Unlit Star

by Lindy Zart

  I shrug, faking a nonchalance I do not feel. It's embarrassing, really. The first time is supposed to be special and with someone you love. Mine was with a guy I didn't really like or know all too well. The alcohol I'd consumed at the party that night didn't help with my decision-making skills. He was sitting there and I was sitting there and it just sort of happened. I felt dirty and cheap for a long time after that. I feel it even more right now, thinking about it, especially compared to how I feel about Rivers and how it would feel with Rivers. It would mean something. It would mean everything, which means it would mean too much. I have not fully admitted my feelings for him to myself, although I have, at least, admitted I have them.

  “That's your answer? To shrug?”

  “Well, at least I didn't say sigh.”

  He moves away, situating himself in a patio chair farther away from me.

  “You did not just physically shun me.”

  Rivers' response is to glare into the lapping water of the pool. I want to laugh at the same time I want to roll my eyes, but then I really look at him. He is actually upset over this, over who I had sex with, or maybe that I ever had sex with anyone, or maybe that it wasn't with him, or...isn't.

  His body is tense, his lips pulled down and fire blazing in his eyes, but I can see beyond the anger. I can see into him and I can see he is angry because he cares about me, and oh, if that doesn't pull at something deep inside me. Looking at him, taking in his stance and the pure energy that is him, I feel poignancy wash over me, but there is sweetness to it as well. And desire. Yeah, I want him. I admit it, and not just a little, but a lot. He is this beautiful, dark creature that is consuming me the longer I am around him.

  “Why are you so mad?” I quietly ask, moving to stand near him.

  “I honestly don't know,” he admits, glancing up at me. He shakes his head and sighs, looking down at his clasped hands.

  “You know what I think?”

  “What?” he asks with hesitation clear in his voice.

  “I think we should go shopping.”

  “For?”

  “I don't know. Whatever we want.”

  “You know what I think?”

  “What?”

  He looks up at me. “I think you're terribly obvious when you're trying to change the subject.”

  “Duh.” I grin.

  Rivers gets to his feet. “Do you like steak?”

  “Now who's changing the subject?”

  “Steaks on the grill sound good.” He puts his hands on his hips and studies the fancy stainless steel grill across the deck. “Do you think we can manage it without starting anything on fire?”

  “I guess we won't know until we try.”

  He snorts. “I guess. We need to go to the store.”

  “We? As in you and me? In public again? Together? Are you sure you want to chance it? Someone might recognize us.”

  He looks up at the sky. “Why did my mom have to hire such a smartass to babysit me?” Glancing at me, he answers, “Depends on if you're going to put on a big show again or not.”

  “I'll try to contain my theatrical tendencies.”

  “And I'll try not to fall on my face while attempting to walk.”

  I thread my arm through his as we walk toward the house. “Do you know how unbelievably awesome we are?”

  Rivers pauses as he glances down at me, secrets and emotions unable to be kept hidden floating in the depths of his eyes. “I do now.”

  We take the Charger. He lets me drive. I can tell he regrets that decision when I roll the windows down, crank the stereo up, and maneuver us through traffic like I am a race car driver. 'It's Tricky' by RUN-DMC is on the radio and I whoop, fist pumping the air.

  “This song is amazing!” I shout to Rivers over the force of the wind, bopping in the seat as I drive.

  “You are absolutely out of your mind!” he tells me, but he's laughing.

  I pull into the parking lot of Market Fresh and cut the engine, grinning out the front window. Letting my head fall against the headrest, I laugh as my heart pounds from the exhilarating ride. “I love this car.”

  Rivers doesn't respond and I turn my head to look at him. He is watching me with a strange expression on his face. His eyes never leave mine as he ever so slowly brings his rough hand to my cheekbone and lets his fingers slide down the side of my face. My breathing becomes shallow, the rise and fall of my chest fast and deep.

  “What are you thinking?”

  His eyes fall to my mouth. He focuses on the dip and curve of my lips as he answers, “I'm thinking I'm glad I fell into the water that day.” He looks up, holding my eyes.

