The kiss began achingly slow. His lips brushed hers once, then twice, soft and warm, slightly chapped from whatever trials he had faced while away. She felt the urge to soften them for him, and so she did, suckling gently on his lower lip, drawing it between hers with a tenderness that surprised even herself. He tasted faintly of salt and something sweetly, quietly his own, a taste she was already learning to crave.
As she nursed his lower lip, he shifted, moving to her upper lip in return, a gentle press, then another, as though he were relearning the exact shape and feel of her mouth. Memorizing it all over again after days of separation that had gnawed at him and nearly undone him with longing. His lips moved against hers the way a man touches something he had been afraid he would never touch again, careful and aching.
He had longed for her like a homeless man longs for shelter. She had remained stuck in his mind like something that could never fade.
