Gemma
“Morning,” The word moves over me like smooth water. “Gemma.”
Am I asleep? Am I dreaming?
“Oh,” I gasp, my eyes flying open, my head working out where I am.
The room is filled with the misty blue light of early morning. Soft grey bed sheets are tangled over my ankles, twisting up my calves and wrapping around my bent knees.
“Good Morning,” Landon says in a voice I haven’t heard before. It’s balmy. Like words wrapped in cool satin.
I blink some more, adjusting to the dim light. The room is small, about the same size as Julie’s bedroom. The off-white walls are bare except for a small calendar by the desk and a poster of the ocean over a low dresser. There are five surfboards of slightly different heights over by the closet. Wyatt is sleeping on a small round dog bed in the corner.
Landon is beside me. He’s propped on his elbows and is looking down at me. His skin is still warm and glossy from sleep. Tiny pink lines are on his chest from where the sheets were crumpled and pressed beneath him. His mouth is curved up at the corners. His eyes are slanted. His forehead in puckered. His cheeks are covered in sandpaper the same brown as the roots of his rumpled hair.
He looks unbelievable.
“Morning,” I croak. Ugh. My voice is grating in the quiet of the room. Like squealing car brakes or metal crumpling.
Landon lets go of a breath and sort of laughs. He lowers his face to my chest, scrapes his rough stubble against my bare skin. “I knew it was too early to wake you but I wasn’t sure—” he starts then stops himself. “You were making this sound and—”
“What sound?”
Instead of answering, he lifts his head and kisses me on my collarbone.
I don’t have time to feel self-conscious about whatever sound I was making or my terrible morning breath or how gross the inside of my mouth is because his tongue touches my skin just below my jaw and I’m back inside of the dream—the good one where we can’t get enough of each other.
Landon’s hair is under my fingers. His hot breath is on my skin. His head is coming up and his hands are moving down.
“I was dreaming about you,” I murmur onto his tongue.
He peels back, looks at me with one eyebrow up. “Good I hope?”
I sigh and close my eyes, still dazed. “Good.”
“Good.” He lifts me until I feel the press of our bare stomachs, the place where our middles line up.
“God, you’re beautiful,” he whispers, his chest rising, and I watch his dark eyes fall shut. “I didn’t think—”
“You’re beautiful,” I whisper back.
He laughs, a soft sound that rolls over my whole body and buries his head in the crook of my neck.
I squeeze him with my thighs and push my hands back into his hair. The silky strands tickle my palms and fall through the thin spaces between my fingers. “You have great hair,” I tell him in a low voice.
He chuckles again and drops his head. I feel the scratch of his teeth against my neck. His left hand moves even lower. “You have great skin.”
“Your eyes,” I say gauzily. A low hum is starting to build deep inside of me. It’s working its way up my torso, pulling on all of the muscles in my stomach, pulling me taut like a guitar string. “And your hands aren’t so bad either.”
Landon rises up and looks over my naked body. His dark eyes are searching and part of me wants to pull the sheet up to hide. Another part of me wants him to keep looking.
“Your lips,” he says, his tone almost reverent. Very carefully, he places one fingertip on the crease of my mouth. “And chin. And your jaw and neck.” The finger descends, its progress achingly slow, over my neck and my sternum, dividing me in two equal halves. “Your shoulders and your breasts and your heart.” He stops and lingers for a moment, his mouth becoming sly. “The way you hold your breath when you’re nervous.”
I laugh, exhaling harshly.
“Your ribs. Your belly button. That freckle right here, just above your hip.” He kisses it. “Everything about you is beautiful.”
Every nerve ending in my body is tingling. I feel full of electricity, like lightning made into flesh.
“You’re beautiful when you’re standing with your face tipped to the sky, when you’re sitting at the bottom of the stairs in the dark, when you’re on the beach, at work. You’re beautiful anywhere you go and I can’t seem to stop watching you.” He laughs at himself. “Did that sound as creepy as I think it sounded?”
Now it’s my turn to laugh. “No.”
He continues to trail his fingertip in a straight line over my stomach. I grab at his wrist with both of my hands, trying to stop him or urge him on. I don’t even know what I’m doing anymore. My feet are digging into the mattress. My thighs are trembling with anticipation.
He sees this and grins, lazy and deliberate.
“Please,” I whimper and Landon lowers his head to my breast. His tongue makes teasing circles on my skin.
“Please,” I say again and this time he takes me into his mouth, pulling on me, wetting me, making me crazy with wanting.
I can’t take it anymore.
My head is sinking back. My eyes are falling shut.
The room is going.
Going.
Gone.
“Like this,” he says between choppy breaths. “You’re beautiful like this.”
I am incoherent. I am nothing but the shape of this thrashing moment. I am nothing but this boy’s mouth on me and his muscles expanding and contracting and the air and the blood raging inside of both of us.
And when he touches me, the sky and the earth switch places.
Landon
“I don’t want you to freak out,” she says.
It’s just after ten in the morning. I should have been at the beach hours ago but I don’t feel like going anywhere. Not today. I’m pretty sure it would take a natural disaster or a full-scale military strike to get me out of this bed.
