One Shot

Three knocks cracked against the door, followed by a loud clap of thunder.

James jumped out of her skin. She had been so consumed in her thoughts that she couldn’t even think about who might be behind the door. However, people don’t just knock on doors, especially not at-- she glanced at the clock-- ten forty-eight in the night. Her curiosity was piqued.

Quickly, she made her way to the front door. Without a peephole, she tried to stretch to her toes to look out the window on the door, but it was too high for her to sufficiently look out. She unlocked the door, throwing caution to the wind. She had always been a risk-taker.

In front of her stood the absolute last person she thought would be on her doorstep at eleven o’clock at night.

Drenched by the rain, his short hair hanging in his face, stood the looming figure of Andy. James hadn’t thought of him in nearly a month, and it had taken a very, very concerted effort on her part to do so. After their split six months ago, her heartbreak had introverted her and had her spending most nights doing exactly what she had just been doing: sitting on the couch and staring into a TV. To an onlooker, it would appear that she was engrossed in a show. However, while her eyes were glued to the screen her mind was always elsewhere, if not just silent. It was impossible for her to focus on anything at night.

“Jamie,” he mumbled.

She winced. He did it in spite of her. She preferred to be called James, as she was named after her late grandfather, but he insisted on slipping the name in every once in a while just as an annoying joke. However, this situation didn’t warrant such light-heartedness.

James crossed her arms. “What?” She had to fight to keep her voice steady, as her voice was shaking almost as much as her knees. The breeze from outside sent goosebumps along her.

“You didn’t even ask who it was,” he remarked. “For all you know I could’ve been a murderer who came to rape and pillage you.” It bothered him a little, his protectiveness coming out subconsciously.

“Well now that I know you’re not a serial killer I don’t have to invite you in,” she dryly replied.

He didn’t respond, instead just watching her silently. Even in the dark, his eyes were visible. It was preternatural.

Feeling uncomfortable, James asked, “What are you doing here?”

There was another brief moment of silence from Andy before he murmured, “I had to see you.”

Her heart skipped a beat. She couldn’t help it when she was near him; her body was a completely separate entity around him. “You didn’t need to see me to continue living, Andy. What do you want?” She could feel frustrated tears prickling at her eyes. She had made so much progress and suddenly here he was, back in her life. Why did he have to fuck up everything?

His stare intimidated her, but to him her small figure could not have been more terrifying. He hated that his pride wanted him to turn around, bite his tongue, and leave. He, however, did need to see her. He felt like each day his chest lost a rib until he was nothing but hollow. Just seeing her had given him the rib he’d shattered back.

“On the contrary,” he spoke quietly, despite the pounding rain around them, “if I didn’t see you tonight I don’t think I would’ve lived to see the morning. My chest feels like it’s being sucked into a black hole the longer I’m without you.”

James’s heart detached from her arteries and veins and lodged itself right in her throat so that she was unable to speak. He had felt the same way. Why now, though? She thought she’d never be able to look someone in the eye again from the moment he left, and it took him almost seven months to show up on her doorstep? She swallowed hard, shifting her heart just low enough to manage, “Me too.”

It was Andy’s turn hitch his breath. He couldn’t feel more elated, more rejuvenated. Perhaps he hadn’t fucked things up too much after all? “Can I come in?” he nearly begged.

Silently, James moved aside and let him enter. He was soaking wet, his boots making little squishing noises against the carpet as little droplets fell from his hair and onto his cheeks. If she didn’t know any better she’d say it looked like he was crying. His face was set in a stern, emotionless void. She had no idea what he was thinking as he walked into her living room.

As she shut the door behind her she asked, “Why are you so wet? Surely it isn’t raining so hard that the walk from your car to my porch almost drowned you?”

He couldn’t help but lightly chuckle at the thought, but the humor abandoned him quickly. “Some jackass crashed into my car when I was on my way here. I walked the rest of the way.”

Unwillingly, concern swept through James like an all-consuming flame. She hated that she still cared so deeply for him.

“Are you okay?” she asked, taking a step forward. “Where’s your car?”

“I don’t know. They probably towed it to an impound lot by now,” he says, looking at the knick knacks on her piano. He missed hearing her play every night before they went to bed.

“You just abandoned it?” she questions. She can’t remember him loving anything more than his car. Well, besides her while it lasted.

“I had to see you,” he told her. He bit his lip as he looked at his shoes. “I was like a man possessed,” he admitted. “I couldn’t think of anything but you. I don’t even know if the other driver is okay. I just got out and walked here.”

James’s heart, which had managed to settle back into its cavity, abruptly skipped an entire beat. When was the last time she had felt that before? With him, of course. He did crazy things to her.

