Dear Sir,

You asked me how long it takes for me to learn my lines. I don’t – it’s why I employ staff. For every wonderful scene I emote my way through, there is a little man called Dennis mumbling in my ear. I do hope I’m not letting too much daylight onto the magic for you.

Kind Regards,

 

 

Later on, after a frantic water fight which ends up with Billy and I winning, and a change of clothes for everyone, we shut and lock the door behind us.

“So, what’s the plan?” I ask.

Asa grins. “We’re going to take the footpath at the bottom of our road to Helford. It runs right by Frenchman’s Creek so you can soak up the atmosphere. Then there’s a nice pub in Helford called The Shipwright Arms, so we can get dinner there. What do you think?”

“Sounds amazing.” I can’t stop smiling, and I don’t feel even an ounce of silliness.

We set off and within minutes we’re on a path that meanders between high hedgerows, interspersed with views of fields. The air is heavy with the sound of birdsong, and it’s one of those glorious summer afternoons England seems to do so well, when everything seems touched with gold.

We stroll down the winding path into woodland through which runs the creek itself, and everything becomes hushed. I stare around fascinated as I’ve loved du Maurier’s descriptions of the English countryside since I first read them. She manages to convey the beauty and the melancholy of a British summer.

Billy sidles up next to me. “It’s really quiet, isn’t it?” he whispers, and I smile.

“Do you like it?”

He nods and looks around. “Do you think I’ll see any pixies?”

“You might,” I say seriously. “But probably not when you’re running around making a noise. Pixies are tiny, so I think they only come out when it’s very quiet.”

“So, definitely no pixies in our house then,” Asa smiles.

He points to the skeleton of an old tree which has fallen down and lies half way across the creek. It’s obviously been there a long time, and when Asa kicks it with his foot, he can’t move it an inch. “Come on,” he says. “There’s a gorgeous view of the river from here.”

“I’ll go first,” I say, stepping up and edging along. The tree trunk is very wide, and I find a flat spot in the middle and sit down comfortably. I hold out my hands to steady Billy while Asa climbs on. He settles down and grabs Billy, hoisting him onto his lap with a pretend roar while Billy shrieks with laughter.

When they’ve settled, silence descends and we stare around. There’s hardly any noise out here, and it’s almost as if the land is under a spell. It’s utterly beautiful and almost magical. High tide has passed I’d estimate, but the river is still full. Trees bend over it, dipping branches into the water, and the clear rippling surface reflects their images so it seems like there are multiple versions of the river, with multiple Judes, Asas and Billys. I stare at the scene and there’s something so timeless about it. I can almost imagine the characters stepping out.

There’s a tiny splash and Billy points excitedly. “What’s that?”

Asa squints and whispers. “They’re otters. Be very still, Billy, or you’ll frighten them away.”

“Ooh!” Billy whispers. “Have they got babies?”

“They have.” Asa pauses, and then says firmly, “But under no circumstances are you picking one up and taking it home.”

“Really?” He sounds disappointed.

Asa smirks. “I’m just glad you haven’t got your backpack with you.”

I laugh and then smile to myself as Asa launches into an explanation of otters’ natural habitats, which I’m sure loses Billy by the second word. Two kayaks pass by, slicing quietly through the water and the people wave and call greetings. Then they’re gone and the creek descends into silence again. The sun is hot, and I reach up and strip off my hoodie then settle back again, gazing at the water and dreaming.

Billy’s chatter slows down and stops, and when I look back, he’s asleep, sprawled over Asa. He smiles at me as he gently strokes his son’s baby-fine curls. “Is it how you thought?”

I look around happily. “Oh, yes. It’s better.”

He settles further into his perch. “Well, tell me about it. What took young Jude’s fancy so much he still reads the book?”

“You really want to know?” I’m startled because people usually aren’t interested, but Asa merely smiles placidly.

“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t want to know. Tell me.”

So I do. We lie on the sun-warmed wood and I watch sunbeams spackle his face as I talk. I tell him about the spoilt and wilful Lady Dona St Columb, a bored wife and mother in the time of Charles the Second, who comes to Cornwall on a whim, and how, over the course of a summer, she found herself, and lost her heart to a French pirate with the soul of a poet. It caught at something inside me when I first read it aged thirteen, that part of me which loves the beauty of a perfectly crafted sentence mingled with a closet romantic.

