I don’t know the answer.Somewhere, deep in my subconscious, I’ve been wondering that myself.
“It could be,” I say.“But I don’t fucking care.”
She kisses me, long and slow, pulls back again.
“That means yes,” she says.
Kiss.
“Stupid’s not the same as wrong,” I murmur.
Kiss.
“I know it’s notwrong,” she says.“That wasn’t the question.”
Kiss.
“I have a question, then,” I say.“Your place or mine?”
Her back muscles stiffen below my hand, instantly, but I don’t take the hint.
“I vote your place,” I murmur.“I’ve got three roommates.”
I kiss her again, and she kisses me back but it’s almost like she’s not present any more, and I pull away.
Clementine is already shaking her head.
“I have to get up early tomorrow morning,” she says.
I know an excuse when I hear one, and I just stay silent.We look at each other for a long, long moment.She finally swallows and looks away.
“And I don’t want to sleep with you,” she says, her voice just above a whisper.
I almost sayyes, you do, I fucking know you dobut I know better.
“No?”I say.
She flicks me anare you kidding meglance, but it doesn’t stick.
“No,” she says.“Not?—”
Clementine takes a deep breath and pushes her hand through her hair, tucking it behind her ear.
“Not tonight,” she says, her voice softer.“Blank slate or not, I can’t just pretend this is all brand new.”
I don’t want to pretend that, I think.Not exactly.
I nod, trying to ignore my hard-on.
“I get it,” I say.
She finally looks at me again.
“Sorry,” she says, softly.“You want a ride back to your bunkhouse?”
Slowly,as we drive back to town, things get back to normal between us.Or, the normal of the past two days.If we even have a normal.
Clementine tells me about Trout the dog, how she got her name when they found her in a burlap sack next to a trout pond.She was probably the runt of her litter, probably part husky, part golden retriever, plus a hodgepodge of other dogs that Clementine can’t identify.
