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“So how does it feel?” Mei asked, leaning across the table and snagging a couple of Candace’s fries.
“Do you want me to order a basket for you?”
“No thanks. Yours always taste better when we share.” Her best friend winked. “Now come on. Answer my question. Candace Garret, how does it feel to be out of college an entire semester earlier than the rest of us regular achievers?”
Candace rolled her eyes. “Technically, I’m not done for real. I just finished all my coursework.”
“Finished all your coursework for a double major in Art History and Spanish with a minor in Sociology,” Mei said. “And now you’re off to spend an entire semester in Ecuador. How does it feel?”
Candace ducked her head to hide her smile. “Weird. Hella weird.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Mei chuckled. “You gonna miss me?”
Candace snatched her basket of French fries away from Mei’s grasp. “Absolutely. I won’t know what to do with myself when I can finally eat an entire basket of French fries for the first time in three and a half years all by myself.”
Mei frowned, “It won’t be as fun as you think. It’s gonna go right to our hips.”
Candace put her basket of fries in the middle of the table. “I’ll be back for graduation.”
Mei snatched two fries and shoved them into her mouth with a smile. “You better,” she mumbled around the food.
“Well, hello there, ladies,” Miles yelled from across the bar.
“Shut up,” Candace and Mei yelled back.
He pretended to be affronted, but slid into the booth next to Mei, their bodies crushing together after so long — three hours — apart.
“Hey, Candace,” Ezra said shyly, as he slid into the booth next to her, his eyes trained on the table.
“Hey,” she said back, always enjoying the way his neck and cheeks turned bright red whenever she spoke to him, even though they’d all been a very tight quad for three years now. It was cute. Frustrating, but cute.
“Are you— Are you all packed?” he asked, still avoiding her eyes.
“Mostly. My mom and dad are coming up next week to grab my furniture and all the clothes I don’t need. But my bags are overstuffed for Quito.”
“When do you leave?”
She didn’t answer him right away. She waited. The sound of Mei and Miles kissing and laughing with each other — lost in their own world — met her silence. Finally, he looked up at her and made eye contact, like he always did when she waited long enough.
“Tomorrow morning,” she finally answered.
The color drained from his face.
“So we gotta live it up tonight,” Miles said unexpectedly, jolting them out of the moment.
“Yeah, we do. We’re gonna send my girl off right,” Mei echoed.
Candace and Ezra groaned.
***
Candace wasn’t sure if getting dumped into bed with her boyfriend by eleven, both of them passed out and snoring, was how Mei wanted to welcome the new year or if this was what she meant by sending her best friend off right, but it was what was happening. So it would have to do and Mei wouldn’t care probably, whenever she woke up.
“They’re kind of sweet when they’re passed out,” she said to Ezra as she stepped back to look down at their friends.
“Quieter at least,” he mumbled irritably.
She snorted a laugh as they watched their friends naturally gravitate to one other in their drunken slumber. Candace chuckled as she turned to walk out of the room, Ezra on her heels. He closed the door gently, even though she was certain nothing was going to wake those two up.
“So, what should we do for the next hour?” she asked.
Ezra looked around the living room. It was piled high with boxes of Candace’s clothes, too many clothes for her parents to pick up after she’d left. “Do you need any help packing?”
“Sure,” she said, even though she’d already told him she was finished.
She walked into her bedroom. The room was mostly empty. She’d taken all her posters and art prints down from the walls, packed away all her jewelry and trinkets. Her closet only had a few hangers left inside with the outfit she was traveling in tomorrow. And her suitcases were jam packed on the closet floor. But her bed was still made and topped with her favorite jumbo brown teddy bear that up until now had gone with her to every place she’d ever lived.
“Are you taking Teddy with you?” Ezra asked.
She turned to him and smiled. He stood just outside the threshold of her room, too nervous to enter. She reached for his hand and pulled him inside, walking him across the room and pushing him onto her bed. He landed stiffly. She pretended to ignore his flushed cheeks.
“I wish, but I can’t. My parents are taking him home.”
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. Because of course he would.
“It’s okay,” she said, even though it wasn’t. “How’s your mom?”
He ducked his head and smiled. “Better. Her hair’s long enough to almost put in a ponytail so she’s teaching my dad how to do French braids.”
She loved the way he looked in that moment; so happy he could burst. She loved him. But he... Well, she didn’t really know what he thought about her. He was too hard to read. He was so nervous around her even after three years that he still dissolved into a red-faced stuttering mess when she tried to talk to him. She couldn’t even imagine what he would do if she tried to flirt with him for real.
