by Lola West
“Darn it!” Joe squealed, handing the picnic basket to Drew who was already carrying a blanket. “I totally forgot something!”
“What?” I asked, grateful for the distraction.
He shook his head. “Nope. It’s a surprise. A good one.” He turned and began to head back the way we came. Over his shoulder, he called, “Go on ahead, I’ll meet you there.”
Oh perfect, now me and my incessant Drew thoughts were alone with Drew. Dammit, Joe.
43
Drew
“This is beautiful,” I said, looking out over the shifting and sparkling glassy moss waves of the lake on the thrive property. It was the first thing either of us said since Joe turned around. We walked the entire hike to the lake in total silence. Lua seemed distracted and I didn’t want to push. Also, I was happy to spend time with her, even though being near her had my body twisted in knots. All my base instincts were firing their alarms. Like the blaring awooga in a submarine, my lips were screaming, kiss her, kiss her, kiss her. And when I wouldn’t listen to them, they enlisted my hands who shouted, touch her, touch her, touch her. (Honestly, I was too civilized to even acknowledge the suggestions filtering up from my dick.) Not talking during our hike had allowed me to maintain an exterior calm. I intended on letting her utter the first words between us, but standing on the pebbly shore, I spoke without thinking.
“I’d call it cute or sweet, I think. Or maybe adorable,” she said.
I turned to her. She was standing behind me, bent over with her lush ass on full display as she spread out the blanket on a portion of ground that she had cleared of sticks and rocks. Jesus, how was I going to get through this afternoon?
“I’m sorry, you’d call the lake cute?” I asked.
She stood up and moved to the other side of the blanket to adjust a crumpled corner. “Yes. It’s actually a pretty small lake, by lake standards, a baby lake, and I find beautiful to be a loaded word when referencing babies. Cute or adorable works better for me.”
She was adorable. I liked that she was just having a conversation with me, especially one of this nature, a Lua conversation, one that smacked of semantics but was interesting all the same. “It may be a small lake…” I paused. “Is it a small lake, Lua? Can we really say that? I mean, I get that lakes come in sizes and I am sure that you know the facts on lake sizing but…”
She interrupted me, “It’s small. Lake Superior is the largest lake in the world and it’s thirty-one thousand seven hundred square miles. Unless you count the Caspian Sea as a lake, some people do. And it’s one hundred forty-three thousand square miles. To be honest, I don’t count the Caspian Sea as a lake. I mean, Sea is in the name of the thing for goddess’ sake.”
“Got it. Caspian Sea is not a lake.” I smiled. I kept my laughs tucked in tight. I loved this about Lua, that she knew so very much and had an opinion on everything. I was also starting to get the inkling that she was nervous being alone with me. She hadn’t made eye contact really and she was talking a bunch.
“There are some ecologists who wouldn’t even call this a lake. They’d call it a pond.”
“How big is this lake?” I emphasized the L in lake, making it clear that this was not a pond for me.
“About thirty acres, less than a square mile.”
I looked out over the water again. “Seems plenty big to me.”
“Agreed, it is more lake than pond, although arguably these terms are not truly well defined. I mean some ecologists believe anything under ninety-nine acres is a pond and others are willing to call any standing water in an inland basin a lake. If that’s your take, a rain puddle could be called a lake, but obviously that’s ridiculous.”
I couldn’t help myself, I laughed. She looked up at me and I sterned my face. “Obviously.”
She blushed for the second time today and then sat down on the blanket she’d laid out. “Anyway, I just think our lake is adorable.”
I took a deep breath. I was going to disagree with her, and I was a little scared. I was so ready for Lua to let me back into her life, but I didn’t just want to follow her around like a puppy. I still wanted to be us. Drew and Lua, opposites who loved to argue and learn from each other. So even if this was an inane topic of her making, I had to tell her what I really thought, not placate her. In the end, Lua wouldn’t want to be placated.
