"It's ok. I…I trust you," he smiles bravely for me, even though as the rest of him is trembling like leaf in the autumn breeze. A pale hand reaches up and clutches at my shoulders in unabashed desperation, just to feel me, to know that I am real and that I am here. Chest to chest. Skin to skin.
I lower my head and grace his lips with a tender kiss, nothing harsh, just the pure and unadulterated affection that I feel for him. I want to nurture the trust that he has placed in my coarse and clumsy hands and shape it into something beautiful and true. He lifts his head and meets me halfway, pressing himself into me, tasting me. I watch his eyes slide shut, his lashes tickling the side of my face as we part.
"How much?" I whisper but even that seem too loud. Sacrilegious, even. For a heartbeat, I fear that this perfect moment would shatter and elude me.
His eyes flutter open and he looks at me with a most curious smile on his face. "All the way." He threads his hands together at the back of my neck and our foreheads touch. He kisses the tip of my nose. "Everything."
My heart swells with more happiness than I have ever experienced. "I…I…" The word was at the tip of my tongue, but I could not give it voice. Love . It sounded trite in my mind. His hand slides loose and a strong finger is pressed against my lips to silence me. His eyes coruscate under the illumination of pale moonlight. I know, they tell me.
Wordlessly, he lifts his hip and wraps his legs around me, his powerful thighs pressing tightly against my flanks. He has stopped trembling now and the look in his eyes lends me his strength and his infallible trust.
I shift cautiously, my hands press against the back of his thighs, anchoring him. He must be uncomfortable but still, the glowing smile never leaves his eyes. His forehead glistens with a delicate sheen of perspiration and eager anticipation. The tension between us is hot and palpable, like raw electricity coursing through our veins. I position myself at his entrance and I stop. Every muscle and primal instinct strain and protest, and yet, movement seems impossible.
He looks up at me with a vulnerable glaze shimmering in his eyes and my heart lurches. His face is flushed red and his breaths were heavy and hot. Our eyes meet, and again, that smile touches off a spark from deep within. "Want you," he mouthed, blinking slowly as his fingers twist tightly into the goose down pillow. The heavens suddenly open up with those two breathy silences and we are engulfed, all inhibitions forgotten.
I would lay awake afterwards, watching the moon as it makes nightly sojourn through the sky. I would listen to my lover's breaths, slow and steady like a metronome. He is the rock upon which I would build my fortress. He is the unerring true North upon which I orient my compass. With him, I am home at last, because I trust.
Maybe this is what love is meant to be. There are no fireworks exploding behind my eyes when we kiss. There are no fan fares and tender melodies flowing through the background when we make love. But there is trust. Trusting the other to do the right thing. Trusting the other with my life and my happiness and knowing that I wouldn't be betrayed. We have that trust, my lover and I, a trust that is forged through fire and tempered through peace.
"I love you."