  “You're thankful your legs are a mess, your face is scarred, and your life has been changed forever?” I keep my tone dubious, but I really, really want him to say yes. I guess that makes me selfish.

  “You're here, aren't you?”

  “Yes,” I breathe.

  “And you don't care about what I look like, do you?”

  “No.”

  “In fact, you think I'm pretty hot.” Half of his mouth lifts.

  I roll my eyes. “Upon occasion. When your mouth is shut, usually.”

  He laughs, but immediately sobers. “Knowing that makes me think maybe I'm not so bad the way I am. I'm okay not being perfect.”

  “You were never perfect.”

  “But close,” he tells me, his lips turning up at the corners.

  There is this giddy, sick, swirly feeling starting in my stomach and bubbling up to my throat. I want to laugh. I want to toss my head back and shout from the pressure of it. What is it? As I stare at Rivers, unable to keep a smile from my face, I think I know what it is. It's him. He makes me feel this way. He makes me look past all the crap that has the power to bring me to my knees if I let it, and he makes me strong enough to stand. I think that's what I do for him as well. I'm not even going to try to figure out why.

  I turn in the seat to face him, reaching my hand forward and letting it caress the length of his marred flesh. Tenderness washes through me and I know it shows in my expression. “You should be proud of your scars, and you know why? Because your scars tell the world that you were stronger than whatever gave them to you.”

  “What about you? Where are your scars?”

  I look away, my hand falling to my lap. “Mine are where you can't see them.”

  “So they run deeper than mine.”

  “Deeper? Maybe, maybe not. Are they any more significant than yours? No. We all have scars, Rivers, in some form or another. Yours are just more visible than some. Doesn't mean they hurt any less.”

  He tilts his head. “You know what I think I like the best about you?”

  I squint my eyes at him. “What?”

  “You make me think.” He opens the door, carefully shifting his body out and up.

  I meet him at the side of the car, unconsciously reaching for his hand. I don't realize what I have done until his hand is lifting to mine. Without hesitation, he threads his fingers through mine—naturally, without thought. I look down at our clasped hands and then up to his face. Rivers has a faint smile on his mouth. He is unapologetic. That hits me hard, shattering through whatever lingering doubt I had about the popular boy falling for the loner girl. What we were in high school doesn't even matter to him. The emotions I have for him grow, deepen.

  I hold his hand tightly, feeling the warmth of it move up my arm until it is like I am cocooned in all of his heat. I am ablaze with Rivers. I sing the lyrics to 'Piano Man' by Billy Joel as we walk to the store and he joins in, surprising me that he knows the song, and that his deep voice harmonizes so well with my higher one. I go to drop his hand when we get to the tan and brown building and he grips my hand harder, telling me without words that he refuses to let me go.

  Our eyes meet, his fierce and determined, and I spontaneously kiss his nose. He does something really crazy then. He drops my hand long enough to cup my face and he kisses me, right in the entrance of Market Fresh, in public
, for anyone and everyone to see. It isn't a quick kiss. It isn't a sweet kiss. It's deep and long and powerful. It makes my stomach swoop and my lips tingle as I get lost in Rivers, forgetting where we are, forgetting the world around us.

  It's the whistling that finally reaches through the fog of my brain. We break apart, smiling at each other. How long we smile at one another, I do not know, but my face feels unusually warm and my mouth hurts from the wideness of it, so it must be for quite some time.

  “We should probably go inside,” Rivers finally tells me.

  “Yeah.”

  I feel half-drugged as we walk up and down the aisles. It's chilly inside the store and my skin pebbles. Rivers shops one-handed, the other firmly locked around mine for the duration of our shopping experience. “I wanted to fly planes when I was a kid,” he tells me as we pick out T-bone steaks, placing them in the carrier I hold in my free hand.

  “You don't anymore?”

  He shrugs. “Seems a little farfetched. It was just a kid thing. What did you want to be?”

  This is an unusually hard question for me. It shouldn't be. I try to simplify it as we stand in the checkout lane. “Well,” I begin, immediately faltering.

