IT ISN'T EVEN A QUESTION. He stands and looks at me, waiting, and within seconds I am following him from the sun room and into his bedroom. I wonder what his mother and father would think if they knew about our sleeping arrangement. I wince. We're not doing anything wrong. I continue to tell myself this, but I still feel guilty. With any luck, I won't have to worry about Monica's reaction to it. Because I'm hoping she doesn't find out, which also means we should stop before she does find out. And yet, still I follow him.
I wonder what this means to him. A small part of me wonders if he is using me because I am close in proximity, but if that was the case, I wouldn't be here and Riley would. He would be talking to Riley and not me. He would be opening up, smiling and laughing, with her instead of me. I don't think he simply needs someone. I think he needs me. I am seeing him in a different way than I used to—I have to think it is the same for him.
His eyes linger on mine longer than they should and when he touches my arm, my heart reacts by pumping extra hard. Every time he looks at me, I feel scorched from the emotions I see in his gaze. Something has changed. I don't know what. I don't know when it happened, but it has.
“Did the movie scare you?” he asks, moving around his room as he gets ready for bed.
My eyes trail after him. “'Saw' isn't scary. It's just gross.”
“You wouldn't be scared if that stuff happened to you?”
I narrow my eyes. “That wasn't the original question.”
He smirks and my eyes are drawn to his lips. Part of me wonders what it would be like—to be loved by him. Or even just desired. To be with a guy like Rivers has got to be unforgettable. Everything he does is done with such intensity that being loved by him couldn't be any less than overwhelming. I think it would be comparable to continually trying to catch your breath and failing.
We take turns brushing our teeth in the bathroom. When I return to the bedroom, he has the blanket pulled down and is idly watching television as he waits on the bed. It seems so domestic, like we're playing at being a married couple. Only there is no commitment, there is no love, there is no happily ever after—or some idea of it. My eyes mold to the construction of his bare chest and I turn the light off to halt my staring. Ignoring his protestations about the sudden dark, I get into the bed. The television goes blank and the remote thumps as it falls to the floor. The silence is heavy, but this time it is not peaceful like it usually is. We need to talk about something, anything, so this tension abates, or at least dims.
“With your grandma the way she is...I'm surprised you didn't insist on going with your parents. Don't you want to be with your grandma right now?”
A full minutes passes before he answers, “No.”
My mouth pulls down. “Why not? She's dying. Why wouldn't you want to be with her right now? I mean, aren't you sad?”
“I don't know. I guess a little.”
“Wow.” I can't believe his coldness. Where did it come from? What caused it?
“She's not my real grandma,” he tells me. He shifts in the bed and our faces are now inches apart.
“Oh?” I ask, suddenly breathless.
“No. She's my step-grandma and Thomas is my step-dad. Other than when I was a baby, I've only been around her twice, I think—both times before the age of ten. She's basically like a stranger to me.”
“But...” I sputter, my mind still stuck on the father revelation. “You look just like him.”
“I look like my dad.” Rivers' voice is ice as he faces the ceiling. “He's dead. Thomas is his first cousin.”
“I...oh...wow,” I say again, realizing how lame I sound.
“I didn't know him. I was a year old when he died. Freak accident at the factory he worked at. My mom's been with Thomas since I was three.”
“How did your mom end up with your father's cousin?”
I feel him shrug next to me. “I don't know. Sometimes I think she wanted to replace my dad as best as she could and he fit in the looks department.”
“But not in any other departments?”
“He's an ass. He won't exactly ever win any awards for best husband or father of the year. He...”
“He what?”
“Nothing. Never mind. What about your dad?” The topic was changed a little too hastily, proof that Rivers is upset.
“My dad...hmm...that's a good question. What about my dad,” I muse. “I don't know my dad.”
“What do you mean, you don't know your dad?”
I purse my lips. “Well...my mom didn't know my dad, hence I don't know my dad.”
“Oh.” I can hear the confusion in that one word.
