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Mel was pretty sure Frank was ignoring her.
Not in the strictest sense—he’d opened the door and greeted her and Samira, after all, offered them drinks and even given them a cursory tour of his place—but in some nebulous sense that she couldn’t quite figure out. Maybe he was just being a dutiful host, she reasoned, watching him work the room, offering drinks and snacks and pausing to chat with just about everyone except her. Post-rehab, Frank poured a lot of himself into the interpersonal relationships he valued (something he refuted whenever she mentioned it); he was being a good friend. A good mentor, too, given he’d even invited the newbies to this soirée that he’d taken to calling his divorce party.
Mel had pointed out that calling it a divorce party was a little flippant and crass. Frank had just shrugged. Their whole divorce was flippant and crass, he’d said. The only reason it took so long to resolve was the custody agreement, which kept evolving as Frank kept passing sobriety checkpoints, until he’d finally been approved for unsupervised overnight visits every other weekend. Abby seemed to have been waiting for that point and since then, Mel gathered that finalizing everything had gone pretty smoothly.
Besides, the party was Cassie’s idea.
Mel hovered in the kitchen, picking at the bowl of pretzels on the counter. Parties weren’t—weren’t really her thing, in college. They always seemed to happen around her, tangentially, without her ever being involved (or, in a lot of cases, invited). The few she attended carried sour memories; too much booze, too-handsy guys, or, in every case, that disquieting feeling of watching other people have fun, with no clue how to jump in and join.
So she just stood there, picking at her fingernails and nursing her beer. The minutes ticked by in her head while she watched Frank from across the room. He was being a good host, she mentally repeated to herself. There was nothing out of the ordinary.
Except—except it had been over half an hour since he’d looked her way; even longer since he’d said a word to her.
If this was a ploy, a move of some kind, well, it was working. (Mel could imagine him doing this in the past—giving a girl just enough attention and then pretending she didn’t exist, stringing her along until she was losing her mind over him, right where he wanted her. Never mind that this was Frank, who was attentive and patient and loyal and, by his own admission, too old to play games. But the idea of being a girl he wanted to toy with made her skin prickle with something hot and unfamiliar, all the same.)
Mel was familiar with want. Her whole life had been one want after the next, driving her forward again and again. Her life caught momentum, propelled by the force of her want. Wanting to be top of her class so she’d have her pick of residency programs. Wanting to secure the best possible care for Becca. Wanting to help as many patients as she possibly could. Wanting to befriend her colleagues after decades of flimsy friendships. She was unfamiliar with this particular kind of want, though, this clawing at her skin, this sense that she might die unless Frank talked to her. That she might burst into flames if he ever touched her. This thinly-veiled desperation that had her doing things like curling her hair and letting Samira dust her eyelids with shimmery shadow.
Mel sighed as she caught sight of Frank migrating to chat with yet another group of people who weren’t her. She took another sip of beer and tried to take stock of her surroundings. Underneath all the people and the music, this was Frank’s apartment, his new home, and she yearned to find traces of him in it.
The living room had one floor lamp, while the rest of the place was lit purple by LED strips he’d tacked along the ceiling. Mel imagined him just leaning up slightly to hang them; he was tall enough that he wouldn’t have needed a ladder. She pictured the way his shirt might ride up as he lifted his arms overhead, the way the muscles in his arms would flex. Mel shook her head to dislodge the image and glanced around some more.
There were several drawings hung on the fridge and the door to the second bedroom remained closed, but otherwise, there were very few indications of children’s presence yet. Frank had only moved in a few weeks ago. The ink on his lease was still drying, he’d joked, even though he told her he’d finalized it via DocuSign. Maybe the kids had only been over once or twice since, not enough time for them to leave traces of themselves. Or maybe Frank had just tidied excessively before people got here. The idea made her smile to herself, something endearing about picturing him preparing for the evening that made warmth spread through her sternum.
The rest of the apartment was pretty barren, in a recently-divorced man kind of way; the furniture was mostly IKEA, mostly black, and nothing hung on the walls except a framed Ocean’s Eleven poster. The TV still didn’t have a stand, but a sound bar had been set up and was playing a song with heavy bass at a volume that was slightly louder than tolerable, but probably not loud enough to warrant any noise complaints from neighbors. People were finding places to dance, anyway, even though the living area was less than 500 square feet.
