by KD Robichaux
Tattoos cover his arms and the upper part of his chest I can see above the neck of his shirt, and his head is shaved. But with as much as there is to take in, it’s those gorgeous chocolate eyes that hold my attention. They’re sucking me in, and I can’t for the life of me look away or even move.
It’s not until Sierra chuckles “She says thank you” that I finally snap out of it.
“Umm… hold that thought,” I say, and jog to the bathroom in the corner. I get some tissue and blow my nose, and then wash my hands at the sink, glancing at myself in the mirror.
Jesus, I look horrendous. I have white streaks of chalk from my scalp down to my knees, and the mascara I put on this morning before school seems to be everywhere but on my eyelashes from sweating. I wet a paper towel and clean up the black smudges, but as I take in my red tank top and black spandex shorts, I know there’s really nothing else I can do for my appearance.
I have no idea what I’m so worried about. I’ve never cared before what other people thought of my looks while I’m here in my happy place. It’s the one place I’m never self-conscious. In my head, it doesn’t matter what I look like, because my confidence in my talent radiates outward and disguises the fact I look like I crawled out of a swamp.
But that guy out there… I have never before experienced what I felt under his gaze. What the hell was that? Part of me wants to hide in the bathroom until I can sneak out and escape past them, but another part wants to hurry up and dry my hands so I can get back out there to him. Knowing there would be no way to signal my mom sitting on the other side of the gym if I tried to make a run for it, I go with the second option, using a couple paper towels before tossing them in the trashcan and yanking open the bathroom door.
When I get back to everyone, the guys are sitting on a bench in the shop area, lacing up their rental shoes. I walk behind the counter and grab my harness from where I keep it in one of ten cubbies reserved for the competition climbing team, carrying it over to the shop.
The tall one finishes first and looks up at me where I stand a few feet away. “Damn, that thing is way cooler than the one I’ve got,” he jokes, holding up the plain black rental harness.
I smile, and look down at my personal harness in my hand. Another gift from my older brother, Henry. He was so excited when he learned that his baby sister was really getting into a sport that he went all out and got me a chalk bag, harness, and top of the line climbing shoes so I could stop renting the ones here at Rock On. He told me, “Now that you have all your own gear, you’re a real climber, and you can’t just give up on it like you did everything else.” I had rolled my eyes but attacked his cheek with a hundred kisses, thanking him profusely.
The gear didn’t come cheap. The harness is thickly padded around the waist and legs, and is obscenely comfortable, even while hanging for long periods of time. It’s black on the outside and neon purple on the inside, with the same purple color thread stitched throughout the black. My climbing shoes are pure black brushed leather, streamline and sleek, fitting my feet like a glove. They feel almost like a soft-sole moccasin, but they lace up the top like a tennis shoe and have thick and hard places along the toes and outside edges. The shoes bend with your feet, but also protect them when pressed into a rock. You don’t wear socks with your climbing shoes, which equals the stench of “sweaty pedis” as Sierra calls them, hence the never-ending supply of Lysol on the counter near the shoe drop-off table.
“Don’t worry. Yours will still keep you up on the rope. Your junk just won’t be as comfortable,” I reply to Tall Guy, and he laughs, holding out his hand.
“Glover. Nice to meet you….” he prompts.
“Glover? Oh, you’re military, huh? That’s your last name?” I ask, placing my hand in his. We get quite a few Army guys in here for PT, since our small town is right next to Ft. Vanter, but I’ve never really hung out with anyone in the military except for Henry, who is in the Navy, stationed in Charleston.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry. Haven’t been out in the civilian world that much in the past year. I was just stationed here right out of boot camp. Haven’t used my first name in a while. I’m Brian,” he tells me, and I smile.
“Nice to meet you, Brian. I’m Vivian, but most people call me Vi.” As I pull my hand from his, his friend comes to stand next to him, and I feel his presence like I’ve stuck my hand on a doorknob after skidding my socked feet over a carpeted floor. I look down, and sure enough, the blonde hairs on my arms are standing up.
