Deanna Roy - Forever Innocent

“You ever listen to that song anymore?” I asked her.

“I put the CD away with Finn’s things after you left.”

“You have it here?”

She hesitated. “Yes, but I can’t open that box.”

“Let me.”

“It’s under the bed. You’ll know it.” Her voice was unsteady.

I pulled away and knelt low, fumbling in the low light. But she was right. I remembered the box, given to us by the hospital just for the baby’s things. A blanket. A little outfit. A candle. A handprint kit. We’d gone through it in the two days between his death and the funeral. The box had been put together by some volunteer group for families like us.

I didn’t pull the box out, just lifted the lid a few inches. The CD was on top, and I was grateful, because just seeing the blanket was more than enough for me. “You got anything to play this on?”

“My laptop has a CD drive. Are you — are you sure we should?”

“I’d like to.”

Corabelle moved to a backpack in the corner and tugged out her computer. She passed it to me, so I opened it up, waited for the chime, and opened the CD tray.

The first song of the soundtrack wasn’t right, so I skipped down to “Feels Like Home.” Hearing that crystal voice sent me back in time so fast that I half expected to look up and see that we were in the sunroom and Corabelle was holding her arms in the air. I realized she was wearing the same white tank from that scene, and I had to wonder about fate, timing, and what exactly the world had in mind when it signed us both up for the same class at the university we had once planned to go to before everything else happened, before life got so dark that it split us apart.

Before I split us apart.

The enormity of my regret crashed over me. I wanted to shut off the song, stop it all. I reached for the keyboard but Corabelle knew what I was doing and grabbed my wrist. “Let’s just get through it. I know it’s hard, but let’s just tough it out.”

The chorus tore through my heart. I was home. We were home. All we had to do was decide that this was where we belonged. She had to forgive me for leaving. Then she had to know what I had done, and forgive me all over again.

I pushed the laptop out of the way and moved closer to her. The mattress dipped and knocked us together. She fell on me, and I held on. The moment to tell her had come a second time, and I had to be man enough to say the words. 

I had to tell him what I’d done. The only way to move on with my life was through his forgiveness. I could start with what happened earlier that day with Austin, then back to New Mexico State and my arrest, and then the worst of all.

He was looking at me with those blue eyes, like I was the only thing in the world, just the way he had always done. I had forgotten what that could feel like. How important it was to be loved like that. How it could heal.

“Corabelle —”

“Gavin —”

We both stopped at the same time and just when I thought we’d both laugh, instead, we both almost sobbed, coming together in a crash, his arms tight around me and mine gripping him like a lifeline.

It was too much, my need of him overwhelming, how hard I ached. He shuddered against me, and I could feel the emotion passing between us. For the first time in four long years, I thought — I can be that girl I once was. I can have hope. I can find happiness.

Gavin was home to me. Just like that night so many years ago, I looked up at him with a mixture of anxiety and certainty, and just like then, just like in the movie, I raised my hands over my head to let him start the journey all over again.

He never took his eyes off mine, but his fingers grasped the bottom of the white tank — God, the same type of shirt as that scene, I realized — and tugged it up and off.

“Corabelle,” he whispered, looking at me as if he’d never seen me before.

“I’m here.”

He pulled me in, letting our skin have its own reunion. His chest was hard and almost hot to the touch. His heart hammered against mine. I wanted him to kiss me again, needed it more than I’d ever needed anything in my whole life. He took his time, running his fingers up the back of my neck and into my hair.

His mouth was achingly close, his nose bumping against mine. Everywhere we connected, I felt fire. His tongue brushed against my lips, and I parted for him.

At first his touch was so gentle that I barely knew we were kissing, the sensation featherlight. Then his hand on my neck pressed me into him and we were back, tasting each other and as close as we ever were.

I never wanted to do anything else but feel his arms around me, our skin touching, and his mouth crossing over mine, delving into me as though I could pour myself into him.

Every emotion I’d ever felt was coursing through me, desire, need, joy, love, and even grief. We’d been through everything, through things people should never have to endure. No wonder we had fractured, blown apart. But we could fix it. We could get it back.

