Purely fiction. To be continued

I absolutely love this movie,” I say to break the ice.

With a hesitant smile and a half-hearted chuckle, I see her muscles relax a bit through her jacket, with no effort of my own, was still wrapped tightly around her shoulders.

“I’ve never had this wine before, thanks for bringing the glasses, I’m not much of a classy alcoholic.” Smiling to her, yet again. A laugh being her only response.

I’m not even old enough to be drinking the chestnut, berry hinted liquor, but I let it slide passed my lips anyway. I’m not old enough to be sitting next to her right now. Her age shows on her face. Beautifully though, her unblemished peach skin shows maturity, not lines.

She knows of my age, not of my inexperience, and sadly that’s been depleting for quite some time now.

“I’m glad you called,” she remarks, almost hoping she could continue her sentence but ceases with a breath.

“Yeah, I mean I figured seeing you at the store the other day, maybe… sort of meant something. I believe in that…” I continue to stutter, “that ‘put it in the fates’ deal.”

“You would,” she patronizes with a laugh.

“Oh?”

“I did too, at your age.”

I’m silent.“I’m sorry, that doesn’t start us off on the right foot.” She recants regrettably.

“Yeah, well the movie,” I start back up. “Fantastic storyline… really, very, French. In the best possible way. It hides pretention and boasts really imaginative and vivid possibilities with mundane subjects.”

“You seem to know your stuff.” Semi-impressed, but with a jaded undertone.

“I hate to admit it, but it the fantasy of it brings out the naïve, ceaseless optimist little kid in me.” I explain.

“Oh? No longer a naïve little kid?” She jokes and settles gently back into the permanently borrowed couch that sits lonesome in my living room apartment. “I still am.”

Maybe it was on purpose, but her last phrase comforts me, relaxes me in and warms my face. That could be the wine though. Wine helps.

As the movie begins my eyes become entranced. I notice through my peripheral, hers do as well, but not just on the movie. Her big brown eyes shift cautiously from the slide of my cheeks bones back to the vibrant coloured screen. It all I need to flush my cheeks and stare directly into my glass. I pretend to ignore her gaze.

“Such a tease,” she whispers.

An embarrassed smile dashes across my face my left to an upward slant at the right. I swished around my half full glass. “More wine?” I reply.

“I’ll get it,” responsively as she slowly sways around the corner, slowly as if she feels my eyes move from the back of her shoulders passed her hips. Oh, her hips.

She rounds back the corner with the bottle and a pack of cigarettes. “Do you mind?” Half-knowing the answer, once I tilt my head towards the heavy glass ash tray sitting on the wooden coffee table.

“Not if you mind parting with one,” I finally verbally answer.

“You can have anything you like to part your lips and fill your fingers.” She slowly smirks.

Her provocative words intoxicate me. Innocent until now, I feel a sense of desire shared between my shoulder blades and thighs.

“Why thank you,” pretending her words do nothing, hiding that they sit heavy in my chest.

She looks down. I say nothing as I lean cautiously but closely over to light her cigarette.

Holding it in her mouth, she puffs and finally departs it from her lips in between her left hand.

“A lefty!” I remark. “I am too.”

“Left-handed people are better.” She quiets back.

“At what?”“At… everything,” She smiles.

‘You know,” she quickly changes the subject, “I’m really glad you called.”

“Yeah,” I smile, “you said that.”

“Right, I mean, I just mean, after the party, with the drunken way I asked for your number, the next morning I soberly felt like an ass.” She justifies her repetition.

“Hey, would you have asked for it, had you not had a few too many beers?” I tease.

“Wouldn’t have had the balls.”

“Wouldn’t have had the ovaries.”

“Ohh, your feminist is showing, Emma!” She retorts.

“Oh what! Oh no! Where? Why didn’t you tell me earlier?” as I jokingly search around for some invisible hole or undone button on my clothing.

She laughs this impossibly soft but steady and firm laugh. It makes my hands weak enough to loosen the grip on my glass. Which I notice I’d been white-knuckling like the stem was glued to my palm for some time, as if I had put it down my hands would have a mind of their own.

I tip my head back as I let the rest of my glass finish down my throat, but don’t take my eyes of her. She stares intently at the movie, which I realized I hadn’t even been aware of for the past ten minutes.

She turns to notice my empty glass, and without permission replenishes my drink. I thank her again. “For the liquid encouragement,” I add silently in my head.

By this time we are sitting so much closer and less comfortably while an unspoken, ignored tension builds, as both of our petite bodies start to become swallowed by the couch.

The back of her hand rests against my leg almost accidentally. There is a sting that unintentionally moves my thigh up and down as if to readjust to a different spot or position only to end up back in the same place. Against her hand.

She removes her hand to slowly massage her neck underneath the right side of her chin.

“How stupid.” I thought, I shouldn’t have moved, I should have pretended her hand wasn’t there, now I’ve gone and made her uncomfortable.

The second I mentally regret my physical action, I feel hers. Her thumb and the inside of her palm slides down my cheek as I deafeningly hear her say, “You have beautiful skin…”

I turn, shoving my pleasant embarrassment into the back of my head and respond, “So do you” Almost too eagerly. She smiles.

“It’s one of the first things I noticed about you, besides your eyes.” I further.

“Not my tits?” She laughingly interjects, as her eyes refer down to petite breasts covered by a pale blue button-up.

She notices my eyes and mouth widen, but I play along, “I’m only kidding,” I say, “It was definitely your tits.”

A grin streaks across her face in between her strong jawline. A look comes across her eyes, that mixed with her mouth, makes my eyelids flutter and makes inhalation difficult. Maybe it’s the wine… It’s not the wine.