Though you are relaxed, your heart beats at a brisk pace. You rest your hand on my stomach, then quickly move it away. What are you afraid of? You pinch a lock of my hair between you fingers as if it doesn’t scare you anymore. Don’t worry. I took the snakes out long ago. Your eyes focus on your thumb as it traces circles on my wrist. Little charges of electricity course through my body everywhere you touch me. How did this happen?
You smell nice, like some combination of soap and cut grass mixed with something else that 20 minutes of thinking cannot describe. I can feel your soft warm breath against the nape of my neck. It occasionally rises to tickle my ear. I am already addicted to the warmth of your body and comfort of your arms. Your stubble brushes against my skin as you kiss me lightly on my shoulder. I am melting, drowning, floating away. I want to pull you with me, though you are not ready. That’s ok. I am perfectly content just lying in your embrace.
Edit (at 9:30am): This sounded ok at 3am but after reading it again I’m not satisfied with it. I’m practicing my creative writing and the goal was to convey a sense of awkwardness and arousal. I attempted a shift from ‘you’ and you’s actions to ‘me’ and my response but the shift is not clean. I also wanted a slow buildup to the fall and then a soft release, but the actual product does not grow as organically as I would like. Thoughts?
you portray awkwardness/arousal well. you’ve also done a nice job with description and imagery. this is particularly good: You pinch a lock of my hair between you fingers as if it doesn’t scare you anymore. Don’t worry. I took the snakes out long ago. Your eyes focus on your thumb as it traces circles on my wrist. Little charges of electricity course through my body everywhere you touch me. you’re very visceral and bodily-focued, which gives your reader a nice, sensual experience.
my only comments would be to change the opening sentence. you’ve done a very effective job with 2nd-person narration, but Though you are relaxed, your heart beats at a brisk pace was unclear to me. i wondered who was being addressed; the narrator dialoguing with herself or the narrator addressing another. of course, this became clear rather quickly, but perhaps experiment with different ways to start the piece.
in the 2nd paragraph, you use the word “some” several times. try experimenting with substitues for this word – “some” is passive and can weaken the tone and voice of writing. (i got reamed for this so much in my lit courses in college.) you also use “warm” a few times – just try different adjectives and see what you can come up with!
additionally, i thought the “melting/drowning/floating” bit was nice. very ophelia.
thanks for the help! I will be playing with it for the next few days. Your tips will be very useful. I love your writing.