So here we are tonight
You and me together
And the storm outside
And the fire's bright
Oh, and in your eyes
I see what's on my mind
You've got me wild
Turned around inside

Oh and then desire, see
Is creeping up heavy
Oh inside here
And do you feel
The same way as I do now
Let's make this an evening
Lovers for a night, lovers for tonight

Why n' stay here with me, love, tonight
Just for an evening
And when we will make it
Our passionate pictures
You and me twist up as secret creatures
And we'll stay here
Tomorrow go back to being friends
Yeah, oh, go back to being friends

But tonight let's be lovers,
We kiss and sweat
We'll turn this better thing to the best
Of all it can offer
Oh, this rogue kiss
Tangled tongues and lips
See me this way
I'm turning and turning for you
Ah girl, ah just tonight run away
Yeah, with me for an evening
Ah, just wait and see
But then tomorrow go back to your man
I'm back to my world
And we're back to being friends
Oh wait and see me
Ah tonight let's do this thingAll we are is wasting hours
'Til the sun comes
It's all ours
On our way here, yeah cause
Tomorrow go back to being friends

Yeah, oh go back to being friends
Tonight let's be lovers, oh please
Tonight let's be lovers, say you will
Tonight let's be lovers, oh yeah
Tonight let's be lovers

And hear me call,
Oh soft-spoken whispering now
Well, a thing or two I have to say here
Tonight let's go all the way then
Oh lover I can see you
Just for an evening
Oh, let's strip down
Trip out at this
One evening's hour starts with a kiss
And away yeah, then

And tomorrow back to being friends yeah
And now lover, love you, yeah,
Just for tonight, one night, love you,
And tomorrow say goodbye
Tomorrow say goodbye...
Tomorrow say goodbye...
Tomorrow say goodbye...

Say Goodbye

He found her sitting on the steps of the back porch, away from the wreckage of the party. With the vague notion of making sure she got in all right and didn’t hurt herself—after all, she’d had a lot to drink, and as one of the few sober people present, he figured he should look out for her—he stepped onto the porch.

The slight chill of the spring night hit him and made him shiver for a second as he waited for his body to adjust to the shift from heated indoors to cool outdoors. He could just make out her silhouette at the edge of the porch, shadows cast over her by the reaching glow of the porch light they’d left on. He stepped forwards slowly, knowing in the way of friends that even though she didn’t turn, she was aware of his presence.

With a small sigh, he settled himself beside her. She was staring off into the night, her feet resting on the step below her and her arms looped around her knees. She’d propped her head on top, blue eyes quiet and solemn as she looked away into the distance at nothing in particular.

“How’re you feeling?”

She pushed at a stray lock of hair, glanced at him with a small smile. “If you mean how drunk am I, I’m fine. I’m not even feeling the buzz anymore.”

“Yeah, you usually sober up pretty quick.” They sat shoulder to shoulder and hip to hip, and despite the fact that both were young, with supposedly uncontrollable hormonal urges, neither was uncomfortable. As if to prove it, she sighed a bit, then laid her head on his shoulder and hummed in quiet contentment when he draped an arm around her to warm her.

“You should’ve brought your sweater,” he murmured, brushing her hair away from her face.

“Didn’t think it would be this cold,” she mumbled, pressing a little closer as the remark reminded her just how cold it was.

“Do you want to go inside?”

“No, I’m good here. Unless you want to go in,” she added, a taunting note slipping into her voice. He grinned.

“If you can take it, so can I.”

She yawned hugely, then grinned. “Guess we’re staying put then, huh?”

“Looks that way,” he replied equably, but his lips were twitching upwards.

They sat quietly, both thinking their own thoughts. He was beginning to wonder if she’d fallen asleep when she asked in a sleepy voice, “Is everyone gone?”

“Yeah, I think it’s just you and me. The girls are upstairs.”

“Mmm. Any idea where we’re supposed to sleep?”

