Аманда Хокинг - Flutter

“No, I’m sure it’s great. If you love it, I know I will too.” That was completely true, so I didn’t understand why I didn’t feel that way. His happiness was taking me over entirely, but there was still this bit of doubt gnawing at me.

“They allow Matilda, and it’s really hard to find a place that allows big dogs, and there’s a dog park real close by. It’s three bedrooms, one for us, one for Milo, and one for… I don’t know. Cause why not?” Jack shrugged. “And it has this fantastic balcony!”

“Do we even use the balcony now?” I asked. All three of the upstairs bedrooms had balconies, but I’m pretty sure that I had never been one, and the only person I’d ever seen use them was Peter. After we kissed. That reminded me that I had to move out. “I’m sure we’ll use it more since we don’t have a yard.”

“I know we’ll be giving up some space and some creature comforts, but I think it’ll be great.” Jack had calmed down some and he looked at me sincerely. “We’ll be able to have a life of our own, you know?”

“Yeah, totally.” I nodded.

“I stopped and got some boxes on my way back, so we can start packing some stuff up.” He started edging away to the door. “I’ll be right back.”

“Okay. I think that I’m gonna take a quick shower and get all the cleaning gunk off of me,” I said.

Jack barely heard me because he was already darting down the stairs.

Once he was gone and took his emotions with him, my anxiety finally had a chance to kick in. I tore off the stupid rubber gloves and went into the closet to get a change of clothes. The shower was mostly an excuse. I needed a moment to catch my breath. It all felt so sudden, and I couldn’t explain what terrified me so much about it. We were just moving out, not that far away, and Milo and Ezra and everyone would still be a part of our lives. Jack was obviously making fairly decent money working with Ezra, although I was too embarrassed to ask the exact dollar amount, so I’m sure he could afford to take care of us.

There was nothing to fear really.

Except being alone. As much as I wanted to be with him, it scared the hell out of me. On top of all these vampire hang ups about possibly murdering him, I still had the normal teenage girl insecurities. I had never been with anyone before, and Jack had. And if something were to go wrong, we were on our own. Milo wouldn’t know how to handle anything, and if Ezra couldn’t get there time.

As I started leafing through my drawer of undergarments, it finally dawned on me. Without a doubt, I wanted to spend the right of my life with Jack, and I definitely wanted to have sex with him.

It would happen someday, and probably someday very soon if we were living on our own. So why not now?

Ezra was downstairs in the den, and Milo was next door. If something happened, I could easily get help. And besides that, nothing would probably happen, except I’d feel scared and embarrassed. But that’s okay. I’ll probably feel that no matter when it happened. And really, I was sick of waiting. I was sick of interruptions. I loved him, and it was time.

I purposely held my clothes close to me when I came out of the closet so Jack wouldn’t notice, but he probably wouldn’t have noticed if I were waving them on a flag in front of me. He put in some 90’s mix CD in the stereo that he claimed had lots of “upbeat jams” that got him in the mood to pack.

Normally, I would’ve argued with him about why he had to have a mix to CD to get him in the mood to do something as specific and rare as packing, but I was on a mission. When I went into the bathroom, I left him grooving to the Presidents of the United States of America while tossing some of his graphic novels into a cardboard box.

More fun facts about being a vampire: The hair on my head grows crazy fast. Body hair does not. I think it’s because of how vampires are designed to be aesthetically pleasing above all else, and apparently, vampires don’t find body hair sexy. It does still grow, but to get the grizzled look Peter had in Finland would take weeks of not shaving. Jack shaves maybe every other day, but he doesn’t even really need when he does.

Still, for today’s shower, I took extra care in making sure that my legs and body were silky smooth.

After the shower, I lotioned myself up, even though my skin is generally incredibly smooth. I had a debate about perfume. Of course I wanted to smell good, but the natural smell of my skin and blood would probably overwhelm any other scent anyway. Besides that, I didn’t want it to make my skin taste funny if he kissed me. I blow dried my hair trying to give to that sexy, full look, but I’m not sure how well it turned out.

I’ve always been so bad at styling hair.

Finally, I put on the piece de resistance: sexy lingerie. Last month, Mae had given me credit card and let me loose in the mall. On a whim, I went to Fredricks of Hollywood, and I spotted this little number. Dark purple, lacy, and sheer, it had a baby doll top with matching panties. I had never worn anything like this before, and I was pleased to see that I looked kind of good. I posed for the bathroom mirror, trying to look as sexy as I possibly could. My stomach twisted with excitement and nerves, and I opened the bathroom door.

The wall was slid open, revealing the secret closet where Jack had his 10,000 DVD’s. He was filling up a cardboard with box his movies, and he was too busy singing and dancing along to the music to notice me. I was doing a sexy lean up against the doorframe, and I didn’t really want to move and ruin it, so I had to wait for him to notice me. Naturally, since I was planning on losing my virginity tonight, the song coming out his stereo was “Truly Madly Deeply” by Savage Garden. Cause the moment didn’t feel awkward or calculated enough for me.

“I’m probably gonna have to buy like a massive entertainment center for all these movies,” Jack said, stilling staring up at his DVD’s. It overwhelmed him for a minute, so he sighed, and finally turned back to look at me. I have no idea what he was planning to say, but his jaw fell open and his eyes widened. “Holy hell.”

“Is that a good holy hell?” I blushed deeply and fought the urge to cover my body with my arms.

Sheepishly, I stepped out from the bathroom door, and I had never felt so self-conscious in my entire life.

Maybe this was a really bad idea.

“Yeah.” Jack seemed to recover a bit and smiled at me. “What’s all this for?”

“You know,” I shrugged. I bit my lip and looked up at him, hoping he would catch the gigantic hint and wouldn’t make me spell it aloud. I took another step closer to him, but the Savage Garden was throwing off the mood entirely. “Can you change the song?”

“Oh, yeah.” He clumsily grabbed the remote off the bed, almost dropping it, and flicked the song to the next track. It was Mazzy Star’s “Fade Into You,” and while I wasn’t sure how it was an upbeat jam, I liked it a lot more. “Better?”

“Much,” I nodded.

Jack started walking over to me, and I started to feel how much he wanted me. The butterflies in my stomach made it hard for him to overpower me, but he finally managed to. Intense and yearning, his hunger radiated off of him like heat. He stood in front of me, taking me in a way that made me uncomfortable, and he exhaled deeply. I couldn’t take it anymore, so I crossed my arms over my body, trying to cover myself up.

“No, don’t do that!” Jack protest more loudly than he meant and touched my arm gently. I lowered my arms and looked up at him, at his ever softening eyes that burned for me. Gingerly, he touched my cheek, then moved his fingers back to my hair. “You are so gorgeous. What are you doing with me?”