At her silence, Andy turned to look at her. She was standing there, gazing at him, and he couldn’t tell if it was in amazement at his stupidity, his devotion to her, or both.

When James caught sight of Andy’s face she couldn’t help but admire it again, because no matter what expression he always looked so remarkably handsome. This time however, now that there was a dim light on him from the TV room, she could see that he had a cut on his forehead, presumably from the car crash. “Oh, Andy, you’re hurt,” she said, and immediately she grabbed his hand and lead him back to her room.

The sudden touch had created a spark inside them. Andy’s hand was freezing from the weather outside, while James was warm from her cozy interior. The two were as contradicting as could be, but they both wouldn’t let go if their lives depended on it.

James grabbed her first aid kit from underneath her bathroom sink before sitting Andy down. She immediately began working on the cut just above Andy’s right eyebrow. He hadn’t even felt the pain until she had pointed it out. He could only focus on the nonexistent one in his chest.

And then there was silence. The TV in the living room was too soft to hear from the bedroom and neither one of them dared to break the film of quiet surrounding them. Even when the rubbing alcohol stung Andy’s skin he only inhaled sharply to keep things quiet.

Inside both of them, however, was a raging storm that made the one outside look like perfect day for the park weather. James was so conflicted, her emotions all jumbled up. She hated what Andy did to her, hated how he just showed up again, but she fucking loved him. She couldn’t stop herself. The way Andy looked at her as she worked made her weak in the knees. She knew if she didn’t stop whatever this was now that she wouldn’t be able to control herself.

After placing a butterfly stitch bandage to his head, she began to pull away as she stated, “Better.” Before she could make the gap between them again, Andy grabbed her by the back of the legs and pulled her closer. This sent a sharp jolt of electricity into James but she had to pull away again and she did. “Don’t,” she pleaded.

“James,” Andy whispered.

“You can’t just do that to me,” she started, her emotions getting the better of her. “You can’t steal my heart just to tear it in two and come back to try to fix it. I won’t let you.”

“I didn’t want to,” he tried. “Please, baby, I love you. I just... sometimes the shit that I deal with in my head is too much. I didn’t want to bring you into that.”

“It’s my fucking choice, Andy!” she shouted. “If I was intimidated by the shit inside your brain I would’ve left a long time ago! But I stayed with you for over a year just for you to throw me out like I was nothing.” She was crying now. She couldn’t stop the tears as they flowed.

Andy stood. “James, please. I don’t want to make you cry.”

“Then why did you?!” she wailed on, although he had just answered that question. “If you loved me so goddamn much why did you do this to me?!”

“Because I didn’t want you to leave me!” he shouted, and this silenced her. He ran a hand through his hair, which was still sopping wet but no longer dripping. “I guess, I just left before you could. I didn’t want to give you the chance.”

“Except I wouldn’t have left you.” Her voice shook. She paused, trying to collect everything she’d ever wanted to scream at him into one coherent thought. “I thought you didn’t love me anymore,” she whispered.

Andy’s head shot up to look at her, but her eyes were down. Instead of telling her verbally, he grabbed her wrist, pulled her forward, and before she could protest kissed her.

This kiss was something that was so passionate that there isn’t a word in dictionary to define it. It was raw and heartfelt and overwhelmingly transparent. Neither one of them could hold back their feelings for one another anymore. Andy was so pleased to be tasting her lips again, and James was so intoxicated by the kiss that she hardly felt the water from his clothes wetting her own, although the chill made her nipples harden beneath her thin tank top. Possessively, Andy wrapped his arms around her and brought her closer, their bodies now pressed flat against one another.

“I’ve always fucking loved you, Jamie,” he said. “The moment I laid my eyes on you on that fucking street in downtown I knew I wanted you to be mine forever. Please believe me, baby. I love you.”

Those words were enough for her and she melted back into him, bringing his lips back down to hers. When their mouths opened their tongues clashed. Andy had her back pressed against the dresser while his hands kept her stuck to him.

And just like that, Andy’s phone began ringing in his pocket. It took both of them a moment to hear it, but when they did it took their whole being to pull apart from one another. When Andy glanced at the screen, it was an unknown number. “Hello?” he asked, aggravation in his voice as he pulled away and took a few steps away. His mind was still foggy with her.

James pulled herself together. What had happened to her? It was like their first date all over again. They had gone to the movies and then did a small hike (small enough that Andy could still wear his boots) up a little hill so they could see part of the skyline. It had gone so well that they had fucked in his car afterwards and had gone on a date every night for the rest of the week. They had always been captivated by each other.

