The study was dark when I finally came downstairs.
I hadn't meant to. I'd spent an hour staring at the ceiling in my room, running my fingers over the places on my shoulders where his hands had been, replaying the way his breathing had changed, the way his forehead had almost touched mine. The way he'd pulled back like I'd burned him.
Not like this, he'd said.
What did that mean? Not like this. Like this was wrong, or like this wasn't the right moment, or like he was one breath away from something he couldn't take back and he knew it?
I gave up on sleep around midnight and wrapped a cardigan around myself and went downstairs, not thinking about where I was going until I was already standing in the hallway outside his study door.
The light was on underneath it.
I almost turned around.
