Paintbrush

by Hannah Bucchin

  Because when he left me there, standing by myself, I became the kind of girl I always told myself I would never be. The kind of girl who lets a guy make her feel like this. And now, here I am.

  And. If this is how it feels when Mitchell leaves me on the dance floor, at a stupid Paintbrush event, how am I going to feel when he leaves for college? We graduate in two weeks. And I have no idea if he’s leaving right after, or partway through the summer, or waiting until the fall. But it doesn’t really matter. Because he’ll be the one leaving, and I’ll be the one staying. He’ll be the one with the power, the power to say goodbye and end it when he wants, the power to leave and go off and start a new adventure in a new place, with new friends, and new girls. New hot, smart, adventurous college girls. And I’ll just be . . . here.

  I need to go to sleep. I’m overthinking everything. I roll onto my side and squeeze my eyes shut and will myself to sleep. I will think about sheep and sweet dreams and not about Mitchell. Not about his soft brown hair, or his long, lanky legs, or the goofy way he grins at his own jokes. And definitely not about the way his hand felt on my waist, the way he pressed his fingertips into my back and gently grabbed a handful of my shirt, like he was afraid I’d change my mind and go . . . .

  Oh god. This is pathetic. I’m pathetic. I sigh and roll the other way, toward the window. And come face to face with a hand.

  The hand knocks on the window, three soft, quick raps. Maybe I’m asleep. Maybe I’m dreaming.

  But then it happens again. And when I sit up and peer outside, Mitchell’s dark eyes peer back at me.

  What’s he doing? My stomach sinks at the same time my heart sputters to life, and I slowly swing my legs over and onto the wooden floor. I’m wearing a long t-shirt with Smokey the Bear’s face on it and tiny shorts that are hidden below its giant hem. My hair is a mess, too, half of it falling out of its braid and frizzy around my face.

  I squint in the darkness for a brush, but I don’t see one, and I don’t want to wake up Mae and Libby looking for one. So I just smooth my hair with my hands and tiptoe to the front door. This is as good as it’s gonna get.

  The door creaks a little as I swing it open, and then I’m padding down the porch in bare feet, across the cool grass and around the side of the cabin. Shit. I’m not wearing a bra, either. I cross my arms over my chest, as tight as I can, and turn the corner.

  Mitchell leans against the side of the cabin, wearing gray sweatpants and a white t-shirt. He has bags under his eyes, and his hair is sticking up in a thousand different directions, and he’s wearing two different socks. And it’s not fair that, despite all that, he still looks good. Like, really good.

  He straightens up when he sees me and strides toward me, crossing the distance between us in two quick strides. He stands close, so close I can smell that warm sleepy-smell on him. Like he just got out of bed.

  He grins. “Hello.”

  “Um. Hi?” My voice is sleepy, a little raspy. The night air is chilly, and I shiver and squeeze my arms tighter. I want to be mad at him for abandoning me a few hours ago. But when he smiles like this, it’s hard.

  “Are you wearing pants?” he whispers.

  “What?” I look down. My huge t-shirt hangs halfway down my thighs, covering up my shorts. Very sexy. I scowl at him. “Yes, I’m wearing pants. God.”

  He shrugs. “Just checking.” He inches closer. “Josie.”

  I look up at him, but then his face is right here, so close, and I have to look down again. “Yeah?”

  He shuffles his feet. “I just wanted to . . .”

  “Wanted to what?” Even my whisper sounds harsh in the quiet night.

  “I couldn’t sleep. So I wanted to come over here, so I could . . .”

  “So you could what, Mitchell?” I’m starting to get impatient and also worried, because I feel like I know what’s on the tip of his tongue. This isn’t working, he’s about to say. I don’t really want to kiss you anymore. I changed my mind. This is a bad idea.

  “I just wanted to do this,” he says. And then he steps forward and slides his arms around my waist.

  His hug is warm and soft, and his grip is tight, and before I know what I’m doing, my arms are snaking around his neck. Like they have a mind of their own. Stupid arms.