Three years of not really knowing where she stood with Ezra made her second-guess herself. She wanted to walk across the room and kiss him, or put his warm hand on her breast and stare at him until he squeezed. But what if he didn’t respond? She didn’t know how Ezra felt about her; not really. It wasn’t indifference, but she couldn’t rightly say that it was interest either. Sometimes she caught him looking at her as if she was the only person in the world. He’d kissed her two out of the three New Year’s Eves they’d spent together, but he’d never asked her out. He never called her just to say hi or to go to the mall, just the two of them. So Candace looked away and swallowed all that unrequited love she felt for him like she had been for years. Because if she was wrong — if she’d been reading Ezra wrong all this time — she knew she wouldn’t be able to handle his too kind rejection. Not right now.
“So give me an update on your Gilder submission. When is everything due?” she asked.
He swallowed loudly. “February first.”
She sat on the bed next to him and bounced a couple of times before she felt strong enough to turn to him with a smile that looked as normal as she could manage. She bent her left leg; her knee grazed his thigh. “Nervous?”
He nodded.
“Nervous about the prize or nervous about sitting on my bed?” she blurted out before she could stop herself. Maybe that one glass of champagne she’d drank earlier had gone to her head.
“Both,” he squeaked.
“Ezra,” she whispered his name. She’d always loved the way it tasted on her tongue.
He swallowed slowly.
“Ezra, are you going to miss me?”
His entire neck had turned the brightest shade of red Candace had ever seen. When he turned to her, his pupils were fully dilated and he looked as if he might be on the verge of passing out. But he managed to nod.
“Do you remember our kiss freshman year, Ezra?”
He nodded again.
“And sophomore year?”
He’d never stopped nodding, so she took that as a yes.
“Do you want to kiss me goodbye, Ezra?” The question was an innocent tease, but she couldn’t be sure exactly who she was teasing, him or herself. She was terrified of his answer.
His eyes widened in shock, but his nodding sped up comically.
She exhaled the breath she hadn’t realized she was holding and reached out tentatively, placing her hands flat on his chest. She felt his muscles jump and heard his breath hitch even as he leaned into her touch. She smiled at him and moved her hands slowly up his pectorals to circle his neck. Her fingers slipped into his hair as their heads dipped forward. Their mouths moved closer and closer until their lips were almost touching. Their eyes locked and just as their lips met, he whispered her name into her mouth. It was divine. It was everything she’d ever fantasized about at night in this room, her hands in her underwear.
This kiss was nothing like that first kiss three years ago. That kiss had been tame, soft lips moving together and over in a heartbeat, even if Candace had spent the past three years thinking about it. This started off, in some ways, like that second kiss: tentative but hotter by the second. But it quickly morphed into something new; something Candace had only ever dreamed of experiencing.
This kiss was soft lips that spread on a shared gasp, wet tongues moving tentatively forward. After that first spark of connection, Candace smiled in surprise as Ezra’s tongue pushed confidently into her mouth, gliding against her tongue, his lips pressing and prying her mouth open. She wouldn’t have thought Ezra capable. She was happy to be wrong.
They fumbled a bit, his hand on her hip when she wanted it higher. But that was okay. With his tongue stroking hers she suddenly felt brave enough to grab his hand and place it on her breast like she’d been considering. And maybe he was braver too, because he used his mouth to push her head just slightly back so he could deepen their kiss. She smiled against his mouth.
She moaned and he pulled back sharply. “Is that okay? Am I doing it right?”
She could have screamed, but she laughed and nodded impatiently. “It’s more than okay, Ezra. Don’t worry.”
He smiled shyly and she pushed him back onto her bed. She crawled on top of him and dipped her head. Their mouths crashed together again.
His hands moved to the hem of her t-shirt and tentatively slipped underneath. She smiled against his lips. She’d been waiting three years for this.
“Is this okay?” he asked again as his hands covered her bra-covered breasts and he trailed soft kisses along her cheek.
She nodded and then shook her head.
He pulled back immediately.
She sat up to straddle his waist and locked eyes with him as she lifted her shirt over her head and then reached back to unhook her bra. Candace wished she’d had the forethought to turn the light off, but she also loved watching the shock and arousal play on Ezra’s face as she bared her breasts to him.