  “Well, what? Why don't you want to tell me? I can tell from the expression on your face. It wasn't something bad, was it?” he teases. “Did you want to be a government assassin or what?”

  “I liked to create things, but I wasn't artistic. I liked to sing, but not enough to want to pursue it as a career. I've always liked patterns, colors, and putting them together in unusual ways. I like to decorate. My mom and I redid the kitchen last summer. It was fun,” I end with, waiting for the strange look to come.

  But it doesn't. He nods, a thoughtful expression on his face. “I remember in Home Economics junior year—you made a scarf. It was red and purple with these yellow dots on it. You designed it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “It was hideous.”

  I laugh. “How is it that you don't remember much about me, but you always remember the negative things?”

  He shrugs. “When you did something unexpected, I took notice.”

  Like this summer. Everything I have done has been unpredicted, most of all to me. And I am now realizing that Rivers paid more attention to me than I thought, and probably more than he knew too.

  “You know, being a government assassin takes all kinds of creativity, in case you need something to fall back on. If you're decorating career doesn't work out.”

  I bump my arm to his, knocking him off-balance. Rivers' hold on my hand tightens as we both stumble back, him landing against an aisle of chips and me on top of him. The sound of whole chips becoming partial ones crackles around us and our eyes meet guiltily. I laugh as we scramble to a standing position. Rivers grins and brushes bangs from my eyes. Every touch I receive from him sends a tingling through me.

  He pays for the food and we walk back out into the hot day, his hand once more locked with mine.

  "Why did you want to be a pilot?" I ask him.

  "Because I wanted to be free, and the sky seemed limitless. Plus, there's the whole being able to fly thing. It's like being Superman without the cape." He grins.

  "Free from what?"

  He looks down at his feet, not speaking for a long time. He glances at me as he says, "Everything."

  My throat tightens, sad for a young boy who disliked his world so much he wanted to be able to escape it. "And now?" He frowns at me and I specify, "Do you still feel like you need to get away from your life?" I am not entirely sure what I am asking, but the pounding of my heart lets me know how much his answer means to me.

  "I already have," he says softly. He smiles as I frown—a perfect balance of seriousness facing off lightheartedness, and draws me in for a quick hug.

  I wonder, as I get into the passenger seat, if part of him knows this can't last as well, and that is why he is so adamant about having some part of him in constant contact with some part of me. He links his free hand with mine as he drives, further affirming my thoughts. Maybe he thinks he can keep me with him from a physical link alone. If only that were possible.

  Is this his version of freedom, here, now, with me? It's funny that, with all his current restrictions, he appears happier than when he had none.

  When we get back to his house, Rivers prepares the grill as I rub spices on the steaks. I cut up a yellow pepper, zuchinni, sweet potatoes, and a red onion, tears burning my eyes and trailing down my cheeks as I do so. I toss them with oil and salt and pepper, turning to face Rivers as the patio door slides open.

  He takes in my face and smiles, snapping the tongs together. "Crying every time I leave the room is getting to be redundant."

  "I can't help it. Look." I show him the vegetables in the blue bowl. "They're so pretty."

  He leans over the island, one eyebrow lifted. "It's like a vegetable rainbow."

  "Exactly."

  Grinning as he raises his face to mine, he places a kiss against my forehead. "The smallest things make you happy. It's endearing."

  "I'll show you endearing," I mutter as I set the bowl down. "Are you going to eat any of these?"

  "I can't promise that." He pauses. "But I can promise I'll try."

  We go about grilling the steaks and vegetables, the scent of herbs surrounding us, the sound of sizzling meat filling my ears. I sit at the patio table and watch as he plays chef for me. I sip peach iced tea and eat celery with peanut butter and raisins. He occasionally glances back at me, shaking his head at my snack choice. I make sure to smile wide when my teeth are covered in peanut butter.

  "I found a toad in our backyard when I was kid."

  A smile curves his lips. "Oh yeah? And? Did you run away screaming?"

  I laugh. "No. I decided to make it my pet. I named it Cha-Cha. I found a box and put grass, rocks, and a dish of water in it. I had no idea what I was doing. Anyway, it stayed around for a few hours, humoring me, I suppose, and then it jumped out. And that was the end of my pet toad."

