“Don’t go down there—oh, God, Devin, you’re going to get seriously hurt—”

It was too late. My best friend was already on his way, his sneakers squeaking as he ran down the slippery stone ledges near the waterfall.

Rose Falls was known for its majestic waterfall—hell, Falls was in the name of the town—but most people didn’t dare go down there on a rainy day like this.

Devin was different than most people.

We’d been walking home from an exam, our last one of the spring semester, third year of college. He’d gotten the idea to walk down toward the waterfall and wouldn’t let it go.

It wasn’t on the way home, really, but he said we hadn’t been in so long. It was our spot, after all.

How could I have said no to him? The glint in his eyes alone could undo me in a second, not that I’d ever admit it to him.

So we went down to the waterfall, and on the way there, a fresh spring rain had begun to fall. The leaves had just sprouted from all the trees a few weeks ago, filling what had once been naked grey branches with a green so lush it felt unreal.

By the time we got there, the stone path down to the base of the waterfall was dangerously slippery, but Devin insisted that we continue on. I followed him, watching my every step carefully, saying a silent prayer every time we successfully descended a steep incline. We grew closer to the rushing water, and soon it filled the air around us, and the blur of Devin running ahead of me slowed to a reasonable pace.

“This place is so damn beautiful in the spring,” he said, leaning his head back and slowly turning to look up at the thick covering of trees and stone and water around us.

“It’s beautiful all year long,” I said.

“Fair enough. Hey—” he said, his eyes zeroing in on a tree filled with candy-pink cherry blossoms, “—could you lift me up? I want to grab a branch of those.”

“That’s not safe, Devin, it’s already hard enough to walk here, let alone lift you up.”

“But I need a still life subject and this is perfect. Come on, my painting professor keeps telling me I need to draw more plants.”

“Can’t you just wait ‘til we get back to town? There’s a billion cherry blossoms up there,” I said.

“Not ones this flawless,” he said. He turned to me, his eyes big and pleading, and already I felt my defenses dropping. I had been hanging out with Devin less and less—the semester had been busy, and we had different friend circles, now—but now when I did hang out with him, the impact was even greater.

He’d been showing up in my dreams, too.

“Fine,” I said, taking a few steps over toward the tree. I first tried reaching up on my own, but couldn’t quite grasp the branch. Devin was right, I was going to need to lift him. “Come here,” I said.

He moved in front of me, turning around so that I could wrap my arms around his waist.

When we were younger, we used to do this all the time—I had always been taller and I helped boost him onto trees, ledges, fences, whatever he could find to climb. I knew the motion well: he’d get in front of me and I’d hold him tight against me, lifting him just slightly so he could gain the extra foot or two of height.

But everything was different, now.

First of all, he wasn’t that much shorter than me now. I had a few inches on him, and he certainly was more slender where I had more bulk, but overall the height difference was far less drastic than when we were kids. He hadn’t asked me to lift him up in years.

And when I wrapped my arms around him now, I was much more aware of… him. I could feel the smooth planes of his abdominal muscles beneath his soft cotton shirt, and my fingers grazed against the warmth of his skin where the hemline rode up a bit.

It felt so right to have him in my arms, lifting him up in the gentle rain. I tried to ignore it—holding him, waiting patiently for him to snap the branch from the tree, willing myself not to rest my head against the small of his back like I wanted to.

“Ahh—” he grunted, trying but failing to pull it off. “I can’t get it—hang on a sec—” he said, tapping my arm so that I’d let him down.

I gently lowered him so that he could stand again, but as I set him down, his ass brushed along the front of my body.

And I realized abruptly that I’d become hard, all in the span of twenty seconds, holding his body against mine.

I quickly let him go, jumping back a little, unsure if he’d felt it through the fabric of both our pants. In the haste of letting him go, my foot slipped and I came down hard on the stone beneath us, kicking against him. He tumbled down, his head narrowly missing a jutting stone ledge, and toppled against me.

“Shit,” I shouted, the side of my body in a dull throbbing pain while adrenaline coursed through my veins. “Dev, are you okay?”

“Ow,” he said, rubbing against his elbow. “Yeah, I’m fine, but that fuckin’ hurt, Russ,” he said with a small chuckle. “What are you thinking? You could have gotten us seriously hurt!”

His words echoed what I’d said to him on the way down the path, and despite the pain radiating in my side, I found myself laughing, too. The wet stone under my back was soaking through my shirt, but I found that I didn’t care.

Devin hoisted himself up to a seated position, sitting on his knees on the stone next to me. The rain collected on his eyelashes and the strands of his hair as he looked down at me, checking to make sure I was okay.

“You’re not bleeding,” he said. “Can you move all your limbs?”

I extended my arm, my leg, and made sure I could move my spine. “I think I’ll be fine,” I said.

“Good,” he replied.

I expected him to stand up, then. But instead, he placed one arm on the other side of my body, lowering his face down close to mine.

My breath caught in my throat immediately—I had no idea what he was doing, and from my perspective, it seemed like he was about to kiss me.

But he knew I was straight. He’d never do that, right?

Instead, he just spoke, as I tried to keep myself from getting lost in the green of his eyes, tried not to stare at his lips, wet and ruddy and slick.

“I know you probably hate me for making you do stupid shit like this all the time,” he said, his voice low. “But I fucking love you for it, Russ.” He moved his hand to give a tight squeeze against my shoulder, and then he was up again in a flash, his attention drawn to some other plant that he could access more easily.

He had no idea that inside my head, I was reeling.

That in so many ways, I wished that he had been bending down to kiss me, instead of just give me his wacky version of an apology.

And that I didn’t hate him for anything at all. It was the opposite—I loved him, and every time I saw him, I grew more and more afraid that I was actually in love with him. My best friend.

But I was straight. And over and over again, I convinced myself that I couldn’t make sense of anything when it came to Devin.

I followed Devin back up the path that day, watching him and knowing he was blissfully unaware of the feelings that threatened to undo me every time I looked in his eyes, every time he shot me his devilish smile.

I had no idea that the afternoon there by the waterfall would be one of the last times I’d hear Devin say he loved me before I went and screwed everything up beyond repair.

And I had no idea it would be almost a decade before I’d ever tell him the truth.