“I guess,” I say, reaching for the bottle of Prosecco. “But I didn’t even fight it.”
“What do you mean?”
I take a slug of wine, right from the bottle. I’m ashamed of all of it, but this is the part that gnaws at me. “After he left, I just shut down. I went to my mom’s and went to bed for, like, a week. I didn’t even call the cops.” Kei’s eyebrows shoot up. “I know, I’m an idiot. But I couldn’t say it all out loud. And I couldn’t handle it if they confirmed that it had, in fact, been all my fault.”
He shakes his head. “I’m sorry that happened to you,” he says. “It sounds really hard. But it’s definitely not your fault. You need to forgive yourself.”
I swallow back the lump forming in my throat.
Kei stares out across the lake. “Cleo,” he says, cautiously. “Do you want me to kill him? Like murder, first degree?”
An unexpected bubble of laughter bursts out of me, and I’m filled with a sense of lightness. I’m buoyant with the relief of absolution. Even if I don’t fully believe it, it’s something I can latch on to.
I jump up. “Let’s go for a swim.” And then, remembering the cold, dark water, and our lack of bathing suits, I immediately sit back down. “Never mind, that’s a stupid idea.”
But Kei’s eyes are wide with delight. “I was kidding,” I clarify.
“No, let’s do it!”
“But it’s so cold.”
“We’ll warm up by the fire.”
“We don’t have our bathing suits.”
“Do we need them?”
“Whatever, perv,” I say, hoping that’s the end of it.
“You cover your eyes while I go in, and then I’ll cover my eyes while you go in—nothing pervy about it.”
I shake my head. “It’s a hard no for me.”
He gives me a look, like he’s waiting for me to capitulate, but when Idon’t, he just shrugs. “Okay, no pressure. But I’m going in.” He stands, pulling off his pyjama top. I try not to look at his chest. “But no peeking at my butt, okay?”
I laugh and cover my eyes. A moment later, he’s whooping as he runs toward the lake. I spread my fingers just the tiniest crack, and just as I suspected, his ass is perfection.
I hear a splash and look up. Kei surfaces, the white of his teeth glowing in the moonlight.
“This feels amazing!” he calls. “Come in!”
“I’m good,” I call back, waving. He dives under again, his legs sticking straight up and then slipping straight down. He reappears about fifteen feet from where he started. He laughs. His profile is lit by the moon, and I can see his huge grin.
“Oh, fuck it,” I mutter to myself. I wait for him to dive under again before pulling off Harmony’s beautiful lingerie. I drape it carefully over a log, covering myself with my arms as I dash into the water.
I yelp as the cold shocks my feet and legs. I dive in, feeling freer than I ever have. The rush of moving water in my ears is comforting and the cold is invigorating. I resurface to find Kei swimming toward me.
“Yes!” he’s yelling. “You did it!”
“It feels so good!”
“I told you! And look at the stars!”
I look up. The night sky is freckled. There’s barely a patch of sky that isn’t illuminated. My dad once told me the light we see from stars is actually ancient, thousands of years old, but the stars are so far away it takes that long for the light to reach the Earth.
Like it’s been there all along, but it just takes a while to see it.
“Hey,” I call to Kei. Maybe it’s the darkness or the nudity or the privacy, but I’m suddenly feeling bold. “So, you’re not in love with Alessandra?”