I wanted to be closer. I shifted on the bed, straddling his lap and locking my legs around his waist. The singer was right, I wanted to lose myself, fall into my one great love and just let everything disappear. He could do that. He’d been the only one who could ever do that.

His mouth never left mine as he kicked off his shoes. His fingers trailed across my spine, relearning every part of me. His thumbs made their way around, slipping into the curve below where our two chests smashed into each other.

Sensations splintered through me like lightning. I sucked in a breath and he moved, suddenly, like a panther, pushing me down on the bed. As soon as we were apart, he left my mouth to press kisses along my face and neck, dropping lower until he captured a nipple.

How could I have forgotten this, gone without? I arched against him, wanting more, needing him more than I thought possible. My hands went to his back, feeling each corded muscle, the angle from his chest down to his waist. He was so erect against me, pushing out against the silky shorts. I had never felt as bold as I did then, reaching for him, reminding myself of his length and breadth.

He sucked in a breath against my skin, his hands on my ribs. The song ended, so he reached around and closed the laptop, lifting it away from the bed and safely onto the floor. I could hear every rapid inhale, the silky sound of his palm running along my belly. He reached for the waist of my shorts, then hesitated, his gaze meeting mine. “Is this okay? Are you okay?”

The concern in those blue eyes sent another wave of emotion through me. He hadn’t stopped caring. He never hated me, like I thought. He just succumbed to a terrible time, riddled with what-ifs. “Yes,” I whispered.

He yanked on the shorts, bringing them to my knees, then dragging them the rest of the way off. My panties were simple, white cotton with an edge of lace. He ran a finger along the border against my skin, then followed some of the stretch marks across my belly. “I never knew about these,” he said.

“They showed up later.” I tried to cover them, but he pushed my hands away.

“They’re beautiful.” He began kissing each pale line, hip to stomach and back down again. “It’s proof that Finn was once here.”

Emotion welled up so hard that I didn’t think I could contain it. Gavin continued to press his lips into my skin, but when his fingers began to slide the panties down, I forgot everything else, overwhelmed with physical sensations, gentle touch, and painful need.

Then I was naked below him, the only person who’d ever seen me like this. He spread my knees and pressed his face against the inside of my leg, pausing there, his mouth against my skin.

I could scarcely bear it. “Gavin, please,” I managed to say.

His head lifted and I could see so much conflict there. Did he think it wasn’t safe? That I could get pregnant again? “I’m still on the shot. I never stopped.”

He closed his eyes and I knew he was thinking about how I was on it before, and it hadn’t mattered. We’d been on the wrong side of every statistic. Less than a one-percent chance of getting pregnant. A heart condition that was one in four thousand.

His hands moved up my thighs, both thumbs resting against me, setting everything on fire.

“Some things just aren’t in our control,” he said. He spread me wide and his tongue flicked against me and then I couldn’t think of anything as the world shattered.

I grabbed the sheets in handfuls. His hair tickled my belly and I zoomed into the next plane of pleasure so fast that I couldn’t have stopped him if I wanted, his mouth so hot, the shuddering of my body already taking me into the past, when we’d been like this constantly, greedy, feasting like the banquet would never end.

He worked every part, tongue and lips and fingers, and then my body vibrated around him, and I let go of the sheets, my fears, the past and present, just rocketing into that shower of sparks.

Gavin knew just where to take it, and how to bring it down, pulling away gently, carefully, as my hips rested back against the bed. He pressed his face into my thigh, holding on to me, and I wondered if he would decide not to take this all the way, to spare the risk. And I couldn’t bear it, I wanted it too, to see him lose control, to fall into me. I rolled over and got to my knees, tugging at his shorts, pulling everything down, boxers and all. I clutched at him, hot and throbbing between my fingers, making sure he couldn’t let it go, couldn’t resist.

I pushed him on his back, settling over him in a position that was so familiar. My hair was falling out of the pins and cascaded around his face. Before he could move or talk or do anything to stop me, I lowered myself down on him, sliding over him like slipping into cool sheets.