I’d forgotten just how beautiful watching the sun rise over the sprawling fields could be. How the color slowly leeched from the horizon onto the farm. Inch by inch it crawled, spreading its glory in rays of golden pink.
I’d risen before the sun. Some instinctive part of me knowing I’d want—no, need—to see this, I’d carefully untangled myself from Quinn and grabbed my sketchpad before quietly heading downstairs.
As if predicting my early arrival, Quinn Sr. had been there, drinking coffee and eating bacon and eggs while reading the paper. He scooted an already full mug over to me and wordlessly pointed at the sugar and milk on the table. As soon as I stepped outside, Spud woke up, his tail flapping sporadically as he walked alongside me. He was now snoozing next to the tree, pawing at a fly that kept trying to land on his nose.
Putting my pencil back in its case, I leaned forward, resting my arms and chin on my bent knees to watch the sun’s final ascent into the sky.
Maybe you didn’t always need to try to capture beauty. Sometimes, you simply needed to experience it, let it seep into you and fill your soul with color instead.
My soul was happy here. So happy, I felt a tear leak out of my eye. Taking a sip of coffee, I brushed it away and leaned back against the trunk of the willow tree.
The swing was gone, but the rocks were still here, a few feet away. They’d sunken into the earth where the grass stopped, undisturbed. The memory of what we did all those years ago felt silly. But it also felt like that was where the magic began.
With a dead rooster.
Shaking my head, I laughed a little, putting my mug down. Crunching footsteps met my ears, and I looked up to find Quinn walking over, hands tucked into his jean pockets.
He sat down, and I squeaked as he picked me up and placed me between his spread legs.
He pulled me back to his chest, his arms like boulders resting on me, trapping me. “Why’d you leave me?”
My throat tightened. I knew he was trying to be playful, but I could hear it. The slight hint of fear in his tone. “Sorry. I wanted to watch the sunrise.”
He moved some hair from my neck, resting his lips there. His breath tickled my skin, and after a minute, I felt him relax a bit more. “I thought it was a dream. When I woke up, expecting you there. For a split second, I thought I’d been transported back to two years ago, and this had all been a dream.”
I grabbed his arm, my other hand reaching up to brush his cheek and chin. “I know what you mean.”
“Alexis tried to call me while we were asleep.”
My hand dropped. “Are you going to call her back?” I selfishly hoped he wouldn’t, but I knew it wasn’t that simple.
“I thought about it, but then, what would I even say? I’m pissed about what she did to you, but I still feel like a dick.”
“Don’t worry about me,” I whispered.
“That’s impossible.” He squeezed me. “Have you had breakfast?”
“Always trying to feed me.”
He chuckled into my neck. “Don’t give me sass. It’s the—”
“Most important meal of the day.” I laughed as he reached down to tickle my stomach. “I know.”
A rooster crowed, and Quinn reached over to grab my mug and take a sip. I took it from him after, taking another drink before he polished it off.
“Hey,” he said, hands climbing under my shirt and splaying over my stomach. “What ever happened to Frederick?”
“Oh, it’s horrible. You don’t want to know.”
“Dais, I’ve helped Dad with a lot of horrible stuff here; I can handle it.”
Sighing, I relaxed back into him, my head resting on his shoulder. “He got run over.”
Quinn tried to hide his laughter, but I felt it and turned around to glare at him. “Sorry,” he said.
“He wasn’t used to it, okay? Living in a residential neighborhood. He didn’t have road smarts.”
“Road smarts?” He snorted.
“Shush, I loved him.”
He quietened then, pushing my head back down onto his shoulder and smoothing my hair back from my forehead. “I know. Sorry.”
“He did okay for a while. But then he just wandered off. Dad found him by the curb on the next street a few days after we noticed he’d gone missing.”
“Did you bury him?”
“Dad did,” I said. “He was driving the neighbors nuts. Wouldn’t be surprised if one of them saw an opportunity and took it.”
