Sheltered(13)

And all the while the cigarette burned away between his fingers, smoke curling from it in spirals and wisps. The smell of it trapped somewhere between tea and newly cut grass. Every part of her aware of how easily she’d start to smell like that, if neither of them were careful.

But then, Van was careful. He held the smoking tip as far away from her as he could physically get it, without dislocating something on his body. And oh it looked so odd, once she’d taken the spot next to him, on the step. Like those “Be Good” videos of boys and girls who’d somehow had to sleep together in the same bed, only the boy kept one leg on the floor the whole time so as to never accidentally put his penis in the girl’s vagina.

Or something like that. She didn’t quite remember and didn’t really want to with Van sitting next to her. Best not to think of anything that contained references to either penises or vaginas.

“Does it make you feel relaxed?” she asked, purely through want of something to say. But once she’d done it, she realized an explanation was in order. “You know, like a Xanax?”

She thought of her mother again, and that time she’d driven her car straight into the Ryersons’ trash cans because she’d “only sort of” fallen asleep at the wheel.

“No. Sometimes it goes in the other direction.”

“It makes you more tense?”

He shrugged, that big shoulder of his drawing her attention in an entirely unwanted sort of way.

“Sort of. If you smoke it too much.”

“You’re not having paranoid hallucinations are you?”

Hey—it was possible. She’d heard it on How Pot Killed Johnny in high school.

“Oh my God, how come your head just swelled to twice its normal size?”

She didn’t expect him to actually prove How Pot Killed Johnny right, however. Her pulse spiked. Stupid words came out of her before she could properly think them through.

“What? I don’t—”

“Evie—I’m teasing you. I’m just teasing.”

He hadn’t seemed the sort to do things like tease. But it looked okay on him—gentle, not cruel. His mouth almost turned up at the corners, which compensated for the embarrassed flush that went through her.

“Oh.”

“It just makes you feel…a little fuzzy around the edges. Pleasantly drunk.”

“I wouldn’t know. I’ve never tasted alcohol either.”

She had no clue why her mouth wanted her to feel even smaller than she already did. But apparently it just had to get out all shameful information at once. She’d never had a drink. Never so much as tasted a sherry at Christmastime.

But he didn’t seem to mind.

“Okay, so it’s sort of like…floating in a tub of warm marshmallows.”

“This is your sales pitch, right? Because that sounds awesome.”

He shook his head. Seemed to move even farther away without actually going anywhere at all.

“This is so not my sales pitch. I shouldn’t even be smoking this around you.”

She thought of the song. Thought of the word pitiable again.

“Why? Because I’m so fragile?”

But he answered whip-quick, without a hint of judgment.

“No, because your dad will smell it on you.”

There it was. Evidence. Evidence that he knew exactly what her deal was, and how things went down in the Bennett household. But surprisingly, it didn’t sting half as bad as she had thought it would. And once he’d finished saying the words he just went right on with something else, as though none of it really mattered.

“I’ll put it out.”

He went to do it—licked his fingers in a way that made her stomach bottom out, then came close to pinching the tip—but she had to stop him. Just the smell of it all around them, like burning tea leaves…the look of it, forming a haze around them…it made her limbs feel like liquid. It made her want to do something probably insane.

“Don’t. Wait.”

He turned his head, eyes suddenly sharp and narrow.

“For what?”

Obviously he knew. He knew what she was going to say, before the words came out.

“I want to try,” she said, so faint she suspected she hadn’t actually spoken at all.

But he caught it just the same.

“I don’t think so, Evie.”

“Are you forbidding me?”

His mouth tightened.

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

“I would never forbid you. I can’t forbid you. It’s not in my power to, and it never should be.”

Something inside her grew very light, suddenly. So light that she expected her head to detach from her body at any moment and float away into the night.