yes? no? maybe so?

you were subtle with it; eating smaller portions, saying you already had some snacks outside, promising you'd eat later…

the first two times weren't concerning.

the third and fourth raised suspicion.

the fifth?

caleb knew something was wrong.

he focused on the amount of spoonfuls you had, on how many times you chewed, on every single grain of rice and noodle you brought to your lips, and they weren't enough.

they simply weren't enough for a mature adult to have enough energy, let alone to nourish their body and brain.

and caleb would do anything to keep you from hurting yourself, even if that meant overstepping boundaries and making you hate him for it.

as long as he kept you safe, he didn't care.

so, eventually, he started placing snack plates next to you as you worked.

he made you try the food as he cooked, making sure you had several spoonfuls.

he sat right in front of you and watched you intently as you ate, with an almost gentle smile on his face and his eyes crinkling as he asked if it was good.

to further calm himself down and give himself some peace of mind, he hand-fed you from time to time, because that way, he could make sure you were eating.

you didn't have time to react before he was offering an apple slice or gently pushing a tangerine segment past your lips.

you wanted to refuse, but how could you when you literally had no escape route?

you even began questioning why he insisted on feeding you so much, wholeheartedly believing he was trying to make you gain weight for some reason.

but his answers were always caring and honest, not once related to your appearance in any way.

“you are gettin' dizzy more often, angel. you need nutrients,” or “i like it when you ask for seconds 'cause it means you liked my food.”

you didn't know he already knew about your situation, and that his worry was growing deeper and deeper, to the point where he grew desperate to save you from your own mind.

“here you go, baby,” he placed a plate full of warm food in front of you, making you hesitate almost immediately.

you knew you had to take at least six spoonfuls for his shoulders to relax and his hands to stop clutching his fork.

but despite not feeling full, you gently pushed the plate aside and patted your belly.

“it was delicious, leb, thanks…”

silence.

caleb looked down at the almost untouched food, and then up at you.

“you're done, angel?” he simply asked, his voice steady enough not to reveal his inner worry.

“mhm, it's just a lot of food…”

he nodded, took a bite of his food, then stood up.

you followed him until he crouched beside you, pulling the plate closer.

“that's okay,” he whispered, and then his eyes met yours. “you don't have to finish it, but…”

he used the knife to push some veggies onto the spoon before bringing it to your lips.

“i'd like you to have a few more bites, hm?” he tilted his head, his lips curling up in that smile that made your breath hitch.

“but caleb,” you whispered, staring at the spoon. the food looked delicious indeed, but the numbers invaded your brain.

weight, calories, pounds…

you couldn't.

“for me, yeah? just one,” he tilted the spoon ever so slightly, his tone tender.

hopeful.

desperate.

it took you a few seconds, but you finally leaned forward to accept it.

the relief was almost unbearable. his body relaxed, and he let out a breathless chuckle, his lips finding your arm to kiss your soft, warm skin.

“there we go, baby,” he whispered shakily. “thank you…”

it was almost as if you had done him a favor by simply eating.

when he offered a second spoonful, you didn't question it. you didn't remind him that he said you'd only eat one more.

the third came, then the fourth, then the fifth, and the food was halfway gone.

that's when you quietly pushed the plate away again, meeting his gaze.

he took a napkin and dabbed at your lips before putting the spoon down and standing up a few seconds later.

“that's it. no more,” he promised, his warm hand cupping your cheek. “just a few bites, see? you did so good for me.”

your body was already thanking you; replacing the hollow ache with something warm, something nourishing caleb had prepared just for you.

you leaned against his touch and sighed, unable to contain your quiet laughter.

“you fed me like i was going to disappear or something,” you jokingly whispered, making caleb flinch slightly.

his jaw tensed, his muscles coiled.

disappear.

he guided you to your feet, his arms immediately wrapping around your waist with desperate strength.

“don't… don't say that,” he pressed his forehead against yours. “don't suggest that, angel. that's not happenin'.”

“caleb—”

“you can't disappear, yeah?” his voice cracked despite the smile he tried to keep on his face. “that's... that's why i take care of you.”

his arms tightened around your waist for only a second before relaxing again, as if he was afraid of holding you too tightly.

“you've been gettin' dizzy.” he swallowed loudly. “you've been so tired lately. you barely smile after meals anymore, and i know you love my cookin'.”

you stayed quiet, because you'd heard all of this before.

his worries, his fears.

however, he then continued.

“i know somethin' is hurtin' you,” he nuzzled your nose. “i'm not stupid, angel.”

you closed your eyes.

so he knew.

“leb, i'm sorry… i didn't mean to worry you, but it's just—” you took a deep, shaky breath, your voice coming out softer and weaker than you anticipated. “i just want to look better, that's all. for me, for you...”

he pulled back to look at you, almost frozen in place.

but you were always breathtaking.

no matter how, when, or where, you looked amazing in his eyes. every change, every fluctuation, every difference was worthy of praise.

but caleb knew not to mention your appearance, because you'd find a way to say you could look better; that being skinnier was your goal, and that you wouldn't feel complete until that day.

a day he knew would never come, because you'd find something else to focus on and try to change, punishing yourself if you couldn't do it.

“i don't care,” he finally mumbled, his voice lower than before. “i don't care, baby. you've been neglecting yourself, and—”

“caleb, you can't say you don't care…” you interjected, the insecurities taking over your mind.

you were tired of the same “you're perfect” speech you'd heard in movies, books, and the media.

“physical attraction is very important, and—” you couldn't continue, as he interrupted you the same way.

“i don't care about that,” he stated, both hands flying up to cup your cheeks. “wanna know what i care about?”

his breath mingled with yours, his eyes so intense they no longer resembled a warm sunset, but rather a dark, stormy night.

“i care about your hands not shakin' anymore. i care about you not gettin' dizzy as soon as you stand up,” he closed his eyes before stepping away from you, his arms falling to his sides. “i care about your heart gettin' enough energy to keep fuckin' beatin'...”

you stood there, your skin immediately missing his warmth.

his words pierced through you.

“do you wanna know what goes through my head every time you sway on your feet or tremble?” he didn't look up. he just couldn't meet your gaze.

the silence stretched until his lips parted again.

“that one day, i'm gonna be too late...”

late.

late for him to help you, or perhaps too late to save you.

your hands were shaky, but not from hunger or a lack of energy; it was from sheer fear and heartbreak.

something as “silly” as just wanting to eat less was caleb's worst nightmare happening right in front of his eyes, and you didn't even notice.

you looked down at your feet, the tears falling one after another onto the polished floor.

“i'm sorry…” you whimpered, your voice as quiet as a whisper. “i'm so sorry, lebbie. i didn't think—”

caleb was in front of you before you could finish the sentence.

he pulled you against his chest without another word, wrapping both arms around you until there wasn't a single inch of space left between you.

right there, with your cheek pressed against his firm body, you could hear his fast, unsteady heartbeat.

“i'm not mad,” he whispered, his voice trembling. “no, angel, i'm not mad at you. i'm scared.”

he buried his face in your hair, breathing you in just to make sure you were still there.

“i've been scared every single day,” he tilted your chin up to wipe away your tears as carefully as he could. “but you… you don't have to say sorry to me, baby.”

you tilted your head slightly, sniffling.

“if there's someone you have to be kinder to, someone who needs an apology… that's you.”

you closed your eyes when his lips found your forehead, and you held his wrists in place, not letting his warmth leave your wet cheeks.

“it's… it's so hard,” you admitted, followed by a broken sob. “it's so hard, caleb, because i don't like what i see, and i don't think i'll ever… fully like myself.”

“i know, i know…” he said desperately, pulling you closer so that he could kiss your head, your forehead, your temple. “i know, angel. it is hard. and i know you've been tryin'...”

you desperately looked up, lips parting.

“you've been tryin', and i'm proud of you, baby… but you can't just wake up one day and suddenly love everythin' about yourself. i know it doesn't work like that.”

he gently took one of your hands and caressed your knuckles with his thumb.

“so… until then, let me help you, yeah?” he lowered himself to look at you, his eyes brighter, clearer.

“let me love you enough for the two of us, and then some. let me take care of you, let me remind you that you do deserve to nourish your body, your soul… please,” he brushed his lips against your cheek, making you shudder. “please, angel. until you slowly become kinder and more forgivin' with yourself, let me help you.”

you shakily breathed in and out, letting his words plant themselves inside your mind.

after what felt like an eternity, you nodded.

you wouldn't just start loving yourself after this, you certainly wouldn't start eating without a care in the world, nor would the doubts vanish from your brain as if they hadn't even existed.

but you wanted to try, and you wanted your heart to keep beating, because you knew if it stopped… caleb would stop with it.

you wouldn't let that happen.

as he sighed in relief and carried you in his arms as if you were something precious, you understood how much he needed you to give him a chance to save you.

and you knew he would succeed right on time, as he always did.~

For two whole years, you remind yourself of these things. You sit through Sunday mass every week without fail, hands folds neatly in your lap, and you ask for forgiveness on your knees beside your bed each night when you realise your focus had drifted from the Lord to His messenger.

It felt much like a test you were failing, over and over and over.

His fingers.

His fingers, above all else, were your undoing.

The Communion procession shuffles forward slowly, drawing you towards your ultimate weekly test. Behold him who takes away the sins of the world. You repeat the words to yourself as the line carries you closer to him. Behold him who takes away the sins…

“Amen,” the elderly woman in front of you mutters under her breath.

And then it’s your turn.

His eyes are gentle and kind, fixed on you as soon as you step forward—unwavering—even as he reaches for the sacramental bread, a small perfectly circular wafer. This was the part that played over and over in your mind as you tossed and turned at night. This was what you asked forgiveness for, above all else. Your heart races in anticipation as his eyes flick to your lips.

You obey his silent request, parting your lips in preparation to accept his offering. He would place the delicate wafer on your tongue with practised ease, careful not to touch you. And then he’d hold the chalice of wine to your lips—helping you take a chaste sip. His eyes would never leave you, and your face would shamefully heat in response.

One small moment of intoxicating proximity.

Repeated, week after week; never changing.

His warm eyes fix on yours as the small wafer approaches your waiting tongue, and you savour the details of his face—surrendering to your habitual sinful indulgence.

Something is different.

You replayed this never-changing ritual in your mind for years. You knew all its minor details. You knew it intimately.

Something is different.

His bottom lip trembles slightly and then drops—falling away from his upper lip. And at the same moment you watch his mouth part, mirroring yours, something else new draws a tiny gasp from your lungs.

His warm finger touches your tongue.

Every week, for years, he repeated the motion of chastely placing the small disc on the tongues of the congregation.

Never before had he touched you. Not once.

“The body of Christ,” he says, hushed, like this was normal.

His parted lips, a touch of his fingertip to your wet tongue, and then, to finalise your torment, he brushes your bottom lip in his retreat.

It’s only the well-formed muscle memory that draws a quiet “Amen” from your lips.

That night, after kneeling and begging forgiveness, you crawl under your covers and desperately will sleep to take you—to free you from your spiralling, sinful remembrance. You toss and turn. You stare at your ceiling. Eventually, you open a window and sip from a glass of water as the cool night air soothes your heated cheeks. And it would be that small sip that finally unravelled you, drawing your mind back to the moment he pressed the lip of the chalice to your lips—the lips he’d touched.

Your cotton nightgown bunches up around your waist as you roll onto your stomach and slip your hand between your legs. It was the way he guided you—the look in his eyes—like he might reach out and wipe away any wine that spilled down your chin if you were too eager. It was the way his pretty fingers wrapped around the cup. It was knowing their warmth. The way they felt on your skin. On your tongue.

He would guide you so gently, if he were here with you now. You’d imagined it before: him watching over you as you traced your fingers through your slick. But never had you imagined him touching. Touching was forbidden. A step too far. He did not touch.

Until now.

A heavenly addition to your sensory experience of him.

It’s what draws the sinful noises from you now: shameful whimpers and gasps as you picture his finger in place of yours—dipping a little inside you.

How could this be such wicked depravity if his finger slipping past your lips could be part of a Holy Rite? Was there really such a difference between two parts of a body? What made the wet heat of your mouth so different from the wet heat between your legs?

It’s these spiralling thoughts, and the flood of tears that follow your cry of his name at your peak, that finally break you.

You were not a good girl.

You were damned.

And only confession could save you.

If you were brave, you wouldn’t hesitate. You’d march through the open church door at the first opportunity and take a place in the pews among a spattering of familiar faces, each waiting their turn to speak to him.

Instead, when weekly confessional hours do arrive, you sit on a small stone bench in the church graveyard and watch people filter in and out. You notice the little changes in them as they leave. Eyes that had been focused on the pavement instead look up into the trees. Their steps are lighter.

A mother who had first passed you hurriedly, tugging her small child behind her, leaves with him in her arms. She pauses and points out a little white rabbit at the edge of the churchyard, bouncing the toddler on her hip a little as she cherishes his reaction. And when the rabbit dips into the bushes, she continues her leisurely pace, engaging with the child’s chatter.

The weight of your burden seems to grow heavier the more you watch them all relieved of theirs. If you hadn’t hesitated at the sight of the open door and rerouted to the small stone bench, you could’ve avoided this. Instead of watching them, you could’ve been sitting in the pews watching him. He would’ve made the child laugh, settling him, so he could talk to his mother.

You loved watching the way they all reacted to him, adored him.

That’s what you should have done; what you should do now. But when you stand, instead of heading inside, you find yourself turning the way you came—scurrying from the church grounds, no braver than a little white rabbit.

When Sunday comes, for the first time in years, you don’t attend.

It’s all the hesitation your body allows before you are nearly sick with anxiety. Wanting it over, you take up position on that same stone bench during confession hours, again. And like the week before, you wait. You watch as a spattering of congregants seeking opportunity for repentance come and go. An hour passes, beyond the departure of his final visitor. Again, you’d let the official hours come and go.

The sky turns a golden yellow as the sun dips behind the trees, and you wrap your small cardigan around yourself as the temperature dips with it.

And then a familiar, warm voice calls your name.

He stands in the stone arch of the old church's entryway, looking out at you. “You must be cold,” he says in his gentle, patient way. “I thought you might be waiting to speak to me last. Some people prefer knowing there’s no one waiting their turn.”

You take a small step forward, arms around yourself in a self-soothing hug. “I was,” you confess. “I’m sorry, I–”

“It’s alright,” he says gently, mercifully cutting you off as a visible shiver takes hold of you. “Come inside, please.”

He stands in the entrance, turning his body to the side as you pass. Somehow, he feels larger—taller—when you’re alone with him. Much like the empty church makes you feel small when its empty of its congregation. He towers over you.

“It must be serious,” he says, his voice echoing slightly. The large wooden door closes as you linger in the aisle between pews. A closed door meant no more visitors. You were the last allowed entry. “Serious enough for you to prefer turning to ice rather than speak to me about it.” He’s slightly teasing as he approaches—clearly trying to ease the tension that has you still wrapped around yourself—cowering like a scared little lamb.

It’s a warm, comforting sort of teasing. Familiar. It’s his natural warmth that contributes to his busy visiting hours. You’d never heard a bad word spoken against him.

It makes your guilt so much worse.

