Love on the Brain

I WAKE UP from a four-hour stress-nap as Levi merges onto the interstate for the last stretch of the trip, and BLINK is instantly on my mind. “About the frequency trains, I wonder if we could take advantage of the magnetothermal—” Something splattered on the side of the road catches my eye. “What’s that?”

“Wow.” Levi’s tone is forcefully cheerful. “Check out that farm on the right!”

“But what’s that on the— Oh no.”

“I didn’t see anything.”

“Is it a dead raccoon?”

“No.”

“Yes, it was!” I start crying. Again. For the seventh time in forty-eight hours. You’d think my lacrimal ducts would have runneth over, but nope. “Poor baby.”

“You know what? It was a raccoon, but it had clearly died of old age.”

“What?”

“In that very spot. He died peacefully in his sleep, then someone ran him over. Nothing to be sad about.” I glare at him. At least I’m not crying anymore. “What were you saying about leveraging magnetothermal properties?”

“You’re full of shit.” I lift my legs, kick his forearm, and then lay my foot on the glove compartment. His eyes follow my every movement, linger briefly on my bare knees. “But thank you. For babysitting my feelings this weekend. For not letting me free-fall into a pit of despair. I promise I’m going to revert to adult status. Starting now.”

“Finally,” he deadpans.

I laugh. “For real—what did you tell Tim?”

“I said hi. Asked how he was.”

“Come on. You were speaking into his ear.”

“Just whispering sweet nothings.”

I snort. “Wouldn’t be surprising. You might be the only person in the lab he didn’t cheat on me with.” His long fingers grip the steering wheel and I instantly regret my words. “Hey, I was joking. I actually don’t care much anymore. Would I mind seeing Tim bent in two with a severe hemorrhoid attack? Nope. But neither would I go out of my way to stab him. Which I didn’t know before this weekend, and that’s . . . freeing.” Liberating, this almost-indifference. It makes me much happier than the resentment I harbored for years. And the conversation with Annie . . . I haven’t processed it yet, but maybe this weekend was less of a waste than I thought. Except that I’m low-key panicking about my job again. “Whatever you told Tim . . . thank you. It was nice to see him almost shit his pants.”

He shakes his head. “You shouldn’t thank me. It was selfish.”

“What did he do to you? Did he sneak bacon into your sandwich? Because that’s totally his signature move—”

“No.” He presses his lips together, staring at the road. “He lied to me.”

“Oh, yeah.” I nod knowingly. “His other signature move.”

The local NPR fills the silence. Something about Rachmaninoff. Until Levi says, “Bee, I . . . I’m not sure I should be telling you this. But hiding things from you hasn’t worked out in our favor. And you asked me to be honest.”

“I did.” I study him, unsure where he’s heading.

“When you and I first met,” he says slowly, carefully weighing his words, “I had issues talking to people. About certain things.”

“Like . . . aphasia?”

He smiles, shaking his head. “Not quite.”

I try to think back to fifth-year Levi—he seemed larger than life, indomitable, whip-smart. Then again, Annie seemed invincible, and I apparently seemed effortless. Grad school really screwed us up, didn’t it? “I never noticed it. You were capable, self-assured, and got along with most people.” I mull it over. “Except for me, of course.”

“I’m not explaining myself well. I had no issues talking to normal people. My issues were . . . with you.”

I scowl. “Are you saying that I’m not normal?”

He laughs silently. “You’re not normal. Not to me.”

“What does that mean?” I turn in the seat to face him, not sure why he’s insulting me again, after two days of being incredibly lovely. Is he having a relapse? “Just because you thought I was ugly or unlikable, it doesn’t mean that I wasn’t normal—”

“I never thought of you as ugly.” His hands tighten even more around the wheel. “Never.”

“Come on. The way you always acted was—”

“The opposite, in fact.”

I frown. “What do you even—” Oh.

Oh.

Oh.

Does he mean that—? No. Impossible. He wouldn’t. Would he? Even if we . . . He can’t possibly be implying that. Can he?

“I—” My mind goes blank for a split second—complete, utter white-out void. I’m suddenly frozen numb, so I lean forward to turn off the AC. I have no clue how to answer him. How to stop my heart from beating out of my throat. “Do you mean that you . . . ?”

He nods.

“You didn’t . . . you didn’t even let me finish the sentence.”

“Whatever you’re imagining, from the tamest to the most . . . inappropriate thoughts, that’s probably where my mind was at.” He swallows visibly. I watch his throat move. “You were always in my head. And I could never get you out.”

