CHAPTER 22
“YES, deadly serious,” Liyah says around a mouthful of mapo tofu.
“She’s the Man is your favorite movie of all time?” Daniel clarifies yet again, putting down his bowl of General Tso’s chicken so he can give her a full view of his duly incredulous expression. Her face reveals nothing, but part of him feels as though she’s pulling his leg.
“It would be one of your favorite films, too, if you had any taste.”
“If I had any taste?”
She narrows her eyes. “Yes. It’s literally Shakespeare.”
“It’s also mid-2000s Amanda Bynes.”
“I thought you were taking the negative argument? If you want me to debate against its merits, I’m gonna need to review my notes.”
Daniel shakes his head and lifts his beer bottle to his lips, taking a generous swig. “Nope, still very much anti.”
Liyah shifts on the couch so that she’s facing Daniel and crosses her legs, knees bumping against the side of his thigh. His hand unconsciously falls to settle on her ankle, thumb stroking the only bare skin it can access. They’ve been doing this—whatever this is—for a few weeks now, but his fingertips have yet to get their fill. Liyah never seems to mind.
“Daniel. You’re missing the point. It’s the fact that it is Shakespeare and Amanda Bynes that makes it so special. There was one, like, ten-year period where Hollywood decided the world needed modern American teen remakes of British classic literature. And you know what? They were absolutely fucking right!”
“I had no idea you felt so strongly about this.” Daniel smiles. She feels this strongly about everything, and he’s only really saying it to get a rise out of her.
She holds up a hand and begins ticking off her fingers. “Clueless—Emma. 10 Things I Hate About You—The Taming of the Shrew. Mean Girls—Julius Caesar. She’s the Man—Twelfth Night. All absolute bangers. The trend sort of fizzled—although Fire Island is officially the best version of Pride and Prejudice, so I’m keeping all my fingers and toes crossed that it’ll kick off a decade of adult queer retellings.”
“Okay, okay, fine.” He rubs his free hand along his jaw and does not miss how Liyah’s eyes briefly drift to follow along. “It just seems like favorite ever is a stretch.” She glares. Daniel retraces his steps. “You work in a museum! I thought your favorite would be something a little more … I don’t know. Acclaimed? I expected you to insist on something from Barry Jenkins or Aaron Sorkin.”
Liyah scoffs, poking him in the chest. “That’s because you’ve been brainwashed by mass media into believing intellectual women must reject traditionally feminine interests!” She fires back, barely stopping to breathe. “Because God forbid a teenage girl likes a movie about a—gasp—teenage girl. These movies got me through middle school and high school.”
“How is it you never mentioned these to me at camp, then?”
“Would you even remember if I had?” she asks, one eyebrow raised. He takes another swig of his beer so he doesn’t have to look at her as he nods. “Well, as a preteen, ‘I’m not like other girls’ really had me in a choke hold. But I have since realized that my shame was a construct of the patriarchy. If you wanted to hang out with someone who jerks off to Martin Scorsese, you should’ve asked one of your non-Jordan coworkers.”
Daniel wants to kiss her. It’ll piss her off, though, so he settles for glancing at the deep groove of her cupid’s bow and letting his lips slide into an easy smile. “I didn’t know I registered for Feminist Reading of Popular Media this semester, but I can’t say I’m disappointed.”
“It comes free, like the side of rice.” She leans across him—brushing against his chest much more than is strictly necessary—to scoop more rice and tofu onto her plate. “Have you ever even seen the movie?”
Daniel shrugs. “With Kayla, maybe? It would’ve been forever ago.”
“And you’re judging already.” Liyah sucks her teeth disapprovingly. “Now we have to watch.”
Daniel laughs, no longer able to resist the urge to wrap his arm around to the small of her back. Instead of lowering his lips to hers, he veers left and lets them brush against her neck just below her ear. Liyah shivers, the same way she did the last time his breath touched this piece of skin, and the time before that. “I never said I didn’t want to watch it.”
“Could’ve fooled me,” she says, voice a touch rougher than usual. He grins into her neck, and she pushes him flush against the sofa cushion and swings her leg over so she’s straddling his lap. He trails his hands up her thighs and under her sweater until he gets to the soft skin of her rib cage. She sighs and leans into the touch, her hips rocking forward, eliciting a sharp inhale from Daniel. Noses brush as Liyah dips her head downward. “You’re so easy.” She laughs softly. “Your eyes have gone dark already.”
“I’m half-hard and it’s my eyes that clue you in?” He leans in, but she tilts her head back at the last moment, evading his kiss. She cradles his jaw in her hand, gently angling his face so she can examine each iris.
“They’re usually this deep chocolate brown, kinda golden in the light. It’s the color of a beer bottle.” She clocks his raised brows. “In a good way, I promise. Right now, your pupils have dilated so much they’re mostly black.” She unbuttons his shirt as she speaks, spreading the fabric aside to trace the planes of his torso. The outline of his tattoo is usually where she starts, and today is no different.
“No fair. Your eyes are always pitch-black. They never give away their secrets.”
She pulls her sweater over her head, some of her mussed curls shielding her eyes from view as they fall, the rest landing against her bare shoulders. “Maybe I’m always turned on,” she whispers mischievously, brushing her hair away from her face. “Or never.”
