When I think of that summer, the heat rises in my cheeks. I’d just finished my first year of college and was crashing at my best friend Emily’s place in Boston, since my tiny family all but disappeared for the season. Emily and I were inseparable, two broke girls sweating through our part-time jobs, but that year, her older brother Sam moved in for a few weeks after graduation, before his big job started in New York. I used to know him as the awkward high school nerd, always quiet at family dinners. Let’s just say that by June, he was everything but awkward, and nothing like the boy I remembered.
It started with the little things. Sam would breeze into the kitchen shirtless, hair still wet from a shower, brushing past me to reach the coffeepot. He’d nod at me like I was one of the furniture, but I noticed the way he ducked his head when he caught me looking too long. He was tall, with the kind of lean muscle you only get from years of sports, and tattoos poking out from under his t-shirts that I didn’t remember. I tried not to stare—it was Emily’s brother, after all, and there was some unwritten code in that—but I caught myself lingering on the couch a little longer when he came home from his runs, just to hear his deep voice cutting through our lazy small talk.
One Saturday night, Emily convinced me to go out for drinks with her. Sam was sprawled on the living room floor, working on his laptop, feet bare and legs stretched out. Emily was yelling for me to hurry, standing in the doorway while she swiped on lipstick.
“Sam, you wanna come out?” she asked. “Molly’s coming too.”
He half-smiled at me, his eyes lingering on the hem of my skirt. “Not really my scene. Maybe next time.”
Emily rolled her eyes. “Suit yourself,” she muttered, and pulled me out the door.
We got wasted, giggled our way back to the apartment, and I fell asleep instantly with the fan humming over my bed. I woke up at 3am, thirsty and fuzzy-headed. I padded into the dark kitchen, not bothering with the light. I almost slammed into Sam, who was hovering by the open fridge in boxers and a t-shirt. I froze as his eyes met mine, almost wild in the blue glow of the fridge light.
“Sorry,” I muttered, fumbling for a glass.
“You’re good,” he said, voice low. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”
He stood just a little too close as I filled my glass, heat radiating off his body. There was a moment—just a slow, tense heartbeat—where neither of us moved. I felt stupid, standing there in an old tank top, hair a mess, but he kept glancing at my lips, then away, like he caught himself every time. I left before I did something dumb, heart thumping as I crawled back into bed.
The tension built after that. Even Emily started to notice: “Jesus, it’s like you and Sam are in some weird silent movie together. Did something happen?” she joked at breakfast the next day, but I just muttered and nudged her foot away under the table.
The weirdest thing was, I wanted something to happen. But this wasn’t just any guy—it was my best friend’s brother. The kind of forbidden, messy thing I swore I’d never get into. And yet every time I saw him shirtless, or caught his gaze across the living room, or listened to his voice crackling through the walls late at night, I felt restless all over.
A week later, Emily left for her parents’ lake house for the weekend, and I made up some half-assed excuse about my job and Boston Pride. It felt wrong—wrong enough to make my hands shake when I texted her a white lie, wrong enough to make me want it more. That Friday night, it was just Sam and me. I tried reading on the couch while he watched something on Netflix. The silence felt heavy, electric. I thought of going to my room, locking the door, pretending I was asleep, but I didn’t.
Around midnight, he stretched and stood up, running a hand through his hair.
“You want a beer?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said, not trusting myself to say anything more.
He tossed me one and sat on the other end of the couch. We watched some shitty action movie, barely talking, and I tried not to glance at the vein running down his forearm or the way his thigh pressed into the cushion.
“Why do you keep looking at me like that?” he asked suddenly, voice dark around the edges. I looked away, heart hammering.
“Like what?”
He leaned in, closing the space between us. He smelled like warm skin and the beer he’d just opened. I couldn’t breathe.
“Like you want something from me,” he said, voice a little hoarse.
My throat was dry. “Do you want me to stop?”
He shook his head, his face just inches from mine. “No. I want you to keep going.”
I don’t remember who moved first. My hands were in his hair, his mouth on mine, rough and desperate and hungry. He tasted like sweat and beer, his lips hot and demanding, and when his hands slid under my shirt, I bit his lower lip. He moaned, low and deep, and that sound made me even crazier.
He pulled me into his lap, fingers tracing the waistband of my shorts. “You sure about this?” he breathed, his forehead pressed to mine.
“I shouldn’t,” I whispered. But God, I wanted it. I wanted him.
“Tell me to stop,” he murmured, trailing his mouth down my neck, biting just enough to make me gasp.
“I can’t,” I said, voice shaking. “Sam, I… I don’t want you to stop.”
He grinned, slow and wicked. “Good.”
We tore each other’s clothes off right there on the couch, hands everywhere. His body felt unreal under my touch: hard muscles, soft skin, that jolt of surprise when I wrapped my hand around his cock and felt him twitch against my palm. He flipped me onto my back, spreading my legs with his knee, kissing down my stomach while I arched against him.
“God, you’re so fucking hot,” he said, his mouth sliding down. I moaned as his tongue found me, slow and deep and relentless, his hands squeezing my thighs. I grabbed at his hair, hips grinding against his mouth, barely holding back as something sharp and sweet coiled in my belly.
He moved above me, kissing me again, slower this time. “Condom?” he muttered, rummaging in his wallet. I nodded, breathless, legs still trembling.
The first push hurt, not bad, just a sweet ache I hadn’t felt in awhile. He moved slow, his eyes locked on mine, and I wrapped my legs around him, pulling him closer. Every thrust was electric, a hard pulse building in my core as he fucked me, his mouth at my ear, breath hot against my skin.
“You like that?” he whispered, voice broken. “Tell me.”
I gasped, clinging to his back. “Yes—oh God, Sam, don’t stop…”
He held out until I broke, body shaking, biting his shoulder to keep from screaming his name. He followed a second later, cursing softly, collapsing on top of me, sweaty and shivering.
We lay like that for a long time, his heartbeat thrumming under my cheek. I felt guilty, dizzy, giddy all at once. I couldn’t believe what I’d just done—and how badly I wanted to do it again.
Just as the sun started breaking through the blinds, he kissed my forehead, soft and slow.
“We probably shouldn’t tell Emily,” he whispered, and I laughed, still breathless, pulling him back into my arms.