Not My Valentine's Date

"That," Theresa said then paused to catch her breath, "was amazing! The real thing is so different."

Nicholas kept his arm around her, rolled onto his back and took the nearest corner of the bedding to draw around them both. With the calm roll of her breath against his chest and a sweetly soft kiss on the cheek, all sorts of stress evaporated and nothing was left but to stay the night. Too bad, he thought as he felt himself drifting away, he would have liked to talk to her more.

--

Theresa's alarm clock was like something designed to get people under their desks before a nuclear bombing. Her arm rose out of the bundled sheets and came down hard on the thing to stay its squacking, and then more gently turned off the alarm before it had the chance to go off ten minutes hence. Going back to sleep wasn't a real possibility anymore after such a shock to the system.

She dragged the sheets off with herself, making a dress out of them until she could find something in her drawers to make herself decent, though the act made Nicholas incredibly indecent until he came out of bed with his hands on his groin to find his pants from last night.

"A-are you feeling better, now?" Theresa stammered, coming out of her morning drowziness and sobering up in an instant, red face pointed away as she caught sight of his nudity and remembered all she'd done the night before. "Do I say thank you? Is that how it goes?"

Nicholas just laughed from where he sat, half naked with only his pants on the edge of her bed. "Not really. But I should thank you, it ended up being a nice night after all."

She sniffled in the cold basement air, just then snapping in the last of the buttons on her fresh shirt and thus having no good excuse as to why she refused to look at him still. "Umm, when you drive me into work... do you want to let me out somewhere in the parking garage?"

"I hadn't thought that far ahead," he said with a raised eyebrow she couldn't see anyway. "Was there something you needed to get out of your car before heading in?"

"No, but... you know how this will look... you coming back in the same clothes as yesterday..."

"I doubt that would be a problem."

Theresa was shaking like a leaf. "I think- people will talk, you know? They always do... If you didn't want to be... seen... What with the way... I hope... I hope your next girlfriend doesn't hurt you like this one did. The other woman, she doesn't deserve you..."

He considered the implications, stood and stepped behind her, calmly put his arms around her slender shoulders. "If I'm reading things right, I'll risk feeling like an ass; that rather depends on you, doesn't it?"

"What do you mean?" she asked quietly, as if she feared the answer.

"I mean I'd rather people saw us coming in together. Are you free this weekend?"

Theresa took a breath to gather her senses, held his hand in her long, delicate fingers. "Maybe... somewhere less expensive, do you think?"

"Fast food and a movie, then?"

"Take-out and a rental, maybe?" She turned in his grasp, pulled his head down, and caressed soft lips against his. "Your treat."

--The end--