Chapter 24 #3
Claire turned into me and lay with her head on my chest, her red hair spread across my skin, one leg hooked over mine. We held each other tight as her breathing slowed. Through the open window, the frogs were in full chorus now.
"I've wanted that for so long. Since the day you walked Wendell home and stood in my kitchen like you weren't sure you were allowed to sit down."
I laughed softly. "That long?"
"That long." She traced a line along my collarbone with her fingertip. "I didn't act on it because I was terrified. But I thought about it. At night, alone in this bed. I touched myself thinking about you."
The admission was raw and honest and without a trace of embarrassment.
"I did the same," I said. "Thinking about you."
Claire was quiet for a moment. Her hand rested lightly on my chest.
"And Scout?"
The question sat between us. I thought about Scout in the hotel room in Port Townsend, dancing barefoot to music from my phone.
Scout in her secret place by the river, pulling her shirt over her head with the directness of someone who had never learned to be ashamed of her own body.
Private moments. Hers. Ours. Just between us.
"I don't want to talk about what Scout and I do. Not behind her back. It wouldn't be fair to her."
Claire lifted her head and looked at me.
"That's the right answer." She settled back against my chest. "Anyway, I know she's in love with you. It's plain on her face every time she looks at you. She doesn't hide it. I don't think she knows how."
"Scout told me something similar about you. That you shared the same feeling toward me."
"She said that?"
"She did. She quoted Rilke. 'A love that consists of two solitudes protecting and bordering on, and greeting each other.'"
Claire was quiet, turning the words over.
"What does that mean?"
"She said it means love is not a fence. That it doesn't work by enclosure."
The frogs sang. The curtain moved in a breath of night air that carried the green smell of the tea rows.
"Maybe Scout recognizes something the rest of us are still catching up to," Claire said carefully. "The bond all three of us share."
"What is it?"
"I don't know just yet." Her hand found mine under the sheet and squeezed. "Neither do you. But we're building it. Maybe--"
Claire's phone buzzed on the nightstand. The screen lit up, casting blue light across the ceiling. Claire reached for it, squinted at the display and tapped the speaker icon.
"Hey, Mom. How was bingo?"
"I won oven mitts," Bessie Anne said brightly. "Blue ones with little roosters on them. Very handsome."
"Congratulations."
"Don't congratulate me. The Nelson woman won the toaster oven. Again. Third time this year. I don't understand how one person can win the toaster oven three times in one year unless there is some kind of arrangement in place."
Claire pressed her lips together, squinting at me as she held in her laughter.
"Sounds like the bingo is rigged."
"It is rigged. It is absolutely rigged. We need that young journalist with the glasses to come investigate. The one from the Bremerton Times. He should do a piece on the bingo scandal because that is what it is, Claire. A scandal."
"I'll tell him next time I see him."
"You do that. I'm getting a ride home with Dottie Farwell. We're leaving early because the bingo caller is sick and nobody is in the mood to get what he has. We'll be there in about half an hour."
"Okay."
There was a deliberate pause. Bessie Anne's voice shifted, becoming lighter and more teasing.
"Half an hour, Claire. Thirty minutes. If there's anything you need to do before I get there, I'd suggest you do it."
Claire's eyes went wide. She looked at me. I was lying beside her with the sheet pulled to my waist, grinning so hard my face ached.
"I... understand, Mom."
"Good." Another pause. "Am I on speaker phone?"
"Yes."
"Hello, Tomás. Are you well?"
I opened my mouth. Nothing came out. I lay there naked in Claire Beaumont's bed while her mother waited on speakerphone.
Claire nudged me with her elbow, urging me to speak.
"Uh... I'm well, Bessie Anne. Thank you."
"I hope you enjoyed the cake and ice cream."
"It was delicious. Thank you."
"You're very welcome. Sorry I'm coming home so soon."
"It's no problem. None at all."
"Half an hour. Good night, Tomás."
The line went dead.
Claire dropped the phone on the mattress and pressed both hands over her face.
"Oh my God."
The laughter came up from somewhere deep in my chest and burst out of me.
Claire's composure shattered at the same moment, and we lay there in her bed laughing until the sheets shook.
Claire rolled toward me and buried her face in my shoulder, her body heaving with it, and I could feel tears on my skin, but they were the good kind.
"Get dressed!" She shoved my chest. "Get dressed and get moving before my mother comes home."
"I feel like I'm sixteen again. Sneaking out of my girlfriend's room."
I rolled out of bed and Claire's hand smacked across my butt, sharp and stinging.
"Don't forget your underwear, Tomás!"