I know that it was hard for you, but we didn't talk much about the kissing thing. It was out of character for you to remain silent about it – and every time, right before we began, or right after we stopped, I could see the questions clouding your mind. It isn't like you to just let something go, and I'm not even entirely sure why you did. I would have talked about it, but I think it was more because you were hiding from yourself than from me.

It changed things between us, though. We weren't the simple (were we ever actually simple?) friends that we had been since we were eight anymore. Instead, our interactions took on a flirtatious quality, and I thought of it as a kind of game. I assumed you did, too – the way you would look at me from under your eyelashes or blush prettily at the most opportune times made me think you were enjoying it in the same carefree way I was. I didn't think – well, that was my failing in this, I suppose. Looking back at it now, I can see how and where it went wrong, and I wish I could go back in time and warn us. I wish I could have saved you from the pain. I didn't understand what I was doing, and neither did you, I think.

The first time it went from soft, tentative pecks to something deeper – the first time my tongue touched your lips – your eyes flew open, and the shock in them was poignant and electric. You didn't pull away, but I felt your chest expand, and your fingers were like vices circling my wrists. It was as if you needed something to hold on to. Your mouth opened for me, and eventually your eyes fluttered shut, and the noise you made when my tongue swept over yours was mixed somewhere between delight and alarm and it made my blood pump excitedly through my body. I had kissed other people – I didn't think I'd ever been someone's first kiss, though; but I knew I was yours. I was your first everything, wasn't I, Rachel?

We kissed like that, long and slow, with our tongues moving sluggishly together, until the air between us was moist and thick. Our lips were swollen and hot, and when we pulled away from one another, the expression your face was strange – it was almost hungry. I'd seen it before, in others, but it looked different on you.. it was like something inside of you was calling to something inside of me, as irresistible as a magnetic force, and more than any time before I felt the strongest urge to let my hands dig beneath your clothes and find all the secret places of your body, to put my mouth on the dark, sweet spots of your skin and listen to the way you breathe and pant when you no longer have control. It was really the first time I remember feeling strong, pulsating arousal, but I didn't know exactly what it was yet. I just knew that my body was tingly and buzzing and my heart was racing, and all of the nerves in my skin were aching for something. I wanted to push you against your mattress and find out what it all meant.

"Brittany," your voice was breathy and it made everything inside of me tighten and tremble, like plucking a harp string, "We should stop."

"Uh huh," I said, but I stroked my thumb down your neck and I felt your fingers squeeze in response.

"Let's.. um." You kept staring at my mouth, and I could see how large your pupils were and that your cheeks were red and your lips were puffy. "Go.. play.. Monopoly."

"We can't.." I swallowed, scooted closer to you on the bed. "We can't play.. Monopoly.. with only two people."

You bit your lip, held your breath. I could swear everything inside of me was throbbing.

"I like it when you kiss me like that," You whispered, and heat flooded through me.

"I like it, too," I couldn't breathe.

"But we should stop." You sucked in a breath because my face was nearing yours, and it made me grin at you, gently.

"Let me try something," I said, and could barely believe that I was thinking it. Your eyes widened slightly, but after a moment you just nodded. I could tell you were drawn up and tense, because I could feel your pulse hammering in the vein on your neck. I had one hand resting there, the other settled on your hip, and we were only a breath apart.

Slowly, I lowered my face towards yours, and you drew up as if you expected me to kiss you again. I used my thumb along your jaw to turn your head, and then I planted a firm, wet kiss to the tiny space behind your ear, and you shivered. I did it again, this time using my tongue to wet the spot, and your fingers clamped into the thin material of my shirt. You hadn't made any noise or any other movement, yet, but the warmth flooding your skin was almost scalding. I kissed again, this time a bit lower, and when I tried licking the skin. It tasted the way I thought it would – soft and secret and like you. You almost mewled when I tried sucking on it.

I didn't know why kissing you like this – small, wet, hot kisses – made me feel like every single part of my body was on fire, and that I had some kind of pressure building from the tips of my fingers down to the center of my pelvis. I just knew I wanted more.

You had begun murmuring a small, whining noise in the back of your throat, and you had your bottom lip clamped firmly between your teeth. I could feel the way you were completely rigid, and your fingertips were digging into my wrist so hard I thought it would leave bruises.