Frank was currently making a group of med students laugh. This new crop had flocked to Frank with an ease that Mel couldn’t begrudge, necessarily, but that still made something ugly churn in her gut. He was a good teacher; she knew that better than almost anybody. He was unnecessarily handsome and had a smile that would send any sane person to an early grave, and none of that was his fault but it was difficult for her to bear on a good day. Let alone a day where he’d barely talked to her.
Sitting on the arm of his couch, he leaned over to deliver some punchline Mel couldn’t hear, with the grin that made her want to tear her hair out. All their heads tipped back simultaneously with loud peals of laughter that bordered on shrill. It made Mel press her fingers into her beer can, the aluminum denting under her grip. She downed the rest of the beer in three graceless gulps.
If Frank was deliberately keeping her on ice tonight, there was only so long she was going to last at this speed.
“Mel, come take a shot!”
Trance broken, Mel glanced up, in the direction of the voice.
Trinity was waving a bottle of what looked like tequila, giving Mel an over-the-top wink. “Don’t worry, it’s not the good stuff. Perfectly acceptable for shooting.”
Against her better judgement, Mel let herself be pulled to the kitchen table, where Garcia was lining up little plastic shot glasses. Trinity unscrewed the bottle and started pouring across the little cups, not bothering to lift it up after each one. The result was each shot was filled to the brim and liquor puddled on the table. The scent of it burned Mel’s nostrils. A handful of people had flocked to the table: Dennis, Victoria, Matteo, Cassie. Samira was there too, standing next to Abbott, who’d insisted he was only stopping by for ten minutes but was somehow still here nearly an hour later.
It dawned on Mel that, unlike college, she knew most people here. She liked most of them, even, and they seemed to like her back. Frank might be ignoring her, but these people weren’t. It was enough of an ego boost that Mel stepped forward and confidently grabbed a shot glass, holding it aloft as she waited for the others.
“Atta girl, Mel,” Garcia said affably.
“To Langdon’s divorce!” Trinity cheered, thrusting her shot glass in the air.
“To divorce in general!” Cassie echoed with equal gusto.
The rest of the group hollered their general assent. It seemed to grab the attention of the rest of the room. A shiver raced down Mel’s spine when she caught Frank glancing up. Laughter was still etched on his features, but his smile stilled, melting into something indecipherable as his gaze caught hers. Mel bit her lip, holding eye contact as she brought the shot to her lips and tipped it all back in one go. The tequila burned all the way down her throat, spreading through her chest before evaporating. In its place was a tingly kind of heat, one that made her feel nearly invincible. She shimmied her shoulders, half shaking off the remnants of the shot, half dancing, as the song switched over to one she recognized from high school. Fall Out Boy, if she remembered correctly.
She felt him before she saw him, all of a sudden in front of her. Mel didn’t even see him get up. Overwhelming in his—his everything. The white t-shirt that pulled across his chest in a way that felt illegal. The faint scent of him, pine and mint and a musk underneath it that Mel recognized as just Frank. The way she had to look up so high to meet his eyes—but god, there they were, blue as ever.
Finally, she thought, unbidden. Frank tilted his head.
“We’re low on ice,” he said, just loud enough for her to hear.
Mel blinked. She wasn’t aware that was such a big issue, but there were probably lots of logistics involved in party hosting that flew over her head. What that had to do with her was also lost on her. It was hardly the topic she’d expected for their first conversation of the night. “Oh. Shoot?”
“There’s a corner store two blocks away. Come with me?”
Oh. “Always,” she said, wincing at the way her voice squeaked.
It was cooler outside now that the sun had been down for a few hours, but the night was still. Frank’s neighborhood was pretty residential and it felt as though they were completely alone as they exited his building and headed down the street. Mel could almost pretend they were the only two people in the world.
Frank linked his hands behind his head, tipping his chin up and whistling the melody of the song that had been playing as they were leaving. Sugar, we’re going down swinging. Mel carefully avoided glancing at the strip of skin above his hips suddenly exposed by the motion.
“You look good,” he said then, and something about the way he was kind of leering, not calling her pretty but good made her spine tingle.
“Thank you,” she mumbled. “Are you having fun?”
“I am. Are you?”
