Authors: Jolene Perry
He hands me the paddle and pulls the boat to the edge of the water. He drops the picnic basket in the middle and points to the bow. “Well, hop in.”
I slide off my shoes and stow them next to the picnic basket. Then I hop in the front of the canoe and look back at him. He’s staring at me so hard that my pulse speeds up. “Are you okay?”
“Yep. Just admiring the view.”
Okay, then. I am s
o screwed.
I open my mouth to volley back, but I’ve got nothing. Literally. My throat is dry and I can’t think of one thing to say. He chuckles and pushes the canoe off the shore, hopping into the stern at the last second.
We paddle to the center of the lake and he points out a family of loons. Then we get in a discussion about the impact of motorized boats on the ecosystem of the lake. And for a second, it’s good and we’re like we’ve always been. And I think maybe all of the subtext of this past summer will fade away. He steers us toward a small island and helps me out of the canoe. The way his fingers skim my hips makes my breath catch. He lets his hands linger too long and by the time he’s setting the basket on the ground, I’m so warm and flustered I can’t speak.
“Why are you doing this?” I whisper.
He looks right into my eyes
,
and I can’t tear my gaze away. “Because you’re worth it.”
Three steps. It takes three steps for him to get to me. To stand in front of me
raw
with every emotion on his face. My breath
comes
in shallow gasps and my brain is too crowded with all the wanting.
He releases a shaky breath of his own and cups my face in his rough hands. “Can I?”
I bite my lip and nod. Then his mouth is covering mine and I open for him and suck on his tongue
,
and he tastes like all the deliciousness of summer in one incredibly sexy package.
He lifts me and my legs wrap around him. I’m whimpering because it’s not enough. His mouth isn’t enough. It’s been too long with too much ache
,
and now I want all of him. He lowers me down and presses himself on top of me. And just when I finally feel his hardness and arch up into him, he drags his mouth away and looks at me.
“Kay-Kay,” he says in between breaths. “Are you sure this is what you want?”
I nod. “Are you?”
“God yes. From the moment I saw you this summer. I can’t stay away. You’ve got me. For whatever you want.
For however long.
I’m yours.”
I tug his head down and slide my hands up the back of his shirt. “I want all of it,” I whisper before kissing him, deep and hard with all the things I’ve been feeling for the past seven weeks.
Then everything in my brain fades as we become a tangle of arms and legs and clothes and sweat and all the questions seem to have the same answer: yes, yes, yes.
I can’t stop touching my face on the ride home. It’s covered in razor burn. Only the biggest fool wouldn’t know what I’ve been up to. Alex keeps staring at me like I’m some sort of
endangered
animal
,
and I finally turn to him.
“What?”
“Why do you want me?”
“What?”
“Why did you choose me at the beginning of the summer? There’s lots of counselors at the boys’ camp. You’re gorgeous. You could probably have your pick.”
My face breaks into a huge grin. “You think I’m gorgeous?”
“I’ve told you
so
from the beginning.”
“Yeah, but it’s still nice to hear after you’ve seen all of me.” I can’t hide my blush so I look at my hands in my lap.
He chuckles. “Yeah. I’d say you’re even more gorgeous now.”
“Thanks.”
“So. Why did you pick me?”
“I like you. I’ve always liked you. We’re kind of alike, you know? I get you more than I get those other guys. They’re all just stupid and wanna get wasted and hook up. They don’t care about anything.”
“You’re nineteen going on forty, Kay-Kay.”
I nod. “Yep. I always have been. That’s why I got so tired of hearing all your crap about how young I am. That stuff has never mattered to me.”
He gets quiet for too long
,
and I nudge his shoulder. “It matt
ers to other people though,
”
he finally says.
I shrug. “Not my problem.”
He frowns and doesn’t say anything else until we get back to the camp road. “So what do you see happening between us now?”
“Well, it wouldn’t suck to do
that
again.”
“Ha. True. So is this just that then? We’ve got three weeks of camp left so it’s just going to be fun. Is that what you want?”
I know what I want, but I’m not about to put myself out there like that again. Not when I’m not sure how he’ll respond. Not when there are so many what ifs between us.
“Can’t we just play it by ear?”
He stops the car half way down the camp road. He leans over and kisses me. Soft and warm and wet and yummy. “Okay. We’ll play it by ear.”
Then he drives the rest of the way to the parking lot
,
and I make the slow climb up the hill back to my cabin. My skin is tingling and I feel like I’m glowing in the dark. My feet move at a snail’s pace because I’m not ready to get back to my cabin yet. The rush of the day is coursing through me
,
and I want it to last a few minutes more before the reality of camp life settles in again.
I take another step and hear a noise by the bathrooms. I peer into the darkness and feel hands grab me. I almost squeak, but I know these hands.
I’ve known them all day.
The
y
pull me into the darkness against a tree.
“Alex,” I whisper as he trails his mouth in lingering kisses along my neck. “Someone might see.”
“Yeah,” he says, then lifts me for a hungry mouth kiss before setting me down and stepping back. “It’s probably a good thing I won’t be here next year.”
He drops another kiss on my cheek and starts to whistle as he makes his way toward his tiny cabin.
I slip beneath my sheets and can’t help my brain from latching on to the last thing he said.
I won’t be here next year
. My gut cramps and I have to take several deep breaths before I can think clearly again. I have three weeks. Three weeks to make a guy old enough to be my dad fall in love with me. How hard can that be?
