By..N507
It was to be a trip to get away from the whole world as it turned itself inside out with red. Red hearts, red cards, red balloons, red rings, red flowers, and red EVERYTHING! It was a cruise to escape the word, LOVE. It was a cruise to get away from the words of your mother saying "Aren't you ever going to go out, or at least flirt with a guy?" that were tamed compared to your aunt's "Are you sure that you aren't gay?" It was cruise, to a beautiful place, in the tropics, with NO COUPLES ALLOWED.
I had looked forward to the cruise, as it was going to get me away from the world. I would escape the humiliation of once again feeling more for someone than what he felt. I would escape away from a "pending" "friendship" and lick my wounds. I got onto that boat, swearing never to talk to another guy, in order to save my own heart and soul. I got onto that boat, pushing away my own fears of boats and fishy water, promising to start the next movement in the USA and Canada… THE ANTI-VALENTINE'S DAY, and to make it a national holiday. NO, an INTERNATIONAL HOLIDAY!
I was very brave through out the cruise, as I even looked out over the side of the boat and saw the ocean water below. Maybe I did have a bit too much to drink that night, but I did look. It could have also been the impending day called Valentine's Day that made me a bit too reflective over the entire event as the sun was dropping in the sky. I was holding my arms around myself, wondering if there would ever be a man to do that to me, when I looked down. There was the rushing seawater, with all of its fish and seaweed and sharks underneath the boat, and it looked like nothing.
That night started a chain reaction of events that spun my world out of control for no reason that I can still phantom. I had looked off to the island the next morning and smiled. I wanted to go and visit it, as the huge palm trees swayed lightly in the breeze. I proudly stepped onto the little boat that would ship us over to land. The trip was good, but the weather was turning bad.
I can't remember exactly what occurred on the return trip. The waves were getting huge as the little boat tried to force its way over to the cruise ship. I tried not to look at the waves or the incoming thunder and lightening storm. I looked away, until I severely became seasick. The captain looked to the ocean and I moved quickly.
THEN I WAS IN IT.
THEN I SAW DARKNESS.
When I first started to open my tired eyes, the light in my face was so bright. It was like one of the dentist's lights on full blast and only an inch away from your face. I turned my head lightly, wondering if this was heaven, because if it was, it sucked. My entire body ached, as something seemed odd about the place.
I squinted at the light, trying to assess what was occurring to my body as I awoke. Slowly I stared up at the light, to find a face drop down from no where. There were there deep gray-green eyes staring down at me, as light brown hair that had been bleached by the sun hangs around the sides of the head.
I start to shake my head and I look back and find the face gone. Now I was sure that I was paralyzed and going crazy as I felt the sand scratching at my arms. Gone was my fun with gambling and damn, I would give a thousand dollars for a good stiff drink at this point.
Something wet nuzzled at my foot and I pulled my leg away, allowing me to know that I could still move it. I placed my hands into the deep and wet sand and start to push my body upward. Now the sun shifts and a view appears in front of me that would drop the jaw of any woman who loved to view a man's body. It would probably even drop a jaw of those who didn't particular find things like this nice.
A firm and chiseled body tanned lightly by the sun, sitting on top of the darkest black horse I have ever seen. The contrast of the colors drew emphasis on the skin tone of the man, and the contours of his muscles and mass.
Fat was not a word associated with this man as his hair started to become picked up in the soft ocean breeze, and the black mane of the horse starts to fly back and forth across his large and perfectly symmetrical chest.
Swallowing became difficult as I continued to stare and found myself not worrying about my own injuries or about what ocean animals had tried to have me for dinner. There was this perfect man, sitting on the deep black horse, with barely a scrap of clothing on. And the scrap of clothing that was one was thin and was not for a man who was modest at all. There was nothing left to the imagination as I stared and blinked.
I thought about heaven again, and swore I was there. I had died and gone to heaven. I could sit here for eternity, staring at this man, who's eyes looked back at me, and never tired. My mouth that was parched before, intensified in its dryness.
The horse started to move towards me, and the long and muscular legs of the man moved, slipping down off of the horse, to thud down onto the sand only a foot away from me. I looked at the long muscular curves of the man's calf and then slowly looked upward. It was a natural progression upwards, until I looked straight into the piercing gray-green eyes.
"Do you need help up?" He asked in an accented voice that made my heart patter harder. A tropical island, in the warm sunlight, with a young man who's chest now sparkled with light droplets of sweat, on the perfectly structured chest, and WITH A FRENCH ACCENT! I could not stop what happened next.