“I’m Corbin,” he says, and he holds out his hand.
I hesitate for a moment, scared of what my body’s reaction might be if I touch him; it’s already acting strange just being near him. But I don’t want to seem rude, so I timidly rest my fingers against his palm, and then feel his close around them. My breath catches as my heart stops for a moment, then restarts as if I’ve been shocked back to life. I feel his warmth blanket every cell of my body, along with a sense of excitement coated in complete calm. “H… hi.”
All I can do is stand there, my hand in his, and I stare into those intense, mesmerizing dark eyes, entranced by the feelings roiling through me. He seems to be just as hypnotized, his breath coming and going deeply through his flared nostrils.
“Sir,” I hear Brian say, seemingly from far away. “Um, Specialist Lowe?”
“Just Corbin,” he says, his lips barely moving, his eyes never wavering from mine.
“Okay then. Corbin, you um… Sorry, sir. But uh, you ready to climb?” Brian asks, and a spark of confusion pulls me out of my trance.
My brows lower and I glance up at Brian, who towers over us, then focus back on Corbin. “Sir?” I prompt, and his eyes flare and his hand tightens around mine briefly before letting go.
“Yeah, he’s basically my boss. I’m a Private, or a ‘cherry’ as they keep calling me, and he’s a Specialist, three ranks higher than me,” Brian explains.
“Oh. Cool. So um, are y’all ready to learn how to belay?” I ask, taking a step back, trying to get a little farther away from the intensity of the man in front of me. This pulls a chuckle from Brian, and my face heats.
“Yeah, little lady. Teach us how to belay,” he says, not bothering to hide the sarcasm in his voice.
It strikes a match inside me, slightly offending me, but instead of responding, I decide to save it for the rocks. They may see me as a ‘little lady’ now, but I’ll show them.
STANDING AT THE beginners’ wall, which is covered in nothing but jug grips, I step into my harness and pull the waist-strap tight, waiting for them to put on their own. I can’t help but let my eyes wander over Corbin as he adjusts his thigh straps, pulling at his shorts where they rode up his legs when he pulled his harness up. I assume Brian gets his on fine, but I wouldn’t be able to swear on it, because my gaze is like metal, attaching itself to Corbin as if he were a magnet.
“Okay, so who wants to be the belayer, and who wants to be the climber first?” I ask, and Corbin answers, “I’ll belay first,” coming to stand close to me where I’m holding onto the anchor attached to the floor.
“All right, so this attaches to your harness… um… there,” I begin, pointing at the belayer’s loop at the front of his harness, feeling my cheeks heat once again. I don’t understand what is with me around this guy. Usually, I just snap the carabiner onto the loop, without even thinking about how close it is to someone’s… private area. But with him, instead, I hand over the metal shackle with its spring-loaded gate and allow him to hook it on himself. “And it anchors you to the floor. That way if someone much larger than you is climbing, you won’t end up trading places in the air.”
I move over to Brian, taking hold of one end of the doubled-over rope hanging from its anchor at the top of the rock wall. “Okay, climber.” I glance up at Corbin to make sure he’s watching, so he’ll know what to do when it’s his turn, finding his eyes burning into me before lowering them to the rope in my hands. I clear my throat, trying to free my airway, because suddenly it
’s hard to breathe. “Um… so the climber will take one end of the rope, and measure out enough length that it goes from your fist to your opposite shoulder. So do that,” I instruct, and Brian’s long wingspan measures out his rope. “Now you tie an 8-knot at that length.”
“Oh, I got this,” Brian says excitedly, and I watch closely as he ties the rope into a perfect 8-knot.
“Good, now, you thread it through the two horizontal loops that sandwich the vertical belayer’s loop. Yep, just like that, and you’re going to make your knot into a double by lacing the end of the rope through and following the line of your eight. Perfect. Wow, this is so much easier than teaching a civilian.” I laugh, and then add, “Now just finish it off with a safety knot at the top, and you’re done.” He quickly ties the simple knot above the more intricate one, and his part is complete.
