Woke up this morning, and YAY, MY REVIEWS WERE THERE!

Honestly, felt like a second Christmas.

"You have to take a break sometime, you know."

Helga jerked her head up from where she sat hunched over her notebook. Books were spread out around her, filled with annotated post-it-notes.

But she wasn't working on her thesis, she was writing. The deadline for the book submission was coming up. Bad timing, but she was sure she'd get it all done. She now woke at 6 every morning, and worked solidly 'til 9 at night, giving herself an hour to read before she went to sleep. Or tried to sleep, anyways. More often than not she lay awake, unable to quiet her thoughts…

She shook herself. "What's the time?"

Arnold was frowning. "About 6. Aren't you hungry?"

Helga dropped her pen onto the page, inspected the ink smears on the ends of her fingers, and tried not to think about how Joel had gifted her that fountain pen for Christmas. "I suppose… you gonna order something in?"

Still frowning, Arnold dropped himself into the chair next to her. "I mean it, Helga. You need to take a break. You look like shit."

"Nice." She rolled her eyes. "Thanks for your concern, Arnold… but if you hadn't noticed, I'm actually really busy."

"Helga…" she cringed at the pity in his voice, "you were doing fine 'til you and Joel broke up." His hand moved to cover hers, worry etched all over his face. "You're just keeping busy so that you don't have to think about it, aren't you?"

"I think about it all the time."

Did she just say that?

But he just nodded, his fingers curled under her palm. "You need a break. You're gonna burn out. Just… just let me make you dinner, and we'll watch something."

She tried to make excuses, that she had to finish this poem, that the deadline was looming… but she was so tired, and Arnold's hand felt so good on hers…

His arms felt good around her, too.

They lay spooning on his bed, Kindergarten Cop playing on his laptop as they nested together. Her head was on his arm, his other hand tucked right around her waist, holding her close. It was so cosy, and warm, and she was full of good food. For the first time in weeks, she felt almost peaceful…

… she woke up to a dark room. The laptop still open on the bedside table, but its screen black. Arnold was still curled around her, leaning heavily into her with his face pressed against the back of her neck.

It was hot, with summer fast approaching and Arnold's breath running down her back and their bare legs pressed together, she could feel sweat dampening her tank top at the small of her back.

She shifted, tried to pull away from him slightly, but he grumbled in his sleep. It was the sweetest noise, an insistent, soft mumble that threatened to undo her. She shifted again, and he buried his face harder into her neck.

"Stay."

Even while knowing he was probably talking to Summer Glau or someone in his sleep, the murmured word was too much. She froze.

Oh god, what the hell is wrong with me… she could feel her breath quicken, a knot of tension grip at the base of her skull, a ripple of hard desire pulsed down. Cold realisation shocked her awake.

… this was it, wasn't it? This is what had been holding her back, the cause of the unexplainable feeling of things left undone… it was Arnold. She wanted Arnold.

She tried to pull away again, only to have him tug her closer, his hand riding up her ribs, his hips pressing forward… there was no mistaking the hard length that was now pressed between them.

She breathed his name from stuttering lungs.

He grumbled, scrubbed his face into her hair. "Helga?" He eventually answered, his voice gruff with sleep. "You 'lright?"

He yawned, stretched. The length of his body taut against hers, making her shallow breathing come even faster as she tried to gain control over her insane reaction to him.

He froze, suddenly still. "Ah. Sorry." He began to pull away from her, tugging his hand from where it cupped her ribs and shuffling back a bit.

It took her a second to figure out that he was apologising for having his erection jammed against her butt… she rolled over, aware that what she wanted to do was very very stupid…

She heard him swallow before he mumbled another apology. "It's just… in my sleep. I wouldn't…" He trailed off as she moved closer, her head still on his arm, her back arching to press her chest to his, her hand finding the hem of his shirt and unthinkingly pushing it up to lay her palm on his side.

"Helga?"

It was wrong. She knew it was. It was like every taboo erotica fiction she'd ever read… but she kissed him.

God, his lips were so soft. So much softer than she was expecting. His stubble scratched at her chin as he started to respond to her. And as soon as he did, she pushed further, opening her mouth to run her tongue along his upper lip, urging him not to think, just to react.

