I assume the fetal position, taking their hands and clasping them in my own. I press my back against their chest. I can feel their rhythmic breathing rise and fall against my shoulder blades, each exhale tickling up my spine. My thumb moves in a circular motion around their thumb knuckle, capturing the one spot that has always reminded me of strength and security. I stare at the wrinkles in the space that lies between their thumb and index finger, wondering how many hours a pencil has been balanced there or how many Starbucks coffee cups have warmed that exact crevice. My pinky extends out, reaching all the way to the nail on their middle finger, feeling the brittleness against my own army green acrylics. I inhale the scent of firewood and smoke that grips their black winter coat. Undertones of Bath & Body Works’s A Thousand Wishes perfume trail from the skin on their exposed neck.
Cuddling. It’s a weird concept and one that I have yet to master. To my boyfriend, this would sound like a usual Sunday night. Sorry to break it to you, babe, but these are descriptions of the cuddling sessions I have with my best friends. Cuddling with the homies is a prospect I never thought about until it just happened one day. The sharing of shot glasses on Friday nights, the squishing onto the common room couches during movie nights, and the perfect hugs after a tiring week have been all the preparation I have needed. I disagree with the idea that cuddling has to be romantic; why has the purity of bodily warmth and skin-to-skin reassurance been perverted into something inclined to sexual tension?
To me, cuddling is safe. I have never quite felt comfortable on my own, often finding myself tugging at loose skin and wrapping my arms around my waist in a make-shift hug. I try to keep myself warm but it never seems to satisfy that intense craving for external safety, the feeling that somebody is there to catch me, the desire to feel the warmth radiating from their heart.
My best friend squeezes my hands a bit harder, tilting her head down to capture the crevice in my shoulder blades—we have learnt how to best warm each other. I bellow with laughter as I nudge her toes with my legs, instinctively finding her ticklish spots. We break apart for mere seconds as she pushes me away in faux annoyance, both of us laughing that we know each other this well. While this act of cuddling might randomly happen on a sub-20 degree Saturday night as we wait for SNL to start, it’s everything else—the laughter and tickle spots and scents reminiscent of home—that keeps us together.
