The Snowstorm: Breakfast

Regardless of what Celeste had said and done, sleep just wasn't in the cards for Aaron that night. While he was no longer worried about a sexual assault charge, the same questions vexed him. Chief among them was, 'what did it all mean?'

Aaron definitely felt something special for Celeste now; that much was certain. And it wasn't merely because she gifted him one of the most bone rattling orgasm of his entire existence, although that was a highlight in Aaron's calculation. There was something else. Something that he wanted to tell her but couldn't quite reduce to words; a sensation he got every time he pictured her wide hazel gaze and her kissy nose and her perfectly aligned purple toenails. A thrill that shot from his toes to his scalp and spun around his heart like a little whirlwind.

From time to time, he looked around the curtains in his room. The snow continued to pile up outside and visibility remained next to nothing. The only way Aaron was sure the sun rose was the lighter shade of gray in the East. Dawn brought the realization that the stubborn questions ensconced in his mind would not let him sleep at all, and so he decided to get up and start the day.

Normally on Saturday's he would go into work for a few hours. It was never articulated, but everyone knew the professional staff were expected to spend at least a few hours in the office every Saturday, even if it was only to sort through their desks or catch up on some paperwork. For young associates like Aaron, Saturday office time was unofficially officially mandatory because the managing partner might show up and advancement in the firm required face time with the managing partner in the office outside of regular business hours.

During tax season the unspoken rule of required hours for young associates who hoped for promotion went from part time Saturdays to all day Saturday and Sunday afternoon. However given the weather today, a failure to appear would be overlooked. Besides, the questions that badgered Aaron would not have let him concentrate on his work in any event.

After a pit stop in the bathroom to brush his teeth and have a quick shower, habit led Aaron to the kitchen to plug in the coffee maker. While the coffee maker burbled to life, Aaron took a pensive seat at the kitchen table and glanced out the kitchen window. The wind still drove the snow before it and heaped it against the buildings and the cars on the street to wrap the world in thick white. For a moment the sight of winter's majesty distracted Aaron's mind from the questions that plagued him.

"That's beautiful," he whispered to himself.

"It cold," Celeste muttered from behind him and jolted Aaron from his reverie.

Celeste straggled past him, swathed in her purple bathrobe and fuzzy slippers, and Aaron just stared at her for perhaps an impolite amount of time. He couldn't help it really. This morning she was prettier than ever in his estimation. True her blonde hair hung in a loose, low ponytail, she had no makeup on, and her gait was a sleepy slump, but to Aaron all that just called attention to how the sleepy scrunch of her peach-colored cheeks emphasized her cute and kissy nose. He didn't even mind when she drowsily appropriated his coffee cup.

Because he was employed, Aaron was always the first one up in the morning and usually left before anyone else woke up. Celeste's current job meant later hours at night, so she got up later than Aaron and honestly it was unusual to see Celeste out of her bedroom before 10:30. Many times Aaron had come home from his Saturday stint at the office around noon to find Celeste fresh out of bed. It's not that she partied or clubbed much. Celeste just loved to sleep in, and that made her appearance at the breakfast table this morning a curious anomaly.

That anomaly caused new questions to bloom in Aaron's mind. What was on Celeste's mind? What should he say? What should he do? Should he say a simple "good morning" or something more intimate? Should he bring up yesterday, or wait for her to bring it up? Should he be attentive or play it cool? Should he give her a hug? A good morning kiss? Was Celeste his roommate again, or had last night changed their relationship in some fundamental way? What would happen now?

With her coffee in the misappropriated cup, Celeste sat down across the table and, as she blew on her coffee to cool it, Aaron admired her with new eyes. The delicate, sleepy way she brought the cup to her puckered lips held him spellbound and finally the force of his indiscreet stare caught Celeste's attention. When their eyes met, Aaron felt a flash of nascent intimate connection form in the air between them. It was tiny and delicate, but it was there, and its presence struck Aaron dumb. Celeste seemed to sense it too, because she shyly ducked behind her bangs and put an uncertain and self-conscious hand to her face. Aaron's heart surged involuntarily as it seemed Celeste's face glowed in the soft morning light.

"What?" Celeste asked softly.

Aaron couldn't help himself, but he didn't really want to help himself either, so he took a chance.

"You're pretty," he whispered honestly.

