“I don’t want to see you with him.”
“I know you’ve been off the market,” I say dryly. “But that’s not exactly how a man talks when all he wants to do is to fuck.”
“What do you want me to say? That I don’t feel anything for you? You know that’s a lie. Whatever was between us when we were young never got the chance to become…more. But it’s still there, and it could never be nothing.”
The words resonate with truth, and all I can do is agree. I felt it at the funeral. I felt it as soon as I saw him again. God knows I felt it when he kissed me.
“You don’t have to worry. I was gonna let Barry down easy when he calls.”
“Good,” he says, satisfaction in his narrowed eyes. “Do that.”
I look down at my hands. “I don’t want Barry.”
“Do you want me?”
It’s a bold question. Everything about this conversation is bold, unabashed, bare.
“Yes.” I shake my head before he can pounce on my admission. “But I’m not sure this is the best thing right now for either of us.”
“Let me decide what’s best for me.”
“You’re just getting out of a long-term relationship. I’m starting a new campaign.” Fingers crossed.
Not to mention all I’m going through with my health. I won’t mention it, but it’s yet another reason why I don’t want emotional attachments right now. And he’s right. Between Ezra and me, it could never not be emotional.
I scoot to the edge of the trampoline, still inside the net, but with my legs hanging over the side. I’m poised to leave but can’t make myself go. He tenses and doesn’t speak.
”The attraction between us…” I scrub my hands over my face. “Well, I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t strong.”
He angles a look at me that is at once heated and sly. “You must admit we both kiss a lot better than we did at thirteen.”
I lean into him and drop my head to his shoulder like I did so often when we were growing up. ”Oh, I don’t know. For a first kiss, I thought it was pretty perfect.”
He links our fingers together on his leg. “It was. I had high hopes for us after that kiss.”
“What did you hope?” I ask, my voice soft, hesitant, a careful tread.
“I hoped it was just the beginning. I hoped that I’d come back from camp for high school and we’d be…” He turns his head to look at me, and the intensity, the tenderness there is familiar because it’s always been there. I’ve seen it a million times and never fully knew what it was. How could I have then? “I hoped we’d be together.”
I don’t know what to say. It was a long time ago and we were so young, but I wanted him then as much as my fledgling heart knew how to want someone.
“Look, I don’t want to lose you again.” His fingers tightening around mine underscore his words. “If you decide you can’t…don’t want to…I want you in my life, Tru, even if it’s only as a friend. Just don’t leave me again.”
I’m not sure what to say to that, so I glance down at our linked hands and find a distraction sketched into his skin. “You have a tattoo.”
He turns his wrist over so I can see the Hebrew characters better.
????? ?????
“What is it?”
“Tikkum Olam. Basically, ‘repair the world.’ I started thinking about this concept when I had to do my Bar Mitzvah project. I went through that for Bubbe, but it actually did shape a lot about me as a man. I started YLA because I saw it as my contribution to make the world, at least one part of it, better.”
“I’m really proud of you, Ez. I knew you would be amazing, but what you’ve done for those kids, for those families? It’s life-changing.”
“You’re proud of me? I was in the airport waiting for a flight, and you came on one of those televisions in the gate waiting area, commentating for MSNBC or something. Some candidate. I almost missed my flight. They were shutting the doors, but I couldn’t move. It was my first time seeing you grown up. I was transfixed. I knew you’d be beautiful, but…” He shakes his head wonderingly. “And you were so fluent. So confident. Not a stutter in sight.”
“That took years to get rid of. And it comes back if I get really nervous. I still hate public speaking. I always made Lennix do that stuff as much as possible.”