He listens intently, asking questions, and I almost want to run away because here, sitting on the trunk of an old tree in the silence of a sleepy afternoon, I can admit to myself, I have found a man who attracts me beyond reason. Before, I danced away from men, and it wasn’t painful because there was never anything there. Here and now it’s real and will stay imprinted in my memory, the three of us by the sleepy Helford River, caught in a midsummer spell.

He looks up and catches my eye, and for a brief second his hand stops its stroking of Billy’s curls and hangs suspended. Then he takes a shuddering breath and resumes the motion, as if for a second we are freeze-framed.

Eventually Billy wakes, and with him riding on Asa’s shoulders, we walk into the pretty fishing village of Helford for a fish and chip supper. Only now, in place of that earlier ease, there is a quiet tension between us which shows itself in stuttered glances and too long silences. The only comfort is that he seems just as freaked out by it as me. Finally, when Billy’s yawns threaten to take over his little face, we summon a taxi and make our way back to the cottage.

While Asa puts Billy to bed, I wander round the cottage, picking things up and putting them down, possessed by a curious restlessness. Finally driven outside, I grab a blanket and throw it down on the grass at the back of the cottage. The birds have fallen silent now, and the only sound is the chuckling of the water nearby and the gentle soughing of the breeze through the trees.

Asa finds me a few minutes later. He’s carrying two glasses of red wine and a bottle. Handing me one, he lowers himself next to me, placing a baby monitor carefully down so the sound of Bill’s gentle snores float out into the silent woods. Mimicking my position, he lies on his back and stares up at the night sky where the first stars are beginning to appear in the plush navy velvet of the sky. “What are you looking at?”

“Fuck knows,” I whisper back, and he snorts.

A comfortable silence falls as we lie there with no need to break it. Still, my body is very aware of how close he is to me. I can smell his warm scent of amber and lavender, and his big body gives off a wonderful heat. At this point, maybe sensing my stare, he turns his head and his eyes lock onto mine. The heat is unmistakable.

I clear my throat quickly. “Billy mentioned his mum earlier,” I say quietly, not wanting to break the spell of the night but knowing I have to.

He looks at me placidly. “Yes?”

I nod. “I didn’t know whether you needed me to tell you?”

He shakes his head. “No. There’s no need. Eve’s name is always used in our house. I don’t want it to become sacred. It needs to be around every day because one day he’s going to find out things about her, and I don’t want her to have to fall from some massive pedestal. It would only hurt him.”

I stare at him in query, but I won’t ask. I have enough secrets I can’t bear for anyone to prod at. I’d never do it to someone else, particularly not Asa.

However, to my surprise he carries on talking. “Eve died in a car crash when Billy was a baby.”

“I’m so sorry. You must have been devastated.”

He stares meditatively into the trees, then levers up to a cross legged position and grabs his glass. Taking a slug of wine, he looks at me and shrugs. “Mainly for Billy. Not for myself really.”

“She was the mother of your child, though.”

“Yes, but I was never in love with her. She was a friend of mine for a short while, then nothing, and then later on we reconnected over one lost weekend and the result was Billy.”

“Were you pleased?”

He looks into his glass. “At first I was freaked out. I was thirty-nine years old. My career was taking off massively, and suddenly I was having a baby with someone I hardly knew. Someone I would never normally have chosen to do that with.” He turns to look at me. “This is a secret.”

I nod and he carries on. “Eve was a junkie.” I jerk and he nods. “She was a moderate drug user when I first knew her. Hell, we all were, but I moved on from that. When I met her again, I was lured by the nostalgia of being with someone who knew me before I was famous. I failed to realise she hadn’t moved on from that life, but had sunk deeper. She had a serious heroin habit by then.”

“Shit!” I say, and he smiles sadly.

“That’s what I thought.” He stares at the house. “For a brief second I considered it when she said she would have an abortion, but something stopped me. I turned down movie roles, bought the London house, got her into rehab, and afterwards moved her in with me and monitored her like a fucking hawk. We weren’t together as a couple because I was with someone else, but she stayed with us.” I flinch at this small slice of info, but he carries on. “For a while it was okay, but then Billy was born. I was ecstatic, but for her it was like the leash was slipped. She relapsed a couple more times, and each time I put her back into rehab. She would come out and swear it was going to be okay, and then start hocking the jewellery I bought her.” He smiles sadly. “It was fucking exhausting.”

