Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
EVE
I ’m snuggled into the couch cushions, listening to the logs in the fireplace crackle and sketching the beach we visited this morning, when I hear a low “Hey.”
Still not immune. The sound of Hunter’s deep voice has my steady heart rate immediately quickening.
I clear my throat before replying, “Hey.”
“Cool if I chill in here?” Hunter asks.
He’s standing at the opposite end of the couch, looming over me like the rocky cliffs I was admiring earlier. Beautiful and rugged and untouchable.
I fake a cough to…I don’t know why. Act casual, I guess? “Yeah, of course.”
Technically, I’m in his bedroom. I should be the one asking permission to enter.
Hunter nods once, then takes a seat a couple of feet away. Not as far away as he could sit, but not right next to me either. A polite distance, in a huge room, and it still feels like he’s stealing more than his fair share of oxygen. I’m breathing fast, yet I can’t seem to pull enough air in.
Air that smells like him. The same scent as his car, except a more concentrated form. My brain isn’t working fast enough to identify a single component, distracted by the giddiness that appears whenever we’re in close proximity.
Ben always used the same cologne—a vanilla-and-tobacco scent that I secretly hated. I bought him different brands as gifts, but he never strayed from his favorite. It became a joke, almost, the unopened bottles sitting unused on his dresser. The final bottle I gave Ben, I told him, “I thought this would look good with the rest of the set.”
Looking back, it’s not funny. It’s another example of a time I hid my true feelings, like with my dad last night. And a premonition of how my relationship with Ben would end. There were always limits to what we’d do for each other. He never changed his cologne. I feigned interest in the films he enjoyed. I don’t know if we ever compromised. If our interests overlapped, great. If they didn’t, we’d each do our own thing. And there’s a very thin line between healthy boundaries and creating distance.
I glance at Hunter’s profile. He’s interlocked his hands behind his head as he stares at the muted television. Hockey is on. I thought the game the guys were watching before dinner ended. But either it’s still going on or another team is playing now.
The jerseys on ice disappear, replaced by a commercial for a fast-food restaurant.
“You didn’t feel like hot-tubbing?” I ask Hunter.
That was tonight’s after-dinner activity. Aidan suggested it. He, Rylan, Harlow, and Conor are all out there, laughing and playing music.
One corner of Hunter’s mouth lifts an inch. “Nah,” he replies, glancing over. “What are you drawing?”
“Uh, the beach we went to.”
“Can I see?”
I hold my sketchpad toward him. As soon as it’s gripped in his hand, my stomach starts performing an acrobatic routine. My teeth worry against my lower lip.
If he flips back a few pages, he’ll see the drawing I did of him in the car. Sadly, I’m not sure that would be the most embarrassed I’ve been around Hunter. But it would be a close second.
Hunter doesn’t flip through the pages. He just stares at the sheet it’s open to. Stares , like he’s really looking, not just taking an obligatory glance. Long enough for me to feel very self-conscious.
I roll the pencil between my fingers nervously. Chew my lip until I’m worried I’ll break skin. Clear my throat. “It’s not finished. I was just?—”
“You drew this? Just now, after dinner? You just sat down and drew this ?”
“Um, yes?”
“Wow. Fuck. I mean, you’re good. You’re really talented, Eve.”
“Thanks,” I say softly. My stomach is a riot of butterflies right now.
He’s still studying my drawing.
It’s not my best work. It’s not even completed. But Hunter is looking at it like he’s genuinely impressed.
Compliments are always nice. But something about Hunter’s praise hits differently. It feels…earned? Like he wouldn’t say something he didn’t mean.
A few seconds later, he hands my sketchbook back. “I draw a mean stick figure, you know.”
I smile. “Oh, yeah?”
“Yep. I use a ruler to make sure that all the arms and legs are the same length. My first-grade teacher was so impressed by my technique that my family portrait was picked for the spot of honor above the whiteboard.”
“Whoa.”
Hunter nods somberly. “I know.”
“Were there a lot of stick figures in the portrait?” I ask, then shake my head. “Sorry. That was a really weird way to ask about your family.”
He props a socked foot on the coffee table. “All good.” His knee bounces once before he continues. “And uh, not really. Just me, my parents, and my brother.”
“Your mom and dad are still together?”
“Yeah. They’re kinda like those guys.” He nods toward the commotion coming from the patio. “Lovey-dovey. Grossed me out as a kid, but now…it’s nice.”
I would have guessed that Hunter comes from a traditional family. He has that settled ease I associate with a more stable home situation than I experienced. A mom who baked cookies after school and a dad who built a swing set in the backyard one weekend.
Hunter lifts his arm and rotates his shoulder a couple of times. “Think I messed my shoulder up paddling out earlier,” he says.