“Your place is very nice.” He’d probably catch the non-sequitur, but she also wasn’t sure whether he wanted her to lie or not. She was having fun, or something adjacent to it, but this was the first time they’d really spoken all night, and it was impossible to deny how that dampened her enjoyment.
It got him to laugh, at least, ducking his head so a piece of hair flopped down over his eyes. “You don’t have to say that. I know it just screams divorced dad.”
“Well, this is a divorce party, after all.”
Frank laughed again, and Mel felt something loosen in her chest. They weren’t walking very fast but already she could see the flickering neon sign of the corner store in the distance. She wanted to stop time. She wanted to make him laugh again.
“You’re a good host,” she mused.
“Don’t let Abby hear you say that.” Frank said. Mel blinked. She didn’t know how that would even be possible. He continued, “She used to do everything, when we’d have parties. I wanted to help but I usually just got in her way.” He cleared his throat. “Anyway, not that it matters.”
When they got to the store, Frank held the door open for her and she felt the gentle brush of his fingertips against her lower back as she passed him, like a touch of lightning through the cotton of her dress. It made her want to do something nonsensical, like bite his shoulder or tackle him to the undoubtedly dingy floor. Whenever he touched her like this at work, always small, always incidental—a guiding hand on her elbow, a reassuring squeeze of her wrist, a palm on her waist as he passed her—as if he might touch anyone like that (although they both knew he never did, never would) she wanted to scream, to disintegrate, to beg for the ground to swallow her up whole. He knew it drove her crazy, she was pretty sure. In the way that men that handsome usually knew when they were driving someone crazy. But sometimes she’d draw attention to it and he’d get this stricken look on his face as though he’d been caught and she wondered if maybe he was equally out of his mind.
Frank immediately made his way to the back of the store where the freezers were, which Mel could admit was disappointing. The tequila was starting to hit her properly, now, and she decided she was done with the hot and cold stuff for tonight. Her first instinct was to reach out and grab one of his belt loops. Frank stuttered to a halt.
“Hi,” he said, slowly turning around with a smile.
Mel’s grip on the loop tightened. “Hi,” she repeated, chewing at the corner of her lip. “So what kind of ice selection do they have here?”
Frank’s smile widened. “Let’s find out.”
The selection wasn’t anything impressive, not that Mel had considered it possible for there to be that many varieties of bagged ice in the first place. Basically it came down to crushed or cubed, and Frank selected a bag of the cubed kind with a nonchalance bordering on indifference. Maybe it didn’t matter either way.
“D’you want anything?” he asked.
Mel shook her head, but he grabbed a Reese’s for her anyway and placed it on the counter next to his singular bag of ice. Before she had time to register what was happening, Frank had paid for their items and was holding the door open to her once again. Over that soon. In a few short minutes, after another short walk, they’d return to the raucous din of Frank’s apartment. They shuffled along the sidewalk in companionable silence for a moment, until Frank cut a glance over to her. He opened and closed his mouth several times before speaking.
“Hey, so, uh. About yesterday—”
Mel bit her lip. Here we go. She wasn’t sure if she was glad he was bringing it up. Somehow she thought they might go the rest of the night without mentioning it. “What about it?”
“If I came on too strong, I…” Frank rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m sorry. I guess I wasn’t sure you’d still show up tonight, honestly.”
“You didn’t,” Mel said with a rush. Is that what all this was about? “Of course I came.”
“I really thought I messed up,” he said. “Like saying something might’ve broken the spell, y’know?”
She couldn’t fathom what he was talking about. Frank must have been able to tell by the look on her face, because he continued, “It happens! Some people enjoy it better when it’s all unspoken and covert. It’s sexy, I guess. I just thought I was gonna go crazy if I didn’t say anything.”
Was Mel hallucinating? Did he somehow think that—that cornering her in the locker enclave after their shift and telling her he had feelings for her was some kind of turn off? Was he afraid of her rejection?
Mel stammered, “Is…is that why you’ve been ignoring me all night?”
Frank stopped in his tracks, eyes going wide. “You—I thought you were ignoring me.” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “I’m such an idiot.”
“No! No, no, you’re not.” Mel latched onto his arm and Frank dropped his hand to look down at her. “Yes, you caught me off-guard yesterday. I’m sorry I didn’t respond, but I…I’m just not used to getting what I want. And I want—you. I have for a long time.”
