Blair （Fifteen Years Old）
Blair
(fifteen years old)
Slipping the curry comb from my fingers, I turned to find Denny staring at me from the barn alley. Leaning on the stall door, he tossed a handful of something into his mouth and chewed. Even in dirty jeans and a ratty T-shirt, he looked good—definitely better than the shape I was probably in. And I frantically reached up to smooth a hand over my hair, stopping to fix the scrunchie holding up my ponytail.
“Thought your grandpa had you fixing fences?” I brushed past him, swinging a bucket of grooming supplies on my short walk to the tack room.
Denny was hot on my heels. “Finished already. Was gonna see if you wanted to go fishing?”
Fingers running along the hem of my T-shirt, I peeled the thin cotton from my damp lower back. With the weather unseasonably warm for late May, I had to stop running barrels before lunch. Which meant a full afternoon with nothing to do until Kevin, one of the ranch hands, could give me a ride home in the evening. Hanging out with Denny under the shady canopy lining the riverbank sounded perfect.
“Heck yes.”
His dimpled grin filled my chest until I could float to the barn rafters, and he held a box of Nerds candy out to me. “Want some?”
I made a face. “That’s what I imagine eating aquarium gravel is like.”
He followed behind me, chomping as loud as possible, definitely aware that each crunch was sending shivers down my spine. “Maybe in texture, but not flavor. I don’t think algae is this sugary.”
“The texture is enough to turn me off, thanks.”
“More for me.”
We walked side by side down the gravel road toward the big house to grab Denny’s fishing rod. Funnily enough—and I pointed it out to him—the rocks under our boots sounded an awful lot like the handful of Nerds jostling around inside his mouth. Without hesitation, he reached down and scooped a handful of pebbles and dirt, then shook it in his cupped hand, as if he was considering eating it.
“Denny. Gross,” I warned him with a disgusted look. “That’s probably full of horse poop and whatever else.”
“Good for the immune system.” He shrugged, lifting his hand, poised to pour the fistful of earth into his open mouth.
“Denny!” I grabbed his hand. “Stop. That’s how you get worms. Don’t be such a boy.”
“You’re one to talk, Hart.” He gestured to my body and I looked down, suddenly filled with regret about my outfit. Jeans that were dustier than his, worn so thin in the knees you could catch a glimpse of skin when the lighting was right. And a Coors Light shirt I robbed from Cassidy’s beer T-shirt collection after a sleepover séance went wrong. I clung to the frayed hem, keeping my lips compressed as I swallowed hard.
As we approached the big house, Grandpa Wells rose from the wicker chair on the front porch and cleared his throat. A strange sight to see in the middle of the day—he preferred to work with the cowboys rather than sit around twiddling his thumbs. “Denver, you, uh…best head inside. Your parents want to talk to you. Blair, hop in the truck and I’ll take you home.”
Confused, I shook my head and looked at Denny to see if he knew what was going on. His nose crinkled, and he squinted in the harsh midday sun. “I finished up the fences already— swear. Blair and I were gonna head out fishing for a bit.”
“You can fish another day.” His chin jutted toward the screen door. “Do as you’re told and go inside.”
While Grandpa Wells was the type of guy to give the shirt off his back, and he treated me and the other non-Wells kids around the ranch like his own grandchildren, we also knew better than to disobey him.
“Yes, sir,” Denny said, turning to give me a goodbye half-smile. “Guess we’ll go fishing tomorrow.”
I nodded, spinning on my heel to climb into Grandpa Wells’s rusty blue Ford.
—
I awoke with a start, my room cloaked in darkness save for the small, horse-shaped night light by the door. Wind whistled through the trees outside—a sound our house’s old single-pane windows did little to mitigate.
The storm must’ve woken me up.
Yawning, I rolled to face away from the window, tugging the comforter to my chin and willing myself back to sleep.
Thunk.
Something hit the glass, and I jolted upward, clutching the bedding for comfort. Heart racing, blood rushing behind my eardrums, and a stutter to my breath. My eyes squeezed tight, pretending that not seeing the danger would be enough to keep me safe.
Another small object hit the windowpane, and I felt around the dark bedside table for my cell phone before quickly darting fully under the covers. I blinked at the painfully bright light, taking a moment for my eyes to adjust enough to see three missed calls and ten text messages, all from Denny.
All vague.
All desperate.
Blair: R u ok?
Denny: Let me in. It’s raining
I stared at the message.
