Chapter 18 Rhymes with “Endless Consternation”
Rhymes with “Endless Consternation”
Monday, Now
I wake up naked with my head wedged in the corner between the mattress and the rear door.
We never bothered with the whole soup-can leveling trick.
Or covering the windows. Instead, we had sex twice and then promptly fell asleep.
Well, mostly. One of last night’s many revelations was that I love touching Ethan Powell’s body—the definition of his shoulders and back, the slope of his neck, the hair trailing his chest, the strong muscles in his arms. I couldn’t bring myself to stop until I finally passed out from erotic exhaustion.
The best part was that I could tell he felt the same.
One moment, he’d be grabbing me with a feral hunger that drove me wild.
Then the next, he’d take his time. His fingers met my skin over and over with a reverent gentleness.
It was one of the loveliest, hottest, most chaotic nights of my life, and, in the harsh morning sun, I’m a little disappointed that daylight didn’t have the decency to stay lost awhile longer.
My bag is in the passenger seat where I threw it last night, and I dig out my last pair of clean underwear before throwing on a pair of Ethan’s light blue boxers and one of his cozy T-shirts, praying to all the available gods that the ceremony today doesn’t happen, if for no other reason than I’d rather not wear a holey concert tee to my sister’s woodland wedding.
When I slide open the van door, scents of cinnamon and coffee fill my nostrils.
Ethan’s playing the guitar again. I hesitate, hoping to catch a folky little riff before he notices.
He looks up when he hears me and smiles.
It’s one of the larger, more ridiculous ones in his repertoire.
Rays of morning light streak across his face, and he looks so damn beautiful that I almost say so out loud.
“Morning, sleepyhead,” he greets me. “The sunlight woke me up, but I was hoping to let you sleep in.”
“No luck.” I step down onto grass, enjoying the dewy blades tickling my toes. He sets down the guitar and hands me a pouch of warm gluten-free oatmeal.
“Breakfast the morning after?”
“I made coffee too.”
I bite the inside of my cheek to keep my face under control and focus on stirring my oatmeal. A tiny puff of steam releases into the air. “How’s the ankle?” I ask.
“Can’t complain.”
I tilt my head in the direction of the guitar. “Are you playing something?”
“Messing around with something new,” he replies, removing the instrument from his lap to lean it against the van.
I waggle my brows. “Were you writing a song about our coitus?”
He stands and walks over to me, wrapping his arms around the small of my back. I lean in too. I can’t seem to help myself when it comes to him. “Yes,” he responds. “But I can’t think of a rhyme for ‘full-on penetration.’?”
I scoop a spoonful of oats into my mouth. “?‘Endless consternation.’?”
“Flawless.” His forehead crinkles, like he’s working overtime to hide his amusement. “You should be the songwriter.”
I swallow and drape my hands around his neck, letting my pouch of oatmeal dangle behind him. “So, the Ethan Powell has finally written a song about me?”
My comment turns the tips of his ears an adorable shade of pink. “I’ve written dozens of songs about you.”
“What?”
“You’d have known that if I’d made it into your Spotify Wrapped.”
The phrase “dozens of songs” shouldn’t make my brain clunk around my head like a hunk of ice in a blender, but I can’t seem to stop fixating on the What will this mean? s and the For how long? s and the How will this end? s and just simply exist in the present.
I bury my face into his neck, where he smells as sweet as ever. He can’t read the anxiety on my face if he can’t see it.
With his finger, he tips my chin to his, and my tension releases into the sheer pleasure of Ethan’s mouth on mine, the way his hand cups my jaw.
The way his body presses against mine and I press back.
The physical sensation of being this close to him in every way is enough to overpower any whirring doubt.
“Nice shirt,” he says, his voice a low hum.
“Sorry. I didn’t have anything clean left. You can use my washing machine when we get back.”
“You should keep it,” he says, letting his lips drag along my neck. Pleasure crackles down my body. “Seraphina is a duo from the Bay Area. They’ve got this folky pop electronic thing going on. I think you’d like them. They’re on the playlist.”
“What playlist?”
“Yours. The ‘End of the World’ playlist. For when we have to rebuild society together. Remember?” I pull my face back and catch a glimpse of his breezy smile. “When I hear music I think you’d like, I add it to the playlist.”