“It was a one-night stand. I think she was grieving over her ex-husband or something. She's always been sort of vague about the details. She didn't know him, didn't know his name, he wasn't from the area. So, you know, a few months later she finds out she's pregnant. No dad.” So many questions could be answered if I knew him, but there is no point in thinking about it, because I don't. I take a deep breath, closing my eyes.
“Neither one of us knew our dads,” he remarks.
“No.”
“But at least I know my dad's name. You don't even have that part of yours. That really sucks. A lot. I don't know what to say—I'm not any good at comforting people, sorry.”
I give a small lift of my shoulders. He can't see my movement and maybe he didn't even feel it. Maybe I am shrugging for no reason other than to shrug. So I reply, “You're really not fluent in making people feel better, I'll give you that.”
Suddenly I am wrapped in strong, warm arms with my head resting on a solid chest. For the first time since we started our nightly sleep-overs, he is consoling me. My heart sighs and I fight the impulse to hold him back. Whatever we have, if we even really have anything, I don't want to tamper with it.
“I'm not sad about it,” I reassure him.
His fingers stroke hair from my face, lingering near my lips before falling away. “You sound sad.”
“I am, but not about that,” I tell him truthfully.
Rivers moves so that he is partially leaning over me, his eyes shining in the night as he studies me, the glow of the moon reflected in them. “What are you sad about?”
I rise up and gently touch my lips to his. I figure the worst he can do is not kiss me. He goes still, his lips unresponsive against mine, and just as a trickle of disappoint weaves through my heart, he parts his lips and kisses me back. It's slow, hesitant, flooding me with sweetness I have never experienced before. The kiss deepens, his body pressing against mine, and the poignancy of it is snatched away and replaced with heat. My veins, my core, every part of me is flooded with fire. I don't want him to stop. It is a dangerous path I have started on, but not going down it would have been even more detrimental.
Imagine if I had never kissed him, just once.
I break away first, knowing our relationship has morphed once more, and that the blame falls on me. Is this wrong? My intentions are purely innocent, but am I still at fault if someone ends up hurt? I'm stealing moments because I know none of this can last. I'm not being fair to him. I'm not being fair to anyone, not even me. But when I look at him, when I touch him, and even when I just know he is near, I feel alive in a way that tells me life truly is infinite, in some aspect. I feel like there is nothing that can take me away from here, from him.
I feel like I have found my positive, and it is a doozy of one.
He stares down at me, his chest grazing mine each time he pulls and releases air from his lungs. My pulse is going haywire, and I shove him aside when I note the way I am clenching his thigh between my legs. Apparently my body was doing more than my brain was capable of deciphering. Neither of us speaks, the pounding of my heart loud enough to make words inessential. I wouldn't be able to hear myself talk anyway—I can barely make sense of my thoughts that are careening wildly out of control at the moment. Closing my eyes, I focus on breathing. That I can at least manage to do.
My body loosens up and my heartbeat slows. I tell myself I have to stop this, but the discomfort that comes with that thought calls me a liar. There is no stopping this. I don't think I could if I tried. Whatever this is, whatever we have, I am choosing to look at it as a gift. One I may have to return, but a gift all the same. I will treasure it while I can.
"I talk about Thomas—at the therapy sessions," he says in a low voice.
I close my eyes as my chest tightens; in joy that he is sharing this with someone, in sorrow that his step-dad can't be what he needs in a father figure, and in bittersweet pain that he has chosen me to confide in. It's all a jumbled up mess of emotions.
"What do you talk about?"
"My earliest memories, my only memories, are of him telling me failure was not an option, that I wasn't anything unless I was something, and that second place was for quitters. One time, when I fell and skinned my knees, he told me to get up and not to cry—told me to be a man about it. I was four."
I want to reach out to him but fold my fingers into my palm instead.
"I got second place in the fifth grade spelling bee and he punished me by making me choose one word every day from the dictionary to write an essay on. I had to do it for a whole month."
I wince, his pain touching me in tendrils of discord, flowing through my limbs, into my veins, and pooling within the center of my being.