“What happened?”

He drains his glass. “She went out to score, got into a car with someone she shouldn’t have, and he drove into the back of a lorry. Thank God she never had Bill with her.”

“What? She’d have taken Billy to go and score?”

“She’d done it before. About two days before she died. The result was I kicked her out and changed the locks. I also told her I was going for sole custody at the time of the accident.” He sighs. “I regret it now, but I was so fucking mad when I found him. My baby in a dealer’s flat while they got high.” He shudders. “Anything could have happened.”

“You shouldn’t feel guilty for being fucking angry, Asa,” I say firmly. “You couldn’t have known what would happen.”

He looks at me out of the corner of his eye, and something tells me we’re approaching the heart of the problem. “I’m not sure I’d have changed anything even if I’d known,” he whispers, and against my will I find myself leaning my weight into him in silent support.

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” I say fiercely. “You’re a fucking brilliant dad, Asa. Billy’s lucky he has you, because God knows what would have happened if one of you hadn’t been responsible.” I hesitate. “Still, it’s hard if someone’s a friend from the past. They’re harder to lose because they come with invisible, sticky ties, even if they’re bad for you.”

He stares ahead. “At one point in my life she was someone to me.” He looks at me. “I don’t have much family. My mum was American. She met my father who was English, when he was working in America. When she got pregnant with me, my dad promptly married her and moved her over here to a small Yorkshire town.” He laughs humourlessly. “Of course, he just as promptly moved on as soon as I was born, leaving her with a baby in a strange country.”

“That must have been difficult. My mum’s Spanish and she stayed here for my dad. She struggled to settle for a long time, and she still had him with her.”

He shrugs. “My mum’s an amazingly strong woman. We were fine for a long time. What changed things for your mum?”

“When she had me, I think. She put down ties in the village, bonded with local mums and met Dylan’s mum, Rebecca. The two of them are thick as thieves and constantly gang up on us.”

He smiles wistfully. “That’s nice. I was very close to my mum for a long while, because it was just the two of us. I still love her a lot, but she married Dean’s dad when I was sixteen and we didn’t exactly get on.”

“Why?”

“He didn’t approve of any of my choices in life. He thought acting was a dead end, and I should get a proper job. Add in the fact I was interested in both boys and girls, and I was like an exotic bird to him. Something okay to look at, but it still shits in your house. Open bisexuality wasn’t really encouraged in my part of Yorkshire, and it embarrassed him.”

“What happened?”

He shrugs. “I stuck it for a couple of years, which, when living with Dean should really be judged the same as dog years.”

I laugh. “I can imagine. So, what happened?”

“I had a big bust up with him so he threw me out, and my mum didn’t stop him. I stayed on friends’ floors for a while thinking she’d regret it.” He shrugs, a tiny speck of humour incredibly peeking out. “She didn’t.”

“Did you try to go home?”

He shakes his head. “I didn’t want to drive a wedge between them. He might have been a prick to me, but he genuinely loved her. Anyway, I was very restless back then, so I packed up my shit and left town.” He smiles and puts his empty wine glass down, twirling the stem absentmindedly. “I bummed around Europe for a few years, and then came back to England. I ended up in London and started working in a pub in the East End and met some good friends, Eve amongst them. Actually, it was her who got me my first acting job. She was going for a casting for the series which ended up netting me Dylan’s undying love.”

I snort with laughter. “At that point, I think it was more psychosis than love, but hey, whatever floats your boat or boils your bunny.”

He laughs and I reach out for my glass, taking a healthy sip of wine, and then without thinking, I hand it to him. Without looking away, he puts his lips where mine have been, and I flush hot all over. Shit, I want him so fucking bad. I can’t deny it any longer. I look at him and I want him on me and so deep in me I’ll feel him for days. I look at his big, warm body, imagining all that heat and strength coming down on me, and I gulp. Fuck, this isn’t good. Neither of us work on paper. He’s obviously fucked up over this Phillip guy who has his fingers all over Asa’s past, and I cannot have ties. My history has more than proved it, and I know already I’m in deeper with him than I’ve ever been with anyone, even Sam. He electrifies every part of me, even my brain, and it’s so fucking intoxicating. I know it will hurt when I have to walk away before he does.

I breathe out evenly. “So, what happened?”