“Never?” His fingers creep up from her ribs, pulling the lace cup of her bra aside and drawing circles around her already pinched nipple. A single brush of his thumb and it tightens further.
Her teeth sink deeply into her bottom lip, and she shrugs, feigning nonchalance. “Maybe.” He draws her breast into his mouth, and her breath hitches. She doesn’t give in yet. Her fingers find the button of his jeans and then she’s unzipping and sliding her hand into his boxer briefs. He bites into her shoulder to avoid groaning.
Holding out, pretending to be unaffected until one of them can’t take it anymore, is Daniel’s new favorite game. Liyah is a formidable offensive player—she can get him so wound up that he thinks he might die if he doesn’t get inside of her—but she lacks the necessary self-control to play defense. It’s always a photo finish, but he wins every single time.
And that’s the fun of it, finding that one last touch that will force her vocal cords to vibrate against one another. Usually a whimper, but once he got a delicious, strangled groan. Then the dam breaks.
Liyah’s playing the best game of her life. They’re both completely naked before she makes a single sound, and Daniel has let out a breath that is dangerously close to a moan one too many times. Surprisingly, he finds today’s pressure points in rather innocuous locations: one of his hands at the small of her back, the other on the side of her face, his lips pressing a chaste kiss to her collarbone.
Her defeat comes with a soft, low whine followed quickly by a hissed “fuck you” and a grind of her hips that would have cost Daniel his win had it come ten seconds earlier.
“Gladly,” he responds, gathering her in his arms so he can lay her against the emerald velvet of her couch, knocking off one of Laura or Lara’s excellent throw pillows in the process.
“Thank God,” she says. “Those things belong on the floor.” She interrupts his laughter with a rough kiss. With great effort, he pulls back so that he can crawl down her torso, filling his mouth with her everywhere he wants to do so.
An untold number of minutes later, when he’s lost in her, hands aiding in the hypnotic motion of her hips, upright chests pressed together, heavy breaths mingling, he’s hit with a startling thought: I love this woman so much.
It’s a mistake, drawn out by the feeling of her around him and above him. I love having sex with this woman so much, it should have been. Or maybe like. He meant to think like.
Liyah stills and leans back to surveil his face. “Is everything okay?”
Daniel smiles. “I’m great, actually.” He kisses the moles on her cheekbone. “Just thinking about how lucky I am to be here right now.”
“Daniel. You can’t say that.”
“Why not?”
“Because it makes me want to…” She trails off, pouting. “I don’t know! You just can’t. You’re so…” She huffs. The way her nose crinkles and her eyes squeeze shut tells him that whatever he’s so … is a good thing.
His smile gives way to a grin. “Sorry.”
“You should be,” Liyah says before using a particularly luxurious roll of her hips to coax out twin moans.
THEY WATCH THE movie completely naked, Liyah draped over Daniel’s body, her cheek pressed to his sternum. Half an hour passes before she realizes that he’s the first she’s done this with, had so much skin on skin when it’s not a prelude to sex (at least not immediately; she hasn’t written off a late-night round two). She’s had exactly one relationship, and she and Spencer had been nervous sixteen-year-olds who couldn’t get beyond half-clothed fumbling. Anybody else, she would’ve either felt self-conscious or altogether disinterested. Not with Daniel.
Besides, Daniel smells wonderfully earthy, and from this vantage point she can feel his warm chest shake with laughter and thus find new ways to say I told you so.
“You know, this is the first Friday night without SSC since August. Except the snowstorm,” she marvels aloud.
Daniel mm-hmms, and she feels it against the whole left side of her face. “Yeah. I’m glad you’re still here, though. Chinese food and a movie on Christmas would be much less fun by myself.”
She laughs. “You’ll be eating your words at five tomorrow morning when you’re driving me to the airport.”
“I should not have agreed to that.”
“Hey!” Liyah says, tilting her face so she can look Daniel in the eyes. “You can’t back out now.”
“I wouldn’t dare.” He kisses her forehead, and she rolls her eyes, earning a short chuckle. “Why this movie?”
“You’re missing the carnival scene!”
Daniel feels around the coffee table for the clicker and hits pause. “Of all the ones you listed, why is She’s the Man your favorite?”
“It’s embarrassing. You’re gonna think I’m dumb.”
He cocks his head to the side, giving her an unimpressed look. “Liyah, come on.”
“Fine,” she says, turning so her cheek rests against his chest. She’s not avoiding eye contact, she’s simply enticed by the freeze-frame of Amanda Bynes removing her wig and sideburns in a Tilt-A-Whirl. “Neen and I used to watch it a lot. Like, objectively, it’s an extremely straight movie. But if you squint just right, it’s a bisexual guy falling in love with someone who’s gender-fluid. We were obsessed before we even knew why. You take what you can get, I guess.” Fingers run up and down her spine as she speaks, drawing out more words than she intends. She feels her muscles tense involuntarily.
“Damn, we’ve gotten to queer analysis and it’s only the first semester! No wonder I’m hot for professor,” Daniel jokes, and her body relaxes.
“Can we finish the movie now?”
“Thank you for sharing this with me, Liyah,” he says, the earnestness in his voice making her stomach flip, then presses play before she has a chance to respond.