"Between friends, unspoken feelings can feel like a fragile thread pulled taut; one denies its existence while the other hides behind its delicate weave, both yearning for the courage to unravel what lies beneath."
Ian and Julian, long-time best fri...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
My eyes drifted up to his, and it was game over. A fatal surrender.
My lips caught his in a hard kiss, driving them apart with the force of it. There was nothing gentle about it. I felt the bottles rattle against his back as he slightly shifted, and there was a chance it would all crash down if I pressed any further against him, but I didn't care. Pushing fiercely against him, I took his face between my hands. Every thought in my head exploded to a pure, pounding white, and I felt the dark curl of desire twist inside me, bending all my rules and snapping that last trembling bit of restraint I had like a volcano waiting for its moment to erupt.
This was our first kiss. I've known him since we were five years old, and that was the first time I'd known his mouth. It's a tragedy. It's a travesty. It's outrageous.
We should've been kissing from the very first moment we met. We should've been kissing for years, for ages, for eons. We were made for kissing—him and me.
A few minutes before Ian's eyes fluttered open, I was already up, and my head rested in his arms. His face was incredibly close, and mine was increasingly red. I could feel his warm breath on my face and his soft, silent snores.
My mouth had tasted like the underside of someone's boot. Somehow, between last night's party after the games—what was her name?—and this moment now, I don't know. I don't remember much. My head hurts. A pounding headache, then a creaking dry mouth, then a tight sore belly
And though my eyes were open, I couldn't think of why my heart was pounding and my mind was empty, as if a hypodermic of adrenaline had been emptied into my carotid. I tensed, not knowing what to do. And I panicked myself back to sleep when his eyes started fluttering open.
The idealization was painful; it stung. I remember the calm panic in his face. Through a slight peek in between my closed eyes, I saw the realization dawn on Ian's face, his eyebrows furrowing heavily with confusion. His eyes widened, scanning the cellar, probably in search of answers.
I recall watching as fear and disbelief crept into his features, mixing with confusion as he tried to piece together the events leading up to this moment. He was probably disgusted. When his gaze darted from one corner of the room to another, as if desperately seeking any familiar objects or signs that would anchor him to a reality he knew,
His lips quivered, and I could see the struggle within him. Denial. A part of him probably didn't want to believe what his senses and eyes were telling him. With every passing moment, his emotions played out across his face—a mix of confusion, fear, and disbelief.
