clean cotton and cologne and a hint of marijuana that was Lindsey's scent and for Stevie had always meant the smell of home, and tears sprang into her eyes as she felt his lips begin to travel from her neck to her breasts and then over the thin gauzy fabric of the dress she wore as he kissed his way down her stomach.