Co-written with Michelle.


You're like a disease. You get under my skin and just spread throughout my blood, devouring everything in your path until I'm void of everything but you. I have spent hours lying on my bed, feeling you wash through me and imagining you by my side with that hair falling into your eyes and that infectious laughter in my ears while we crack jokes naked beneath the sheets. You're a warmth that echoes through me, never leaving and biding your time in the confines of my mind, re-enacting my fantasies and playing them out for me on my eyelids.

God, you're everywhere.

You drive me crazy because I can't get away. Your constant presence brings me to tears, pounding on my blood even in the midst of the night and begging to be thought of again. So I sit up, staring at my ceiling and imagining you until I was fall asleep again. Then you haunt me in my dreams; you pull me close to you and drop endless kisses on my lips. You run your hands along skin that's never been touched by anyone but you, and you whisper into my ear about how much you love me and want me and need to hold me.

It hurts.

And so this is what I was thinking of as you stood on my doorstep tonight, trying to work up the nerve to ring my doorbell. I was watching infomercials and thinking about your hands and your eyes and your unruly hair and the way your laugh is so amazing to me. I was thinking about how it used to be, back when you let me love you, let me hold you and touch you and tell you you're the only one. You're fucking still the only one, I was thinking, and that crushed me.

But then the doorbell rang.

I opened up the door hesitantly, unsure of who would be gracing me with their presence at eleven o' clock on a Thursday night. The tinge of uncertainty I had as I laid eyes on your figure on my steps was dramatically morphed into stark disbelief and I stood agape. You seemed so much taller than I'd remember, despite the fact you were hunched against the bitter wind around you, chin tucked deep into the collar of your leather jacket. It made me remember exactly how long it had been since my eyes had skirted your body.

Four years, six months, and twenty days.

Your gaze had been fixated on the bushes flanking my modest doorway but quickly snapped up when the porch screen opened and I stared uneasily out at you. I watched a vague demeanor of shock sweep your features, those that I'd tried so desperately to rid myself of. Now I breathed them in deeply, becoming reaccquainted rather quickly and feeling that stab of desire that hurt so badly every day for the past four years. An unfamiliar aching overcame my stomach.

Your blue eyes blinked slowly and you swallowed, standing up a bit straighter. Shaking a mass of blonde hair from your forehead, you attempted to regain control of your facial expressions and cleared your throat. "Hey, Zac."

I couldn't breathe.

Your voice, that sweet whisper of a voice that I was positive I'd never hear again. It drifted slowly through the air between us and made love to my ears with such serenity that my knees nearly buckled. That fucking beautiful voice, that mouth. Those lips. Weren't you gone? Out of my life? Certainly I thought you had taken all of this with you when I watched you back down the driveway that afternoon, without so much as a glance in my direction.

Weren't you gone?

Your eyes were staring at me, burning into me with a feeling I couldn't register. Far too long I stood dumbly, one hand on the doorknob and just trying to decipher the puzzle set before me. You were patient and seemingly none too intent on moving either. We were simply drinking each other in, and it was both beautiful and painfully confusing. I shook my head slightly and glanced downward momentarily to free myself from the trance I'd been subjected to. My tongue was wet but my mouth was dry; I wasn't sure if I'd be able to speak, but slowly I heard a raspy breath coming from my throat: "Why are you here?"

You paused, eyes never once flickering in their intensity. It made me shiver. "Can I come in?"

My eyebrows furrowed. You LEFT, YOU LEFT ME, and you didn't want me anymore. You TOLD ME THAT. Why do you want to come in? Why didn't you answer my question? God, if you only could have felt my heart beating; I knew at that moment I wouldn't be able to keep myself from you. I knew that if I let you in, I wouldn't be able to hold back the feeling that was wrenching the life from my chest now that you were at an arm's length. I don't care that you didn't want me, I NEED YOU.

I opened the door.

You entered slowly as I stepped back, almost slinking over the threshold with your head bowed and staring at the shuffling of your feet. We stood awkwardly in the foyer of my new apartment, quite obviously not certain of what there was between us that needed to be spoken. I briefly entertained the idea of you thinking about the best way to apologize, the best way to tell me that even after so long, after all that, you still loved me. That you couldn't get away from me, either.

My heart did a little pitter-patter.

"I am sorry, you know."

He seemed to choose his words carefully, watching me with an intent gaze, not sure as to how I was going to react to him, to what he had to say. And in all honesty, I had no clue how to react. My normal everyday functions had left my body the minute I saw him standing on my porch.

I regained my composure, however, and realized what a fucking idiot he must be to expect me to forgive him that easily. To forgive him with such a simple apology. One, that, in his mind, probably wasn't even an apology, just an acknowledgement. I felt the anger course through my body and fought to keep it subdued beneath my thick skin, determined to remain aloof. You will not get the better of me this time. You will not see how much you've hurt me these past four years.

I exhaled shakily, avoiding your stare, and slumped down into a chair. "Yeah, I suppose you probably should be." Yeah you fucking should be. To believe that you have the audacity to march into my house and expect me to forgive you just like that is something so enormous I can't even begin to wrap my mind around it.

The fact that I probably will is something more incomprehensible.

I can't help it... the way you're looking at me has me in a fit of hormones, and my emotions are all over the place, and God, the way you can still fucking make me feel like this is amazing. And I'd give anything right now just to hear you tell me you still loved me, that I was still the one for you after all these years.

Don't disappoint me, Taylor. My heart can't handle another let down.

He sighed softly and clasped his hands together, sitting down on the couch next to me. "I deserved that. And I deserve much worse... It's just... God, Zac, I've missed you so fucking much," he whispered, those goddamn blue eyes penetrating me fully. I could have sworn I saw his eyes glass over, and a single tear slide down his ruddy cheeks.

I swallowed thickly, my eyes sliding down his body slowly, appreciatively. I felt the tears come as the memories slammed against me, hitting me like a brick wall. Your hands and your eyes and your mouth and your thighs... and your goddamn sighs and whimpers and fuck, the moans...

A thin line of sweatbeads formed on my upper lip, and I licked at them absently, oblivious to anything else in the world except your lips, and how bad I wanted to feel them on mine. How bad I wanted to crush your thin frame beneath me, to ravage you, and drink you up, how fucking bad I needed you.

I stood, and made my way carefully to the couch, sinking in beside you, shivering as I felt your arm brush against mine. Slowly, I curled into your side and pulling your arm around me, though you didn't need any direction - I felt your arms nearly crush me in a tight, protective embrace.

And for the first time in four years, six months and twenty days, I cried tears of joy.

I was always the one.

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