by Lena Maye
“Please…” I shake my head, not knowing if I can hold on any longer. Not wanting to. I fucking plead. But they are words only for Kepler. Words I would never give to anyone else. “Please, please, please…”
“I love it when you beg.” He rewards me with a deep thrust that makes the stars spin.
My back hits hard against the tree as he strengthens his movements. My legs spread so wide my hips hurt. Air expelling in gasps, my thoughts tumbling. My body hangs between ache and pleasure.
“Please… Please—” It tears through me. I let out a cry, gripping onto him as he brings me up again—this time so high that I lose consciousness of anything else. Every muscle tenses, binding down until I don’t think I can take it anymore. Then in a frenzy, I let go with his name on my lips, my mind fuzzy with that need being answered.
I melt around him, my legs shaking. My tension releasing. I focus back on him, but the world is slightly blurry. His jaw is clenched—he’s holding back.
I don’t want him to hold back.
I tip my chin up. “Fuck me, Kepler.”
It’s not saying fuck off. This is so, so much better.
He answers with a powerful thrust, so much force that the forest flashes white. I’m dizzy and breathless, and I grab onto him as he drives into me. Thrusts that say he’s done teasing me. He’s done playing. His control vanishes—swept up in a growl that sends shockwaves down my spine. He pumps harder, filling me.
I’ve never experienced anything like it. The raw power of a man completely lost in me. Another thrust, and then he pauses, his fingers gripping my thighs so hard it almost hurts. His jaw slowly releases. He leans in to kiss me, but pauses an inch away.
Wetness touches my cheek. Am I crying again? I look up to find small specks of white floating above us, cascading between the branches of the aspens.
Snowflakes.
They flutter and float—so few they hardly exist at all. Like falling stars. They dot my cheeks and hang in his hair. He glances up at them—like I do, his breath expelling. He starts to slide out, but I hit him so hard on the shoulder that he stops.
Everything in me aches at the thought of saying what’s on my tongue. It’s a good tension. It’s a bad tension. But all I know is that it’s the truth, and I have to say it. “I’m scared for when you leave. I don’t know if I can…”
His gaze flicks over my face, his chest moving hard to catch his breath. “Just keep holding on to me.” His bicep tenses under my hard grip. “And I’ll keep holding on to you.”
His jaw is set. His voice is clear. The acceptance of a fact without doubt.
Snowflakes land on our lips and cheeks. Pricks of cold that make me smile. And for the first time, there’s a word that simmers in the back of my thoughts as I stare at him. Love. But it slips away as quickly as it came, as elusive as the snow melting against the heat of our skin.
And instead I’m left in the cold with the other truths I need to give him. The Drawer waiting for me. The minutes and hours and seconds counting down. But I can’t let them ruin this night. What we have here—now. It needs to stay crisp and untainted. Because I don’t know if he’ll want to keep holding on to me after he knows.
He leans to kiss me again, still buried inside.
I push him back. “Wait.”
He pauses, that bottom lip asking me to nibble it. His cock is hardening again, twitching. My whole body wants to grind down.
I resist the urge. “I want to talk about something in the morning.”
His forehead wrinkles. “Why not now?”
“Because I’m a little drunk and a little high. And because…” Now I do grind down, and his eyes close for a moment. He swallows hard, then he’s moving again. Steady and evenly. With that certainty I always wish I felt.
Twenty-Five
The Jeep’s backseat isn’t big enough for both of us, but at least the proximity to Kepler keeps me warm. I’m buried under blankets, pressed up against his chest—smelling like campfire and weed and sex. So, there’s a ridiculous grin on my face. Even scrunched together, I sleep better with Kepler than I ever do alone. No falling dreams. No waking with a jerk of fear.
I inch my leg out from underneath him as I try to shift my hips, but his arms snake out and pull me closer.
“You’re awake.” He nuzzles my neck, leaving small kisses. His breath warms my skin. Everything about him warms my skin. And he’s taking up more than his share of the seat. “I have granola bars in the back.”
