Chapter Ten - You Shouldn’t Kiss Me Like This

“Because,” Nick whispered as he closed his eyes, leaning over to kiss the side of her mouth lightly, tasting the rain that had fallen on her face, “You’re not one of them. You know why I forget about them?” he asked as he moved his lips down to her chin, kissing her lightly. Caraline just closed her eyes in return, taking a deep breath, “Because they’re not that important,” he said as he moved his lips up to hers, whispering against them, “and you, you’re important to me,” he said as she started to press his lips against hers and she backed away, opening her eyes and looked at him.

“They’re not important to you?” Caraline asked as Nick pressed his lips together and looked at her, “How can you say that?”

“They are important to me Caraline,” Nick said as he walked back up to her, and pushed his hair that was wet from the rain, out of his face, “I’ve done shit in my past okay, and I regret a lot of it, some of it I don’t regret. Some of it I would seriously rather forget, some I wish I could remember, and some of it, I want to remember forever.” He looked down, taking her hands into his and looked back at her, “You’re important to me. I like you. I wasn’t just trying to rush you into anything, I just wanted to kiss you. I wanted to taste your lips.”

Caraline just stood there, looking away as she pressed her lips together, “You’re always talking about my ‘rock star lifestyle’ and the ‘groupies’ and that’s a part of my job. Look, Tim has them too, but he doesn’t act on them does he?” he asked as she shook her head no, “No, because he loves his wife too much. Me, I’ve acted on it, a lot actually, and lately I’ve been thinking about it and I’m tired of my life being that way. I’m tired of having someone different every night and nobody to tell me that they love me and they actually mean it -”

“That’s why I’m more important?” Caraline asked as she looked him back in the eyes, “I’m important because you want someone to calm you down?”

“No,” Nick said as he looked down at their hands, and entwined their fingers together, “I didn’t mean it like that. I wasn’t even thinking of stuff like that until that first time I met you. I met you that day at the production company and thought to myself ‘Hey, there’s a girl I wouldn’t mind waking up next to every morning.’ -”

“Why? Because of the way I look?”

“No, why are you being so defensive all of a sudden?”

“No reason,” Caraline said as she looked back down and Nick tried to look into her eyes.

“What’s wrong?” Nick asked as Caraline looked back up at him, “Did I say something wrong somewhere or something?”

“No,” Caraline said as she smiled, letting go of his hands and tucked her hair behind her ears. She licked her lips and pressed them together, looking into his eyes as if she was searching for something. She leaned up, moving up closer to him and closed her eyes. Nick smiled, closing his eyes and moved his in a little as they rubbed their noses together, nudging each other, until their lips met. Nick moved his hands up to her face, cupping her cheeks in the palm of his hands as they started to kiss each other a little more strongly. Caraline moved her hands to his waist, holding onto him as he started to back away, sucking on her bottom lip lightly. They both opened their eyes, looking at each other and Nick started to smile.

“See, it’s right,” Nick whispered as he moved his hand up, pushing a strand of wet hair off of her forehead. He leaned up, kissing her on the forehead and looked back down at her as she smiled at him.

“I’m defensive because I don’t want to be used again. I’ve been used in the past and I don’t want that to happen again,” Caraline said as Nick looked at her, “And with you being who you are,” she said as she looked down, “and with your lifestyle -”

“I’m not going to use you,” Nick whispered as she looked back up at him, “I want you. Why would I go anywhere else?”

“Because you can?”

“Because I don’t want to,”

“But you can,”

“But I’m not,” Nick said as Caraline looked away, and he moved his hand up, moving her face back towards him, “I don’t want anybody else but you, don’t you get that?”