“Shit.”
“Frank, I’m pretty sure I would have died if you hadn’t come talk to me.”
His jaw dropped, a private thrill. Mel loved when she could surprise him. She tracked the slow grin that spread across his face. Her heart stuttered. “Yeah?”
Mel really was helpless around him. “Yeah.”
“Okay,” he said, nodding like he was resolving himself to something. “Noted. Let me make it up to you.”
“How so?”
“I’m only talking to you for the rest of the night.”
Now it was Mel’s turn to laugh, tucking the back of her hand against her mouth, even as the thought of having him all to herself made her pulse jump. “Frank, you can’t do that. This is your party.”
“Exactly. It’s my party and I can do what I want.”
Frank was still standing on the sidewalk, the bag of cubed ice tucked against his hip. The look he was giving her was nothing short of indulgent, possibly even adoring, if Mel could ever work up the nerve to acknowledge it. It just—it didn’t feel real, that this man somehow felt for her the way she did for him. She suspected it never would. Frank was just so…tall and caring and funny and charming and intelligent and so Frank. Mel just wasn’t the kind of girl things like this happened to. But here they were. And it was happening.
Mel glanced up at him. His eyes, so startlingly blue even in the dim night, bore into hers with an intensity that made her breath catch.
“Maybe,” she said hesitantly, taking a timid step forward, “you could just kiss me instead.”
Frank said nothing, but his gaze darkened. His building loomed in sight behind them and, without a word, he grabbed Mel’s hand and guided them the rest of the way. She worried for all of ten seconds that maybe she’d said the wrong thing, that she’d been too forward.
All her fears evaporated when he crowded her against the cold brick wall of his apartment building, dropping the bag of ice at his feet. He pressed his face into her neck, into her décolletage, into her mouth. Her lips trailed over his cheeks, his forehead, the dip in his chin, before he finally, mercifully, tipped his face up to seal his mouth over hers. The kiss was slow, purposeful, but there was an edge behind it, something urgent that threatened to spill over within her.
The longer they stood there making out against Frank’s apartment building, the more Mel felt like an elastic being pulled taut. Tauter, as he cupped the side of her jaw with his large hand. Tauter, as he slipped his tongue into her mouth. Tauter, as he rutted into her. She wanted to know what it felt like to let herself snap. The kisses turned messy, desperation searing through them with every slide of their tongues, every nip of their lips. They were barreling into brand new territory at a hundred miles an hour, and neither of them seemed interested in slowing down.
“The ice is going to melt,” Mel panted, just as his hand gripped her thigh, guiding it up around his hip. She couldn’t care less about the ice, frankly. But it felt irresponsible to ignore it.
“Let it,” he said, breathy, driving himself forward against her and rocking a little, enough that she could feel him, hard through his jeans.
At the brush of contact, Mel heard a sound fall from her lips that she didn’t think she’d ever made before. Frank pulled back slightly, just enough to look at her, and Mel felt her cheeks grow warm, the flush spreading all through her body.
“Are you…” he started. “This is good, right?”
Mel clutched his back, fingers digging into his shoulderblades to beckon him closer, closer. “This is good,” she agreed.
Frank grabbed a handful of her dress and pushed it up over her hips. The night air was a shock against her bare thighs, but his hands were there instantly, rubbing soothing lines up and down. The brick wall bit into her back but Mel welcomed the rough feeling, the hard press that pinned her in the most electrifying way.
“Mel,” he breathed, curving his head to mouth at her neck. “Baby, can I please—”
“Yeah,” she managed, legs liquefying at the pet name. “Anything you want.”
Holding her up against the wall with one hand leveraging her thigh, Frank used his other to undo his belt. Mel watched, through hooded eyes, as he slid his pants down ever so slightly, enough to reveal the tip of his hard cock bulging through his briefs. Her mouth went dry at the sight. Frank leaned in to press his forehead to hers and, in what Mel deemed to be an experimental move, canted his hips forward. A gasp tore from her mouth as she felt him brush against her, pleasure crackling down her spine. Even through her underwear, the friction was mind-numbing. As if reading her mind, Frank repeated the motion, changing the angle this time so he dragged over her clit with a precision that made her whole body light up. She could come just like this, just grinding against him.