  He doesn’t say anything. I don’t say anything. Slowly, carefully, he rubs his chin across the top of my head. I turn and press my forehead into his neck, right underneath his jaw. I feel him inhale, then exhale, slowly, and I tighten my arms around his neck.

  He wants me to kiss him, I think. I’m supposed to kiss him, and I want to kiss him, and we’re alone, and it’s dark, and we should kiss. But I can’t seem to move my head. His neck is smooth and warm and soft and perfect. His neck is his best feature. He has the best neck around. I am genuinely worried that it will be physically impossible for me to remove myself from his neck, that he’ll have to awkwardly peel me off, that he’ll go find Cord tomorrow and say, Yeah, I thought I liked her, but then I realized she was a weird neck-nuzzler.

  We’ve been hugging for a solid minute, I think, or maybe ten or twenty, and my arms are going a little numb and his hands are rubbing my lower back in small, soft circles and my eyes are drifting shut. I think that I might be falling asleep.

  Slowly, I shift away. His grip tightens for a split second, like he doesn’t want me to go, but then he leans away. The night is cold now that he’s not hugging me anymore, and I don’t know what to say. Just a few hours ago he left me alone on the dance floor. But then he’s leaning in, closer and closer, until our foreheads are almost touching.

  This is it, I think. This is when I kiss him.

  But he just nudges his forehead against mine and whispers, “Goodnight, Josie.”

  “Goodnight, Mitchell,” I whisper back.

  And then he’s padding across the grass, his steps silent in his mismatched socks, across the lawn, into the darkness. Gone.

  I spend the whole next day, a Sunday, thinking about Mitchell and seeing Mitchell and smiling at Mitchell, but not actually talking to Mitchell. I see him working on something outside with Bernie, hammering away at an old fence. I wave, and Mitchell waves back, and my heart sputters. I see him crossing the lawn while I’m working on the tomatoes, and he smiles, and my heart sputters. I’m on my porch with my calculus textbook in my lap and see him sitting on his porch, and our eyes meet, and my heart sputters.

  I’m worried that one of these days my heart is just going to sputter out, and then I’ll be dead, and then I’ll never be able to hug Mitchell again. And that will be the real tragedy.

  With all the sputtering going on, it’s probably a good thing I don’t actually talk to him all day. At least, that’s what I try telling myself. But I also know the reason I’m kind of relieved is that I’m still nervous about kissing him. Nervous he’s changed his mind. Nervous I’ll be bad at it. Nervous we’ll kiss, and then I’ll be done, gone, down the rabbit hole of falling for Mitchell. And when he leaves, it’ll be that much harder.

  I snuggle into my bed at night and try not to think about him. But it’s almost like I can feel his presence, real and palpable, all the way from his cabin a couple hundred feet away. Like I have a Mitchell monitor implanted in my brain.

  I’d like to say it’s annoying, the way my brain won’t turn off, the way his face and words and lips bounce around behind my eyelids. But really, I fall asleep with a smile on my face.

  Chapter Thirty

  Mitchell

  “You told her that you’d wait? For her to make the first move?” Cord’s face scrunches up in confusion as he stuffs a chicken nugget in his mouth. “That was stupid, dude.”

  I sigh as he reaches for another one. “Yeah. That’s what I’m saying.”

  My whole truck smells like grease and french fries and ketchup. Cord and I decided to cash in on our senior privilege today and run out to the nearest drive-thru on our lunch break. The upside of this is that we don’t have to eat cafeteria food. The downside
is that, between the ten minutes there, five minutes ordering, and ten minutes back, we now have five minutes to actually eat. I basically inhaled my burger and am now watching as Cord singlehandedly eats a family-sized portion of chicken nuggets. A grand total of thirty nuggets—too much for any one human being. It’s disgusting but also fascinating. Like a car accident I can’t look away from.

  “So who cares?” Cord mumbles around a mouthful of chicken nuggets. “It’s not like you made some unbreakable promise. Kiss her anyway.”

