“Where’s my flashlight?” I say, looking around.
Wesley got me my own since I wouldn’t stop complaining about having to use the perpetually dirty, ugly, black-and-silver one that’s probably been around for decades. Mine is purple with a sparkly finish and I carved my name into the end of it so everyone knows who it belongs to.
He steps away and pulls open a toolbox drawer. “Right here.” He hands it to me and steps back on top of the upside-down bucket beside me.
I get a whiff of him, noticing the sweat on the ends of his hair, his neck glistening, his back and underarms wet. He’d definitely been at this for a little while.
“I’m trying to get this bolt off.” He grunts and hits it with a wrench. I adjust the path of the flashlight for him and hold itsteady. “Perfect,” he adds and tries again.
I watch as he holds his breath, his bicep tightening and the veins in his arms bulging. I catch myself staring for a second longer than I should and then look away. He exhales sharply and mutters a curse.
“Maybe you need to let me try,” I tease.
He laughs and takes a second to catch his breath again. “One more time and I might have to get Dad.” He turns his baseball cap around before hoisting himself up higher to try again.
“Come on, you—”
“Uh-uh!” I smack him on the butt, knowing a curse is the last word in that sentence.
He laughs. “I wasn’t gonna say it.”
“Yes, you were,” I argue. I know him way too well to believe that.
We haven’t been “just neighbors” in a very long time, basically, our whole lives; he is my best friend. He’s the only friend who never left me. I don’t have any girlfriends anymore. When we were still in school, I had a few, but we never got together outside those walls. I didn’t want to…everyone got into trouble on the weekends. Trouble that I didn’t want to be anywhere near. Therefore, the last time I saw anyone was graduation day. I haven’t heard from anybody either, and it doesn’t bother me. I don’t need a group of friends. I have my family, Wesley, his family, Blake and Sierra, and of course, Brantley.
“You’re right. It’s good you’re here to keep me in line.” Wesley’s tone is light and playful.
“And to hold the light,” I add.
He repeats, “And to hold the light.”
The bolt finally comes loose a minute or so later. “GoodLord, finally.” He huffs and climbs down.
I jump down as well. “Good job.”
His brown eyes smile back at me and he walks over to the workbench. I enjoy being here like this with him. It’s relaxed, there are no expectations, and it’s always fun. Just two friends hanging out with nothing better to do. Well,Idon’t have anything better to do. He’s actually doing important stuff, I’m just watching.
“Brantley texted you,” Wes informs me, wiping his hands on another shop rag.
I walk past him to the workbench where I left my phone and tap the screen to see what he said.
“I wish you would tell me what makes you so anxious to be around me. Your boyfriend.”
When I hadn’t answered, he followed it with,“I’m not mad, love you.”
My stomach knots slightly. I clear the message from my lock screen and flip it face down. My cheeks warm and my body stiffens at the fact that Wes saw it, but I don’t know why.
Wesley’s voice pulls me from my thoughts. “Trouble in paradise?” His eyes search mine.
I quickly look away. His gaze is too sharp, too knowing. Not where I should focus when I’m trying to keep my thoughts to myself. Although, there’s a comfort in it. He wouldn’t tell anyone, especially if I told him not to.
I start to the couch by the unlit woodstove. “I was supposed to go to his house after dinner,” I admit.
Wesley takes a couple of steps closer but stops a few feet away from me. “Oh. What made you change your mind?”
“Same thing that always does.” I sigh.
Wes has known about my anxiety since middle school. He knows how much it disrupts my life. The first few years of dealing with it, I didn’t even have a name for it. I thought I was just weird. That I had this embarrassing, overdramatic nervous system that no one else on this Earth seemed to have. It’s isolating and a huge reason I lack long-lasting friendships. My anxiety kept me home, out of the party scenes. Had I not struggled with it, I can’t say for sure what my life would look like. It’s impossible to even imagine my life without it. It’s all I know.
