Free Gemini by Penelope Ward

many of them just one-night stands, with no emotional connection. I didn’t want anything more than that. I just needed sex to wash away the pain and devastation I had endured so many years ago. Karyn is the first long-term relationship I have had in a very long time, but even with her, the emotional connection just isn’t there.
    I didn’t think I even had the capacity to feel anything for a woman again beyond sexual attraction. But I knew what I felt for Allison in the car tonight was more than just sexual. Even though I have never wanted a woman as much sexually, the emotional connection was even stronger; I can’t even find a word to describe it. It just felt right being with her. I instantly felt like I could trust her and mostly, I never wanted to leave her. I could have stayed there all night asking her question after question. It pained me to have to say goodbye so quickly, only just getting to know her and not knowing how I would manage to get that kind of alone time again.
    This I know for sure: I need to see her again and I want to help make her life better, even if mine has gone to shit. I want to make up for my past mistakes. God, this is all too much to handle. My life was so simple before I found Allison: shallow job, shallow girlfriend...shallow life…no risk of getting hurt again whatsoever.
    But as of tonight, I have entered into a lose-lose situation that has turned my world upside down.
    If I vowed to never contact Allison again, my heart would break. I also know that getting to know her and having to tell her the truth would absolutely shatter it. So, I am inevitably going to get hurt. I vowed I would never let myself hurt again.
    Fuck.
    I take one last drag of the cigarette before rolling down the window and tossing it out, deciding to get out of the car at last.
     
    Once inside my condo, I collapsed onto the leather couch, holding my head in my hands. I looked at the clock and saw that it was now 1:30 am. Glancing down at the phone number and email written on my hand in beautiful feminine script, I got up immediately to transfer the information into my newly charged phone before it faded away.
    I had an intense urge to email her right then and there but decided that would come across as strange. I also have no job information to give her, which is supposed to be the reason for emailing in the first place. Dummy. So, I nixed that idea and instead decided to text Karyn the lie that I received an email about the New York trip being postponed a week, suggesting that we have dinner tomorrow night, since I’ll be in town.
    I entered the bedroom, taking off my clothes that now reek of smoke and walked into the master bathroom to turn on the faucet in my large walk-in shower.
    I got in and willed the hot water to wash away these feelings of agony.
    The one girl you can’t have Cedric, is the only one you want.
    Thanks to all the tension built up tonight, though, my thoughts quickly turned impure as I closed my eyes and imagined Allison naked here in front of me, wearing nothing but my handwriting on her breasts.
    I grabbed the shampoo and roughly stroked myself to release the tension that has built up all day and conclude that I am screwed.     

CHAPTER 9
ALLISON
                 
     
    Do you feel like a new person today, Gemini? Something has grown back, and unless you’re a reptile with a new tail…that probably means that some part of your soul has woken up from a deep sleep.
     
    When the alarm clock sounded at 5-am, I felt like even though I had barely slept, I was more alive than I had been in months.
    It took me a while to get to sleep last night because I couldn’t stop smelling my hands and thinking about him. I sniffed them until every last drop of Cedric evaporated.
    The sight of the sun rising through my bedroom window was bittersweet.
    It’s Tuesday and I have to be at the diner for the breakfast crowd at 6:30. I hurried out of bed, ran to the bathroom to pee and as I