“Your face is on my foot!”
“Just—” I sigh and sit up, nearly hitting my head on the tarp roof. “Okay. Lie down like this, along this wall, and I’ll lie next to the other one.”
But with only one weather blanket between us and the temperature rapidly dropping, I find myself closer to Dean than I would have liked. We’re packed like sardines, stiff on our back, with our hands folded on top of our stomachs to avoid grazing each other. This is too intimate for comfort. A thought occurs to me then.
“You don’t have a girlfriend, do you?” I blurt.
There’s silence in the dark tent. Then, “Are you calling me a virgin, or is that a genuine question?”
“I’m asking for real, dickweed. What if your girlfriend isn’t comfortable with you sharing a bed with someone else?” I start sitting up. “Maybe we should—”
Dean fumbles in the pitch-black and grabs my shoulder, pushing me back down. “First off, the pine needles digging into my back hardly qualify as a bed. Second off, it’sfine,just lie down.”
“I don’t want to be rude—”
“Seyoon?” Dean says, voice strained. “I don’t have a girlfriend. Or a boyfriend. Or anybody who would throw a fit about me sleeping under the same tarp as you. Satisfied?”
I relax. “Okay. Just checking.”
“Why? Do you have a boyfriend or something?”
Emmanuel Wiley, the captain of the boy’s swim team, and I dated for three and a half months last year, but that was more because we could carpool to the aquatic center together than kismet. And there was that one awkward double date that Amelia begged me to go on with her. But besides that, no.
I roll over and give Dean a shit-eating grin even though I know he can’t see. “Wouldn’tyoulike to know, lover boy.”
“Oh God, shut up. There’s my answer.”
Dean shuffles around. But I can’t go to sleep. The ground is hard and cold, and I’m not used to sleeping with someone. Next to someone. I can’t even see the night sky with the tarp blocking the view.
“I wish we could stargaze right now,” I say, just to say something. “I love stargazing.”
“Just picture a black sky with little specks in your mind.”
I twiddle my thumb and let the silence sit for almost a full minute before more word vomit spews up. “I think we’re in good shape, points-wise. We foraged more than anyone, and besides us, only Carter was able to get a fire going.”
“Yeah.” Dean hums. “Still can’t believe I made a fire.”
“I knew you could.”
A pause. “Did you really?”
“Yeah. You’re smart. And you had an excellent, knowledgeable teacher.”
“Watching you really did help,” Dean says quietly. “Thank you for still wanting to team up with me after I was an asshole.”
The tent feels, somehow, even smaller. “I’m an asshole, too, sometimes.”
“Well, yes.”
“Hey.”
Dean snickers, and I relax. “We make a better team than I thought we would.”
“Couple of assholes.”
“That could be our team name. Would be better than Seydean.”
I kick his calf, and Dean curses. Enough time passes that I think he’s fallen asleep, but then he asks an unexpected question.
