The Glint of Glass

Rain fell that night like it had something to confess.

Soft at first. Then harder. Harsher. It tapped against the windows and soaked the garden beds below, blurring the view of the backyard from my bedroom. The storm outside echoed the one building inside me.

Leah’s arrival had poisoned everything.

She walked through this house like she belonged here, laughing with Jason, lounging on the couch like she’d always been part of this world.

But she wasn’t part of my world.

She didn’t know the feeling of Mrs. Rowen’s fingers threading through my hair, the hush of her voice in the dark, the fire beneath her calm.

She hadn’t tasted the heat behind the silk.

And yet, she saw too much.

I was pacing the hallway around midnight when I heard them.

Voices.

Leah’s. Low. Heated.

And Mrs. Rowen’s, cool, clipped, that edge she used when she was seconds from snapping.

I moved closer, heart thudding.

They were in the den.

The door was cracked.

“I know what you’re doing,” Leah was saying.

Mrs. Rowen didn’t respond immediately. When she did, her tone was even.

“I suggest you be careful with your assumptions, Leah.”

“I’m not assuming. I see the way he looks at you.”

“I’m a grown woman. He’s Jason’s friend.”

Leah scoffed. “That’s not denial. That’s a deflection.”

A pause. Then,

“You’re jealous.”

“You’re a predator.”

The room went quiet.

I pressed my back to the wall, breath frozen.

Then Mrs. Rowen spoke again, softly:

“And you’re a child playing with matches, trying to start a fire you can’t control.”

“You’re right,” Leah said. “But if you burn, I’m taking you with me.”

That night, I waited until the house was asleep.

Jason’s room was dark. Leah’s door was closed.

Only one light remained glowing, under her door.

I didn’t knock.

I slipped inside.

She was standing by the window in a dark slip, barely more than a whisper of fabric. Her arms were crossed over her chest, but her posture was steel.

“You heard.”

“I didn’t mean to.”

“Yes, you did.”

I stepped closer.

“She’s not wrong,” I said.

She turned sharply. “Excuse me?”

“I do look at you differently. I look at you like I can’t look at anyone else.”

Her shoulders relaxed just slightly, but her eyes didn’t lose their fire.

“You’re spiraling,” she said. “You need to remember who you are.”

“I remember too well.”

I took another step.

“I remember the way your breath catches when I kiss the hollow of your neck. I remember how your hands tremble when I’m inside you.”

She sucked in a breath.

I reached for her wrist.

“Tell me to stop.”

She didn’t.

She led me to the bed like she had the first time, with silence and tension drawn tight like a wire.

The air was thick, hot, electric.

When she lay down, the slip rode up her thighs. My eyes followed the fabric’s path, my hands soon after. I climbed over her slowly, my fingers brushing her bare skin, tracing her curves like they were etched in glass.

Her chest rose to meet me.

I kissed her there, slow and deep, letting my tongue circle just above her heartbeat.

She gasped. Quiet. But it echoed through me.

I undid the straps of her slip with one hand, my fingers moving deliberately. Not clumsy. Not greedy. Focused.

When it slipped down her body, I took her in like the first time I had ever seen light.

She arched beneath me as my lips moved down her stomach, my hands parting her thighs. I kissed along the inside of her leg, teasing, savoring.

She shivered. “Ethan…”

“I know.”

I found the place where she pulsed the hardest. I used my tongue the way she’d shown me, slow, circular, firm.

She gripped the sheets, her hips rising to meet every motion, her breath hitching in time.

When she came undone, she didn’t scream.

She sighed, like release, like surrender, like mourning.

I moved up to kiss her, and she kissed me back with a hunger that was all need and no pretense.

Then it was her turn.

She rolled me onto my back, her legs straddling me.

Her hands roamed, torso, ribs, waist, her fingers memorizing. Her mouth followed, branding me with each kiss.

When she lowered herself onto me, I bit my lip so hard I tasted blood.

She moved slowly at first, each roll of her hips a wave, each pause a tease. Her hands braced against my chest, her head thrown back, hair falling like silk.

It was unbearable.

And perfect.

When we both broke, it wasn’t fast.

It was deep.

Drawn out.

Dangerous.

We lay there, limbs tangled, breathing into the same space.

Then I noticed it.

A blinking red dot.

Across the room.

On her dresser.

Jason’s camcorder.

She saw it a split second after I did.

We both froze.

I got up, stumbling, grabbing it with shaking hands.

It was recording.

Still.

Still recording.

My fingers fumbled the buttons.

I turned it off.

Then we stared at each other, the gravity of what had just happened sinking in.

“Did he…?”

“I don’t know,” she whispered. “Maybe he was just filming something earlier. Maybe he forgot to turn it off.”

“Or maybe he set it up.”

Silence.

Then she stood, pulling the robe from the chair.

“If he knows,” she said, her voice calm but cold, “this is over.”

My chest clenched.

“I can’t lose this,” I said.

“You already might have.”

The next morning, Leah was gone.

No goodbye.

Just a text:

Leah 6:33 a.m. I don’t know what I walked into, but I’m out.

Jason was quiet.

Too quiet.

He avoided me all day. He didn’t ask where I’d been or why my window was still cracked open at sunrise.

At one point, I found him in the garage.

Watching something on his phone.

When he saw me, he locked the screen.

Smiled.

“Sleep okay?”

“Yeah.”

“You and Mom seem really close these days.”

My heart thudded.

“I guess.”

“She tell you about Dad?”

I nodded. “Some.”

“She tell you he used to hit her?”

I swallowed. “No.”

“She’s good at hiding bruises,” Jason said. “Even better at hiding what she wants.”

I didn’t know how to respond.

He stood up.

“You think you know her,” he said. “But she only shows you what she wants you to see.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because I liked you.”

“Liked?”

“I’m not stupid, Ethan.”