"He told me I had to be the best, at everything. He expected perfection from me, but you know what? He never gave it back. He failed at being a father and I want to tell him that, and every day I don't, it eats me up. I let it control my life, I let it determine the person I was going to be, and it wasn't someone I am proud of. I told myself it was who I needed to be, who I wanted to be, but...since my accident, I know it never was. I have all these awards, I had the girl, the popularity, everything—and all I felt was empty.
"Now it feels like I'm fighting to be me, and I am not just fighting myself, but the weight of his judgment as well, and it is so...heavy. And I keep losing. But..." he trails off, inhaling deeply. "But I also feel like maybe I can finally do it, and I don't know if it's because you're here, or just because I finally don't care what he thinks of me, and...anyway—I keep trying. No matter how many times I don't get it right or I mess up, I don't stop. And I guess that makes the power he has always held over me become nothing."
I don't speak, his words more dominant than any control Thomas ever tried to wield over him. Though we are merely inches apart, the space between us is wide and insurmountable. It's the doubt growing to slam up walls between us. It's the fear unraveling the bits of us that have come together. It's every insecurity we can possibly dream up shredding the magic created between a boy named Rivers and a girl named Delilah. And we're letting it win with our silence.
I refuse to let it.
I roll to my side, placing my hand over his heart, and feel the steady tempo of it beating against my palm. His hand covers mine, holding it there. "You're stronger than you think you are."
"Am I?" Doubt twists his voice and turns it disbelieving.
I turn my hand so that my palm is up, resting against his, and lock our fingers together. "Desperately stronger."
His chest rises in a deep inhalation of air, his fingers tightening around mine. We fall asleep like this—just the touching of our hands enough to wash away all the darkness of circumstances we have no say in. Sometimes we cannot control what happens to us, but we can decide how to go on from it.
OUT OF EVERYTHING I HAVE found out so far this summer—good and bad, I think realizing what I feel for Rivers scares me the most. How can emotions be more worrisome than all the rest of it? I roll my shoulders and sit back on my heels, dropping the rag into the tub of soapy water. Everything about Rivers terrifies me. There. I admitted it. But what scares me the most about him is that he makes me want more—more of everything. More than this life, more than what I am promised, more than I can ever truly have.
I see who he used to be, who he is now, and who he can be, and all of that melds together into what he is. Rivers is a scarred young man, but I am only now seeing that they run deeper than I imagined. What he told me last night closed the deal—I cannot go back to thinking I knew him. I am only starting to now. There is depth to him I wasn't expecting—there are so many layers of him to pull away and I want to be the one to do it, and that is wrong of me.
It doesn't matter. I can't turn off what I feel and I don't want to.
I finish scrubbing the walls of the upstairs bathroom. It is even bigger than the downstairs one and that is already impressive. My shoulders and arms ache and my fingers are wrinkly and prune-like. I've been hiding out in the upper half of the house all morning. It's silly to think that in staying away from Rivers, I can pretend I don't feel what I do. On a positive note, the upper level of the house is shining like it has never shone before. I've cleaned three bedrooms, an office, and now the bathroom, not to mention the hallway.
The stairs are difficult for Rivers to maneuver up and I feel sort of evil about being in the one place he can't reach me, but I need to be alone to think. I am used to my solitude and sometimes the urge to return to it is unavoidable. I am sure I'm over-thinking what the kiss meant to Rivers. It probably meant nothing. He probably just kissed me because I put my lips against his and I am a girl and he is a guy and that's all. I don't even think he likes me. But he didn't kiss me like he doesn't like me.
My heart twinges when I find a turkey sandwich waiting for me in the kitchen with a note that reads, I figured it was my turn to show off the culinary skills. - R
I eat half of the sandwich and carefully wrap the rest of it up and set it in the refrigerator. It was probably the best sandwich I ever ate, even better than my peanut butter, honey, and jelly ones. I turn in a circle, wondering what I should do now since my household chores are done for the day. I should have taken my time, but the restless energy I was carrying around made that an impossibility.
I spy Rivers' dark head in the grass beyond the deck. Curiosity, and something more, pulls me forth. He's sitting in the green foliage, his eyes lowered to his distorted legs. They are stiff and straight before him, unapologetic for their appearance—which is how Rivers needs to learn to be. He is what he is. He shouldn't feel bad about it.