“Oh, fuck,” Frank said. “Fuck, I can’t believe we’ve waited this long.”
“I know,” Mel panted, as he slid over her clit again. “You’ve been good.”
At that, he groaned. “Mel, god, I need to—is it okay if I…?” His hand went back to his waistband and pulled himself out of his briefs. The pink tip caught the light, glistening with precome, and Mel was suddenly certain that she’d never felt desire, true desire, true hunger, until this very moment.
She could only nod. The fact that they were outside, in an alleyway, barely registered. They had wandered a fair distance from the street, but there was still a bright overhead light not too far from where they were pressed against each other; anyone who knew to look would see them, right there, out in the open. The thought sent a thrill through her core. They would see Mel with Frank, like she’d been dreaming about for the past year. She shocked herself with how tantalized she was by the idea, and used one hand to shove her underwear to one side, grabbing the back of Frank’s neck with the other and forcing him to look down at her.
“Oh my god.” He sounded delirious, and Mel drank it in eagerly. “I might die tonight, King. You might kill me.”
Frank took hold of his cock and carefully guided himself forward. At the first slip of his head through her folds, they both moaned. Mel was already wetter than she could ever recall being, and the sensation of having him so close (about to be inside her) made her feel like she was on the precipice of something she might never recover from. Even with the slick between her legs, the first nudge of his head against her entrance was overwhelming. Mel had never done this in anything remotely similar to this position, and the angle was tricky given how much taller than her he was. She breathed through it, her nails digging into the base of his skull. He advanced slowly, inching closer and closer until, with a sudden shift, her body yielded to his as she took the fat mushroom tip in.
The burn was all-consuming. Mel felt as her walls stretched around the thickest part of him; he was only just inside her and yet she felt him everywhere, felt so full with him. Mel felt her back arch off the wall.
“Fuck, Mel, you’re unreal—how are you this fucking perfect?” Frank babbled, his forehead tipped against hers. He was nearly trembling, gripping her waist in a way that had her hoping she’d bruise. She wondered if it was from an effort to stay still, or stay quiet, or both.
“Yeah,” he moaned, “you’re definitely gonna kill me. I’m going to arrest on the spot.”
“Don’t worry,” she said, voice shaky. “I’m a doctor.”
Frank huffed a laugh and pulled away to give her the look that always winded her. Like he was a little in awe of her. It turned her to mush. He opened his mouth to reply when suddenly—
A ringtone blared, loud and incessant even through the fabric of his jeans.
“Ignore it,” he said immediately, bending to nuzzle her neck.
Mel wanted to. God, but did she want to. But—what if it was an emergency? What if it was his kids? “Frank. You should answer it.”
He groaned, but obliged her, pulling the phone from his back pocket and sliding to accept the call. “This had better be good,” he said, a little petulantly. Presumably not his kids, then.
Mel couldn’t hear who was on the other line but, judging from his put-out expression and eye rolling, she had to guess it was either Garcia or Trinity and that it wasn’t a true emergency. The relief mingled with amusement at the absurdity of the whole situation, and it made her want to do something reckless. So, taking a moment to consider physics, she hitched her leg up higher around his waist and dug her heel into his lower back, coaxing him forward until more of him slid inside her.
His eyes bugged out, mouth falling open, and she felt a nugget of satisfaction glow in her belly. He let out a rough cough before speaking. “Yeah—yep. Yes, we can get more beer. Yep, we’re…we’re on it.”
Frank ended the call and heaved a sigh. He leaned forward, bracing a hand against the wall next to her head. “You’re trouble.”
Mel just grinned, pleased with herself. “So, back to the store?”
He nodded. “But it can wait.”
Something warm was unfurling in her chest. She thought it might be fun to tease him a little, the way she thought he’d been teasing her at the beginning of the night. It helped, probably, knowing that he seemed willing to go along with whatever she wanted. That him coming to her yesterday with those huge hopeful eyes, telling her he—he’s in love with her meant something real. She’d been patient for so long but, well, she would have waited a lot longer if it meant she could have him like this: pliant in her hands, willing to give himself to her. She, of course, had been willing to take whatever he could give her, right from the start. But accepting that he wanted her back was a leap of faith that, until tonight, she hadn’t realized she was capable of taking.
