HOMEBOUND CONTRAIL

"You're my home."

SYNOPSIS

You used to fly paper planes together; now he's commanding real ones in the sky. You spend every minute of every day missing him, having no idea you're all he thinks about night after night as he watches the ceiling of his empty room.

One chilly duskfall brings him back to you again along with little confessions a lifetime in the making.

The setting sun had painted the sky with the most beautiful gradient of cotton candy pinks, warm oranges, and pastel purples, flooding the kitchen with the golden glow of a summer day even though it was freezing outside. You spent the entire Sunday with Chris’ great-aunt making citrus jam. She had this habit of making her nephew’s favorites whenever she missed him too much, even when he wasn’t around to taste them. You knew how much solace she found in your presence when Chris wasn’t around, but it wasn’t just to make an old lady happy that you readily accompanied her every time she invited you. 

It was your silent attempt to appease the excruciating longing you had for the curly-haired rascal you used to ride seesaws with.

“How’s this?” you held your hand under the tasting spoon carrying hot drops of jam and offered it to Helen.

“It’s perfect!” she loudly clapped, “We’ll label your batch with a gold star. I’ll go bring more jars from the cellar.”

You brightly smiled at her as she disappeared into the hallway, but the curls of your lips flattened in an instant. It just wasn’t working this time around. Every contrail in the orange sky outside was making your heart sizzle. The sweet and zesty scent permeating the kitchen was making you miss him even more terribly, reminding you of the eighth-grade summer you and Chris had to help Aunt Helen make fifty jars of citrus jam as punishment for not doing your summer homework. 

“Wish you were here, Falcon,” you mumbled to yourself, heaving a deep sigh as you slowly stirred the pot, “It’s just not the same without you.”

“And what are your other two wishes, Chickadee?”

The extremely specific nickname rendered in that familiar voice gave you such a start that you thought you went certifiably insane for a second. When you swiftly turned towards the entrance, the jar you were holding said goodbye to this cruel world and loudly crashed into dust. Your heart was singing horribly out of tune while doing somersaults, and you were rapidly going back and forth between the urge to break down crying and die laughing for being able to manifest him out of sheer willpower.

“I know I was away for too long but you do remember who I am, right?” he dropped his large duffel bag on the floor, smiling at you with mischievous lights flickering in his eyes, “Where’s my hug, you klutz?”

You choked back a sob of relief and bolted into his embrace. You threw your arms around his waist, clawing at the fabric wrapping his body like he was going to evanesce otherwise. 

“You’re back,” you whispered into the crook of his neck, breathing all erratically and trembling like a leaf, “You’re really back.”

He held you as tightly as he could to bask in your warmth, hoping you would forgive him for slightly hurting you. If it meant you were going to welcome him like this, he would gladly go to the bottom circle of hell any freaking day.

“Sweetheart, are you okay?! I heard the jar—”

Helen’s eyes widened in shock looking at the handsome young man clad in his civilian uniform made up of a plain white t-shirt, jeans, and combat boots, her blood pressure promptly climbing at the unexpected sight.

“Are you trying to give me a heart attack?!” she shrieked as she hasitly made her way towards the door, “Showing up out of thin air. You said you wouldn’t be back until March!”

“Mission ended much earlier than expected. I thought I could spend my time off with my favorite girls,” Chris reluctantly let you go for another big hug in the making, “but I can go if you’d rather—”

“Shush, you! Come here.”

Oh, the sight of a mother reuniting with her son… This. If there was a singular silver lining to the torture that was Chris being gone, it was this right there. Even though Helen was quietly sobbing in his chest, your heart was so full it was about to burst. 

“Come, now, milady,” he gently wiped her tears with a comforting smile, “No tears allowed when I’m here, yeah?”

“Don’t tell me what to do, brat! God, I’m so glad you’re safe and sound,” she pulled him close again, then nailed her boy to the chair in the kitchen as you two started preparing a lightning-fast dinner accompanied by his stories. 

Chris’ job description came with a bunch of potentially fatal risks, but it didn’t stop you from being worried sick as if every damn day was the worst-case scenario. His eyes were still as sleep-deprived as ever, but they were at least smiling, and as long as he was healthy, maybe you could consider overlooking his bedtime problem. He was back now. He was with you. And that was all that mattered at the end of the day. 

There was so much catching up to do that nobody realized how fast time flew by. Only when Helen rose to her feet to call it a night did you realize the clock was showing midnight hours.

“Alright, I’m off to bed now. Don’t stay up too late,” she toggled to mom mode again, then turned to you, “I’ll make your bed in the guest room today, okay sweetheart?”