“It’s way too cold.” I snuggle closer to him. He’s better than breakfast. “We aren’t leaving this sanctuary until it’s eighty degrees outside.”
The wind rattles the Jeep and makes my conviction to stay right-the-fuck-here more serious.
“That won’t be until next summer.” Kepler chuckles. “And you’ll miss Sloane’s family dinner and finals and the annual Rock Falls Christmas Parade.”
“Fuck it all.” I rest my head on his shoulder. “I pick you over all that.”
“Me and my beast?”
I smack him on the shoulder. “Are you ever going to forget that?”
“Not likely.” His chest rises under my cheek. Birds chirp outside, a hint the mountain day has already begun. Kepler and I anchor against the inevitable. The day will start. This moment will end.
His lips press against my forehead. “I don’t think I brought enough condoms for us to last the winter.”
I sit up. “Well, morning it is.”
This time the chuckle is deeper. Getting him to laugh makes me practically quiver. An actual smile would send me over a cliff.
“I thought that might get you moving, Lo.”
I chew on the inside of my cheek. “Why do you call me that?”
“Lo?” He moves out from under me, stretching his shoulders as he sits up. “Because it’s your name.”
“No, it’s not.” I shake my head. “You say it wrong.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Whose name is it? Yours or mine?” I tug one of the blankets up to my chin. “You know you say it wrong. Don’t pretend.”
“I’m not pretending.” Kepler leans towards me.
“You say low.” I draw out the last sound. “Not Lo.”
He stares at me for a long moment. “You think that I’m calling you ‘low’ every time I say your last name?”
“I…” Outside, the wind whistles in the evergreens. I snuggle deeper into the blanket, the chill sudden even though the wind can’t reach me in the Jeep. “That’s what I hear when you say it.”
He shifts, his hand smoothing over the back of his neck. “I never meant that.”
I blink at him. He never meant that word? The one I’ve heard over and over. I stare down at my lap. I swear I heard it.
“Say it again,” he orders.
“Lo.” I emphasize the sharpness of it, the upturn at the end instead of drop in voice. “It’s a Chinese name. My father's parents moved to Jeollanam-do in the seventies.” I say it like I really know—like I was there or something. But what do I really know about being Korean? Not much more than Kepler. Soup. Spurts of language. Korean baseball. It’s all surface. I’ve been locked away from that side of myself for my whole life.
He repeats my name—carefully. “So I’m actually wrong about something? First time for everything.”
I flip the corner of the blanket at him. “You’re obnoxious.”
He grabs the corner and tugs, pulling my blanket off. I yank it back. We tug-of-war on it and then he suddenly lets go. I fly back into the armrest, giggling. And there’s no weed affecting me this morning. It’s so easy to be with him in the quiet mornings.
I throw the blanket at his chest. “Could it always be like this?”
His fingers slide under my knee, and he pulls me closer to him. “Reality has a way of stalking us.”
I tense at his words. “I expected you to at least give me a little white lie.”
“No lies.” His thumb rolls over my kneecap, and I gasp. He
could touch me anywhere, and I’d be a puddle.
“At least no lies of our making.”
“Lies of our making? What the hell does that mean?”
He shrugs. “Nothing, really. Sometimes you have to keep other people’s secrets. You keep Cassie’s secrets.”
“I’m not sure Cassie has secrets anymore.” But Sloane does, and I bite my lip as I realize that it’s a secret I’ll keep for as long as she wants it kept. “Whose secrets are you keeping?”
“You know, just guy stuff.”
“Guy stuff?” I wrinkle my nose. “You’re right. Those are the secrets I don’t want to know.”
Kepler’s thumb rolls over my knee again. The tree branches hang in the wind—frozen. The whole world waiting for me to speak. Just say it… Kepler, I messed up. I attacked that guy. Me… I did it.