He examines me silently for a second, and I squirm. Then he nods. “She didn’t get the job but they took one look at me, asked me to walk in a straight line and read from a sheet of paper. Then they gave me the job and an agent. I thought I was in fucking clover. I mean all I had to do was remember lines and not fall over.”

I know it’s more than that, because Dylan told me he won a lot of awards. “What did Spencer Tracy say? Know your lines and don’t bump into the furniture.”

He snorts out a laugh. “Yeah, I’m okay with that. Not sure about the theory part. I’m a little superstitious, so I tend not to look too closely at how I do it. I’m not one of those actors who look inwards for motivation. Mine is the motivation not to starve to death or stick Billy up a chimney.”

“Not sure he’d be any good, anyway. It’d be too dirty,” I say absently. “He had a fit when he got marmalade on him last week.” I hesitate, and then curiosity wins. “Can I ask you something?”

He looks at me searchingly. “Anything.” He drains the wine and pours the last dregs from the bottle into the glass and passes it to me. Against my better judgement, I place my lips where his had been too, tasting the tannin of the wine and a deeper taste I know is his. Swallowing, I lick my lips slowly. His expression fills with heat and his chest rises and falls quickly. “It’s a night for confessions,” he says hoarsely, and he’s right. The night has that still, magical air about it, like it’s waiting for us to decide our fate.

I clear my throat, but when I speak my voice is still low and hoarse, and I swallow hard as he unselfconsciously lowers his hand and adjusts what is obviously a massive erection. “You said it couldn’t have worked anyway with Eve. Was it just because of the drugs, or was it because you’re bisexual?”

The words fill the summer heat between us, seeming to float like pollen. Then he stirs and his face wipes clean of all expression. “Yeah.” He looks at me. “I suppose you disapprove,” he says lightly. “I mean, you’re gay. I suppose you think I’m playing both sides of the fence, having my cake and eating everyone else’s share.”

I laugh without any real humour. “Why does everyone always use cake as a euphemism? Why not beer or cheese?” He snorts and I carry on. “Asa, I can hardly cast judgement on your sex life. I may only sleep with men, but believe me, after too much to drink, some of them next morning, appear to be completely different life forms.” I grab his hand, feeling the warm calluses catch on my skin. “Relax. It’s okay.”

He smiles almost shyly. “I’ve slept with women and I’ve slept with men. I’ve enjoyed both, but I don’t think I’ve ever had sex where I completely lost myself. As I got older, I tended to look more for a relationship and it seemed to happen more with men, but really, it’s just been based on the individual. It’s the personality that intrigues me.”

“Not looks?” I hold my breath because it’s always what attracts people to me, and I fucking hate it. The breath rushes out as he shakes his head.

“Looks can get my attention, but I need the full package to really engage.” He shrugs. “I’m not exactly the best judge of character, anyway. Men or women, they’ve all disappointed me in the end.”

“Why?” I whisper, and he looks hard at me, eyes dark with secrets.

“None of them saw me. None of them wanted me, and none of them ever measured up to the silly thoughts of what I really want in my life.”

“Not even Phillip?”

He stares at me for a long while, the only noise the breeze and the increased rapidity of our breathing. “Especially him. I don’t want to talk about Phillip,” he says harshly. He pauses. “I don’t want to talk.”

The silence stretches, and then my mouth opens independently of my brain. “I’m not with Dean.”

He jerks. “What?”

I look down at my fingers which have started an agitated tapping on my knee. “I was never in a relationship with Dean. We’re friends and we’ve hooked up a couple of times but that’s it.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

I look up at him. “You know why.”

Comprehension and understanding cross his face. “Yeah, I suppose I do,” he whispers. “I shouldn’t even be considering this with my history. I should have kept my distance, and if you’d been what I thought you were at the beginning, it would have been so easy.” Then he looks up and his eyes are pools of darkness. “So why tell me now?”

I stare at him, and just for a second, I consider all the reasons why this is a terrible idea, before I lean forward and kiss him.

For a moment, we rest our lips softly against each other, both of us I think, stunned how this can be happening. Then he groans loudly and takes over. Grabbing the hair at the back of my neck with his big hands, he cradles my skull and moves me into a better position. Then he slants his mouth over mine and everything goes red behind my eyes. I stop thinking, and all I can do is fucking feel as he eats at my mouth, forcing in his tongue and twining it around mine. I moan in my throat and fling my arms around his neck trying to get closer, as the kiss breaks its moorings and drifts into turbulent water.

