Why did Van always have to be such a fucking buzzkill? She didn’t remember her being that way when they were kids. If anything, Van was the one who had never tired, who had urged Nate to make one more rocket, to watch one more movie, to play one more video game. She’d been like a geeked out Energizer Bunny on Red Bull. And now…

Willa had never worried all that much if people liked her. Truthfully, because most people did. She was easy to get along with, smart but not what some people would feel was annoyingly so, pretty but not in a way that usually inspired jealousy, and she did her best to be nice to people. Above all, she had no reason to think people wouldn’t like her.

But Van was shooting holes in that theory all over the damn place. She’d tried to be a considerate cabinmate and not drive Van too crazy, but for whatever reason, she hadn’t succeeded. At least not enough. Van ran hot and cold on her constantly, and she was starting to be tweaked by it. It wasn’t fair.

They’d watched two of the movies and were about to start on the third. Van was off grabbing her idea of snack food—apparently kale chips didn’t count—and Willa decided she’d had enough.

Van came back and tossed a bag of Bugles into Willa’s lap—which, to be fair, were secretly one of her favorite junk foods, but where did one find Bugles outside of a gas station or an airport?—and stood in front of Willa with a carton of Double Stuf Oreos in her hands.

“Ready?”

“No. I have a question.”

Van nodded as she ripped open the side of the carton, even though it specifically said Open Here at a flap on the top. “You’ve come to the right place. I was MIT’s Star Wars trivia winner four years in a row. Shoot.”

“Do you hate me?”

Van froze with one of the cookies halfway to her mouth. “Hate you? Why would you think that?”

“Sometimes you’re nice to me, but then you act all weird, like maybe being nice was too taxing and you’re done with it, have to rest up until the next time you can find the energy to talk and joke with me. Did Nate threaten you? Because I have to say, if you can’t stand me, I’d rather we be colleagues and get our shit done and not pretend we’re…” Friends, moron, say friends, because she’s not going to like you any better if she knows you’ve had a major crush on her for basically forever. “…friends or whatever.”

A small crease formed between Van’s brows and her mouth crunched to the side. “I don’t hate you.”

“Well then, why—”

Van looked toward the ceiling where a model of the Millennium Falcon was dangling from a beam and blew an impatient breath through her nose. “I don’t hate you, okay? Can we leave it at that?”

“No, we can’t. I won’t tell Nate if you don’t want to keep up this façade. He won’t know you still think of me as an annoying tagalong you put up with.”

“That is not how I think of you at all. You’re not annoying, you’re not a tagalong, and I don’t put up with you. I—”

She seemed to choke on whatever she was going to say next and set the Oreos on her desk in order to run both hands through her hair, making it stand on end instead of being floppy like Han’s.

“What, Van? Tell me. Because I don’t get it. I’m sorry your summer with Nate got ruined, okay? But it wasn’t my fault.”

“I know. You saved Nate’s ass, along with the Tullys’ which is awesome. Everyone who takes lessons with you raves about you, and you’re doing a great job planning for this eighties week. Really, I don’t hate you. Altogether, I think you’re…” Van’s lips flattened into a reluctant line. “I like you, okay? And not I-don’t-hate-you levels of like, but Nate-would-probably-kill-me levels of like.”

What? Willa sat there, feeling concussed. As though she’d stood in front of a ball machine turned on high and hadn’t moved out of the way when the ball spit out and now her brain was knocking around in her skull. “You like me? As in, like me like me?”

Some words, many of which Willa would’ve wagered were swear words, made their way out of Van’s mouth, under her breath. “Yes, okay? I like you like you. You’re beautiful and strong and smarter than I ever gave you credit for. You work hard, I’ve loved hanging out with you, and you look phenomenal in your tennis whites. What exactly is there not to like? Are you happy now?”

Whoa. The buzzing in her ears, the full-body flush, the feeling like she was going to fall over even though she was sitting down. Those things weren’t normal. Maybe she was asleep? She’d fallen asleep during their movie marathon before and maybe that could explain it, but she pinched her wrist and didn’t wake up. So, okay, not a dream. Which meant there was only one thing to do.

Willa climbed off her perch on the bed, setting the Bugles to the side, because what she was about to do would require empty hands unburdened by horn-shaped corn snacks. Emboldened by Van’s exasperated confession, she strode up to her for the third time that night, impinging on her personal space to the extent Van had to look up slightly into her face.

“The feeling is mutual.” Then Willa kissed her, taking Van’s round face between her hands so Van couldn’t slip away.

