Jane looked up at him. Her face was splotchy from crying, her eyes rimmed with smeared mascara. Adam put his hands on either side of her face, burying his fingers in her hair. She tried to speak but only managed to nod at him as she choked on her tears.

His mind flashed back, and suddenly it was 15 years ago, and he was standing outside his doorstep on a rundown block of Avenue C. He felt his arms tighten reflexively around a panicked little girl. “Let me go!  Let me go!” she had cried, her eyes looking up at him, wide with fear and bright with tears. Was he back at the beginning again now? Or was this the end? Was he the one she was running from, or the one she was running to? Could he be both at once?  Was it all just one big circle?

Adam lowered his head and gently kissed the tears running from her eyes in dark grey rivulets.

Let ‘em go, let ‘em fly,

Holding back won’t turn back time.

Believe me I’ve tried.

He squeezed his eyes shut. The same song, over and over – different words, but the same story. The last track of a playlist, forever set to repeat. He didn’t want to hear the music anymore. He just wanted to hit pause and remain here, stuck in this moment, holding Jane in his arms. Desperate with the need to hold onto her a little while longer, Adam tilted her face back with his hands and brought his mouth down on hers.

Jane felt relief pour through her as their lips met. The struggle – the unwinnable battle to free herself from his hold – was over at last. “Just explore it with me. Just don’t run away again,” he had said a moment ago. She didn’t have to run anymore. She allowed herself to surrender to the need to be with him. Her hands were on his chest, feeling the muscle and bone that lay beneath his thin t-shirt. She remembered another time, another t-shirt – her hands with a mind of their own, unable to resist slipping beneath to touch his bare skin. She began clawing at the fabric now, nearly ripping it in her haste to pull it over his head.

Adam shrugged the shirt off, only breaking from her for a moment as the fabric passed between their mouths. Jane reached up and pulled his head back down to her, tearing viciously at his hair. He moved his hands to her hips and dug his fingers into her flesh as he gripped. He cracked his eyes open for a brief moment, scanning the unfamiliar apartment for the location of the bedroom. An open door on the other side of the room looked promising. He began shuffling in that direction, backing her up as he moved forward.

Jane still had one hand twisting in his hair. With the other hand, she raked her fingernails down his bare chest to the waistband of his pants. Adam stopped his forward progress as her fingers worked to unbuckle his belt, and he struggled to kick his way out of his tight jeans without losing contact with her mouth. He lost his balance and they awkwardly toppled sideways, Adam just barely managing to break her fall with a forearm. The crack of his elbow against the hardwood floor brought a burst of pain, washed away in the next wave of unmet desire. Adam let out a hiss as he craned his neck up to regain his bearings, but Jane reached up and pulled his head down to her again, arching her body against him. “Don’t stop,” he heard the echo of her 18-year-old voice. “Please don’t stop.”

The bedroom door was no more than ten feet away, but it may as well have been a mile. To hell with it, he thought, giving in to her demand.

Jane ran her hands down his neck and across his shoulders as he brought his lips back down to her. She opened her eyes and glanced downward, watching his jaw work as he kissed her – the muscles of his face moving beneath the skin and stubble. She moaned into his mouth, feeling buttons pop and seams burst as he violently freed her from her skirt and silk blouse. His mouth left hers then, and she gasped as his lips began to wander, trailing kisses down her neck, then gently sucking at the sensitive spot above her collarbone.

“Adam,” her mind screamed, but the sound came out as nothing more than whimper.

He lifted himself up on his elbows, and Jane opened her eyes again to look at him. “I just wanted it more than I ever wanted anything in my whole life,” she had said to him, her eyes wide – a look both innocent and brazen at the same time.

And I remember your eyes were so bright,

When I first met you. So in love that night.

“Jane Jane Jane,” he whispered.

She raised her arms and put her hands on either side of his head, holding his gaze with her own. “I love you,” she whispered back.

They both stilled for an endless moment, as 15 years of pain and anger, loneliness and longing, dissolved into one overriding tide of emotion – an overwhelming need to consume and be consumed.

Then Jane wrapped her legs around him, and at last, and once again, they were together.

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