“Thanks for the sandwich.”
He nods, flexing the fingers of his left hand.
I exhale, ignoring the overactive beating of my heart. “What are you doing?”
“Staring at my super-hot legs.”
Rolling my eyes, I say, “Don't you already have enough admirers without being one yourself?”
“Funny.”
“What are you thinking?” That's the real question I want answered. What does Rivers think about the kiss we exchanged last night? I am not sure I want to know, but I decided I couldn't hide out in the upstairs of his house indefinitely, so here I am.
“It shouldn't have happened.” His eyes are downcast as he fiddles with the hem of his yellow shirt.
A crack forms somewhere inside me. I pretend it isn't there, forcing a lightness to my tone I do not feel. “What shouldn't have?”
He glances up, a scowl on his face. “You know what I'm talking about. The kiss.”
I sit down in the grass beside him, partially turned away from him. “Are you sorry I kissed you?”
“Aren't you?”
“I instigated it, didn't I?”
“Yeah. About that. I don't get it. Why did you?” Our eyes meet, his dark and searching. I don't have time to answer before he says, “When you look at me, you have to be repulsed.”
“By what?” I ask.
He gestures to the scars that line his face and then to his legs.
“I don't even see them,” I say with all honesty.
His eyebrows lower and his eyes follow. I caught the blatant yearning in his gaze just before he hid it. He wants to believe me, but can't allow himself to.
My fingers curl into the palms of my hands to keep from reaching out to him. I blow out a noisy breath and look at a caterpillar ever so slowly creeping along the grass. I put my finger out and it carefully feels my skin before crawling over it, tickling my flesh as it goes.
I smile. “He's so slow, but you know what? He never gives up. He knows, one day, he'll be free,” I say in a low voice. “He's ugly to most, but to those that matter, he's beautiful. They know his potential. They know where he started and where he'll end, and how long it will take for him to get there. It's something to be admired, not tossed aside.”
“You're saying one day I'll be a butterfly,” he says skeptically.
I look up. “I'm saying you've always been one.”
Rivers stares at me for a long time, his eyes tracing the angles and curves of my face. “You say a lot of strange stuff, you know that?”
Nodding, I hide a smile. “I guess so.”
His tone is thoughtful when he tells me, “I like it. I like being around you.”
My pulse picks up. “Why?”
With a shrug, he states, “I don't feel so sorry for myself when you're around. I don't feel so ugly or worthless. I feel normal.”
“You are neither of those things.”
“Yeah.” His voice says he doesn't believe me.
I run a finger along the soft grass as I say, "I kind of like being around you too."
"Why?" he shoots back.
I tilt my head, my hair falling to the side as I ponder this. "Well, aside from the fact that you make me look good—oddly enough, I think I like your personality."
"Hmm. You think? I'm usually wanted for my body and not my mind."
"Given the circumstances, we all have to make exceptions."
His mouth twitches. "What circumstances?"
"Your hideous disfigurement," I tell him airily.
"Thanks," he says dryly, a faint smile on his mouth.
“Sure. I'm all about looking on the bright side. Want to go for a walk? We'll go slow,” I add when he hesitates.
His face darkens. “I hate that—that you even have to say that. I don't want you to have to go slow for me.”
I get to my feet. “So I won't.” I walk to the fence gate, opening it and going through. A tendril of elation webs through me and spreads when he follows.
The walk takes twice as long as it normally would for me, but I don't mind. Being with Rivers is all I really focus on. Each smile of his opens a wound inside me at the same time it heals it. When he brushes a lock of hair from my eyes, I try to swallow and have to repeat the motion three times before having success. I can tell the farther we walk that his legs are beginning to bother him. I wonder if each and every step he takes is painful to him or if his legs start to ache after a while. He doesn't say anything about stopping or going back, so I don't either. It isn't for me to decide when he's had enough. Rivers will make that decision.
“Your mom owns a flower shop, right?”