I turn to the window, scarlet. There’s no universe in which I’m parsing his words correctly. This is a misunderstanding. I’m having some neurological event. And all I want to ask is, What about now? Am I still in your head? “You always stared at me like I was some obscene monstrosity.”

“I tried not to stare, but . . . it wasn’t easy.”

“No. No, you—the dress. You hated me in that dress. My blue dress, the one with—”

“I know what dress, Bee.”

“You know because you hated it,” I say in a panic.

“I didn’t hate it.” His words are quiet. “It just took me by surprise.”

“My Target dress took you by surprise?”

“No, Bee. My . . . reaction to you wearing it did.”

I shake my head. This cannot be true. “You wouldn’t even sit next to me.”

“It was hard to think when you were close.” His voice is husky.

“No. No! You refused to collaborate with me. You told Tim he should marry someone better, you avoided me like the bubonic plague—”

“Tim warned me off.”

I turn to him. “What?”

“He asked me to back off and leave you alone.”

“He . . .” I cover my mouth and imagine Tim, very average-sized Tim, confronting Levi, a not-so-gentle bison. “How did he . . . ?”

“He told me you knew that I was . . . interested. That I was making you uncomfortable. That you found me unpleasant.” Levi’s throat works. “He asked me to avoid you as much as I could. And I did. In a way, it was easier.”

“Easier?”

He shrugs with a self-deprecating smile. “Just . . . wanting and not having, it can get unbearable. Quickly so.” He wets his lips. “I didn’t know what to say anyway. You have to understand, people don’t talk about the things they feel where I come from. I got really tongue-tied around you—leading you and everyone else to believe that I despised you, apparently. I . . . I had no idea. I owe you an apology for that.”

I can’t believe what he’s saying. I can’t believe what I’m hearing. I can’t believe Tim knew and successfully manipulated Levi into staying away while he screwed his way through Pitt’s student body.

“Why are you telling this to me? Why now?”

He looks at me, serious and earnest like only Levi Ward could ever be, and something surges into me. Something painful and delightful and confusing. Something breathtaking and spellbinding, rich and frightening. Not a fully formed feeling, but an early draft of it. It’s on the back of my throat and on the tip of my tongue. I want to get a grasp of its taste before it’s gone. I am reaching out, almost there when Levi says, “Bee, I—”

My phone rings. I groan in frustration and relief and scramble to pick up. “Hello?”

“Bee, this is Boris Covington.” Huh? “Are you and Levi back?”

I glance at Google Maps. “We’re about ten minutes out.”

“Could you both come to the Discovery Building as soon as you get in?”

“Sure.” I frown, switching to speakerphone. “Does this have to do with BLINK?”

“No. Well, yes. But only indirectly.” Boris sounds tired and almost . . . embarrassed? Levi and I exchange a long glance.

“What’s this about?”

Boris sighs. “It’s about Ms. Jackson and Ms. Cortoreal. Please, come in as soon as you can.”

Levi presses on the gas pedal.

•   •   •

I LOOK AROUND Boris’s office and blink at least four times before asking, “What do you mean, ‘sexual intercourse is forbidden in work areas’?”

Boris’s skin’s even redder than usual, and he retreats farther into his desk. “Exactly what I said. It’s—”

“Bee’s not my mother and I’m not a minor,” Rocío proclaims from one of the guest chairs. “This conversation is a HIPAA violation.”

Boris pinches the bridge of his nose. He’s clearly been at this for a while. “HIPAA rules apply to medical records, not to you being caught having sex in your office. Which, just like every other space in the building, is video-surveilled twenty-four-seven because of the high-security projects it houses. Now, no need to worry about that, Guy is a security admin and has agreed to delete all footage. But Bee is your direct supervisor, just like Levi is Ms. Jackson’s, and because of the disciplinary actions required when NASA employees engage in activities such as . . . intercourse in work spaces, they need to be informed.”

I glance at Levi. His face is a blank void. I’m positive that inside he’s rolling with laughter like a pork in mud. Positive.

“Sorry.” I scratch the back of my neck. “Just to be clear, you two were having intercourse with . . .”

“With each other,” Rocío tells me proudly.

I nod. Next to Rocío, Kaylee appears enraptured by her own pink nail polish. She hasn’t looked up since we came in.

“Um . . .” I have no idea what to say. Zero. Nada. Maybe Dr. Curie left behind helpful tips to handle similar situations? If only her notes weren’t too radioactive to be touched before the year 3500. Maybe I can go to the Bibliothèque Nationale with a hazmat suit and—

“I won’t write up a complaint,” Boris says, “and I trust Bee and Levi will take care of . . .” He gestures vaguely at two of the smartest women I’ve ever met, who must be going through a spell of nymphomania. “But I beg you on my knees. Don’t do anything similar ever again.”