You finally shifted, and it made me draw back. Your chest was heaving. I didn't know why I stopped. I wanted to keep going.

You put a hand on my shoulder to stop me from moving back in, and when our eyes met, yours were almost black.

"Let me try it," You said, and I was surprised by how rough your voice was. I raised my eyebrows, but then I nodded, and instead of sitting up right away, I scooted backwards on your bed until I was lying down. You crawled after me, not at all hesitating, until you were hovering over me and then I saw your nervousness. I smiled at you, and pushed your hair behind your ear, and it made you relax. You started slow, by kissing my lips, and I kept a hand in your hair because I liked the soft, thick weight of it against my fingers. You pressed your mouth against my jaw, and then finally high on my neck, and I don't know why the span of just a few inches of skin makes such a difference, but immediately every sensation in my body intensified. I felt that stretched-tight feeling again, and a vibration, a thrumming. Your kisses were soft and a little ticklish, but they started such a fire in me. Your right hand brushed across my lower stomach, and my shirt had ridden up, exposing some of the skin there. It made me shudder. I curled my fists into the blankets of the bed and squeezed my eyes tight, just trying to keep myself still.

Your fingertips skimmed across my belly again, and then they were snaking up my shirt. They stroked gently over the skin there, around my belly button, up higher, along the bottom of my ribs. I could tell you were tentative and exploring – your tongue flicked against my neck the same time your palm brushed my side – but it was winding my body up. I couldn't breathe.

I gasped when your mouth closed over my earlobe, and I felt the sharp scrape of your teeth and then suction, and I couldn't stop the moan that came out of my throat. I bucked, rolling my body, and your hand froze on my abdomen. I felt almost feverish. You pulled your head away, a little startled, and in a second I had my mouth against yours and now our kissing was hungry and furious. I could tell it surprised you, because you squeaked a little, but I swallowed up the sound. My hands dove into your hair, and in an instant I had our bodies switched, your back flat against the mattress, mine with both legs over your hips, straddling you.

The only sounds I could hear was the noisy breathing between us, the little clicks and pops of lips separating and meeting again, and the tiny, almost animal grunts and growls that squeezed out. I couldn't help the way my hips shifted hard against you, grinding down, and your own hands came up to settle there. It felt like a firestorm between us – it went from tentative to boiling in a heartbeat.

"Britt—" you tried to talk to me between kisses, but I couldn't stop. I just wanted.. something. Something to do with the pressure between my legs, which only seemed to grow and become more frustrating by the minute. "Wait. It's too much."

I grunted, pulled back, and tried to look at your face. Everything was obscured by a haze of hair and the damp throbbing that seemed to cover my entire body. I didn't want to listen to you. I tried to hear you: wait. But it was hard. I didn't want to wait.

"I want you.." It was muffled, because I was nuzzling against your neck, trying to fuse my mouth to your skin there. "To touch me." I used one of my hands and took yours, guided it up the leg of my cotton shorts. "Here."

"Oh." You gasped, and your fingertips tickled along my inner thigh. My breath exploded against the outer shell of your ear, and your own chest expanded with air. Your palm slid against my leg, and then higher, and your fingers finally found the crotch of my panties.

They stuck to me because they were so wet, and I knew you could feel the outline of my everything. I whined, and pressed against you, and used my teeth at the span of your neck that connected to your shoulder. You swallowed and your hips raised into me, as if by instinct. Your movements were slow and they made me insane. I was impatient.

I took a breath, because I felt rushed and tight and so hot and full and empty at the same time, but I knew you weren't so sure. Your breathing was hard and frantic but your fingers were so light and soft, as if you were afraid of hurting me – or doing something wrong.

"Underneath," I swallowed, and whispered, "Higher."

You held your breath as your fingers picked beneath the hem of my underwear, but then you let out a strangled sound at how wet I was. I knew that everything was slick and messy and slippery down there. It felt swollen and hot. I used my hand, over my shorts, and directed your wrist until I felt your fingertips brush where I wanted them. Then I moaned, and clutched at your shoulder, and pressed my face against your neck.