Shame wracks you, suddenly faced with the reality of confessing your wickedness to a man so good and kind. A man so rare. You had been all alone for so long. No family to guide you with unconditional care. He was a little spark of genuine warmth and care, irresistible to someone starved of it.

You couldn’t imagine returning to Sunday mass every week after this, knowing that he might think back to this night every time his eyes landed on you in the pews.

Soft footfalls approach as you stare at the stone floor.

He speaks your name in a hushed, gentle command.He wants you to look at him. To face your shame.

And when you refuse, eyes stubbornly fixed to the floor, you must deal with the repercussions.

For the second time, he touches you.

His fingers rest under your chin as he lifts your head with a gentle pressure. He’s warm. Warmer than he’d been last time. At least, that’s how it seems as your chilled skin leaches the heat from his fingers. They linger, just for a moment, holding you in position as his eyes flick across your face.

Then they’re gone.

“Would the booth make it easier?” he asks, hushed enough to avoid the echo.

There was no shame in hiding, you tell yourself. It was the only way you’d ever manage it. How could you ever tell him the truth with his eyes warming your skin?

He sees the answer in your eyes. And you’re grateful when he takes the lead without further question, letting you trail behind him to the small confessional booth in the corner of the empty church.

“In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen,” you begin. “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It is… three months since my last confession.” Three months. The last time you’d convinced yourself to confess, only to find yourself listing off trivial everyday faults instead.

The sound of your breathing seems far too loud in the small wooden chamber. So much so that you take in shallower breaths in the silence that follows, self-conscious.

“Are you unwell?” he asks as the silence stretches, kind—like he truly cared. When you hesitate, confused by the unexpected question, he adds, “You were absent on Sunday. I assumed you might’ve been sick, but you look healthy. Nothing serious, then.” The last part isn’t a question. He says it like he’s reassuring himself, like he really, truly cared.

Always so caring, of everyone. It makes it worse.

Your gut flips, anxiety rushing through you. You remember why you’d listed of a few trivial things and escaped in your last attempt. It was unbearable.

You couldn’t do this again.

“It’s a kind of sickness,” you confess, relying on the echo of the box to carry your hushed words through the small hatched window in the divider between you.

He’s quiet, letting you elaborate in your own time.

“I’ve been distracted. I haven’t heard your sermons. Not really.” You dig your fingernails into your thighs. “Not because they aren’t interesting… or helpful. It’s me. I’m full of—” One of your knees starts to bounce automatically. “My head is full of… sickness. Sick thoughts. They won’t stop.”

You focus on his steady breathing in the lull between your confession and his answer, letting the even rhythm of it calm you until your leg stills.

“Has something happened?” he asks. “Something is bothering you.” A pause. “Someone?”

“Someone,” the word leaves you on an exhale.

His next question leaves him faster than any of his previous responses. You haven’t even managed to take in another breath. It’s a falter in the calm rhythm you are used to, catching you off guard.

“Who?”

“It… doesn’t matter.”

It did matter. You’d lied. One moment of impulse and you’d lied. If your distraction had been a man in the pews instead of the one standing at the pulpit, it would be a different matter entirely. You’d have asked Caleb for advice years earlier.

You’d have confessed your eyes had been drifting in the pews, distracted by temptation, instead of focused on him, as they should be. There’d be no confusing, twisted entanglement between his guidance and his unwilling involvement in your sin.

“Gideon,” he says, disrupting your spiralling thoughts. “He’s only been attending a few weeks. I haven’t seen him approach you. Was it after service?”

You’d never heard the name in your life. You hadn’t even noticed a new face in the congregation.

If only you had. If only it was that simple.

When you fail to answer, mind whirring, he continues, “Is that why you weren’t here Sunday?” The fabric of his pants brush across the wood in a way that signals his movement. His voice is a little clearer when he speaks next, closer. “Has he hurt you?”

“No,” you answer, quickly. “No, I—”

“You’ll be honest with me,” he interrupts. “Won’t you?” He sounds a little like a parent about to catch their child in a lie. Not quite stern, but the authority in his tone has you biting your lip.

“It’s not Gideon.”

“Who?”

“That’s what makes it so wicked, Father. I’ve been so afraid—” Movement again, through the divider. It breaks your momentum. You fall into silence.

Like his face, you know his voice. You’ve studied it intently, every week, for years. All the warm, gentle kindness is missing when he interrupts you, “Afraid?”

You pick at the skin at the edge of your nail.

“Of you,” you finish.

Silence follows, except from your breath.

His, for the first time, is inaudible.

You should continue. You should take the silence as opportunity to confess the depths of your depravity. Your lips part, ready—

“Communion.” His voice fills the box—fills your head.

He knew.

He must’ve seen it in your face. Of course he did. He was good and pure and righteous. He would have seen that lustful wickedness on your face each and every time.

Had he been waiting for you to confess it? Had he expected it from you each and every time you came to him, only to be disappointed when you failed to admit to your true sin?

Shame. Embarrassing, pitiful shame.

Your voice is shaky, emotion thinly veiled. “I’m sorry, I—”

“No.” He cuts you off quickly. “This is my weakness. I should be asking your forgiveness.” A bump against the wood. Maybe his elbow. Your eyes lift to the small window separating you for the first time as you turn his words over, confused. “I took advantage of your innocence. I didn’t think you’d notice. I was weak. If I knew you’d see—feel my…” he trails off, sucks in a breath, then, “I shouldn’t have touched you. Forgive me.”

Your heart races as you put together his meaning.

He was talking about his accidental touch of your tongue… and lip.

No, that wasn’t right. He was confessing it was… intentional.

He was confessing.

It’s like a sedative: the daze his words puts you in. Suddenly, instead of being hyper aware of your body, of your anxiety, you feel entirely outside of it—floating outside of yourself. “I don’t understand,” you mutter, disbelief stuttering your ability to process. He was good, and righteous, and loved, and kind, and virtu—

“You dont—,” he starts. “You don’t understand?”

He’d wanted to touch you? Why would he—

“Talk to me,” he adds with a hint of urgency. “You don’t understand?”

“It was on purpose?”

He’s quiet. Then, “You said you were afraid of me. If it’s not that—”

“You wanted to touch me?” you whisper, hardly hearing his questioning through your ongoing daze.

“Yes,” he answers quickly. “I succumbed to—” He sighs. “I gave in.”

He had... lusted. He’d lusted… for you. And even if it had been a one-off moment of weakness, unlike your own, his sin had reached out to brush yours…

Something releases inside of you. Confession rushes from your lips, unrestrained. “Father, bless me, for I have sinned. I’ve also given into lustful thoughts.”

Silence.

Then, “These are your… sick thoughts? The sickness distracting you from sermon?”

You nod. “For two years now.”

“Two—” he cuts himself off abruptly. “During mass.” He shifts. “And when else?”

The marks in your thighs capture your attention again. You scratch at them. “At night,” you confess, hushed. This… is where your sin diverged from his. Shame surrounds it still, heavy.

“Your indulgence…” he trails off.

“Yes, Father?”

A bump against wood. “Why were you absent this past Sunday?”

“I—” You tug the hem of your dress down over your knees. “I was afraid to see you.”

“Because of Communion? Because I—”

“No.” You shake your head, despite knowing he couldn’t see it. “I was ashamed.”

He’s quiet.

It stretches.

Finally, “We all have moments of weakness—”

“But it wasn’t a moment,” you interject. “There’s something wrong with me. Father, it’s—I can’t—My Sunday’s aren’t spent in worship of the Lord, they’re—” spent in worship of you.

You drop your head into your hands, incapable of speaking the words aloud. Then, so quiet you aren’t sure he can even hear you with your head bowed the way it is, “I’d never done it before you.”

When he doesn’t respond, you raise your head. “I’ve never thought about anyone but you. What is wrong with me? To lust for the first time—to lust only for a man of God?”

You focus on his breathing in the silence, hoping to let it calm you like it had before. But it’s different now. It’s uneven, heavier. It stirs your unease instead.

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” he says, finally.

“But—”

“There is nothing wrong with you,” he insists, firm, without room for argument. “You are… perfection, sent to tempt me.” The wooden bench he sits on creaks with his movement.

“Tell me why you wore that dress,” he adds, gentler.

You look down at the plain dress, hem resting at your knees where you’d tugged it down. Did you have a reason? You hadn’t worn it in while, and the weather was just about to get too cold for you to wear it again for months. That was all.

At your hesitation, he continues, “You wore that the first day I gave in. Apple red.”

“…gave in?” you question, a little wobble in your voice. You know what he’s implying, deep down. But it’s all too much. One thing after the other, shattering all you thought you knew.

And then, unaware of your imminent collapse, he deals the final blow.

“The first time I wrapped my hand around myself and thought of the way looked up at me, all sweet and trusting. You look at me like—”

Your small sob cuts him off, and you press your hands over your mouth, desperately trying to stifle the sounds escaping you without permission.

He stands, draws his curtain back, and exits his half off the booth. Your hands are still pressed over your mouth when he pulls the curtain in your little part of the box aside.

You look up at him with watery eyes, a towering dark shadow. And when he slowly enters and kneels in front of you, his large body fills your little section of booth. “Are you afraid?” he whispers. “Did I scare you?”

You shake your head, hands still clasped across your mouth.

You aren’t breathing at all when he leans a little closer and gently guides your hands from your face into your lap instead. His thumbs brush over your knuckles in soothing caresses as he speaks again, “Why are you crying?”

Months and months of inner turmoil spill from you in shaky half-sobs that you fail to hold back. You look into his eyes—gentle, familiar, warm. He’s an angel filling your vision, dressed in black—sin and salvation. His skin is hot where he touches you. And your eyes flutter closed when his hand lifts to your cheek, ghosting over your damp skin—like he meant to wipe away your tears but wasn’t sure he should.

With a slight tilt towards him, you close the distance.

His knuckles brush your skin, gently wiping at your tears. “I’m so proud of you for coming to speak to me,” he says, voice still lowered. “You’re so good.”

You shake your head quickly, looking down.

He lifts your chin, guiding your focus back up to him. His eyes flick across your face. “Why are you crying?” he asks again.

You suck in a shaky breath, “I don’t know.”

“Overwhelmed?”

You nod, exhaling.

“Mm,” he hums, taking your hand in his. “That’s okay.”

Gently, he guides you from the box. He stands before you, closer than he stood in Communion—a wall of black fabric. You watch his chest rise and fall, rise and fall. Then you tilt your head back to look up at him.

“Deep breaths,” he soothes as your breathing evens out.

His thumb strokes across your knuckles again.

“I’m sorry,” you breathe into the space between you.

He shakes his head, and his palm lifts to your cheek—making proper contact this time. “Don’t. Didn’t I say you did good? I’m proud of you,” he whispers.

“But—”

“Would I lie to you?”

You look up at him with glassy eyes. At your priest. Loved and trusted by all. Gentle and kind and good.

“That’s it,” he breathes. “That’s how you look at me—how you’ve always looked at me.” His fingers slip behind your ear and eventually curl around the back of your neck, holding you steady. “Thought it was your love for the Lord. That I was a privileged conduit, sampling all that sweet love you carried around inside you.”

His fingers press into your skin. “…but it was for me,” he finishes, breathy.

You whimper, tears forming again.

“Shh,” he coos, breath tickling your lips as he lowers himself to meet you. His hands are all gentle again after that brief moment of pressure. One trails up your arm as the other cups the side of your head, thumb stroking across your temple. “Please don’t cry.”

“It was wicked,” you whisper. “I’ve been wicked.”

His hand comes to rest on your shoulder, rubbing back and forth—comforting. His eyes drop to watch the way your cardigan slips off, folding down to expose the thin shoulder strap of your red dress. “No, sweet girl,” he says, distracted. His eyes move across your upper chest before returning to meet your gaze. “You were worshipping the Lord through me.”

His hair looks darker than you’d ever seen it before. The sun is gone now. You’d never seen him by candlelight before. “I was?” you sniffle.

He drags your cardigan back up over your shoulder. “You’re a virgin?”

You nod. Another sniffle.

“And you’ve only touched yourself when you were thinking of me?”

He doesn’t let you drop your head when you try, so you nod—eyes darting to the side in shame.

“What could be more sacred?” he breathes.

His lips ghost over yours before landing on your cheek in a feather-light kiss. You close your eyes, savouring his touch as he leaves a leisurely trail of them across your face. Tender kisses anointing your skin in patient reverence.

“A sweet..” Kiss. “Innocent…” Kiss. “Little lamb.” Kiss. “Using her body to worship Him. You love Him through me. That’s all.” He returns to your mouth, holding your head steady as his warm lips slide across yours—your first kiss. “Through my body,” he finishes, warm breath mixing with yours.

That made sense, your hazy mind offers. It’s why it had consumed you all these years; why you’d never felt it for anyone but him.

Light, bubbly, warmth rises in your chest as the guilt lifts.

Caleb would not lie to you. It was an impossibility.

He watches the smile take over your face with a look you’ve never seen on him before. Then his head drops to your neck, and he’s lifting you into his arms. He doesn’t move. He just stands there, holding you to his body—breathing in the scent of you. He groans something into your neck, a word you can’t decipher. Then he withdraws.

“Would you let me guide you in worship?” he says, a little shaky with his uneven breathing.

“Mm,” you hum, nodding. Whatever that means. It didn’t matter. This was good. Everything was okay now. You’re practically limp in his arms, releasing yourself to his will.

He takes a few step backwards, and then lowers himself into a pew. You sit in his lap, knees at either side of his thighs—relaxed as his strong arms hold you against him. “I’ve resisted for so long,” he says, fingers tangling in your hair at the back of your head.

Then he drags you to his mouth, messy in his indulgence. He’s eager to please the Lord, your mind supplies, as his tongue dips between your lips to meet your own. You have no experience. You don’t know what you’re doing. So you let him take you. There’s a moment, when you are limp in his arms—eyes closed, chin wet with drool—that he dips his long fingers between your lips to play with your tongue. He takes it between his fingertips. Toys with it.

When your eyes flutter open, you find yourself transfixed by the expression on his face as he plays with you. His own lips are parted to accommodate his ragged breathing, and his eyes are hooded, locked on his fingers in your mouth.

Eventually, he lowers you onto your back across the pew and crawls over you. It’s only now you notice his black shirt untucked from his pants. Then his mouth is on yours again, devouring you with a low groan. The wood is cool against your back, contrasting with the heat of him above you—with the heat of his mouth. He tasted a little sweet, like the hard candies he kept at the entrance of the booth.

He’d sucked on one while listening to confessions.

He’d heard their sins, in all his virtuous kindness, and he’d let the sweet lolly melt in his hot mouth.

And now you were tasting it.

You were tasting your sweet priest.

His warm breath tickles your neck when he parts from you.

Then his fingers return. Slipping between your wet lips and into your mouth, he plays. In and out and around your tongue, he explores your mouth like it hid something he treasured. You take in as much of his face as the dim candlelit space allowed. Lost in worship, you hardly process his words when he finally speaks.

“Body of Christ,” he mumbles.

He holds your jaw, wet fingers against your cheek. And you lay limp beneath him, willing to receive, as he hovers over you and spits into your mouth.

You swallow without hesitation, indulging in the brand new expression painting his pretty face. Hunger and satisfaction combined.

