“What’s weird? This?”
He sucked his lower lip back and forth and stared down at the dog without seeing him. I waited patiently for his answer. I knew not to prod too much or he’d clam up for a long time.
I sighed and put my hand out, palm up, feeling for the rain. Cold, heavy drops fell onto it, ricocheting off. Fat Rabbit stared up at me like I was holding a treat.
Dex suddenly reached out and grabbed my hand, holding it there. He pushed back the sleeve of my leather jacket and peered at the purple Silly Bandz bracelet that he had given me as a makeshift birthday present.
“You’re still wearing this,” he said, his voice sounding softly amazed.
I let him hold my wrist, my hand quickly growing wet. His grip was gentle and hot against my cold skin.
“It’s my anchor,” I lowered my voice, feeling just a bit embarrassed. He raised his eyes to mine and I blushed on command, my cheeks filling with hot blood. He let his hand slide down until it was holding mine, our fingers intertwined. The hairs on my neck stood up like cactus needles. This was not good. It felt good. It felt really, sticky good. But that didn’t make it right.
I took my hand away and quickly averted my eyes to the wet grass. A totally awkward pause filled the gap between us.
“This is what I mean by weird,” he said. “I actually wanted you to stay in a motel; I was going to pay for it and everything. But Jenn insisted that you stay with us and I knew she would get suspicious if I didn’t agree.”
I didn’t want to say it, but I had to. “Why didn’t you want me to stay with you?” I tried not to sound hurt.
He burst into a wry grin. “Oh come on, kiddo. I know how awkward this is for you. It’s just as awkward for me. And I know it’s awkward for Jenn too. Not that she suspects anything. And not that there is anything to suspect, but you know.”
“Why is this awkward?”
He paused, almost doing a comic double take, then saw how serious my expression was. I wanted to hear it from him. I wanted to see if he had the balls to talk about it instead of sweeping what happened underneath a rug.
He stepped closer to me. I lifted the umbrella up so that both of our heads were underneath the wide canopy. His face reflected blue in the shade, his hood creating deep shadows on his face. I felt my breath slipping away, pausing in my throat, waiting for what was going to happen next.
“I want you to stay with me,” he said. “And that’s the problem. Every time you leave me, I need you a little bit more.”
I didn’t know what to say to that or what to think. My heart might have melted just a bit, solidifying around that pin. I just wanted to kiss him. To touch him. To feel him. But it couldn’t happen. I wouldn’t let that happen. I had to be strong.
“See, it’s weird,” he said with a sigh and looked away. “I shouldn’t be saying these things to you.”
“No,” I mumbled, trying to focus on Fat Rabbit, who had gotten bored of us and was now sniffing at the wet grass. “You shouldn’t.”
“I’m going to try and put what happened on the island past us.”
“What happened?” I repeated absently.
“Yeah. What happened. With us. That whole trip just seemed like…a dream, didn’t it?”
I nodded. It had. Like a terrible yet enthralling dream, or a flashback to a drug trip.
“It was a dream,” I said, still avoiding his eyes. “And a mistake.”
I didn’t really believe that. At least, I never thought it was a mistake. Not until this moment when I realized how weird it had made things between us. The elephant in the room.
“You think it was a mistake?” he asked. The subtle vulnerability in his voice drew my eyes to him. He was still so close to me, the steam from our collective breaths meeting in the small space between us. He was staring at me in all seriousness. No easy leer, no sarcastic smirk, no horndog grin. It was just him, stripped of any defenses for a few rare seconds.
“Don’t you think it was wrong?” I challenged quietly, not wanting to raise my voice in our sheltered enclave.
His head twitched in a small side-to-side movement. No. He continued to watch me, sincere yet unreadable.
Do you regularly cheat on your girlfriend?, I wanted to ask. Do you normally harbor desires to go down on your partner? How is it not a mistake to you? Look at us!
But I didn’t say any of that. Instead, I said in my breeziest voice, “I agree, anyway. We need to put it past us. What’s done is done. That island was a whole lot of cray cray. And for what it’s worth, I’m sorry I punched you.”
Finally the smirk returned to his wide mouth. “And I’m sorry for being a…what was it? Shithead? Fuckface? There’s been so many words to describe me lately that I can’t keep track.”
“They are all applicable,” I said with a smile.
He playfully punched me in the shoulder. It was awkward. Then he stepped away from me and out into the rain and looked down at the dog. “Well, Fat Rabbit.”
The dog looked up at him. Poor Jenn. He was never going to be a Harvey.
We turned around and headed back the way we came, both silent, both lost in our own heads for most of the walk back.
His phone beeped and he fished it out of his pocket. Probably Jenn, checking up on him, I thought.
“What are you doing on Wednesday?” he asked me, peering at the screen.
“Me? I don’t know. You tell me.”
“Rebecca just texted. She wants to take you out for lunch.”
I raised my brows at him. “What? Why?”
He shook his head at me, wincing a little, his eyes becoming squinty. “Because she wants to get to know you better. She wants to be your friend, kiddo.”
Huh. I actually thought Rebecca didn’t like me.
“I wish you could see what I see,” he added with some weight to his tone.
“What do you mean?”
He stopped abruptly and crossed his arms. Fat Rabbit honked uncomfortably, pulled back at the collar. “I wish you could see what I see in you. What others see in you.”
I opened my mouth to protest but he just raised his hand to pause me and said, “And I know you’re trying. You’re a lot different from the girl I bumped into in the lighthouse. It’s just frustrating to me.”
“Well, I am trying,” I admitted. “You know, that whole ‘Anonymous’ thing-”