You at school biatch? Alex asked me to help him with their muscles exam next week and I figured you would already have a study room locked down
True to her word, Thu, and the others, allowed the group to fall back into their normal rhythm, pretending Harper’s meltdown hadn’t happened. Harper was beyond grateful. She knew they wanted to return to the issue, but she trusted them to not push her on it further.
I’m in 112. Dan’s coming
I bet he is ;）
you’re disgusting
lawlz see you soon
The door to the study room opened quietly and Harper tossed her phone to the side. Dan walked in and her heart gave a squeeze in greeting. Damn, she’d really missed him.
She smiled and slid her backpack off the table, making room for him next to her. He grinned back, taking the seat.
“Hi,” he said. He stared at her and Harper wanted to bottle the tenderness in his gaze and wear it like perfume. Indecision flickered in his eyes before he reached his arm around the back of her neck and leaned in, planting a soft kiss on the top of her head. Dan lingered for a moment, breathing against her hair. It was close and familiar and maddeningly intimate, making her body thrum with need.
She gave herself a half-hearted shake and pulled away. You’re moving. You’re a mess. Stop. The words repeated in her head like a sick mantra, but the cruel voice said them with weakened resolve.
“Hi,” she finally said, her tongue thick and heavy. “Why are you wet?”
Dan ran a hand through his damp hair, making the gentle waves clump together.
“I had cadaver lab today. I went home and took a scalding hour-long shower and pretty much scrubbed my skin off.”
An image of Dan washing his long, lean muscles under steamy water popped into her head and she resisted the urge to fan herself.
“How did that go?” she asked, shifting slightly away from him and subtly adjusting her thighs to alleviate some pressure. Cadaver dissection and horniness were not an acceptable combination.
“The shower was good, thanks.” He shot her a cheeky grin and she batted his shoulder.
“How was cadaver?”
He shrugged, his teasing replaced with sheepishness. “It was kind of tough, to be honest—for me at least. I couldn’t quite get past it being a person, you know? It’s weird to be in a room with a dozen dead bodies and disassociate from the fact that they were once … people.”
Harper nodded. Cadaver lab was a huge privilege for health professionals to learn from, but that didn’t stop it from also turning her stomach.
“I had a hard time with it too.”
Dan’s eyes perked up. “Yeah? So I’m not a massive wimp?”
“Not because of cadaver at least. Other parts of you…” she teased, and he gave her earlobe a playful tug that set her heart racing.
Harper was starting to feel like her body was one giant pleasure nerve that only required Dan to take a deep enough breath before going off like a bomb, but her physiology textbook lacked a chapter called “Super Horny Girls Practicing Self-Denial,” so she didn’t have the science to back her up.
“But you felt weird about it too?” Dan asked earnestly.
“Oh, for sure. It’s a really bizarre experience. You’re there to learn and understand the body better, but it feels wrong to separate that from the actual human that was in there. You can’t help but wonder who the person was … It reminded me of my mom’s death, I think.”
It felt like an anvil dropped in her gut and she scrambled to put a source to that admission. That was a thought she’d refused to even give form to in her own mind during cadaver—something that had lurked the whole time she dissected and analyzed the anonymous body on a table.
She waited for the sharp feelings and onslaught of pain that usually accompanied such clear thoughts of her mom, but they didn’t hit her. The words had left her brain, traveled out of her mouth and into Dan’s ears, and she didn’t fall apart. She didn’t break.
And she wasn’t sure what to make of that.
She looked at Dan and saw the reflection of her surprise in his eyes. She also saw the moment he gingerly took her piece of honesty and cradled it in his mind. He nodded gently, telling her without words that he’d treat that piece of her delicately and with respect. No poking or prodding or nagging for it to be more. Just allowing it to be a small moment of her vulnerability that they now shared.
“The smell really freaked me out too,” he said slowly, and Harper wanted to thank him on her knees for his willingness to move on.