“Oh, no need! I’ll go home after ca—”

“Nonsense!” she immediately protested, “You are staying, and we are having a feast tomorrow morning together as a family again.”

“But I shouldn—”

“I’ll put a deadbolt on the door so she can’t leave,” Chris reassured his aunt with the firmness of a drill sergeant, albeit smugly smirking at you, “She owes me a year’s worth of pancakes anyway.”

“Attaboy,” she ruffled his hair lovingly and bade you two goodnight.

Chris was finally home. Of course it was going to be a good night even if the world was ending the morning after.

“I’ll go take a shower,” he stood up as well, “Meet you upstairs in a bit?”

You retreated to his room to change into your nightwear from the day before. This particular corner of the house always took you back to when you were a bunch of kids running around the neighborhood looking for birds, but it was fascinating how much of a difference Chris’ physical presence made. When he was away, the room felt gigantic but tighter than a coffin at the same time. You would start having trouble breathing just being in it for three seconds, drowning yourself in the sweet pain of nostalgia and getting crushed under the weight of love you had for him. You didn’t know why you were willingly hurting yourself to this extent; maybe it was the only way for you to feel alive in his absence, but when he was home…

Oh, when he was home… 

There was no place on earth that was cozier. It was an everlasting carnival where cotton candies made of happiness were sold. The thrill of the roller coasters constantly rushed through your veins. 

It was pure heaven.

“Have you been sleeping in my room?”

Chris’ voice echoed like a record scratch, immediately stopping you from internally kicking your feet. You flinched in your place, feeling guilty for some reason like you got caught red-handed doing something utterly shameful.

“W–What?” 

“It smells like you in here,” he sniffed the air as he was drying his hair with a towel, “Also you’re using my favorite shirt as a nightgown.”

“Shut up, I spilled tomato sauce on mine!”

He burst into toned-down laughter, tousling your hair to annoy you further. The chain of his necklace peeked through the collar of his t-shirt, and it took everything in your willpower to stop yourself from smiling like an idiot. You had the pendant of two little chickadees custom-made and gave it to him before his very first deployment. All these years later he was still wearing it.

So many butterflies were holding hands and doing a line dance in your stomach that you were about to combust.

“Okay, Falcon, you’re gonna tell me everything now.”

“Sure, would you like me to share classified tactical plans, too?” he sat cross-legged on the bed across from you, leaning against the headboard.

“You know what I mean! There has to be some stuff you couldn’t say in front of Aunt Helen,” you slapped his bare arm, “How are you? How is your insomnia? Are you eating all your meals? Did you g—?”

“Breathe, Chickadee,” he held your hands and gave them a firm squeeze, “One at a time.”

Your heart beat so hard in your chest that you were pretty sure it looked like a hiccup.

He started answering your questions, but you couldn’t pay attention to what he was saying at all courtesy of your limbic system abruptly taking over the microphone. The orange glow emitting from the nightstand lamp was casting a somewhat sultry spotlight on him, unnecessarily pointing out some changes in his physique. His sunkissed skin was stretched tight over his now bulkier body, and unless your eyes were deceiving you, his shoulders had somehow gotten broader and his thighs looked a lot thicker. One look at the bulging veins on his arms, and your mind rendered an unsolicited mental picture for you in 4K, depicting him doing bench presses half-naked.

Oh, he looked gooood.

“Are you listening?” he lowered his head to hold your gaze.

“HUH? Y–Yeah,” you shook your head to snap out of it.

“What were you thinking about that intensely?”

You in your uniform but topless, would be the correct answer, but you hadn’t lost your mind that bad to give him the uncensored version.

“I was just thinking you must be a hit with the officers in your fleet,” you told him instead.

“How do you figure?”

“I mean…” you gestured in his general direction, “You got quite the eye candy situation going on. I’d look forward to going to work if it were me.”

He narrowed his eyes and slightly tilted his head with a barely there smile. By your usually levelheaded standards, this would be considered straight up bold, and Chris was clearly loving the change in demeanor.

“Yeah?” he clasped his hands under his nape, posture way too cocky for no reason, “Would you fall for me if you saw me in the locker room?”

“Oh, christ, I totally forgot you can’t take compliments like a normal human being,” you slapped your forehead. 

“Would you gossip about me with other officers?”

“Chris…”

“Would you tell them I’m very bangable?”

“Cut it out!”

You lunged at him as a knee-jerk response to put a stopper to his giggle fit. You didn’t have any intention to legitimately hurt him, so it naturally scared you when he suddenly hissed in pain.

“I’m sorry! Are you okay?”

“Yeah, it’s nothing,” he pulled on the collar of his top as if to hide something, but it was very much in vain.