He pets your hair with one long gentle stroke, adoration flooding his eyes as he gazes down upon you. It’s a look that has your heart fluttering in your chest as your mind drifts further and further outside of your body and into the space above you—light and free.

As his thumb brushes across your glistening lips, leaving a tingling sensation in its wake, a question flitters across your vacated mind. “Is this sex?” you mutter in a dreamy breathy sigh.

He stills.

You watch the muscles move in his face as his expression shifts. His brows tug together, then relax. His wet lips part, then close, then part again.

“It’s worship,” he answers. Your cardigan had fallen off both your shoulders at some point. He gently lifts the soft fabric back over your bare skin now, putting you back together. “When it’s with me, it’s worship.”

You release a shaky breath. “So I’ll still—I’ll still be a virgin? After?”

His fingers trace over your collarbone, then wrap around your neck lightly. His voice is as gentle and warm as always when he answers, “Only when it’s with me. No one else.”

“No one else,” you sigh, blissful under his exalted guidance.

He nods with an approving hum, fingers slipping from your throat down to your chest. He traces down your body, making little patterns over the fabric of your dress as he goes.

“When I fill you with my cock…”

He makes a pattern over your lower belly as he speaks.

“…and your untouched cunt clings to me…”

His fingers brush at your thigh, where your hem bunches up. “…I might say some terrible, vulgar, things. Perverted depravity—” His fingertips dig into your skin. “—is only natural as such perfect worship is filtered through our imperfect human bodies.”

His warm breath tickles your thighs as he lifts your dress, exposing your cotton panties to the cool air, and to his eyes. He looks up at you through the brown hair that falls over his face. “No matter what I say, remember this is worship. Okay?”

“Okay,” you sigh with a nod, entirely surrendered to him.

“Good girl,” he breathes, the warmth of it tickling you through the cotton. “Angel.”

His finger makes a single light stroke down the centre of the fabric, tickling your clit as he passes. Immediately, your body tenses as you attempt to curl in on yourself, overwhelmed by the newness of the feeling. You’d expected it to feel like it did when you’d slipped your hands between your legs yourself.

It didn’t.

He traps your thighs in the firm grip of his hands, preventing you from escaping him.

“It tickles,” you confess, embarrassed.

“Here?” He brushes over the fabric again, and it’s only his firm grip on one thigh that prevents you clamping him between your legs.

His hands slip just under the dip of your lower back, and he tugs you down the bench a little, towards his mouth. Then, as you look up at the vast vaulted ceiling, he kisses the cotton. It’s nothing more than a peck. And somehow, it feels closer to sin than anything prior. More than his tongue in your mouth, or his candy-flavoured spit.

But this wasn’t sin.

Another gentle kiss, directly over your clit.

This was worship.

“Father?”

“Mm?” he hums.

You can’t see him, eyes fixed on the ceiling.

“Should I… kiss you too?” Your cardigan falls off one shoulder again. “I mean like you are. Worshipping your body is worshipping Him?”

He crawls up your body, filling your vision as he hovers over you again. His eyes fall to your exposed shoulder briefly. This time, he doesn’t fix it. “Where I kissed you?” he asks on a ragged breath.

Your eyes drop to his chest, and you fill in the rest of the path down to his belt in your mind. “Between your legs,” you whisper.

His thumb swipes across your lower lip, then he strums it a little—letting it bounce back as he watches its movement intently. “You want to kiss my cock?” he asks, a little rumble in his voice—dropping it lower than you’d heard it before.

Your eyes widen a little, still unused to his vulgar language.

“Remember what I told you,” he adds. “It’s natural, hm? To speak like this.”

You nod.

He lowers his face to your neck, and you look at the ceiling again and he inhales deeply, nose against your skin. Then, “Say it.” His lips tickle your neck as he speaks. “How do you want to worship m—Him?” His chest presses into yours. “Say it.”

The ceiling is a void of darkness. His body separates you from it, warm and safe. You turn your head and breathe in the scent of his soft hair. “I want to kiss you… kiss your cock.”

You jolt a little beneath him as his teeth sink into your skin without warning. “Good girl,” he groans. “So good. So proud of you.” A kiss where he’d bitten you… then another behind your ear… then your cheek… the corner of your mouth. “Just let me taste you a little first,” he whispers. “I’ve wanted to taste you for so long.”

You expect him to take your mouth again.

But he disappears, back down your body, to his position between your thighs.

You close your eyes rather than stare up into the darkness again, focusing on the warmth of him between your legs… on the delicate way he plays with the little strip of cotton covering you. His fingers lift the edges just a little as his breath fills the space he occupies—warming your thighs and cunt alike. “No one has seen it?” he asks as he toys with the fabric.

You shake your head and drop an arm across your head, over your closed eyes. “No, Father.”

“No one has touched it?”

“Just me,” you answer quietly, embarrassed, still.

His finger dips far enough under the fabric to sample the wetness beginning to leak from you. You should be ashamed, wracked with the guilt of sinful indulgence of the worst kind. Instead, a small high-pitched sound escapes you.

“And now me,” he says, low enough you almost miss it. “You’ll let me take these off, won’t you? You’ll let me see?”

“Mm,” you squeak with a nod.

His fingers hook into the waistband. You expect him to take them off quickly, like removing a band-aid.

“This is only for me,” he mutters as he lightly tugs at the fabric, inching the underwear down in a torturous lazy indulgence. “This is worship.”

You nod. “Anyone else would be sinful.”

“Mm. That’s right, angel. That’s good.”

Just before your twitching cunt is exposed to the room, he stops. You open your eyes and watch as he kneels beside the pew so he can guide your underwear down your legs and over your feet.

Then he stands.

He looks down at you.

And you watch as he brings the white cotton to his face and breathes in.

He turns and takes a few steps away. You watch him inhale again.

Then he shoves them into his pocket.

He stands there, with his back to you, lit by the candles at the entrance to the booth.

“Father?” you prompt after a long lingering silence.

His shoulders rise on a deep inhale, then he turns. He stands there, looking at you with his hands in his pockets, just far enough away that you can’t make out his expression in the darkness.

Even when you sit up, he doesn’t move.

You tug your dress down over your knees. “Did I—Did I do something wrong?”

He takes one step forward, the sole of his shoe squeaking over the stone tiles in his haste. But then he freezes again.

“No,” he answers simply.

You tilt your head, trying to make out his expression. The dark empty church seems bigger now. It’s dark corners seem darker. You resist turning around to check nothing is creeping from the dark while your back is turned. The cold starts to bite at you again. You miss him.

It’s only when you wrap your arms around yourself—much like you had when he’d found you on the bench—that he seems to break from whatever invisible string held him back. He surges towards you and drops to his knees at your feet. “Forgive me,” he pleads, wrapping his arms around you and pressing his forehead to your stomach.

Your red dress rides up to your thighs again. He takes the chance to invade the space between your thighs, gripping onto you like a lifeline.

“This is wrong,” he says, head still bowed, pressed against you. “Forgive me.” He grips the dress at your back in closed fists. “I gave in. You’re too sweet. I’ve never strayed before. Forgive—”

“I don’t understand.”

“—me. You’re—”

You shove at his shoulders.

It’s enough to halt his speech, but it does nothing to loosen his hold on you.

“Father?”

He looks up at you. Tortured. That’s how you’d describe the twist of his pretty features now. “I told myself I’d let myself have you once. That it’d be enough. That it’d fix it.” His fists flatten against your back. “But it won’t ever be enough,” he breathes. It leaves him like a confession. But instead of it making him lighter, he sags. His hands slide down to your hips, then a little further. He plays with the puddle of fabric where your dress bunches up at the top of your thighs. “I’m sick,” he mutters, sounding defeated.

“But it’s worship. It’s okay.”

He looks up at you from between your legs, through the hair that falls over his eyes—messier than you’ve ever seen it before. “Mm, it’s worship,” he says. “But it has nothing to do with God.”

You look over to the altar, then to the crucifix on the wall behind it.

Then, you look back at the man kneeling at your feet.

“It didn’t feel like sin.”

His eyes drop to your lips, and then his fingers wrap around your thighs, just below your hem. “No?” His hands warm your thighs where he touches you, squeezing and releasing you in a comforting rhythm. “It did for me, angel. So much I nearly lost myself to it. It was so easy. I’ve spent so long resisting you and all it took was a little confession, and I nearly had your—”

He swallows.

“I’m a bad man.”

You shake your head emphatically, quickly covering his hands with yours. “Don’t say that. Please.”

He looks down at your hands covering his own, lingering there, even when he speaks. “You should find a new church,” he says, entirely unmoving. “Or I’ll leave, if that makes it easier. I can leave.”

He sounds a little like he’s trying to convince himself at the end.

And when he shifts, attempting to pull himself to his feet, you panic. “No!” you cry, wrapping your arms around his neck and dragging him back into you. You wrap your calves around him for good measure. “Please don’t leave me. Please? I’ll be good. I won’t bother you again. I swear I won’t bother you.”

He breathes heavily as you cling to him, forcing his head against you again.

Then, when the tension leaves his body, and you’re sure he’s not about the leap to his feet, you loosen your hold on him enough that he can look up at you. His hand lifts to your cheek. “You are good,” he says. “You’ve always been so good, and you’ve never bothered me. Never.”

“But—”

“I’ll give in,” he interrupts. “I’ll give in eventually. I want you so—” he sighs. “I’ll give in.”

Your eyes flick to the altar again. Just briefly.

A door was opened now, one you’d kept locked and buried deep inside you. His tongue between your lips had been the key to unlock it, and the prospect of him pulling away—of losing him—had swung it wide open on its hinges.

Nothing mattered more to you.

No one. Not even God mattered more than—“Caleb,” you whisper.

His eyes dart to yours. It’s the first time you’ve called him by name. You hadn’t meant to say it aloud.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

He looks at you in a way that makes it immediately clear that you’d never truly seen his gentleness more. Not really. You suppose you’d seen part of it. Maybe a little sliver. But the way he looks at you now fills you with a desperation unlike anything you’ve felt before. A desperation to cling to him. He looks at you like he could offer you everything.

You couldn’t part from him now.

Not ever.

“Have you really thought of me before? In sin?”

He doesn’t look away when he answers. “Many times.”

Even after having his spit dribbling down your chin, you struggle to comprehend the idea of him… touching himself. Especially thinking of you. Was the man before you now really the same pious one you’d idolised all these years?

“And you asked for forgiveness?” you ask softly. It was comforting to imagine someone like him kneeling beside his bed in prayer the same way you had.

His eyes drop now, shame crossing his face.

He grips the bench either side of you and slumps forward, until all you can see of him is the soft brown hair at the crown of his head. Then, “No, I haven’t. Not for this. Not from Him.”

His breath tickles your thighs as you battle your confusion. It’d been a self-soothing search for comfort, not a genuine question. You hadn’t considered he might say no.

“I’ve never strayed before,” he says, head still lowered before you. “Not before you.” His arms move to your back again. He takes hold of your dress and tugs you forward until his head rests on your stomach. “You are my greatest sin,” he confesses, sounded closer to distress than you’d ever heard him. “I don’t understand it. I’ve sat as a helpless passenger as it’s wrapped itself around me—inside me.” He looks up, glassy eyes meeting yours. “You’re inside me.”

Your lips are slightly parted in awe—in stupor.

You weren’t alone in this feeling.

The door—unlocked by his touch—falls off it’s hinges entirely. You could never close it again.

With his glassy eyes still on you, you gently nudge your cardigan from your shoulders and let the warm fabric fall into a pile around your hips.

“What are you doing?” he asks, his eyes widening slightly.

“I feel it too,” you answer, hushed. “I want to be wrapped around you. I want to feel you inside me.”

He shakes his head, and you feel his body tense, like he might try and escape again.

Quickly, you wrap your arms around his neck and fall forward, falling onto him. He keeps his balance for a moment, but gravity wins. He lands on his back, and you manage to cradle his head—preventing it making contact with the stone tile floor.

He’s entirely still.

“Caleb?” you whisper with a little tilt of your head, resting comfortably on top of him.

A muscle in his jaw ticks. “Please—” He swallows. “Please, sweetheart. You shouldn’t—we can’t do this.”

It only takes a little adjustment for you to brush you lips over his. “Why?” you whisper.

His lips tickles yours as he speaks. “I’m sick,” he breathes. His hand glides up your back as he says it, until his fingers wrap around the back of your neck. “You make me sick.” His grip is firm now, fingertips making little indentations in your skin. “I’m supposed to guide you, protect your sweet soul as you walk through this sick world, and instead, I look at you, and all I think about is plucking you and keeping you. Greed and depravity and lust and—”

A little whimper from you silences him.

His eyes flick across your face, studying, and then he takes your bottom lip between his teeth—tugging just a little, then releasing you again. “I realised it when I couldn’t find you in the pews—when Gideon was absent too: it’s not just lust,” he continues, keeping his hold on you. “It’s anger, and violence, and jealousy. I feel it all.”

“Father…” you breathe into his mouth. “I don’t want anyone else to see me, or touch me.” Gently, you cradle his warm cheek in your palm. “No one but you.”

His nostrils flare slightly.

Then his hand drops from the back of your neck, leaving you entirely.

His eyes flick down your bodies, to where your thighs cradle his stomach. Then he turns his head to the side and closes his eyes, shaking it a little, like he’s trying to erase whatever thought his mind had conjured.

You sit up, straddling him. His stomach is firm beneath your palms and you shimmy down a little more, until you’re resting just above his belt.

His brows draw together as you roll your hips, bare pussy separated from his skin only by the cotton of his dark dress shirt. The friction of it feels a lot like your pillow had on nights you’d writhed against it and thought of him.

But you can feel his warmth, seeping through the fabric.

He must feels yours too.

It was your warmest place, after all.

His eyes open, and for a moment, he stares out into the darkness. Then, slowly, he turns his head and looks directly at you—watching as you move against him. Watching as your lips part and you let a few little sounds of pleasure slip out.

His shirt nudges higher with your rhythmic movement.

He does nothing to fix it.

He doesn’t move. Except for his eyes.

They move between your face and the red fabric covering your shame.

He knows his shirt is nudging higher.

He doesn’t look away.

And when it finally creeps high enough to allow you to drag your slippery pussy over his warm stomach for the first time, his hands snap to your hips.

He holds you so tightly, you are forced to halt your movement entirely.

“Stop it,” he scolds, stern.

You tilt your head. He says it like he hadn’t been watching, waiting—as if he hadn’t been anticipating the feel of your messy cunt against him.

“But I need—”

He sits up suddenly, supporting you with a hand to your back as you slip into his lap. “What?” he demands. “What do you need? You came for confession. You needed to confess and be heard. That’s my purpose. That’s what I am to you.”

“Are you angry with me?”

He leans forward, holding you firmly against him. “Why is your little flower all messy? Hm?”His eyes drop between your eyes and your lips, over and over. “What kind of girl rubs her juicy little cunt all over the priest who was supposed to protect her perfect, pure, sweet soul—on the floor of His Holy Sanctuary?”

He bites at your lip before you can even process the lewdness of his words. “Your body is a temple of worship,” he continues, a hint of anger still darkening his voice in a way you’d never heard before. He presses you into him, forcing your breasts to compress against his chest.

