All Chapters of SUBMISSION 101: Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

My hands search his face before snaking through his loose raven locks and yanking. He groans at the pain, but the way he shudders against me tells me everything I need to know. Hunger. Delight. More.His lips leave mine, leaving me desperate for their return.Tenderlessly, he kicks my feet apart, forcing my legs wider. The agony dissipates when I feel his lips at my neck. His hands snake over my middle as he works his way downward before sinking to his knees. His hands rake up my thighs, the hem of my skirt lifting under his touch, exposing nearly the whole length of my legs. His eyes flicker up to meet mine and in a moment of dark realization, I stop breathing altogether.All I can do is brace myself against the steady wood of the door behind me. Because Harlan begins kissing my thigh, his head dipping underneath my skirt. And I'm gone.His kiss is tender. I roll my head against the back of the door, savouring the touch I'd been craving for hours but desperate for r

I ‘m dreaming when he wakes me up.The touch of his fingers against my cheek pulls me straight out of a deep, vision-filled sleep and back into reality. The image had just been there, whatever scene in my imagination just having been playing fresh in my mind moments before, like a TV that had just been shut off. Except I can't remember exactly what I saw.I know Harlan is there. He always is. And I remember happiness. Warmth. I remember speaking with him, but whatever words were shared are long gone, floating further and further away as I try to grasp my memory with invisible fingers, watching it slip through until it is gone.My eyes open into thin slits, squinting as I try to adjust them to the low light. A hand presses to my cheek.It is Harlan. He is everywhere: there in my dreams, and again there next to me in real life, when he pulls me out of them and back to earth. He hovers above me, propped on his elbow, giving me light strokes until I am finally awake and

The coldness of his words shocks me.I sit there, cross-legged next to him for some time, the weight of his words – or rather, his warning – giving me pause and much to contemplate. I feel my heart freeze and shatter, feeling so sad and rejected that it renders me unable to move.I don't know how long I sit there for, waiting for the ice to leave my veins, waiting for the sting of his words to dissolve. Eventually, it does. And when the time comes, I finally settle next to him, keeping a wide berth between our bodies, hugging my side of his bed.I’m quickly asleep, as far away from Harlan as I can possibly be in the confines of his bed, black sheets smooth and comforting against my skin. I sleep well considering, and could have sworn, at some point in the night, that I still wake up to a heavy, muscled arm slung around my waist, and a rough hand resting on my stomach.~ ~ ~ ~ ~The next morning, I find Harlan as I did the last time I spent the night at

Harlan misses the girl more than he cares to admit. If he'd been asked a few mere weeks ago if he could ever see himself in the state he finds himself in now, carrying her with him in his mind, with every step he takes, every agonizing day away from her... well, how could he have even considered the possibility?But now, his nights are sleepless. The left side of his bed empty. His thoughts swim in his mind, insatiable. Loud. Agonizing.He'd made a mistake today.That stupid pet name he'd called her on the phone had just slipped out. It scares him how easily the word fell from his mouth, without so much as a forethought. He has to draw back now, to make it a point to create some distance. Not because he wants to, but because he can't have her confused about what they are. What they can never be.He misses her. That's why he'd called her in the first place. It’s been fucking torture. So long since seeing her face, hearing her soft, familiar voice. It is a weakness on

I hadn’t pictured my reunion with Harlan after five agonizingly long weeks to be like this. I expected to feel a sliver of joy, of anticipation, for one thing.Well, at least the anticipation is still there.The anticipation of giving him a good sock in the jaw.I pace around his empty office. I bolted from that lecture hall the second I got the opportunity, and without a look back. And I didn't even think about the fact that Harlan likely didn’t even notice, or it would have made me feel even worse.When his head isn't up his own ass, it is buried in the boatloads of work he has to do. It pains me to admit that I probably wasn't even on his radar that afternoon.But I know he'll be coming back to his office thanks to his schedule I now have access to, and I've taken the liberty of blocking off some time for myself, after I cried in the bathroom for a while.So now, I find myself in his empty office this evening: pacing furiously, all hope for the romantic re