She gripped at his back with her hand and levered herself to him, pressing them hard together from chest to knee. Against her mouth, he made a small noise, like a question, that found it's answer in the way she circled her hips against him.

He groaned. His hand found her and began roving over her. Exploring her back, her arms, her neck, her sides. He brushed his fingertips oh so lightly across the side of her breast – making her shudder – before trailing down to grasp at her waist.

Not enough. She moaned, pointedly, and dragged her leg up to lay it over his thigh. He was shaking, and when she tugged at his side, urging him to roll over, to pin her beneath him, he hesitated.

"Helga." His voice was muffled in her mouth. She took the opportunity to touch her tongue to his, revelling in how his breath hitched. "Helga!" He jerked back, unceremoniously breaking their kiss.

She'd managed to drag him half on top of her, and even while he stared down at her, she tugged him closer, impatient.

"Helga, I got a job, I'm leaving."

Her shifting stilled as she stared up at him. She could feel his gaze on her, watching her face as best he could in the dark room. She could hear his breath, as laboured as hers. Would his heart be racing, too, if she put a hand on his chest?

He was still over her. One arm still under her head, the other braced by her shoulder… it would take just a small shift to press her lips to his again. Like he could read her mind, he pulled back just a fraction.

"I just found out today… I was going to tell you, after the movie, but you fell asleep… it's a really good job." He finished lamely.

"Where?" She was too curious about his heart. She raised both hands and placed them on his chest.

His pulse was racing. Fast, strong beats against her palms. His breath shook at her touch. "Back in New York. At the state museum."

"When?" She slid her hands up around his neck, gauging his reactions.

He dropped lower, pressing his weight against her thigh. "As soon as semester finishes."

That stunned her. "Three weeks?"

He nodded. "So we can't do this."

Of course we can. "Why not?"

"Because I don't want to be your rebound."

ARGH. No! None of this was going right! She squirmed. "You're not my rebound, Arnold! You're the reason Joel and I broke up!"

"I… what?" Even in the dark room, she could see the confusion on his face. But it was all too much. The last few weeks, the horrifying realisation that she'd never grown out of her childhood crush…

"You heard me! You're the reason Joel and I broke up. Not because I didn't love him enough, or that I don't want to be with him, but because I can't move on with anyone until I finally deal with this shit."

"I loved you all through our childhood. I was totally gaga, head-over-heels, pathetically in love with you. I was the one that wrote that book of awful poems about you. I spent hours searching through the dump to find your hat that time you lost it, and I gave my Nancy Spumoni snowboots to the guy in the records office, so he'd find Mr Huang's daughter and make you happy on Christmas… I was the fake Cecile!"

"Oh, Helga -"

"Shut up! I didn't think I liked you like that anymore. I genuinely thought we were friends. But I just haven't been able to get past it. I've had this weird feeling for the past year that I've been missing something. I thought it was something to do with Joel. I've been so deep in denial that I didn't realise that it was you I was missing until I woke up just now with your boner in my back."

"So, I want to do this. I know you have this moral code thing, and I know I'm not over Joel… but I think you like me. I think you've liked me for a while. I think you liking me probably contributed to your break up with Maya, and I think if we don't at least see what happens, we'll just keep messing shit up."

She sighed, closing her eyes. Her hands were still at his neck, and she could feel how still he'd become.

"I can't promise anything, Shortman. I might wake up in the morning and decide that this was a huge mistake, and be unable to meet your eye for the next three weeks. Or I might fall crazy in love with you again, but you might not want me. I don't know. I think we need to get this out of our systems… because if we don't, not only will we always be asking what if, but I think we'd stop being friends eventually, too… too much left unsaid. I just really think we need to fuck."

He didn't even hesitate. "OK."

She blinked. OK? Really? "Yeah?"

"Yeah, OK… I've wanted you for years. You think, that night we met in Mighty Pete that I didn't have ulterior motives for asking you to my place? Or that I wasn't hoping we'd hook up on our road trip?" He chuckled.

