The Tutor

Chapter 20: Tokyo

Part Two: Japan

Sumire woke up feeling strangely peaceful. She felt the odd, weightless, bumping of the plane, and reflected that everything was just much more comfortable in first class. Even the "blanket" wasn't really a blanket, but rather a lovely down comforter with the JAL logo embroidered in red across the bottom.

Wow.

It was so warm. Sumire shifted a little, and realized that the warmth she felt along her back wasn't from the comforter at all, but was rather from the presence of another body, specifically that of one Nick Pensieri. He was tucked up against her like the proverbial spoon in a drawer, from chest to feet, knees drawn intimately against the backs of her legs, hips aligned with hers, exhalations rhythmic against the back of her neck.

Why wasn't she freaking out?

She tried to shift away from him, to stealthily move toward the window, which showed bright light around the shade, but she discovered that his arm was drawn firmly around her waist, holding her against his body. She hadn't realized this fact at first because his arm was on top of the comforter and she couldn't feel it, but once she became aware of it, she couldn't stop feeling it, how it was holding her in, keeping her hemmed in against his body, a warm, living belt of sorts.

Cautiously, she attempted to lift his hand and arm off her body, but he made a soft sound of protest and snuggled in even closer, something she wouldn't have believed was possible. She wouldn't have thought there was even an inch of space between their bodies.

Apparently, there was.

Or there had been. There wasn't anymore. She could even feel where his shirt had ridden up and his bare skin was pressed against the fabric of her shirt. At least that one layer was still between them. She didn't know what she would've done if they'd had skin on skin contact, especially the intimate, secret skin of his chest and her back.

Sumire remained where she was, trying to think about the situation rationally. She knew her aversion to being touched stemmed from what had happened to her when she was little, and she knew it was affecting her life negatively. She knew from her copious reading on the subject that one of the ways to deal with it was to slowly acclimate herself to being touched in non-threatening situations. It was called exposure therapy. And she knew that Nick would never, ever hurt her.

He was her friend.

Come on, Sumire, stop being a baby, try to be a little bit brave?

So she continued to lie still, to just experience being close to Nick, to feeling his breaths on her neck, his arm around her waist (through the blanket, thankfully), his skin against her back (through her shirt), and to not flipping out. Every time she felt herself starting to breathe faster, she focused on slowing it down, and every time she felt herself tensing up, she tried as hard as she could to focus on relaxing, one muscle, one joint at a time.

After a while, she noticed that Nick smelled very nice. She wondered what she smelled like to him. She reflected also that there must be hundreds of women out in the world who'd been in this position with him, who'd enjoyed this closeness, this fragrance of Nick, this warmth. How sad for them to like it, to want it, then to have to give it up.

She finally felt Nick's breathing change and deepen, his body tense as he became aware of his surroundings, and she steeled herself and turned over to face him.