I taste him and it’s a deep, sweet flavour which bursts on my tongue and makes my mouth water. Grabbing his neck, I ease up into a kneeling position, straining my body and angling my head to get closer, to take his tongue deeper. His breaths pant against my face and he gives a hard, rattling groan and grabs my hips, pulling me up and over so I’m straddling him where he kneels. He lowers me and I tear my mouth away, taking in harsh panting breaths and gasping as I ride on his lap, grinding against the massive length of his cock.

He groans a protest. “No, come back,” he whispers harshly. “I need your mouth on me. Kiss me.”

“What about Billy?” I pull back and gasp out with my last shred of sanity. “What if he wakes up?”

“Fast asleep and our bedroom faces the other way,” he groans. “Anyway, we’ll hear him through the monitor if he wakes. Fuck, just come closer. I need you on me.”

I lower my lips to his, grabbing his shoulders to steady myself, and then sink lower again until I feel the insane pressure of his cock against mine. I rub insistently against him, this insanely hot frotting taking me quicker towards orgasm than some long sessions I’ve had. I can feel my cock leaking wildly and my arsehole throbs steadily, sending little pulses of need through me. I rut harder, feeling the inseam of my jeans rub against my balls and taint with a rough, abrasive tug that drives me mad.

“Ungh,” I cry out, tearing my mouth away and lowering it to his neck where I suck and lick, hearing his deep groans fly away into the still air. The heat between us is intense. I can feel sweat dripping down my body making humid moisture in my clothes, but I can’t pull away when I’m chasing this intense feeling.

“God, Jude,” he gasps. “I’m so fucking close.” He groans almost painfully. “Fuck, I need to be in you so bad.”

I gasp and rut harder, the slight pain adding an extra, darker edge and making me wild. “Need it,” I gasp. “Want to feel your thick cock inside me. Want to ride you so fucking bad. Want you to come on me.”

He gives a harsh needy sigh. We’re moving furiously now, our movements unrestrained and violent, the only thought in our heads the end. He grabs my arse, pulling me harder against him, until the pressure makes my eyes roll back in my head. “Yes, there,” I gasp out.

He pushes me back slightly and presses his finger against my lips. “Suck it,” he groans.

Panting desperately, I take his long, broad finger into my mouth, and suck on it how I want to take his cock, drawing it deep into my throat and bathing it in wetness until saliva coats my chin. He stares at me, his dark eyes fixed and fascinated, as if I’m the only person in the world at this point, and some stupid part of me revels in it.

Then he lowers his hand and pushes it down the back of my jeans, and that one long, broad finger slides under the band of my briefs and into the crevice. I hang suspended for a second. “Yes, there,” I gasp out. “Please baby, put it in.”

He grunts and taps the finger against my hole, massaging it with the moisture until it pulses around him, sucking the tip in. “More. Oh God,” I cry out, my movements growing jerky. “Fuck! Give me more.”

Sweat runs down his face, which contorts as he presses steadily in until it’s seated. “Careful,” he warns, but I’m too far gone.

“More,” I moan and push down and then back up, riding the digit and shouting out as he taps my gland. The slight pain makes white pressure sear through me as though my head’s going to blow up. “Oh God, I’m so fucking close,” I groan, taking his mouth in between panting breathes as I ease up on his finger and then down again, the pressure of his cock like a red-hot pipe rubbing against mine.

His other hand grabs my hip hard, undoubtedly leaving a bruise. He jerks his hips up frantically, rubbing hard against me. Then he cries out, his body moving spasmodically and I ride the last wave and let go, spilling into the tumid heat of my briefs, riding his finger with a deep, groaning sigh.

For a few minutes, the only sound is our panting and the breeze rustling the leaves, and then he stirs and I grunt as he withdraws his finger.

“You alright?” he says hoarsely. “That was hard with no real lube.”

I rest my head in the crook of his neck, feeling my breathing slow and smelling his natural, warm scent mixed with his cologne. “It was amazing,” I finally mutter. “Just right.”

He chuckles, and I relish the feeling of his big body moving. Finally, after a few minutes, he shifts and I laugh as the stickiness is close to being irritating now. “Yeah, I know, it’s getting uncomfortable.” I ease off him, and for a second he looks like he wants to pull me back. The fuck of it is that I want him to.

