“Ah, yeah. It kinda scares the shit out of me.”
Oh god. Me too. “Scares you how?”
“It freaks me out that I think about being with you a lot and we hardly know each other.” He releases a long breath. “And because I’ve never felt anything close to this before.”
“What about your other girlfriends?” I want to know how many. Has he loved someone before? Will he laugh at my inexperience?
“The few girls I dated at school weren’t really special, just . . . I don’t know, there, I guess. God, that must sound shitty.”
“No, I get it.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” All my crushes before were just for fun. Now I find myself running to Alec after fighting with Mom, needing him.
He brushes my lip with the calloused tips of his fingers. I’ve come to love the roughness there. “I’d make things at your house better if I could.”
“And I’d help you go to culinary school if I could.”
“That might be the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”
“Really? That’s sad.”
He narrows his gaze. “Why sad?”
“Because you should have people saying nice things to you all the time.”
“I think I do now. I have you.”
“You do.” I lean in and we kiss slowly. Until we don’t. Alec rolls me onto the bed, his hips meeting mine. His knee spreads my legs, makes our bodies fit. His hands move along my stomach, up my shirt. Alec’s fingers cup my flesh as he lets a heavy breath escape. I steal back, out of reach.
Alec pulls away. “You okay?”
I sit up, dazed. “Yeah, fine. I just . . . I don’t know. . . .”
“I don’t ever want to push you, Zephyr. Is this”—he moves one finger under the lip of my shirt, paints across my stomach with the slightest brush—“okay?”
I suck in an ocean of air. I want this, even if I’m afraid of what this is. But then a voice inside me tells me I’ve been afraid for too long. And being with Alec doesn’t make me feel vulnerable or scared. Being here makes me feel alive in a way I didn’t know was possible.
I pull him to me and he moves against my skin. Everywhere. My fingers grab, my body trembles. I give over to the sensation of finding my body under his hands, closing my eyes to what feels like floating, flying, dreaming.
“Yes,” I tell him. The word is mist, our breath pooling into vapor.
• • •
When I return home it’s late, but Mom’s not home. I grab a bottled water from the fridge and climb into bed. When I close my eyes again, Alec is with me. I smell him on my hair, my skin. I know it’s him when my phone rings.
“Favorite book,” he asks.
“To Kill a Mockingbird. Because guilt and innocence are in all the wrong places. Favorite poem?”
“There once was a man from Nantucket—”
“Stop!” My hushed laughter explodes.
“Yours?”
“Leaves of Grass, because I’d love to feel large and contain multitudes. Favorite movie adaptation of a book?”
“Princess Bride.”
“Mine too!”
“You’re breaking the rules of the game.”
“Right,” I say. “What’s your one reason?”
“The stable boy’s got serious game. You?”
“Duh. Because it’s a kissing book, Fred Savage.”
We both laugh until I hear the metallic grind of the garage door opening. I don’t want Mom to know I’m awake. “I gotta go,” I tell Alec.
“As you wish.”
I turn off my light and pretend I’m asleep, cowardly avoiding Mom. But it’s Lizzie who wakes me the next morning, plopping down onto my bed and yanking the covers down. “Wakey, wakey, Sleeping Beauty. I need pancakes and you’re coming with.”
“When did you get here?”
“Two minutes ago. Let myself in.”
“What time is it?” I scrape crust from my eyes.
“Almost eleven. The Blueberry Muffin’s gonna stop serving breakfast soon and I needs me some carbs.”
I slip from my covers and pull on jeans and a top.
“You didn’t call yesterday. I’ve been worried about you,” Lizzie tells me.
I corral my curls into a ponytail. “Ugh. I had a shitty fight with Olivia. It was a whole thing.”
“About your dad?”
“What else? It’s all beyond bizarre. Can we just not talk about it and get something to eat? I’m starved.”
“We can and we shall.” Lizzie ushers me out of my bedroom and I’m glad Mom’s not in the kitchen waiting to ambush me. I notice all the ailing plants are cleared from the sill and it strikes me that Dad might have taken them, though gardening has never been his thing. Over the summer, Mom let all her heirloom houseplants wilt slowly, turning kaleidoscope shades of yellows and browns as they battled against her erratic watering.