Cherry Red Summer (Emely and Elyas Book 1)

by Bartsch, Carina

  Sophie slowly shook her head. “God, I thought that whole thing was behind us.”

  “We all did,” Elyas said. “Apparently she’s a very good actor.”

  We were silent. I looked down at the grass at my feet. Elyas’s body cast a long shadow across the meadow in the firelight, and I could tell he was moving toward me. His shadow grew smaller and smaller as he came to stand next to me. Elyas squatted down.

  “Hey . . . ,” he whispered, close to me.

  My heartbeat sped up when I turned to look at him. The light of the fire reflected in his eyes, turning them into a turbulent, turquoise sea.

  “Would you take a little walk with me, Emely?”

  Would I take a walk with Elyas? In other words, walk with him, defenseless, into the darkness? I shook my head.

  He sighed. “I won’t do anything,” he said. “I just want to talk about before.”

  “You don’t need to, Elyas.”

  “I know . . . But I’d like to explain why I . . . Why that happened.”

  Elyas had no idea Sebastian had already filled me in. The way he was looking at me, it seemed like he was afraid I had drawn some hasty conclusions about him.

  I was about to take a breath and tell him, but a kind of mean idea popped into my head.

  No.

  I couldn’t do that to him.

  Or could I?

  Bad Emely.

  Very bad Emely!

  “Please,” he said.

  “All right,” I mumbled, struggling to my feet.

  “Thank you,” he said with a smile.

  “We’ll be back in a little while,” he called out to Andy and Sophie.

  He strolled next to me in silence. After a while we reached the edge of the lake, the moon reflecting beautifully on its surface. We walked around the lake until we reached a little dock, where I stopped.

  “You could have just told me you’re more interested in Jessica,” I said.

  “What?” His eyes grew wide. “No, no! You’ve misunderstood.”

  “Elyas.” I looked at the ground. “You don’t need to talk your way out of this one with some silly story—”

  “No, it’s not what you think. Really!”

  “Please, Elyas. I know the speech all too well.”

  He stared at me then pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes. “This time it’s true!” he said. “Jessica is going through a really rough time. I’m trying to be there for her and help her—as a friend.”

  “Rough time? You’re helping?” I repeated. “Let me guess. Jessica is in a nymphomaniac phase and urgently needs you to help her with that, right?”

  Oh boy, was I mean!

  “G-God, no, Emely!” he stammered. “There’s nothing going on between me and Jessica . . . It’s because of Domenic. She’s unhappily in love with him and—”

  “You’re blaming all this on Domenic?” I interrupted. “You’re the one who’s meddling out of jealous rage!”

  “No!” he said, shaking his head.

  “You’re not meddling?”

  “Well, sort of, yes . . . but not out of jealousy. It’s because Domenic is only using her.”

  He was so darned cute whenever he tried to talk his way out of something.

  Although—dammit—he was actually telling the truth . . .

  But no matter.

  “You aren’t seriously trying to tell me that you almost picked a fight with Domenic because Domenic is using Jessica?” I snorted. “You’ve got to admit that sounds pretty laughable.”

  “It’s true,” he pleaded. “Let me tell you the whole story.”

  “No, I think I’ve heard enough!” I tried to turn away, but he grabbed me by the shoulder and held me. “No! Wait . . . please! Let me explain!”

  I looked down at his hand, which he released from my shoulder.

  “Please just listen to me,” he said.

  I didn’t know whether to laugh or take him into my arms with compassion.

  “No. I don’t want to hear any more.”

  “Please, Emely, I’m begging you!”

  I looked at my feet. “You know, I had just started trusting you . . . then I find out you’re just toying with me. Instead of being honest now, you’ve shamelessly continued lying to my face.”

  Elyas shook his head, his eyes big. “No, you can trust me, Emely . . . really!”

  “Letting me drive the Mustang, all your compliments, your text messages—it’s all been a lie!”

  “I wasn’t lying. I swear! It’s a gigantic misunderstanding! Let me explain.”

