He drags the boat out into the slow-moving river, his arms flexing from the effort, then reaches out a hand to me.
I know we shouldn’t touch—the closeness is dangerous, and I fear I won’t want to let go—but I allow my fingers to fold into his, and he helps me into the boat, one hand grazing my lower ribs, my spine, his touch making it hard to breathe as his eyes drag over me.
But once I’m seated on the wooden bench, he releases his hold on me, then shoves the boat the rest of the way into the river, swings himself easily over the side, and takes up the oars in his hands. I draw in a deep breath, reciting all the warnings I’ve told myself over the years, yet they don’t seem to stick. I lose myself in the steady rhythmof Oak’s arms as they pull the oars through the crystal-clear water, a motion he knows by heart, guiding the boat down the center of the river.
“Do you come out here a lot?” I ask, trying to distract my thoughts, my hands pressed to the wooden bench beneath me, my heart feeling light and windless as we move away from his house, following the lazy current of the river.
He draws in the warm forest air, the low light through the trees dappling his face. “Every morning, before sunrise.”
I like the image of this: him waking when the light is still pale and soft, rowing up the river and back, sweat at his temples, his torso and shoulders strengthened a little more each time from the effort.
I lean against the side of the boat and trail my fingertips along the surface of the water, feeling lost in a dream that is pulling me farther and farther downstream—but I love this dream too much to force myself to wake. I love this impossible day, with him, the river widening around us, carving a path through the green forest, the evening sunlight peeking through the trees, the shore grassy and quiet, not a stirring of wind. I could drift for hours like this, watching him row with each practiced stroke, an easy smile finding his eyes whenever I look at him.
It feels like something I’m not allowed to have. This moment was stolen from a different life, a different girl. Yet I am greedy and selfish and will keep it for as long as I can.
A school of tiny silver fish whip past, slipping beneath the boat, then hurrying off downstream. “My mom used to say that if you eat a fish’s eye, you’ll be able to see underwater,” I say.
Oak’s eyebrows come together.
“I never tried it, obviously.” My gaze falls back to the river. “She was like that, always making up stories and riddles, her own kind of folklore. When I was younger, I loved it. But now…” I shake my head. “I realize that most of them were just lies.”
“Maybe her lies were just a way to make sense of the world.”
I look up at him, but his face is unreadable.
“Maybe.” But I think about the lie she told the morning she left, the lie that was hidden in her silence. Her refusal to tell us the truth—that she was running away and never coming back. “She was a mystery, even to me.”
Oak stares at me, like he understands what I mean.
I lift my hand from the river, waterdrops clinging to my fingertips, and I release an uncomfortable laugh.
“What?” he asks.
I shake my head, keeping my eyes on the shoreline as it drifts by.
“I just…” I swallow. “I can’t believe that some part of you isn’t afraid. Terrified, even.”
He drives the oars into the water, steering the boat through a series of rocks jutting out from the shore. “Of what?”
“Of being this close to me. A Goode.”
He smirks, and I like the way his green eyes crinkle at the corners. The way his mouth forms when he has a thought, a secret idea he’s deciding whether or not to share. “I won’t fall in love with you…,” he says decisively, like he’s already made up his mind, but there is a shiver in his eyes, a tug at the edge of his mouth. “If that’s what you’re thinking.”
“No?” I ask, raising an eyebrow.
“I’m not like everyone else in this town.”
And this is precisely what ties my mind into knots. What I don’t understand.Why is he not like everyone else? Why does he seem unaffected by the tulips? By me?I try to recenter my thoughts, but his eyes are too crushing, his mouth too perfect—my sketch of him doesn’t even come close.
“The real question is,” he continues, upper lip pulled into a merciless smile that makes my chest want to cave in, “can you keep yourself from falling in love with me?”
I want to laugh, a nervous twitch nearly breaking across my lips—I know he’s making a joke, but I feel a pressure against my ribs, the truth of his words, and I don’t know if I’m strong enough. I don’t know if I can keep myself from crashing into something I won’t be able to save myself from. Because when he looks at me like he does right now, I know it’s possible. I know I could let my heart unravel and never look back.
And I know each moment I spend with him only makes it worse.
I know it might already be too late.
The river narrows, and we fall into a teetering silence, easy and untroubled. His arms flex, rowing harder, keeping the boat from plunging into the soft shoreline. The water heaves around us, splashing over the side, dampening my bare legs, but then it calms, flattens out again, and I tilt my eyes up to the halcyon blue sky, trees swinging by overhead. No moment in time, no river through the trees, has any right to be this perfect, this chest-swayingly beautiful.
