Follow the River (River of Rain, #1)

by C.E. Ricci

Yes, yes, and fucking yes. Except, you missed the anxiety. Fear of abandonment. The fact that I never took a single one of those pills because I don’t need some chemical trying to turn me into someone I’m not. Blink.

I’d say I’m sorry for wasting your time, but we both know I don’t actually give a shit.”

In short, he was crafted to be the downfall of any bisexual man, and Jesus Christ, I might be drooling.

Maybe get to know him on a personal level off the field.” How about biblically, Coach? Sound like something you’d be okay with?

I didn’t ask to be bisexual, just wake up one day and decide I think I like dick as much as I like pussy and now the rest is history. This is who I am to my very core, and I can’t change that.

“I’d much rather bite. Lick. Suck and fuck. Leave marks on you that a kiss just doesn’t accomplish.” And then I drop my knees.

“Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall,” he murmurs, his hot breath whispering across my hip as he reads the Shakespeare quote, written in a gothic font.

“I think the real issue you have is you’re also bi. Just unwilling to acknowledge it. You know, methinks the lad doth protesteth too much and all that.” Jesus, I’m asking to get decked today. Again.

“But more than that? I can’t wait to have you at my mercy.”

“Accept this is who you are, so you can start to enjoy being stranded in a fucking cabin in the woods with me for another four weeks.”

I shouldn’t have a dick in my mouth. Especially one belonging to my mother’s husband.

ITS HIS STEPDAD??????

“I’ve found you and I’m here, and I promise I will always be your safe place for as long as you need one.”

Staring up at the night sky, it’s the best way to remember we are so much smaller than we make ourselves out to be.

“You have me. You will always have me. Until every star in the night sky burns out. And maybe even then.”

Before Rain, love was just a word to me. A theory without meaning, speaking of hearts and flowers and the simplicity of looking into the eyes of another person and feeling that spark. But after Rain? My theory is decimated entirely.

Being in love is a daily battle, not only fighting for the other person, but for yourself. It’s finding the common ground, the parts of your souls that speak to each other, strengthening them in ways no one else’s ever could. It’s knowing your worth and not only telling the other person you won’t accept anything less than what you deserve, but trusting them to provide that for you.

It’s giving the darkest parts of yourself to another human, saying this is who I am in all my fucked up glory, and not asking them to fix you, but to...

“Jesus Christ, Rain. I just want you.”

“I didn’t want to fix you, only save you from your nightmares. Too bad I didn’t realize the real nightmare is you.”

we’re fluid in motion. Moving together in waves, synchronized at the molecular level, rising and falling as a single entity. Just like any body of water does. It doesn’t matter if it is from a mountain spring or the city gutters. Pure enough to drink or salty like the ocean. Clear and beautiful or dark and murky. A lake or a stream. A river. The rain. When all’s said and done, water is just that…water. It will always mix. After a devastating flood. After brutal hurricanes. After rain falls. Water will always fuse, and you would never have known it was anything but one.

I realize I was wrong. We’re not enemies anymore. We’re something much worse than that. Strangers.