Since that first night they had spent together nude, that seemed to become their default mode whenever they stayed over at each other's homes. And now, three weeks later, it was spring and she was feeling ready to take things to the next logical step. Waking up before he did, Roxanna brushed her fingers through his hair, watching his features shift as he slowly stretched and came to wakefulness. "Good morning, Roxanna," he said, his voice low and gravelly with sleep still.

"Good morning, Henrik," she replied before leaning in and kissing him. "So, we have the whole day in front of us, and since we got in too late to do anything other than shower and fall asleep, I was thinking."

"Yes?"

She kissed him again as she ran her hand down his side, letting it rest on his hip as she pulled back and just stared into his eyes. Feeling a tad bit shy, she shrugged, hoping that he would attune himself to her thoughts. "Well, there's been something a long time in coming, isn't there?"

"Oh, you mean spending the morning in bed, doing nothing more than talk?" he replied, a slight twinkle in his eyes as he nudged her over onto her back, reclining on his elbow as he smirked at her.

"I was hoping that your mouth would be doing something other than talking, if we're being honest here," Roxanna said lowly as she arched her back a little. "But if all you really want to do is talk, I suppose that I could be okay with that."

Henrik smiled a little wider as he shook his head. "I've been waiting for this invitation for weeks, you know. I didn't want to push things faster than you wanted them to go," he murmured as he reached out with his free hand and stroked her cheek. "Are you ready to take this next step?"

"Yes, Henrik." Roxanna raised herself up on her elbows and puckered her lips in clear invitation for a kiss, and he obliged her, straddling her body as he deepened the kiss. There was something so beautiful about the kiss, and she sighed as she curled her arms around his neck, pulling him down with her onto the mattress as he continued to rain kisses on her face, his hands roaming up and down her body. "Please," she whimpered as she reached for his hand and brought it to her breast, encouraging him to touch her where she wanted. He nodded and dragged his lips down the column of her neck and over the top of her chest before nipping at the rise of one of her breasts, causing her to gasp and arch against him, wanting him closer as he fitted a hand between her legs, gently parting them before running his fingers over her labia, his thumb nudging against her clit.

A soft groan escaped her lips as she arched her hips upwards, trying to get in closer contact with him. This was the culmination of everything she had been waiting for, and it felt so good to have him mapping her body, learning her shape, even as his mouth closed around one of her nipples, sucking lightly before running his tongue along it, tightening it into an even harder bud before pulling his head away and blowing on it softly. That sensation drove her wild, and Roxanna dug her fingers into Henrik's hair, needing to touch him, to guide him, to somehow make their bodies one. "I have you, Roxanna," he whispered against her chest as he slid inside her, filling her completely.

Gasping, Roxanna wrapped one long leg around his hips, drawing him in even deeper. He completed her in a way that she hadn't felt for so long. Unable to stop herself, Roxanna began to cry a little, filled with an overwhelming wave of love for her partner. "I'll keep holding you like an anchor, darling," she breathed out as he began to thrust in and out of her, setting a lazy pace for them as they learned how their bodies worked in tandem. This slow pace allowed her to focus on his face and the way his features changed and contorted with the pleasure that was clearly filling him.

She could feel when things shifted into a different gear, as it all felt suddenly more frantic to her, and her hands scrabbled at his back, trying not to tear his skin with her nails as she moved with him, trying to reach the precipice of pleasure. "I love you, Roxanna," he gasped out as his hips started to move at a faster pace, clearly nearing his orgasm. She moaned as he fitted a hand between their bodies, teasing between her slick folds to find her clit, helping to speed along her orgasm. He was perfect in his timing, as they both fell over into the throes of absolute pleasure within moments of each other.

She flopped back onto the mattress as his weight came down on her, cocooning her in a warmth that was absolutely heavenly. "I love you, too, Henrik. So much," she panted out as she ran her hands up and down his back, pressing her lips to every bit of skin that she could reach as she tried to get control of her breathing once more. "I, I didn't expect this to be so perfect, the first time. I thought we'd be a little more awkward, honestly."

"I thought so, too. But maybe some things are just meant to be perfect from the beginning." He gently turned them onto their sides, and she rested her head on her pillow as she watched him, smiling widely. "There's been such lightness about us both lately. I didn't want to rock the boat, to perhaps knock things off course, but this morning, well…"

"It feels like we've started sailing towards our happy ending," she finished for him, letting her hand come to rest on his hip. "Did you ever read the Chronicles of Narnia?"

"I can't say that I have. "

"Oh, well, I grew up on them, The Last Battle still makes me weep, but there's this scene towards the end of Voyage of the Dawn Treader, where they're sailing towards the Eastern Shore, and the water changes from salty to sweet and everything becomes unimaginably more beautiful. After a long struggle, the children find a bittersweet peace, since Edmund and Lucy will never get to go back to Narnia. I feel sort of like that? Like we're sailing out of the salty bitterness of what happened to us last year and into the sweetness of something new, something we should have had since Boston."

Again, tears made her vision go fuzzy, and then Henrik was cupping her head with one of his large hands, and she could just make out the fact that he was tearing up, too. "Things might have turned out very differently for all of us had we made different choices back then. I listened to John, when he told me that you wouldn't understand what I tried to do. I tried to kill myself, Roxanna, because the darkness in my brain couldn't see any other way out. I should have trusted you with that truth, but I was younger then, and I didn't know just how much you would trust me now."

"We were such numpties, Henrik," she whispered as she brushed her lips against his. "But I don't think that I would have traded my time with David for all the world. I needed the focus he provided me in my research, though maybe we could have staved off some of the sorrow we faced alone by being together. I guess we'll never know."

He shook his head with a sad smile on his lips. "That is true, Roxanna. So I suppose that we need to hold on to today and move forward together." He kissed her gently and then ran his hand down her back until it rested on her bum, squeezing a bit. Roxanna let out a small giggle as she scooted closer to him, breathing in the scent of them on his skin. "I don't know if I'll be able to keep my hands off you, now that we've taken this step. There is something thoroughly addicting about the feel of you."

"I feel the same way, honestly. I wonder if this is what everyone new in love feels like? I'm trying to remember what it was like when David and I were in the first blushes of love, but it didn't feel like this, from what my memory tells me." She pressed her forehead against his as she started to drag her toes up and down his shin, unable to get enough of the feel of him. "Lend me your shirt? I am famished, but don't really feel like getting dressed at the moment, since we might want to return to bed once we've eaten, and I really don't want to have a lot to wear when we inevitably want to get naked again."

Henrik tilted his head a little as he slipped off the bed and padded over to the trunk at the end of his bed, pulling on his boxers before tossing her the white button up. She shrugged into it as she watched him pull on a pair of trousers, and Roxanna couldn't help but smile as she did up the buttons before padding over to him and wrapping her arms around his waist, her cheek coming to rest on his back as they started to breathe in tandem. "If only every moment could be like this," he murmured, so low that she almost missed it, and she nodded, feeling the same way.