You had already caught a sliver of what you prayed to be an optical illusion.

“What is this?” you tried to remove his fingers, “Did you… Did you get hurt?”

“I’m fine.”

“That wasn’t the question,” you grabbed the hem of his shirt.

“Let it go, it’s noth—”

“Stop squirming!”

In one swift move, you took his shirt off. There were remains of a stitched wound there, and it looked like it had been healing for a while now. 

“W–What happened to you?”

“It’s just a scratch,” he shrugged it off and tried to put his shirt back on clearly as an attempt to avoid confrontation, but you immediately stopped him because…

One of the chickadees on the pendant seemed slightly disfigured and discolored.

The one on the left…

“Is this… a gun wound?” deep creases formed between your brows upon the unpleasant realization.

“Shh, keep your voice down,” he abruptly sat up and covered your mouth.

“Were you in combat? DID YOU GET IN—?”

“Look at me. Look at me. I’m fine,” he held your face to force you to look at him before you started spiraling, pacifying you with a warm smile, “It was just an accident during training, so don’t worry about it, okay?”

Your quickening breathing took a U-turn, and you chose to believe him because the alternative was simply too unbearable to even think about. You hesitantly touched around the still somewhat raw skin.

“Does it… hurt too much?”

“Nothing I can’t manage,” he held your hand over his wound. 

You didn’t know what came over you. As you were staring at the scar, you instinctively leaned forward and gently kissed it, and your lips lingered there for quite a bit. Chris had heard of the term kissing it better before, but he had never believed it would actually work. 

Until now.

“I will worry,” you retreated, averting your eyes away from him, “I already worry all the time wondering if you’re safe. I worry if you—”

You stopped. Otherwise you were going to cry.

“Didn’t know you liked me that much, Chickadee,” he teased like he always did to disperse the dark clouds whenever you were sad.

“Well, you’d better, stupid!”

His smile shapeshifted then. This time he leaned forward and held your face, looking at you with so much adoration in his eyes.

“Haven’t you ever wondered why I wanted to become a pilot?” he asked as his thumb caressed your cheek.

“Because you thought you’d be Ironman.”

“Well, that, too,” he quietly chuckled, “When we were kids, you would drag me around the neighborhood every time you spotted a chickadee. I’ve never seen someone this enamored by those fluffballs.”

“Because they’re so cute!”

“They are,” he quickly agreed, but his voice carried the fragrance of defeat for some reason, “But you seemed to like them more than me.”

This time for sure it looked like you had a hiccup. You didn’t know what to do with yourself at all.

“I worry, too, you know,” he pulled his hand back and started playing with his fingers, “I worry you will forget about me one of these days. I worry you will give your heart to someone, and—”

He stopped. Otherwise he was going to cry.

“I wanted to learn how to fly for you,” his smile was broken enough to shatter your heart, “Maybe you would like me just as much then.”

You were stunned.

What was he even saying? What kind of nonsense was maybe you would like him? Maybe. Had his prolonged lack of oxygen somehow managed to blind him, or were your performances for him to take the hint much more applauseworthy than you intended?

All the words that insisted on eluding you finally decided to come back home, and you started speaking before you could form coherent sentences in your brain.

“They say people are immune to their own scents but not to others’,” you reflected his broken smile back at him, hoping yours would be able to complete his, “I do sleep here a lot. It’s crazy how it still hasn’t vanished by now, but every time I walk in, it still smells like you. It feels like we’re still hiding under the blankets together when I close my eyes.”

Your words helped him find a bit of courage to look up at you. His gaze was filled with pleasant surprise. He prayed to everything he could think of that you weren’t just saying these things because he was feeling something very dangerously close to hope again. He tried. God knows he tried so hard not to hold onto even a shred of it, but every time he resolved to give up, you would do something, say something, or just breathe the same air as him, exist under the same sky, and everything would come rushing back to him.

Everything.

“It feels like you’re hugging me when I wear your t-shirts,” a single tear let itself fall free down your cheek as you assumed your best impression of a smile, “I can’t bring myself to wear them often. I’m scared your scent will fade away.”

His brows were furrowed as if he was mad, but his eyes were welled up with tears. Oh, you were cruel. You were so cruel for not telling him any of this sooner. And he was a coward for telling you how much he loved you only when you were sleeping. He was unbelievably selfish for hating the idea of you moving on with your life, but he couldn’t help it. The only way he knew how to love you was with destructive greed.

Would you have said yes to him if he asked for ownership of your heart? Would you despise him if he begged you to have eyes for him only?

Would you slam the door to his face or take a step back to invite him in if he asked to hold your hand for an eternity?

