Jamb: by Misty Provencher

smiles.  My stomach squeezes with the idea of it.  I mean, Garrett’s slept in a bed beside mine before, when we stayed in Nok’s little Veritas hide-out beneath the library.  Of course, I was unconscious and briefly dead for most of it, since I was re-Impressioning with the Cornerstone in my palm, but Garrett had been there.  He had laid on the bed beside mine, reading his book and waiting for me to wake up.
    I think again of what it would be like to spend a whole night with Garrett while I am conscious.  My palms get damp and the squirm in my stomach starts up again.  I lace my fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck and close my eyes, laying my head against him.  I breathe in all the lime and snow and water and wood smells that make up Garrett.  He is every good smell in the world and my fingertips on his skin send pulses of electricity through me that heat my arms.
    I inhale him until my lungs hurt.  I remember how we were not allowed to touch when I first began training, because as my Vieo, Garrett should have drained my energy instead of recharging it like he does.  Being able to touch him whenever I want is still mind-blowing and right now, all I can think of is touching him.
    M y mind wanders off to thoughts of Garrett in my bed, wearing only his pajama bottoms, and the tingles zip through me like bottle rockets.  Garrett’s lips find mine and he moves closer, my chest pressed to his, as he deepens our kiss.  My hands drop to his waist and I can feel the solid bands of muscle over his stomach.  He lets out a tiny groan in the back of his throat and the bottle rockets explode a warehouse supply of glittery tingles that whiz through every inch of me.
    “I would love to stay with you, but that would create a huge scandal,” Garrett says as he slowly pulls his head away from mine.  His arms remain looped around me and his grip keeps me pressed against the length of his body, feeling the entire network of his muscles.  “And I think my brother’s got ‘scandal’ totally covered right now.”
    “I didn’t know Sean liked anything more than books,” I say.
    “Well, he obviously liked Teagan.  A lot,” Garrett laughs.  “They dated about four months, but they knew each other before that.  Well, as good as you can know somebody on the internet, when they live a continent away.  She’s Vietnamese.”
    Recalling how Teagan’s face looked so out of place among the rest of the second Cura that hung over the balcony ledge, I screw up my face when I ask him, “You sure about that?”
    “Yeah.  Her mo m, Lorie, was transferred to the 2 nd Cura because she’d gotten pregnant with Teagan at sixteen.”
    “I thought that wasn’t, uh, done .”
    “ No, but it does happen every once in a while,” Garrett says.  “I guess Teagan’s biological father was a Contego from Lorie’s Cura, but he denied that he was the one who got Lorie pregnant, because his parents couldn’t stand Lorie.  The story I got was that everyone knew he was the father and he was finally going take responsibility, when he died in a motorcycle accident.  Lorie’s parents felt ostracized by the scandal, so they packed their daughter off to another Cura. Lorie met Dai there, and they ended up together.”
    “ But I thought we can only marry once.”
    “You’ve been paying attention, Rebel,” Garrett teases me with a squeeze that blasts sparks through my veins.  “It’s true.  When we Impression, it changes a lot more than just your nerve system.  You can only bind and marry once, and that person is the only one you can have children with.  The binding rule comes from our community, but the conception part comes from how our bodies change when we are Impressioned.  Like in Lorie’s case, if you conceive a child with someone, the two of you can’t have kids with anyone else.  You can have sex with other partners, but neither of you will be able to conceive.”
    I blush with him talking about sex and