You didn’t need to wear a bra with this dress. It wrapped around you so perfectly that it supported you fine all on it’s own.

“Please don’t be angry,” you whisper. “I—I—” Tears swell in your eyes as you stutter, quickly breaching your lower lids and streaking down your cheeks.

As your vision blurs, your world tilts. Your back meets the hard floor gently, and the shape of him hovers above you—obscured by your tears. It all happens in one smooth motion.

And then, without another word, the sound of tearing fabric fills the empty church.

He tears the red fabric from your skin, split from the neckline down the centre of you.

Your chest rises and falls heavily in the stillness that follows.

He’s a blurry figure above you. You haven’t had time to blink away your tears.

His breathing is uneven and heavy, to match your own.

Then, as your vision starts to clear, he falls forward and wraps his warm lips around one of your nipples. There’s no build-up. He starts in a frenzy—a chaotic tandem of his wet swirling tongue interspersed with desperate feral suckling. It fills the echoing darkness with vulgar symphony.

It drags desperate whimpers from your lips. And when one of them sounds like a high, broken cry of his name, he surges into you—wrapping his arms around your back and tugging you a little off the floor and further into his mouth. He hums something around you, the muffled words vibrating around your nipples.

Your eyes lock on the crucifix behind him as he ravages your breasts, animalistic in his intensity. It felt like all-consuming reverence, adoration… worship.

It was worship.

Worship was good.

He was good.

You aren’t even aware you are doing it when you start muttering. It’s only when he detaches from you with gasping breaths and looks up into your eyes that you realise it.

What had you been saying?

Your nipples, wet with his spit, pebble tight in the frigid air.

“Thank you,” you whisper.

That was it.

You had been thanking him.

He sucks in a long shaky breath. Then, with his eyes fixed on yours, his large, warm hand cups your breast—covering it entirely. “These were made to nurture new life,” he begins. He’s all gentle, guiding authority figure now. This was how you’d always known him. He has the same cadence he used in the booth when he was offering up the Lord’s teachings. “They’re His perfect design.” He palms your breast, massaging it without hesitation or restraint. “Don’t you think it’s right—” He takes your other breast in hand and leans back a little so he can watch as he gropes you almost painfully. “—that we honour and cherish His perfect creation?”

He swings a leg over you, never ceasing his rough kneading. “Take it off,” he instructs, rolling his hips towards you. “Undo the buckle.”

His belt is hidden under his loose shirt. You fumble a little with it, half-blind. He doesn’t stop to help you. He plays with your breasts instead, looking down at you from above.

“That’s it,” he coos in gentle encouragement as you slip the leather through the loops at his waistband.

It’s only then that he lifts his hands from you.

He sits above you, one leg on either side of your body—holding his weight off you. And you watch as he unbuttons his shirt. The collar goes first. He tosses the white strip aside without looking at it’s landing place.

His pretty fingers work at the buttons.

He makes it about half-way.

Then he grips the fabric and tears. Buttons pop off and scatter across the stone around you.

And then he’s bare.

Muscle sculpts him like a living, breathing work of art. He’s— “Beautiful.”

His chest rises and falls heavily as he gazes down at you, head tilting a little as the word slips from your lips involuntarily.

“Mm?” he hums, falling forward over you. “What was that?”

When you avoid his gaze, he grips your jaw in his palm. “Touch me,” he says, “as I touched you. Worship Him through me. We are created in His image.”

He takes your hand, falls back on his heels, and lift you to your feet as he stands.

You are bare, and he is half-bare. Somehow, he feels taller than he ever had before.

Then he places your palm on his chest, flat against his warm skin. “This is my body,” he says, dark hair falling over his eyes. “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God…” He quotes the passage as he guides your hands across his torso. “So we treasure it, and and honour Him through it.”

His stomach is firm under your palm, rising and falling shallowly as he guides you to the little trail of hair that disappearing down into his waistband. “Look at me,” he commands.

You obey, fingering brushing the hem of his underwear.

“I’m a bad man,” he says.

You shake your head, frowning. He was wrong. He wasn’t bad, he was everything good and safe and warm.

He catches your chin just as it dip downwards; as your attention is drawn to the movement at his hips. He keeps your eyes fixed on his as he undoes his fly with one hand. “I’m a bad man,” he repeats. “I want to fuck you,” he breathes, a little ragged now. “Pretty little virgin comes to her trusted priest asking for forgiveness and he lowers her to the cold floor, naked, and tells her he wants to shove his leaking cock deep inside her. Is that a bad man?”

You can’t respond. Not with the way he grips you.

“He tells her he wants her to kiss his throbbing cock. To worship him, like he was her god. He wants her to put him above all other gods, above her God. He’s a jealous man, without exception.” Fabric hits the floor, and slowly, he guides your hand into the elastic of his underwear. “He wants her on her knees, looking up at him with her sweet, devoted eyes, promising she’ll put no one else above him.” You gasp as he guides your fingers around him, hot and thick. “Is that a bad man?”

His other hand slides up your stomach to wrap around your breast, still wet from his spit.

“He wants to fill his pretty little angel with his hot cum, until she’s bred nice and full, and then when her pretty tits ache with sweet milk—” He squeezes at your breast as he speaks, over and over. “—he wants to suck at her until it dribbles down his chin. Is that a bad man?”

He leans down and places a gentle kiss to your lips. “He wants her to call him Father when he’s inside her,” he whispers. “He wants her to cry as she sucks at his cock with her naughty little cunt because she knows it’s bad.” He squeezes your hand around his erection. “You know it’s bad, don’t you, angel?”

One shaky breath. Two. Then you nod.

He lips curve into a little smile, proud. “Good girl,” he whispers. Then he steps away from you, separating you from him.

You take a small step to follow.

“No.”

You freeze, wobbling a little on your feet in your haste to obey.

“Go lay down on the steps and spread your legs.”

Your eyes flick to the stairs leading up the pulpit, then back to him.

You rock on your feet again, this time in hesitation.

The stone is cold on the soles of your feet. If you stood there long enough, they might go numb.

But the steps are covered in a dark, red carpet.

He takes a small step towards you. “Didn’t you come here to confess? Hm? Show me. I need to see the part of you that aches for me.”

His eyes heat your skin as you slip past him and climb the steps. There’s only a few.

He’s closer when you turn.

And he’s entirely bare.

He stands in the candlelight, just in front of the first pew, watching you—waiting for your obedience. And as you lower yourself onto the steps, leaning back to prop yourself up on your elbows, his hand wraps around himself.

You can still feel the heat of him in your palm.

“Spread your legs,” he commands.

“Mm,” you nod. “Yes, Father.” Then you drop your knees, exposing your messy centre to his hungry eyes and the cold air. He’s silent as your cunt clenches around nothing, wanting. He strokes over himself in gentle twists, base to tip—eyes locked on your offering.

“Are you going to ask me what I think?” He doesn't look up from between your legs as he speaks. “That’s what you came here for, isn’t? For help?”

You nod, readjusting yourself on your elbows a little.

He closes the distance between you and lowers himself onto his knees on the bottom step. “I can see it clenching,” he murmurs. “Greedy. Hm? Is it greedy, angel?”

Your lips quiver as you suck in a shaky breath.

“Mm,” he hums. “Tell me why you touch it. Help me understand.”

“I don’t know,” you mutter with a shake of your head.

“You’ll tell me the truth,” he orders. It’s not like earlier, in the booth—when he was still the man you’d thought you’d known these past two years. He’s all stern authority now. There’s no doubt. You will tell him the truth.

“Felt empty,” you confess in a little whine and roll of your hips. “I felt so empty.”

He leans closer. “Yeah? Poor little baby. A virgin with an achy little hole…” His fingers wrap around your ankle. “Empty,” he mutters. "So proud of you for coming to me,” he says as he strokes up your calf in a comforting caress. You struggle not to squeeze your thighs together, tortured by the lack of friction and the pulse of your cunt under his lingering gaze.

Then he lowers himself down between your legs. His finger strokes the skin just around where you want him most. “Sweetheart,” he breathes. “You need filling with the Holy Spirit. You’re all empty, yeah? You came to me because you knew I could fix it? Because I can fill you?”

He’s asking you a question, but he’s focused entirely on your twitching pussy as you flinch under this teasing touches. There is no logic to his questioning regardless. He’s consumed by the lust you share—slave to it.

“Who better to fill you than me?” he mutters as his fingertip dips into your hole. It’s barely a prod, easing back again as soon as your soft entrance offers a little resistance.

“Just for you…” you breathe.

“Hm?” He looks up. “What was that?”

“Only want you.”

He crawls over you slowly, forcing you to look into his eyes as he asks, “Me? Yeah? You came to your priest to fill your empty little pussy?”

“Forgive me,” you whisper.

He brushes his knuckles from your temple down to your chin. “I’ll help you, angel.” His lips brush over yours. “My angel…”

When he climbs off you and stands to his feet, a tiny part of your brain fires off in panic—afraid of him leaving you. But then his pretty fingers wrap around the thick length as it bobs above you. “It needs anointing,” he says with a gravely darkness in his voice.

He towers above you, skin glowing golden as the candlelight bounces off him. The same strong fingers that gripped the Holy Book high above his head each Sunday glide over the length of him as he looks down upon you.

He takes one step backward, down the steps. “On your knees,” he instructs. His aim becomes clear as he takes one step closer again, levelling himself at the perfect height for your mouth. “Tell me,” he prompts. “Where do you want to kiss me?”

On a shaky breath, you exhale, “Your cock, Father.”

You watch his closed fist stroke over his length, from the base to the tip. There’s a little shine there, at the end of it, leaking from the slit. “Alright, angel. Anoint my cock with your drool, hm?” He lets go of it, and you watching it bob a little—heavy. Looking up at him for reassurance, you level yourself with the head and touch your lips to him tentatively. One gentle kiss. “That’s it,” he coos. So you place another to his skin, right at the very tip. It bobs a little as he shifts his weight. Then you dip your tongue out, catching a little of the shine at the slit.

A bird calls in the night as it flies somewhere nearby.

His head drops back.

“This is what you needed,” he sighs. “This is what you came to me for. Isn’t it?”

You nod with a hum as you take the tip of him between your lips, tongue working in clumsy little swirling flicks—confidence building.

“Good girl,” he praises, looking down at you again. “Oh, my good girl. Just play with it. Just like that. Sweet little kisses for Father’s cock. Oh, Fuck. Oh God,” he groans.

He slips from your lips as you startle a little, looking up at him. The vulgarity had become your new normal. But this was new.

“What is it, baby?” he coos, stroking your hair. “I shouldn’t take the Lord’s name in vain. I’m sorry.” He takes his cock in hand as he apologises, standing on the steps of the pulpit, in the empty church where he gives his sermon each Sunday.

No one else would ever see him like this. He was too good. He was loved and trusted and righteous. And his cock was wet with your spit.

When you stand to your feet at his guidance, he still towers over you from the step down.

“Are you gonna put it inside me now?” you question with a little tilt of your head.

He takes one step down and runs his fingers through his hair. For a brief moment, it almost looks like he comes back to himself—to the version of him that almost left you—good and virtuous. It fights to take over.

So you take one step towards him.

He takes a step down again, in return, away from you.

“I’m so empty, Father,” you whine, slipping your fingers down between your legs. “Need you to fill me up again. Please.”

A further step down has him standing on the stone tiles.

So you lower yourself onto the steps again, leaning back and parting your thighs.

He stands there as you play with yourself, slipping your fingers through your slick until your clit is as sloppy as the fluttering entrance you leak from.

His heavy cock twitches as you watch each other. He doesn’t touch it.

“Please, Father,” you plead with a half-sob, on the edge of tears. “My pussy…”

He takes a small step towards you and pauses again.

“I know it’s bad,” you continue, somewhere between a sob and a whine. “It’s wicked. My naughty pussy wants to worship your cock, Father. Wanted it so long. I think about it during mass. I imagine you inside me. I come every week for you.” You dip your finger inside yourself, whimpering a little. “Don’t you want me?”

His chest rises and falls heavily as he approaches. He’s slow, like a predator stalking.

“So bad,” he mutters as he lowers himself onto the steps between your legs.

He watches as you play with yourself, messy and clumsy.

“Sent to tempt me,” he continues muttering as his fingers wrap around himself again. “That’s what you are, aren’t you? Are you from the Devil? Made to look like a perfect little angel? Is that it?” His hand strokes along his whole length, base to tip, over and over in a slight twisting action as he speaks. “You were made for me, weren’t you?”

It sounded right. Made for him. You’d never wanted anyone else.

He lowers himself over you before you can answer.

“I’ll never stop wanting you,” he warns. “It’ll get worse and worse. I can feel it. This obsession.”

His forehead drops to yours. And with your eyes closed and his warmth over you, the slick tip of him slides over you for the first time. You want to kiss him, but he doesn’t let you get close. Instead, he breathes into your mouth as his tip collects all the slick between your folds and spreads it in an obscene mess between your thighs. “This belongs to me. Only I get to fill your greedy little pussy, yeah?”

His lips brush yours.

“No one else touches it. No one else looks at it.” He prods at your virgin hole, indulging in the sweet spongy heat that presses back at him. “This is worship,” he breathes. “You’ll suck me inside your sweet cunt, all needy and sweet and looking at me like you do in Communion. You’ll worship me. Above all else.” A chaste kiss. “Then I’ll flood you with cum, so you’re nice and full, yeah? Does that sound nice?”

“Inside,” you plead as you squirm, trying to take him in as he slips over you again and again.

He breathes into your neck as he prods at you a little harder. “You gotta let me inside. Can feel you sucking at me. Take me inside, sweet girl. Come on.”

He kisses your neck as you try to take him, letting your muscles go slack under him as he eases inside you over and over. “There you go,” he mumbles. “Fuck, that’s it. Perfect fucking cunt. Mine.”

It’s just the tip of him. It fills the ache beyond anything you’d managed with your fingers. His breath, his voice, his warmth, and his thick hot cock stretching your walls open.

It’s enough to drag tears from you again.

He kisses them away as they wet your cheeks.

“You’re inside. Inside me.”

His brows draw together as you squeeze at him, clenching rhythmically.

“Thank you, Father,” you whisper.

He groans, and then he shifts, and impossibly, he fills you further—spearing apart your walls until it feels like you might look down and see the shape of him in your belly.

“We shouldn’t—” he mutters. “Forgive me.” His hips drag back, and then he’s pressing into you again. “Forgive me.” He bites at your earlobe. “Naughty pussy. Naughty girl. Desperate for her priest to fill her with cock. Fuck. Fuck, you feel so good.”

“This is sex,” you mewl.

He bites into you, feral, and the obscene slap of skin echoes from the pulpit steps as his hips slam into yours. “This is sex,” he answers, breathless. “This is what you wanted. You wanted to suck on my cock with your perfect little cunny. You wanted to be full of me, hm? This is what you wanted.”

“He’ll forgive us,” you whisper into his ear. “I’m made for you. He made me for you. How can it be wrong?”

“Yeah?” he rasps, looking a little frenzied when he lifts his head to find your eyes. “You made for me?”

“Can’t you feel it?” you ask with a roll of your hips.