“I think one of the guest rooms had a couple beds in it. We can crash there.”

“M’kay.” The drowsy noise made him smile. She was sober and she was tired, run ragged by part-time work and full-time classes at the college. In the doting way of friends, he would let her fall asleep and then carry her in, leaving her to sleep through ‘til morning. It was a system they’d used since they’d partied together in high school, and though she pretended to be annoyed by it, it made them both happy.

He sat in silence for a while longer, idly stroking her hair as she slowly went limp with sleep and her breathing slowed and deepened. When he judged her to be asleep and not likely to stir, he rose, gently lifting her into his arms. She murmured something unintelligible and turned her face into the curve of his throat, her slow, even breaths warm against his skin and sending goosebumps prickling over it.

He supposed it was normal to feel the occasional tug of unexpected lust, even when the woman in question was your best friend. They’d withstood all the trials time had thrown at them—distance, one-night stands, and the petty disputes that go hand in hand with every teenage friendship. Still, it wasn’t as though he’d ever acted on that occasional little tug.

Moving carefully with her cradled in his arms, he picked his way through the living room that was now cluttered with beer cans—what the boys had been drinking—and the coolers the women had preferred and made his way to the little spare room that had been designated as a crash-here spot for the partygoers. Without switching on the light, he made his way over to one of the two double beds and laid her on it, then stood for a moment, thinking about that little tug that had moved in him when she’d stirred against him and watching her as she slept.

The blinds on the window hadn’t been closed, so that fingers of moonlight stretched into the room and cast a pale, nearly ethereal glow across her face, making her seem far more fragile than he knew her to be. Her lips moved slightly as she mumbled something, began to stir. He chuckled under his breath, then leaned in, propped a hand on the mattress beside her and bent his head to touch his mouth to hers for just a brief second, intending only to lull her back into sleep.

He knew it when she opened her eyes because he heard the soft sound of a breath being drawn and opened his own to find her watching him, her eyes not wide with shock or outrage but heavy-lidded and watchful.

They stayed like that, watching each other, for three long heartbeats. Then her hand came up from where it lay at her side, rested on his hip and skimmed slowly, lightly up his side until it came to rest at the nape of his neck.

“Again,” she murmured, voice thick. “But only if you want to.”

With his heart pounding in his ears, he nodded, found his voice. “I want to,” he managed to say hoarsely, and she lifted her other arm to link it with the other around his neck.

“Then kiss me again,” she whispered, “and we’ll see what might happen.”

He swallowed hard against the knot in his throat, then lowered his head to catch her mouth. At first the kiss was slow and lazy, lips rubbing sleepily as fatigue weighed on them both. Then she shifted, lifted her hips just enough to touch his. His breath strangled in his throat; the hand that had been resting beside her head clenched on the sheets; and he slanted his mouth at a different angle over hers, so that the kiss went from lazily warm to suddenly, stunningly fierce.

He heard her quick, indrawn breath, felt her hands tighten in the fistfuls of his hair she’d caught a loose hold of. And he didn’t stop himself. He lowered himself onto her, pressed close, and shifted to the side, propping himself up on one arm so that he could let the other hand race greedily down her side and back up again, resting just beneath her breast and setting her skin on fire through the thin shirt she’d worn.

Ball’s in your court, he seemed to be saying. We can stop, or we can continue. It’s up to you.

She groaned, twisted so that his hand slipped the fraction of an inch it took to have it cupping her breast, and made a low sound of approval in her throat when he squeezed lightly. As if it was all the encouragement he’d needed, his mouth lost the last traces of gentleness and the kiss turned rough, feral, tongues sweeping out to taste and teeth nipping as her heartbeat sped up under his hand.

Rather than hesitate, she threw herself wholeheartedly into the kiss, arching up into him. He let out a quiet, throaty growl, hand streaking impatiently under her top to find soft, warm skin. She gasped, hips rocking upwards in surprise, then turned her head to bite at the skin stretched taut over his collarbone, where the open collar of his shirt had left the skin exposed.