I nod, the mention of my mom causing a hint of longing within me. I blink at the realization that I miss her. I always thought I wanted to be on my own, out of the house where the past lingers in much too fine detail, but now that I've been away, I want to see her, to sleep in the bed I have always slept in, in the house I have always lived in, knowing my mom is but a short walk away. I feel homesick, something I never expected to be.
“What's the name of it? 'Flower Appeal'?”
“How do you know the name of my mom's flower shop?” I can't help smiling that he would know such a thing. It seems too trivial a detail for him to remember.
Rivers shrugs. “My mom's sent me over there before to get flowers. And I've been in there for myself too,” he adds.
“Really?” I wonder if his mother knows my mother. It's possible they've even had actual conversations, although I doubt they knew they were talking to one another. I can see Janet and Monica becoming friends. In fact, I hope one day soon I can arrange a meeting between them.
I also wonder if my mom talked to Rivers without knowing it. The thought of Rivers holding a discussion with my mom makes my cheeks heat up and I don't understand why. I think because it makes me think of a boyfriend talking his girlfriend's mom—totally not what I should be thinking about, not with him. I don't think anyone I ever dated met my mom, not that I had a lot of boyfriends. I never dated anyone for long and I never felt inclined to introduce them, because I never cared about them. Rivers, I already care too much for.
"Why does your mom allow Thomas to treat you the way he does?"
He squints at the sun, his body unconsciously tensing. "She can't exactly make him stop."
"But she could say something. She could...leave."
He shakes his head. "She did once. He cried and begged her to come back. She went back. I think they love each other, in some way. He isn't a bad person, he just...isn't the greatest either."
The wind is cool and the sun occasionally peeks out from behind gray and white swirled clouds. It's always windier in Prairie du Chien than it is in surrounding towns. I'm assuming it's because it is at a higher elevation plus the river is nearby, but I do not know that for a fact. I was book smart in school, but that is because I worked my butt off. My academic glory didn't come naturally to me. I had to work for it. Some people have brains that just seem to know stuff. Mine isn't one of them.
"Sometimes I think it's a jealousy thing. Like, I remind him of his cousin, the man my mom first loved, still loves, and would be with if he hadn't died, the man who is my real father. He's the replacement. Maybe he realizes it. In me he sees what he can never be." He shrugs.
"That's terrible to put that blame on you."
Half of his mouth quirks in a sardonic semblance of a smile. "Is blame ever logical?"
Traffic is heavy as we cross the highway, my feet unconsciously taking me to St. Feriole Island and the Mississippi river. I don't realize where we're at until Rivers mentions it.
“I don't want to go there.”
I blink, lost in the floral beauty around us. There are flower beds along the sidewalk, alive in the hues of red, yellow, pink, and orange. It makes me think of sunsets and fire. “Where?”
He nods toward the vastness of the moving waters farther down the path.
The Mississippi is still far off in the distance from where we stand, but I don't think that little tidbit matters too much to Rivers right now. “Okay. Where do you want to go?”
“Might as well see if the Villa Louis really is haunted.”
The silence is heavy between us as we make our way toward the historical building that was once a house and is now used for reminiscent tours of years long passed. In 1843, Hercules L. Dousman—a wealthy man well-known as a fur trader, lumberman, and land sculptor—built a Greek Revival style brick home directly on an Indian mound. Apparently he wasn't worried about cursed land.
He was the first millionaire in Wisconsin. After his death, his son, Louis, tore down the House on the Mound, as it was called, and built what currently is known as the Villa Louis estate; a large Victorian Italianate-styled structure. The building is now a museum, open for scheduled tours, and holds the title of being the first state-operated historic site. It's reputed to be haunted, but then, most old structures are. There is an ambivalence to them that is old and heavy with years gone by.
The building is a sprawling mansion of window upon window, pillars and multiple levels; surrounded by colorful flowers and greenery. As I look at it, I am struggling to aptly describe what I am seeing and feeling. Just standing near it fills me with nostalgia. It seems like I am trespassing upon history. It is eerie, almost surreal, like we have stepped into the past and are not exactly allowed. We walk along the outskirts of the lawn, neither of us anxious to get too close to the beautiful, untouchable house.