"Brittany," Your voice was small and breathy. "Like this?" And you started rubbing.

"Oh God," I whimpered, and rocked into you. "Yes."

My breathing got short and loud, amplified by the small space between my mouth and your neck. My body curled on top of yours, and my heart thundered so loud and so violently in my chest. The pressure inside of me was building – twisting and tightening, at times jumping and leaping, and others building slowly. It was driving me crazy. My hips jerked in a stuttered dance, and my whole body flashed heat.

"Don't stop," My breaths were desperate sobs, because I felt like I couldn't stand it a second longer but I knew that if you didn't keep going I would die –

"I won't," You said, and turned your face to press a kiss to the side of my forehead.

A moment later I spasmed, and my whole body clenched. I cried out against the cusp of your neck, and you froze. My hips jolted, grinding down, and my belly went tight and hard. Then finally all of the strength and movement went out of me, and I slid until your hand was out of my shorts but trapped between our bodies, and I crumpled on top of you.

I was breathing too hard, you not at all. You didn't make a sound, and I moved until my head was resting on your shoulder. My body still throbbed, but it was a slow, satisfied kind of feeling. I didn't know what to call it, except happy. I felt happy, and wanted to lie on top of you (even though I was almost half a foot taller than you, at least) and listen to your heart beat for the rest of the day.

Your free hand lifted up and so, so softly, slid down the length of my hair. The touch was back to being unsure and hesitant, but it felt as nice as a warm sunbeam through the living room window.

"Do you want me to do it to you?" I murmured into the silence.

Your hand paused, cupped my hair, and then continued stroking. "No. No, thank you."

I lifted my face so I could look at yours. You smiled and I didn't expect it.

"It was really good," I said, grinning. "You'll like it."

"I know," You sounded thoughtful. "But Brittany – wasn't that – wasn't that a sexual thing that we did?"

I shrugged. "I guess."

"Was it sex?" Your eyes grew round.

"I don't know." I frowned. "Maybe. Why?"

"Well I just.." You slanted your head, and I began to think my weight on top of you was uncomfortable. I went to slide away from you, but your arms came up and circled me, holding me in place. "I just always thought you should be dating a person before you have sex with them. I always thought you should be in love first."

I decided to think about this, because I knew it was important to you. I watched you and knew you were watching me – your eyes skimmed my face, and it felt like we were trying to exchange messages telepathically. Sometimes I wish we really could do that. Words are too hard.

"I love you, Rachel." I gave a tiny nod.

"Yes, but that's different, isn't it?"

You sounded unsure.

I shrugged again.

I could tell that wasn't the answer you wanted – your eyes grew cloudy, your mouth turned down. I used my arms to slide beneath you, holding you closer to me, so that our hearts beat against one another.

"What we didn't wasn't wrong, Rachel," I said it because I needed you to believe it. I said it as forcefully as I knew how, because I had the sick kind of feeling that you were going to feel guilty or bad about this.

Your eyes dug into mine, like you could extract the truth from them, whatever that might be. It took you a long time to answer: "Are you sure?"

"Yes," I didn't miss a beat. "It felt good and we didn't hurt anyone. It wasn't wrong."

"But was it right?" Your voice was thick, like you might be on the verge of crying.

"Rachel," I sighed. "Let me show you. You'll see, it's not.. it's definitely right."

"I'm not ready," You said, and this time I could sense the real fear in you. "I'm not ready for someone to touch me there."

"Okay, Rachel." I said.

You looked like you felt swamped with relief. I brushed the skin on your cheek, and it made a small smile peak out.

"Don't change this," I warned you. "Don't think about this so much you change it into something else. Just – let it be what it was. Please."

You whispered, "But I don't know what it was."

"It doesn't have to have a name," I supplied, and touched my fingers to your bottom lip, softly. "Naming something can make it small or unimportant, or make it into something different altogether."

It took you several long seconds before you finally relented. "All right."

I could tell that you were still troubled, but the light in your bedroom was dim and muffled by your white lace curtains, and the evening sun cast long threads of sunlight on your carpet. Your house was quiet – always much quieter than mine – because your dads were out on a date somewhere. It was the middle of July, and we knew school would be starting in a few weeks. Even though it was in the high 90s outside, my nose was cold, because your dads kept the AC up so high. I buried my face into your shirt, and let the quiet sounds of your breath and blood ticking away inside of you lull me into a daze.

