I run my thumb over the bruise again, and for a moment, we’re quiet again as the darkness deepens in the cabin.
“You broke my heart back then,” she finally says.“And yesterday, I’d just spent two days watching my parents call each other names, so when I saw you and Mandy, all I could think was that you were going to do it again.”
She sighs, leans her head back against the glass, and closes her eyes.
“I mean, what kind of dumbass goes back for asecondhelping of that?”she says.
“And this whole time, I thought you broke mine,” I say, running my thumb gently over the ridge of her kneecap.
“God, we fucked up,” she says.“It’s almost impressive howmuchwe fucked that up.”
“We were teenagers,” I say.“If dealing with new Marine recruits taught me one thing, it was that eighteen-year-olds are kind of dumb.”
“Yeah, but I was twenty-six yesterday,” she says.“Apparently I haven’t changed all that much.”
She opens her eyes and looks at me sideways, the corners just barely crinkling.
“Didn’t youjustshout that at me in the bathroom?”I ask, half-teasing, even though it feels dangerous.
“Look, I alreadysaidI was sorry about that,” she says, but she’s laughing.“Don’t make me say it again, once was bad enough.”
“So you’re also still bad at apologizing.”
“And you still needle me until I’m about ready to kill you,” she teases.
We look at each other in the dark, her eyes deep pools, her face dark blue and white.The sliver of the moon is somewhere overhead, and it’s casting white light on the forests around us.
You’re still so beautiful it aches, I think.I still want to kiss you more than I’ve ever wanted anything.
ChapterFifteen
Clementine
We both goquiet again for a moment.Hunter’s thumb runs along my knee, barely a whisper against my skin.I don’t think he even knows he’s doing it, because it has that familiar, habitual, time-worn rhythm to it.
It still feels the same, I’m thinking.Like it did when we were good, before all this shit went down.
I want to kiss him again.Well, I want more than that,waymore, but I feel like an asshole.First, I tell him I need a couple days of time, then I decide to go for it,thenI change my mind, cry in a bathroom, and yell at him.
I realize that heading to Hunter’s as soon as I got back from two days of dealing with my parents’ divorce probably wasn’t a great call.Learning that someone you’ve known your whole life, who you’vetrustedyour whole life, cheated on your other parent and has been doing her best to act like everything is his fault?It doesn’t really put one in a very good place for dealing rationally with relationships.
It’s still an excuse, though.A pretty good one, but an excuse.
And, for fuck’s sake, he followed me up a mountain.I can do better.
I take a deep breath, because I’m about to act like a grown-ass woman.
“I actually came over yesterday, you know, before I freaked out, to say I think we should...”
I swallow.
Have sex, and see what happens then, but definitely have sex,I think.
“...give this a shot,” I finish lamely, my face bright red.
I’m so nervous it feels like there’s ropes tied around my stomach, because Ihatesaying stuff like this out loud.Admitting I have feelings?And especially that I have squishy, mushy ones?Ew.
Hunter’s running one finger under my leggings where I pushed them over my knee, and that alone is making my body dothings.