Shaking my head at myself I stand up, adjusting my underwear gingerly. “Fuck, that’s horrible. I haven’t come in my pants since I was fifteen and Freddie Peters jerked me off outside McDonalds in Exeter.”

His voice is hoarse, but there’s an undercurrent of amusement. “I’m glad I didn’t know about the dizzying heights of your sexual experiences. It might have given me performance anxiety.”

I laugh. “Never mind. Your fragile Hollywood ego can rest easily. Freddie hadn’t cottoned on to the fact you don’t use your nails. I thought he’d rip my cock off.”

Starting to get up, he jerks at my comment before falling over on his side and bursting out laughing. “Make sure you write up that glowing reference. I’ll put it on my CV. Gets me off better than the fifteen-year-old Freddie Peters.”

I make a ticking motion, and suddenly the laughter dies between us and we still. “What have we done?” I ask helplessly, and he stares at me, something moving behind his eyes, but then it vanishes and he shrugs.

“I’m not sure,” he admits finally, and I sag with relief, lowering myself to crouch in front of him.

“I don’t want a relationship. I can’t,” I finally say, and something inside me throbs when I utter the by now familiar words, as though I’m hurting myself in some way for the first time.

He stares at me for a long minute. “I shouldn’t want one either,” he finally says, and the way he says it sounds strange. I stare at him, wondering why for the first time I feel wrong. I have this chat with loads of men, and normally my feeling is relief when they accept my limitations. I have never before felt this unease, this sense that I’m making a mistake, and I make myself shrug it off, feeling like I’m going to crawl out of my skin. Yet all the time the baser part of my emotions urges me to feel his body against mine again, to kiss him and taste him one more time, and unconsciously I feel myself bend towards him as if he’s the sun giving me energy.

He moves suddenly, and I gasp as he throws me down onto the blanket on my back and rolls onto me. Then I groan in satisfaction at the feel of his weight on me which somehow makes me fancifully think I’m a balloon and he’s tethering me to earth so I can’t float away.

I stare into his eyes. “This isn’t going away, is it?” I ask solemnly, and he shakes his head, his eyes dark and hooded and his mouth swollen from my kisses. I reach up and trace my finger over his full bottom lip and he sucks in a breath. “I want you again,” I say slowly, and he nods.

“I want you too.” He groans. “So much.” He rolls off me and rises gracefully up, lowering his hand to pull me against him. “Let’s shower, and if you’re quiet, I want to suck you off.”

I breathe in sharply and gasp out a stuttered laugh. “It’s that simple, is it?” He nods and I laugh, feeling unexplained jubilation fill me. “Anyway, there’s no chance of that. They’ll probably be able to hear me in St Ives.”

He smiles devilishly. “Maybe I’d better make sure your mouth’s full then.”

I smirk. “My, my, who’s a bossy boy?”

He shakes his head. “You have no idea of how demanding I am.” He looks me up and down. “But I can provide a demonstration if you wish.”

I shudder theatrically. “Ooh, just what the moment needs. Uncomfortable role playing of a sleazy salesman.”

He laughs out loud, grabbing me into a tight hug and kissing the top of my head. There’s something tender and familiar about this gesture which sets alarm bells ringing in my head, because it’s as though we’re long term lovers who know each other inside out. I never felt this close connection before, not even with Sam, and it scares me.

I ease back. “So we keep doing it then?” He nods slowly and I hasten on. “But no ties. I’ll stay for the summer but no longer. I take it you want to keep it from Billy?”

He nods immediately. “Fuck, yes. I’ll never let Billy meet anyone again until I’m serious, and in enough of my right mind to make a good character judgement.”

I massage my chest absently at the stab of pain I feel at the thought of him in the future with someone serious. Someone else who will sit at his table laughing and talking, someone who will kiss his son goodnight and sleep against his heart in the dark silence of the night, while I wander on in the world, never settling and never home.

“You alright?” he asks, drawing me close, and I rest for a second before I pull back. I can’t lean on him. I can never lean on anyone. “I’m fine.” I look up at him. “So, it’s a deal? Just fucking. No ties, and at the end of the summer, I go.”

He stares at me, something I can’t place moving over his kind, warm face. It’s an emotion I know has never been directed at me by a man, so I can’t parse it. Then it vanishes and he nods solemnly. “It’s a deal.”