Steel 7 (Multiple Love)

We're all in this forbidden relationship with a girl who is still trying to find out how to be happy and live her dreams. We're struggling to work through our own feelings and pasts in the process. He's not the only one who should be making these decisions. We are eight people. We all need to take responsibility for ourselves and for each other.

"Okay," Asher says, reaching out to take Luna's hand. He broke first once, and it seems he'll always be the one to give in where Luna's concerned.

She beams and hugs Asher, taking time to send each of us a smile so grateful that it should warm us to the bottom of our damaged souls. "I won't be long." Trotting off to get changed, we trudge off to each root around in our cases for swimwear that we packed, never believing we'd actually need it.

We never believed that we'd allow ourselves to step so far over the line with our client.

It's funny how little we really know ourselves until we're tested.

The sea at night is a totally different animal.

Water, which during the day is clear enough to see your feet, suddenly becomes opaque and inky black. It turns from something welcoming to something with unfathomable dangers.

After scanning the shore and finding that we're alone, we strip silently, as though each of us understands that Luna wants this to be a tranquil memory. She's chosen to wear a black two-piece that perfectly fits with the oil-slick sea, and she's the first to dip a toe into the water.

"It's still warm," she says in a voice that is high with surprise.

"The sun warms it during the day," Asher says. "This time of year, it probably never gets much cooler."

As we wade in, I watch my Steel 7 brothers, taking in their constant watchfulness but also the other element of their protective feelings toward Luna. I see the beginnings of feelings of tenderness and care in the way they gather, careful not to cramp her style. I see their gentle touches to her arm and brief caresses to her face that have nothing to do with sex and everything to do with love. I see all the things that we shouldn't be feeling, and I see them in Luna too.

"This is perfect," she says. Then she holds her nose, dipping under the water and rising with her hair slicked around her face and trailing down her back. Her shoulders rise and fall with a deep breath as though she’s trying to draw in everything around her for safekeeping.

"The smell of the sea is intoxicating," I tell her. Beneath the water, her hand finds mine, and my heart skips a beat.

When she moves closer, her wet skin already cooler than mine, I don't tell her that it's a mistake. We're in public, and we made a promise not to do this, but with the darkness resting like a cloak around us, all caution seems to slide away.

Her wet lips find mine, and as I kiss her back, I taste the salt of the sea and the unending sweetness that is Luna. All around us, the other six other people who make up our strange relationship gather closer. Luna, conscious always that there are many of us, slides out of my arms and into the waiting arms of another. Elijah cradles her to his chest, nuzzling into the warmth of her neck. Then she's moved to embrace Ben, touching his face softly, and his hands graze her body beneath the water. Asher is next, his artist's fingers tracing circles through the beaded water resting on her shoulders. She shivers, breaking out into goose flesh as Connor embraces her from behind. She's so tiny between the protective bodies of my friends, but she doesn't rest there long. Jax, with his ever-present smile, swoops in for his own embrace, and lastly, Hudson waits patiently for his turn.

It's seamless, the movement between us. As liquid as the ocean that surrounds us. As natural as anything I've ever experienced in my life. And although I know that this kind of relationship would never have been what I dreamed for myself, I find that I'm drifting weightlessly in the perfection of it.

And I will drift for as long as it can last.

I’ve learned that you can fight the paths that life creates for you, or simply walk them, soaking up all the experiences that you never believed would be yours. My paths have been challenging, but there is little I would change. Our days are like the glittering links in a long golden chain. Break one, and everything unravels. I preserve my chain, even when experiences feel more like dreams that reality.

We all need to wake from our dreams sometimes, but we can fight to stay slumbering in them for as long as we can.