Chapter 3.
It's not like our friendship was complicated. It was easy. Until suddenly, it wasn't.
We were the 'fab four' through high-school. Duncan, Logan, Lily and I. Then lily was murdered our friendship took a real hit. We were all reeling, devastated by the loss of a sister, a girlfriend, a friend. We all dealt with it in our own ways. Duncan withdrew, I rebelled, and Logan raged. We splintered, alone in our grief for a long time.
It took a few years before we found our way back to each other. Duncan had asked, begged to meet up again just for a coffee. I relented. Logan refused.
Duncan and I settled back into our relationship; we got back together and stayed together ever since.
Logan continued to destroy himself, taking others down with him. Eventually, he crashed his car, drunk, into a tree and almost killed himself. He broke six ribs, his collarbone, his leg and had bad internal bleeding. When he woke, Duncan and I were there. Logan had no-one. We were his family.
So the 'fab four' became three, and we rebuilt. Best friends again. We even got a house when college started and lived together for years. There was banter, always banter. Logan liked to challenge me, fire me up in a way Duncan never did. So we played the constant word game, challenging each other. It was platonic. I'm sure it was nothing more to him. But slowly, gradually, I started to realize that I lived for that banter. I began to crave it. To crave him. His cheeky smirk, his dark eyes, his stare. But Duncan was there, and I was with Duncan.
In the second year of college, Logan started dating Parker. The banter didn't stop. Sometimes I wished it would. A brush of a finger, a nudge, legs touching while watching TV. It was my oxygen. If it meant anything to him, he certainly never gave it away.
Once, we had all poured into a cab, already drunk and headed for a club. It was Logan's 21st Birthday. We were celebrating, in excess. My shirt was too short, my heels too high. I could barely walk. Vodkas all round. Another round. Another round.
Parker and I were dancing, hands high above our heads, grinding, swaying together in the darkness. My hips moved back and forth, following the music. I was feeling sexy, acting sexy.
Then, my eyes found his. He was watching us, hooded, intense. I realized he wasn't watching Parker.
He was watching me.
I danced a little slower, moved my hips a little deeper. I pressed my legs together to try and dampen the ache. Parker turned to me and mouthed "Bathroom," over the booming music and stumbled off the floor.
Logan stood slowly and walked towards the dance floor. My heart started beating faster. I could feel the pulse in my neck. I didn't stop dancing. I couldn't stop moving. He approached from behind and wrapped his arms around me, resting his hands on my hip bones. We moved together. Back and forth, he turned his face into my neck and breathed, strained, into my ear, almost a groan. Guttural. My eyes involuntarily closed. He started grinding into my rear, I could feel him. All of him.
I was filled with one feeling only. Want.
"You're killing me," he whispered, voice low. I could barely hear it above the music.
I grinned.
"You're always killing me," he breathed.
I wanted to turn around, to face him. But I couldn't. I couldn't look at those eyes. I didn't think I'd be able to stop myself. On a dancefloor, with Duncan at the bar and Parker in the bathroom.
It continued to build.
We started to move, slowly, towards the back of the dancefloor, to the wall. Behind the crowd, away from the bar. Hidden.
It's all a dance. We're just dancing I kept telling myself.
His hand put pressure on my hipbone, and tried to turn me, turn me to face him.
"Look at me," his lips grazed my neck.
I shake my head.
"Please," he pressed himself into me, harder.
I tilted my head backward so I could reach his ear, his eyes found mine. I can't breathe.
"I can't," I shook my head again,
"But it's my birthday," he growled.
I turned, surrendering. His hands moved to my waist, tight. "Okay, but only because it's your birthday," feigning a shrug: those brown eyes, hooded, yearning. Boring into mine, I couldn't look away.
He ran his hand up my waist, light as a feather, dusting across my breasts and wrapped his palm around the base of my neck, his thumb gently caressed my collarbone. My head involuntarily tilted back. I had lost all control. Crackles of electricity seemed to come from his fingertips, leaving goosebumps over my skin in their wake.
"Did you know," his lips were back at my ear, "there is only one thing I want for my birthday, only one thing I've ever wanted?" he hid his lips in my hair, gently kissing the base of my neck. Once, twice. His tongue traced towards my ear, warm.
I swallowed, hard.
I was dying.
I opened my eyes to see Parker stagger back to the dancefloor, "Baby, you're DANCING!" she yelled and ran to Logan, turning to grind against him, grabbing my hand and pulling me towards her as she danced between us.
I tried to dance. Tried to stay. Logan's eyes turned dark. I couldn't look at him. It was over so quickly. Did it even happen? I excused myself and headed for the bar. I took my place next to Duncan. He was talking to someone, at someone, oblivious. I downed another vodka and put my forehead onto the bar.
For the rest of the night, for the taxi home, as we ate greasy food the next morning, Logan wouldn't look at me. He wouldn't turn to me. Avoidance. I started to think I'd imagined it all, misread the situation, throwing myself at him. I was mortified. He withdrew.
And it was never spoken of again, written off in my mind as a drunken mistake. Emotions heightened by the vodka in my veins. We continued, uninterrupted as friends.
There was still occasional brushes of a finger, a nudge, legs touching while watching TV, and sometimes I even imagined them lingering longer than they used to.