You watch his eyes flutter shut.“Yeah. Yeah, sweetheart, I feel it. Wrap around me so perfect.” He grinds into you, indulging in the feeling of your walls rippling around him in desperate waves. “I’m keeping you. You’re mine now. My pretty girl. Mine to fuck, and kiss—” He licks at your jaw. “—and breed.” He drops his weight onto you, smothering you in his heat. “Gonna keep you safe and warm. All mine.”

“Do you think He’s watching?” you whisper in his ear.

He groans into your neck. “Tell me who you were thinking of,” he orders, low and gravelly. “When you looked up at me during Communion. Tell me.”

“You.”

He draws his hips back and begins fucking you just with his tip in shallow little rocking thrusts. “No one else before me, hm?” he prods as you clench rhythmically around him, attempting to draw him back in. “You worship me with this cunt. Only me.”

You nod desperately, emphatically. “Only you.”

Pleased, he sinks back inside you with a low groan.

All your life you’d believed your body was a temple of the Lord; that you were filled with His Spirit; that you carried Him inside you always.

But you’d been empty. You’d been so, so empty. Longing to fill the cold, hollowness inside you. You’d desperately returned to this church week after week, believing the man at the pulpit was merely a messenger between you and your heavenly God. Believing your fixation was your failure—that he was temptation, and only in submission to God could you be delivered from him.

But with his cum anointing your skin, and his large warm body sheltering you from the cold, you know the truth of it all: anything, or anyone, which worked to separate you from him, could be nothing but the greatest evil. He was your salvation. And nothing would come before him.

Your face is quickly wet with tears again as you roll against each other in the dark, empty church—indulging in your mutual worship. His mouth adorns your neck in messy kisses as you mutter in his ear: praising him, worshiping him. You can’t stop, desperate to release the intensity of your adoration upon him.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who’s been there since you guys were children. Sitting under the big oak tree in your front yard, his grandma bringing cold, perfectly cut fruit for the two of you to snack on. Musing young Caleb’s wild black hair with a smile before heading back to finish preparing dinner.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who became your best friend. Same elementary, middle, and high school. The two of you were inseparable. You showed up to his basketball games in corny, homemade shirts, and over-the-top school spirited attire. He always made a big deal of asking you to the school dance. The bestest of friends.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who gets a hefty scholarship to go play basketball on the other side of the country. He seems hesitant, since you had already committed to a university only a few hours from home.

You tell him this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. To attend such a prestigious school on a full ride, to experience a different community, to be free! He would be a fool to not accept it. It’s with tears in his soft, sweet eyes that he finally agrees, and officially commits.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who spends his last few months at home just about glued to your hip. If people thought you guys were inseparable before, they would think you guys are dating now.

boy nextdoor!Caleb drives you two down to the beach in his beat up, 2006 Toyota Tacoma the night before he’s set to leave. You sit in the bed of his truck, splitting an order of carne asada fries, watching the sunset. It’s quiet. You barely spoke when he walked to your door to pick you up. And now you sit here in silence, both of you clearly distraught over the major life change that was happening too quickly.

“My flight is at 9, by the way.” Caleb breaks the silence, solemnly. His eyes still cast on the warm pinks and reds that dance over the blue horizon. You wipe your mouth on a napkin before peering over at him.

The Caleb sitting next to you had changed so much over the 14 years you had known him. The golden hues of the sunset helped to blur some old, teenage acne scars. His jaw was well defined and sharp, definitely a result of years of corrective orthodontic work. You’ll never forget how corny and irritating he was when he finally got his braces off. Gloating about how he was about to be the most good-looking guy in the school, and the girls were just gonna be swarming all over him.

A wave of jealousy washed over you. But you naively passed it off as irritation from his new found ego. Because why would you be jealous of your friend getting attention from other girls?

“Surprised you would book a flight that early, I rarely see you out of bed before 10.” You chuckle, trying to make light of the aggressively glum conversation. He finally looks over at you, and you can tell he’s holding back tears.

Not because his eyes are watering, or his lip is quivering. To a stranger, there’s nothing about his expression that gives away how he’s feeling. But after years of reading Caleb like a book, you know his giveaways. The shifty eyes, the biting of his inner cheek, the near imperceptible bouncing of his leg.

He pinches his lips together and looks down at his hands in his lap.

“I’m gonna miss you, Caleb.”

“I know, Pipsqueak.” But he just can’t bring himself to say it back.

Of course he’s going to miss you. He’s probably going miss you more than you miss him! It’s him who’s leaving after all. He just… can’t acknowledge that without it turning into a big sappy mess. And he knows that when it turns into that big sappy mess, of him being honest with you, he’s not getting on that airplane tomorrow.

And so he keeps his feelings balled up tight. Changes the subject to ask about how you’re feeling for university. Let’s you scold him for eating more than his half of the carne asada fries, even if he did pay for them. Gives you his zip-up when the sun finally disappears below the horizon, and the ocean breeze gets too chilly.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who fights for one last night of normalcy with you, because he knows your relationship will never be this comforting, this intimate, this homey, ever again.

boy nextdoor! Caleb who lies to you about when his flight takes off.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who couldn’t even bear to think about you waving goodbye at airport curb. He knew you would have insisted on taking him to the airport yourself. He knew that one tear running down your cheek would have had him cancelling his flight.

So he’d rather just not deal. So he’d rather tell you his flight was taking off an hour after it really was.

When you wake up to see him off, you already feel nauseous. Trudging through your front lawn to his front door, expecting a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed Caleb to answer. But it’s Josephine.

“Don’t tell me he slept through his alarm.” You kid, oblivious to the truth. Josephine looks at you with furrowed brows and a confused expression.

“Dear, Caleb’s uber came and got him over an hour ago.”

…

What?

You let out a nervous, forced laugh. You poke your head into the house, hoping to see Caleb standing around the corner playing one more cruel prank on you.

The living room is empty.

“Very funny, Josephine. Did Caleb put you up to this?” Your voice is shaking. Tears are threatening to spill. Your hands are trembling in the pockets of the zip-up he left you last night. The one you slept in after he walked you back to your doorstep and hugged you just a little tighter than he normally does.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart. He told me you had your reasons for not seeing him to the airport…”

You can see her lips moving, but your ears are ringing so loudly you can’t understand a word she’s saying. Your feet are carrying you through the house before you know it, pushing right past the small, frail woman. Bounding up the stairs, throwing the door to Caleb’s room open, to find it near bare.

His closet is significantly emptier than it was last week. His posters are gone. His bed sheets are the neatest you’ve ever seen them. His favorite model planes are missing from their spots on the shelves.

He’s gone.

He’s gone.

He’s gone and he couldn’t even say goodbye.

So many emotions run through your head. Devastation, confusion, betrayal, rage.

How could he put you in this situation? How could he be so selfish?

You’re crying before you can even register it. Your best friend. The one who used to let you eat all the red sour patch kids from every bag he got. The one who carried you a half mile on his back from the skatepark because you thought you could drop into the bowl with almost no skateboarding experience. His signature was the first, and the biggest one on your cast.

He was your rock, from when you were 6 years old and missing your front teeth, to when you were 17 and sneaking around the neighborhood with a plastic bottle full of shitty tequila.

You’d think those memories meant something. That your relationship was important enough to at least say goodbye.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who broke your heart without even being in a relationship.

Five months later

It’s your winter break. You made it through your first quarter of college. You had taken your last final yesterday, and immediately drove home for the 3 week break.

You’re helping your parents carry in groceries from the car. Christmas isn’t for another week, but of course your Mom still bought way too much food from the store. Can never be over prepared, as she says.

Standing in front of the trunk of your moms car, you look to your right to see Caleb’s truck still parked in Josephine’s driveway. It’s exactly where it was all those months ago when he just about vanished from the face of the earth. It’s covered in pollen and bird poops. The bed of the truck blanketed in a layer of dead leaves. It’s the dirtiest you’ve ever seen it. The Caleb you know would never let his beloved truck get this filthy.

Or maybe he would. After basically ghosting you all those months ago, you’re questioning if you ever knew him at all.

The last bag of groceries gets taken in, and you’re handing stuff to your mom as she reorganizes the fridge to make space.

“Josephine said Caleb gets in tomorrow afternoon.” She mentions, almost too nonchalantly. Your mom knows what happened. She was the one who held you when you came back to the house in tears after finding out he was gone.

You huff, trying to appear somewhat unphased.

“I’m sure Josephine is excited to see him.” You say, coolly. You know your Mom isn’t falling for the unbothered act. It’s more so for your own sanity. Digging into the crunchy grapes you carried through the door less than 10 minutes ago.

She arranges the last item on the shelf, shutting the refrigerator door and turning to face you.

“Honey.” She lets out a long sigh. “I invited them over for dinner.”

You immediately stop chewing the food in your mouth and meet her gaze.

“Huh?”

“Josephine is coming over for dinner tomorrow. And I told her to bring Caleb.”

A beat of silence, before nearly spitting out your food. It takes effort to finish chewing and swallow.

“Mom, are you being serious?” You try not to raise your voice at your mother, but you’re obviously upset. “I don’t want that selfish dick in my house!”

“One, language! And two, you don’t have to speak to him, but you will sit down and have dinner like a respectful young adult!” Your Mom points a finger towards the dining room table in emphasis.

“I know you’re still hurting, baby. But Josephine told me Caleb is having a hard time being so far away. He’s obviously hurting too.” She walks around the kitchen island to meet you. “You don’t have to talk to him tomorrow, but just show up for him. I think it would mean a lot.” Her gaze is soft as she cups your cheek for a second.

“He didn’t even want me to show up at the airport. Why should I show up for him now?” You spit, fighting back tears as you storm up to your room.

The next day, you’re just in a shit mood. You decide to take a walk around noon, hoping to enjoy the calmness of your childhood neighborhood. Dissociation gets the best of you, and you don’t get back home for another two hours.

When you get back home, you can’t help but notice the shining navy blue paint of Caleb’s truck. No pollen or bird poop to be found.

His car is clean.

Meaning he’s inside the house.

Part of you wants to stomp through the beautiful hydrangeas in his front yard, break that front door down, and give him a piece of your mind.

The other part of you doesn’t want him to know how bad you’ve been hurting.

How you’ve secretly missed his company more than anyone’s in the world.

How you compare him to all of your new college friends. How they never come close to understanding you like he did.

Fuck this.

You can’t let him know he’s under your skin. You have to show up to the dinner tonight. He will see how well you are doing. And when he comes running back to you, it will be your turn to break his heart.

Your Mother always does a little too much when she’s hosting. She definitely made way too much food for a casual dinner. Roast chicken, potatoes, brussels sprouts, the whole nine yards.

You come down from your room after spending hours getting ready, only to pull off the “I’m not even trying” look. Just enough makeup to make you look alive. Your hair is blowdried, but not styled. Picked out a very simple outfit, too. Just some lowrise bootcut jeans, and a navy blue long sleeve.

“Jesus, I thought we were only feeding Josephine and Caleb. Not the whole dang neighborhood.” You quip to your Mother as you enter the kitchen, seeing all the completed dishes waiting on the counter.

“It’s better to have too much food than not enough, sweetheart. We can always send them home with leftovers.” She responds as she does the finishing touches on a few dishes.

A knock on the front door sounds through the house.

Your Mom looks at you expectantly. But you make your way to the sink to start tucking dishes into the dishwasher.

She lets out a deep sigh as she wipes her hands down on a towel before making her way to the front door.

You hear her greet sweet, elderly Josephine. You hadn’t seen her since Thanksgiving break. She had also come over for dinner, since Caleb hadn’t come home. Their voices draw closer, but suddenly the dirty measuring cups and pots in the sink are much more interesting.

They enter the kitchen, and you still only hear two voices, your mom and Josephine. Did Caleb not show up? Was he too embarrassed to see you? You scoff to yourself. Not surprising, he couldn’t deal with you face-to-face once again. Shutting the water off and drying your hands, you think you’ve won.

You couldn’t be more wrong.

Because there he is, standing in the doorway to the kitchen.

Eyes staring directly at you.

It’s irritating how he looks like he’s doing great. His shoulders are a little broader, his posture a little straighter. Did he get taller?

Your Dad interrupts your inner monologue by giving Caleb a firm handshake. Since when has Caleb been taller than your Dad? You can’t pull your eyes away from their interaction, Caleb being nothing but polite, as usual.

Josephine is what saves you from your trance.

“Hello, dear. You look wonderful!” She coos sweetly, pulling you into a gentle hug. “The food looks great, Caleb and I are grateful to be invited into your home.” She smiles up at you.

“Please, it was Moms idea to invite you guys over. She prepared all the food. No thanks to me.” You sheepishly rub the back of your neck, suddenly feeling Caleb’s undivided attention on you from the other side of the room. A quick glance in his direction confirms your suspicion.

Your Dad is saying something to him, but his gaze flicks over to you every couple seconds.

“Well, however things panned out, we are happy to be here. Caleb was looking forward to this.”

It takes everything in you not to laugh.

Looking forward to this? And he can’t even grow the fucking balls to say hello? Just stare at you from across the room? You want to rip his head off.

You can’t even respond to Josephine, just a sweet smile, nod of your head, and back to scrubbing dishes.

It’s ridiculous. This whole situation is so laughable. What kind of fucked up, pussy ass bitch would—

“Scrub any harder and I think you might burn a hole through that cast iron.”

You freeze. Too afraid to turn around, but you can feel him not far behind you. Close enough to use a soft voice to get your attention.

Gently setting the pan and scrub brush into the sink, you stare at the suds.

“Hi, Pipsqueak.”

You want to slap him. You want to hold him tight and never let go. You want to scream in his face until your lungs give out. You want to stare at him until his features are burned into your retinas.

You opt for the safe option. The one where you simply ignore him.

When you turn around, you don’t even look at him, just shoulder past him. You try to shoulder check him, except he’s got about 8 inches of height on you, and another 60 pounds, at least. So much for the intimidation tactic.

He lets you pass. Doesn’t try to stop you, to say anything to you. He just watches as you walk, as unbothered as physically possible, out of the kitchen and towards the bathroom.

You lock the door behind you and turn to meet your reflection. Your face is red, and a little sweaty. Trembling hands find their way to the cold water knob. Not to splash water on your face, but to just hold them there. To let them turn a little numb. To give you something to focus on besides the boy in your kitchen.

When you can’t feel your fingers, you turn the water off and dry your hands. Running your fingers through your hair to tame some of the anxiety frizz. Straightening out your clothes, and putting on your best, fake smile in the mirror. Show time.

Your Dad and Caleb are seated at the table when you enter the kitchen, probably rambling about basketball or whatever. Your mother and Josephine are setting the prepared dishes on the table. Josephine takes the seat next to Caleb, and your mother takes the seat next to your father at the head. You sit next to your mother.

Mindless chatter fills the room as everyone serves themselves. Your father asking Caleb about life as a college athlete, balancing training with his academics, whatever. Your dad always seemed to like Caleb. Even after he abandoned you all those months ago.

“An athlete and an engineering student. How impressive!” Your dad clasps a big hand on Caleb’s shoulder, to which he sheepishly grins and shakes his head.

“It’s all at the expense of my social life.” He chuckles, starting to slice into a hunk of chicken.

