The Wrong Sister

Her lips quivered. Her eyes had lost any domineering intensity she might have had, and now looked vulnerable and unsure. He felt the same doubt starting to sink in. Each of them seemed lost, both in each other's eyes, and in their lives.

"Amber..."

"Cole, I-..."

Neither could fit words together between the fading thrill of what they had done, and the growing realization of its significance. They still didn't move, as if to hide from the real world creeping in from all sides now.

He finally stepped back, at first almost because he lost his balance, but the movement triggered his body into action again, and he stepped to the side away from her.

"I need to go," he said, the full weight of it all hitting him at once and spurring him to retreat from the scene of the crime.

"Wait, Cole!" she spun and stood up, quickly wiping her face clean.

He begrudgingly turned as he opened the door.

"Just... first of all take your boxers," she shrugged and smirked and held them out to him, but with remorse still filling her eyes as much as him.

He closed his eyes and sighed, nodding and reaching out to take them from her. He had returned her smirk but it was wiped away as he grasped his underwear and touched her hand.

It was the first and only physical contact they had made through the whole ordeal. Finally feeling even a small part of her soft skin shot lightning up his arm and into his body. She seemed to react the same, and stiffened with him, as if somehow this touch was as forbidden, or as significant, as anything else they had done. Another long stare into each other's eyes drew on before she finally spoke.

"We don't say anything. Ever. Right?" she said, her eyes becoming fearful for a moment.

"Yeah," he agreed hoarsely.

"Nothing happened. Goes to our grave. K?" she confirmed.

He hesitated, but replied all the same, "Yeah."

Their eyes shared a regret that tore through him, and he finally ripped his hand and his boxers away from her. The jolt of his hand coming away triggered a look of loss in her eyes that he felt in his bones. He thought that maybe for a brief moment they silently mourned together, imagining what might have been, had their lives been different. She finally stepped away, and he did the same, their eyes drifting apart.

"Goodnight, Cole," she whispered tenderly.

"Goodnight, Amber," he uttered back as she closed the door.

He stared at it for another long moment, before finally, numbly walking back to his room and lying down next to his girlfriend.

He wasn't sure if he'd ever fall asleep, his mind split and spinning. When he was finally able to ignore all the doubt and guilt and potentials he couldn't do anything about right now anyway, his heart seemed to settle at last, and he let his body relax and sink into the soft mattress.

His mind went to the last soft words she'd said to him. Goodnight Cole. That sensuous whisper that she'd spoken to him, looking in his eyes and both of them knowing how they felt about each other. It finally soothed him to sleep as he heard it again and again in his mind, as if she was right there. She was only just on the other side of the wall after all. So close, yet so far.

Cole... it echoed in his mind as he finally escaped into his dreams.

That voice.