It’s the slowness that does it. The way her fingers trace the edge of his belt instead of yanking it loose, how she pauses to brush a thumb over his jaw, like she’s memorizing the shape of it. He’s used to hurry—fumbling hands, quick breaths, the rush to get to the end. This patience is a foreign language, and his body reacts before his brain can catch up: a sharp inhale, a stutter of his pulse that sounds loud in the quiet.
She notices, of course she does. Her lips curve into a half-smile as she works the button on his jeans, her touch light as a feather. “Nervous?” she asks, and he huffs a laugh that comes out shaky. “No,” he lies, but his hands curl into fists at his sides, like he’s fighting the urge to grab her, to speed things up. That’s the habit, the reflex—take control before someone else does, because no one’s ever taken this much care with him before.
When she finally leans in, her mouth hovering just above his skin, he gasps again, louder this time. It’s not pleasure, not exactly. It’s surprise—at being treated like something worth savoring, not just using. He’s spent years building walls around the soft parts of himself, the parts that crave this kind of attention, but her slowness is a wrecking ball. “Easy,” she murmurs, and he forces himself to unclench his hands. Maybe, for once, he can let someone else set the pace. Maybe being handled gently isn’t such a bad thing.