“Everyone.” His mouth touched the inside of my knee. “That’s why I went into the military. I didn’t know what I wanted to do, but I knew I didn’t want to go to college and join the family business like my brother had done, and my dad had before him. It’s what everyone expected. It’s what everyone’s always done. Joined one of the familybusinesses.”
Were there more? But instead I asked, “But you don’twantto?”
One of Aaron’s hands wrapped around my bare calf. “No. Not really.” There was a pause. “I don’t knowanymore,Ru.”
“Then don’t,” I told him as easily as he always told me I could do everything and anything. “Or do. This is going to sound really cliché, but it’s the truth: you can do whatever you want. Anything. You’ll figure it out. Just because you didn’t want to go to college years ago doesn’t mean you can’t in the future. You can stay in the military if you want. You can do anything. As long as you’re happy, you can never be a failure. You don’t have to make a ton of money to be successful, you know. Look at me, I’d rather be poor and stressed out than have a steady job that I hate.” I hesitated. “Maybe I’m not the best example. All I’m saying is, do whatever you want to do. That’s what you’re always preaching to me,isn’tit?”
He made a chuffing sound against my leg as he stroked it from the calf down to the ankle and back up. Aaron didn’t say anything for a while, his gaze stayed forward onthefire.
With the hand not on his chest, I touched his soft blond hair and leaned in closer to his ear. “I don’t know what to do with my life either, you know. But someone I know told me not to give up on my dreams. You know I’ll help you figure it out in any way I can, just like I know you’ll help me any way you can. Ruron,remember?”
That had him tilting his face to the side, peering at me over his shoulder thoughtfully. Before I could react, before I could even think, he pressed his mouth against mine. Lip to lip, just a press, then a peck on the corner before he smiled softly and nodded almost hesitantly like he believed what I said but was still a littleunsure.
And that was okay. Because I wasn’t going to quit telling him what he needed to hear.Notever.
Neither one of us talked much as we ate smores roasted over the fire, and hours later, once the fire had finally died down enough for us to smother it completely, we trudged back to the house. My head had been full of all kinds of things I wanted to think about and all kinds of things I didn’t want to thinkabout.
But there was one thing I couldn’t stop thinkingabout.
And that one particular thought stuck with me as we went back to the house and I detoured to shower because I smelled like smoke. With that same thought still in my head as I got dressed, I told myself that I only got to live this life once.Justonce.
And somewhere deep down inside of me, I was the brave twenty-one-year-old who had done something I couldn’t ever imagine redoing. Except this time, it was with someone that every part of me was convinced loved me back. Loved me back and wouldn’t be afraid to hide it, if there was anythingtohide.
But therewasn’t.
There wasn’t, but if there had been, Aaron would never make me his dirtysecret.
Never.
So when I saw the sliver of light coming in from beneath the doorway of his room, the door slightly cracked, I shook off the tingling coming from my fingertips and told myself that I was a different person than I’d been even just a fewdaysago.
I pushed the door open a little more, nerves buzzing along my skin trying to convince me that I was scared. I ignored them as much as Icould.
If I was going to be brave for anyone, it should beAaron.
“Yoohoo?” I tried to ask, but it came out like awhisper.
He was kneeling in front of the bed, his suitcase wide open as he rummaged through it, but the moment I spoke, he stopped what he was doing and glanced over, smiling easily. “Youokay?”
“Yes,” I said, pushing the door open wider. “Can Icomein?”
“You don’t have to ask, Rubes,” he said in a chiding tone. “Like I’d ever tell you I don’t want toseeyou.”
How did he do this to me? How? Swallowing the knot in my throat, I finally opened the door wide and stepped inside, closing and locking the door behind me. Aaron’s eyes stayed on my face the entire time, obviously aware that I’d just gotten out of the shower from how wet my hair was, up in a knot at the top of my head. I smiled at him as I walked over to his bed, sitting on the edge of the corner closesttohim.
“Good shower?” he asked, getting to his feet with a clean shirt and boxersinhand.
I nodded, trying my best to ignore the butterflies in my stomach going crazy at what the hell I was goingtosay.
Something must have been apparent on my face because Aaron made a goofy expression. “What’swrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” Icroakedout.
He raised aneyebrow.
“Nothing iswrong.”
His eyebrow still didn’t goanywhere.
