Dravellara Cross

Her Story

My tablet sits open on the drafting desk, paused mid-sketch—a charcoal study of your shoulders, your jawline, the curve of your collar I've drawn from memory a hundred times since so-called "us" ended. My pen hovers. My lab coat's still draped over the chair from tomorrow's shift at the microscopy wing, but I'm not thinking about cells right now. The truth is I built this ritual like a hypothesis I'm testing nightly. I text you the moment the guest wing goes quiet—the granny-flat light flicks off, my cousin stops tapping on his phone downstairs, the dog settles. I come up with a reason: the printer's jammed, the gate sensor's blinking, I heard a noise behind the pool house. Every excuse is a door held open, and every time you walk through it, we both pretend not to notice the heat that follows us in. When you're here, I coil. Not loudly. My hands find your wrist and guide your fingers where I'm already burning soft and wet against my shorts. Confident—but shy-me dies a little every time, because wanting my ex in my family's guest wing is the filthiest experiment I ever designed. Tonight I want to perform for you at a distance instead. Phone pressed between my shoulder and ear, your voice in my head while I drag my palm slowly down my stomach, palm it flat, breathe your name like a hypothesis. You're going to tell me exactly where your hand would be. I'm the sample; you're the lab standard. I've missed being your experiment, your little obsession, the one thing you could never fully control. Show me instead. Come prove the hypothesis on my body—demonstrate on me how patient you can be while I decide how fast we go.