"That party, where you hooked up with Matt… I was going to make a move that night, but that obviously didn't happen. I still remember how you looked when you answered the door just in your towel. I honestly don't know how I held it together. But after a while I just figured you weren't interested. Life goes on, right? I'm no stranger to unrequited crushes… and I do love you. You're my best friend. I never felt like I was getting a consolation prize or anything…

"But you're right, my thing for you did get in the way with Maya. I'd start getting over it, then we'd spend a night together, just you and me, and I'd be all confused again. So yeah. OK. I want to fuck you…"

For emphasis, he pressed against her thigh again, showing her his want.

"… and we'll see what happens. No holding back, no hard feelings. Deal?"

"Deal."

"So is that it? Can I kiss you now?" She could see the shine of his teeth as he smiled in the dark. A giggle bubbled up her throat. I can't believe this is actually happening!

"Please."

And his mouth was on hers.

This was more like it. No hesitation, no oh so light touches, he dropped his weight and pressed hard against her.

His tongue was in her mouth, her hands tugged at his shirt. They scrambled to undress each other, sliding hands under fabric and swearing when shirts and shorts got tangled and snagged.

"Jesus, Shortman." Helga gasped when she pushed her hands into his boxers and grasped at him. He just groaned in reply, the muscles of his stomach jumping. Maya hadn't lied, he was huge.

She swallowed another giggle. Who knew Shortman wasn't – at all – short?

She wasn't giggling a few seconds later though, when he roughly tugged her panties to the side and pushed his fingers into the folds of her. "Holy… you're so wet." He explored, concentrating, running the pad of thumb over the top of her until he found just the spot that made her start panting… then began gently working his finger inside her.

Oh… ohhh… he knew what he was doing. Within a minute, he had two fingers working magic inside of her, his thumb circling the most sensitive spot on her body, and his mouth sucking almost too hard on her nipple.

"I think I'm gonna come." She groaned, clutching at the sheets, his back.

He popped his mouth from her breast. She could hear the grin in his voice. "That's the plan."

"But I – ah – I wanna fuck… oh god…"

"How close are you?"

"Close… close! Ohmygod." Her thighs started shaking.

He chuckled as we drew his fingers from her… chuckled. She'd never heard a more self-satisfied sound in her life. "God, this is fun." He kissed her, kissed her again. "We should have been doing this ages ago."

"Friends with benefits?" She was panting, her head reeling as pushed on the waistband of his boxers, edging them down over his ass.

"Sure." He held himself up, watching as she struggled with his underwear. "Then maybe it wouldn't have been so torturous to watch you walk around without a bra all the time."

She snorted, then beamed in triumph when she got his boxers down his thighs. "You noticed?" Leaving him to kick them off, she started wriggling out of her own panties.

"Of course I noticed." He shook his boxers from his foot, laughing softly as they manoeuvred around each other to get her underwear off. "No dignified way to get naked, huh?" He chortled as he finally got her legs free.

Naked… holy shit, they were naked. Butterflies exploded so hard in her stomach that her fingers started tingling.

"Oh my god, please come here." She opened her arms and he fell to her, peppering her face, her neck, with kisses. She let her hands rove over him, the long, lean body she'd known for so long. "Have you got a condom?"

A quiver ran through his body, she felt it. Without saying anything, he hefted himself up to wrench open his bedside draw and fumble around, eventually drawing out a little foil square.

"Let me." She took it from him, tore it open, chewed her lip at his shaking reaction to her hands on him.

"I can't believe we're going to do this." He whispered, sitting above her, his hands clasping the outside of her thighs.

"Neither." She breathed, rolling the thin latex down over him. "I feel like I'm 15 again."

He laughed at that. "Well, be thankful we're not… I was useless at this back then."

She opened her arms again, kissing him when he fell forward. "I dunno… it might have been fun to teach you…"

He pulled at her thigh, persuading her to wrap her legs around him, before sliding his hand under her hips. "We're here now though."

She nodded enthusiastically. Nervous and excited and… nervous… as he began to push against her.

"I'll go slow." He let out a long, shaking breath from between his teeth. "Tell me if I hurt you, OK?"

"OK."

They both groaned as he moved forward.