I sit up, the silence in the car stretching. Kepler shifts so he can dig a hand in his pocket. Then he checks his back pockets, his forehead deepening into a frown.
“Kepler, I—”
“Do you have my green?” He opens the Jeep door, hops out, and digs deeper into his pockets.
“No, of course not.”
He kicks the pine needles around the Jeep.
“I’m sure you’ve got more somewhere. You always do.”
“It’s not a big deal. What were you going to say?” He circles the Jeep, kicking at the pine needles and dirt, his attention about a million light years from our conversation.
I slide across the seat, letting my feet swing out the door.
He makes another circle and then stares off towards where the bonfire was last night. His hoodie is wrinkled, his hair crimped up adorably in the back. But there’s this kind of intense energy about him.
I’m about to speak when he abruptly stalks away and heads off into the trees, otherwise known as the bathroom. Or maybe he’s still searching for that baggie.
I lean against the Jeep, not sure what to do. I finally fold the blankets and find a water bottle in the back that I use to wash off my face. When Kepler gets back, he makes another circle around the Jeep.
“What are you looking for?” I ask after a minute. Even though I already have a pretty damn good idea.
“Nothing.” He unlocks a box welded into the back and roots through it. A minute later he extends me a granola bar.
I tiptoe to give him a kiss on the cheek, and he lets the lid fall shut.
“No granola bar for you?” I munch on mine, tempted to ask for another.
“Not hungry.” He shrugs and glances at the sun a few inches above the horizon. “And we should be getting back.” He crosses to the driver’s seat before I can respond.
I swallow the last bite too fast and jump up into the passenger seat just as he turns over the key.
Nothing.
I side-eye him, wanting to scream I told you so. But I keep it tucked back. This isn’t the time to push him. The orchid sits on the dash, the petals wilted. I stare at it as he tries again. And again. The Jeep remains silent. Not even starting to catch like it did last night.
“Fuck.” He hits a hand against the steering wheel and then reaches down to pop the hood. “You don’t know anything about starters, do you?”
“Not a thing,” I admit before he slides out. He fiddles under the hood for a while before slamming it shut.
“We’re going to have to walk,” he says.
I nod and slip out. The sun is higher now, the sharp shadows from the trees cutting across the path as we start the walk towards the highway. We pass through the bonfire, hoping that someone still might be around. But it’s deserted and black now. The smell of smoke still lingers—like an echo of last night.
But last night feels so far away. Kepler drops my hand and kicks at piles of pine needles around the clearing before we continue onwards, down a narrow path between the trees. I don’t know which direction we’re going, but he seems certain. So I hurry to keep up with his long strides.
I should say something, but I have no idea what. I don’t think my fuck off type of communication will help. So I follow him, my breathing labored, my feet starting to ache in my tall boots. We should stop and rest.
But he presses forward with an uncomfortable intensity.
“Kepler,” I finally call. “Slow down.”
He stops in the middle of the trail and waits for me to catch up, but as soon as I get there, he turns.
“Kepler.” I reach out to grab his hand, but he’s already walking.
He shakes his head. His breath is uneven, but his feet carry him forward. I jog to catch up with him. What the hell is he doing?
“Stop.” I grab onto his shirt and pull him to a stop.
When he turns towards me, his jaw is steel. “Don’t fucking stop me like that.”
“I’m sorry.” But I need to know what’s going on with him.
Sweat beads down his forehead and drips onto his shirt—even with the chill wind. “I need to get back in time to read a few chapters.”
I grip onto his t-shirt. “Look at me.” If there’s anything I’m good at recognizing, it’s need. It’s coming off him in waves so huge I’m worried it will knock me over.
When he finally looks at me, it isn’t reassuring like I thought it would be. It’s unnerving. His gaze jumps around. It doesn’t land on anything for more than a few seconds.
Reality. We never left it. I might be able to ignore mine for a day, but Kepler brought his reality with us.