Being forewarned about her initial reaction to physical contact, Willa didn’t panic when Van went rigid, but held on, sustaining a gentle pressure, not bidding for anything more, even though she ached to part Van’s lips with her tongue and explore her mouth. Patience, Willa, have patience.

Her persistence was rewarded by hands landing on her waist and a responding press of Van’s mouth against her own and, soon enough, a shy insinuation of Van’s tongue against the seam of her lips. Yes.

Willa welcomed the incursion with a slight spread and a dart of her own tongue to touch Van’s, beating a quick retreat because she didn’t want to overwhelm Van. Van who she was kissing, Van who’d confessed to liking her, Van whose hands were climbing steadily up her back, clinging to her like she never wanted to let go.

They kissed for a minute before Van pulled away, and though Willa was reluctant to let her go, she’d move at the speed Van was able to go. If that meant stopping, then she’d stop.

“How important is it that we finish this movie tonight?”

“Um…” Really? Van wanted to talk about The Return of the Jedi right now? If that’s what Van needed, then she’d do it, but come on.

“Because I’d rather make out with you than watch it, but if it’s important, I could probably… No, I can’t hold off. I’ve been wanting to do that since you climbed out of your parents’ station wagon. Here’s a summary: Slave Leia, Yoda dies, Ewoks, Darth Vader dies, and then…then, this.”

Van’s fingers worked their way under the buns she herself had wound up only a few hours ago and pulled Willa into her, kissing her quite thoroughly. Damn. Not that it was a surprise, exactly, because Van was a passionate person, but never had she seen Van be passionate about a person; only science, fandoms, and feats of engineering. Feeling like she was up there in Van’s estimation was far more satisfying than it ought to be, especially when Van slipped her tongue fully into Willa’s mouth, not shy anymore, and caressed Willa’s tongue with her own, drawing a groan out of Willa.

Arms around each other, they fumbled for the bed, pushing the snacks out of the way and trying to find a comfortable way to lie on the twin bed together, finally settling with Van on top, their bodies tangling until Willa wrapped a leg around Van’s waist and pulled her down because she wanted more.

More of Van’s mouth, more of the breathy satisfied moans Van was making, more of Van’s hands roaming possessively over her. More of Van’s hips pushing against her own and making her core pulse with want. Their breasts pressed together, and Willa wanted to strip Van out of her shirt, see the body she’d wondered about almost as much as she’d wondered about what it must be like to have Van’s mind.

Hoping she wouldn’t scare Van off by asking for too much, too soon, she separated from those lips and said a prayer before getting on with it. “I’d like to take this off you,” she said, tugging at the black vest and then the cream, deep-necked shirt. “And this.”

There was a split-second pause, and Willa braced herself for disappointment. Van had mentioned something about Nate killing her. Was that going to stop her from doing what they both clearly wanted? She hoped not, but she couldn’t—

“Please.” The word was barely out of Van’s mouth before they were both reaching to peel the clothing away.

Willa managed the vest while Van tugged the shirt from her waistband, tossing the thing to the floor, and there she was, looming above Willa, utility belt still on, which for some reason Willa found kinda hot. What was even more mouth-watering was Van’s bare skin.

Soft abdomen; small, high breasts with dark brown nipples that had already drawn into hard points; no freckles like Willa had all over. Willa didn’t hesitate to reach up and cup Van’s breasts in her hands, run her thumbs over the peaks of Van’s nipples, and god did she love it when Van squirmed over her.

“I’m really—ah—sensitive. That feels—”

“Too much?” Willa asked, strumming her thumbs across the hard buds again and then circling them, careful not to touch.

“No, not too much. Just know you’re going to—ngh—make me frigging crazy doing that.” Van’s eyes were squeezed tightly shut, and she rocked her hips against Willa.

What kind of woman would Willa be if she didn’t take that as more of a promise than a threat? Was there something she wanted more in this moment than to drive Van up a goddamn wall? No. No, there was not.

While it was fun to handle Van, what Willa wanted more than anything was to make that woman lose that focused, steady mind of hers. She wanted to take her out of her brain for once and put her firmly in her body, which was being lovingly tormented. No better way to do that than with her mouth.

Willa wrapped her arms around Van’s back and, with one hand firmly between her shoulder blades and another at her lower back, pulled her down until Van’s breasts were level with Willa’s open mouth.

