problems going to sleep.
He kissed the top of my head. “Being with you tonight was…”
I raised my face to look at him.
He looked away.
I lowered my face again.
I heard his voice again, barely louder than a whisper, even though it reverberated in his chest, where my head was resting. “You’re lovely.”
I felt his words dart into me. They made my breath hitch and my insides clench. I liked him too.
* * *
I liked him too much, I decided when I woke up alone in the morning.
And my feelings were probably going to get me hurt.
I managed to shove aside my thoughts about it while I worked on the article about him, focusing instead only on writing the best news story I possibly could. Writing was generally like that. Once I fell deep into what I was doing, the rest of the world didn’t matter. It was my passion. I loved it, and it took me away from everything.
The Vigil in the story, the one who’d answered my questions, wasn’t the same Vigil who I’d been intimate with. Because the Vigil in the story was beginning to seem more and more like my own creation. I was editing so much of who Vigil was out of the version I gave out for public consumption that it was almost as if they were two people.
It fractured him even worse.
Presumably, he was someone else under that mask. Someone with another name and another life. I didn’t know anything about that someone.
Then he was the masked man that saved women, was connected to Hayden Barclay, and fucked my brains out.
Finally, he was the sanitized Vigil, the one I wrote about, with all of his disturbing and confusing bits cut off.
But once the article was done, and I got up from my computer, I couldn’t stop hiding from the fact that I’d been intimate with Vigil.
Every time I moved, I became aware of the fact that I’d gotten laid last night. I had that just-fucked tenderness between my legs, the sort of sweet twinge that took me back into my memories of what had happened. I walked across the room, and I remembered the way it felt to have his hands on my breasts. I riffled through my closet looking at clothes, and I was lost in the things he’d whispered to me while his cock pounded in and out of me. I sat down, and it was as if his mouth was still on my neck.
I was assaulted by the memories of it. They were good memories. I had enjoyed every second of being with him, and I wanted to wallow in thinking about it, taking out each moment and replaying it over and over again, cherishing the things he’d said to me like well-worn keepsakes.
But other thoughts were intruding.
It wasn’t late at night anymore, and he wasn’t here, and I could think clearly away from him.
And what I kept thinking was that I was in deep trouble.
I hadn’t been with an enormous number of men. Vigil made five.
There had been two in high school, one that mattered to me and one that didn’t.
A drunken hook-up in my freshman year.
And Scott, who I’d broken up with only a few months ago.
But even though I hadn’t slept with scores of men, I recognized the symptoms of what I was feeling for Vigil. I seemed to be cursed with falling for for men after I slept with them. Possibly only because I slept with them. I didn’t know.
I did know that both the boy who didn’t matter in high school and the drunken hook-up in college had broken my heart.
I didn’t mean to fall for any guy who managed to get his dick in me, of course. That didn’t stop it from happening.
Darlene had told me that the only way to get over it was to have a lot of sex with a lot of different guys. She said it was emotionally painful at first, but that after a while it got easier.
I didn’t like that option. It sounded to me that Darlene had simply burned off her ability to feel. She’d hurt herself enough to become desensitized to it. I was afraid that she’d made herself numb. Not just to pain, but to actual love. When a guy came along who deserved her, would she be able to remember how to care
He kissed the top of my head. “Being with you tonight was…”
I raised my face to look at him.
He looked away.
I lowered my face again.
I heard his voice again, barely louder than a whisper, even though it reverberated in his chest, where my head was resting. “You’re lovely.”
I felt his words dart into me. They made my breath hitch and my insides clench. I liked him too.
* * *
I liked him too much, I decided when I woke up alone in the morning.
And my feelings were probably going to get me hurt.
I managed to shove aside my thoughts about it while I worked on the article about him, focusing instead only on writing the best news story I possibly could. Writing was generally like that. Once I fell deep into what I was doing, the rest of the world didn’t matter. It was my passion. I loved it, and it took me away from everything.
The Vigil in the story, the one who’d answered my questions, wasn’t the same Vigil who I’d been intimate with. Because the Vigil in the story was beginning to seem more and more like my own creation. I was editing so much of who Vigil was out of the version I gave out for public consumption that it was almost as if they were two people.
It fractured him even worse.
Presumably, he was someone else under that mask. Someone with another name and another life. I didn’t know anything about that someone.
Then he was the masked man that saved women, was connected to Hayden Barclay, and fucked my brains out.
Finally, he was the sanitized Vigil, the one I wrote about, with all of his disturbing and confusing bits cut off.
But once the article was done, and I got up from my computer, I couldn’t stop hiding from the fact that I’d been intimate with Vigil.
Every time I moved, I became aware of the fact that I’d gotten laid last night. I had that just-fucked tenderness between my legs, the sort of sweet twinge that took me back into my memories of what had happened. I walked across the room, and I remembered the way it felt to have his hands on my breasts. I riffled through my closet looking at clothes, and I was lost in the things he’d whispered to me while his cock pounded in and out of me. I sat down, and it was as if his mouth was still on my neck.
I was assaulted by the memories of it. They were good memories. I had enjoyed every second of being with him, and I wanted to wallow in thinking about it, taking out each moment and replaying it over and over again, cherishing the things he’d said to me like well-worn keepsakes.
But other thoughts were intruding.
It wasn’t late at night anymore, and he wasn’t here, and I could think clearly away from him.
And what I kept thinking was that I was in deep trouble.
I hadn’t been with an enormous number of men. Vigil made five.
There had been two in high school, one that mattered to me and one that didn’t.
A drunken hook-up in my freshman year.
And Scott, who I’d broken up with only a few months ago.
But even though I hadn’t slept with scores of men, I recognized the symptoms of what I was feeling for Vigil. I seemed to be cursed with falling for for men after I slept with them. Possibly only because I slept with them. I didn’t know.
I did know that both the boy who didn’t matter in high school and the drunken hook-up in college had broken my heart.
I didn’t mean to fall for any guy who managed to get his dick in me, of course. That didn’t stop it from happening.
Darlene had told me that the only way to get over it was to have a lot of sex with a lot of different guys. She said it was emotionally painful at first, but that after a while it got easier.
I didn’t like that option. It sounded to me that Darlene had simply burned off her ability to feel. She’d hurt herself enough to become desensitized to it. I was afraid that she’d made herself numb. Not just to pain, but to actual love. When a guy came along who deserved her, would she be able to remember how to care
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