  "What possessed you to name it Cha-Cha?"

  I squint my eyes as I think this over. "I don't know. I guess because it looked like it was dancing when it hopped around." I shrug. "Did you have any pets?"

  "I had a kitten when I was seven." He looks down. "It got outside one day. I searched the house and yard for hours and couldn't find it. No one knew, but...it was under the car. My mom ran it over without knowing it."

  "Well, that's depressing," I tell him dryly.

  He flashes a quick, sad smile at me. "Yeah. I cried for weeks over that. Thomas got so annoyed with me moping around that he got me a stuffed cat."

  "A real stuffed cat?" I widen my eyes at him, totally kidding.

  His narrow-eyed look tells me he knows my tricks. "No. A toy one. He thought it would help."

  "Did it?"

  He shrugs, his attention locked on the food. "It didn't hurt."

  "What did you name your kitten?" I ask softly, getting up and moving to stand beside him. I rest my arm against his, giving him silent support. I rub my cheek against the hardness of his upper arm, placing a light kiss against the warm flesh.

  His smile turns to a laugh, flowing over me like the notes of an alluring melody. "He was orange and white and liked to play fetch."

  "This was a cat, right?"

  "Yeah." He glances at me. "I named him Fido."

  "I guess that's on par with Cha-Cha."

  "You could say that."

  Low music plays from his phone, his diversified taste impressing me. He likes a lot of the same music I do—Coldplay, AWOLNATION, The Killers, The Fray, Imagine Dragons, as well as older music like The Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Guns N' Roses. I move away, studying him. The lines of his form are captivating, even as he stands off-center to favor his left leg. Each movement is with purpose and I think I could watch him do anything, or nothing, and still find him interesting.

  He catches my eyes on him. "Food's ready."

&n
bsp; I nod, feeling warmth pool in my chest. "I'll get the plates and bring everything out here." I turn to leave and he grabs my wrist and tugs me back to him. I look up and his dark eyes sear mine. "Yes?"

  "I feel like I should be asking that. What are you looking at?" He waits, staring back at me like he can find the answer he seeks in my face. Maybe he can.

  "You."

  "Why? Am I really so fascinating?"

  "Oh, yes," I assure him. "You always have been."

  He releases my wrist, lines forming around his eyes as he gauges whether I am being serious or not. In this, I am. His expression clears as he says, "You too."

  A shaky exhalation of air leaves me as I spin away. I truly think he meant that. I don't even know what just happened, but it felt like a shifting in the foundation of our relationship, or how we view one another.

  The steak is delicious, and Rivers surprises me by not only trying the vegetables, but liking them enough to have two servings. We spend the afternoon in the sun; me with my layers of sunscreen on and him without. We talk about music, movies, and school, but we focus on the good and do not mention the bad. It's a lot of good-humored arguing over movies, and laughter over school. I bring up the time Sandy Smith freaked out over a spider in History class and knocked herself out by running face-first into the wall. He talks about the pep rally for the first football game senior year when Melissa Mathison and Brent Stickler got caught making out behind the bleachers and the principal made them stand before the entire student body and apologize for their indecent behavior.

  When he mentions my Halloween costume freshman year, the words I was about to say falter on my lips. Noticing my look, he asks, "What?"

  "I...I'm just surprised." I frown, looking at the hem of my orange cotton shorts. Why didn't I try to know him in school? True, Riley would have freaked out if I'd ever approached him, but I could have made an effort. I gave up on the social aspect of high school before giving it a chance. I gave up on him before I ever talked to him.

  "You won the school contest for funniest costume. You had rollers in your hair, crazy makeup all over your face, and you wore a robe over a nightgown with slippers. I couldn't believe it was you when I first saw you." He looks down, taking my hand in his and squeezing it before letting it go. "I don't think you realize how much you were noticeable, at least at times. Usually you kept to yourself and it was easy to forget you were there, but then you would do something totally out of character for you, or at least, how you were perceived to be, and...people noticed. I noticed."