“Willa, please, I—”

It’s possible a protest would’ve followed, except it ended up languishing in Van’s mouth while Willa worked first one of Van’s nipples with her tongue and teeth and then the other. Which had the magical effect of shutting Van the hell up—or at least making her incoherent. Those sounds were a balm to Willa’s ears. That she could reduce the smartest person she knew to nonsensical babbling, pleading, or even feral noises because she was so taken by what Willa was doing.

A nice ego boost too, for the part of Willa that wasn’t entirely confident in her ability to please women in bed. She’d always liked girls, found them attractive, wanted to be with them, but it had taken her until her senior year in college to get up the nerve to do more than kiss one drunkenly at a party. Now here she was, sexing up her first crush—mind…blown.

She stopped long enough to catch her breath and let Van maybe find some words. She’d love to get Van off, but if there was one thing she’d learned from her last few girlfriends, it was that women were far more complicated than men. Making a woman come took finesse, attention, time. She wanted to learn what Van liked and then do it. Do all the things and make her head explode.

“Want to see you. Touch you.”

Oh, she’d scored incomplete sentences, excellent. Then she remembered she wasn’t wearing anything approaching normal for her—no, she had on this white…thing and it was going to have to come off. Like, all the way off. Because if Van wanted to touch her, she wasn’t going to argue.

Getting out from under Van was a less-than-graceful operation, given how entangled they’d become, but she finally managed to stand up to the side of the bed and loved the look in Van’s eyes as she rucked the skirt up to pull the long white dress over her head. Practically drooling, her Han was.

Willa managed to tear her eyes off the topless woman in front of her long enough to draw the Leia costume over her head, and then she was standing there in nothing but a bra and underwear. Not even a sexy bra and definitely not sexy underwear. But for the way Van’s gaze was raking her body, they may as well have come from La Perla instead of Target.

If the heat pouring off Van was literal instead of metaphorical, Willa would have been quite comfortable standing there in her skivvies, but as things were, it wasn’t warm in the cabin and gooseflesh started to pebble all over her body. Nothing said “fuck me” like goosebumps.

Lucky for her, Van noticed almost immediately and, after mumbling some apologies, threw her BB-8 pillow on the floor and drew back her comforter to invite Willa under her sheets. The idea of snuggling with Van in a bunk with the potential for oh so much more made Willa’s knees wobble and she was only too glad to climb in alongside Van.

Once they were lying side by side, Van’s hand landed on her waist. “You…you look even better naked than I ever imagined. I thank the tennis gods every day that you love to play because it’s given you a phenomenal ass and legs and…well, everything. Over the past few weeks, I’ve imagined you getting naked more than I’d like to admit.”

Heat bloomed on Willa’s cheeks. “You have?”

“Uh, yeah. I don’t actually usually take such long showers.”

Oh. My. God. Then why had Van been avoiding her? She could try to figure that out, or she could get it on with the most incredible woman she knew. At the moment? No contest.

“Then will you show me? What you were doing? If you weren’t just standing under the water anyhow.”

Van’s dark eyes glinted back at her, and a smile made her mouth curl up at one corner. “Want to help?”

“Uh, yes, yes, I do.”

Before they could get there, there was more kissing. Van took off that sexy-as-fuck utility belt but didn’t seem in any hurry to disrobe further. When Willa didn’t think she could take it anymore, she reached for Van’s fly and undid the button before sliding down the zipper, hardly believing what she was about to do.

Once the fly was down, she and Van worked in tandem to wriggle the fitted pants down her legs, and then they were only in their underwear.

Willa gestured to the grey boycut shorts with the Wonder Woman logo on the front. Wonder Woman was right; holy hell did Van look amazing, her hips flaring out from her waist. “Would it be presumptuous to take these off too?”

“No, not at all.” This time Willa took matters into her own hands and urged Van’s hips up as she peeled the cotton down Van’s legs. And then… Van. Naked. It was strange in a way—she’d seen Van in a bathing suit countless times, but somehow her body seemed different here and now. Laid out like a buffet for Willa to take what she would, and she wanted it all.

They kissed more and pressed their bodies together underneath the sheets before Willa threaded her fingers through Van’s. “Is it show-and-tell time yet?”

“Show-and-tell?”

“Yeah.” She let a saucy smile spread across her face. “You show me what to do and then tell me how it feels.”

Van’s eyes widened, and it was possible her pupils dilated, though it was hard to say for certain in this low light. The arousal came through loud and clear in her breathy voice, though. “Best version of show-and-tell ever.”