  I couldn’t hold it in anymore: my mouth formed a grin, and I burst out laughing. Oh, his face! Nothing, and I mean nothing, could surpass his flabbergasted expression. I wiped a tear from my eye.

  “W-why are you laughing?”

  I mimicked him. “Please, please, please, Emely, let me explain!” I was laughing so hard by the end, no sound was coming out anymore.

  His mouth fell agape. “What’s so funny about that?”

  “Everything!” I gasped.

  “Y-you mean you’re not mad?”

  “No.” I sniffled. “Sebastian told me the whole story, before.”

  Elyas’s face drained of all expression. He remained frozen, as though his brain were rebooting.

  “You knew all along?”

  I nodded, laughing and slapping my thigh.

  “You were taking me for a ride?”

  I nodded again.

  “Here I am practically begging on my knees, and you were just toying with me?”

  “You should have seen your face!” I said, trying to mimic him again.

  “Bah!” he burst out. “You . . . you . . . you turd!”

  “Oh, you deserved it!”

  “Deserved?”

  “Oh my God, yes! That was revenge for pretending you didn’t recognize me the day I helped Alex move in!”

  “Now hold on . . . ,” he said as he took a step toward me.

  “Don’t you come any closer to me!” I said, instantly dead serious, and staggered backward.

  His eyes were ablaze, and he clearly had no intention of stopping. As I turned to flee, his arms came from behind and caught hold of me around my middle.

  “No!” I protested.

  Then he grabbed me around the hollows of my knees and hiked me up.

  “Put me down!” I yelled, thrashing about.

  “You gambled and you lost,” he said, carrying me over to the dock and holding me out over the water.

  “Don’t you dare!”

  “Shouldn’t I?” He grinned and eased his grip.

  “No!” I clung tightly to him. “Stop fooling around, please! I don’t have any clothes to change into!”

  “That doesn’t exactly speak against throwing you in.”

  “Please, Elyas. Don’t do it.”

  “Give me one reason why I shouldn’t throw you into that water right now for playing such a shitty trick on me?”

  “Because . . . because . . .”

  Dammit, reasons, where are you?

  “Because?” He eased his grip some more.

  I screamed and tried to find a way to hold on to him more tightly. “Because I swear you would regret it for the rest of your life!” I finally said.

  He looked up into the sky and moaned. “It would have been smarter just to throw you in instead of listening to you first!”

  “Please put me down now,” I said as my heart raced faster and faster. Although I wasn’t so sure it was racing for fear of getting wet.

  “No.”

  “What do you mean, no? I thought you weren’t going to throw me in!”

  I felt his breath in my hair. “I’m not. But now that I have you in my arms . . .”

  W
armth spread through my body from my core. If I hadn’t been so charged up from my nearly forced swim, I would have liked to rest my head on his shoulder and let him carry me, holding me in his arms . . .

  I shook my head. No naughty thoughts about Elyas!

  “I’m feeling slightly uncomfortable here, Elyas. Would you please be so kind as to set me down?”

  He sulked. “If I set you down now, the first thing you’ll do is take a six-foot jump away from me.”

  “I would be justified, wouldn’t I?”

  “What justification would you have?”

  “Elyas,” I snarled. “Believe me. Enough already. Plus, this is a crappy position to put me in to debate it!”

  He uttered a sequence of dissatisfied sounds but finally turned, let loose my knees, and let me slide down onto the dock. I was relieved to be on my own two feet again, but the relief vanished as I noticed Elyas had “forgotten” to take his arms from around my middle and was resting his chin on my shoulder from behind.

  “Let go of me!” I said, struggling to break free, but he shook his head and held me tighter. “Elyas!” I felt hot and cold at the same time. I thrashed wildly and after a couple more attempts managed to free myself. I ran away with huge strides and couldn’t breathe again until I had reestablished my safety zone. I turned to him and glared with squinted eyes.