My stomach somersaults, and suddenly, I’m a performer in a community theater production of Peter Pan and an overeager stagehand has just yanked me into the air by my waist. It’s possible I leave my body, because what is that?
Who curates secret playlists for friends they’ve imagined having casual sex with?
What kind of fuckboy head game is he playing at?
“Charley. Don’t.” He squeezes my waist. The pressure of it brings me back down to earth. “It’s not a big thing. I’m a musician with a weakness for curation and lists. That’s all it is. Please, don’t run into the woods.”
“I’m not going to run,” I promise. “I can’t. I’m too sore from the nude five K.”
Air sputters from his lips. “Good.” He kisses me again, and I feel a bit more myself. Or whatever version of myself hooks up with Ethan in the woods. “Our canoe’s still on the other side, but I saw Ted when I was making coffee, and he can take us over to the campsite for the wedding.”
The wedding. I’d nearly let myself forget.
“But he has to work a couple more hours before his cousin can cover his shift.”
“A couple hours?” I shake my head. “That’s not good enough. I still haven’t gotten Laurel alone.”
“Chill.” He groans into my bare shoulder. It’s so addictive, stealing every touch like we’re running out of time. It almost crowds out my worry about Laurel.
“You can pull her aside for a little sister time as soon as we get there,” he reminds me. “I’ll even run interference.”
“You’d do that?” I ask, tilting my head to get a better look at his sleepy, sweet expression.
“It’s still just a conversation, right? Then I’m on your team, Beekman.” His words seep their way inside, sticking to me like chocolate syrup. He’s on my team now. But I guess he always has been. “I’ll tackle anyone who gets in your way. Even Petey.”
“We both know you can’t take down Petey.”
“I cannot,” he agrees without an ounce of wounded machismo.
Sun streams through the trees in bursts of light, dappling his face in the early morning glow. He looks like magic. He’s a leading man in need of an equally enchanting costar.
“Oh. Don’t move,” I instruct. I inch back into the van, framing up the shot in my head. His body stays stock-still with the rigidity of a nervous child who has a spider perched on his nose. He relaxes a touch when I reappear with his camera.
“The light is incredible.” The sun is that perfect tangerine hue we only get in Minnesota during these elongated hours in late June. When the light feels endless yet the days are still too short.
“These’ll be perfect for your website,” I say, my brows drawn in my “concentration face.” “And they don’t look anything like stills from a murder documentary.”
Ethan’s eyes grow wide. “I don’t need to be in the photo. I’m selling vans .”
“You’re selling a lifestyle. You need to show people the person they want to be.”
“And they want to be me?” He’s incredulous but seems to find the idea somewhat persuasive since he’s reaching for his guitar to complete the roaming-musician aesthetic. “Should I put a hat on or something?”
“And cover that nineties heartthrob thing you have going on? Absolutely not.”
I move him to the mattress and position his arms around the guitar like he’s an articulable Ken doll.
The breeze kicks up, carrying with it florals and earthy notes of pine.
It’s my favorite thing about Minnesota summers.
It falls through your fingers like warm sand.
The minute you think it might last forever—that summer might never end—you catch that whiff of pine and you’re transported to a dark December afternoon with the cold, crisp air scratching at your cheeks like a stray cat.
But I wouldn’t want to hold on to it even if I could.
The hot, sweaty days and bitter cold nights visitors find punishing are magical.
The stark changes from season to season and complete transformation of the landscape serve to remind me that time passes, disappears even.
And I wouldn’t want to live in a place that would neglect its responsibility to gently remind me of how fleeting everything is.
It probably shouldn’t surprise me how much I enjoy being in nature.
It’s how I spent so much of my time as a kid.
I introduced myself to unfamiliar cities by capturing them with my camera.
It didn’t matter if I was dropped into places where I didn’t belong.
If I explored the woods, hiked along the shorelines, and traversed the unending city sidewalks, I could blend in.
But whatever version of discovery this is with Ethan, I prefer it.
It’s nice to be someplace new with no agenda.
It’s been so long since I could take a deep breath. I’ve been too busy with divorces and furniture sales and proving myself at work, all so I’d finally feel rooted to the ground. Somehow, I’ve neglected everything else I needed to flourish.