They shifted so Van was on her back, Willa curling into her side and using a hand to pry Van’s knees open before dragging her fingertips up Van’s inner thigh toward the promised land. As soon as she reached pubic hair, Van bit her lip in an effort to stifle a groan and then took Willa by the wrist. Laying her short, blunt fingers over Willa’s, she slid their hands in tandem until their middle fingers parted Van’s labia, and there.

Even if Willa didn’t recognize the particular feel, she would’ve known they’d grazed Van’s clit by the way Van sucked air through her teeth and pressed her head back into the pillow. Then she was urging Willa’s finger into tight circles around the little bud, harder and faster than Willa touched herself.

The way Van’s hips rocked up to meet their touch was a delight, as was her breath coming hard and close, the inhales and exhales clipped with effort and arousal. Willa wasn’t sure what to expect—she’d never much enjoyed it when people had tried to make her come this way, but Van seemed well on her way.

Willa lowered her head, kissed Van’s neck up to her ear, and whispered. “Do you need anything else?”

Van tossed her head on the pillow—no, no—and instead used Willa’s hand gripped in hers to speed the circles further. The way Willa’s finger slicked over Van’s most intimate parts made her want to devour the woman who was coming apart at her touch. Maybe someday she’d get to taste Van—the idea made her squirm, rocking her own hips against Van whose cheeks had flushed. Movements still purposeful and rhythmic, Willa couldn’t wait until she lost it. With a few more revolutions around Van’s clit, she did.

A small choked cry and a few last uneven bucks of her hips, Van kept their entwined fingers pressed to her core as she shuddered with pleasure.

“Wills. Dammit, Wills.”

Willa didn’t want to hear Van anymore, she wanted to taste her, so she leaned down to kiss her and managed to wring a few more beats of climax from the body collapsed beneath her. Was this what Van had done, leaning up against the white subway tiles that lined the shower? Because heaven above was that hot as fuck.

When the urgency had abated—at least for Van, Willa’s body was still strung taut with wanting—they kissed languidly, their mouths moving affectionately with each other, small nips and tinier licks until they came few and far between and Willa was resting her head on Van’s shoulder.

They breathed together for a while, Willa still buzzing with desire, but also strangely content. This was not at all how she’d foreseen the night going, but this was way better than anything she could’ve imagined. She stroked Van’s arm and enjoyed the smell of her skin. She smelled like, like…water.

Which was a strange thing to say, because water didn’t smell. She supposed it was how things were grape-flavored—they didn’t actually taste a lick like grape, but everyone knew what you meant if you said that. So, yeah, Van smelled like water. Cool and clean with a salty tang.

It was close enough Willa could practically hear the ocean waves rolling in and did that ever make her tired. But Van apparently had ideas other than sleep.

Her hand, small and warm, nudged at Willa’s hip to roll her over onto her back and then caressed her side, from ribcage to hip and back again. A firm, comforting touch that sent Willa further into the dreamy space she’d been headed toward. Unhurried and languorous, she was content to let Van touch her however she wanted to.

It wasn’t so long before the contact became less soothing and more sensual and then downright erotic, Van cupping Willa’s breasts over her bra and thumbing her nipples through the fabric. Hands squeezed, fingers pinched, and Willa inhaled audibly. Van never took Willa’s bra off or pushed the cups down, but the tiny distance was delicious in its own way—when Van finally touched her, the trigger she’d cocked would go off.

Then Van smoothed her hand down Willa’s stomach until the heel met Willa’s pubic bone and Willa rocked her hips to meet it, the pressure sending a bolt of electricity straight to Willa’s clit.

“Please, Van.”

Van kissed her, and while it was amazing—the taste and texture of her, the heat of her breath still new and surprising—it wasn’t what she wanted.

“Your fingers, your hands, I want more. Will you make me come? Please?”

“Think I can?” Van’s teasing murmur was soft as she stared down to where her hand was pressed against Willa. Applying more pressure, she blinked her dark eyes up to Willa’s, and Willa’s breath caught before she could even answer. From the smug look on her face, Van damn well knew she could do it, but she wanted Willa to say it. The woman was going to drive her crazy and was Willa ever going to enjoy the ride.

“Yes, yes, I think you can. Please, I want you inside of me.”

Van nodded as if she were taking Willa’s words under advisement, but she would do whatever she damn well pleased. Knowing Van, she probably would, but there would be no way Willa would regret it. Then Van was leaning over her, taking Willa’s bottom lip between her teeth and sucking. Why was it Van knew how to make crackles of desire buzz through her erotic nerve system?

