Completed A Precarious Rendezvous

[Kristen Pirian]

What started as a small daring of the heart, unclear in its goal but certain its impetus, had become something greater. In quiet moments, in still moments, in dark moments beneath the stars while traveling or beneath the familiar ceiling of her dorm, she wondered. Each of these sessions of wondering was marked by the same fiery liveliness of racing thoughts, thrilling and frightening, exciting and worrying, as if each new session was yet the first come again.

Here now came the answer which in all this intermittent restlessness had eluded her.

Kristen blushed deeply. She forgot, briefly, everything: the reason for this precarious rendezvous, the concern over all that had been discussed, the fact of her and Alistair's lingering in this alley. How could these things, so diminutive before the pulsing warmth in her cheeks and the swell of flame in her chest, hold any sway over her attention? All she saw was Alistair. All she heard were his words.

And her reply:

"Nor would I want you to do so."

He had taken a step back, but his hands she clutched still in hers and she with a kind of immediate desperation, as if the loss of this intimacy now would mean the loss of it forever, tightened her grip just so. Just so. Enough to suggest through the squeeze of her hands an entreaty for him to stay. Stay just a moment longer.

So that she could work up the courage to ask what she was going to ask. Her heart was pounding with terribly wonderful pain.

"May you...kiss me again?"

Alistair Krixus

 

[Alistair Krixus]

Oh, why did she have to hold on? Why did she have to look up at him with those grey eyes and that auburn hair that framed her face perfectly? She could have just called him names and stormed off; he might have left it at that.

He knew those words to be a lie even as he thought them. The thumping of his heart was beating so much louder than those thoughts. It was a novel experience. His life had been defined by intellect and following his head, and this was going against everything his head kept telling him.

The most gentle of squeezes to his hand was enough to override every objection his mind could create. Alistair stepped back to close the distance, while never letting go of her hand. It was only now that he realized that at some point in this conversation, he had forgotten to breathe.

A sharp intake of breath was followed by the words, "I would very much like that."

With his free hand, he reached up to cup her chin before he leaned in and kissed her. This one was the exact opposite of the fleeting moment that they had shared before.

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

All worry and fear from everything was gone, and it was as though a blossom of fire unfurled within her heart and consumed her body entire. Kristen melted into the moment, the initial gentleness of her lips pressed to his born of a disbelief that this was even happening, and the ensuing passion born from the sheer joy that it was. She didn't know when her hand had found freedom and thus rose to cradle Alistair's neck beneath the solid line of his jaw, but it had. Even before they parted, this kiss and all of its attending sensations—the tickling whisper of his breath, the texture of his lips, the press of his skin to hers—would stake its permanent claim within her memory until Aionus welcomed her into His fold.

Her chest swelled with the slow pace of her breath. Her eyes were on his, and even in the night's gloom their vivid blue was not lost to her.

"Once more," she said, a touch greedily—oh but there would be time to chastise herself for it later. "Once more, and then we must go. I shall miss—"

She couldn't wait any longer, and all but threw herself with a fierce longing to him again, savoring this second kiss and all its intimacy just as much as the first.

Alistair Krixus

 

[Alistair Krixus]

Alistair did not need any more encouragement as he hungrily leaned deeper into the kiss that both of them refused to end. Her words bounced around in his head, echoing and multiplying.

Once more, once more, once more. Again and again and again.

The logic in his brain had long since been overwhelmed by the passions as the only things that registered in his brain were the warmth of Kristen's body pressed close to him, and the taste of her lips against his own. He would have left himself to get lost in these passions forever not for the slightest of noises.

The sounds of footsteps.

Instinctively, Alistair pressed Kristen deeper into the shadows of the alley. Slowly, the sound of the footsteps began to grow further away and then they were gone. They had never even come close to their alley, but it was enough to break Alistair from his high, as logic slowly began to wrestle control once again.

He inhaled a deep breath before offering Kristen the slightest smile as he broke the kiss. He looked down at her, but with great effort, he pulled himself away and pulled his cloak tight.

"I will write to you...We will do this again."

The last comment managed to pull a small smirk to his face, a rare facial expression that showed a mischievous side to Alistair that he rarely showed.

Not trusting himself to hold back his urges with Kristen any longer. He turned and entered the streets, once again fading into the shadows.

Kristen Pirian

 

[Kristen Pirian]

Somehow, for reasons she could not readily explain, the sound of the footsteps and Alistair's quick thinking, guiding her with a sure but gentle force into the deepest pocket of shadow, heightened the experience. A giddy excitement soared in her chest alongside the already roiling waves of her impassioned heart.

But so it was that all good things must come to an end. And here, if for no other reason than the urgent beseeching of her lungs, they had to part from one another. Kristen breathed heavily, chest rising and falling, and all was lovely, just lovely, despite the troubles of the past and the uncertainty of the future. Yes, lovely indeed.

I will write to you...We will do this again.

"So shall longing and anticipation mingle until it is so."

That smile, that smirk, framed by what scant light fell upon them from the moons, these little lapses in Alistair's otherwise unfalteringly stolid countenance were the things she would hold onto until then.

But they could not stay. She could not stay. Kristen turned as Alistair turned, leaving the alley through its opposite exit, and so did the two of them vanish into the night, carrying sweet memories.

Alistair Krixus