While I spoke, I moved in her direction and then sat down next to her on the blanket. “Okay, now that I’ve had a lesson in lake sizing, I have to disagree with your use of the words adorable and cute. First, we often call babies beautiful.” She started to protest, but I shushed her. “Just a minute, Argumentative Ann, I’m not finished. And yes, I hear you that for girls, beautiful is a loaded word to use when complimenting a child because we often compliment little boys for their brains and little girls for their beauty, although I’m not sure babies are the same as children. I’ve heard babies of all genders get called beautiful but that’s clearly antidotal. Sooo…… Secondly, and more to the point, yes, in the grand scheme of things this lake is small, but in comparison to us, it is quite large, so it is complicated to define as a baby because its relationship to our size is dwarfing.”
“Dwarfing?” She smirked at me.
“Yes, we are in awe of it. The expanse of the thing makes us feel small and introspective.”
“So, your point is that the lake affects us like large scale art?”
“Yes.”
“And therefore?”
“And therefore, even if it is a baby lake, we cannot understand it as cute because it is not endearing or sweet. It’s awe-inspiring and dramatic. Majestic even.”
Seeming to consider my ideas, Lua opened the picnic basket and started to take out the food.
I couldn’t help myself, I belabored my point. “Cute is demeaning, diminishing in this context.”
She pulled out an apple and bit into it immediately. I watched her chew and swallow. I could see her mind churning, her brown eyes twinkling because she loved the thrill of the argument. God, I just wanted to kiss her. I could picture it in my mind as if it were happening. Leaning over, the rush of making contact with her skin, cradling her face in my hands, the warm slip of my tongue against hers. I literally ached to take those full lips in mine, to trap her under my body (consensually of course), and grind her into that blanket for hours. We didn’t even have to take our clothes off yet. I just wanted to feel her again. Shit.
“How about striking?”
“What?” I shook free from my lascivious thoughts.
“Striking, what if we called the lake striking. Would that work for you?”
I nodded. “That seems fair.” More than fair. I had clearly won that argument, but I wasn’t going to rub it in.
Argument complete, we grew quiet. Lua fiddled with the stuff in the picnic basket, silently offering me things: hummus, veggies, something that looked like fruit salad.
“Should we wait for Joe?” I asked.
She shrugged, then sighed. “Maybe. I’m not so sure. I mean, there is an awful lot of food here but…” Her tone was both frustrated and shaky like she was admitting something. “I think we may have been abandoned.”
“What do you mean?” I laughed.
“Well, honestly, unless he’s carrying a piano back, he should have been here by now.”
I smiled and then flirted. “Soooo… you are the surprise. Well done, Joe.” I was one hundred percent done attempting to hide that I was and always would be interested in her. I’d scream it from the rooftops if she’d let me.
She snapped her head in my direction and then closed her eyes and shook her head. “You are both incorrigible.”
“That’s why you love us.” It popped out. Over the last few minutes, I’d grown comfortable around her, arguing about the lake parameters, and it was just something I would have said to anyone in the context of the conversation. I didn’t consider it at all, but as soon as the sounds left my lips, I wanted them back. I heard the little huff of air she r
eleased in response and it was controlled, but there was shock there too. I closed my eyes, trying to find the right thing to say next. I knew the words were cocky and assuming, and I was terrified to look her in the eye.
I sighed and stood up, racing with the adrenaline of screwing up the calm that had started to stretch between us. I still didn’t look at her when I said, “God, I’m sorry. That was just perfunctory. You know?” I was pacing back and forth in the gray pebbles, tapping them with the toes of my sneakers. “Like I just said it in the rhythm of conversation. I don’t actually assume that you love me, Lua. I don’t assume anyone loves me.”
Fuck. That last bit also slipped out. I wanted to be light now, have fun with her, not spiral off into some wacked-out Drew is a freaking mess conversation. I pushed my hands through my hair and then manned up and looked at her.
She was smiling, and her chest was bouncing with squelched giggles. She shook her head. “Holy moly cannoli,” she said. “Someone is wound a little tight.” Still smiling, she took another giant bite of her apple.