  I shake my head. “I don’t want to lose her trust. But I’m worried that she’ll never kiss me.”

  “You think she doesn’t like you?”

  “No, she likes me.” I frown. “I think.” I run my fingers through my hair and then realize too late that my hair probably smells like french fries now. “She just . . . I don’t think she has a lot of confidence in herself. She’s . . .” I try to find the word I’m looking for. “Careful. She’s careful.”

  Cord snorts. “So? You’re careful, too. You’re the most careful guy I know. You’ve never even had a real girlfriend, for god’s sake.”

  I wipe my greasy fingers on my jeans. “I know that. I just don’t think she sees me like that.”

  “How does she see you?”

  “Like the guy who went to a party with a drunk girl falling all over him.”

  Cord nods at this, taking a noisy slurp of his Coke. “To be fair. You were that guy.”

  I slump in my seat. “You know, you’re not a lot of help today.”

  I lean forward and rest my head on the steering wheel, only to have a fry tossed at my head. “Hey. No throwing food in my truck.”

  He shrugs. “Wasn’t me.”

  “Okay, Shaggy.” I roll my eyes, reach down, and grab my burger wrapper and grease-stained white bag. “Come on. We’re going to be late.”

  But Cord is still staring at me, chewing his last fry with a smug smile on his face.

  I frown. “What?”

  “You really like her, don’t you?”

  I think about shrugging, about rolling my eyes, about punching him in the shoulder and telling him to get out of my truck. But instead, I smile. I can’t help it. “Yeah. I do.”

  Cord grins and shakes his head, popping open his car door. “It’s weird, dude. Seeing you like this.”

  I shrug. It’s weird feeling like this.

  “But like, good weird,” he says.

  “Good weird,” I repeat.

  “It’s the best kind of weird to be.”

  The day rushes by, mostly because I will it to rush by, mostly because all I want to do is be alone with Josie again. I practically sprint out when the bell rings, like I’ve been doing for the past week. I have many fine qualities, but being casual is not one of them.

  I toss my backpack into the backseat and lean against the sunbaked metal of the side of the truck. I scan the crowd emerging from the high school in waves. One minute. Then two. Then three. Still no Josie.

  “You know, all that staring is making you look like the school psychopath.”

  I whip around. And there she is, smiling at me from the other side of the truck.

  “You’re scaring people,” she says.

  “Am not.” Her hair is in its usual braid over her shoulder, and she wears a plain white t-shirt. I can’t see her legs, but I know she’s wearing ripped jeans, the ones with grass stains from playing tackle hide-and-seek with the Macphersons. She squints at me in the sunlight.

  “So . . .” As soon as her voice trails off, I realize I’ve been staring at her. Whoops. I have to get it together.

  “Ready to go?” I ask.

  “Home?”

  I shrug. “Wherever you want.”

  “Home is good, I think.”

  My heart sinks a little, and I try not to look disappointed. I must do a bad job because she quickly continues. “Not that I don’t want to go on an adventure! I just have to study.”

  I give her a blank look. “Study.”

  “For finals?” She raises her eyebrows. “Or does the captain of the swim team get exempt from trivial things like end of the year exams?”

  “Sadly, no. I have to take them with the rest of the common people.”

  “You’re obnoxious.”

  I laugh. “No, I’m charming.”

  I open the driver’s door and slide into my seat. A second later, she slides into the passenger’s side.

  “So don’t you have to study too?” she asks as the engine coughs to life.

  I turn and squint over my shoulder as I back out of the spot. “I guess.” I push the stick into drive, and we turn out of the lot. “If I’m being honest . . .” I sneak a glance at her.

  “What?” She looks at me suspiciously.

  “I’m doing pretty well in all my classes. I could get a D on all my finals and still make at least a B plus in all of them. Or even an A.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Well, me too.”

  “Really?”

  She glares at me. “Yes, really. I’m actually pretty smart, you know.”

  “I know,” I say quickly. “It’s just that you said you have to study.”