I take the two steps back over to Corbin, dragging the second half of the rope with me. “You have your belay device?” I ask, looking down at his hands.
“No,” he replies, and the one word reverberates through me. As little as he’s spoken, when he actually does, it’s like it sends a shockwave through the air.
“Oh, sorry. Let me go grab one real quick.” I jog away, feeling my high ponytail swish across the back of my shoulders. Sensing eyes on me, I glance over my shoulder, and sure enough, Corbin’s are once again boring into me. But this time, they’re on my ass. The realization makes my step falter, and I nearly trip, but luckily I’m close enough to the glass case that I catch myself with my palms to the edge.
He’s checking me out? The thought makes me both giddy and nervous. I haven’t had a boyfriend since Jax and I broke up our freshman year, and with graduation just a few months away, the comments of the assholes at school who have picked on me mercilessly for never dating come to the surface of my brain.
She’s such a snob. She doesn’t think anyone is good enough for her.
What a dork. She’d rather go to that stupid gym than come to the Fall Dance.
What guy would want a girl who spends all her time climbing on walls?
All she does is talk about that rock climbing crap.
My mom comforts me when their words finally penetrate the armor I’ve been able to build around myself with the confidence I’ve gained since finding my niche. She calls them jealous and immature. In reality, I know she’s happy I’ve spent the last four years of my life in love with a sport instead of chasing after boys. But the fact is, it’s left me completely inexperienced with the opposite sex. Jax and I had kissed a few times, but never with tongue. So here I am, eighteen years old and soon to graduate high school, and I have never even French kissed before.
So catching Corbin looking at my butt in my spandex climbing shorts is brand new territory for me. Territory I don’t even know how to explore, so I decide to tuck it into a hidden nook in my brain so I can try to forget about it until absolutely necessary.
Reaching into the display case, I grab a belay device and hurry back over to Corbin, finding it impossible to look him in the eyes. “Y’all probably already know this, but I have to do my spiel. This is a tubular belay device. It attaches to the belayer’s harness in the front by a locking carabiner.”
My hands tremble, but I’m determined to act like I normally would with any other person taking the belay lesson, so I rotate the metal lock on the clip, and hook it onto the loop at the front of his hips. Being this close, his soft shorts tucked close against his body because of the harness, it is impossible to miss the movement of his penis behind the black fabric. I jerk my hands away, my entire body growing flushed and my skin suddenly feeling too tight around my bones. Even my scalp feels hot and prickly.
I’ve read romance novels before. I’m actually a pretty big fan of paranormal love stories. I don’t have much time for reading nowadays, but I’ve read enough that I get the gist of sex, as much as you can get without actually experiencing it yourself. I’ve read all about ‘twitching members’ and ‘tight channels’, so I know exactly what just happened in Corbin’s shorts.
He’s affected by me as well.
With wide eyes, I look up into Corbin’s. His expression is unreadable. No cocky smirk, no blush of embarrassment from his body’s reaction to me. Whatever emotion he is feeling is completely concealed behind the wall of his heart-stopping, perfect face. So, I clear my throat again and stutter through the next part of their lesson.
“Um… o-okay. S-so next, you grab your rope and pinch it in half, then stick the pinched part through one side of the belay device, so when it comes through the metal, it makes a loop that you will hook onto the locking carabiner too.” I watch as Corbin does as I instructed, and when he spins the lock back into place, he looks up at me, waiting for my next step.
“I’m going to hook into the rope next to you so you can watch how I do it,” I tell them, making quick work of unhooking my personal belay device from the loop I keep it on at my hip, and then strapping into the rope next to them so I can demonstrate the proper movements. Normally, I would just stand behind the student, wrap my arms around theirs, and teach them that way. But the thought of doing that sends me into near panic.