“I hear you,” Caraline said as she smiled at him, “What I wrote last night was about you,”

“I would have never guessed,” Nick said as Caraline smiled, looking down. She moved her arms around his waist and leaned in, giving him a hug as he wrapped his arms around her, hugging her back. She rested her head on his shoulder and started crying a little but you couldn’t tell because of the rain.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

“Don’t slip,” Nick said as he started to laugh, as he took her hand, leading her off of the elevator a little bit later. They were both soaked and wet from standing in the rain on the rooftop. Caraline started to walk a little in her shoes and started to slip again and cracked up laughing as Nick caught her, “Take those damn shoes off,”

“Damn okay,” Caraline said as she started to laughing, leaning herself against the wall as she took her shoes off and started to walk down the hallway barefoot, “I’ll have to get this dress dry cleaned,”

“It was worth it though wasn’t it?” Nick asked as Caraline looked at him, smiling, “You know you had fun acting like a idiot up on the roof just then,”

“Screaming off of the rooftop? Yeah,”

“You’re the one that said it was in a movie once,”

“It was in a movie, with River Phoenix. They got on the rooftop and told the whole city they were going to be something and that they were never going to leave, although I think we’ve pretty much established ourselves in our careers, a little screaming doesn’t hurt anybody,” Caraline said as Nick cut his eyes over, smirking at her, “Not that kind of screaming,”

“I know that,” Nick said as she walked up to her door and took her key out of her little purse, opening the door up. She put the key back in her purse and looked over her shoulder to see Nick standing there and smiled.

“Do you wanna come in?” Caraline asked as Nick nodded his head. She smiled again, pushing the door open and Nick walked in, shutting the door behind them, “God, it’s two in the morning,”

“Shit,” Nick muttered as he started to untie his tie but couldn’t, “And I have to be up at eight in the morning to go to the studio,”

“Here, let me see,” Caraline said as she walked up to him, and started untying it. Nick looked down, watching her as she untied it, and slid it from around his neck, holding it up in the air, “I like this tie,”

“You want it?”

“Can I keep it?”

“It’s yours,” Nick said as she smiled, tossing it over on the bed, “So did you have a good time tonight?”

“Yes I did,” Caraline said as she smiled even more and looked down, “I had a really good time,”

“Good enough time to go out with me again?”

“Possibly,” Caraline whispered as Nick smiled, “But you better go back to your room if you have to be up and ready to go at eight in the morning,”

“Yeah, I probably should,” Nick said as he laughed a little, putting his hands in his pockets and looked around. He walked up closer to her, leaning over and to kiss her on cheek, but Caraline moved her face over so that he kissed her lips, “You’re slick,”

“Not too slick,” Caraline said as Nick smiled, “I’ll see you sometime tomorrow,”

“Okay,” Nick said as he smiled, walking backwards to the door, almost tripping over her shoes, “Fucking shoes!” Caraline cracked up laughing as he raised his eyebrows, smiling at her and turned around walking to the door, “Night,”

“Night,” Caraline said as she gave him a little wave, watching him as he walked out of the door. She took a deep breath, putting her hands over her face and walked over, looking into the mirror at herself to see that her make up wasn’t smeared at all, even after being in the rain and crying, “That stuff really is water proof,” she said as she pulled her skin down on her chin, looking at her eyeliner when she heard a knock at the door. She looked over at it and walked over, looking out of the peephole to see Nick standing there, peeking back into the peephole on the other end, “Dumbass,” she whispered as she unlocked the door and opened it up, seeing him standing there, “Yes?”

“I have a question for you,”

“Uh huh, what?”

“That whole vagina talk you did tonight -”

“Uh huh, what about it?” Caraline asked as she crossed her arms, giving him a smirk.

“That was just to get to me and turn me on right?” Nick asked as Caraline started to smile.

“Why would you think that?”

“No reason at all,” Nick said as he shrugged his shoulders and looked away, before looking back at her.

“I have a question for you,” Caraline said as she walked up closer to him.

“What’s that?”

“Did what I said tonight get you hard?”

“Uh, no,”

“Then what was that problem in your pants when we left the restaurant?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Nick whispered as he tried to play innocent. Caraline just laughed in return and looked down, shaking her head, “What? I’m serious.”

“Well then some boy scouts were in your pants pitching a tent,” Caraline said as Nick cracked up laughing.

“Okay yes, you got to me. I got totally turned on by your whole ‘I love my vagina because it makes me feel good’ speech. I was ready to explode. Are you happy?” Nick asked as Caraline smiled again, pressing her lips together.

“Sweet dreams,” Caraline whispered as Nick smiled, shaking his head as she shut the door and leaned up against it, giggling.