  “I hate you,” he mumbled.

  “Ditto,” I replied, crossing my arms.

  We stood facing each other, as I shot telepathic lightning bolts at him. The look he returned reminded me of a thunderstorm more than anything. At some point, I just trudged past him and returned to the campfire. To my disappointment, he silently followed, a step behind.

  When we made it back to the middle of the meadow, we found nothing but couples. Alex and Sebastian had returned. Alex sat in front of Sebastian, their arms and legs intertwined. Sophie rested her head, eyes closed, on Andy’s shoulder.

  I didn’t say anything and just sat down on one of the blankets.

  “Sebastian, if it occurs to you to explain anything else to Emely, would you please give me a heads-up?” Elyas said.

  I smirked, but only until he sat down much too close to me. I scooted away.

  Sebastian frowned. “Why?”

  “Don’t ask,” Elyas mumbled, grabbing for a bottle of water.

  “What have you two been up to?” Alex asked, leaning her head on Sebastian’s upper arm.

  “Oh, you know Emely,” Elyas answered, unscrewing the cap to the bottle. “She shamelessly came on to me, as always. When will she finally understand she has no chance with me?” He smirked at me and took a drink.

  “That’d be nice,” I grumbled. He looked me in the eye so intensely that I forgot who I was.

  Emely Schwarz?

  No! Emely Winter! Winter!

  “Do I have spinach in my teeth or something?” I muttered, looking away.

  “No,” he said. “But there’s a spider in your hair.”

  I leaped up and shook out my hair. “Is it gone?” I yelled.

  All I heard was soft laughing. I peered through my hair and saw that same unabashedly mischievous twinkle in his eyes.

  “No spider then, huh?”

  The five other people smiled and shook their heads.

  I turned red and sat back down. What a jerk!

  “Sorry,” he said. His smile was as sweet as honey . . . I almost couldn’t be mad. Almost. I gave him a push and glared at him for the next ten minutes straight.

  After that, the longer I ignored him, the more it seemed to draw him in. He bombarded me with stupid comments, and Andy laughed loudly at each of them. We played a scooting game: he scooted toward me five times, and I scooted away five times.

  “Emely,” Elyas said, pestering me again. “I urgently need your help.”

  “All you have to do,” I said, not knowing what he wanted, “is keep moving your hand up and down, and you’ll get there without me.”

  Andy and Sebastian burst out laughing, though Elyas only smirked. “First of all, I would not want to get there without you. Second, I was going to discuss something different.”

  “Why am I worried you’ll tell me, whether I want to hear it or not?”

  “Pay attention,” he said. “I know a girl. And I know she’s totally into me. But she won’t admit it—not at all.”

  I looked at the sky and waited.

  “So, my question is this: What can I do to make her give in and have the night of her life?”

  My fingers flexed, wanting nothing more than to take hold of his neck and squeeze.

  “I wonder if it would be the night of her life, or the night of someone else’s life,” Sebastian said, raising an eyebrow. I nodded my thanks to him before turning back to Elyas.

  “Here’s what you do.”

  “Yes?” He leaned closer.

  “Rent yourself a room at Guantánamo Bay, and don’t come back until I’ve had a chance to change my name and graduate.”

  Elyas grinned. “Oh, you don’t mean that, sweetums.”

  “True,” I said. “What I’d actually prefer is that you never come back. Ever.” I increased the space between us again, and gave him the cold shoulder.

  “Elyas,” I heard Andy say. “Why don’t you just tell her you like her?”

  Oh, great. Now his friends were in on it.

  “Emely,” Elyas said, though I didn’t look at him. “Please look at me.”

  “Why?”

  “Please.”

  Something in his voice made me act against my will. I turned to him and looked into his eyes. I felt caught in some kind of magic spell emanating from the blue-green rim of his irises.

  “Emely, I like you,” he said.

  I stopped breathing as warmth flooded me from head to foot.

  Why couldn’t these words actually be true?