“I have no heart left to give. Someone already stole it,” you reached for his hands and squeezed them way too hard than you should have, “How can I ever forget you when you’re the only thing on my mind?”

Chris didn’t know why he was getting hiccups all of a sudden.

Did you know how many mountains he had to carry on his back since he was fifteen? Did you know they only multiplied when he turned twenty three? Did you know it didn’t lessen the burden one bit when he soared as high as he could, even to the point of defying gravity? 

One hesitant kiss loaded with a crippling fear of loss, and everything he had kept locked away for so long ripped their chains apart.

His soul was being tortured every time he was away from you, loudly withering, yearning for its missing piece, calling out to it in heart-wrenching pleas to have mercy and come make him whole again. He was living half a life without you. He was only half a man.

He heard something click when he held the first girl he ever loved in his arms. It fit. It fit better than a puzzle piece. 

He finally felt complete.

“I miss you. I miss you every minute of every day,” he breathily whispered into your lips, “I’m dying when you are far away.”

He would be lying if he never once imagined you naked, but his imagination just did not compare to what he witnessed when he stripped you bare. Your skin. The curves on your body. He wanted to set up camp in each of them and dedicate weeks to fully exploring you. He pulled you under him, still completely incredulous you were actually in his bed like he always pictured you to be, and took in the sight for a while.

You were beautiful under that soft orange light.

You reached for the waistband of his sweatpants, and he let you drag it down, watching you tease yourself with how slow you were taking it. The silent groan you let out at the sight was complete music to his ears. How could you not? His gorgeous figure hovering over you, his girth threateningly swollen, his mouth watering staring at your nakedness as bad as you were salivating over his.

Trying to decide whether you wanted him to pass through you right fucking now or worship you all night was the worst dilemma you had ever faced in your life.

He lowered himself on your lips first, picking up where he left off as his hands sketched an outline of your body, committing every single nook and cranny to memory. It was a slow descent down to your jawline, then to your breasts, then all the way into insanity. Each kiss he left behind as he made his way between your legs felt like a brand was scorching your skin. Your breathing was fully irregular when he made it to his destination and wrapped his arms around your thighs.

“Do I ever pop into your mind?” you ran your fingers through his hair, “When you’re… by yourself.”

“Are you asking me if I’m jerking off to you?”

You nodded fervently while biting into your lips. He placed three kisses on your pussy, one before, one during, and one after his answer.

“Every… day.” 

“How do you imagine me?” you pressed further.

“In my bed. In the shower with me. Even in the jet sometimes.” 

“How’s that gonna work?” you let out a soft chuckle.

“It’s called a cockpit for a reason,” he spoke matter-of-factly, “I’ve always wanted to fuck you in there.” 

“While flying at an insane speed?”

“On the ground, know-it-all,” he grazed his teeth on your thighs as a warning, “I’m the one who’s allowed to make you fly, not the plane.”

He wrapped his lips around your clit, and you almost let out a suspiciously loud sound when he started sucking on it. You sank deeper into the pillow in rapture when he got messy, slurping all over your pussy like he wanted to see for himself how much more you could ooze.

“Do you think about me at all?” he asked in between his sloppy kisses.

“Are you asking me if I fuck myself to you?”

He slowly nodded, swirling his tongue around your clit as he stared right into your soul, and while his tongue worked absolute wonders on your flesh, that intense gaze was what was about to make you cum. His eyes were screaming his lust for you, ablaze with an insatiable appetite. 

“Every… night,” you dragged on each syllable.

“How do I fuck you in your fantasies?”

“God, you fucking ruin me,” you threw your head back and grabbed fistfuls of his hair, pressing his face closer into your cunt.

You started riding his face when he started licking you deeper, but you were aching to feel something inside you. Maybe it was because of how hard you were throbbing, or maybe you somehow managed to form telepathy through gustatory sense, but mere moments later Chris was shoving his middle and ring fingers into his mouth, getting them properly wet and slippery, then gently prodding your entrance like a warning shot. 

“Like this?”

“FU—!”

You had to press a pillow on your face to stop yourself from screaming at the last second. His tongue was still hard at work, licking illegible words all over your pussy while his fingers were beckoning for your doom, pushing you dangerously close to the ledge. A line. A line. A line. A circle. A curve. Wet. 

Wet. 

Wet.

An unfamiliar and muffled noise escaped your lips as you arched into his mouth, tasting sweeter than citrus jam on his tongue, and if Chris was touching himself, he would legitimately cum when those sounds of pleasure hit his ears. He was having the hardest time deciding whether he found it cute or extremely erotic. He obscenely licked his fingers clean, then climbed back up to kiss you. 