It's easy for me, to let things go – to not spend time thinking about them, or needing to define them. But for you, letting things go is hard, almost impossible. That's the thing about us, Rachel; we're opposites in nearly every way.

I've spent half my life trying to decide if that's what makes us perfect for each other, or if that's what has doomed us from the start.

I don't know what miracle took place that made you decide to not worry about it – but you seemed to let it go, just as you said you would. You didn't ask me again about the rightness of what we had done.

When I remember it, like this, with the distance of years separating me from what happened, I feel like I was so blind – I made mistakes, Rachel. I made mistakes that I wish I could have had the foresight or wisdom to avoid. I know that I spent the next four years paying for them, which I deserved. But you didn't – you didn't deserve any of it.

It was so obvious. It was so obvious, but I was blind to it, and I don't know how.

It was another week before we kissed again, and it was beneath the shade of the old oak tree in your back yard. We had been sitting underneath its boughs, waiting for the hottest part of the day to pass us by. You kept plucking at the dandelions that grew persistently around the tree's roots, though your dad cursed them for weeds and tried everything to make them stop growing. You liked to watch the little white seeds fly away in the wind.

The summer sun had turned your skin the color of dusky hazelnut, and your hair glinted when the light touched it. You had it up in a ponytail, and I could see that sweat had made the little hairs along the nape of your neck curl. I liked to run my fingers through it, to catch the different subtle shades – as dark as midnight at its core, in other places a creamy chocolate, even the flash of honey on the ends. I liked holding our arms together and marveling at the difference – yours so tanned and even, mine gold with a touch of pink, spattered with freckles.

You always smiled delicately at me when I did this, as if it were a silly child's game you indulged in for my sake. You didn't think there was anything special about the shades of your hair or the tone of your skin, and you certainly couldn't understand why I liked looking at your eyes. Plain and brown, is how you described them – but for me, they were like pools, like the night sky, like the color of tree bark or coffee or candies in a Valentine's Day heart.

I lied back in the soft grass, resting my head on my arm. You glanced over at me, and I didn't see you because I was busy looking at the lazy, heavy clouds through the smattering of tree leaves, and thinking about how hot my feet were getting with the sunlight on them. I was thinking about trying to talk you into walking down to the neighborhood pool, or over to Dandee's for an ice cream. I never expected you to bend over me, so suddenly, and block my view.

I smiled, even though I was surprised, because seeing you always did that to me. Your face was wrinkled, as if you were thinking hard about something, and your eyes skipped over mine like a stone skips on water. You seemed determined. I was curious, but not concerned, until you leaned in and then pressed a kiss to my lips.

It had a different quality than our kisses in the past – the kisses that I almost always initiated – because you seemed frustrated, or maybe angry. Your lips were hard and bruising and demanding, unlike the soft and willowy way you've kissed me in the past. Your hand cupped the side of my face, and it felt like an order to hold still. Your tongue dipped past my lips and into my mouth, and stole my breath away. I felt like I was on a carousel cranked up to high speed, dizzy and disoriented. I kissed you back when I remembered how to, and it made a noise click in the back of your throat.

I felt pinned in place, both by the strength of your hand on my face and the heat that came from you which had little to do with the midday sun. You've always been smaller than me, Rachel – more petite and compact – and I've never felt like you could best me in any kind of physical competition. But I still felt overpowered, somehow; I felt fragile, the way aluminum foil crinkles up and disintegrates when held over an open flame.

When you peeled away from me, your eyes were black and liquid again, a look I was beginning to recognize. I sucked in the humid air through lips that felt swollen, and I knew my cheeks were pink and burning.

"Do you want to go upstairs?" You asked.

I gave a mute nod.

You stood up first, and offered me your hand. I let you help me up, and dusted the dead grass from my back. You kept your hand closed in mine on the entire journey through the house and up the stairs.

When we were in your room, you pushed me down on the mattress, and started kissing me again like you did before – with determination and force, and more skill than I knew you possessed.