She could tell by Andy’s half of the conversation that whoever had found his car wanted information from him as to who he was and why he left the scene. While he dealt with it, James looked in the back of one of her dresser drawers and found a ratty pair of pajamas that belonged to him. She had always known they were there, she could just never bring herself to throw them out. Now that he was here, and soaking wet, he could have at least those pants to change into.

It took a few minutes for him to get off the phone after reassuring the police officer at the impound lot that he was not on drugs and didn’t leave the scene because he was under their influence. He managed to convince him that he was dazed from the crash and just went to his girlfriend’s house because that’s what he was on the way to do anyway. After promising to answer questions at the lot the next morning he finally hung up and turned again to see James holding out his old flannel pajama pants. “These were the only things you left,” she said quietly. “It’s the only thing I have for you to change into after you get out of those wet clothes. You must be pretty uncomfortable.”

He remembered vaguely wondering what had happened to these. He took them from her with a grateful smile and sat them back on dresser as he began to undress. His skinny jeans were a pain in the ass to take off dry, let alone wet. His jacket and t-shirt were easier, and he was unabashed as he did all of this in front of his former (current?) flame. She had seen him nude a thousand times.

It was as he grabbed the pajama bottoms off the dresser again that she stepped forward, stopping him from putting them on. All he had on now were his damp underwear, and his plan was to take them off just before putting the pajamas on. Cold dick was not a great feeling. But when she touched his chest it was like putting a lighter to his skin. She was so warm. She always had been the warmer of the pair.

James couldn’t help but touch his icy skin; she hadn’t seen it in months. She had always been in love with the curves and lines in his body and the ones in the tattoos decorating it. She quickly found herself wrapping her arms around him and pressing her body to his.

Andy held her tightly. She was her own sun. He could already feel the chill in his bones thawing away with just her embrace, but it wasn’t just her physicality that melted him. The fact that she was so close, and she wanted to be, made his emotions go haywire. Their love had always been a fiery, quick, amorous, impassioned one, and this hug brought all those emotions back in not only him, but her as well.

“James, kiss me, please,” Andy pleaded.

He didn’t have to ask twice. James removed her cheek from his broad chest and tilted her chin up, and Andy met her lips with such fervor that she shivered. Instinctively, Andy wanted to hold her to make her warm again, but with such a chill on his body it would be pointless. Instead he grabbed her hands from him and laced their fingers together. He wanted nothing more but to feel close to her. She was his sun, and he orbited around her.

When she pulled away from his chest, but not his lips, and started walking backwards, Andy wanted to say he was surprised. He couldn’t. He had the idea in the back of his mind always. James was the one woman he could never get enough of, be it sexually or emotionally. She was everything he’d ever wanted. She was his new dream.

Andy pulled James’s tank top off. He didn’t actually grab the fabric, but he held her waist and sides the entire time and in turn dragged it up. He had to touch her. When it got off over her head she immediately pressed herself against him again. The clash sent both of them shuddering, her from the chill and him from the intense heat. Their body temperatures were so contradicting.

Sitting on the edge of the bed set James at eye level with Andy’s now present erection. She knew he had to be uncomfortable. His pants had been soaked through so his underwear must’ve been too. She looked up at him as she pulled them down gently, and he kicked them off.

The chill of the room nearly killed the hard-on he got from looking at the beautiful woman below him, but when she immediately wrapped her mouth around it there was nothing that could take it away. As she lowered her mouth and took nearly all of him in, Andy grabbed her hair to hold it back. The short strands he once knew had grown out past her shoulders. He still loved it. Nothing could tarnish her beauty.

James began a rhythm. She was trying to warm his body just through his cock, and it was working. Andy moaned into the air as he felt his skin light up. “Baby,” he muttered, and he caressed her cheek. She glanced up at him, which was a beautiful sight, and smiled before taking him in again.

Andy tilted his head back, allowing his noises to hit the ceiling above them. He had missed the sensation of her lips nestled around his dick. She was always great at giving head. But to truly warm up, he wanted something else.

After only a few minutes, James felt herself being pulled up by the arm. When she stood it was with a look of confusion, but Andy soothed it with a small kiss. He leaned in and grabbed her breast gently, massaging it. James watched as he lowered his mouth to kiss her nipple, which had been insanely hardened by the iciness of Andy’s body. He gently rubbed his thumb against the other, and James responded with a sigh and tangling her hand in his hair. “Andy,” she whispered.

Andy was quick to surprise her, and he gently pushed her back so she was laying on the bed. She fell with a little gasp, but again Andy was quick to fix things. Her legs were both bent and pointed upwards at her falling, as a way of balance, and he grabbed her left and kissed the knee, then the inside of the knee, then the inside of the thigh. James was reacting almost immediately. Her hips grinded and her other leg moved away.

