I stay leaning against the cliff, the phone pressed to my ear, long after the call ends. The screen goes dark. My hand aches from clenching it so tightly. I feel the pressure building behind my eyes, and the swell of nausea in my stomach.
I look back to our camp, then notice in the distance a figure—in black from head to toe—emerging from the water.
In spite of my guilt, I’m still drawn to him, and push off from the rocks.
The waves might be crashing, but the sun is bright, and the air is still.
Carey will make it back before I do, and as I set out, I put in the effort to make each of my steps slow.
Each crunch of my boots into the pebbles is a different side of the argument over what I want, and what I’ll allow myself to have.
It feels like I’ve walked forever before I raise my head again.
Carey is standing by the fire wrapped up like a burrito. There’s a towel around his waist and one of the blankets from the van is draped over his shoulders being held together by a clump of it gripped between his teeth. His hair is wet and stiff, like a wild sunburst, and when I’m close enough for us to make clear eye contact, he releases the blanket and smiles at me.
His arms are crossed over his chest with his hands snug between the opposite underarms.
The towel is so low I can see the strip of pale skin that never tanned from all those years in the sun.
He shivers a little, but he tries to hide it by shuffling closer to the fire.
His wetsuit, cap, and socks are draped over the chair beside him, drying so they don’t freeze.
I keep the barrier of the firepit between us and sit in the same chair I was in last night. I stare at the flames, refusing to let my eyes linger further on the bare, golden skin of his stomach just three feet away from me.
Like my saviour, he’s the first to speak. “Did I wake you?”
I shake my head.
“Where did you go?"
“Just needed a walk.”
I tried to stay strong but I can't take it anymore.
I want to see the morning sun on his face.
My eyes raise, lingering long enough on his belly piercing that I know he notices, before finally reaching his gorgeous eyes.
He takes hold of the blanket, wrapping it around his mid section in a way that covers his stomach but bears his shoulders, and—my god—they look impossibly strong.
He grins wide, but it’s not cocky. “Did you bring me back anything?”
“Just an existential crisis.”
He snorts, and it’s cute, and I know he knows exactly what I’m talking about. Because everything the pair of us is doing is code. We're tip-toeing around the truth, flashing skin and admitting our desires without ever muttering the exact words.
Carey crouches down to poke at the fire. When he puts another large log on it the blanket and towel flare wide enough for me to see his inner thighs.
He glances up and catches me staring, but doesn't say anything about it because the silence between us is different out here.
He stands and walks to the van, returning less than a minute later with the camping kettle full of water and sits it in the ashes on the red glowing stones. He then lays all the pieces of his wetsuit down on the rocks where they will still be warm, carries the chair around to my side of the firepit, and sits so close to me that our legs are only an inch apart.
"Aren't you cold?"
"I'll go wash up in a minute when the water's boiled… Unless." He pauses. "You're that desperate for me to put some clothes on."
I shake my head and look away from him. "I don't care."
