“You don’t say it because you don’t hate me. If you did, you never would’ve asked Brian to call me and talk to me. You did it because you don’t hate me. You just want me to think that you do so I’ll go away. And I did think that. I did and you never corrected me. You never told me the truth. Why didn’t you tell me the truth? Why do you want me to go away?”
His mouth twitches and curls and he takes such a long, deep breath that the wayward strands of hair around my face flutter.
“I don’t have time for your teenage hormones right now, okay? I need you to back off and leave me alone.”
“You know, you call me a teenager a lot,” I whisper, studying his features.
He cleaned up today for the camp, I realize. He trimmed his beard. It isn’t as savage and untamed anymore. It reminds me of the beard he had back in Connecticut, polished and civilized.
Although there’s no way after seeing him make repairs around the yard and living in this woody cabin that I can ever think him civilized.
He’s a man of nature to me. All big and flowing with strength.
“That’s what you are, aren’t you?”
“I am, yes.” I reach up with my hand, wanting to caress his jaw, touch that neatly trimmed beard but he stops me.
He grabs my wrist with his wet fingers, the only place he’s touched me so far, and squeezes. “Don’t be dumb enough to touch me right now.”
I didn’t expect anything less from him. I didn’t expect anything less than threats and a cruel grip.
“You saying it over and over won’t make me grow up any faster,” I tell him, ignoring his warning.
“And I care about that? You growing up faster.”
I nod, letting my hand, my entire body go limp and lax. Like clay. He can mold me and press and push into me as much as he wants. He can shape me however he wants.
I’m his.
“You do. Because if you didn’t, you would’ve kissed me back that night.”
I think I dropped a bomb on him or something.
Or at least, that’s what it feels like when he shudders and jerks back. He steps away from me and lets go of my wrist.
Then he snaps the shower curtain open and climbs out, reaching for his jeans and whipping them off the hook. In a flash, he has them on, covering his gorgeous nakedness.
“Brian told me everything.”
He pauses, going still.
I watch the planes of his back shift up and down with his breaths, as I say, “How he wanted to ask me out that night.”
“So you have your answer now, don’t you? I’d like you to go away because my son wants you.”
He’s not getting off that easily.
“But he doesn’t. He doesn’t want me anymore.”
At this, he turns around, his face a blank mask and his eyes arrogant and slitted. “So what? Am I supposed to pounce on you now? Because my son doesn’t want you and my path is clear.”
“No.”
“Good. Because I’m not going to.”
“You’re supposed to tell me the truth though.”
He folds his arms across his misty, wet chest. “Truth about what?”
“Would you have kissed me back that night if we hadn’t gotten interrupted and I was older?”
His response is to grit his teeth.
“Because see, I’ve been thinking about this too. That’s what I did today. I thought and analyzed. You know all these things about me. You know where I liked to sit in school while I wrote in my journal. You know my favorite things to eat. So that means you watched me, right? You knew who I was that night. The night I kissed you. But still, you pretended not to know me. You let me think that you hadn’t seen me before then. You kept saying go home. You wanted me to go away then too but you didn’t know about Brian’s crush.”
“And that’s supposed to mean something?”
“Yes. It means that you were ashamed of watching me, weren’t you?”
A growl escapes him then.
It’s very low, barely audible, and I wouldn’t have heard it if I wasn’t so attuned to every little detail about him in this moment. His breathing pattern. The tick-tock of the vein on the side of his neck. The flare of his nostrils.
“You were. You were ashamed maybe because I was too young and you were too old.” I swallow. “And I know this because I was too. Not because of those reasons. But because I was watching my best friend’s dad. In fact, I used to avoid you. I mean, I’d only go over to your house when you weren’t there and the rest of the time, I’d have Brian over to mine.”
I realized this much, much later in the day.
When Brian’s words really sunk in.