He continued this small path to just above her center and rested on the ground, pulling his lover closer to the edge of the bed. He wasted no time and instantly began licking at her core. She almost yelped, but she felt too good and moaned instead. His cold nose brushed against her labia while his hot tongue did wonders to her clit. She wrapped her legs up and over his shoulders so her calves were pressed against his back.

Nothing could’ve made Andy feel warm again besides her. Every part of her he touched was warm, but her snatch was hot and wet for him. He was panting if he wasn’t trying to warm himself in it. His tongue eagerly lapped up what she gave him. He was greedy, overcome with a incessant need for her. He glanced up at her and though her eyes were shut, he could imagine the color and light that would reflect inside them. He shut his own.

James was breathing hard. While she hadn’t been completely celibate when by herself, no man had touched her here in months. Andy was the last, and maybe he’d be her last forever. She knew he’d ruined her, as no man could pleasure her the way he had. When Andy nipped at her engorged nub, she moaned his name as if it were a prayer.

Andy couldn’t stop himself. He slid two fingers inside of her to feel how fucking hot she was. He could feel himself slipping away like he had before. He was a man possessed solely by her, and he’d do whatever it took to be hers.

With a loud moan, James tightened her grip on his back with her calves and pushed him into her further. She grabbed his hair as he thrust his fingers back and forth. She was close to begging him for a release, although he showed no signs of stopping. She couldn’t get enough of him. She had to have him. His cold fingers inside of her chilled her in the most pleasurable way. She wanted him so much.

“Andy, please,” she moaned. “Goddammit, I need you. Please.”

The words almost didn’t break through the fog in Andy’s mind. Almost. He glanced up at her, and she was panting the way he was. He wanted to make her come, but maybe he could do that with her, or at least give her what she wanted first. He had always been prone to making her come more than once, but he wanted this to be earth-shattering.

He stood wordlessly and bent down to kiss her. She grabbed onto him as tightly as she could and kept her legs parted. She could feel him aligning himself and she almost screamed at him to fuck her. She needed him like the shore needs the tide, and the tide she received.

Andy thrust into her, and both of them cried out. James was so hot. Her heat had engulfed him. He began thrusting, loving the way she warmed him. He loved her, he loved her...

James pulled him down closer. She was so hot that the cold left in his skin brought her back to a livable temperature. She was engulfed in desire and emotions for him. She was mad with love.

He murmured her name, and she returned the favor. Their eyes met as his hips rocked against hers, and they locked until it was too much for her. He had always been too much for her. She could feel herself building. Having him occupy the empty space inside of her made her go crazy. She needed her orgasm.

“Andy please,” she begged.

He began moving roughly, his hips making a sound against hers. “Please come for me, James,” he murmured. “I want you to.”

And she wanted to please him with whatever he wanted. With only a few more thrusts and a few hot breaths of his on her neck she crumbled around him, moaning out and gripping onto his now room-temperature skin. He still wasn’t warm, but the chill of the rain no longer had him. Her nails dug in and clung to him, and he kept close as he moved in a dragging, slow way to help her along. She was left gasping for the air around them.

When he pulled out, she rolled over. “Keep going,” she said. “I want you to.”

He didn’t need to be told again. As she raised her ass in the air he plunged back in, growling at the sensation. She was still having small aftershocks, and the pulsating feeling that came along with them were almost milking him. He leaned down and placed kisses on her back as he whispered, “Do you love me?”

“Of course I do,” she responded, out of breath. “I love you more than anything in the world.”

This was enough for him. He only had to thrust for a few more moments before her moans and body sent him crashing. He had to remind himself to pull out, since he didn’t know if she was still on the pill, and he wound up spilling all over her back. While this wasn’t unusual for them, at the moment it was embarrassing for him. His orgasm had hit him hard, though, and he had to blindly look for the tissues she had on her nightstand.

Finally, he could see well enough to clean her up. He immediately threw it away in the bathroom, and when he returned she was the right way in bed and had an open embrace. He slid in with her and held her. Their body temperatures matched finally.

“I’m sorry for leaving,” he whispered.

“I’m sorry I let you leave,” she answered.

They gave each other a soft look but smiled after the briefest of seconds and kissed. After their wordless profession of love, it only took pulling the covers up and a quiet moment to fall asleep.

Notes

Chapter title inspired by the always amazing band The Cure. If you're ever stuck in a creative block, play a band you don't listen to all the time. I listen to the Cure in these special occasions, because they get the writing juices flowing again, so to speak. Also, the whole temperature aspect of this chapter really pleases me. I'm kinda happy with this.

I should be writing tons more since the chaos of graduating is over! So expect more out of me, and don't be afraid to tell me I need to step up!

~Niki X,,,,,,x