Non Pratt - Trouble

I wriggle, trying to get comfortable but I’m not. I feel all tingly and excited. This is stupid. This is Jay. I squeeze my eyes shut and concentrate on the idea of falling asleep.

“Han?”

“Yeah?” I don’t look round.

“You’re a really heavy breather.”

“Thanks!” I smile into the pillow.

There’s silence again, but I’m even less sleepy than I was to start with.

Jay shuffles about behind me until I feel his breath on the back of my neck. All I can think about is that whisper of air on my skin. There’s movement and I feel an arm reach round to cuddle me. Gently, I lay my hand over his. Jay goes very still, like he’s waiting for something. Slowly, uncertainly, I slide my fingers between his and gently guide his hand under my top and onto the skin of my tummy.

I breathe out.

This should be weird. But it really, really isn’t.

Jay’s body is close to mine. I can feel the heat on my back, his legs as they curl into the curve made by mine. Gradually, I find that I’m leaning back, pushing myself into him. The hand under my top strokes very, very gentle fingers over my skin.

The breath on my neck gets warmer and I feel lips on my skin. Feather-light and cool-yet-hot. Jay kisses my neck once, then again, gently around onto my shoulder. He lifts himself up and I turn around to look at him.

We’re silent as we look at each other, letting our eyes do the talking. Then we’re kissing. I’ve never been kissed like this. It’s the sexiest thing that’s ever happened to me. I swell up with need as the kissing swallows me whole.

The hand under my top pulls me round until he’s lying on top of me. Somehow, between the kissing on the lips and the neck and the shoulders, he takes off my top and I wriggle out of my skirt until we’re there in our underwear, skin on skin, as we stroke and kiss each other. I can feel him pressing against me through his boxers and my hand is sliding down…

As Jay shudders, I can feel it echoing in my own body. He’s running the back of his nails down the skin on my tummy, edging up the elastic on my pants as I tense up, knowing what happens next and not knowing all at once. Where is this going? Because this isn’t just some guy I’ve known for a few hours, a few days, a few weeks — this is Jay.

And there are very different rules for Jay. I think.

Our pants come off pretty quickly. As does my bra.

His fingers trace over every inch of my body, over my breasts, my sides and back up to my face. And then he stops and holds my face in his fingertips and looks me in the eye.

“Has anyone ever told you how gorgeous you are?”

I don’t say anything.

“You’re something special, Hannah.” He sweeps forward and kisses me on the forehead. Jay pushes me back on the bed and kisses me, his tongue pushing right into my mouth, before working his way down my body, and down and down and…

Oh. My. God.

I’m in a world of awesome as Jay leans over to get a condom out of his bedside drawer and pulls it on. As he pushes into me there’s a hiss of breath from both of us and it’s uncomfortable for a second, but then I find I’m trying to burrow into him, pushing back just as hard, kissing whatever bit of skin that comes close, my hands gripping his back, his shoulders, his bum… I’m not thinking about what I’m doing, I’m not trying to be good, not trying to think like he’s going to mark me out of ten. I’m just there, in it, feeling it, wanting it so much and then more and more and…

It’s over too soon. It wouldn’t have lasted long enough if it had lasted all night. I just want more of him than there is.

When he pulls out I deflate.

We curl up on our sides, our foreheads touching, a hand resting on the other’s body as we kiss and smile at each other, eyes lit up. There isn’t much talking. Mostly smiling, kissing, stroking. I feel a bit stiff — bruised almost, although it lessens as my heartbeat slows to something like normal. After a while, I slide my hand down his body. Then I slide down to join it. Jay doesn’t take much persuading when I come back up.

“I’m good to go if you are?” he says, running his hand across my thigh and chuckling as I sigh and roll my eyes back. I did not mean to do that, but it’s not like I have much control here. Around him I don’t need it.

Jay scrambles over me and opens his drawer.

“Shit.” He grabs his wallet open. “Fuck.”

“Yeah — that’s what I’m waiting for.”

“No condoms.”

This would be the point where I’d have some in my handbag or my pocket or my bra. Only I don’t. Jay climbs back next to me, frowning.

“Never mind,” I say. “You don’t need condoms to do this.” My hand goes straight down and I start again, kissing his neck until he relaxes. Soon we’re fooling around, kissing, stroking… and it feels good. This is enough, I tell myself firmly. This is totally enough.

But tomorrow Jay will pack up and leave for university. There’ll be no sneaking off to do this some other time unless I manage to go and visit him, but I can’t see that happening. There’s always the hope that Jay will come home one weekend but…

It feels so good to be this close to him. Why do I want more than this?

“We could…” I start to say, then stop. Jay stops what he’s doing, but I shake my head. “Don’t stop.”

He starts up again. It feels amazing. I close my eyes and shuffle down until I can feel him hard against me, then I slip up and under and around until he’s almost…

“Hannah.” Jay pulls away, but I shift so he’s trapped and I look him in the eye.

“I’m clean, I promise.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about,” Jay says. “Tell me you’re on the pill or something.”

I nearly do. I so want that to be the truth.

“You could pull out, or I could take the morning-after pill,” I say hopefully, twisting my hips so he can feel me against him. It’s killing me, being this close.

“I could…” He edges in, just a little, and I bite my lip in ecstasy. I want this so much. “Or you could…”

Out again.

“We could…”

In again.

“But…”

Out.

“Please, Jay.”

In. All the way.

“Have it your way,” he mutters, before we stop being able to say anything at all.

The second time is better than the first. Longer, slower, more intense. There is no one I trust more than Jay and, just like I asked, he pulls out.

And so it ended now, him pulling away, his hands warm from holding me. How did a kiss turn into Jay — the first boy that I’ve loved, that I still love — telling me that he can’t do this with me, that everything that’s happened was a mistake? How did a kiss turn to this? To nothing but silence? I was so stupid to hope things were about to change… The tears I’m crying as I stare out of his car window are no longer for my baby, for my family or for Jay — they’re for me.

Because tonight I have learned that Jay is not the boy I thought he was and, as it turns out, Aaron isn’t quite the boy I thought he was either.

Two let-downs in one night is more than I think I can handle.

“Are you going to tell me what’s going on with you and your missus, or are you just going to sit there and lose at cards?” Neville says. If I hadn’t already moved our “date” from Friday, I would have cancelled — but even sitting here with a cracking headache, losing every hand and wondering whether I’ll bump into Hannah is better than the wrath of a Neville scorned.

“Hannah’s not my missus.”

“She’s carrying your baby, sunshine. That makes her something more than a friend.”