Celeste flushed a deeper hue of peach and tried to hide her face behind her self-conscious hand. Her lips pushed out a somnolent and adorable pout.

"No, I'm not," she murmured with a hint of sleepy timidity.

For a moment, Aaron worried he had said too much. Could it be that all Celeste didn't want any kind of a relationship with him? Maybe she thought it all was a foolish mistake between two roommates who should have known better? Maybe he had overestimated the whole encounter and Celeste just wanted things to go on as they had before? Aaron's heart sank at these thoughts. Could it be he was wrong about this small connection he felt between himself and Celeste?

Then Celeste's hazel eyes peeked skittishly from under her hair at him and Aaron sensed that maybe wasn't the case. Maybe she was as uncertain of him as he was of her? Was that uncertainty he saw in her eyes? Relief? It gave him pause. Words rushed up towards his lips. Aaron had more to say, a lot more actually, but he wasn't sure exactly how to say it or if he should say it. Instead, he hesitated, struck dumb by the fear that Celeste might flee to her room before he could tell her ... what? What should he say? The wheels of his mind spun in place as it futilely struggled to synthesize his mishmash of thoughts, fears, wants and feelings into complete sentences. Desperate to prolong the early dawn bond he felt with Celeste, Aaron blurted out the first thing that came to his mind.

"I ... ummm ... I was about to make some breakfast. You want something?"

Celeste gave him a shy smile from behind her hand. It dazzled him.

"OK."

"Great!" pronounced Aaron a bit too loudly as he stood. "Breakfast coming up!"

Even as he said it, Aaron knew he'd just put himself in a truly awkward spot. His list of talents was on the paltry side, and cooking certainly was not included among the few he possessed. In the kitchen, Aaron was a lost cause. His mother had once observed that Aaron was such a bad cook that he could burn water before it boiled. Besides the microwave, kitchen appliances baffled Aaron and since he moved in to the apartment, Aaron's last infrequent foray into cooking resulted in an apple pie so bad that not even his notoriously hungry roommates could stomach a single forkful.

Now at this critical, but amorphous juncture he had offered to make Celeste breakfast. Given his total lack of kitchen prowess, even at the best of times this was a Herculean task, but now while questions buzzed in his brain like giant hummingbirds of distraction, it was well-nigh impossible. As he opened the refrigerator to hide his consternation, Aaron could only hope that impending culinary disaster did not put Celeste off ... whatever this fragile little connection between them was this morning.

"Let's see here," he murmured gamely, as if he had not already resigned himself to failure.

Aaron's eyes roved over the contents of the refrigerator and, like a man overboard, hoped for a lifeline. He saw a dozen eggs. What about scrambled eggs? No. His last attempt at scrambled eggs produced a pan full of black rocks at which the normally ravenous park squirrels turn up their noses. There might be some bacon, but any bacon Aaron had cooked previously inevitably wound up as hard as shoe leather. No. Pancakes? He shook his head. Pancakes had too many ingredients and he was bound to set off the smoke detectors and then the whole building would be mad because they would have to go out into the snow to wait for the fire department. No to pancakes as well. Dejectedly Aaron realized he was quickly running out of options.

Behind him Celeste put his coffee cup down on the table after her latest drink. He could feel her eyes on his back and the pressure mounted. What was he going to do? Toast with jelly? Reheated pork fried rice? Aaron pinched his face in disapproval. Last night as a given, he had hoped that on this new day they would tease out a new definition of Aaron and Celeste, but now the best he could muster for her was leftover Chinese food with a side of toast and ... did he even have any jelly? Despite the persistently cool breeze from the refrigerator, Aaron felt himself begin to sweat.

His mind raced alphabetically through every type of breakfast food he could recall and summarily discarded each due to either scarcity or improbability until he reached the letter "W". Wait! That was it! He slammed the refrigerator door and hopefully yanked open the freezer and instantly felt like he had been paroled. A choir of angels literally rang in his ears as he beheld a box of Eggo waffles perched on the glacier of permanent freezer frost.

"Waffles!" Aaron barked a little too loud in relief. "Let's have waffles!"

Aaron tore into the package of Eggo waffles like a man who had struck gold. He could heat up waffles in the toaster easy enough and he had butter and maple syrup and even some whipped cream to garnish them. His luck made him so giddy that he nearly giggled out loud. Celeste watched him with her hazel gaze and a shy smile crept onto her face.

"I like waffles," she agreed quietly.