“Before you can climb, the climber and the belayer must let each other know they’re ready. The climber will ask, ‘On belay?’ and the belayer will answer with, ‘Belay is on,’ if they’re all set up. The belayer will then ask the climber if they’re ready to start climbing by asking, ‘On rock?’ and when the climber approaches the wall and is ready to begin, they will respond with, ‘Rock on.’” Without thinking, I say the last part while giving the rock-n-roll hand signal, a little growl to my voice out of habit. This makes Brian laugh. When I realize what I did, my eyes lift to Corbin, and I see one side of his lips is lifted, his dark eyes twinkling. I’ve given these instructions so many times, usually to kids and their parents, and I’m so used to trying to make it fun and calm their nerves that I always say the last reply to the belayer that way. Seeing the guys’ reaction to my dramatics, my embarrassment doesn’t have a chance to form, so I chuckle along with Brian. “Okay, y’all’s turn.”
Brian clears his throat animatedly, and then holds his hand palm up in Corbin’s direction, asking, “On belay, sir?”
Corbin shakes his shaved head and runs a palm down his face. “You’re such an idiot. Belay is on, cherry.” Brian laughs and moves up to the wall. “On rock?” Corbin asks him.
Brian places one hand on a grip, and then looks over at me, his other hand copying my rock-n-roll gesture, as he growls loudly, “Rock on!” making me laugh at his antics.
“Very good,” I tell them. “And now you can climb. As he moves up the wall, the rope is going to get slacker. With your right hand, you are going to pull the slack out of the line through the belay device. Between his moves, you lock off the rope by just pulling it in your right hand down by your hip. If he warns you he is about to fall, or if he falls without warning, he’s not going anywhere if you already have him locked off. The only time you are not in the locked off position is if you are pulling out his slack.”
“Got it,” Corbin replies, watching me demonstrate pulling my empty rope through the device and locking it off as I instructed.
“Did you get all that, Brian?” I ask, and he nods from his perch on the first set of beginner rocks.
“Awesome,” Sierra says, coming up behind me, and I smile over at her. She stays with our little group while Brian goes up the wall then lets go, letting Corbin practice catching him a couple times before lowering him to the ground one final time. They switch places, Corbin becoming the climber and Brian the belayer, and ten minutes later, they receive their certification.
“I’m going to get back to my route. Nice meeting you guys. Have fun,” I tell them, and with an awkward little wave, I go back to the wall in front of my mom who’s sitting on the couch. She’s still reading her book, completely unaware of the emotional rollercoaster I was just on.
I reach into my chalk bag and coat my hands,
then take up my starting position at the left end of the route once again, completely aware of Brian and Corbin choosing the wall across from me. They must not notice, or maybe they don’t care, that the wall they picked is marked Expert, as they begin strapping themselves into the ropes. I don’t say anything though. They’re grown men and will figure it out on their own. Even if it’s the hard way.
WHAT. THE. FUCK?
Her presence caught my attention before the loud sneeze lifted her small frame off the floor. I had felt the approach of something… someone… as if it were a physical thing. Like the scene in Jurassic Park, the water rippling in the glasses as the giant T-Rex grew closer and closer, shaking the ground with its advance. So when I looked over my shoulder where I was standing at the front counter, and my eyes landed on the girl making her way from the back of the gym, clapping her hands together and forming a small dust cloud as she walked, I was struck stupid. Her? She was the one causing this strange feeling inside me?
She didn’t look a day over fifteen. Her long, dark ponytail swished behind her as she hurried toward us. When she circled around one of the walls, I took in her thin arms and legs, exposed thanks to the bright red tank top and skin-tight black spandex shorts she was wearing. Her black sports bra peeked out from beneath her shirt, but it didn’t seem like she needed it. Her chest was small, in proportion with the rest of her. But God, she was stunningly beautiful, her face clear of makeup except for the smudge of black around her eyes, and the chalk smeared on her cheeks, forehead, and the tip of her nose.
And then she had sneezed, and my automatic reaction to say, “Bless you,” brought her eyes to mine, and it felt like I was being electrocuted. I vaguely heard the lady behind the desk say something about her being an eight out of ten, but to me, she far surpassed a dime. She was utterly perfect.