“Let go of my fucking shirt, Lo.” His jaw clenches. The glare he’s giving me now is nothing that I’ve seen before.
So I let go, and I follow him. I don’t want to get separated. We’re at least halfway to the highway—maybe a mile there and then another mile to Kepler’s house. He’s got to stop then. A measly two miles. I’ve pushed myself through more on some of my jogs with exhaustion so heavy I didn’t know if I’d make it. What’s a little hike over uneven trail with no water?
So many times I’ve seen him smoke. His greenhouse, his life—everything revolves around it. I was a silly little girl thinking it wasn’t a big deal. It’s just weed. Not heroin or meth or any of those “real” drugs. Thinking of my own fucking problems and how it’s nice to be around someone who understands me.
Every time I get myself in control, I wake up and realize I’m even more lost.
I follow him. Over uneven trail and then asphalt and then gravel up to his stone steps. He stops in front of the door—so suddenly that I almost crash into the back of him.
“I’m sorry.” His words are quiet. I almost don’t hear them.
I nod. I don’t say it’s okay because it’s not.
He digs keys out of his pocket. “I’m working on it.”
“Working on what?”
“Static equilibrium.” He pushes open the door, turning towards me for the first time since we left the forest. “You’re like a force on me. Throwing off my balance.” He squeezes my hand for a quick second. “It’s a good thing. It’s just new.”
He steps inside and snags a joint out of a drawer by the front door. A pre-rolled joint. As if he’s had this problem before.
He lights it and takes a few drags before calling for a tow truck and getting us some water. Once the joint is smoked away, he turns to me. “Want to order carryout? We could bring something over for Cassie.”
I don’t know what else to do besides answer the question.
Twenty-Six
Kepler snags his legal pad out of my hands. “What are you working on so intently?”
“Nothing,” I say, which is pretty much the truth since I’ve been staring at a blank page for the better part of the last hour. And all last week. Ever since we returned from the camping trip, I’ve been attempting to write my list o’ future possibilities. My last therapy session I showed up without it. I don’t want to fail twice. There’s something inherently sad about failing self-work.
We’re sprawled over Kepler’s bed, physics books stuffed with Post-its circling us. A
half-smoked joint sits on his bedside table. He’s spent more time looking at it than smoking it. When I asked him about it, he shrugged and distracted me with neck nibbles that turned into other good things. I’m not going to let his willowy hotness stop me from asking about it again. But I’m also nervous about pressuring him too much.
And there are still other unspoken words between us. With every passing day, they get harder to say and easier to forget.
I tuck his gray hoodie around me and try to ignore those nerdy glasses.
He glances at my legal pad. “This does look like nothing.”
I sigh. “I’m supposed to make a list of all the possibilities for after graduation. It’s for Claire.”
“Ah.” He taps his pen against the paper. “Do you need me to get you started?”
“No.” I drop my head on the bed. Who knew self-work would be so fucking hard? Claire’s always got me doing something. If it’s not lists about the future, then it’s breathing exercises and self-reflection. But it’s good—working on my triggers. Finding a way to stop being the girl who lashes out all the time. A girl who doesn’t repeat the same mistakes.
“Okay, then. How about…” His pen scratches on paper. I sit up and steal the pad before he can finish the word.
Seriously? “Become a contortionist? Is that one of your sexual fantasies?”
“You said possibilities. I’m trying to offer a few alternatives. And the fact that it plays into my sexual fantasies is just coincidence.”
I slap him on the shoulder with the legal pad. “I could get a job with Sloane. Focusing on drug enforcement.”
His eyes narrow on me. “It’s a possibility.”
“Being a cop? That’s about as likely as contortionist.”
I stare down at Kepler’s careful writing. “I suppose you have this life stuff all figured out. With charts and graphs outlining how you’ll achieve your goals.”
He snaps a textbook closed. “I’m just guessing. Call it a good estimate of what might make me somewhat satisfied. The actual truth is I’m clueless.”