“You good?” Cooper asks. He has a calm, soothing voice. He speaks softly, but you can hear everything he says. You wonder what he sounds like when he sings. You know he’s a good violin player: He’s third-chair second violin. You’re third-chair cello yourself, but that’s not nearly as impressive given there are only six cellos to begin with.
Sometimes you nod at each other as you play. Between orchestra and RC you might actually be approaching a solid B-tier friendship, but you’re not sure. It’s not the same as hanging out with Nour, where you can talk about anything and nothing and just come away happy and laughing. Everything with Cooper feels complicated, and you don’t even know why.
You pull up your collar to wipe away the sweat beading your upper lip. You shaved again this morning, and it’s sensitive.
“I’m good.”
Cooper nods and passes you another box to tape shut. He’s sweating, too, but while you can feel your deodorant starting to fail and have started keeping your elbows at your sides to trap any sweat in your armpits, Cooper smells… nice.
You can’t help breathing in, flaring your nostrils, whenever he gets close enough to pass you another box of peanut butter and green beans and instant rice.
He smells like Maman’s baking, sugar and almonds and fresh-ground cardamom, vanilla and toast and something else you can’t identify.
“You smell good,” you blurt out.
You wish you could take it back, grasp the words as they fly from your mouth and stuff them back in, knock them out of the sky, but your jabs aren’tthatfast.
Guys don’t compliment each other on how they smell.
“No—” you begin to say, but Cooper’s face breaks into the brightest smile you’ve ever seen.
“Thanks, man,” he says. “It’s my fall fragrance. It’s not cloying, is it?”
You don’t even know whatcloyingmeans, but if it’s something bad, then no, it’s not cloying. If more people smelled as nice as Cooper, maybe the world would have less problems.
The packing tape screeches across the top of the box as you secure it. When you turn to pass it to Nour to stack, she’s staring at you.
“What?”
“Nothing.” She shakes her head and takes the box.
“Seriously, what?” Oh God, can she smell you? You clamp your arms down again.
You put on extra deodorant after conditioning, but that just means your sweaty stink is mixed withsea breeze, whatever that is.
“Don’t worry about it,” she says. “Just thinking.”
Your face is already flushed with exertion, so at least she can’t see you blush from embarrassment. Neither can Cooper, who catches your eye and gives another smile.
All told, you and the rest of RC pack 212 boxes—enough to fill the big white creep van that pulls up to the main doors.
You and Cooper end up in the back of the van, stacking the boxes, and in here his smell is concentrated, even sweeter, and he’s breathing hard, and as he hoists another stack of boxes his shirt gets caught and rides up, exposing his smooth brown stomach. It’s soft, and tight, with a few wisps of black hair, and he smells nice, andGod no, you feel that pressure in your boxers, that weird hook behind your waist, that fluttering in your chest.
You keep your back turned to him, think about your algebra homework, think about the cello part in Smetana’sMá Vlastthat you need to rehearse when you get home, think about the scorpion burpees Coach Nico had you doing this morning and what hemight have in store for you tonight. You tug your shirt down over your waistband, wishing you had never decided to go down a size to show off your gains, and hope the creep van is dark enough to hide your awkwardness.
It’s just the exertion, and the fact that Jina was banging on the bathroom door this morning so you had to make your shower super quick, and Baba told you abouthormonesand how it’s normal to feel weird feelings, so honestly, you don’t have to worry about anything.
It’s not because of how Cooper smells, obviously.
“You good?” he asks again.
“Yeah.” You push your sweaty hair off your forehead, then remember you’re trying to keep your arms down in case you smell. “How many more?”
You’ve been good all month. You’ve stuck to your food plan, hit your macros, said no to desserts and yes to vegetables and lean protein and brown rice instead of white.
But today, when Cooper says, “Let’s see if there are any cookies left,” you follow him and think you might actually eat one, because you love lovelovepeanut butter cookies, especially if they’ve got that flaky salt on top.
Nour walks beside you, and she still looks put together, even though she worked just as hard as you. Her winged eyeliner is still in place, and her lipstick is still immaculate. The only sign she’s been working hard is a small black smudge on the hem of her sweatshirt that she’s trying to rub out with her thumb.
