“It’s okay. I figured it was something like that.”
“You drove that long by yourself without stopping?”
“I refueled twice, but you didn’t wake up for it.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. You needed to sleep.”
“I bet you were lonely.”
I huff. “Yeah, but you were there with me, just sleeping. It’s fine. I binged a podcast.”
“I bet you’re exhausted, now.”
I groan an affirmative sound. “I’m beat.”
She rolls to her back, and now her arm is under my neck, cradling my shoulders, and my head is against her chest. I can hear her heartbeat thudding rhythmically. She’s soft, and warm. “How’s this?”
“Mmm. Best.”
Her lips touch my forehead. My temple. “I’ll hold you, now. Sleep.”
I’ve never been held like this, before. It’s weird, at first, mentally. But it feels…safe. Warm. Vulnerable. It makes my heart…open, like a flower in the dawn light.
I turn my face up, wriggle higher. Kiss her.
She murmurs a laugh. “I thought you were tired.”
“I am. But I’m never too tired to kiss you.”
Her lips are soft and warm, and I feel myself melting into her. Kissing, and kissing. Exhaustion tugs at me, but desire wins. Pushes me closer to her, prompts me to deepen the kiss.
She pulls away first, with a frustrated sigh. “I feel…impatient, Wes. Sexually. I want everything. I want more. I also want to just…enjoy the process of discovering this, of finding out what things feel like. But I also know that…I don’t have much time. And I want to feel everything with you while I still can.”
This is an abrupt transition from kissing, but I roll with it. Pull away from her and rest my head on her chest again. “It’s all on your time frame, Jo. It can all happen as slowly or as quickly as you want.”
“I want to…” She gazes down at me. “I want to make love with you, Wes.”
I trace her jawline, the shell of her ear. Searches her face. “I want that too. I want to make love to you, Jolene.”
“Now?”
I touch her lips with a thumb. “Would you trust me if I said I wanted to wait, and do something special for you? For us, I mean.” I trace her lips again.
“I trust you.”
“I want to make it special, Jo. It should be special. Magical.”
“Everything we do is special and magical.”
I laugh. “That’s the damn truth, baby. But I mean…I want to take you out on a proper date. Get you a fancy gown and shoes and rent a limo and…all that.”
“That sounds amazing.” She kisses my temple again, a soft, gentle, warm touch of her lips. Affectionate, and sweet, and it sends a lance of something deep and intense through me. “I don’t need all that, though.”
“You deserve it,” I say. “You deserve magic. Romance. You deserve to feel like the most beautiful and special woman in the world, because you are.”
“Well, I won’t lie—that does sound like the most incredible night ever.”
“I’ll make it happen, then.” I lift up, and my lips touch hers. “You deserve everything, Jo. Because you are everything.”
“Wes, I…” She stops short. Looks away from me, blinking hard. “I can’t even begin to tell you how thankful I am that you showed up at my door.” She kisses me, then and I kiss her back, and then we’re lost in each other, and she rolls into me, hovers over me, and kisses me breathless.
Then pulls away, settles back and resumes holding me. “Sleep.”
I laugh, but exhaustion hits me in a sudden wave. I let her hold me. Let need subside.
“Showing up at your door is the best decision I ever made.”
She doesn’t answer that, but I can feel the many different responses she could make.
La-La Land
Jolene
I end up falling back asleep after an hour or so of dozy mental meandering, while holding a sleeping Wes. And then, I wake back up a few hours later, with a spinning mind. Mainly, I consider how grateful I am for this experience. For him.
He pushes me out of my comfort zone, but gently. He allows me time to think and process, lets me set the pace and doesn’t complain if his desires may not totally align with my needs.
He’s adorable, asleep like this. He rolled after an hour in my arms, and I moved to spoon him. Inhaling his scent. Touching his shoulders. Just enjoying the privilege of being able to be near and touch someone so beautiful, inside and out.
It’s bizarre how quickly he’s infiltrated my whole being. I can’t imagine going back to life without Wes. I literally just cannot. I don’t want to. I’ll fight tooth and nail for every moment with him. If there was a treatment option that would feasibly prolong my life to any kind of meaningful degree, I’d do it. But I’ve exhausted them all. Nothing would do more than make me dreadfully sick and give me a few more weeks of mostly misery. That’s the trade-off with most treatments: yeah, it extends your life, but at a cost. It’s poison, you know? Kills the cancer, yes, but good grief, it’s freaking miserable beyond belief.
No thanks.
I’ll take the time I have left. As many good days as I can get, and hopefully spend the bad ones with him near me.
At 9:00 a.m. on the dot, Wes’s phone rings, on the nightstand beside him. He groans, exhales with resignation, and grabs the handset off the table without moving any other part of his body.
Peers at it one-eyed, pokes the speaker button, and grumbles at the handset. “What.”
A bright, chipper, businesslike female voice responds. “Well good morning to you too, Wes.”
“We got in at four in the morning, Jen.”
“So you got a good five hours. I know you can function on less than that.” A pause. “Wait…we?”
“Yes, we.” He rolls to his back, eyes opening and fixing on me, smiling sleepily. “Myself and Jolene.”
“I assume I’m on speaker, but I’m not going to filter for her sake, Wes.” A hesitation. “You brought her home with you?”
“Yes, I did.” He wriggles to a seated position, reaches for me, pulls me to him so I’m cradled in his arms.
“So…what’s the plan, then?”
“Well, for right now, breakfast. Showers. Relax. We spent the last several days on the road, so I think we’re going to spend some time just unwinding.”
“You have responsibilities, Wes.”
“I know. And I’m going to have to give you the unwelcome burden of buying me time.”
“Like, how much time? I can reschedule some stuff, but you’re starting choreo with Shania next week, and that’s a nonnegotiable.”
“It’s going to have to be negotiable, Jen. Something more important came up. End of story.”
“More important than your career, your reputation, and your contracted obligations?”
“Yes.”
A harsh, unhappy sigh. “Wes, come on. Work with me, here. You gotta give me something. I can get you out of all media, or maybe you just do phone- or Zoom only interviews, an hour or less. Maybe one day, we jam the whole media tour into one day, all day. She can go shopping or something. I’ll have a personal shopper, security, the works, and she can to Rodeo Drive and spend some of the money you refuse to touch.” A thoughtful pause. “But, Wes, you can’t bail on the film. You can’t. Bail now, on this, and you’ll never get hired again for anything major. Or it’ll be like starting over, only harder.”