My jaw dropped. I felt it. I wasn’t shocked that my words didn’t offend her. She had a tendency to surprise me from the moment we met. I often misinterpreted how she would react to things. What shocked me was the look in her eyes, the kindness. I wasn’t the enemy anymore. Lua had finally forgiven me, like for real.
In awe of her ability to be open, I picked up my jawbone and smiled back. She laughed, a warm sound that flooded my chest, healing all sorts of darkness that I’d been carrying there for months. Then, a little dumbstruck, I just sort of stared at her. God, she was so beautiful, like the glow of the campfire she sparkled with the power to burn me but also to warm me anytime I was feeling cold.
I loved her. No matter what. And I could wait, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to push her. I wanted her to remember that I wasn’t trying to be her friend. There would never be just friends for Lua and me again. I was always wanting to be her lover and I needed to know if that was on the table for us. Her forgiveness emboldened my cocky underbelly.
She cleared her throat. “Are you just going to stare at me? Or should we like eat or something?”
There was a tiny little brown leaf in her hair, and I was going to use it to my advantage. With silly in mind, I quirked my head to the left and to the right, examining her. She looked happy, genuinely. Her face was relaxed. She was enjoying my company, and I could see it; even if she didn’t love me, she liked me. She liked being with me.
“What?” she laughed.
“Nothing,” I said to infuriate her more than anything else, while I continued to make a show of inspecting her. I wanted to tease her, flirt with her, get close to her. I walked back to the blanket, got down on my knees, inched into her airspace a bit, leaned in. If I had a magnifying glass, I’d be peering through it.
Lua swallowed. As I got closer, she’d grown very quiet. Her jaw tightened and I saw a flash of nervousness in her eyes, but she wasn’t resisting me. Did she think I was going to kiss her? I bit my lip at the thought of it. She did the same. I let the moment sit. Stayed close to her face, looking in her eyes, imagining the rush of closing the gap between us. I let us both feel what it would be like for us to kiss again. Her breathing picked up; so did mine. Lua’s eyes fluttered closed.
My voice deep, thick with the hunger of my desire, I said, “You have a leaf.” And then, slowly, I reached into her hair, feeling the strands against my fingertips and pulled forth the little piece of browning foliage. I didn’t lean back.
“Strangely, out of season,” Lua breathed, attempting to carry on our conversation like our proximity was completely normal.
I didn’t let her get away with her attempt at normalization. “Are you still angry at me, Lu?” I knew the answer, but I asked anyway.
She shook her head no, but it was a tiny movement, barely perceptible. I could feel her panting breaths on my lips.
“You know that I don’t want to be friends this time, right?”
This time she nodded yes, and the movement was even smaller. I couldn’t kiss her. She had to kiss me. But the ball wasn’t entirely in her court. I could tell her what I wanted. I could be vulnerable with her.
“Do it. Kiss me. You know I want you to.”
She sucked in a little breath, her eyes opened and flared wide, but she didn’t move.
“But what if…” Her voice was wavering, and she didn’t finish her thought, but the magic of moment was broken.
I crashed over backwards and growled, “Ucghldh. Too soon, Drew,” and writhed on the ground, flopping like a beached fish.
She giggled at me. “You’re so crazy.”
I paused my flopping, picked up my head, and looked her in the eye. “Crazy for you.”
She rolled her eyes, and I proceeded to flop some more.
44
Lua
Playful Drew was alive and well and he wanted me to kiss him. I wanted to kiss him. I wished I’d kissed him. But the moment had passed now, and I didn’t know how to get it back. We’d eaten. We’d talked more. We’d laughed and flirted. We’d cleaned up. If it were the summer, we could have gone swimming. Swimming might have led to kissing because I could play wrestle or something like that. But just sitting on the blanket talking, nothing. I couldn’t just jump on top of him and start kissing, could I? I felt like we were nearing the moment when one of us would say, would you like to go back? or I guess we should be heading back, and I just didn’t know what to do about it. Also, I fixated so on our impending departure that I couldn’t seem to think of anything to say other than some form of the picnic part has ended, so let’s head out.
