Page 56 of A Solid Guide to Surviving a Situationship

“We were beautiful even for a moment, weren’t we?” I said, like raising a toast to something that had already passed.

“We were,” he agreed, smiling.

And for some reason, I thought about the flowers around us—how something could bloom so beautifully, even if it wasn’t meant to last.

Francis and I stayed a little longer in the café, talking about lighter things: work, life, the small updates that fill the space between who we used to be and who we had become.

And it felt normal in a way that didn’t hurt.

Eventually, the conversation slowed on its own, like it knew where to end.

And maybe that was the thing about some relationships: they don’t end with a fight or betrayal. Sometimes, they end in silence. In missed conversations. In all the things you thought were too small to say, until they became too big to ignore.

I used to think that staying silent meant keeping the peace. That if I stayed easy, quiet, and understanding, then maybe things would last.

But sitting there, across someone I once loved, I realized something else.

Love doesn’t fall apart because people feel too much. It falls apart because they don’t say enough. Because silence creates distance—one unspoken truth at a time.

CHAPTER 8

STRAIGHT MALE’S PERSPECTIVE

Lorenzo pounded me from behind.

Not gently. Not carefully.

My hands pressed against the sheets, fingers curling into the fabric as his pounding built—fast, relentless, almost impatient. Like a beast charging at me. The headboard tapped loudly against the wall in uneven beats, matching the pace of his fucking without ever talking about it.

It was messy.

Uncoordinated in the way that meant neither of us was trying to impress the other.

And somehow, that made it better.

I could feel his girth moving in and out, driving me insane as every shift and rhythm sent waves of pleasure throughout my body, waking up sensations I hadn’t felt in a long time.

Then he pushed so hard, it blew my brains out.

A loud moan escaped me before I could stop it—half surprise, half surrender.

“Relax,” he murmured, breath warm against my neck, voice rough in a way that felt earned.

Then his hands found my hips, grounding, steadying, and guiding me to the new rhythm just enough that my body didn’t have to think about it anymore.

But then suddenly, he rolled me onto my back, and I blinked up at the bear looming above me.

Sweat clung to his skin, chest rising and falling, and he was looking down at me like I was a prize.

He wasn’t ripped. Just solid. Strong in a way that felt natural, deliberate. Hair covered him in all the right places, and that thick beard looked like it could both scratch and soothe at the same time.

And then there was his eyes. Big, round, almost innocent—puppy eyes that somehow softened this chaos.

He actually reminded me of an American football player on a good day. The one who could laugh, fight, and charm all at once.

I swallowed hard, because that look—bright, messy, knowing—made my chest tighten in all the wrong ways. And I hadn’t even started thinking about anything else yet.

Then he raised his hands, scraped a mouthful of saliva from his tongue, and wet his protected knob.