It’s a casual comment. But it also occurs to me that he’s deftly steering the subject away from his family.
“How was surfing otherwise?” I ask.
“I would have rather walked on the beach,” Hunter replies. His expression turns wry. “Don’t tell Aidan.”
“I won’t,” I assure him.
“The water wasn’t warm and Hart spent most of the time talking about this shark documentary he watched with Harlow. I guess surfers often get mistaken for seals.” He rotates his shoulder again. “I hadn’t swum in a while and stopped lifting regularly after the season ended.”
“Well, you’ve still got a six-pack.”
For a few seconds, I’m able to pretend that thought stayed in my head.
But when my eyes meet Hunter’s blue ones, the corners are crinkled from his grin. “Thought you didn’t see anything?”
There’s no chance I’m not bright red. “I wasn’t—I was talking about this morning. When you were, um, shirtless.”
I don’t think clarifying that made things better. That might have made things worse. Essentially, I’ve admitted to checking him out multiple times.
He nods, still grinning.
And, despite my embarrassment, I’m a little proud. Even around Conor and Aidan, I haven’t seen Hunter smile that wide.
Since I’m already blushing, I figure the next words can’t hurt. “Harlow mentioned that you had to carry me to the car last night. Thank you. And, uh, sorry. That you had to. Not my finest moment.”
“No thanks necessary,” he tells me.
Hunter says that like any guy would think to carry his best friend’s girlfriend’s best friend after she’d downed too many tequila shots. When, in my experience, college guys and chivalrous are not three words that are used in conjunction with each other.
I glance down at the drawing in my lap. Wriggle my toes inside my striped fuzzy socks. I want to keep talking with him, but I don’t know what to say next.
The giddiness isn’t evaporating. It’s rolling over me in endless waves, like I’m standing at the edge of the ocean I was drawing and water keeps kissing the shore.
I’m alone with Hunter Morgan. I’m alone with Hunter Morgan. I’m alone with Hunter Morgan.
Maybe if I repeat it enough times, the shock value will start to wear off and I’ll think of something witty to say.
“Can I ask you a random question?” he asks suddenly.
I glance over. “Yeah. Sure.”
“Where are your folks staying for graduation?” He rubs his shoulder again. “That’s why my mom called earlier. She’s trying to make plans and thinks the hotel they stayed at before is too far from campus.”
A question he could have asked the group when he climbed in the car. Instead he’s asking only me, now.
“I think my mom is staying at the Westin in Loughton. And my dad…he’s not coming. He called to tell me last night. But the Westin’s nice. About fifteen minutes from campus, and not that pricey. They probably raised rates for graduation, but hopefully not too much. I’d suggest it to your mom.”
I can feel Hunter’s eyes on me, but I don’t look over. I roll my pencil between my fingers, pretending to focus on my drawing.
“I’m really sorry, Eve.”
I nod, then tuck a piece of hair behind my ear. “Thanks. It shouldn’t have been…” I exhale, then relax deeper into the couch, letting the sketchbook slide off my lap. “My dad and me…it’s one of those situations that’s always sucked. I accepted it sucked a long time ago, and it’s just gone through different degrees of suckiness since. So, I shouldn’t have been surprised, but I was.”
“I know exactly what you mean.”
The sentence is earnest. There’s no hesitation. No uncomfortable edge to Hunter’s tone.
It compels me to continue talking. “That’s why I drank so much last night. But I promise it was a one-time thing. You won’t need to employ any more heroics this trip. I’ll get over it. It’s just a silly ceremony, anyway.”
“It’s a ceremony celebrating four years of hard work. It’s not silly.”
His matter-of-fact statement cuts deep. It’s what I was hoping my mom would say, I realize. I needed some acknowledgment that I have a right to be disappointed my father won’t be there to see me graduate college. It’s a moment that will mean something to me. And I wanted it to be a moment that meant something to him too.
I nod jerkily. “Yeah. You’re right. But I promise I’m done being a disaster.”
“I promise I’ve never thought you were a disaster, Eve.”
The soft sincerity in Hunter’s voice is not helping the secret crush situation.
I thought that was the point of crushes—they’re rooted in fantasy. They’re an escape from reality and its inevitable disappointments. They’re based on tiny, enticing glimpses of someone, not the full, flawed picture. But each longer look I get at Hunter only makes me like him more.
I glance at the television. The hockey game is back on, colorful jerseys darting around on the ice.
“Do you miss playing hockey?” I ask.
“Yeah.” When I sneak a peek at him, Hunter’s staring at the screen. “But it had to end sometime, and it couldn’t have ended any better than it did.”
“Will you, uh, explain it to me?” I ask.
I feel his eyes on me, but keep mine straight ahead. “Hockey?”
