I don’t say anything in reply. My head is too full of opposing thoughts and feelings.
“Finny?”
“Sorry,” I say. “I was trying to decide whether I should kill Jack for telling you I was into you or if I should kill him for telling you that I wasn’t into you. Tough call.”
“Noooo,” Autumn says. She kisses my cheek. “Don’t be mad. He was looking out for you. It was sweet. He loves you.”
“Yeah,” I admit. Jack was protecting me, but there’s no way he believed that I was over Autumn. I’m wondering now though. “What would you have done if he’d told you the truth, that I was”—I try to remember how Jack put it before—“bonkers in love with you?”
Autumn rests her head on my shoulder. I can’t believe this is real life, holding her like this.
“Hmm,” she says. “I think I would have had a hard time believing him.”
“Really?”
“I mean, yeah. I’m not exactly your type.”
“I—” I decide to skip over the whole “type” comment. “Let’s say Jack convinced you. I’m certain he could have eventually. Then what?”
“I guess I would have…” Autumn trails off and begins again. “I guess I would have flirted with you?”
“How?”
“I have no idea,” Autumn says. “But when I gave you my nov—Oh.” Before I can react, she’s sliding off my lap and looking at me with frantic eyes. “With everything that happened last night, I almost forgot you read my book.”
She’s looking at me like I’ve turned into a wild animal she does not trust.
“Autumn, it was great,” I tell her. She’s still looking at me dubiously. “Really.”
“It’s a first draft,” she says. “It can’t be great. But if you liked it okay, that’s a good start.”
“I loved it,” I say.
She shakes her head, brushing off my praise.
“Why were you so nervous to share it with me?”
“Because.” Autumn picks at the blanket in her lap. “It’s all of me, dissected and splayed out. I’m not nervous about how you interpreted Izzy and Aden’s relationship anymore, but last night, I thought it might be the end of our friendship. Because you got over me. After I abandoned you.”
“But I didn’t,” I say. “I couldn’t get over you.”
She looks back at me.
“I’m glad you didn’t,” she says, and a smile cracks her worry briefly. “So you liked the book. Obviously, you’re biased.”
“You remember how furious I was last night? I thought you’d recorded my devotion in perfect detail and then dropped it in my lap without considering my feelings. And I still loved it as a story. You’re a good writer, Autumn. You’ve always been good.”
Autumn shrugs and looks away, but her smile is back. “Thanks,” she whispers.
I can’t take it anymore. I lean over and kiss her deeply. A few minutes are lost to that, and then I gasp as I feel her fingers close around me.
“We can’t double our chances of you getting pregnant,” I say, even though I’m kissing her neck now and doing nothing to stop her hand.
Autumn pulls away and puts her other hand on my shoulder.
“Don’t worry,” she whispers. “I know what to do.” Autumn pushes me down on the bed, and for some unknown period of time, I am entirely at her mercy.
thirteen
“How much longer do we have?” Autumn asks.
I don’t want to think about it, but I glance at the clock anyway. We’ve kissed and dozed the afternoon away.
“In an hour, I should take a shower,” I say. When she went to the bathroom earlier, I quietly checked my phone and saw the text from Sylvie, confirming I can pick her up at her house after seven.
Autumn presses her back into my chest, and I stop stroking her arm to hug her. I raise my head and kiss her cheek. We’ve been lying like this for a while.
After Autumn charmingly tortured me with her hands and then triumphantly ravished me with her mouth, I tried to return the favor. I needed more coaching, but Autumn’s enthusiasm remained throughout.
Again and again this afternoon, Autumn has looked at me like she’s trying to believe I’m real. It was such a strange mirror of my own feelings.
Over and over, Autumn has told me she loves me. She’s said it breathlessly between kisses. She’s growled it before biting me softly on the shoulder, making me gasp in surprised pleasure. She’s said it smugly after destroying me, while I was still trembling in her hold.