“Thank you, Boris,” I say, hoping I sound as grateful as I feel.

The walk to the outside of the building is deadly silent—until we form a circle and stare at one another with varying levels of hostility (Rocío), mortification (Kaylee), and poorly hidden amusement (Levi). I hope I look neutral. I probably don’t.

“So . . . that happened,” I start.

Rocío nods. “Sure did.”

“How did Boris even . . . find you?”

“Guy came into our office looking for something, found us on your desk, ratted us out.”

“On my—why did you have to do it on my—” I stop. Take a deep breath. “To be clear.” I look between them. “This was . . . consensual?”

“Very,” they answer in unison, locking eyes and smiling like idiots.

I clear my throat. “Is there anything you’d like to add?” I ask Levi, meaning please help, but he shakes his head, biting his lip to avoid smiling. He fails.

“Okay. Well. It’s none of our business what you guys do.”

“For the first time in my life I agree with you,” Rocío says.

“Really? For the first time?” She nods. Ungrateful little gremlin. “If you’re happy about this, so are we. But please, don’t, um, have intercourse in front of cameras. Unless you’re making a sex tape,” I rush to add, “in which case just . . . don’t do it in public places?”

Kaylee nods silently, looking a smidge less mortified. Rocío rolls her eyes. “Whatever.” She takes Kaylee’s hand and drags her away. “You’re not my real mother, Bee!” she yells without turning around.

Levi and I watch them walk away in the late afternoon sunlight. When they’re just little dots on the street, he tells me, “That was excellent practice for when we’ll have teenage daughters.”

My heart skips. He doesn’t mean together, idiot. “They’re young. Their frontal lobes are not fully developed yet.”

He takes the car keys out of his pocket and dangles them in front of my face. “Want to process the trauma of our twenty-three-year-olds role-playing on top of your Marie Curie mouse pad while I take you home?”

“They better be going to Kaylee’s place.”

“Why?”

“The walls between my apartment and Rocío’s are very thin.”

“You should invest in noise-canceling headphones.” He tugs me toward the car. “Order online while I drive.”

•   •   •

“IT JUST SEEMS far-fetched,” I say in the passenger seat. “First of all, Rocío’s in a relationship. Oh—I wonder if they’re poly?”

“Should we be discussing our RAs’ love lives?”

“I’d normally say no, but them bumping uglies on my desk automatically grants us a waiver.”

He contemplates it. “Fair.”

“And—those two are so different from each other.”

“You think that’s a problem?”

It might not be. They might produce well-rounded children who know how to apply raccoon-style eyeliner and glitter. “Okay, it’s not. But Rocío disliked Kaylee. She kept clamming up whenever Kaylee was around. She made an entire list of things she hated about her.”

Levi half smiles. “You sure about that?”

“Yeah. She told me that—” I recall what Levi told me less than one hour ago and shut my mouth. I forgot when Boris’s call sent me into emergency mode, but now it’s all back, swirling around the forefront of my brain, and with that my heart is heavy in my throat, a liquid warmth in the pit of my stomach, the sense of being on a precipice. I could be falling. I will be falling, fast and hard, if only I take one step forward and let myself—

A thought hits me. Smack in the head. Like a freight train.

I gasp. “I’ve got it.”

Levi pulls into my driveway. “What did you say?”

“I got it!”

“Got . . . what?”

“The helmet. BLINK. I know how to fix the compatibility issue—do you have paper? Why don’t you have paper in your stupid car?”

“It’s a rental—”

“My apartment! I have paper up there!” The car hasn’t fully stopped, but I jump out and run upstairs anyway. I unlock the door, hunt down a pen and notebook, and start scribbling as fast as my fingers will go, pitifully out of breath. A minute later I hear steps behind me and Levi closing the door I left open. Oops.

“I’m assuming you wanted me to follow you in, but if not—”

“Look.” I push the notebook under his nose. “We’re going to do this. Look at this.”

He blinks a few times. “Bee, I don’t think this is . . . English.”

I turn the notebook around. Shit, I wrote in German. “Okay—don’t look at this. Just listen to me. And don’t be scared. We’ve been having issues with the switchboard, right? We’ve been trying to fix it, but . . . what if we just bypass it?”

“But the different frequencies—”

“Right. That’s where I’m going to scare you.”

“Scare me?”

“Yes.” I make room on the table, and start sketching a diagram. “But don’t be scared.”

