I'm sitting on the windowsill.
The last time I sat on a windowsill like this was in the school hallway. The teachers always told me off for it. My legs dangle. Don't reach the floor. By the pane of glass with the sun blazing through it, my faux-leather sneakers are hot. I feel my socks getting damp. Black skinny jeans cling to my thighs.
Hot June.
Inhale, exhale — the gray tee rises and falls on my chest.
Beyond my shoulder is the window. Beyond the window — summer. Beyond summer — autumn.
Poplar fluff flies with the wind. Fleeing the heat and the cars that scatter it all over the road. Even though it knows there is no escape. It flees to unfamiliar streets, to unfamiliar cities, peeks into unfamiliar courtyards. Tries to save itself. But no one cares about it. Everyone hates it. Some are allergic to it. It is nothing but nature's litter. Beautiful, delicate nature's litter that swirls in the wind.
Poplar fluff is always unwanted. Always an outsider.
As much an outsider as I am.
An incomer, like me.
A stranger, like me.
"I'm so hot..." I whispered.
It's scorching in the office. I can't breathe. All around — the scent of his perfume and my fear... I already smell like him. I'm dying for something to drink. Still water. Water that isn't sweet.
On his desk — Perrier with lemon and tomato juice.
I'm in a tee with a tiny ice-cream cone embroidered on the right above my chest, three scoops stacked on top. And for some reason, everything is sweet. I had no idea today would be sweet.
I hear his heart. Feel his pulse against my temples. With every beat, the scoops of ice cream tremble. Especially the pink one. My cheeks are burning. My hair is growing damp.
I'm sitting on the windowsill, silently tapping my feet against the wall and looking into his eyes. I've seen those eyes hundreds of times. But this close — never before. They make me even hotter. He smiled and placed my hand in his palm.
Taylor Swift is playing on his computer. She has red lipstick on her lips and a guitar in her hands:
Loving him is like trying to change your mind
Once you're already flying through the free fall
Like the colors in autumn, so bright,
Just before they lose it all…
Red lipstick, red wine, red manicure. The best color for feelings. The defining color of my summer. Though right now, the only red I have is on my nails.
His fingers are the perfect length and shape. Long, slender, straight. My hand feels as though it was made for his palms.
"How can anyone be this beautiful..." He tucked a strand of my hair behind my ear and breathed in my scent.
I'm the same kind of runaway as poplar fluff in June. Ran away from my hometown, running from my desires, and will always run from my fears. I'll run from people, wedge myself into cracks in windows, beneath the blanket of asphalt, settle on water.
I live among people to whom I will always be a stranger. In a city where I will forever remain an incomer. Unless I find my soulmate. One out of one million four hundred forty-six thousand one hundred and seven people.
One.
Mine.
Real.
"Could you always look at me like that?"
Did I think it or say it aloud? Doesn't matter. What matters is that under that gaze, my bra comes undone.
The straps slip down.
My palms sweat.
My mouth goes dry.
My temples pound.
My teeth clench.
I want to caress his pitch-black hair, and let mine loose over my shoulders. My hair hurts. Or maybe it's my scalp... Either way, the hair is to blame. I pull off the tie. Let the tight ponytail loose. Finally. It's alive! Fell over my shoulders and spilled down my back. Goosebumps seem to have raced across my scalp. A second, they reach my arms. And stop at the mole by my wrist.
"I want to count every single one." He caresses the mole and all my goosebumps along with it.
They're already in love with him too. They're begging him not to stop. My body is burning. No longer merely hot. And I don't know where to blow. How to bring the temperature down.
If he kisses me, there's no going back — I thought, and closed my eyes.
He grabbed me by the waist and sharply pulled me toward him. I wrapped my legs around him. Desire pounds through every vessel in my body. Especially in my thighs. It has tangled itself between our legs, trapped in stiff denim.
"I want to kiss you so badly..."
He leaned closer and touched my lips. My swallows flew from my left leg. They followed the fluff. I'm swirling beside them too, and I don't want to run anymore. I'm warm here. I'm hot here.
Our lips catch on one another with delicate threads of tenderness. Passion dries them out until they crack. His taste is tart and dangerous. My neck and collarbones smell like that now. Turns out, kisses on the collarbones are extraordinarily intimate and arousing. I've never felt anything like it before. And now I adore them — my collarbones covered in his kisses.
He reached out and swished the curtain.
Rustle!
The sudden movement loosened a piece of curtain in the corner. But it still managed to hide us. No one can see us. And everyone can. I looked at him, no longer embarrassed.
"There's a reason I don't eat sweets," Kostya stopped and looked at me. "I've just spent my whole life waiting for this exact dessert."
He ran his thumb over my lips. They don't hurt. They want more.
And maybe there's a reason I'm a runaway.
Maybe there's a reason I'm an incomer.
Maybe I was running only to him. And maybe, finally, I'll never be a stranger again, right here, in his office, on his windowsill. Hidden behind the heavy curtains, maybe, finally, I'll be.
Only his. And not one bit — a stranger.