“Surely you have some free time. These first few months are supposed to be the most fun.” Your Mom chimes in as she takes a sip of her wine.

“The big parties aren’t really my thing anyways. Just me, the gym, and my textbooks.” Lies. Caleb was literally part of student council in high school. He loved planning big events and wearing ridiculous, school-spirited costumes. Caleb was, without a doubt, the more sociable one between the two of you.

His eyes find you staring a hole through your plate. His comment feels very pointed. As if he trying to make sure you know there is absolutely nothing, or no one, in his life right now. Like he’s almost punishing himself.

“I’m sure you’ll find your people, Caleb.” Your Mother reassures him.

The rest of the meal is cordial. Your Dad acts like he missed Caleb more than anyone else in the world, asking him question after question. Josephine kept diverting the conversation to talk about you, what you were studying, how the new independence was treating you, how you were faring making new friends.

As suspected, there was way too much food left over. Caleb and your Dad stood by the front door while your Mom and Josephine packed some tupperwares to take back. You collected the plates and silverware from the table to wash.

“Thank you for helping, dear.” Josephine said with a kind smile, a soft, wrinkled hand coming up to cup your cheek. “Don’t be too in your head, now. I know you’re a kind girl.” And with that, she turned to make her way towards the front door.

Your parents bid them both goodbye, Caleb throwing one last look over his shoulder to where you stand in the doorway between the kitchen and living room. Hoping to finally meet your gaze, yet your arms are crossed and the living room rug is the most interesting thing in the world, apparently.

Later that evening, when your parents had turned in for the night, you sat on your living room couch with your cheesy ass romantasy novel. The warm lighting from the Christmas tree creating the coziest ambiance. Grimy sweatshorts from your high school days, holey summer camp tshirt with the neckline cut out.

The zip-up he wrapped around you in the bed of his truck, the night before he disappeared. Smells like your laundry detergent now.

A quiet knock rings against the front door.

There’s only one person who would have the audacity to knock at a time like this. Unless it’s a murderer. Might be a better option at this point, though.

Your bare feet pad over to the door to look through the peephole. Before you can even look, Caleb’s voice comes through the door.

“I know you’re standing at the door, Pips.”

Did this guy have echolocation? X-ray vision?

“Can you just open it?”

Through the peephole, Caleb stands on your porch in a university-branded sweatshirt, black sweatpants, and his own house slippers. He looks directly at the peephole, and your breath hitches.

He sucks in a deep breath before shoving his hands in his pockets.

“Or don’t. Just… hear me out. Please.”

You think about unlocking the door. Think about how pathetic he probably feels standing on your porch at close to midnight. Think about how he’s probably freezing. He was always more of a warm weather guy, where you preferred the cold.

You don’t open the door. But you lean your forehead against it.

“I didn’t want to leave you. I was so afraid that college was going to turn us both into different people. I didn’t want to think about you not needing me in your life anymore.”

You swear you hear a sniffle.

“I was selfish. I was a coward. I thought running away would preserve what we have. Or had. That if I didn’t acknowledge it, everything would be just as I left it. I could come back and we’d still be… friends.”

You lift your head off the door and glance at the locked handle.

“I don’t want to be your friend, pips.”

Your hand is frozen on the knob.

“I don’t want things to be like when I left. I don’t want to keep thinking about what things would be like if we were… more than friends.”

You think you might start crying. You know Caleb already is.

“I just… I’ve known something was wrong. Getting that scholarship was just… I don’t know. It made me think of a life without you. And I hated it. I hated the idea of not having you with me. Not being able to look at your face, or hear your laugh, or smell your favorite perfume.”

That was almost a year ago. Just how long has he been feeling this way?

You begin to silently cry on the other side of the door.

“I kicked myself everyday for leaving. I couldn’t think about anything besides you. I wanted to know what you were doing. What classes you were taking. What you ate for breakfast.” Caleb takes a deep breath in.

“I wanted to know if you were talking to anyone. The idea of another man taking my place… I didn’t even know how to describe how I felt.”

Another sniffle comes through the door.

“That’s when I realized I couldn’t be your best friend anymore. That just running away and hoping everything would stay the same was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done.”

Your hand trembles on the cold, locked door handle.

“If you don’t wanna forgive me, that’s okay. I just can’t go on any longer with this tearing me apart from the inside out. I’d rather watch you live your life happily without me, than constantly think about the ‘what-ifs.’”

There’s a minute of silence. A strong exhale from Caleb’s side of the door.

You’ve never unlocked a door faster.

Caleb had taken about 5 steps down your lawn before the door got just about blown clean off the hinges. His head whips around, revealing his wet cheeks and red, puffy eyes.

There you are, standing in the doorway, just as red-eyed and puffy as him.

All he can do is stare at you, sniffling. You throw your hands out to your sides.

“You’re letting all the heat out.”

boy nextdoor!Caleb who nearly knocks the wind out of from how hard he collides with you, two big, strong arms wrapping around you. His face finds the crook of your neck.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” All he can do is say it over and over again into your hair, wetting it from his tears. You smack a hand on his back.

“You’re… suffocat—ing… me.” You say with a strained voice. He loosens his grip, hands sliding out from around you to rest on your waist. He pulls his face out of your neck to stand to his full height.

You think this is the most handsome he’s ever looked. Yearning, soft eyes swollen from crying. Thick, furrowed eyebrows. Lips pinched together.

Your hands reach up to thumb away his tears. He all but melts into your touch.

“Do that stupid shit again and I will actually fucking kill you.” You say sweetly. He laughs through his tears.

“Never again.” He smiles. As you both stand in your living room, trying to be as quiet as possible, laughing through sniffles and sobs, he soaks in all your beautiful features. The ones he hasn’t been able to admire this close up since that night he left.

Your sweet, kind eyes. Rounded cheeks. Straight nose. Your bright, beaming smile. Your lips.

Your perfectly pink lips. Perfectly full. Perfectly… kissable.

His gaze flicks from your lips to your face, leaning in an imperceptible distance.

“I…” he swallows. “Can I kiss you, please?”

Caleb’s hands tremble on your waist. Your eyes move to his lips as you gently nod.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who kisses you like it’s the easiest, most natural thing in his life.

He’s so soft. Your lips move and glide together like they’ve done this a million times. A warm, callused hands finds its way to the back of your neck as your smaller ones find purchase on his solid, broad chest.

His tongue runs against the seam of your lips, asking for permission. You invite him in, letting him explore your mouth. His hands snake down your body to cup the backs of your thighs.

“Jump.” He murmurs into your mouth. Which you do, so obediently.

Caleb hoists you up, your legs wrapping around his trim waist, arms hugging his neck. He begins to walk towards the couch.

You hear a door open upstairs. The two of you freeze.

“Honey?” Of course it’s your Dad. The floorboards creak as his footsteps draw closer to the staircase.

Caleb just about throws you onto the couch before quickly assessing the living room for the best hiding spot. He decides to simply duck behind where you’re sitting.

Just as he attempts to hide all 6’2 of him behind the couch, your Dads footsteps come into view. He comes about halfway down the stairs before sleepily surveying the room.

“Everything okay down here?” He rubs an eye.

“Yep! Just… trying to fall asleep!” You chirp, probably a bit too eagerly considering it’s past midnight. He scans the room.

“Ok, honey… just— just keep the TV volume low, alright?” He turns to go back up the stairs. Did he think you were watching TV?

“Will do, Dad. Goodnight!” Again with the over enthusiastic response. Your Dad throws a hand over his shoulder before wishing you goodnight, as well.

Caleb is smiling up at you where he lays on the floor. He wiggles his eyebrows. You bend down to smack him.

“Don’t give me that look, you prick.” You whisper-yell at him. He’s trying to block your smacks, keeping his giggles to a low. “You could have offered to tuck him into bed and he would have said yes, kiss-ass.”

“He would not.” Caleb grabs your wrists and pulls you down on top of him, preventing you from thudding against the hard wood floor. You squirm and continue to try and slap him, but he’s got your wrists pinned.

“Would to!” You’re straddling him, still whisper-yelling in his face. “Oh, Caleb, you’re an athlete and an engineering major. You’re so smart, please be my son!” You say in a mocking voice. “You guys were having total bromance the entire time we were eating, and you know I’m right.”

Caleb playfully rolls his eyes, placing your hands on either side of his head before settling his own on your hips.

“Just say you’re jealous and move on.” He smirks, looking so boyish from his spot under you.

“Jealous?! Jealous of what? Of you or my freaking Dad?” You arch an eyebrow, tilting your head down at him.

“Jealous of all the attention I was giving your Dad. Obviously.” His fingers lightly pinch your sides in emphasis.

“I’ll have you know I was the furthest thing from jealous. I was one comment away from smashing a plate over your head the entire night.”

He throws his head back in playful, silent laughter.

“Yeah? And where’s that hostility now, hmm?” He teases, earning him a flick to the forehead.

“Ouch, Pip—!” He groans, rather loudly. You clamp a hand over his mouth to shut him up.

“Shut the fuck up, Caleb! Do you want my Dad to come back down here?” You scold him, albeit with a smile on your face. His eyes crinkle, and you can feel his grin under your palm.

“Maybe he’d be nicer to me than you’re being right now.” He says from under your hand. You roll your eyes and move to get off him, but a strong arm wraps around your torso and flips you both. Caleb’s large, muscular frame looms over you. The warm, incandescent bulbs from the Christmas tree softening his features.

His intense gaze makes you shyly look away.

“Don’t look at me like that, it’s embarrassing…” you murmur. A warm hand cups your cheek to turn your face back towards him, before tucking a stray piece of hair behind your ear.

“You’re so pretty.” His compliment makes your cheeks turn red. “You’ve always been the prettiest.” His hand on the side of your face is forcing you to hold his gaze. Uncomfortable under his attention and praise, you can do nothing but squirm.

“Caleb, stop…” An attempt to turn away is ruined by his thumb dragging over your chin, using his forefinger to pinch your jaw. A quiet exclamation of your name leaves his lips.

“Let me tell you how beautiful you are.”

You feel flustered and uneasy.

“I’ve never tried to be beautiful for you. You’ve never seen my beautiful side.”

“You don’t have to try for me. You’ve been beautiful ever since I met you. I thought you were beautiful when we were 9 and you had sand and strawberry ice cream all over your face after the beach. The same way I thought you were beautiful when we were 16 and I had to watch that water polo scumbag pick you up for your first date ever.” You can’t help but laugh. “Never liked that guy, by the way.” He adds, so matter-of-factly.

“You are the worst at holding grudges, you know that?” You reach up to pinch his nose. He just smiles and laughs. You love his smile. It’s just so… Caleb. You love his laugh.

You love Caleb.

You’ve always loved Caleb. You thought you loved him as a friend. Someone you could depend on to have your back through thick and thin. A shoulder to cry on. A set of ears to listen to your stupid, unimportant rants.

Five months apart changed your perspective. Caleb was more than that friend. Caleb was someone you wanted to grow old with. He was the person you wanted to come home to every night. The person you wanted to fold laundry and do your taxes with. Caleb was the person you saw yourself starting a family with.

Like he could hear your thoughts, he broke the moment of quiet with a whisper of your name.

“I love you. I love you so much.” He leans in to say against your lips, before kissing you so softly.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who kisses you exactly how you need to be kissed. His lips are soft, moving dominantly against yours to guide you. One forearm braced beside your head, the other hand gently squeezing your waist.

“I don’t wanna do this on my living room floor.” You mutter against his mouth. Caleb begins to trail kisses across your jaw, your neck, under your ear.

“Tell me where you wanna go, baby. I’ll take you anywhere right now.” Another wet kiss to your neck. He definitely just left a hickey. A small whine escapes you.

“My room,” is all you say before Caleb is effortlessly scooping you up off the floor. All four limbs wrapped around him like a koala as he ascends the stairs as quickly and silently as possible. No direction necessary, Caleb knows your house like the back of his hand.

He pushes his back against the door to open it, then his hand leaves your thigh for a split second to silently close and lock it behind him. Very carefully, he sets you onto your childhood, twin-sized mattress and climbs on top of you.

Caleb’s hips bracket yours as he wraps your legs around his waist. He wastes no time crashing his lips against yours. As his hips press against your core, you begin to feel his hardening length behind the layers of clothing. He feels big. Too big. A string of saliva connects your lips when he pulls away.

“You know, I used to have wet dreams about this exact scenario. About me getting to take care of you in this very bed.” His ears are pink at the admission, but he embraces it. Another hickey on your neck, right below your ear before he whispers.

“Dreamt about you screaming my name, too.” His tongue finds your earlobe. “But we will have to save that for another time. Need you to be quiet for me tonight.” The sensual voice in your ear makes you shudder.

Big, warm hands unzip the hoodie and dip under your shirt to trace the bottom of your ribs.

“Tell me to stop.” He whispers against your lips.

“Keep going.” You say, pulling him into the kiss with a hand carded through his hair. Caleb’s hands travel further up your ribcage to caress your breasts. One squeeze has you both moaning into each other’s mouths.

“Wanna see them.” He mutters against you while greedy hands bunch that ratty, summer camp tshirt up and over your perky tits. You feel him get a little harder when your chest is exposed to him.

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer.” You snort. He pinches a nipple in retaliation.

“Brat.” He teases before diving straight into sucking a tit into his mouth.

The sight before you is… indescribable. Caleb, the same guy who used to knock on your door and ask if your mom if you could come out to ride bikes, has his face buried in your tits. Grabbing, squeezing, pinching, drooling all over them. His hips are starting to slowly grind against yours, rubbing his fat erection on your heated core.

All in your childhood bed. There’s a trophy from an 8u recreational soccer team on a shelf next to a one-eyed, stuffed bunny. The literal shirt you’re wearing is from a summer camp you both went to when you were 14. Your parents are 15 feet down the hall.

Teeth gently clamp on your nipple and tug, instantly knocking the thoughts from your brain. He kisses, sucks, and bites his way back up your neck to your lips.

“Take this off.” You grab at the hem of his sweatshirt, before he swiftly pulls it over his head in one smooth move. You take the break to completely shed your zip-up and tshirt.

Has Caleb always been this fucking ripped?

Strong, rounded delts bracket a broad, solid chest. One, two, three… is that an 8-pack? His abs look mandoline-level sharp. A light trail of hair from his navel chases a few veins down his v-line, to below his waistband.

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer.” He quips in a mocking tone. You roll your eyes as he collapses back over you again, smiling into the kiss.

Exploratory hands roam every inch of each other’s bodies. His muscular, firm pecs press against your perky, cute tits. Warm, callused palms run up and down your waist, down to your hips, where they trace around to the front of your sweatshorts. Caleb lightly teases a finger underneath the drawstring.

“Is this okay?” His eyes find yours, full of want and hunger.

“Yes.” And his fingers immediately dip into your sweatshorts. He freezes for a moment.

“No panties?” He chuckles.

“It’s bad for your pH to wear panties to bed.” You retort, cheeky grin spanning your face. “And I didn’t know you were gonna show up and cry on my porch!”

“You’re never gonna let me live that down, huh?” His boyish smile making his eyes crinkle.

“Nope.” You taunt, popping the “p” in emphasis.