Van released Willa’s lip, only to dip her tongue into Willa’s mouth, and at the same time slip her hand into Willa’s underwear, fingers coasting temptingly over Willa’s clit and then farther back to where Willa was, dear god, so wet. Even before Van said it, she knew.

“Jesus, Wills, you feel so good. So wet for me.” Then she was slicking the moisture back up to Willa’s clit where she circled and rubbed, toyed with her.

“Please,” Willa begged. This was nice, the fingers dancing over her sensitive flesh, but what she wanted, what her body ached for, was—

Van’s fingers drove back, and then two of them were inside her.

“Yes.”

It came out a desperate hiss, and Willa laid a hand over Van’s, urging her to press her fingers farther, possess Willa more, reach that perfect place inside that would make her eyes cross. Van wasn’t in a hurry. She kept a rhythm that was tempting, not satisfying, and wouldn’t fuck Willa as hard as she wanted with her impossibly clever fingers.

“More. More!”

“Your manners are atrocious, you know that?”

Willa had gone from languid and dreamy to flat-out desperate, and she wasn’t even sorry. “My manners? What about yours? You could make me come, and you won’t.”

“Fine.” God was that confidence of hers sexy, that know-it-all attitude and the cocky way she smiled down at Willa. “But someday, I’m going to make you wait. I’m going to torture you until you’re a writhing mess, and then I’m going to give you the orgasm of your life with my head between your legs.”

Fuck it all. With a change in angle of Van’s clever fingers, a few hard thrusts of her hand and the image of Van putting her mouth to work at the juncture of Willa’s thighs, Willa gave in. Her internal muscles clenched around Van’s fingers, and she rocked her hips so her clit could get that delicious contact with the heel of Van’s hand, and oh that was heavenly. Made her feel as though she was zooming up through the clouds and passing angels on her way toward the heat and the light of the sun.

Her cry wasn’t as muffled as Van’s had been and she had a split-second of wondering if the next cabin over would be able to hear her shouts of ecstasy, but who the fuck cared? Another wave hit her, and she drowned in it, closing her eyes and taking her final pulses of pleasure from their entwined hands.

* * *

Shit. Shit, fuck, and damn. Van’s reflection looked back at her from the mirror, and goddamn did she look well-fucked. Hair crazy, face lit with afterglow, lips still a little kiss-swollen. Scoring with a woman like Willa should’ve made her feel like a goddess, but instead Van was freaking out. Freaking. The fuck. Out.

How could she have just banged Nate’s baby sister? That was a thing she had decided very specifically she would not do, and here she was looking—and feeling—thoroughly lady-loved. Nate wasn’t the kind of big brother who would lose his shit about his little sister being a sexual being. But she wasn’t sure if that would extend to his bestie being the person his sister was having the sexy times with. She’d always been Nate’s friend, and she could see how her becoming…intimate with Willa would feel like she was betraying that.

Even though Van was kind of a turd about keeping up with the details of people’s other people, she did know one thing for certain: Nate adored Willa, and if this ended badly, he was going to be very unhappy with her and in more than a using-her-full-name kind of way. The thought made her sick to her stomach. Nate was one of the people she loved most in the whole world, and no woman was worth losing that.

Not even sex-mussed Willa who was drowsing in her bed at this very second. Shit. But there was some good news here, right? This didn’t have to be the end of the world. In a few weeks, she’d be headed back to Charlottesville and Willa would be headed back to Stanford, and that would be that. Being on opposite sides of the country didn’t exactly encourage long-term relationships. This could be a camp fling. Enjoy each other for a few weeks, and when the cabins were all closed up, they’d move on with their lives. No need to pick out china patterns or some shit.

And if this was just going to be a casual sexing thing, Nate wouldn’t even have to know. At all. Ever. Yeah, that was good.

That solution gave her the confidence to uncurl her fingers from where they’d developed a death-grip on their bathroom sink and turn on the water. The cold felt good on her face and further helped her chill. She could do this. Having limited-time flings with people was one of life’s great pleasures. At Comic-Con and academic conferences, she looked forward to getting into some attractive woman’s pants—why should summer camp be any different? And if that super-fine woman happened to be Willa Carter? Did that really matter so much?

She’d just go with no. Not that that stopped her from crossing her fingers behind her back as she tiptoed back to where Willa was sound asleep in Van’s bed. Though a little voice piped up when she climbed in beside her and just had to cuddle up because the bed was so damn small, she ignored it. Maybe the rest of this summer would turn out better than she’d thought.