“Thomas was driving the boat.”
I keep my face forward and my pace even, waiting. What he is about to tell me is big, and I don't want to screw it up by talking and having him clam up in return.
He draws in a lungful of air before continuing. “It was the twenty-seventh of April, but we'd been having warmer weather and wanted to take advantage of it. Of course, on that day the weather was a little cooler, but the sun was shining, so we still went. It was Thomas and me and a friend of mine—Dustin Richter.”
Rivers seems to struggle for words, his lips pressing together. He finally looks at me, his expression sad and tormented. His voice is ragged as he says, “I don't know what happened. I got up to get a drink out of a cooler and I swear he chose that moment to jerk the wheel and aim us right at the waves. The river was already choppy and we hit hard. I lost my balance from him turning the wheel so sharply and when we hit the first wave, I fell into the water. I didn't even have time to react before I was already sucked under. And then...then I remember fighting to breathe...and the pain. I blacked out, woke up in the hospital. It was crazy. People were shouting and I didn't fully know what was going on. The pain was excruciating and I felt like I was in this fog...”
I suck in a sharp breath as I wonder how much he remembers about his arrival at the hospital, but Rivers doesn't notice, lost in the nightmare of the watery depths of the Mississippi River. He finally glances at me, silently gauging my reaction to his words. It takes me a moment to find my voice. “Are you saying you think he wanted you to fall out and get hurt?”
“No. I don't know. I don't know what I'm saying. I mean, I'm sure he didn't really think I'd fall into the water or that he intended for me to get hurt, but he at least wanted to scare me. I would even feel better about the whole thing if he would just admit he did something wrong, but he won't. He acts like it was my fault I ended up in the water, which makes me think he doesn't give a shit about me. I don't want to care, but...he's the closest thing I have to a father, even if he's a sucky one, so I guess I do anyway. I know how stupid that sounds.”
He pauses, reaching down to pick a dandelion. He twirls the stem between his fingers, releasing it to sway to the ground. “I've never told anyone else that—any of it.”
“Why are you telling me?”
He shrugs. “You're easy to talk to. You seem like you understand a lot.”
“Children love their parents, no matter how good or bad they are. They're forgiving, resilient, adaptable,” I tell him softly. “Children see the good in a being when others can't, maybe even when they shouldn't. Don't feel bad about wanting approval from him. That's natural. All children really want is to be loved, and most importantly, by their parents. What you can feel bad about is that he is losing the chance at loving you, and it's a shame he doesn't realize what he's missing.”
The unflinching way he studies me takes my breath away, but I cannot look away from him. I watch as his features transform from scowling to longing, certain aspects of his face darkening while others lighten. My heart hurts seeing that look on his face. Swallowing, he finally turns his face from mine, but not before I see a sheen of moisture over his eyes.
“You're killing me, Bana,” he says after a long pause.
That is completely the opposite of what I am doing, and we both know it. He's living again. Not because I made him, but because he chose to. Maybe I am the one that gave him a shove back into consciousness, but he is the only one that can decide how he is going to be. He is choosing to live in the light instead of sleeping in the dark. We all must return to the dark at some point—why go there before we have to?
I sweep the fallen dandelion up into my hand and swipe it across his face, leaving a yellow streak in its wake. Rivers blinks at me before narrowing his eyes and grabbing a handful of the weedy flowers, striding for me with his weapons of mass flowery.
I sprint away, laughing. “Come on, Young, show me what you got. Terrify me.”
“I don't need to terrify you. I'll just wait you out. You can run, but eventually you'll get tired. I'll be here, waiting,” he promises.
“I'm counting on it,” I taunt from under the reaching limbs of a Willow tree.
A stillness creeps over him as he watches me, and my eyes drink in all the dark, scarred beauty that is Rivers. The sun is at his back, creating a contrast between light, silhouettes, and shadows. He stands in a bed of grass, looking mythical or magical, and the placidity in him reaches out to me. It's strange how our movements coincide; he moves for me at the same time I move for him, and I know, when we reach one another, nothing will be the same again. I could stop. I could hesitate. I could walk away. But I don't. I meet him in a field of flowers and sunshine and we kiss, arms locked around each other, bodies pressed together like two missing puzzle pieces finally fitting as one for the first time.