“I’m not scared.”

“Good. Stay unscared.”

“I— Why would I be scared?”

“Because of what I’m about to show you. Which you might find scary.” I tap the back of the pen on the top of my diagram. “Okay. We remove the switchboard.” I draw a cross on it. “We build separate circuits. And then we leverage the magnetothermal properties of each one—”

“—for speed.” Levi’s eyes are wide. “And if we have separate circuits—”

“—we can rely on the wireless remote.” I grin at him. “Will it work?”

He bites into his lower lip, staring at the diagram. “The wiring will be tricky. And isolating each circuit. But if we work around that . . .” He turns to me with a wide, breathless grin. “This could work. It could really work.”

“And it will be so much better than what MagTech is doing.”

“We’d have a final prototype in . . . weeks. Days.” He rubs his mouth. “This is a fantastic idea.”

I jump up and down excitedly. It’s obnoxious, but I can’t stop myself. Where does all this energy go when I try to run? “Am I a genius, or what?”

He shakes his head even as he says, “You are.”

“Should we go to the lab? Start working on it?”

“Before the cleaning crew has a chance to disinfect your desk?”

“Good point. But I need to do something.”

He smiles fondly. “Maybe you can keep jumping up and down?”

“I’m starting to get tired, actually.”

“Okay, then . . .” He shrugs, and before I know what’s going on I’m in his arms and he’s spinning me around, my legs wrapped around his waist and his hands on my thighs.

I laugh. I laugh like I’m happy. What a weekend. I’m a feather. I’m invincible. I’m doing science. I’m having fun. I’m building things, useful, important things. I’m facing demons from my past. I’m being whirled around when I’m too tired to do it myself. I’m bubbling, exhilarated, brave. I’m the most myself and not myself at all. I’m tightening my hands around Levi’s neck, and when he slows down I’m asking him, “Are you going to kiss me?”

No idea where that came from. But I’m not sorry it’s out there.

His smile doesn’t falter, but he shakes his head. “I don’t think so,” he says quietly. Strands of purple hair brush against his forehead. His cheeks. We are close, so close. He smells so good.

“Why?”

“Because I’m not sure you want me to kiss you.”

“Oh.” I nod. My hair tickles his nose. He scrunches it, and I laugh. “What if I told you that I do? Would you kiss me then?”

“I still don’t think so,” he says calmly. Seriously.

My smile fades. Oh, shit. Shit, I made a mess. “You don’t want to?” My voice is small, insecure. He shakes his head.

“That’s not it.”

It must be. What else? “Right.” I’ve been in his arms for a while, but suddenly I feel self-conscious. He’s not okay with this. He used to be attracted to me, but not anymore. I’m overstepping. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to go too far.”

“You don’t understand, Bee.” A small smile. Our foreheads touch, his skin warm against mine. I really, really want a kiss from this man. I want it bad enough to burn. “You can’t go too far.”

“Then why . . . ?”

His eyes flutter closed. His lips move closer. “I’m terrified that you won’t go far enough.”

When Tim kissed her for the first time—after a screening of 2001: A Space Odyssey, which I later found out he slept through—eighteen-year-old Bee called her sister to say she’d had the loveliest of kisses. But eighteen-year-old Bee was a fool. Eighteen-year-old Bee had no idea. Eighteen-year-old Bee overrated that Tim wasn’t overly clumsy and brushed his teeth. And twenty-eight-year-old Bee would consider going back in time to slap her upside the head, but she’s busy having a real, true, actual, honest-to-God good kiss.

The best kiss.

It has to do with how slow it starts. With the way Levi and I breathe against each other for a moment, just breathe and taste the air between us. It should feel ridiculous, but there’s something unique about how he looks at my mouth from lowered eyelashes. Wrapped around him like I am, I can feel his pounding heartbeat, the heat of his skin, and suddenly I’m not scared anymore. He wants this—he wants me. I know it in the liquid, messy warmth of my abdomen, in the red spreading over his cheekbones, in his breathing, even faster and louder than mine.

“Bee.”

The tension stretches so unbearably tight, we might as well be on different sides of the world. So I close the distance, and then it’s not slow anymore. It’s hard and fast and open-mouthed. Wet and pressing and half bites. It’s messy, the least smooth kiss of my life—but maybe it’s not a kiss at all. Just two people trying to be as close as possible. His hands are sliding up my ass. My nails are in his scalp. He grunts choppy, surprised praise into my throat—“Yeah. Yeah.”—licks the dip of my collarbone, and I’m on fire, half a minute of this and I’m already aflame, pulsating with want and need. I have no brakes: I grind myself helplessly against him, my nipples hard against his chest, his hard abs the perfect slate for my core to rub on.