Drew seemed way calmer than I felt. He was lying stretched out on the blanket, basking in the sun. He had his eyes closed and the arm farthest from me was crooked behind his head, serving as a pillow. There was the slightest hint of a smile on his face. He looked handsome and downright serene. Was it just me or did men have an uncanny ability to relax anywhere, no matter what was happening around them? I was sitting upright a few feet from him, my arms wrapped around my knees. I did not feel calm at all.
“Lua?” he questioned.
“Hmm?” This was meant to just be a casual reaction, but it came out a little too squeaky.
“Could you stop buzzing?” He said the words nonchalantly, like they weren’t both cryptic and annoying.
“What does that even mean?” I asked.
“I can feel you buzzing, feel the gears in that big, beautiful brain of yours overthinking every minute of today, and it’s distracting me. I’m trying to be peaceful.”
I hated him. No, not really. I didn’t say anything because… annoying.
At my silence, he opened one eye and peered at me. “Don’t get mad. You’re being too sensitive.” He closed the eye again and adjusted his positioning a bit, moving all of him and none of him at the same time.
“It’s a lot,” I said quietly.
“It’s not. Well, maybe it is. But is it really that different than it was yesterday? Or a few months ago? It’s not like you haven’t always known that I’m attracted to you.”
“Yeah, but now it’s like…” What was it like? I wasn’t sure. If I was going to make it a metaphor, he’d cleared the debris from the road, but I wasn’t sure we could really get the car started and keep driving. All I said was, “Different.”
He flipped onto his side, propping his head up on his elbow, and looked at me. “Stop it. It’s just me and you, Lu. We are the only two left who can fuck this up. And there is no pressure. I will wait. I will be here. I’m just not going to pretend anymore.”
“Again, what does that even mean?” I sighed.
“I’m gonna tell you what I want, when I want it. And you get to choose.”
I rolled my eyes at him, then teased, “Maybe third times the charm. What does that even mean?”
He dropped back onto the blanket and once he was lying flat with his far arm resituated as his pillow, he stretched out the other arm in my di
rection. “Right now, I want to lie here in the spring sun and ideally, you would lie next to me. Curl up in my armpit with your head on my chest. And we could just be quiet together. Maybe even take a lazy day nap. Yeah, that’s what I want.”
I didn’t say anything. I just looked at him peacefully lying there, his arm unfurled, an offer, not a command. It was so silly, but it felt like a big deal, crossing the two feet between us and snuggling up next to him. It was an outright admission that I wanted to snuggle him. And I did. I’d missed spending time with him so much. I’d had more fun with him in the last couple hours than I’d had all semester. And even if it was deranged and foolish, I trusted him enough to believe that he wouldn’t intentionally hurt me again. But it was the unintentional bits. He couldn’t control everything about his life. He was still Senator Scott’s son, and I was still Lua Steinbeck, girl from a commune. If we were really together, eventually there would be talk. Maybe even more news trucks. Did I really want that?
Also, shedding a lifetime of his conservative upbringing wasn’t like a thing you do in a few months. And honestly, I didn’t want it to be. I didn’t want him to see the world exactly like I did because he was smart, and he helped me see the flaws and weaknesses in my own thinking. But there would be more layers. There would be moments when he would say things that made me really angry. Things that were racist, sexist, classist, homophobic, xenophobic byproducts of his privilege that would be cruel and hurtful. Did I really want to mess with all that? Wouldn’t it just be easier to move on and love someone more like me?
“Lua,” he scolded. “You’re buzzing again.”
He hadn’t moved. His arm was still splayed open, hoping I would rest there. He didn’t ask again. He wasn’t twitching his arm to jokingly beg me to come to him. He just put it out there into the universe. And fuck it, I wanted in. I’d spent months trying to shake him and sure, he was going to be fucking complicated and messy, but life was about risks. And I loved him. Oh, shit, I loved him.