His arms were locked stiffly at his sides as if he was terrified to touch her bare skin. She grabbed his hands and gently placed them on her waist. And then she waited.
“I’m a virgin,” he whispered.
“I know,” she said. “We can stop whenever you want.”
His eyes had been locked on her breasts but flew to her face. “Why would I want to stop?”
Her shocked laughter filled the room. “You’re still so very interesting, Ezra Posner. Whenever I think I get you; I don’t.”
He smiled shyly as his hands moved across her skin slowly, dry and warm, leaving a path of electricity in their wake. His fingertips blazed a trail up the soft flesh that spilled over the waist of her jeans, up the rounded planes of her hips, and across her rib cage. He cupped her breasts gently.
“Play with my nipples,” she whispered, part instruction, part plea.
He moved his thumbs over them, circling each bud softly. “Like this?”
She nodded. “You don’t have to be so gentle.”
He nodded back and began to pluck at them as he bit his bottom lip in concentration. She smiled. She’d seen this look on his face before. In the library computer lab, during their Biology III midterm, while they studied with Mei and Miles at the campus coffee shop, whenever he inspected the salad bar in the dining hall. She’d always dreamt that he would look at her that way and imagined what it would do to her body if he did.
“Ow,” she hissed.
“Shit, sorry.” He moved his hands away, holding them up in apology.
She smiled down at him and grabbed his hands, moving them back to her breasts. “It’s okay, Ezra. Just don’t twist that hard, okay?”
He nodded and began tentatively massaging her breasts again.
Once they’d reestablished their rhythm, her eyes closed, and her hips began to circle at the waist as she ground into his lap. She moaned when she felt his mouth cover her right nipple. “God, yes.” Her head fell back in ecstasy.
Ezra had always been quick at picking up new skills. He was also a hard worker and very focused on doing things right. And just as Candace had always secretly hoped, when he turned his attention toward pleasuring her body, it was amazing. His head moved from one breast to the other, kissing and licking at her while she rode his lap, trying desperately to get herself off on the growing bulge in his pants. She cupped the back of his head, scratching at his scalp, gently pulling his strands through her fingers. She whimpered when he stopped, already missing his touch. She looked down at him, confused, and the sight of him looking up at her, her breasts in his hands, made her shiver.
“Can we reposition?” he asked, oh so politely as usual.
She couldn’t help but smile down at him. “Of course, Ezra.”
She crawled off his lap and he jumped from the bed excitedly, pulling his shirt over his head.
Candace had never seen Ezra without his shirt on and since he seemed to swing between scorching and glacial with her, she wasn’t sure if she ever would again. She greedily drank in every new part of him just in case this was the only time she got to see it. She was surprised at how sexy she found the veil of dark hair on his chest and down his stomach. Her gaze followed that hair to the waist of his jeans and then her attention settled on the bulge she’d been riding. She sucked her bottom lip into her mouth.
“Can we...?”
She looked at his face. “Can we what, Ezra?” She smiled.
He swallowed again and took a deep breath. “Can I taste you?”
Her mouth fell open in shock and her eyes widened. “Ezra, have you ever eaten a girl out before?”
He shook his head quickly, but he didn’t blush, Candace noticed. “But I’ve had dreams.”
“Have you?” She couldn’t help but laugh.
“Dreams about you,” he said.
The laughter died on her tongue. “Have you?” she whispered.
He looked her directly in the eyes and nodded. “Always. Can you teach me?”
Candace could have screamed again. Why hadn’t he ever said anything? Three years. They’d been friends for three years and he’d never said anything. Not once. And she had no idea why.
The only thing that kept the frustrated yell from her throat was that she’d known almost from the moment she’d met Ezra at freshman orientation that she’d have to wait for him. And so far, he’d been worth it. She let out a frustrated breath and nodded up at him. His smile was so big Candace could hardly think as she tried to memorize it.
She leaned back against Teddy and unbuttoned her jeans. She shimmied out of them with Ezra’s help and lifted her hips as he grabbed her underwear. She would have worn something sexier if she’d ever imagined that Ezra Posner would be kneeling between her thighs, red-faced with lust rather than embarrassment, shirtless, with a more than impressive bulge in his pants. But now that he was, who cared that she didn’t have sexier panties? Certainly not Ezra, who placed them on the floor gently without looking, his eyes laser-focused on her sex.
She pressed her knees together and she could have sworn she heard him whimper. She liked it. “Are you ready, Ezra?”