It seemed to take forever for the old toaster to pop them out, but eventually an unburned and crisp stack of two waffles smothered in butter and syrup sat in front of Celeste. She refused the whipped cream garnish, but at Aaron's suggestion put some whipped cream in her coffee in lieu of her usual milk. Aaron's waffles didn't take as long because he didn't really care how they were cooked as long as he could eat breakfast with Celeste. A few moments later Aaron sat down across from Celeste with his own stack of waffles and a sigh of relief. Celeste fixed him with her hazel gaze.

"Thank you," she smiled in a way that made his heart skip a beat.

"My pleasure," he answered as grandly as he could muster. "Bon appetite."

For the next half hour, they ate mostly in silence across an eternal table of unspoken somethings. Well, Celeste ate, but Aaron hardly touched his waffles. Instead, he stole glances at Celeste as she munched demurely at her stack of waffles. Aaron was so distracted that when Celeste finished her waffles and looked up at him, she again caught him as he gazed at her. A little worried furrow appeared between her eyes, and her self-conscious hand went back to her cheek.

"What?"

"Uhhh ...," Aaron sputtered like he had been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. He glanced down at his plate and found his excuse.

"You ... you want some more? I'm not that hungry and I hardly touched mine."

Celeste hesitated and then nodded gently.

"OK. Just one though."

Aaron slid his plate across the table and, quite briefly, as Celeste reached for the plate their fingers touched. Together they both froze in a lightning flash of shared intimacy due to skin-to-skin contact, until Aaron pulled his hand away guiltily. Celeste glanced up quickly and then her eyes darted away. What was that strange look in her eye? A desire?

While Celeste picked into a third waffle, Aaron stood and allegedly busied himself with cleaning up the kitchen area, but that was only cover so he could sneak more glances at her. Every so often Celeste would meet his gaze. She seemed a bit more comfortable and gave him small smiles in return for his attention. Then they would both give outsized attention to the menial tasks of eating and rinsing, while the air grew thick with an unspoken ... something. Soon Celeste finished with her waffle, and Aaron felt he had to say something, or he might explode.

"Any good?" he asked stupidly because he currently lacked the capacity for rational thought.

Celeste nodded and dabbed her lips with a napkin in a motion so delicately feminine that Aaron's mind went blank, and he dropped the plastic bottle of maple syrup. Celeste giggled benignly as he scrambled after it. Fatally embarrassed by his clumsiness, Aaron flushed as he scooped up the wayward maple syrup and restored it to its spot in the cabinet. When he found himself fixed with Celeste's hazel gaze, Aaron felt trapped and in need of escape.

"I ... uhh ... need a shave," he muttered to cover his consternation. Celeste's hazel eyes never wavered.

"I've never seen a man shave before," Celeste ventured.

Aaron blinked in surprise.

"I'm sorry ... did you say ...."

"I said, I've never seen a man shave before."

"Ummm ... you mean ... like his face?" Aaron stammered.

God! He was so uncool sometimes. How stupid could he sound? Fortunately, Celeste bailed him out with a conciliatory giggle and Aaron felt a little better. He even managed to smile with her encouragement.

"Well, I supposed I could, you know, show you," he offered. "If you want, I mean."

Celeste sparkled at him.

"OK!"

A few moments later, Celeste perched on the side of the tub as Aaron ran a sink full of hot water. After she was settled, she nodded for him to proceed, and Aaron began to apply shaving cream to his face. He had never paid much attention to how he applied shaving cream before this moment, but under her watchful eye Aaron carefully dabbed it on his face and began to massage it into his morning stubble. Celeste wandered over and stood next to him at the vanity. For a few moments she just observed him in the mirror.

"What's that feel like?" she asked with sly curiosity.

"What, the shaving cream?" Aaron asked like the fool the teacher caught who hadn't paid attention in class.

"Yeah."

"Well, it's kind of cool and smooth."

"Oh," she nodded. "Well, can you put some on my face?"

Celeste inclined her cheek to him while Aaron stared, his face half covered in shaving cream like a clown with half of his whiteface on.

"On your face?" he asked and cursed himself as an idiot who was perpetually two steps behind the conversation.

"Yeah."

"OK."

Cautiously Aaron dipped his finger in the shaving cream and then dabbed it gently onto Celeste's offered cheek. She giggled encouragement, so as his scalp tingled, he smiled and dabbed another fingertip at her face.