“No, we should get back,” Mel said, biting down on her smile when he leaned back with a whine.
“You can’t be serious?”
“’I’m afraid so. But…” She hesitated, toying with the collar of his shirt before remembering that his dick was still very much inside her. The thought made her want to throw caution to the wind. “Maybe I don’t have to go home tonight.”
His gaze whipped up, eyes flaring. “You’re… for real?”
Mel shrugged. “Why not? If you’ll have me.”
Frank surged forward to capture her lips, so quick she could only squeak in response. He pulled back with a dazed expression. “If I’ll—Mel, I don’t think you realize how badly I…how I’ll have you forever, if you’d let me.”
Mel felt her cheeks flush. She didn’t know how to respond, how to tell him she felt the exact same way. “Okay,” she said. “It’s a deal.”
“Deal,” he repeated, flashing her a disbelieving grin that made him look so boyishly handsome she couldn’t imagine a day in her life not loving him.
Frank was growing soft inside her and she grimaced a little as he pulled out. Her underwear were carefully replaced, his pants were done back up, and the skirt of her dress was smoothed back against her legs. Mel chose to ignore the wrinkles in the fabric.
The ice was a bag of slush when Frank crouched down to retrieve it and he just shrugged, chucking in a nearby trash can as they ambled back down the street to the corner store. After passing the second streetlight, he slipped his hand into hers.
Part of Mel hoped, selfishly, that when they returned to Frank’s apartment, it would be empty. That everyone would have packed up and gone home in the time that they were out. But when they opened the door, slightly disheveled, the party was still in full swing. As if no one had noticed their absence. Trinity and Dennis were engaged in a game of beer pong against Samira and Abbott, which was something Mel didn’t realize people played outside of TV shows. Several nurses were attempting to catch pretzels in their mouths from an admittedly impressive distance. The med students were still on the couch.
“We come bearing beer,” Frank announced to a chorus of cheers.
Mel watched as he went about distributing the new cans before dumping the rest into the drink cooler along with the fresh ice.
“What did we miss?” she asked Samira quietly.
Trinity responded in her place: “We’re wiping the floor with these two. Suckers. Bet you didn’t count on Huckleberry being a sleeper pong assassin.”
Mel smiled. She pretended to watch their game for another minute before something in the corner of her eye caught her attention. Frank was settling down on the arm chair in the corner of the living room, leaning in to talk to Donnie, who had commandeered the AUX. Taking a steadying breath, Mel slid through the crowd to stand at Frank’s feet. Before she could second guess herself, she dropped into his lap, arranging herself carefully and assuming an air of perfect nonchalance. Almost immediately, his hand came to settle around her waist, even as he continued chatting with Donnie (who, mercifully, only quirked a brow at them but otherwise said nothing). Mel wasn’t sure if this was normal partygoing behavior, or if it was in some way expected of her, but the world kept turning; the party kept raging around them. Either nobody noticed what she’d done, or nobody saw anything out of the ordinary.
“Oy, lovebirds!” Trinity called. “Care to play the reigning champs?”
Frank angled his head, raising his eyebrows at her in the way Mel recognized as him asking for permission. Ah, what the heck. She dipped her chin in a nod and his grin widened. “Sure,” he called back, eyes never leaving Mel’s face. “But you’re going down.”
When they stood up, Frank took her hand again and Mel was struck by how truly right it felt, here, with him.
She covered her smile with one hand, half-listening as he and Trinity alternated explaining the rules to her. When Frank deliberately cradled her elbow to guide her through a trial throw, she heard at least two people let out comically exaggerated gagging sounds. Somehow, Mel didn’t think there was actual malice behind it, especially not after meeting Samira’s eyes, who gave her an excited eyebrow wag.
As Dennis took the first turn, Mel leaned against Frank's side. “For what it’s worth,” she murmured, Frank ducking low so he could hear her. “I think this is the best party I’ve ever been to.”
Frank’s answering smile sent a tremor through her whole body. “I’ve been told I’m a pretty good host,” he said with a wink. He bent to press a quick kiss to her cheek before turning to lob some trash talk at Trinity as the game started in earnest.
No, Mel didn’t think she’d ever had this much fun at a party before. She could get used to this.