“Cruel, cruel woman.” His smile beams as he presses his face in your neck, hand disappearing under your waistband.

Greedy kisses explore your neck as his long, dexterous fingers trace up and down your wet slit. Using his middle and ring fingers to draw featherlight circles on your clit. Caleb lifts his head to watch your expressions.

Your mouth slightly agape as quiet pants escape you. Your eyebrows pinches together in concentration, trying to be as silent as possible.

“You gotta tell me if I’m doing good, I— I’ve never done this before.” He hesitates for a second before coming clean with you.

“Yes, just keep going.” You gasp as he increases the pressure on the little bundle of nerves. His two fingers move down to circle your drooling hole, his thumb taking their place on your clit.

“Christ, you’re fucking soaked.” Caleb braces his free forearm beside your head. When his fingers finally push into your pussy, he can’t help but smile at your cute little gasps. “Feels good?” Your eyes squeeze shut as you nod mindlessly.

The hand that’s not scissoring your insides comes to pinch your cheeks together.

“Nuh-uh, Pips. Use your words like a big girl.” Your eyes open to see his smug expression, and it makes you blush even harder.

“I want to fuck you, Caleb.” He tries not to laugh too loud at your muffled request.

“I know, baby. Just a little longer.” He teases as his fingers continue to pump in and out of your squelching pussy.

The pressure from his thumb on your clit is dizzying. His two thick fingers massaging your walls are driving you wild. You want more.

Your small hand trails down his torso to try and dig into his sweatpants. With one hand, he grabs both of your wrists and pins them above his head.

“If you touch my dick right now, I am going to cum in my pants.” He states, not a hint of embarrassment in his voice. You whine at his rejection.

“Caaleeebb…” you whimper, that knot building in your tummy.

“Just cum for me. Cum for me one time and then I can fuck you. Okay?” His thumb moves and little faster, fingers driving a little deeper. “Let go, baby. Just let go.” He’s muttering against the side of your face, his own hips starting to buck erratically again.

Your nails dig into the sheets as your orgasm barrels towards you. All it takes is another soft kiss from Caleb, and the knot snaps. He swallows your moans with a bruising kiss, fingers still working you. When the pressure begins to dull, your hips instinctually buck away from his hand, clit too sensitive.

Caleb smiles ear to ear, obviously very proud of his handiwork. You pant and cover your face, embarrassment taking over. He pulls your hands away from your face, lacing your fingers together.

“Ready for more?” He grins as kiss after kiss is pressed to your cheeks, your jaw, your forehead.

“Mm, yeah…” You moan into a kiss, mind still a little fuzzy from your orgasm. Small, shaky hands start to push at his sweatpants, until Caleb gets the hint and pulls his sweats and boxers down in one go.

boy nextdoor!Caleb who is so achingly hard in your bed right now. Pretty, pink-tipped cock that is so fucking fat, it’s struggling to stand upright. Slightly curved upwards, veins pulsing as they dance upwards from base to tip. A dark, well groomed patch of hair dusting his base, sprawling out from the happy trail leading from his belly button.

You barely have time to admire before he’s placing a quick kiss to your navel and pulling your shorts off, too. Heavy thighs push against yours, coercing your legs to go up and over his elbows. A few thrusts have his leaking dick sliding through your wet folds.

“Wait.” He pauses, sitting back on his haunches. “Do you have a condom?” You blink up at him, the question totally pulling you from the moment.

“Why the fuck would I have condoms in my childhood bedroom?” You retort, moving to sit back on your elbows.

“I don’t fucking know what you were doing in high school!”

“What do you mean you don’t know? You say that like you weren’t attached to my fucking hip!” You’re whispering-yelling in each other’s faces now.

“You could have hooked up with that water polo prick for all I know!” Caleb is smiling. When is he not smiling?

“Don’t mention another guy when you’re about to fuck me! And I didn’t even kiss him, by the way!”

“I’m not going to fuck you if we can’t find a fucking condom! Don’t you remember anything from sex ed?”

“I’m on the pill, you moron!” He blinks down at you before running a hand through his hair.

“You could have lead with that!”

“Can you just fucking put it in?”

“Well, are you clean?”

“I’ve never fucking had sex with anyone!”

…

“Really?” He doesn’t mean it insultingly, like he doesn’t believe you. It’s more so said like he’s surprised.

“Yes, really. Can you stop interrogating me and just fuck me already?” He smirks to himself. “Stop smiling like that!”

“Like what?” He braces himself over you again and begins stroking his dick.

“Like… I don’t know! All smug and shit.” Your voice wavers when you feel his cock notch at your wet hole.

“You wanted me to be the one to fuck you for the first time, huh?” A kiss to your neck, before sucking another hickey. A small gasp escapes you when his tip breaches your winking hole, already squeezing him so tight. Caleb lets out a quiet groan. “Wanted your Caleb to take your little virginity.”

His fat cock slowly pushes in, your walls clamping down like a vice. A hand reaches down to rub your clit.

“Come on, let me in.” Moving to sit upright as one hand continues to work your little bundle of nerves, while the other pushes a leg up towards your chest. Pupils dilated as he watches his length disappear into you.

The stimulation on your clit has your hole softening for him, letting him slide all the way to the base. He moves both of your legs to rest on his elbows, in awe of the sight of you two connected.

“Holy shit.” He groans, throwing his head back.

“Caleb, fucking move.” You urge him, trying to move your hips for any kind of friction.

“Just… give me a second.” Thick cock splitting you open, your chest heaves in time with his. After a few moments, his hands come to brace on either side of you, legs still hooked over his elbows. His hips begin to gently thrust into you, cock coming out only an inch or two before sliding back in.

“Harder, Caleb.” You moan, pulling him into a kiss with a hand on his nape. He can’t help but moan in your open mouth.

“You’re gonna squeeze my dick off.” He grumbles, pressing a kiss to the corner of your mouth. With each thrust, he pulls out just a little more, until he’s sliding out nearly to his tip before pushing back in. “God, you feel so fucking good.”

“Better than your dreams?” You grin, still panting with each thrust. Caleb lets out a breathy laugh before pressing his face into your neck.

“Shut up.” He emphasizes with a particularly hard thrust, earning a loud moan from you. Your hand comes to cover your mouth, terrified of being heard. “Next time, I wanna hear you scream my name so loud.”

Next time. Your heart warms at the idea of there being a “next time.”

“Caaleeeb,” you whine.

“Yeah, Pips?”

Pips. The nickname he gave you when you were 7 at the summer county fair and you weren’t tall enough to ride any of the rides.

The contrast of the nostalgic name being used as a pet name in a time like this. When you’re both 19 and he’s rearranging your guts. It’s jarring.

“I love you, Caleb.”

His jaw drops open as an unfiltered groan escapes. You throw a hand over his mouth to muffle it.

“I love you so much, Caleb.” His eyes are so soft and full of yearning, mouth still covered as he drops his forehead onto your shoulder. “Never wanna leave you again…”

Thrusts turning animalistic and desperate, Caleb bites down on your shoulder to stifle his noises.

“I wanna cum together, baby. I’m so close.” You whisper in his ear, feeling him nod against your collarbone. His hips stutter once, twice, three times before you feel his warmth flood your pussy. The feeling of him filling you up so generously pushes you into your second orgasm of the night. You bite down on the back of your hand to keep quiet.

Caleb slumps on top of you, panting hard. His hair is damp with sweat, face totally red and glowy. You run a nail down his spine, and he shivers as he pulls out and rolls to your side.

“Fucking hell.” His gaze is fixed on the ceiling as he comes down from his high. “Does this mean you forgive me?” He laughs, turning his head to look at you. You shove his chest.

“I think you still owe me big time, crybaby.” A playful grin pulling your smile from ear to ear. He turns to his side, propping his head up on his elbow.

“I thought girls were into the emotional guy!” He bickers, smoothing a hand over your waist, trying not to openly ogle the mess between your legs.

“I’m kidding,” you push his hair out of his face. “Your big show was very sweet.” The hand on your waist pulls you into his embrace. “What would you have done if I didn’t open the door?” He rubs his chin in exaggerated thought.

“To be honest, that wasn’t even an option in my head. I probably would have slept on your porch until someone found me.”

“You’re such a weirdo.”

“You love it.” He smiles and pulls you into a soft kiss. After a short-lived makeout, Caleb moves to stand up.

“What kind of guy would I be if I didn’t clean up my girl?” He snorts, pulling his boxers back on. “Be right back.” And with a wink, he’s silently sliding out of your bedroom.

His girl. Caleb’s girl. You turn over and bury your face in the pillow to keep from squealing.

boy nextdoor!Caleb returns a few minutes later with a glass of ice water and a damp cloth. A sheepish, embarrassed grin on his face.

“I don’t think your Dad ever went back to sleep. I just ran into him in the kitchen.”

Today was Saturday. Simone's birthday, the one you'd been planning with her for two weeks, color coded playlist and all.

You knew who'd show and who wouldn't. Zayne never came to anything with more than five people in a room; he'd send a gift and a text. Sylus would be there past midnight like the party had been waiting on him, which, in fairness, it usually was. Rafayel was still out of town and Xavier —Xavier had walked you to class yesterday and mentioned that he had a test to study for.

He hadn't brought up Wednesday. Hadn't asked for a repeat. He seemed happy just walking beside you in silence, matching his pace to yours, and that was enough. You were relieved because your thighs couldn't take another round like that. He'd made you cum more times than you could count and you'd blacked out before his second orgasm. You woke up to him wiping you down with a warm cloth, humming something under his breath.

And still. You missed Caleb.

He was the only friend who'd been there since high school, back when he felt like a brother —carrying your backpack when your arm was in a cast, threatening a guy who stood you up sophomore year. Then something shifted senior year, some line neither of you named, and it took root over the summer before college and never let go. He hadn't texted you all week. Not once. Not even a meme, not even the thumbs up emoji he used when he couldn't be bothered to type words. That had never happened before, not even the semester he broke his wrist and had to write messages one finger at a time.

You got to Simone's early to set everything up. Gideon showed up a couple of hours later hauling two bags of ice against his hip and Caleb wasn't with him. That was wrong on its own. Those two attended every party together.

"He's coming," Gideon said, before you'd even asked. "Said he had something to take care of."

The party filled up fast after that, someone's playlist too heavy on bass. You stayed near the kitchen with a cup you angled just right so you could watch the door without looking like you were watching it. By the second hour your stomach had knotted itself tight enough that you'd stopped tasting your drink.

Then he walked in.

Not alone. A girl had her hand curled around his arm, up on her toes to say something against his ear, dark hair falling over her shoulder as she leaned in. He laughed at whatever she said, that laugh you'd have recognized anywhere, head tipping back just slightly.

You didn't stay to see if he'd notice you. Cup abandoned on the counter, bag already in hand, the last thing you saw before you were out the back door was him still bent toward her, listening and laughing.

It was cold outside. Colder by the time you'd cut halfway across campus, arms wrapped around yourself, and ran into Greyson. One of Zayne's friends from pre med, someone you'd shared a class with and one very unfortunate group project. He took one look at you shivering in your thin top and shrugged his jacket off without asking.

"Here. You'll freeze before you make it back to your dorm"

"I'm fine," you said, already pulling it on.

He laughed and fell into step beside you anyway, talking about an anatomy exam he was dreading and his girlfriend's alarming obsession with plushies. Easy conversation that didn't ask anything of you, that let you nod and half listen while your mind kept circling back to the door, to the laugh, to the girl's hand on his arm.

At your door he said goodnight and jogged off toward his building as you went inside to let the quiet close over you.

You tossed the jacket over your desk chair and started peeling off your shoes when your hand brushed something hard in the pocket. Keys. You fished them out, it was a single silver one on a carabiner with a chewed up rubber duck keychain.

Not even ten minutes later, someone knocked.

You smiled, already reaching for the keys on your desk. Of course he'd come back for them. You scooped them up, grabbed his jacket and draped it over your arm and pulled the door open, keys dangling from your fingers before you'd even looked up.

"A bit soon to be giving me the keys to your place, don't you thi—?" it was meant to be a joke.

Caleb stood in the hallway, hands shoved in his pockets. His eyes went from the keys swinging from your hand to the jacket slung over your arm, and back again. Whatever smile he'd walked up with was already gone.

"Whose is that?"

His voice had lost the party in it. Gone was the easy tone, replaced by something flat that landed somewhere in your belly.

You knew that tone. Dug in. Stubborn. It was the same voice he used when men tried to put their hands on you. You'd forgotten what that sounded like until now.

Something reckless flared up under your nerves. Days of avoiding him and now he was standing in your doorway looking at you like that. You leaned your shoulder into the frame, unhurried.

"Just a friend's," you said, letting the jacket slip a little on your arm so he'd notice how big it was. "He walked me back from the party. It was cold."

"A friend."

"Mm-hmm." You tilted your head, biting back a smile you didn't try very hard to hide. "Nice guy. Gave me his jacket without me even asking."

"Did he?"

"He did." You shrugged, one shoulder, watching the muscle in his jaw tighten. "Very sweet, actually. I might keep it."

Caleb moved, one step, closing half the distance between you, and you found yourself backing up without deciding to.

"What's his name."

"Why does it matter?"

"I just want his name."

"Jealous?" The word came out lighter than you felt. You tipped your chin up, daring him.

His eyes narrowed. "Should I be?"

You didn't answer. You just held his gaze, arms crossed loosely, jacket bunched against your ribs, and let the silence do the talking. You'd meant it as a tease. It landed like a confession.

Caleb's hand caught the door before you could think to close it, and stepped over the threshold like he had every right to be there. The door closed behind him with a heavy sound that cut off the hallway light and the cold.

"You've been running from me all week," he said.

"I haven't—"

"Don't." One word, quiet, and it stopped you cold. "I saw you by the food truck Tuesday. Wednesday you turned around and walked into a building you don't even have class in. Today you bolted out the back door the second I walked through the front." He took another step. You were nearly at your desk now, nowhere left to go. "So don't tell me you haven't been running."

Your ass met the edge of the desk. He didn't stop until there was almost nothing between you, close enough that you caught the cold night air still clinging to him, and under it, the same warm cedar smell you'd have known blindfolded.

"Maybe I like it when you chase me," you said, the teasing thinner than you wanted it to sound.

Something shifted in his face. "Yeah?"

"Maybe."

He leaned in, slow, until his mouth hovered a breath from yours, close enough that if either of you moved even slightly you wouldn't be able to help it. Your heart was beating hard against your ribs.

"Say that again," he murmured.

You didn't say anything at all.

"Maybe I should go find him, thank him properly for lending you his jacket."

"Caleb—"

"What's his name?" A ghost of a smirk, infuriating. His nose brushed yours, and you nearly closed the gap yourself before he pulled back a fraction, just out of reach.

"You're impossible."

"You like impossible." He tilted his head, closing in again, slower this time, until his lips almost grazed yours and then he stopped there too, breath warm against your mouth, watching you through half lowered lashes. "Tell me to stop."

"Stop," you whispered, and it came out all wrong, breathless instead of firm.

"Try again." He was smiling now, a smile that didn't reach his eyes so much as darken them. "Say it like you mean it." he pulled back again, like he had all the time in the world and you had none.