“Is it… Is it true?” you flashed him a fucked out smile.

“What is?”

“Do I really save a plane if I ride a pilot?”

“Let’s just say that you do,” he joined the curls of your lips with an amused chortle.

“Then the Air Force is about to be very grateful for me,” you mustered all your strength to straddle him.

You had always imagined what it would feel like when you finally had him disappear into you, but none of those daydreams could have prepared you for the stars you saw when he hit that dead end inside you. He put his hands on your hips and started rolling them, letting you have your way with him to your heart’s content. It was as lazy as a Sunday morning, allowing you to feel every inch of him fully. You felt his palm pressing on the small of your back, lowering you to kiss him again. You couldn’t tell how and when he hijacked control, but he was holding you in place to fuck into you. A little faster. A little harder. Soaking him as much as he soaked you.

“Fuck… Under me.” 

You found yourself on your back, your legs on his shoulders as he paved such a deep path into you that he was quite literally marking his territory. Trapping himself in your leg lock, he leaned a bit more forward, then held both your hands while kissing your life out of you.

“I’ll cum if you say you love me,” he panted hard, eyes barely open as he chased his high at full speed.

If you said you loved him… A simple I love you could not do justice to the mythological extent of your feelings for him. You held his face in your hands and crowned your best kept secret with a kiss.

“I’ve been ridiculously in love with you for fifteen fucking years.”  

Chris didn’t cum; he was reborn deep inside you. Each drop that mixed with your essence, each tremor that passed through his body glued the pieces of his shattered soul back together. Each kiss you placed on his face soothed a part of his charred heart that he used to believe was beyond saving.

He fell deeper in love with you, never ever to resurface again.

As his feet were about to touch the ground, he pulled you close and started counting the circles you were drawing on his chest. You reached for his necklace and started playing with it.

“Do you always wear this?” you asked him, gently rubbing your thumb on the pendant.

“I even kiss it goodnight hoping you will feel it someday,” he responded while caressing your hair.

“So that was you tickling me in my sleep.”

Your tired chuckles melted into each other, but it didn’t take long for yours to take an unexpected leave of absence. Your mood turned somber all of a sudden when you remembered the inevitable.

“When are you…? When are you leaving again?”

Your anticipated answer was somewhere around March, but certainly not…

“I won’t go if you ask me to stay.”

Even if it was only for less than a second, the sparks that flew from those words were dangerous enough to set you on fire. You knew it didn’t work that way. Of course he was going to leave. He had to. No one threw a lifetime’s worth of hard work into the trash for any reason.

But it didn’t stop you from pleading your deepest desire to him anyway.

“Don’t go, Falcon,” you hugged him tighter and buried your face in the crook of his neck.

“Fine, I won’t.”

“Don’t joke about it,” you responded from your hideout, “It’s painful enough as it is.”

“I’m not joking.”

You suddenly lifted your head and stared at his face. It had better not be a fucking joke because there was nothing funny about a looming heart attack.

“Wh–What do you mean?”

“The girl of my dreams is asking me to sta—”

“Be serious!” you snapped at him with a very loud whisper, “You didn’t… resign or anything, right?”

“Nope.”

“Then?”

You knew this play. He always grinned like that when he was sitting on some juicy news. You raised your brows, expecting him to give an answer before you became the first person to assault a military officer for dragging on suspense. 

“I got stationed here,” he finally satisfied your curiosity, ending your life just a little bit in the process. 

You stared at him blankly for some time, utterly unable to process the piece of information he just dropped on you. So this entire time… when you thought you were holding on to him for dear life…

Just how hard were you holding on that you managed to nail him in his goddamn place?

“Couldn’t you have told me that when you first walked through the door?!”

“I was going to!” he immediately raised his hands to surrender, “I just got… distracted a little bit.”

You couldn’t help it. The feeling of relief was so overwhelming that you lost complete control of your tear glands, but not because of your longing for the days that were never going to come back. Not because of the pity you had for yourself, relentlessly chasing something that could never be yours. 

It was out of unmitigated happiness for once.

“You’re my home, Chickadee,” he pressed his forehead against yours, “I’m home now.”

He kissed your tears away and pulled you into a tight embrace, brushing your hair with one hand as his idle one locked his fingers within yours. You lent your ear to his chest and listened to his heart, calm and steady like a homebound contrail drawn in the sky by a jet plane somewhere.

“Welcome home, Falcon,” you mumbled with a smile, drifting to sleep in your home for the first time.

Exxxtraoddinary? Appreciate with a pudding.

© 2025 Feelfolio.

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