"I don't think that's enough," she sparkled to him in the mirror. Her nose looked so darn kissable.

"Oh really?" Aaron asked slily as his wits finally caught up to the game. Then before he thought twice, he did something he had wanted to do all morning. Gently, he cupped Celeste's face between his shaving cream slick hands and planted a loud shaving cream "mmmmwaaaah" right on the end of her kissy nose. Celeste's eyes went mirthfully wide as she squealed dramatically and scrunched her nose even more kissable. So Aaron did it again, but a little longer this time.

"Mmmmmmmmmmmmmwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!"

"Aaron!" Celeste giggled playfully.

It all felt so natural and joyful that Aaron did it again. And again. And again. He just couldn't get enough of that pert little nose.

"Mmmmwah! Mmmmwah! Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmwah!"

Soon Celeste's kissable nose was smeared with shaving cream, and Aaron leaned back to arm's length to admire the pretty mess cupped between his hands. Celeste's hazel gaze sparkled back at him, and Aaron's heart fluttered, and another wild impulse took him. Without a thought he leaned in and placed an exploratory kiss on her full lips. For a moment they both stood still, as each of them waited for the other's reaction.

Then, encouraged that Celeste didn't pull back from his kiss, he gently but insistently searched her lips with his, and then leaned back to look in her eyes again. Celeste's hazel gaze didn't waver. Was that agreement in her eyes? Hope?

"Why did you stop?" Celeste questioned him in a small voice.

"I didn't ... I thought ...."

"Do it again."

Aaron smirked wolfishly and planted another gentle kiss on the end of Celeste's nose.

"That's not what I meant!" Celeste complained.

"But I like your nose!" Aaron protested. "It's so cute and kissable."

Celeste giggled merrily and then leaned closer to him.

"No, silly," she admonished him in a dusky whisper. "Kiss me. Please."

So Aaron did.

Somehow Aaron retrieved a towel and managed to wipe the shaving cream from their faces while Celeste stared purposefully into his eyes and loosened his belt. There was no need for words as their collective decision was already made. Primal urgency drove them and as this was their first time together there were the attendant clumsy clutches and missteps.

The thick sexual tension of the moment made the removal of their clothes halting and awkward. Her robe was not an impediment and fell to the bathroom floor without protest as did his T shirt and sweatpants. However, as Celeste's hands searched his body hotly, the drawstring on her pajama bottoms flummoxed Aaron's nervous hands and Celeste had to pause her explorations to help him undo the knot before he tore them from her body in frustration.

Then as their underwear came off, their bodies seemed to collide as they struggled to get into sync with one another. For a time, it seemed that they were perpetually in their own way. Their hands fenced as they tried to touch each other in all the wrong places and the masculine angles of his body futilely strove to fit into the feminine curves of hers. In the tight space of their awkward embrace, it seemed that even their breathing refused to come into balance, and for a time it seemed that even their lungs contended against each other for the short supply of shared air.

But then something natural synchronized their bodies, and the initial frantic pace slowed until together they began to discover their peculiar sexual rhythm. Encouraged by her sighs and moans, Aaron's hands found their way down to Celeste's hips and his fingertips gently kneaded the small of her back. Celeste's hands roamed over Aaron's chests and arms and drew little wisps of pleasure on his skin. Their kisses became deeper, and more searching as their shared purpose grew between them. Together they worked towards an inevitable union, and Aaron reluctantly paused to reach for his wallet and the condom it contained.

"No," breathed Celeste to him. "On the pill."

Without any further preamble, Celeste turned and bent over the vanity and Aaron matched her gasp of pleasure as she guided him inside of her. For a moment all he could do was marvel at the sensation of her moist softness as it sheathed him. Then Celeste pushed herself backwards into his lap until she engulfed his whole cock inside of her. Her eyes went wide and round, and her mouth formed the familiar circle of pleasure that drove him so wild last night.

Enticed by the welcome of Celeste's body, Aaron moved gently against her, and Celeste emitted a round little "ah" as if the pleasure of the moment surprised her. Aaron's right hand searched out her clitoris as he gently pulled his hips back and eased them forward in a first slow, exploratory thrust. Celeste uttered a round, extended "oh" until he found the bottom of that first languid deep stroke. Softly his fingers worked around her clit and Celeste's eyes welled and her back arched against him.