Smash!

•T W E N T Y T W O•

Jamie's POV

"That feels good." Riley moans, his naked torso arching up in pleasure. His dark hair sticks to his forehead, draping over his shut eyes. Water drops drum against my cheeks, cooling my heated, flushed skin. As my hands go up and down his broad back, I try to not to go to hard against his yellowing bruises.

"I feel like I'm working in a nursing home." I grumble.

"Can you scrub harder, Jamie?" Riley moans with a goofy smile on his wet face. Sleeves clumsily rolled up to my elbow, I stand on my tippy toes outside our shower, my damp arms reaching past the shower curtain between us to wash Riley's back. Battered and bruised, Riley can't reach behind to wash without yelling out in pain.

"Why you're at it, could you massage my back?"

"No way." I decline.

"Fine," he sighs. "How about coming in and washing my hair for me?" He jokes. I don't have to be in the actual shower to know he's smirking up at the running shower head.

"In your dreams."

"That would be one hell of a wet dream." Riley chuckles, leaning into my touch.

"Alright, you're squeaky clean." My arms happily sighs in relief as they fall back down at my sides. As I exit the steamy bathroom, Riley calls out a thank you followed with one last invitation to join him and wash his dark hair. An invitation I don't bother answering, but did silently contemplate it.

It has been a long time since I've been with a guy. Dropping onto my stomach on my bed, I try to remember the last time I had a boy over. Glancing out the window over my bed, the pale sunshine shines on my string of heartbreaks, and every awful feeling I've felt harshly reminding me. Before Riley there was only one other person who I let into this apartment, a cute mover I hired when I first moved in years ago, who helped me break in my then new sofa. Before that I dated here and there, who all turned out to be jerks. The guy who dumped me at homecoming. After him a pointless, short term relationship with a troubled guy who dumped me after he took my virginity.

"I'm getting to use to that low water pressure. My standards are lowering." Riley lowers next to me, struggling to pull on a tshirt. Straightening up onto my knees, I help him pull his bruised head through, easily sliding it over his scabbed shoulders.

"This close I can count all your freckles." Riley huskily says, as his damp head emerges from under the shirt. We're close, very close. So close I can see small water drops sticking to his lashes. Knees brushing his outer thighs, hands lingering on his shoulders, I just realized, as if I just got electrocuted with logic, that I'm so comfortable with Riley that I sort of just threw myself into his personal space without a spare thought. Why did it take me so long to realize till now?

"If you count, we'll be here all night." I say quietly, my eyes falling down towards his spilt lips.

"Sounds like a fun night in." He jokes, leaning forward to start counting out loud. Riley makes it to thirty five freckles before I cut him off by laughing in his face. He tries to make it to forty, but can't with my nose crinkling up with laughter. Giving up, Riley pushes me aside, grumbling an insult about my many, many freckles.

"I have something to give you." Riley digs through his pocket.

"A puppy?" I joke.

"Why a puppy of all things?" Riley questions, his hand freezing up in his pockets with a befuddled look on his bruised face.

"They're nature's friendliest friend. I've always wanted one, but my grandmother wouldn't let us have one for a number of boring, yet realistic adult reasons." I explain, all those dejected hopes from childhood clenching my heart painfully tight. My grandma's most important excuse was she was too old to look after two children, and an animal.

"It's not a puppy. Not even close. So, this is kind of going to suck in comparison." Riley drops a crisp wad of money held together by a rubber band into my hand.

"What is this?"

"Rent."

"Rent?"

"Rent." I thumb through, counting the fifty dollar bills that smell like what I would imagine a gstring smells like. Finding a total of four hundred dollars, I search Riley's face for answer. I'm not the type to be bought. If he thinks four hundred can erase that awful week he left, he's about to be mistaken.

"I've been crashing here for a couple of weeks. Nearly a whole month. So long that this is my home now. So, I have to pay rent too." Riley tries to sound matter of factory, but he can't hide that sheepish look on his face, or the self conscious gleam burning in his dark eyes. Heart soaring, I clench onto money, trying to hide the huge smile threatening to spilt my cheeks.

For someone who is so straight forward, Riley ironically never tells you how he feels. No, instead he shows you. He doesn't say pointless things just to talk, or be fake to pretend he's pleasant. But when it comes to heartstrings, he'll speak through his actions. Rent is his gesture of something permanent. A gesture of committing.

"So, we're going to be splitting the rent every month from now on? As indefinitely?" I ask, fighting to keep my freckled cheeks still. One corner rising into any form of a grin will undone this moment.

"That's the plan." Riley nods, not looking me in the eye. Not able to suppress my content any longer, a huge smile breaks out across my face, so large it makes my cheeks ache.

"Don't get all excited about it." Riley grumbles, clasping his hands over my eyes and my ear to ear smile.

Please tell me your favorite scene thought the entire story!! Your comments inspire me to write faster!