FORTY ONE

Ryder

I did try.

I had no idea whether or not that made a difference, but if I ever had to explain this to Samantha, I could say that I had tried my very best to explain it. But despite everything I did, nothing came of it. The genie refused to go back into the bottle no matter how hard we tried. I was standing below her and looked up at her. During the night, I draped a plush blanket over us both, but it only covered her bare body halfway. She was pressed up against me, and her hair draped over the arm that I had wrapped around her. I felt as though one of her arms was encircling my chest. She ended up falling asleep on my shoulder. I was able to detect her delicate breaths flitting across my clavicle like butterflies. Her leg was draped over mine, golden against my paler skin. The length of her body wrapped around mine was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen, so I pulled the blanket up higher to cover us both.

She came to when she moved. I could feel her eyelashes fluttering open