“Can I just have a vodka cranberry?”

   “You can have anything you want.” His eyes sparkled as he spoke, and I found myself smiling at him, feeling particularly punchy even without any alcohol in my system yet. He gave me a wink and then told the bartender my order. After a moment or two, and a much shorter wait than anyone else in the room had, we were handed our drinks. Elliot nodded toward the sliding doors, indicating he wanted to go outside, and I nodded in agreement. He then led me through the throngs of people, like fish swimming upstream, until we were finally outside.

   I thought, since we weren’t surrounded by people, he’d want to let go of my hand, but when I started to release his, he strengthened his grip and pulled me closer. It was impossible to hide the smile that stretched over my face. We walked to a bench overlooking their house’s underwhelming yard – a  large patch of grass with one sad, sagging volleyball net stretched across it, drooping in the middle. I sat first and then inwardly warmed when he sat down right next to me, even though it left plenty of empty bench on the other side of him.

   “So,” he said before sipping his beer. “You know all about my lack of ambition, tell me about your plans. You’re a sophomore next year, right?”

   I nodded. “Yeah, and I might be even more unmotivated than you.”

   “Well, now there’s a challenge I will gladly accept. What makes you so unmotivated?”

   “I don’t know.” I shrugged. “I guess I just don’t really have the urge to find the career that will make me the most money.”

   “Ah, I see. You’re not motivated by greed. Satan would be very disappointed in you.”

   “No,” I laughed, “I suppose I’m not. And I make my lack of greed up to Satan by being really good at gluttony.”

   I watched as Elliot’s eyes floated down over my body. He tried to hide it by bringing his red cup up to his lips and taking a drink, but there was no use, the heat his gaze caused followed the trail of his eyes. When they met back up with mine, and it was obvious he’d been caught ogling me, he simply smiled.

   “Gluttony looks good on you.” His comment floated in the air between us, both of us smiling like fools. “But seriously,” he finally said, breaking the electric silence between us, “what is it you want to do after college?”

   “Honestly?”

   “Of course honestly. I never want you to lie to me.”

   I ignored the flip of my stomach at his use of the word never, as if we’d have an always. “I want to be a photographer.”

   “That’s pretty ambitious,” he said, his tone argumentative.

   “You think so? I don’t know. I think it sounds kind of lazy.”

   “I mean, I totally get why you feel that way, but when I think of people who do photography for a living, or art in general, I think of people relying on inspiration for their next paycheck. It’s easy to show up for a desk job and get your monthly check, but a photographer’s got to actually work for their money.”

   “I guess that’s true,” I replied, feeling a little better about the quiet dream I’d never really shared with anyone. “So, what are you really going to do with your sociology degree?”

   “That’s a good question. You’ll be the first person I tell when I decide.”

   We sat on that bench for the majority of the evening, only leaving after we’d both downed multiple drinks and were feeling a little fuzzy. He asked me to dance and I had not one reason not to. Also, I was hoping I could feel my body pressed up against his again.

   It was with my front pressed to his, my hands wrapped around his neck, his thigh between my knees, that I found a place in my mind where nothing else seemed to exist. I was just drunk enough to feel happy, slightly weightless, and loose, but not drunk enough to be stumbly or obnoxious. His hands were moving up and down my back, each downward swipe coming closer and closer to my backside. On each pass, I silently begged for him to graze his hands over my ass, to show me in some physical way he wanted me, wanted to do more than sit on a bench and drink with me.

   “You’re killing me here, Evie,” he said in my ear, sending shivers throughout my body. He must have felt me tremble because his arms squeezed me gently. I took his admission as a clue that he needed me to move us forward, needed me to give him permission. I leaned away from him, feeling the scruff that had grown on his face throughout the day scrape against my cheek. My hands slid from the back of his neck to his shoulders, and I pulled him toward me, angling my face up to his.

   The kiss, our first, was hesitant, soft, and mostly sweet. His lips brushed over mine, their lushness a surprise to me. They were plump and made it almost impossible not to kiss him a little harder, to use them to their capacity. We both inhaled, simultaneously pulling each other closer with the breath. His hand came up to grip the back of my neck and then his tongue was gently teasing. I opened, thankful he’d made the move and not waited for me, and I lost a little bit of myself in that kiss.

   His tongue traced mine, and I let out a whimper. I couldn’t find it in myself to be embarrassed by my sounds and, in fact, he seemed to like them. He responded with a low growl, which only made everything that was already burning up in my body liquefy. I forgot I was at a frat party, forgot I was on a dance floor surrounded by people, forgot about everything except Elliot and that kiss.

   When he pulled away it was with a gasp, as if he’d forgotten to breathe while worshipping my lips, but then his mouth found my neck and slowly slid down, leaving a trail of wetness as his tongue darted out. I dropped my forehead to his shoulder, just trying to stay upright as his mouth assaulted me.

   “I’ve wanted to kiss you for weeks, Evie.”

   Something about his words, the idea that he’d been thinking about me, wanting me, sent me over some proverbial line. Suddenly, I was desperate for his mouth. Hearing his need for me was more of an aphrodisiac than I’d ever experienced. My lips found his, and I kissed him with renewed vigor, my hands taking more liberties with his body, running down his chest, over his ribs, around his waist. He seemed to be enjoying the new enthusiasm with which I was kissing him, and before I was finished, he’d pulled away and grabbed my hand, leading me across the dance floor.

   I followed him into the house and we made it to the staircase before he stopped and pushed me up against the wall, his hands spanning the sides of my hips, his tongue brushing up against mine again.

   “I want to take you to my room,” he rasped, his mouth against my neck again. I arched my back, pressing my breasts into his chest, aching for some sort of contact.

   “Um, all right…” I responded.

   “We don’t have to have sex.”

   “Um, all right.” He pulled away at my response.

   “If you don’t want to go upstairs, just tell me. Honestly, I just want to be alone with you, kiss you in an empty room, instead of being surrounded by a bunch of other people.”

   “Um, all right,” I said, that time smiling. Luckily, he smiled in return. He grabbed my hand and led me further up the stairs to the second floor, then up to the third. We walked down a corridor of closed doors and I wondered how many of those doors had people behind them, and what state of undress they were in.

   We stopped at a door and I watched as he pulled keys out of his pocket and unlocked it. He swung the door open and then motioned for me to enter first. I was pleasantly surprised that the room wasn’t a disaster and it didn’t smell. I’d been on the boy’s floor of my dorm before and was appalled at how smelly boys could be when their mothers were no longer cleaning up after them. Elliot’s room was neat, organized, and odor-free.

   All thoughts of his room were pushed from my brain when his arms wrapped around me from behind and his luscious lips made contact with the skin just below my ear.