I feel whole wrapped around him. I feel invincible. I feel unbreakable. I feel like I could never die, never fade away, never become nothing, as long as we are together. As long as he keeps holding me, I will stay.
His eyes drink me in when the kiss ends, studying me like he is only now seeing an exceptional quality in something he used to view as plain. “Have you ever felt like you were searching for something, only you didn't know what it was until you found it?”
I run my finger down the length of his damaged cheek, brushing short black bangs back to touch the marred flesh of his temple. “If you didn't know you were searching for something, how would you know when you find it?” A teasing smile takes over my mouth as our gazes collide.
“It's...” He swallows, briefly resting his forehead against mine. “I don't know how to explain it. It's a feeling of...fullness. Being centered. My heart, my head, every part of me, feels it. It's because of you, or maybe how I feel about you.”
"And how do you feel about me?" I ask, holding my breath as I wait for his answer.
He steps back as he tilts his head, studying me. "I'm not sure."
I snort. "Thanks. Way to brighten my day."
"I feel better when I'm with you," is his simple response, and it is perfect.
But I have to ask, “How can you feel anything for me? We haven't been talking that long." How can I already feel for him what I do? And what is it, exactly?
Rivers shrugs, looking toward the water. “When you know, you know. Does the amount of time really matter so much?”
A twinge of pain sweeps through me and I step away from him. “Yes,” I whisper. “And no.” Time is an interesting thing—it takes time to love, it takes time to heal, it even takes time to die.
The warmth of his hand as he takes mine into his and holds it washes away the ache. “Are you thinking about the past? About how I was in school? That wasn't really me. I mean, I guess it was, but it isn't me anymore. The accident...it changed me. Does that make sense?”
I nod. “Yes. It does. But I wasn't thinking of you, I was thinking of me. How I used to be, how I'll be in the future. We're all allowed to change. You don't have to feel bad about who you used to be. You never have to feel bad about which version of yourself you are at any given moment. All the parts that make you up are a blessing.”
“Do you really mean that?”
My voice is solemn as I say, “I do.”
He watches me. “I know what you're doing.”
Though my body goes still, my pulse races. “What do you mean?”
“I'm observant enough to realize you're slowly pulling me out of the depressing hell I was wallowing in. But I don't understand why. Why have you been so adamant about helping me? What do you get out of it? Why would you want to help me? I've never been particularly nice to you.”
“You're asking me this after we've kissed? Twice?”
He shrugs. “I'd like to know why you even gave me a chance in the first place.”
“Maybe I thought you were worth knowing.”
“You've already said you didn't like me. Why even try to reach someone you don't like?”
“You didn't like me either. Why open up to someone you don't like? Why be nice to me now when you never were in school?” I shouldn't have brought it up; no memories from the past are helpful to us now. But I guess since Rivers means something to me now, it hurts more than it did when we didn't interact. I know him now. I know him and that changes everything.
“It's funny...you say I was always mistakenly judging you, but weren't you doing the same? I was the jock, the prick, the guy who didn't care about anyone or anything but myself, right?”
I let out a deep sigh, knowing his words are true. I look down as I nod. “I was wrong.”
“You were, in a way. In another way, you were entirely correct.” He tips my chin up, forcing me to look at him. “Does any of it matter now?”
“No.” And it doesn't. Because I won't let it.
He smiles, the sweetness of it like a knife to all of my convictions over what I should and should not allow to happen. “Tell me...why did you want to help me?” His voice is soft, as is the kiss he presses to my brow.
I want to ask him what is happening between us. I want to ask what our kisses and touching—not to mention our sleeping arrangements—mean, but instead I answer his question. It seems the simpler option of the two.
“I don't like to see something usually so strong, broken. It's like watching someone fall and being unable to get to them in time. It hurts me to see others in pain. I want to fix them,” I whisper.
“You can't fix me.”