“Assholes,” Quinn said. “We’ve got three again. Take your pick.”
I laughed, feeling a little giddy from how relieved I was. Being here. Smelling the hay in the air and feeling the crisp, clean breeze stirring tendrils of my hair around my face.
“Sometimes, I come down here just to remember where we began. To remember that we happened.”
My voice was a whisper. “You don’t know how good it feels to see it, to know it did.”
“I’m gonna marry you someday, Daisy June.” My chest caved in at those words. “Shit, don’t cry.” He grabbed my chin, brushing his lips over my cheek.
“No, it’s … they’re happy tears.” I sniffed, not realizing they’d escaped. “Does your offer still stand?”
“It was never an offer. It was a statement. A feeling I had in my gut.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. How you can simply look at something or someone and just see it. Feel it.”
“What?” I asked.
“You. Us. Years from now. Always.”
“Yes.” My heart was buzzing in my ears.
He hummed, holding me tighter. “When you see it, what are we doing?”
“We’re right here. On this farm.”
“You’re painting on the porch, and I’m working out in the fields, trying to catch just the tiniest glimpse of you.”
Sniffling, I choked out, “Yes, all of that. Yes.”
“What else do you see?”
I shyly admitted, “A little girl with sandy blond hair, following you around.”
“A little boy, too,” he said. “Sneaking into your art supplies and painting the walls whenever our backs are turned.”
The image we’d created felt so real, so beautiful, so right, that a sob escaped me. “I want it so bad. I always have.”
“Well, time for us to wake up. Because we’re gonna have it.”
We stayed out under the tree until our butts grew sore and our bellies grumbled. After a huge breakfast, Quinn went out into the fields to help his dad fix some fencing while I helped Amy prep lunch.
“Have you met Pluto?” she asked, handing me tongs for the salad.
“Not yet, but I’ve seen pictures. He’s gorgeous.”
“Quinton is quite proud of him,” she said, a fond smile in her voice. “You’ll have to go out and meet him.”
“I will.” I checked on the turkey in the oven as she washed some plates from breakfast.
I passed her the dish towel to dry her hands, then moved to the fridge to grab drinks and set them on the dining table.
“You know,” she said, hanging the towel up. “I heard what happened.”
My face turned crimson in an instant, and she laughed. “Not just that. But what happened after. Have you seen her?”
“Yeah, I have.” I wrung my hands together. “It didn’t turn out so well, but I guess I can’t expect forgiveness or that we can fix everything.”
The gentle lines on Amy’s pretty face tightened. “There’s no single person to blame or forgive here. The way I see it, you’ve all done wrong by each other. You and Quinn, you should never have gone about things the way you did.”
“I know.” Shame filled me, just when I thought I could finally shake it.
“But you were already betraying her,” she went on. “It didn’t have to be physical. But really, Alexis already knew how you felt. And I’m sure she knew how Quinn felt too. She just ignored it. Hoped it’d go away.”
“She still didn’t deserve it.”
Amy gave me a warm smile, stepping closer to touch my cheek. “You’re a good egg, my girl. But do me a favor?” I nodded. “Don’t beat yourself up for it. If you want my opinion, Alexis and Quinn shouldn’t have ever tried to make something out of your absence. It never would’ve worked out how either of them wanted it to.”
With a pat on my cheek, she left the kitchen, and something in my chest loosened even more.
“Psst.”
In the living room, I spun around from my perch near the window. Quinn was in the doorway, a blanket and torch underneath his arm and a mischevious smile on his face.
With a jerk of his head toward the front of the house, he walked away.
I followed, curious about what he was up to. It was nearing ten o’clock, and his parents had only just gone up to bed.
Spud groaned from his bed on the porch, but otherwise let us be as we made our way into the fields. Torchlight shone over the grass, and Quinn grabbed my hand, tucking it in his arm so that I didn’t trip over any grooves hidden beneath the blades of grass and weeds.
