I’ll keep staring till you turn around
Each time that I’m down, you lift me back up
Each time that I lie, you say that’s enough
It hurts to be near you and also too far
The wounds you inflict will all turn to scars
No piece of you I’d ever exchange
Nothing about you that doesn’t remain
Some people are only meant to be friends
I love you too much not to pretend
We’re moments that glimmer and touches that linger
Heartbreak for you and heartbreak for me
We’re a one-way ticket toward heartbreak for two
And because of you, my favorite month is June
I swallow. Blink. Feel like I’m sweating and shivering and skydiving, all at once. “You write songs?”
“Yeah.”
My eyes linger onthat stupid hat you love so much.I run my thumb along the rim of my Yankees cap. It was a gift from my dad, who grew up in Brooklyn. I hardly take it off.“You write songs aboutme?”
In answer, she stands and pulls her shirt off. It’s probably the only thing that could distract me from this piece of paper right now. From memorizing every single word she wrote about me—about us.
She’s wearing a black bralette under her T-shirt. There’s a band of lace that runs around the bottom. Hints of her pale skin peek out through the small openings in the pattern. I focus on those tiny glimpses because looking at the elegant slope of her bare shoulders or the swell of her breasts or the flat plane of her stomach feels like what I imagine eating a fudge sundae after depriving yourself of sugar for decades would.
Rich.
Decadent.
Dangerous.
“Wha—”
I don’t even manage to get one damn word out before Sutton starts shimmying out of the jean shorts she’s wearing. They slip down her long legs in a descent that seems to take hours.
Sutton Everett is suddenly standing in front of me in her underwear. All I can see is black lace and smooth skin and blonde curls.
And just like that, I’m hard.
“You coming?” She turns and scrambles down the side of the boulder, navigating the rough surface of the rock with ease.
I watch her hit the sand and run into the lake, laughing as she splashes and slips on the murky bottom.
I stand. All the movement in the water stops.
She’s watching.
I take my time dragging my shirt up and off. I’m not bulky, and I haven’t played a sport since middle school. But I handle most of the restocking and deliveries at Dave’s Grocery—not to mention, helping out on her grandfather’s farm. My arms and shoulders are muscular, and so is my abdomen. But I’m still self-conscious, especially when I lower my shorts, so I’m left in just my boxers. I’m not sure how much she can see from a distance in the moonlight, but if she is able to see anything, she’s basically seeing everything.