I let your hands (tiny, artful hands) wander over my body, and I let your mouth kiss where it wanted. It made me feel drunk to lie so still and prone, to let you lift up the clothes and reveal me piece by piece, layer by layer. But I knew, instinctively, you needed to – you needed to do this to me, for whatever reason. I couldn't imagine why, but I was glad to let you do it. I was glad when your hands found all the curves and dips of my waist, the soft and quiet places that no one other than me has touched since I was too young to remember.

It surprised me, a little, the breadth of your curiosity – it caused you to do things to me I never imagined; things I didn't think even you'd imagined. It still had the sweetness of innocence and love attached to it, but when you were done, and I was damp and sweating on your sheets, spent and tired and drowsy, I felt more adult than I ever had yet in my short life. I think, by the look on your face, you did, too.

"Was it good?" You crawled on top of me – mostly naked – and stared straight into my eyes.

"You have to ask?" I smiled, pushed your bangs behind your ears. "Let me show you, Rachel,"

This time you hesitated. I could see the flush on your cheeks, the longing look in your eye – you wanted it. You wanted me. I knew that if I started touching you, you wouldn't want me to stop.

"Not yet." You huffed out a breath, and I could tell you didn't really want to say no.

"When you're ready."

The rest of our summer went like that – spending long, hot days walking around your neighborhood, eating ice cream at the diner, climbing your oak tree. You always laughed and squinted at me when I pushed you to do things you would never normally do – we climbed out on your roof one night, and you screamed so loud when your foot slipped I thought your neighbors would wake up and call the cops – but eventually you would give in. I had to boost you up over the fence into the Truman's backyard so we could go skinny dipping in their pool, but you did it.

We never got caught. I think that was part of the magic of that summer – we always did things we knew were wrong, things we knew would get us in trouble if anyone ever found out. We climbed higher in the trees than your dads would want us to, we used sidewalk chalk and colored in other people's driveways while they were at work. We rode our bikes across town, we stayed out after curfew. Our parents would scold us, but we never got grounded.

And some nights, I would sneak out of my house and ride my bike the six blocks to yours, and then climb the lattice up to your window. You always left it cracked, as if you just always knew when I would come by. We never talked about it – we never planned it – but some nights, lying in my own bed, smelling my own sheets washed in our laundry soap, instead of yours, I would start to miss you. I'd miss the way your laugh tinkled and tickled at my chest, like birds fluttering. I'd miss your smell and the feeling of your hair on my face.

I'd climb in your window, quick as a cat, and shimmy through your window. Most of the nights you would sleep straight through it, until I was curled up in bed next to you, a leg thrown over your hip. I would bury my face in the dark, tangled curtain of your hair and fall asleep listening to you breathe.

But some nights I'd find you awake, your chocolate eyes glinting in the dark, and when I climbed into your bed, your hands would search out my body beneath my nightclothes, stroking along the skin and muscle and bone, as if to memorize it. And I'd let you touch me until every part of me was on fire, until your mouth and hands had turned me into a creature capable only of feeling – and every time, after it was over, I'd look at you and ask you to let me show you what it's like.

"Almost," You'd say, and it sounded like a promise.

I wanted to show you what it was like, because I loved you – and I could feel that you loved me when you touched me and kissed me the way that you did. I wanted to give you the same warm, full feeling you gave me. And I was curious, too – I wanted to see the way your face looked when you had no control. I wanted to hear your sounds, wanted to see what you felt like, what you smelled and tasted like. It was an ache inside of me, some days.

But I knew I couldn't pressure you – just like I knew I had to lie still and let you search every inch of me, and be patient, even when I felt like I was going to burn up from the intensity of waiting. I wish I had found the words to say to you all the reasons why I wanted to reciprocate; I wish I had thought to say – Rachel, I love you, let me show you what it's like to be loved like this. But I didn't. I didn't have them inside of me, yet, and didn't know how to say them.

It's something I've always regretted.

but I come with a dream in my eyes tonight,
and knock with a rose at the hopeless gate of your heart—
open to me!
for I will show you the places Nobody knows,
and, if you like,
the perfect places of Sleep.

if you're enjoying this fic, please let me know!

I think it's turning out rather grand