Gemma is on top of me, the warm skin of her stomach pressing against my ribs. It’s so incredibly hot and I’m thinking about how amazing she feels and how much I love her hair like this—wild and curling over her shoulders and forehead. She’s so cute and rumpled and I can’t get enough of it. I push my thumb on the spot between her breasts where I can see the bone poking out from her skin.
For the first time in maybe forever, I feel like I’m where I should be. “I’m not going to freak out,” I tell her, a little confused. “Not unless you tell me that all that music talk was bullshit and Nickelback is actually your favorite band.”
She smiles, relief changing her features. “It’s not about Nickelback.”
Laughing weakly, I run my fingers down her back, stroking her long brown hair away from her eyes. “So, what am I not freaking out about?”
She buries her face in the crook of my elbow. In a muffled voice she says, “It’s just—”
“It’s just what?”
Eyes up. Black eyelashes flickering. “I just want you to know that I’m not under any delusions. I know what’s happening here, okay?”
“What’s happening here, Gemma?” I run my knuckle slowly across her bottom lip, the memory of last night and earlier this morning lifting my chest.
“I need you to know that I get it. This is sex. I don’t expect anything else from you. No strings, okay?”
“No strings, huh?” I say, the memory crashing and burning to the ground like it just got lit up by a surface-to-air missile.
Her shoulders go tense. She swallows. “No strings, no regrets.”
“That sounds like the name of an album.” I roll away and reach to the side of the bed for my boxer briefs. I don’t want Gemma to see my face right now. I get what she’s saying; I’m just not sure how I feel about it and I don’t think I’ll be able to school my features. “It probably is the name of an album.”
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” she continues awkwardly. Her fingers touch my lower back and a rip
ple moves through me.
I don’t know why I’m taken off guard. She basically said this exact thing last night, but I guess I thought after—shit. I thought with the way things were between us she’d change her mind.
It was a stupid thought.
She’s still talking. “You understand what I’m trying to say? I can only do non-serious right now.”
I swivel my head. “Gemma, I know exactly what you’re saying. And trust me, it’s fine. I don’t need or want any crazy, obsessed girls hounding me to nail down a wedding date anytime soon,” I assure her. “This is good.”
“Okay, good.”
“Good.”
“So why do I feel like I just made things awkward? I didn’t—” She breaks off and sighs. “I guess I needed to make sure you knew that we’re on the same page.”
“We’re on the same page,” I say, yanking the boxers up over my calves. “Non-serious. Got it.”
“I meant everything I said last night. I like you a lot, Landon, but I think we should be careful with how far we take things. It’s not—”
I cut her off because I really do not need to hear the it’s not you, it’s me speech right now. Not after last night. Not after the way I was feeling less than one minute ago. “Gemma, you don’t have to explain anything to me, all right? This is the way things go.” I roll my neck, the tiny hairs on my back prickling.
A few minutes ago, I’d been thinking of asking her to stay the day, the night, the week. I’d been thinking of telling her things—things I don’t tell anyone. Instead, I’m having the casual sex conversation with her. Fuck me.
Now, I say, “I’m just glad you brought it up before I had to.”
She sits up a little, pulling the sheet up over her bare breasts. “I’m recovering from a broken heart.”
I laugh morosely. “I’m recovering from a broken life.”
She frowns. “What does that mean? A broken life? You don’t seem like that to me.”
I find myself looking away. “There are things I haven’t told you.”
“Like what?”
Catching my breath, I lift my head and glare at her. “Do you really want to do this part right now, Gemma? You just said you didn’t want strings and I told you I’m good with that.”
Damn, I hate how curt I sound. I’m reverting back to that guy who was rude to her because I can’t manage to get a handle on my own shit.
“I’m sorry,” I say, shaking my head. “I don’t know what my problem is.”
“No, you’re right,” she says, worrying her teeth back and forth over her bottom lip. “And Landon—” Her head goes back and her intake of air is audible. “Everything in my life is shaky at best. I feel like I’m lost at sea or something.” She shrugs her shoulders sadly. “For now, I just need one thing to be easy and uncomplicated.”
Easy and uncomplicated?
Who am I kidding? I want to push her into the mattress and kiss her until she can’t see straight, until the two of us are tangled up and sweaty.
I want to erase the doubt and the hurt and the memory of the guy who came before me.
I want to discover every place on her body.
I want to know everything inside her head.
I want to turn her inside out.
I want complicated. I want to tell her the truth. I want her to know who I am and know about surfing and my failures and about Abby, but it’s obvious she’s not ready for that. The mistrust and uncertainty are etched all over her face.
Slowly, like a cat creeping up on its prey, I say, “Fair enough.”
She laughs. “So we’re okay?”
If what Gemma needs right now is easy and uncomplicated—a rebound guy to fill the void—that is exactly who I’ll be. I won’t push her. I won’t besiege her with all of my pent up want. I can be patient.
“We’re okay,” I say, smiling.