  “Well, I don’t want to lose my spot in the class rank this late in the game.” She yanks her seatbelt on. “Aren’t you worried about that at all? You’re third in the class, right?”

  “Right.” I’m surprised she knows this.

  “So if you slip at all, you won’t get to speak at graduation anymore.”

  “That would be a relief, actually. I’m terrible at public speaking.”

  She shakes her head. “Says the most popular boy in school.”

  “First of all, I hate that word. And second of all, remember seventh grade science class?”

  “What word?” she asks innocently. “Boy? School?”

  “Popular.” I glare at her.

  “Wait. Seventh grade science . . .” She taps her chin, her eyes scrunched up.

  “The life cycle of a frog?” I prompt her.

  “Oh my god! The life cycle of a frog!” She bounces in her seat. “I totally forgot! How could I forget? It started out pretty good. But then—”

  “But then I got tripped up on the word polliwog.”

  “Polliwog!” She cracks up. “I remember now. You got to that word, and you just couldn’t say it. It was like your tongue got stuck.”

  I still remember that day vividly, shaking and stuttering in front of my classmates with a beet-red face and brain that had somehow decided to stop working. It was only my second year of public school, and I was still terrified that everyone would think I was the weird hippie kid, still desperately trying to prove myself.

  Usually this memory doesn’t make me laugh. But with Josie shaking with laughter in the seat next to me, it doesn’t seem so bad.

  “I was just up there, stuttering away. I couldn’t remember how to pronounce it for the life of me.”

  “Isn’t polliwog just another word for tadpole?”

  “Yep.”

  For some reason, this makes her giggle even more. “Then why didn’t you just say tadpole?”

  “I was an overachiever! I was trying to cover all my bases!”

  “And then, you just turned and ran out of the classroom. Just sprinted right out the door.”

  “I hid in the bathroom till the end of the school day.”

  “Mr. Reece was so confused.”

  “I’m pretty sure he still hates me.”

  She rubs a hand over her face as her laughter subsides. “Oh, please. No one could ever hate you.”

  It’s a throw-away comment, barely even a real compliment. She probably doesn’t even realize she said it. But I’m starting to realize that anything nice this girl says to me—every small compliment, every kind word, even every touch on the shoulder—makes a goofy smile spread across my face.

  “I’m serious, though.” I let my head fall back against the seat. “I know it was just a stupid middle school project, but ever since then I’ve
hated talking in front of people. There’s too much pressure to say something meaningful. At graduation, in front of hundreds of people? I have no idea what I’m going to talk about.”

  She furrows her brow. “But you talk so much. You never stop talking.”

  “Wow. Thanks.”

  A pink flush creeps into her cheeks. “No! Not like that. You just . . . I see you at school. And at Paintbrush. You’re always talking with other kids or teachers or coaches or Ned or Bernie or Myra or whoever. You always have something to say.” She tucks her hair behind her ear. “It makes me jealous. I never know what to say. My whole life is just one big awkward pause occasionally interrupted by bits of conversation.”

  I laugh at this. But she’s not laughing. She’s intently studying her toes, her bare feet propped on the dashboard as the trees lining the road whiz by outside her window.

  I clear my throat. “You’re not awkward.” I search for the right words. “You just . . . you think.”

  “I think.” She sounds skeptical.

  “You’re careful with what you say. So everything you say is important. I just chatter away about nothing all the time, but you . . . You don’t waste your words.” I grip the steering wheel tighter, my knuckles turning white as I try to say what I want to say. “It makes me want to really listen when you talk.”

  It’s quiet in the truck, my words hanging in the air. I carefully, slowly wind my way up the mountain. Taking my time so I can prolong this car ride as long as possible. So I can spend as much time with Josie as possible.

  She’s still quiet. I hope I didn’t say the wrong thing. I’m getting hot, the worry building in my chest.

  Just when I’m opening my mouth to say something, anything, to fill the silence, she slides her head onto my shoulder. And then she slides her hand onto my knee, gentle and warm and so totally distracting that I think I might drive right off the road.