scrimble

She pulls back, wondering if maybe she'd read the situation wrong. Wondering if he was just playing along not to embarrass her. But then he blinks up at her, eyes glassy and unfocussed. Pupils blown wide.

"Gem—" he says.

"Hey. Are you… into this?" She finds herself asking, and Grian's expression sobers as he pushes up onto his elbows.

"Of course. Of course, Gem, I—" and then he sighs. "It's my meds. Please don't— I want this."

There's a desperation in his voice that would be so fucking hot if what he was saying didn't make Gem so damn sad.

"We can stop," she says, kindly, and Grian's hands grip her waist.

"No, no," he urges. "I'm sorry. It just takes a bit, I promise I want this. I want you. I've wanted you—"

She hushes him when he starts babbling, can see his pulse racing in his neck, the hazy arousal in his eyes replaced with panic. So she kisses him again, and he moans softly, arching up into her touch. A hint of frustration in his noises.

"Okay," Gem says, against his mouth, sliding her hand under his t-shirt. More than ready to start getting him out of his clothes.

"We can stop if you want," Grian mumbles, when she kisses his neck. "I don't want this to be bad for you."

And Gem just shakes her head. She thinks she understands now. "We're just going to take our time," she says, and watches Grian melt in relief.

So they take it slow. Long, deep kisses, hands under shirts. Slowly peeling each other out of their clothes. Gem gets her hand inside Grian's jeans, over his underwear, just cupping him gently, letting him push up into her hand. It's slow going, but he does start to get hard, humming pleased noises into their kisses when she squeezes him.

And, she thinks, if this is what he's working with, no wonder it takes him a while to get there. Meds or no meds. It's a lot of dick.

She kisses her way down his chest to the open fly of his jeans, giving him plenty of time to stop her if he doesn't want it. But he's just as eager, if not more so now that she's actually got him going, and he sighs her name like a fucking prayer when she takes him into her mouth.

She's not overly experienced with this particular act, but he doesn't seem to care. She can feel him throbbing against her tongue, getting harder in her mouth as she sucks him. When she hums encouragingly, looking up at him, he makes this breathless sound, fingers tugging at the sheets below him, his head dropping back as though he can't bear to look at her any longer. The sensations are overwhelming enough.

She pulls her mouth off of him eventually, still stroking him to full mast.

He's always seemed a little shy about his bare body around the hermits, often hunched over protectively as he climbs into a hot tub full of friends, or outright refusing a late night skinny dip in the pool. But like this, shirt discarded, jeans tugged down around his thighs, cock out — he's exactly as gorgeous as Gem knew he would be.

"You wanna fuck me?" She asks, and Grian laughs feverishly, twitching in her grip.

"Do what you want with me," he says, chuckling, "I'm— I won't last, Gem."

Gem pushes off the bed to shove her leggings down and kick them aside. No time to waste. She sees Grian's gaze drop, fixed between her thighs as she straddles him, lining up his cock to sink down onto.

"Well, just try," she says, "for me."

He visibly gulps, watching as she slowly eases herself down onto him, taking his cock inside in slow undulating motions. Again his head falls back as he groans, hands clutching at the sheets, swearing under his breath.

To his credit, he does manage to hold out for her. Even when she starts riding him proper, bouncing and sighing on him and then, when she's close, sinking down all the way to grind down on him. He touches her clit for her, circling with the pad of his thumb until she's bucking against him, gasping his name out.

She's coming on him, squeezing tight around his cock when she says, "You can come," panting and breathless. "Fuck, come inside me. C'mon."

She nudges his hand away from her over-sensitive clit, and instead he grips her waist hard, fucking up into her just a handful of times before shoving in deep, pulling her down onto him again. She swears she can feel him pulsing inside her, imagining the way he floods her as he comes. And thank god for her IUD, because he is deep.

It feels so good that she reaches down to touch herself again. No direct contact, she's still too sensitive, but using her index and middle finger either side of her clit, sliding back and forth as she rocks on him. It's enough to get her off again while Grian pants below her, moaning weakly when he feels her squeezing again.

He gets soft very quickly, slipping out of her before she can try for another orgasm. She just rolls off him, flopping down next to him with a sigh. Her, still in her T-shirt, him with his jeans around his thighs.

She giggles after a moment, and he chokes out a noise that might be laugh or a sob; she's not ready to deal with the latter so she doesn't look over. She just says, "So. You haven't done that in a while, then."

It's a laugh. The sound he makes is a laugh, embarrassed as he brings his hands up to his face, rubbing his brow.

"Was it that obvious?" He sits up with a sigh, kicking his jeans the rest of the way off until they land on the floor with a thwump.

"Not like that," Gem says, gently, and as he lays back on the bed she turns over to slip her leg over his thigh, her hand over his chest. He's always hairier than she expects, on his chest and belly, fine and blonde. It surprises and delights her every time she sees him shirtless (though, those instances can still be counted on one hand).

"I should have told you," he says, a touch of regret in his words, and Gem shakes her head firmly.

"Why would you? We've never…" they've never done this before, no. But the tension has been there from the start. She can still remember the excitement she felt the first time he ever messaged her. Almost eight years ago, now.

"No. We haven't," Grian agrees. He sounds tired, as she tucks her face into his neck. They should wash up, climb under the covers, but she wants to bask a little longer. At least until she's in danger of ruining the sheets.

"And you don't…" she trails off again. It's a bit of a faux pas to mention the wife of the man you're fucking. Especially just after you're done fucking him. "Um. At home?"

Grian shakes his head tightly, his jaw clenching. "No. I think it got a bit tedious. For her. I did everything else to— to make things good for her. But she couldn't understand why I wasn't able to perform, as much as I explained. She, uh, she thought I wasn't attracted to her anymore."

It makes sense to Gem, putting together pieces of the last year like a puzzle. Grian's late nights online, a distraction, an avoidance tactic. Staying up so he could slip into bed long after his wife was asleep. All the while, the closeness between him and Gem, an intimate friendship spiralling into something more.

Grian telling her, privately and earnestly and long past his bedtime, that she has a patience for him (and his general bullshit) that he's never known before. And how much he appreciates it.

"You still love her?" It's not something she should be asking right now. Not when she can feel the tacky-wet of his come trickling down her inner thigh. She needs to move soon.

"Maybe," Grian says. "I don't know. I let myself get pretty bitter about it all."

Gem sighs, her fingers tracing the swirling pattern of his chest hair.

"I want to do this again," she says, feeling him exhale hard, a breath she hadn't known he was holding. "Is that something that can happen?"

"Not... Not immediately," Grian says, timidly, and Gem huffs out a laugh.

"I meant in the future. I meant another trip. Us."

Grian nods after a moment. "Yeah. Yeah, I want that too. Maybe— maybe April."

Gem sits up with a stretch.

"April it is," she says. "You ever try Viagra?"

Grian scoffs. "That's— that's old man stuff, Gem."

"You have a pill caddy. I've seen it."

"Only three years older than you, by the way. Less than three years, actually."

Gem laughs, already on her way to the bathroom.

"Are you joining me in the shower or what, Ebenezer?"

Grian scrambles up off the bed, and Gem grins.