  I looked back at the fire. “If you say so, Elyas.”

  “That’s why,” he said with a sigh, turning to Andy.

  Elyas and I didn’t say anything to each other for fifteen minutes. The mood in the group was pleasant again; the incident with Jessica had receded in everyone’s minds, but an invisible wall had arisen between Elyas and me. It was odd. Normally I was the one who put up the wall, but this time it was Elyas. I was surprised when my name came out of his mouth again after the pause.

  “Say, Alex,” Elyas said. “Is Emely always so . . . uptight?”

  I stared at him, mouth agape. Then I hit his shoulder. “You are so full of BS!”

  He laughed. “OK, then let’s say . . . standoffish. Is she that way just with me or with other guys, too?”

  “Hmm . . . ,” Alex said, running her fingers over Sebastian’s hands, which were around her middle. Elyas took a sip of water. “It’s probably because she’s a virgin.”

  Elyas spit his water out into the fire. He lowered his head and coughed several times. Meanwhile I couldn’t believe what I had heard. What kind of crap was Alex talking?

  “V-v-virgin?” Elyas stammered, his eyes tearing up from having choked on the water.

  “Of course, you jerk,” I moaned. “I’ve been saving myself for you. What do you think?” I had a good idea what the word virgin conjured in a stupid man’s head. “What kind of bullshit is that?” I asked Alex. She giggled, but everyone else didn’t know whether to laugh or feel sorry for me.

  “My God . . . Emely . . . a virgin . . . ,” Elyas said with a trembling jaw. “Please, come with me into the tent . . . please . . . I’ll be very gentle, I promise,” he pleaded.

  I dropped my forehead into my hand. “God, Elyas! This is total crap. I’m twenty-three! Do I look remotely that desperate? No! So much for the topic of virgins.” I glared back at Alex. “Now tell them the truth.”

  She grinned. “OK, fine. Maybe not a virgin in the c
onventional sense . . .”

  “What does that mean, ‘not in the conventional sense’? Alex, stop messing around. Otherwise your terrorist of a brother won’t give me a moment’s peace!”

  “I just mean you could pass for one again.”

  “Why are we discussing my sex life in front of others?” My voice was getting higher and higher.

  “Let’s be honest, Emely,” she said, unfazed. “How long has it been since you had sex?”

  I puffed up my cheeks, but instead of replying, I let the air out of my mouth. When had the Beatles come out with their first album again?

  Everyone looked at me, as my ears got hotter and hotter.

  “See?” Alex laughed. “You don’t even know, yourself.”

  I pressed my lips together. “Of course I know! But it’s none of your business!”

  “She doesn’t know,” Alex sang.

  God, what kind of a shitty person was I calling my best friend? And why hadn’t I wrung her neck ages ago?

  “Don’t be embarrassed, Emely,” Elyas said, scooting closer to me. “I haven’t had sex for three months, myself.”

  Three months? Was he trying to pull one over on me again? Why didn’t he just say the day before yesterday?”

  “That’s a long time, for Elyas,” Andy explained.

  “Alex, I hate you! I hate you. I hate you.”

  “Oh, come on. I didn’t mean it in a bad way. But it is a fact.” She shrugged.

  My eyes narrowed into the darkest of glares. “You think you get to open that gaping flytrap of yours just because you’ve got Mr. ‘I know all your wishes just from looking into your eyes and I like to cuddle and sex can wait and I look hot, too’ sitting there next to you!” I shot an apologetic look at Sebastian, who merely raised his hand to say he could live with that description.

  “Hey, except for the ‘sex can wait’ part, you can have all that with me!” Elyas interjected. I just glared at him.

  “I only mean you don’t need to keep everyone and everything at bay,” Alex said.

  “I don’t keep everyone and everything at bay. Just your stupid brother! Now let’s change the subject!”

  “Stupid?” Elyas repeated.

  “Yes, stupid! And stop driving me crazy!” But that was exactly what he was planning, and he smiled. I ground my teeth.