I passed out.
The pain was the first thing I became aware of as my eyes attempted to open once again after the ordeal I had. It was during this half-awake and half-asleep stage that I told myself that the man and the horse was a dream. I had told myself that about ten times before I willingly set out to open my eyes.
There was a ceiling above my head and I blinked lightly. I swallowed lightly and wanted to know where I was. I looked back up and the gray-green eyes and the lightly sun-bleached hair was above my face again. My heart skipped a beat, as the dream continued.
"How are you feeling?" the accented voice asks and I get drawn into the whiteness of his teeth that are hidden underneath lips that just sang out to be kissed, licked, and lightly nibbled on. I slowly drop my eyes and become shocked.
"You have clothes on." I stated slowly as I saw the white T-shirt clinging to his chest and jean shorts on his legs. There is a pleasant laugh from the man's mouth as he kneels down to get closer to my face and body. I swallowed as I see his face in greater detail, the slight curve around his nose, the deep jaw muscles, and even the eyes that seemed to be changing color as I stared at them.
Slowly he raised his hand towards my face. He flipped the palm over and extended the back of the hand to my cheek and slowly stroke the side of my face. I felt the hand and saw the impending blackness from the softness of the touch.
"No…. Don't pass out again…." He quickly said a he dropped the hand to my shoulder. I blinked my eyes and swallowed. I couldn't believe I had been close to passing out from a touch on my cheek from this man. The touch made him real, and maybe that was what shocked me. Maybe I was still thinking that this was all a great alcohol induced dream or something. I was half hoping to find out that I never went to that island and that instead I stayed in the bar to drink away memories of the guy I practically threw myself at before the cruise.
"I'm so embarrassed." I comment with a scratchy voice that sounded like fingernails running down a chalkboard. I turn my head away from the man as he slowly stands up. I closed my eyes, suddenly feeling alone, but quickly he returns.
"Here." He says as he kneels back down and helps to lift my head and raises a cup to my mouth. I let the cool water dribble down my throat and rewet parts of my insides I didn't realize where dry. I push my arms out and lift my body in the bed. There is pain from my right leg as I drag it backward to lean against the broad headboard of the bed.
"I think you broke your ankle." The man says as he reaches out and touches my cheek again. I blink and look at him.
"Where did you come from? How did you get to the island?" The man asks and I look around the room. It was a small cottage, but yet nice. I swallowed and looked at him.
"I was on the Anti-Valentine's Day Cruise and fell overboard during a storm." I said quickly and the man started to laugh.
"Anti-Valentine's Day Cruise?" he laughed loudly as he sat back on his feet. I looked at him and then quickly turned away from him. The matter wasn't funny.
"Yes. Anti-Valentine's Day Cruise!" I said loudly and the man stopped laughing and looked at me. He tilted his head to the side and sighed.
"It's one of the holidays I miss the most." The man let out in a whisper and I now began to laugh.
"Well, that's a no-brainer! You're the type the always has a girlfriend…. And the type that doesn't see the ones out there that have no one and has to watch all the loving couple send damn flowers to each other till we get to our stomachs from seeing all the damn love!" I quickly launched the words at him.
He stood up softly and hung his head from his neck. "You are right. I always had a girlfriend and I always sent flowers." The man said as he walked across the room. There was sadness in his face and I bit my lip softly. I never was the one to inflict pain onto a man. They always made me cry, and it was never the other way around.
"I'm sorry!" I said quickly and the motion of the now clothed gorgeous man stopped. He turned around and smiled softly.
"I am going to have to change your mind on that." The man said and I let out a soft smirk. Here I was hurt, stranded on an island, not knowing where, and I was worried that maybe this man could prove to me the importance of Valentine's Day. I would have to say that at that point, my priorities were messed up. He walked back to the bed and looked at me.
"You have been hurt." The man said and I laughed.
"Remember, I fell over board and somehow washed upon your beach to find you staring at me half-naked?" I asked and the man laughed loudly as he dropped his arms to hold his stomach from the deep laughter.
"And funny." He finished and I shook my head. He turned and headed towards the table, where I saw some medical supplies. Now he was going to make me hurt. He had turned on his charm so I wouldn't scream so loudly when he tended to my injuries.
"I was more than half naked." He commented a he turned back around to look at me. I let out a soft laugh and look at his hands and then to his face. "My name is Roy." He said and I nodded my head.
"Hello, Roy, and thank you for saving me. You can call me Michelle." I said and he nodded his head with a lopsided grin on his face.
