Delaney.
I didn’t need anyone to tell me who she was to him. Not after seeing the way his face lights up when he sees her walking towards him. She gives him a little finger wave, smiling back.
“This is gonna suck,” I hear Brett mutter. I don’t remember moving so close to the screen door.
I don’t respond, even though I wholeheartedly agree.
The door slams shut behind me like it always does as I step out on the porch with a platter in hand and what I hope is a smooth expression on my face. Sheila piled it high with watermelon, cookies, and chips and shooed me out the door. I was just about to pull out all the canned goods and reorganize the cupboard alphabetically, too. Then, maybe, I was going to mop the floors with a dishcloth on my hands and knees or dust the walls or something. Literally anything but do this.
But here I am.Joy.
I pause just outside the door and hate that my treacherous eyes immediately find him.Them.
She’s prettier than I remember; sunglasses perched on her head like a headband. She’s got that cool-girl confidence, the kind that makes other people want to lean in to hear her every word.
Bowen is leaned in, alright. He’s sitting next to her on the bench of the picnic table, their shoulders touching, and something just between them written all over their smiles.
Gag.Kill me now.
He looks up and catches me watching before I can get my body to turn around to step right back inside. Bowen stands up, smile dimming and changing before my eyes. The smirk I know well is fully in place when hewalks over and takes the food from my hands. He balances it on one palm, then…
Thenhe reaches up and brushes my bangs out of my face with two fingers, slow and familiar like he’s done it a million times before. Because he has.
“Hey,” he says, so warm, not knowing he’s setting fire to my entire existence with the way he looks at me. “I thought you were going to hide from me all day. You okay?”
I nod. Or maybe I shake my head. I don’t know. It must be a nod, though, because then he tilts his chin in the direction of his guest.
“This is Delaney.”
“Kit, right? I’ve seen you around school. Bowen’s told me about you,” she says, voice pretty, like her. “I think my friend had a crush on you last semester.”
My head tilts to the side. “Your friend?”
She nods with a laugh. “Yeah, thought you were cute. You never really came around though.”
I stare at her for a beat too long. Then shrug, trying to come off as cool as she effortlessly does. “Is your friend a guy?”
Brett chokes on a chip.
Delaney blinks.
Bowen huffs a laugh, tickling my cheek with it and sending a shiver down my spine. He gives my shoulder a squeeze before he moves back to the table and snags the sunscreen after setting down the food.
That’s it. As if it doesn’t actually matter, and that’s the way it should be. But after years of internal preparation, my psyche is prepped for the worst and on the brink of fight or flight again.
“No,” Delaney says, a little too quickly, cutting into my mental freak out. Then adds, “it's cool.”
It doesn’t feel cool. It feelsawful, actually. Yesterday's shit show in the lake is far too fresh. My feelings are too close to the surface. I feel silly for my reaction and raw from the truth that’s out there now, whether I wanted it to be or not. Not to mention, now I’m sure every interaction with me and herboyfriendwill be under a microscope. The way I stare too long. Blush too often. The way he—
“Kitten.” Bowen’s voice is low beside me. I squint one eye from the sun to look up at him.
“Boe.”
He holds up the sunscreen bottle. “You’re already burning. Turn your head.”
“It’s fine.”
“It’s not.”