We can’t stop touching each other. It’s bordering on obnoxious and if anyone was looking really careful, we’d totally be called out on it. Alex helps me adjust the archery target, which really involves his hand on my ass as I struggle to inch it two feet to the side. I help him put away the windsurfing boards which is really me sliding my hands up his muscular back while he hoists boards over his head. I m
ay have also licked him. Twice.
I can’t wait until my next night off and when it finally comes, I race to his cabin without even talking to Jo or
Sam
about my plans. My shirt is off and I’m on top of him when a hard knock sounds on his door.
“You in for the night?”
Sam
yells.
I choke back a laugh at the look of horror on Alex’s face. “Yep. Talk to you tomorrow.”
“Use protection. Some of his sperm might still be viable,” she calls out and barks out a laugh as she clomps away.
“Your friends know about us?”
I raise my eyebrows. “Not that hard to figure out. They’re not stupid.”
He shakes his head. “This is going to bite you in the ass later. Irene’s gonna find out
,
and there’s no way she’ll hire you back next year.”
I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from blurting out that I have no intention of returning to camp if he isn’t. Instead, I say, “Well, you won’t be here so it won’t be a problem.”
He fingers the edge of my cut-offs and pulls me down on top of him. “Unless you attack the next poor, unsuspecting windsurfing instructor.”
“Nah. This is kind of a one-time deal. Plus, who’s to say he’d want me? It took everything I had to win you over.”
Alex chuckles. “He’d want you. It took everything I had not to fall.”
I lick my lips and he follows the movement. Yeah. I’m not the only one screwed in this deal. “But you did fall, didn’t you?”
He lifts me up and searches my face for the question behind the question. We both know it’s there. He opens and shuts his mouth, then shakes his head. He knows what I need to hear and still he won’t give it to me. Instead, he flips me over and kisses me until I can’t think about the missing words between us anymore.
Jo,
Sam
and I are sitting on the waterskiing dock, watching the sunset. It’s a free evening as most of the campers are watching a movie in the rec hall. The loons are calling to each other across the lake
,
and the quiet peacefulness sinks into me and dampens my restlessness.
“Only about two more weeks,” Jo says. “Do you know what you’re gonna do?”
I shrug. “Go back to college.”
“And him?”
“He’ll go back to teaching.” The hole inside quivers at the notion of time apart, but I’m not an idiot. I want to finish college. He has a job. The reality of nineteen and forty isn’t lost on me.
“And then?”
I bite my lip. “Can I ask him to wait?” I eye
Sam
who is strangely quiet tonight.
She turns to me.
“Is that what you want? I mean
,
do you really think this is the real deal? I get that you’re an old soul, but really, you’re pretty young to
be planting your flag right now.
”
Sam
dangles her bare feet into the water and kicks up a splash.
“Where do you see yourself in five years?” I ask her.
She raises a shoulder. “Don’t know. I couldn’t plan where I’ll be next year. Too much is changing. Too much has changed over the past year.”
“You see, for me, I
do
know. I mean not exactly, but I know I’ll be teaching
in five years
. I know I’ll be working with kids somehow. I know I’ll figure out a way to spend summers on a lake. And I know I’ll be with him. Or
at least
I hope I will be.”
Jo inhales a quick breath. “Really? You’re that sure?”
It’s a weighted question.
I know all the shit she’s been through with Jeff and the new guy is hitting her hard right now, but again, she won’t talk unless she really needs to, and she rarely thinks she needs to.
“Yeah. I mean nothing is set in stone. But it makes sense. He makes sense to me. Like for the first time, I feel like I found someone who’s a right fit.”
Sam
shakes her head. “You won’t be able to talk him into it. No matter how he feels or how sure you are. He’ll think he’s taking something away from you.”
I nibble on my bottom lip. This is the problem, of course. He will think that. And part of it will be a little true. It’s hard to find your great love when you’re only nineteen. It’s stupid and romantic and bullshit really. Except that it’s not. And the idea that I won’t be with him in five years makes something inside of me whither.
“Any ideas?” I ask.
Jo shakes her head and looks to
Sam
who says, “Hey. I got you in the guy’s bed. All the rest of that stuff is
so
not my area. Not that getting a guy into bed is my area.” She trips and stumbles over her words as her face reddens, making me even more curious what’s going on with her.
The three of us spend the next twenty minutes in relative silence. We listen to the loons and the voices of people passing in their boats, but mostly, we’re each in our own heads. I’ve gotten used to that with us. It’s become a friendship of time and comfort. We all seem to know when it’s best just to let the universe unfold as it will.
We head back up to the cabins and Alex stops me in his golf cart half way up the hill.
“Hop in. I want to show you something.”
I grin. “I love it when you talk dirty.”
He blushes and smiles in this adorable little boy way. “Knock it off and get in.”
I slide next to him and this time I press too close. If anyone saw us, they’d be asking all sorts of questions, but at this point, I don’t care. I’m t-minus fifteen days and need all the help I can get. Alex rests his hand on my thigh as he drives us towa
r
d the fire pit. He parks the golf cart and pulls me close.
“You have to be quiet,” he says as he kisses the tip of my nose. “We don’t want to scare them off.”
I follow behind him and he walks us to the edge of the lake on the south side of camp. He drops to his stomach and I mirror his action. Then he shimmies closer to the edge and peers over. I slide in next to him and hold my breath.