It had been a gamble to accept to Roy's notion of a ride on the horse. I looked at the horse as Michael pulled the reins tightly. Roy wanted to show me why I was wrong about Valentine's Day. I sighed and looked up at the horse.
Roy reached down his muscular arm and pulled me up onto the back of the horse. "Hold me, tightly." Roy said firmly and I slowly wrapped my arms around his chest. The muscles rippled at my touch and I pulled away when Roy started to walk the horse slowly. He turned his head around to face me.
The sun was low in the sky and I saw the seagulls flying above our heads. I still did not know where I was, and knew that the boat was now three days away, as I had spent that time with Roy, arguing about Valentine's day. Now, I was on a horse, with Roy. I could smell his shampoo and the scent that was only uniquely his. It brought a pleasure to my body that I had quickly learned to turn away from in all my years of being on the hunt for a man.
"What is it?" Roy slowly asked as he pulled his arms back and stopped the horse. I looked up at the sky before looking back into Roy's eyes. How do you tell a man, that you still barely know, that he was the man that you have been dreaming about for the past six years of your life, and now he was acting in the way the same dream had played out in for six years? How could you even expect a man to understand that? How could you expect a man to find the harmony of the words, and the significance of the dream, without laughing at you? How could you allow this man to be that man in the dream, because once you leave, the dream becomes dead? How couldn't I realize that I had already seen the connection and already made the move?
"Michelle?" Roy asked again as he touched my arm. I looked into his green eyes and I knew I was no longer in a world without dreams. I knew that I was touching my dream, or rather, my dream had touched me. I looked at the hand that grazed against my skin ever so softly and then looked up my arm. I was afraid to look still to his face. I didn't want to fall into the trap of Valentine's Day. All it was, was a trap for me. I didn't want to fall. I didn't want to fall. I didn't want to fall. I didn't want to fall.
I had fallen.
I looked up into the eyes and felt no need for anything else. Those eyes pulled me in closer and closer until I felt as if I was deeply embedded into the gray-green eyes. I start to close my eyes as I see the lips glistened with the readiness to kiss, and I can feel the soft exhale of his own very breath.
The hand that was on my arm moves and takes hold of the very tip of my chin. "Don't close your eyes…. Look at me." Roy says as he leans forward and takes possession of my mouth. The gray-green eyes get larger as they stare deeply into my own being. They do not move from my eyes as his hands drift to my shoulders and then to my lower back. It is not until the hands flirt down near my pants do I even consciously remember that I am still on a horse.
There is a twinkle of excitement in Roy's eyes that only provokes my hands to move to his own bare arms, and then to the thin material of the white T-shirt. Now I close my eyes briefly, and the kiss intensifies by tenfold. It is like he is in my very soul, part of my very being. Where my skin started and ended no longer existed as this man, Roy, set my entire being on fire, and he was gasoline.
There we were, on top of a horse, in the throws of passion that I never thought would be mine to participate in. His nimble fingers worked quickly at the button down shirt that Roy had given me to wear, seeking out my own bare flesh. I felt the shirt lightly drop from my shoulders and Roy's lips following in the line of my neck down to my collarbone.
This wasn't part of the original dream.
Roy was good at the revision.
****
"Wine?" Roy asked as he lifted the bottle from the small basket. I nodded my head and Roy poured the red wine into the glass. I leaned my head back and looked out over the ocean. I no longer wondered where my cruise ship had sailed off. I no longer worried about making the Anti-Valentine's Day, an international holiday. I looked at the setting sun and sighed as I felt Roy's eyes on me.
"I can't believe we did that." Roy said slowly and I turned my head as my entire face turned red. The shirt had been retrieved and placed back onto my bare shoulders. Memories of moments were almost embarrassing. The feat that had occurred was a feat of nature and physics. The physical connection was made, and how the bodies maneuvered and managed not to fall off of the horse was beyond me.
I was basking in the memories, and the soft touch of Roy's fingertips brushing the softness of my thigh. I took a sip of the wine and looked into the eyes that seemed like the endless ocean not far from the beach that we laid upon.
"That was a scene from a romance novel." I commented and Roy laughed loudly as the comment seemed to hang in the air.
"No one would believe it was physically possible." Roy said with a devilish smile creeping upon his face. I laugh. He was everything, and funny.
"Then we would have to show them that it was possible." I commented as I held the wine in my hands and smiled back at Roy. He took the wineglass and pushed it off to the side.
"Why don't we stay on ground this time?" Roy asked slowly and I was not one to argue.