Your fingers curled into the front of his shirt "You're doing this on purpose."

"Obviously."

He came in again, and this time you swore his mouth grazed yours, barely, gone before you could be sure it happened at all. A soft, frustrated sound climbed up your throat.

"Caleb."

"Yeah?" he still hovered there, he needed you to break first.

Fisting his shirt, you hauled him down and crashed your mouth into his.

He groaned like you'd finally given him something he'd been starving for, one hand sliding into your hair, the other gripping your waist and pulling you flush against him. The jacket dropped from your fingers, forgotten on the floor. He kissed you like the last few days had been sitting in his chest the whole time, like the wait had worn through whatever control he'd been holding onto.

He walked you backward until your knees hit the mattress, and when you sat down hard he followed you down "No more running," he said against your jaw "Not from me."

Your fingers shook, but the urgency in your chest didn't leave room for nerves to win. You caught the hem of his shirt and pulled it up his torso, and he lifted his arms without being asked, letting you drag it off and drop it behind you. You slid your hands down to his belt and he took over from there, working it loose himself, shoving his jeans down with one impatient kick until he was standing in nothing but his underwear.

The fabric strained. The thick outline of his cock was impossible to miss.

You didn't mean to stare and he didn't give you time to. He leaned over you, pulling your top over your head in one motion, and his hands went around your back a second later, unhooking your bra like he'd done it a hundred times in his head already. The marks Rafayel had left were still faintly there. You didn't notice him catch sight of them, you were too busy working your jeans down, kicking them off.

The room's light hit the bruises on your inner thighs.

Caleb went still. His breathing turned loud and something crossed his face you'd never seen on him before, not once in all the years you'd known him.

"Who?"

It wasn't even a full question. You couldn't answer it. You couldn't even lift your eyes to his, heat crawling up your neck, half shame, half something closer to fear.

His hand found your jaw, careful even now, but firm enough that you couldn't look away from him.

"I'll find out either way"

You said nothing. Your mouth stayed shut, lips pressed together, and he pulled back like he meant to walk away from the whole thing. Panic shot through you and you grabbed his forearm, held on.

"It wasn't a stranger," you whispered.

"Then who."

He was already working through it, you could see him doing it, running through the short list of people close enough to you that this made sense. He didn't need the full story. He just needed a name.

"Rafayel," you said, and then, because there was no version of this where you got to leave it there, "and Xavier."

The color left his face. "At the same time?"

"No." You shook your head fast. "No, it wasn't like that..."

That was as far as you got before he pulled his arm free and stepped back from the bed like it had burned him.

He didn't look at you. He started pacing between your desk and the window, one hand dragging through his hair over and over, like he could pull the thought straight out of his own skull.

"Rafayel," he muttered, more to the wall than to you. "Of course. Probably had you half convinced it meant something, didn't he?" A short breath, no humor in it at all. "And Xavier." He said the name like it left a bad taste. "Quiet Xavier. Too tired for a party, but not tired enough for that."

He stopped at the window, both hands braced on the sill, shoulders locked up tight. For a second he just breathed.

"I gave you space," he said, quieter now, and the quiet was worse than the pacing had been. "After Zayne's, I backed off. Thought you needed space. Figured if I pushed, you'd run, so I didn't." He turned around, and the storm on his face had gone raw underneath. "And they didn't. They just moved into the space I left. Used it."

"Caleb, that's not fair, they didn't—"

"Didn't what?" his jaw ticked. "Know you were vulnerable right after? Because I think they knew exactly what they were doing." He crossed the room until he was close enough that you had to tip your head back to keep his eyes. "Did either of them ask what you wanted? Or did they just take what you were too shaken to say no to?"

"It wasn't like that."

"Then tell me what it was like." He crouched slightly, hands braced on the mattress on either side of you, caging you in without touching you "Because I waited. I told myself slow was better than not at all." His eyes dropped to the marks on your thighs and back up, something dark moving behind them. "They didn't wait for anything."

You fingers curled around his wrist "You're the one standing in my room right now."

Something flickered across his face —not a smile, too sharp for that, but close to one. "Yeah," he said. "I am."

His fury was still there, sitting in his jaw and his hands but his touch when it landed wasn't rough. It was heavy.

He didn't look for unmarked skin.

He went straight for what they'd left behind.

His mouth found your chest first, closing over the fading marks Rafayel had put there, and he sucked —slow and thorough— his tongue working until the skin flushed dark underneath his lips. His. Over the top of someone else's, but his now. When he was done he moved down, his thumbs pressing into the bruises on your inner thighs, pinning your legs open while his mouth found the soft flesh there and bit down soft enough not to hurt but hard enough to mark.

"Mine," he said, against your skin. "Every single one. By morning."

His fingers hooked into the leg bands of your underwear, pulling the fabric taut against you. "Your pretty pussy is already soaking through these."

He didn't take them off.

He dragged his tongue up the center seam instead, one slow stroke, and the friction of it through the soaked fabric hit your clit with a sharpness that snapped your hips off the mattress. He caught you, both hands pressing your hips back down, and then his mouth was on you again, lips closing around the swollen bud through the thin wet cotton, sucking in slow pulls that made your vision blur at the edges.

"I should have been first," he said, against the fabric, his voice vibrating through it and into you. The pressure of his lips didn't let up for a second while he talked. "I'm going to spend a long time thinking about that. How I had years and I waited and now I have to share something that should have been mine from the start."

The build was fast, mean and gave you no warning. You came with your fingers twisted in his hair and his name in your throat, soaking through the fabric completely.

He watched you, gave you approximately three seconds.

Then he pulled your underwear down your legs, dropped them off the side of the bed and his mouth was back before you'd finished shaking — bare now, his tongue flat and heavy against you, licking with an attention to detail that made your spine curl. He used two fingers to spread you open, his tongue pressing into your entrance, drawing back up to your clit.

"When I'm inside your mouth," his breath felt warm against your wet skin "I'm going to make you taste what you do to me." He kept going until you came a second time. This one was quieter and left you with tears leaking from the corners of your eyes, his name coming out in pieces.

He gave you a moment. Not a long one. Just enough to take his underwear off and then his hands grabbed your hips, lifting you slightly off the mattress, guiding himself to your entrance. He pushed inside — just the crown and the first two inches — and stopped there.

The sound you made was filthy.

It was everything you had imagined. The stretch, the fullness, the weight of him just sitting there while your body tried to accommodate it and couldn't decide between pulling him in and pushing him out. He stayed there until your mind went blank and your hands found the sheets and gripped. Then he pulled out.

The emptiness was felt awful.

He shifted up the mattress and settled on his knees in front of your face, fully hard, the evidence of the last few minutes glistening on his skin, and looked down at you.

"Tell me when to stop and I'll stop."

"Don't stop." Your voice had no strength left in it. Just the words, barely above a whisper.

"Open your mouth when I tell you to."

His thumb came down to your lower lip, pressing into the center of it, pulling it slightly down. He watched your mouth part under the pressure "Do you want me inside your pretty mouth?"

"Yes."

He leaned in just enough. Dragged the tip across your upper lip, leaving a hot wet streak against your skin, watching your face while he did it.

"Say it."

Your hands came up to grip his thighs, fingers pressing into the muscle there. "I want to suck your dick."

The exhale that left him wasn't quiet. "Good girl."

He took his time, dragging the head of his cock across your lips, down your cheek and back to your mouth, leaving a trail of pre across your skin that made something in your chest clench with how much you wanted it.

You kept your eyes on his the entire time. You wanted him to see how much you wanted this.

"Open up, sweet girl"

His cock came back to rest against your lips and your mouth opened wider on instinct, the whole talk flashed through Caleb's head in the same second —Zayne's voice, clipped and deeply irritating.

She isn't built like you. Don't push inside when she isn't ready or you'll hurt her throat. She has to breathe through her nose. Don't fight her jaw. Let her drool on it as much as she can, you'll thank me later. It needs to be slow. If you rush it, you hurt her.

His knuckles had gone white against the mattress. He slowed down.

Pressed inside carefully, just the tip, feeling your lips wrap around him and your breath change as your body adjusted. He stopped there. Watched your eyes. Waited for the slight shift in your expression that meant you were ready before he went any further.

"That's it," he managed, his voice mostly gone. "Breathe through your nose. Take your time."

You did. Your hands wrapped around the base, thumbs tracing the veins there while you let the saliva build and run, coating him in a way that made the slide easier and the visual of it more overwhelming than anything else that had happened tonight. You started to move, slow forward bobs that took him a little deeper each time, your tongue working the underside on the draw back.

Caleb made a sound above you that had nothing controlled left in it.

He matched the pace —hips rolling forward in shallow, careful thrusts that tested the back of your throat, a hand in your hair gripping without pulling, his whole body wound up and trembling slightly with the effort of not taking what he wanted at the speed he wanted it.

"You're so—" He stopped, jaw tight, trying again. "Suck it harder. Taste yourself on me. You can feel it, can't you."

You could.

You sucked harder, felt his thighs tense under your hands, felt the groan that moved through his whole body when your lips slid all the way down and your nose pressed into him and you held it there, looking up at his face.

The sight was doing something to him.

Your mouth stretched around him, eyes wet at the corners, saliva running down your chin and onto your chest in slow trails, and you were looking up at him. That was the part that was killing him. You were not looking away, not closing your eyes. You were loking directly at him with a ruined stare while you took him apart with your mouth, and every time he thought he had some grip on his composure you'd do something with your tongue and it was gone again.

He wanted to grip your hair and drive forward and lose his mind entirely.

Not yet. He held still. Let you set the pace. Let your mouth work him at the speed you'd decided on.

"God," he breathed, his head dropping back for a second before he forced it back down because he couldn't look away from you. "I've thought about this. Exactly this. More times than you can imagine."

The tears running from the corners of your eyes weren't distress. He knew the difference. Your hands were firm and steady on his thighs and every time you pushed forward to take him deeper there was a small sound in your throat that sent a pulse straight up his spine.

"That's it, just like that. Keep going just like that and don't stop."

You swallowed around him in response. His hips snapped forward an inch before he caught himself.

You noticed. Your eyes said so.

He pressed his thumb to the corner of your mouth, feeling the stretch of your lips around him. "You're so good at this," he said, the words coming out unsteady. "So fucking good. Look at you taking all of it. Other girls—"

He'd said it without thinking, his brain running three seconds behind his mouth, and he felt the exact moment it landed because your rhythm changed.

Faster.

Your eyes had gone somewhere else —still on his face, but different now, something sharp moving through them that had nothing to do with what you'd been doing a second ago. Your hands tightened on his thighs. Your mouth pushed forward, taking him deeper than you had been, the angle shifting in a way that made his breath leave him all at once.

"Wait—" he started.

You hummed. It wasn't accidental. A low vibration right around the tip of his cock, your throat working, your cheeks hollowed, and whatever sentence he'd been constructing about other girls dissolved completely because his brain stopped producing language.

"I didn't—" He tried again. Failed again. Your head was moving faster now "That's not what I —, I wasn't—"

You hummed again, deeper this time, and took him further.

"Okay. Okay. There are no other girls. There have not been — in any meaningful way — other girls. You are the only girl. You are the only—" His thighs were shaking. "Please, you have to—if you keep doing that I'm going to—"

You didn't stop doing that.

Your hands moved to grip his ass, pulling him forward, inviting a depth that made his whole body seize up.

"You're—" he looked down at you with an expression that was completely gone for you. "You're jealous and you're doing this on purpose and it's working. You've made your point."

You hummed a third time. Longer. Right over the most sensitive part of him. Your eyes were saying everything your mouth was otherwise occupied with.

The sound that came out of him was not quiet. He didn't have time to pull back. He didn't even try.

He came hard, the first pulse hitting the back of your throat without warning, and he felt you swallow — fast and determined— and then the next wave and the next, each one heavier, the volume of it backing up past your lips and running down your chin, dripping onto your chest.

You were watching him fall apart and made sure he knew you were watching.

His thighs were shaking and he was coming back slowly, the room reassembling itself around the two of you.

He looked down at you.

Lips swollen, chin a complete mess, eyes bright and entirely satisfied with yourself.

He reached down and dragged his thumb slowly across your lower lip.

"Other girls do not exist. As far as I'm concerned, going forward, they never did."

Something in your expression shifted. The jealous edge softening into something warmer.

"Good," you said, and your voice was ruined too, something he found extraordinarily satisfying.

He brought his thumb to your lip. "Open."

You opened. He pressed inside, watched you close your lips around it, watched you hold his gaze while you tasted what was on it.

He pulled his thumb back.

"You're going to be the death of me," he said. Just a fact. A fact he was making peace with.

He brought his mouth to yours. Tasting everything, not flinching from any of it.

When he pulled back his forehead dropped to yours "I'm not done," he said, into the space between your faces.

"I know," you said.

"I want to do this right." His hands cupped your face, thumbs brushing your cheekbones, "I've been waiting too long to rush it."

Years. Easy laughter. Carefully maintained distance. Him looking at you the whole time with that steady certain gaze that you'd been pretending not to understand.

"Then don't"

He kissed you again. Softer this time. And then he laid you back against the mattress and took his time.

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In the image and in life, his hair is a mess: points jutting out every imaginable angle. It looks deliberate— fixed with gel, spray, or perhaps a spontaneous desire to be a talking point at breakfast— but his eyes are sharp with curiosity as he pats at his head. Is his hair really—? Yes, he can feel it under his hand.

Now that’s confusion, soft-bellied and exposed. You don’t know when you’ll have this chance again, so you take the shots you can, rapid-fire, no mercy:

“You look like you fell asleep in a washing machine. Like you were practicing alchemy, and it blew up in your face. Ooh, ooh! You look like a toilet brush that’s been used to scrub seven million toilets.”

Sylus hums as he pokes a hair tuft. “How… colourful.”

“Seriously, Sy. I know you’re a deep sleeper, but you’d think something was nesting in there, the way that—”

You gasp.

A little preoccupied, Sylus misses the ember. By the time he gazes up, sensing warmth and danger, it’s too late to stamp on it. He tries, anyway. “No. No. Kitten? No.”

…

“Hold still, Sylus!”

Mephisto wobbles on Sylus’s head, hunkering down for stability with a chirp.

“Take your time, sweetie,” Sylus grimaces, claws in his scalp as you take so many more pictures than necessary.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m almost done… try, uh… try to look really grumpy, yeah? Like you wanna kill me. Can you do that, Sy?”

He can’t, actually. He might be bleeding, ridiculed, but there’s light in his eyes as he watches you laugh and fuss over the composition of his downfall. When you say something about the rule of thirds, you catch his lip quirking; he’s trying not to smile.

You lower your phone, grinning. “Okay. I’ve got it.”

Sylus lifts Mephisto from his head— plonking him down on the kitchen counter, then finally, finally, tending to his hair. He mumbles as he smooths it back down, guiding silver-white curls with his fingers: “The things I do for you, kitten. Just make sure the twins don’t see it, hm? I couldn’t care less what they think, but the headaches, oh, they’d never let me hear the end of—”

Across Onychinus’s base, someone shrieks with laughter. Sylus flinches.  

You glance up from your phone, where your group chat with Luke and Kieran is open. “Hmm? Say that again, Sy, sorry, I missed it.”