I look up and my eyes clash with his. “I know I can't fix you. I can't fix anyone, but maybe I can heal them somehow.”
He leans down and scoops up gravel, watching it fall between his long, calloused fingers. “You had a brother, right?”
I blink my eyes as a wave of pain goes through me. “Yes.”
He nods, his eyes still downcast. “I remember. He was a few years older than us. I was at the park that day.”
A tremble forms in my lower lip and I press my lips together, turning so that my back is to him. An image of a smiling face with golden eyes and unruly brown hair flashes through my mind, but I shove it back into the darkness. The blackness is always near, hovering beyond the brink of consciousness, but I am not able to face it yet, and I don't know if I ever will be able to.
“You must have hated me at first.”
I glance over my shoulder at him, but remain quiet.
“The first few weeks you worked for us. You must have hated me. Watching me act like my life was over just because my life was changed from that point on. You know more about loss than I ever have. I was such an asshole.”
“You lost your father,” I remind him, facing him.
“That's different. I didn't really know him. I miss that part of my life and my heritage I'll never know, but I can't miss a person I never met. I mean, I miss the idea of him, but not the actual man.”
My voice is soft as I say, “I think I would have missed you even if we'd never met.” I should have kept the thought to myself, but whether he likes it or not, it is true. Whatever I am feeling for him—it would have been a shame if I had never had the chance to feel it.
Rivers stares at me and I feel the heat of his eyes all the way into my chest, where it warms and spreads. He looks away as he mumbles, “You should have left me in the water.”
“You wouldn't have drowned.”
He cocks his head as he listens.
“There were two parts of you struggling. I watched them. Part of you wanted to give up and the other part of you didn't know how. You would have eventually come back up.”
“Then why'd you jump in after me?”
I shrug. “I think maybe you needed to know someone wouldn't let you drown, even if it wasn't really a possibility.”
A long moment passes before he speaks again.
"You're different from school."
"I'm different? Maybe you're different."
He pauses and then narrows his eyes. "Nice try. No. You're different. But then, yeah, I suppose I am too. You know those flowers that close at night and open again during the day? I don't know what they're called—"
"Morning glory," I murmur.
He squints his eyes at me, slowly repeating, "Morning glory."
"There are other kinds, but that is the first that comes to mind. They close at night to conserve their fragrance and during the day they open, producing fragrance to attract bees and other pollinators."
I can see I've lost him by the faint glazing over of his eyes.
"Are you saying I'm seducing you with my alluring scent?" I tease, a grin in place.
"I'm saying during school you were closed up to the point that no one could see what an amazing person you are, and now you've opened up like a morning glory, and you're...breathtaking." He clamps his lips together, looking like he thinks he has said too much.
If I could put a feeling into a physical embodiment of something, I would say that right now, what I feel is like a warm, light rainfall. The drink of cool water against a dry throat, or the gentle lapping of waves. Peaceful, calm, serene.
"You know what I see you as?"
Wariness creeps into his stance and expression. "What?"
I smile. "A moonflower. They close during the daytime light and open during the night. That's you—you shine in the dark."
He digests this, a small smile lifting his lips and entering his eyes to alter them from a dark brown to a warm chocolate. And there he is, the radiance that manages to hit me all the way into my core. I feel that smile.
“What's happening between us?” The directness of his question surprises me, but I like that he asked it. I like that he wonders—at least I am not the only one trying to figure out this unthinkable, yet totally workable association we have. His eyes are steady on mine, his face a mix of curiosity and confusion as he waits for me to respond.
“I don't know,” I tell him. I have not one clue what is going on with us, but I want to wrap myself around whatever it is so it can't escape.
Rivers reaches up and touches a lock of my hair, his fingers slowly sliding through the hair above my left ear, causing tingles to dance along the sensitive flesh of my skin. His other hand gently clasps my chin as he lowers his face to mine. “I don't know either, but I do know I like kissing you. A lot. And I know you do too,” he murmurs against my lips, his eyes black with emotion. I feel his mouth smile against mine, see the corners of his eyes crinkling up, and my stomach drops.
And he kisses me again.