He set the blanket on the grass to the left of the willow tree and placed the torch on the ground before sitting down and tugging me onto his lap.
His arms felt like a warm blanket, and I snuggled back into his chest. I was about to ask him why we’d come out here, but then the peace settled over me in the silence.
Alone. We were blissfully alone save for the cows in the far-off field and the insects brave enough to chirp in the cool night.
“So much clearer out here,” I said, my head resting back against his shoulder to gaze at the starry sky. His lips slid side to side over my jaw, causing goose bumps to rise that had nothing to do with the looming winter chill.
“Can I kiss you?”
I turned my head, my lips a breath away from his. “I’ve been waiting for you to.”
His eyes were luminous, even in the dark. “I didn’t want to push you.”
“Push me,” I whispered. “I’ve been ready to fall since you brought me here.”
A rush of breath hit my lips, then his hand was in my hair and his lips were on mine. Like fire on ice, I melted into him, the cold making way for the kind of heat I’d gladly let consume me.
He pulled away, resting his forehead on mine as his fingers dug into my hair. “What I said last night? What I did when you stopped talking to me, the other girls …”
My gut churned. “Stop. I don’t need to know.”
“No,” he croaked, his thumb moving between our mouths to run over my bottom lip. “You’ve gotta know I was desperate, going insane. Always searching for these god damned lips.” I turned around completely, my legs winding around his waist and my hands gripping his head. His hands crept under my shirt, climbing up my back, the rough pads of his fingers tickling over my flushed skin. “Because without the stars, the moon is left alone to battle the dark.”
“I’m sorry.” I stroked my thumb over his cheek.
“Me too.”
Tilting his head back, I dropped my lips to his. “I love you.”
His eyes shut, and when they reopened, they were full of urgency. “Forever, I’ll love you. It’ll never stop.”
Our lips fell into each other, desperate yet gentle as they glided over and dipped under, our hands clutching and our hearts banging against our sternums.
He fell back, and I fell over him, sinking my tongue inside his mouth and growing dizzy from his taste, the way he touched me, felt against me, and met my every move with a fervor that rivaled my own. “I want you,” I repeated his words from last night.
Groaning, he rolled me over, and I pulled the drawstring on his pajama pants.
He shoved them over his ass, and I reached down, lifting his Henley to touch his stomach first. Abs twitched, contracting beneath my hand, and his breath stuttered. “Dais.”
“Let me.”
“There’s no way in hell I’m stopping you.”
Grinning up at him, I reached down, fingertips following the tiny trickle of hair that led to his hard length. His whole body shuddered over mine when I wrapped my hand around him, gently moving it up and down.
Nostrils flaring, he cursed. “I need inside you, or I’m gonna blow real soon.”
He took my hand off him, kissing it when I pouted. Slowly, he moved down my body, tugging at the waistband of my leggings and panties, then pulling them off my legs.
He crawled back over me, leaning on an elbow while his other hand spread my legs open, his fingers trailing over the sensitive skin on the inside of my thigh.
My head fell back when he reached my center, a finger drifting over me until I was spread open for him to dip inside. “So warm.”
I garbled out something incoherent in response, and he chuckled. “I think you’re more than ready for me,” he said, plunging his finger inside then pulling it out to rub wetness over my most sensitive area.
“Yes,” I moaned.
Settling between my legs, he hooked my thighs behind his back and gently eased himself inside. He stopped when he was all the way in, his hands searching for mine and linking our fingers together on either side of my head.
He moved slowly, confidently, yet his body felt like it was shaking. “Are you cold?” I asked.
“No, too fucking warm.” He kissed me hard, and my body melded with his, my hips tilting upward and my breath quickening.
We gasped and groaned into the heat of each other’s mouths, and under the stars, beside our favorite tree, we crashed and came together.
Afterward, with our limbs tangled, we gazed up at the night sky, naming stars until our bodies demanded to become one, and we gave in all over again.
As if we’d never even been apart.