Ellen knew they were a cliché.
Some small part of her liked that, the way people had looked at them when ever they entered a restaurant or club.
Something shimmered between them, an aura that made people stop and watch. Made them wonder why they had yet to find the person that made them glow like that, unaware that the very fire that lit them from within was also the fire that threatened to reduce them to ashes.
***********
It was a bad idea.
She knew it..... He probably knew it.
Drawing the lipstick roughly across her mouth she scowled into the mirror, snatched up a tissue and wiped it off, before applying it again.
She'd done this six time already, and now her lips were stained as though she'd eaten over ripe berries, let the juices fall messily from her lips.
That's how she felt.
Careless.
Pausing, her left hand gripping the tissue, her right loosely holding the lipstick, she stared at the mirror and wondered.
Would he still see her.
Would he still be him.
Fuck it.
She put on lipstick, brought her lips together then pouted at herself.
It was too late in the day to start worrying about that.
*******
Eighteen was so young.
When she saw eighteen year olds now she was always amazed at how childlike they where, how soft their features seemed, how gangly they were.
Legs and arms grown too fast, bodies waiting to catch up.
But of course, when you're eighteen yourself you feel aloof in your new found adultness, you're test driving a brand new upgrade of hormones.
You're invincible.
Ellen had first seen Gino at her friends house.
He'd come over to borrow a tape from the friends brother.... A tape!
She laughed at the memory and how it seemed sepia saturated, like a period drama.
"I'm going to have him." She'd told the friend, who'd shrugged, unsurprised.
She'd let down her hair and shook it about, she smoothed down her top and stalked into the living room to conquer this new boy.
It was a game to her, using her looks and her manner and her lopsided, knowing smile to captivate a boy, she did it even when she had no real interest in them.
She did it because she could.
But this time was different.
This time as she sauntered over and leant against the wall, one hand on her hip, legs crossed one in front of the other, and flicked back her hair, this time ...
Gino had looked up at her and they'd locked gazes.
His dark, almost black eyes peering into hers, he looked momentarily stunned.
And then he smiled.
It was like everything in her body contracted.
*************
Ellen coloured at the thought as the cab pulled away from the curb and headed off into the city.
Gino had inky black, curled hair and a nose that made him look like a bust on a Roman coin.
How many times had she run her hands through his hair that summer? How many times had she stroked the length of his nose and felt her heart stutter when he smiled at her?
To their friends they were this luminous couple.
She with her Irish hair and pale skin, and he with his Italian ancestry stamped all over him, together, always touching, holding hands, linking arms, he'd wrap an arm around her and pull her close in an almost painful embrace.
"Mine." He'd growl like a dog with a bone and she'd giggle and squirm in his arms.
But it wasn't all romance.
A well known as they were as a beautiful brace, people also talked about their tempers.
Their arguments were as spectacular as they were pointless.
Stupid things, tiny things, things so insignificant that they could never remember what they'd started arguing about.
The last big one had been simmering away for hours until, bolstered by alcohol fuelled rage she'd confronted him.
"Don't lie to me!" She screeched at him as he tried to mollify her. " I saw you! You had your fucking arm round her!"
"Ell, nothing was going on..."
She slapped him hard.
Gino grabbed her wrist as she brought her hand around to hit him again, pulling her around the corner of the building away from their friends stares.
She knew the glances and giggles embarrassed him and she took nasty delight in his discomfort.
"She was pissed, she'd just thrown up, I had my arm around her because the silly bitch could hardly stand." His voice had that low hiss to it, like a kettle in danger of boiling over.
She didn't care though, alcohol had made her petulant and ready for a fight.
"You're a fucking liar!" She spat in his face and watched with creeping dread as the colour rose in his face and she realised he'd pushed him too far.
She saw it come towards her and flinched, snapping her head to the side and squeezing her eyes shut.
The wooden wall of the shed she was leant against shuddered as Ginos fist connected with it.
Opening her eyes she saw him stood close to her, staring at his bloodies knuckles, his whole body shaking.
"Gino." She whispered and he looked up, his eyes wide and glazed, as though he'd forgotten she was there.
He went to touch her face, then drew back as though her skin would burn his fingers.
"Gino." Ellen took his hand in hers, the bloodied one.
She held it to her face then pressed her lips to the knuckles, tasting blood.
"Lets go."
That night he took her virginity.
They were shy and careful together, they knew nothing really.
She watched his face as he pushed gently into her, saw his eyes widen and his lips part when he got to the point where he could push no further and rested there for a while.
Ellen breathed slow and steady while his own was irregular, hitching, like he was running, not just resting here in this narrow bed.
"Are you ok?"
She nodded.
It hadn't really hurt, not like some had said it would.
It was... Strange.... To be filled with another person, not her fingers, not his.
He started to move, slowly at first his brow so creased with concentration that she began to smile, and to hide it she reached for his face and kissed him.
In doing so she tilted her hips and rose to meet him.
She gasped into his mouth and he moaned back, kissing her name over her lips, her cheeks, her eyes, he shook with the release and nearly fell on her, so strong were the shudders that wracked his body.
"Did I hurt you?" He whispered into her neck as she lay there, wide eyed, her hips still moving, her loins aching, waiting for more.
"No." She said quietly. "No you didn't."
At the end of the summer he went to University and they broke up.
It seemed for the best.
And that should have been that.....
Only it wasn't.
Fate enjoyed a game and how could it resist such interesting players?
Six years.
There were lovers and jobs and seasons that seemed to flicker past until they blurred and then...
"Ellen?"
She looked up from her book, frowning a little into the sun that was only slightly obscured by the person stood at the side of her table.
"Gino?"
It was, and before she could say another a word he had her in that vice like hug of his, after a second she gripped him just as tightly.
Sitting across from her he smiled broadly and she noticed how his face had sharpened, lost the last of boyhood, his hair was still unruly but only feral rather than untamed.
She felt her stomach knot as she watched the crinkle of his eyes as he laughed, she imagined running her fingers across his face.... She forgot how they argued.
When he took her hand in his over the table and said , "I missed you..." She knew she wouldn't be sleeping alone that night.
In her flat she was suddenly shy, awkward.
She dropped her keys on the table and went to the kitchen to get drinks. There was beer in the fridge, she grabbed two bottles and turned to find him standing close behind her.
Gino takes the bottles from her and put them on the counter before troking her cheek with his fingertips.
He studies her for a moment before smiling slightly and, sighing, he rests his forehead against hers.
"I never should have left."
"Why did you?"
There's that tiny threat of an accusation in her voice but he ignores it.
"Because I was a kid and I was stupid and it was easy to just run..... I never stopped thinking about you."
There's a glint that returns to her eye as she sees a chink in his armour.
"Prove it." She challenges and inside thrills as that slow smile spreads across his face and his body is suddenly hot and pressed close against her.
Their first kiss in six years threatens to bring her to her knees but suddenly his hands have hooked the back of her thighs and pulled her up and off her feet, his body crushing her to the fridge behind them.
His tongue's pushed deep in her mouth, his fingers digging into the bare flesh of her thighs under her skirt, he breaks away and growls "I waited six years for this.... Every woman I've fucked was you. Every name on my lips was yours..."
She knows its true.
She understands because she's felt the same.