He jolted, swore, and when she let out a quiet laugh, squeezed her breast through the thin shirt and bra until her breath strangled in her throat, cutting off the laughter. Amusement fled; need, sharp-edged and hot, took its place.

“Oh, God.” She whispered it, tilting her head back into the pillow to bare her throat. His mouth roamed over it, nipping and suckling by turns until she made a needy little noise and clutched at his hips, whispering incoherent little pleas that buzzed in his ears like a thousand bees.

He lifted himself off her by a fraction of an inch, peeling the top upwards. When it bunched above her breasts she let out a frustrated little sigh and shoved at his chest, pushing him back so that she could sit up and yank the shirt away.

He stared at her, at the pale, creamy skin she’d bared, and smiled at the low-cut black bra that was all that remained besides her jeans. He reached out, traced a finger along the edge of it, and flicked his eyes up to hers. “Nice.”

With her mouth dry, she caught two fistfuls of his shirt and tugged it upwards, and realized in disgust that her hands were shaking. He started to shrug out of the shirt himself, then noticed the slight tremor and frowned.

“Stop here?”

She shook her head. They’d gone too far to stop now.

Apparently he knew it too, because he nodded his head, then tugged his shirt off over his head. The disordered mess this left his hair in was more familiar to her, and she grinned, then allowed her eyes to run slowly over him, once, then twice. “Same goes,” she told him, and this time she was the one to lean in and press her mouth to his.

Slowly they lowered themselves back onto the bed, mouths still locked and hands wandering over bared skin. When his hands lightly touched the snap of her jeans, she murmured in assent and lifted her hips so that he could peel the denim away.

Beneath that was a scrap of lace that matched the bra. Watching her, he dipped his head and pressed a kiss to the expanse of skin just at her waist. She started, then relaxed, the muscles of her belly quivering as his mouth trailed over her skin.

Their breathing slowed, thickened; their heartbeats grew sluggish; their limbs grew heavy. Layer by layer their clothes came away, leaving skin bared to wandering hands and mouths.

His mouth found her breast, suckled. She made a strangled noise and arched beneath him, the little sounds that rose in her throat ringing in his ears and making him burn. He drew harder, a sharp-edged thrill sprinting through him when she let out a choked little cry. Pleasure sharpened until she couldn’t separate it from pain; murmuring breathlessly, she fisted her hands in his hair and yanked until his mouth came back to hers.

And now, while they were still locked at the mouth, he slipped inside her, listening to her quick intake of breath as he filled her, a feeling both familiar and foreign. For a moment they were still and silent, the only sounds in the room their ragged breathing and the hum of the heater. Then he shifted slightly inside her and she gasped, startled, just before they began to move with each other.

It was instinctive, her hips rising and falling to match his thrusts into her, both of them moving together as though they’d done this a hundred times before. The need for release built until their movements were almost frantic, until her nails were digging into his back and urging him on.

He felt her muscles tighten, felt her entire body go taut just before she clamped tight around him with a little moan as release claimed her; he clung to control until she’d gone limp and soft beneath him, then moved in her one last time before he let go.

And in the morning, they woke in separate beds, rolled to face each other. He offered her a sleepy grin; she threw a pillow at him.

Friends.

I got the idea for this from the song Say Goodbye by the Dave Matthews Band (looooove it), and I couldn’t clear my head to write anything else until I purged this from my system. So, I’m hoping you like it, as it was written in a matter of hours the day after too much alcohol and may be less than perfect. For myself, I’m pretty happy with it, and I hope you will be too. Please, even if you despise it, REVIEW, okay? Tell me what needs work, and all that jazz!

Oh, and also, this wasn’t spell- or grammar-checked, so I swear I won’t be offended if you point out errors. (Hint, hint.)

— Murphy