She cocks her head to the side and taps her index finger on her chin like she’s thinking. “Should we set down ground rules?”
“If you need them.” Whatever you need, it’s yours.
Her eyebrows pop. “You think I should just say it?”
“Go for it,” I tell her.
She releases a breath. “Sex obviously.”
I laugh. “Obviously?”
“Unless, you don’t want that?” Her forehead creases and the sides of her mouth fall.
“I want,” I tell her firmly, running my hand down her arm until I’ve got her wrists circled. “I definitely want.”
“Okay.”
“So just sex?”
Gemma rests her head back against the pillow. “Well, no. I guess that doesn’t make much sense. We’re going to be working together so we have to be friendly. We can still do surf lessons and hang out, but we won’t date per se.”
“No holding hands or staring longingly into each other’s eyes?” I joke.
But she doesn’t laugh. She nods, visibly relieved. “Right. No coordinated outfits. No ridiculous pet names.”
“No secret hand signals.”
“No presents or shared desserts.”
“No sitting on the same side of the booth,” I say, smiling softly.
“No flowers.”
“No heart-shaped boxes of chocolate?”
“Exactly,” Gemma replies, making a popping sound with her lips. “No check-in phone calls or guilt trips or family history lessons.”
I swing my legs onto the bed and lean my back against the metal headboard. “No sunset beach walks where we talk for hours about the meaning of life?”
She laughs a little and a stray brown lock falls in front of her eyes. I brush it behind her ear and she tilts her face until her cheek is resting in the palm of my hand. “Nope. I don’t want us to dredge up the past or worry about the future. No promises required and most importantly, no expectations between us.”
My pause is less than a second. “I can do that.”
She smiles and puts her mouth on my chest to seal our deal with a kiss. Her tongue feels like a bird flapping its wings against my skin. “Good. I was really hoping you would say that.”
Ending
I lied.
I wanted you from that moment.
I wanted you, wrapped in starlight and reflections,
To be tied up with strings.
And ropes.
And chains.
I wanted you hanging around my neck
Like a charm I could press to my heart and
Make three wishes on.
But I trapped the want
And the words inside my mouth.
I buried those secret things under my tongue,
Biting down until blood and bitterness
Filled my mouth
And poured down the back of my throat.
In the beginning, you said, there was only water.
But what about the end?
I closed my eyes and lay flat
With my back to the ocean
And my face to the sky.
I lifted my hands and caught ribbons of wind
Underneath my fingernails.
I rode the water for so long,
I forgot what my skin felt like when it was dry.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Landon
Who do you want to be now?
After I was forced into rehab, I saw a shrink exactly one time. It was at Claudia’s urging. She thought it would do me some good to “talk things out.”
During the session, the line of questioning went pretty much how I expected it to go. Shit about my childhood. Shit about my mother. Shit about fighting. Shit about the painkillers.
Nothing was shocking.
Nothing was a revelation.
In a soothing, monotonous voice, the therapist spoke about closure and moving forward. I nodded along like what she was saying was new or interesting to me. But I’d heard it all before and I really didn’t need a pep talk. I knew why I’d let things go so far because I’d already familiarized myself with the miser
able scent of my own failings.
And I was doing just fine. I wasn’t bumming pills. I wasn’t getting high. I didn’t even want to. Not really. I’d lost everything that mattered and I’d stayed clean and out of trouble for months. To me, this was proof that I was okay. So, when the therapist asked me if I thought I was like my mother, I was able to give her an unequivocal “no.”
At the end of the session, she said, “Now the question you need to ask yourself is, Who do you want to be now?”
Considering the fact that I’d lost the only thing that had ever made me feel whole, I didn’t know what to say. Truthfully, I was pissed.
So I quietly thanked her for her time, paid for the session, and never went back.
Who do you want to be now?
For the past few days, that question has been rolling around my head.
Claudia tells me I’m acting differently. She thinks my attitude change has to do with Gemma. I don’t know. Maybe my sister is right. Maybe the truth is that all I’ve ever wanted is to be good for somebody else.
Gemma
Do you remember when I said the past was out of bounds?
Yeah, well, I’m starting to rethink that decision. There are things I want you to know before we continue; things that might give you a better picture of who I am.
It probably won’t make a difference but I’m going to tell you about the time we went tubing on the American River. Andrew was five so I must have been eleven. Dad drove us for an hour and a half through nothingness. He didn’t give any hints, only told us to wear our bathing suits under our clothes. We counted state license plates and stopped to eat on the side of the road. Then Dad parked in a dusty lot where the highway forked, bought inner tubes from some guy selling them out of the flatbed of his pickup, and the four of us spent the afternoon floating down the river.
Mom held our hands the whole time. So I don’t lose you, she said, tugging us through the water until our tubes collided and pushed away from each other like repelling magnets.
Even now, if I close my eyes, I can hear the whirring sound the river made as it spilled past a grouping of rocks. I can feel the rhythmic sway of the current underneath me and the smooth plastic of the inner tube sticking to the backs of my thighs. I can picture my mother’s skin, soft and warm as a sun-ripened lemon peel.
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