Reason
I like it best when you kiss me like this, after dinner the first day I run into you guys and we surprise each other with how much we missed it.
In a weird sort of way, since I haven't been thinking of you except sometimes and you haven't been thinking of me except accidentally so all the missing happens when we're together, right when I smile at you.
I get on board, I say my hellos, you comment that a meal is almost ready and duck off to the kitchen because you like to be shy about things with me. And there's this happy waiting stretch while you finish up and the rest of us stall, and suddenly we're thinking a lot about each other and it makes my stomach warm and nervous.
We don't look at each other during dinner because it's such a family affair I pretend not to be there, but someone always calls you out on unusually subdued lady chasing so you cover your ass with a blush and a bow and some doting. Pretty damn cute .
The meal ends and the crew disperses, i promise Luffy I'll catch up with him soon; I haven't finished eating. And the door swings shut and my eyes roam up to you working at the sink, I watch you hear my fork clink onto my plate then I watch you tense up to turn around. You turn halfway. Wipe your hands slowly and carry the cloth with you around the table. We meet at the corner and I can't wait to get my hands on those hips.
But you look up and my smile starts hurting and the missing begins hard and cutting.
And we take a couple of seconds to soak it in before you kiss me in this way I like best. Where it starts with jaws reaching and moves up to noses. Where we're not sure it's really happening unless we can feel each other out with jaded hands, knowing we're smart not to hope but thankful when I find your legs and your elbows, when you find the ends of my hair and my collarbone, right where they always are.
And my hands on your hips aren't so much sexy as sorry and squeezing. And I feel warm wet on your cheeks and taste it when we open our mouths because you try not to cry about things with me.
On this first kiss, where we relearn what made us say 'why the hell not' to begin with, even if it's the only one before I go, even if it's the last thing I do with you before I move on, you just can't keep it together. So we stand there sucking face and missing each other bad with shaky breaths and scowls and the whole nine yards.
It's kind of stupid, yeah, but it's our own thing and I like it best even if we feel like naughty teenaged party girls later. Even if we'd laugh our asses off if we could only see how we're clinging and clutching.
Right now, I know you're hurting and I know it's not because of me; it's something bigger that I kind of get but couldn't tell you. It's because of questions you hate to ask yourself but have to if there are things you want to live for. Something about losing that I always wish I'd feel, that makes you cry right now and lets those questions leave my mind because I know I can make you stop. I can make you better, you, who has things you want to live for.
And that makes my life worth it , right? - if I can stop that hurting?
So I like it best when you kiss me like this, and you let me count one reason it's okay for me to be here:
So I can kiss you back.