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“Put your seat back, hon. Take a rest. It’s been a long day.”
Ed slipped his hand off of the steering wheel and rubbed his knuckles on Lorraine’s shoulder for a few moments. The touch felt good through her cardigan. She hummed, rolling the back of her head across the headrest to glance at him with sleepy eyes.
“Mm’kay,” she sighed. She let out a long exhale.
Lorraine yanked on the bar beside her seat to nudge it back, finding an angle that allowed her to shift onto her side and curl up under her seatbelt.
Ed didn’t need her for navigation. He knew this route; they’d spent the day at their favorite church in Connecticut, meeting and chatting with priests and lay leaders about their recent work. It was pleasant enough for Lorraine, in her element, with not too many people. But she’d had her social energy turned up since the morning and was exhausted. She craved their warm bed and comforting, dark bedroom.
The hum of the road beneath the tires lulled her to sleep easily.
What felt like only a minute later, she heard Ed opening up the passenger side door beside her.
“Lorraine. We’re home.”
She stirred, stretching her arms out like a cat. A high-pitched noise squeaked out of her throat.
Ed rubbed her shoulder and leaned over to unbuckle her seatbelt. He chuckled softly, close to her head. “Sleepy girl, huh?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Let me carry you, sleepy girl.” He encouraged her to wrap her arm around his neck. His arms wriggled underneath her knees and her back. “Come on.”
“Mm.” Lorraine burrowed her head against his shoulder as he hoisted her up, her nose tucked into his collarbone. “But if you drop me I’ll be an angry girl.”
She heard it in his breath as he smiled, feeling overwhelmingly fond of her.
He buried his nose in her hair and murmured, “Aye aye, captain.”
She drifted in his arms and then atop their bed while he undressed. Then, she felt him sit beside her and begin to help her out of her clothes. Lorraine fought to keep her fluttering eyes half-open and to lift her shoulders, her waist, her hips, her legs, while he worked her blouse and trousers and the stiffness of her bra off of her.
While he rolled her socks off of her feet, he asked softly, “Nightgown?”
“Mm-mm,” she hummed, rocking her head back and forth. “Like this.”
Low hums rumbled in Ed’s chest as he kissed her. From her ankles and calves up to her thighs, her hips, across the soft curves and planes of her belly, nuzzling her with his nose in the places he knew would deliver sleepy giggles. He kissed her sternum and her chest and the fine tendons of her neck. There, she felt him hold her arms and tuck kisses into her wrists, as tender as prayers.
Lorraine opened and closed her fists until he held her again. He slid his big arms perfectly around her and carved out a nest for them in the blankets and sheets.
Even with her exhaustion, his bare chest and back and arms felt so good wrapped around her. She couldn’t help but kiss him. Maybe an instinct of her subconscious, eternally aching, yearning for this tender love. She pressed her lips to his, to his cheek and his jaw, and burrowed as close to him, into him, as she could. Her soft inhales and exhales purred into the crook of his neck like a cat.
Baby, Ed sighed against her head, a near-silent whisper, only for them. My baby, baby, baby.