“Uh-huh. I’ve only been to one game, and I didn’t figure out much aside from it being a good thing when the blue jerseys scored.”
Hunter doesn’t reply right away. When I muster the courage to glance over, he’s studying me instead of the game. Almost like he’s testing my true level of interest.
I must pass, because he holds out a hand. “Can I use that?”
I flip to a fresh page before handing my sketchbook and pencil over.
“Okay, so—” He draws a huge oval on the page, slashing a line down the center and two more on either side of it. “Here’s the rink. Red line and two blue lines. Goals are here and here.” Hunter adds two X’s to each end of the oval. “Each team is allowed six players on the ice at a time, one being the goalie. Two defensemen, who guard their end of the rink and assist the goalie in preventing the other team from scoring.”
“That’s what you play, right?” Played , I guess, but he doesn’t correct me.
Hunter nods. “Right. Then there are the two wingers and the center, who are on offense. Their main purpose is to score goals for their team, but when they’re past the blue line and in the opposing team’s zone, the defensemen will typically come down to assist. Just like the other team’s wingers and center will hang back and help play defense in certain situations. Players follow the puck, for the most part. If it’s by your goal, you’re focused on getting it as far away as possible. If it’s by the other team’s goal, you’re trying to get it in the goal. Doesn’t matter your position, as much.”
“That’s why all the players are gathered in the same spot?” I gesture at the screen, where there’s currently a clump of mixed jerseys.
“Yeah. To prevent a goal, you have to be close to the puck. To score a goal, you have to be close to the puck. Half those guys are trying to get it closer to the pipes, the rest are trying to send it in the opposite direction.”
“Makes sense,” I say, and I’m not even lying.
Sports have always been this elusive clump of rules and jargon and chants that, frankly, I’ve had no interest in trying to decipher. My sudden interest absolutely has something to do with Hunter, but I’m also glancing between his drawing and the screen, attempting to figure out which players are defensemen and which are the wingers and center. The goalie, at least, I can identify easily.
“Okay, what else? Uh, there are three periods. Twenty minutes apiece. And these”—he adds five circles to his drawing, one in the very center and two toward each end—“are the face-off circles. Whenever there’s a stoppage of play, that’s how the game resumes. One of the refs drops the puck, and whoever is playing center for each team fights for possession.” He glances at me. “Still with me?”
“Uh-huh. I think I followed.”
“You sure?” He passes me my sketchbook and pencil back. “I’ve never actually explained hockey to anyone before. As my first pupil, you owe it to me to tell me if I suck.”
“You can give me a pop quiz later, if you want.”
He smiles and glances at the screen. It’s back to ads. “We should go over penalties and offsides and icing first. Overtime rules, for extra credit.”
I can’t tell if he’s kidding or not.
Hunter is complicated. It’s not a bad thing, just noticeable. The guys I’ve dated have been endearing and open and…simple. There was no puzzle to decipher. Never any sign of the quiet intensity that radiates from Hunter like a forcefield.
I noticed it the first time we met, and it’s just as compelling now.
And for some reason, this moment is when I decide to finally say, “You probably don’t remember, but we met freshman year. At one of those first-week mixers. The very first night on campus.”
Hunter’s hand stalls in the midst of adjusting the pillow under his arm, and immediate regret swamps me.
I’ve debated bringing that night up every single time I’ve seen him since. But I’ve always talked myself out of it, convinced it was weird or unnecessary or would result in the awkward pause I’m experiencing now. Now that the words are out, I can tell they were a mistake.
Of course he doesn’t remember. It was a ten-minute interaction nearly four years ago. And I’ve just put Hunter in the uncomfortable position of admitting how forgettable I am or else feigning remembrance of a meaningless moment.
“Are you guys seriously sitting on the couch instead of in the hot tub ?” Aidan’s booming voice fills the living room, cutting through the heavy silence.
I’ve never been more relieved for an interruption.
I glance over one shoulder, spotting Aidan in the kitchen rummaging through the fridge. “I, um, forgot my suit.”
I wasn’t expecting to swim in the ocean, and Harlow didn’t mention a hot tub. Which is probably for the best, because I have a strong feeling sitting in a hot tub with two couples would really feel like fifth-wheeling.
“Did you tell Rylan? She basically brought her entire closet. I’m sure she has an extra.”
I can’t think of a tactful way to tell Aidan that my boobs are twice the size of his girlfriend’s, and that bikinis aren’t exactly a one size fits all situation, so I just respond with a vague “Maybe.”
And then, before Aidan can exit and leave me and Hunter alone, I stand and stretch. “I’ll come outside in a little bit. I just have to use the bathroom first.”
I flee before Aidan or Hunter can say a word.
The rest of this trip, I’m triple -guessing before opening my mouth.
Especially around Hunter.