“You are so—” He groans deep, like he’s halfway to insane. I’m too busy desperately seeking friction to even try to keep up with my end of the kiss, but it’s okay. He’s got me. His large palm comes up, wraps around my neck, angles my head sharply, just so. His tongue is inside my mouth, pressing against mine, and . . .

Dirty. This is not a kiss—this is dirty. Obscene. He pushes me against the wall, and I push back, and back, and back, like there can be no air between us. His hand under my shirt is possessive, confident, so large that it completely spans my rib cage, and I arch up, swallowing a whimper in the back of my throat. My head is spinning, my body is melting, I can hear bells, and—

Not bells. A phone. Ringing. It slowly penetrates the thick haze of Levi mouthing my breasts, leaving a wet trail over my T-shirt—God oh God. “Your phone,” I whisper, forcing myself to still my hips. It’s the loudest my voice will go. Then one of his hands slips inside the back of my panties, and he starts grinding me up and down on his abs, and I forget what I meant to say. It’s the exact spot, the exact rhythm I’d been trying to reach. He learned it, and he’s helping me keep it up, fingers digging into the flesh of my ass. A perfect thrust. He growls, and I whimper at the spear of pleasure. My eyes roll in the back of my head, and . . . Yes. Right against— Yes.

There.

“Levi,” I gasp. “Your phone—do you maybe want to—oh—pick up?” Or we can just continue until the ache disappears. Yes, that would be lovely. And stopping would be unbearable. Is that his cock rubbing against my ass? No. Impossible. No one’s that big, right?

The phone is still ringing. I’m all about ignoring it, but Levi— I realize that Levi is not ignoring it. Levi is making his way under my shorts, sucking on the spot under my ear, and not even hearing it.

“Levi.” He doesn’t quite snap out of it. He doesn’t pull back, doesn’t move his mouth from my skin, but he stops. His grip tightens around me. A child, reluctant to let go of a favorite toy. “Your phone. Do you want to . . . ?”

His eyes are glassy. His hands not fully steady as he lets go of me, gingerly, with difficulty. I watch him try to collect himself for long seconds before he picks up. “Ward.”

He is winded, chest moving up and down. He palms his erection like it hurts, all the while staring at me, me, only me. Then he looks away and his demeanor abruptly changes. “Say that again?” The speaker on the other end is female. I can’t make out the words, but I recognize the voice from before. From the picture in his office. “Yeah, of course,” Levi says reassuringly. His voice is still husky, but soft. Caring. Intimate. He turns around and gives me his back, like I’m not here anymore. They used to date, a nagging voice provides. What you just did with Levi? He used to do it with her. And much more.

“I’ll be right there.”

Reality’s catching up fast. I just—I did that. I haven’t been this close to another human being in years, and now—with Levi. I liked it, too. I forgot myself and probably all decency, but maybe he didn’t? He’s leaving in the middle of it. Because of a phone call. From a friend. Whom he used to date. Shit. Shit—

“Bee?” I look up. His eyes are ablaze. His jeans tented. Okay—he is that big. “I need to go.” His throat bobs before and after he says it. He doesn’t seem fully in control. Could I convince him to stay, if I tried?

Probably not. I won’t, anyway. “Of course.”

“I would . . .”

“It’s okay.”

“I will . . .”

“Yeah, you can . . .”

“Yes.”

I’ve no clue what he’s trying to say, and I seriously doubt he knows what I mean, since I have no idea myself. We’re talking over each other. Just like we were all over each other. Ba Dum Tss.

One last glance and he leaves. He’s halfway down the stairs when I notice the car keys on the table, on top of the diagram I drew. I grab them and run after him. “Hey, you forgot your keys!”

He stops on the landing and holds out his hand, so I go to him and drop them into his palm. I expect him to leave right after, but he surprises me by stepping closer. Then closer still.

For long moments he just looks at me, eyes full of beautiful, undecipherable green things. My throat constricts, my stomach twists, and I want to tell him that I’m sorry, that it’s okay, that I know he made a mistake, that we never need to talk about this, never again. But before I can say anything, he cups my cheek and leans down to kiss me once more.

This time it’s sweet, slow, savoring. Patient. This time it’s lingering and gentle—everything our other kiss wasn’t.

I want to try them all. All the kisses Levi Ward is capable of, I want to sample them like fine wine.

I touch my lips, feel his residual warmth, and don’t take my eyes off his back as he disappears.