He nodded, his hands fisting the bedsheets on either side of her hips in anticipation. She spread her legs again slowly and then lifted them to rest her feet on his shoulders. He licked his lips.
Candace had to bite back a moan. Did he even know what he was doing to her?
She reached between her legs. “Give me your hand.”
He nodded, his eyes still trained on her. She grabbed his index and middle fingers and ran the pads of his digits down her lips.
“How does it feel?” she whispered in a shaky breath.
“Wet,” he croaked and then cleared his throat. “Soft. So soft.”
They moved his fingers up and down and then she spread them, spreading herself open for him. She heard the sharp intake of his breath as he saw her for the first time.
She moved his middle finger to the base of her sex and pulled a moan from his lips as his finger slowly moved inside. She watched him as he pumped his digit in and out slowly — so damn slowly — his eyebrows bunched in concentration.
“Is this okay?” he asked again.
“You could add another,” she whispered, her own breath ragged.
His hand stopped and he looked up at her. “Are you sure?”
She bit her bottom lip to try and stifle the smile, but she failed. “Very.”
His free hand gripped her hip and they both moaned as he slipped one more finger inside her, massaging her gently. This time he watched her face as he worked her over. Her chest rose and fell faster and her eyes drifted closed.
“Can I taste you now?”
She whimpered. He sounded needy. It was so wonderful to finally be on the same page, she thought to herself. “Yes,” she moaned. “Just lick me. Or kiss me like you kissed my mouth.” She wasn’t even sure if her voice had risen high enough for him to hear until his tongue swiped up her lips.
Her legs fell open and she cried out as he did it again and again with increasing pressure.
She was going to tell him where her clit was and ask him to suck it, but his fingers were still working her over and his wet tongue was so nice that words were becoming harder to conjure. So when his tongue accidentally grazed her clit, she reached down and cupped the back of his head to keep his tongue just there, knowing that he would catch on. Ezra was the smartest boy she knew.
His fingers dug into the soft flesh of her hip with the perfect amount of pressure. Then his tongue scraped over her hard clit again and she groaned. He lifted his head. She loosened her grip and did the same. She watched and moaned as he ran two of his soaked fingers up her lips and pulled back the hood to expose her sensitive nub. “Is this...?”
“Yes. Please,” she groaned, her hips lifting from the bed, trying to close the distance to his mouth.
“What should I...?”
“Suck it, Ezra. Please.” Of all the ways she’d imagined tonight unfolding, she’d never expected that she would beg — actually beg — Ezra Posner to suck her clit. But as it happened, she’d once had a dream exactly like this, so she wasn’t mad about this development at all.
His mouth covered her again and he sucked her clit into his mouth like she was the fountain of youth.
“Oh god,” she moaned, and her head fell back.
He pushed his fingers back into her sex and turned his hand to stroke her inside at the same rhythm as his mouth. Candace’s legs began to shake and her sex clenched around his fingers. She moved her hands back to his head, not that she was at all worried that he might stop. Her hips began to rotate. Her body had developed a mind of its own. The only thing that mattered was that her pussy stayed as close to Ezra’s mouth as possible.
She gasped and moaned and then cried out as her orgasm unexpectedly rippled through her. Her entire body shook and her breathing was nothing more than vulgar pants. It was the best orgasm of her life. And Ezra seemed hell bent on pushing her over again because his fingers and mouth didn’t stop moving as she clenched and shuddered and gushed onto his hand. Her entire body felt like an exposed nerve that Ezra somehow knew exactly how to touch.
When she couldn’t take it anymore, Candace finally pushed him away, albeit reluctantly. The room was full of the sound of their labored breathing. She felt the warm puff of his breath as he placed soft kisses on her inner thighs and could only groan weakly at the perfection of this handful of moments.
When his mouth finally disappeared from her skin, she opened one eye to peek at him and moaned.
He was licking her off his hand.
She sat up on her elbows, ready to ask Ezra if he was sure he’d never done that before, and where the fuck he learned to rub her that way. She was planning to ask him those and a million more questions while also switching places so she could return the favor, when the sound of fireworks outside caught their attention. There were sporadic bursts at first and then the sound became a popping crescendo. And then they heard shuffled footsteps down the hall.
“Oh god, I’m gonna puke,” Mei groaned before the bathroom door slammed shut.
Candace turned back to Ezra and smiled. “Happy New Year,” she breathed.
They dissolved into quiet, intimate giggles.