Let me in. What the…
Tiptoeing, I made my way to the window and peeked from behind the curtain. Sure enough, there was Denny, slumped down in a patio chair with the rain and wind howling around him.
“Denny,” I whisper-yelled, sliding the window open with a grating squeal.
Within seconds, my best friend—also the boy I had the world’s biggest crush on—was dripping wet and shivering in my bedroom in the middle of the night.
“What’s going on?” I gawked at him, awkward and unsure of how to handle the situation. Whatever the situation was.
“It’s…uh…” He let out a ragged breath. “Sorry for waking you up. I-I wanted to talk to you.”
“It couldn’t wait until I see you tomorrow?” I asked through a loud yawn.
“No. Well, yes…I guess. But, no. I need to talk to you now. I couldn’t sleep.” Everything about him was off—unlike any version of Denver Wells I’d seen before. No self-assured confidence behind his words. No warm smile. No light. “I just…Blair, I don’t know why I’m here.”
A shiver racked his body and, without a word, I turned and opened my closet door. Then felt around in the dark for a pair of buffalo plaid pajama pants and a baggy old T-shirt.
“Here. Get out of the wet clothes,” I said, thrusting the pants and shirt toward him. And when he stepped toward the door, I shuffled to block his path, my palm falling to his damp chest. “You can’t go out there and get us caught. I’ll go so you can change.”
I gingerly stepped into the hallway and padded to the kitchen, pretending to get a glass of water for enough time I could be sure he was fully dressed. Fighting to stop myself from thinking about him half-naked in my room. I’d had a crush on him for so long, I forgot what it was like not to have a crush on him. But it was painfully obvious those feelings were never going to be reciprocated. He told me about girls who passed him notes in class, teased me relentlessly for being weird, and introduced me to people as his best friend—there had even been times where he referred to me as his sister .
I desperately needed to get over my crush. And picturing his bare chest, cold and damp from the rain, wasn’t helpful. Picturing him slipping out of his wet jeans wasn’t helpful. And picturing him naked in my bedroom definitely wasn’t helpful. But there was no stopping it. My glass of water went down in slow, painful gulps as the tiny clock hand skipped forward.
He was sitting cross-legged on top of my bed when I slipped back through the door. Denver Wells was in my room. Wearing my clothes. On my bed.
Crying.
“What’s going on?” The door shut behind me with a soft click, and I crawled across the floral bedspread to sit in front of him.
“It’s Mom,” he muttered. “She’s sick.”
“What?” I croaked, feeling as though my ribs were imploding.
“Cancer.”
The world stopped, air falling still. I couldn’t breathe or think or see. In the dark quiet of my room, I reached for his hand, looping my fingers around his. His grip held strong, clung to my touch like a life raft, squeezing around my knuckles with each slow, shaky breath. The bones in my hand pressing together hurt, but the pain was dulled by the excruciating ache in my chest.
“Is she…” Scared of the answer, I struggled to ask the question. “Is she going to be okay?”
“Mom and Dad say she will be.”
“Okay. So then…it’s okay. She’ll be fine.”
She had to be.
I didn’t see how there could be any option other than her being fine. Aside from the junk food when we were on the road for rodeos, Lucy Wells was the healthiest person I’d ever met. She was young. She was amazing. Everyone loved her. People like that need to be okay, because the world is counting on them to stick around.
And if I was wrong, I had to pretend that things would be fine. That’s what Denny needed from me. It wasn’t my time to be emotional or scared.
I ran my thumb across the back of Denny’s shaking hand. “Your mom is the toughest person I know. She’s going to kick cancer’s butt.”
“Yeah.”
And then it dawned on me….
“Wait. How did you get here? It’s like one o’clock in the morning.”
“I stole Grandpa’s truck,” he said matter-of-factly. As if it wasn’t a big deal for a fifteen-year-old to steal a truck and drive through a storm in the middle of the night.
“Denver Wells,” I whisper-yelled. Regardless of the fact that he couldn’t see a single detail of my face, I shot him a look. “That’s seriously illegal. What if you got caught or crashed the truck?”
He shifted on the bed, releasing the death grip on my hand. “I’ve been driving around the ranch since I was six. I’m fine.”
“Even still. It wasn’t worth the risk to drive here. You could’ve texted or called or waited until I saw you tomorrow to talk to me.”
“I couldn’t.” His rough exhalation was hot against my cheek, and I realized how close we were. “I tried to sleep. Forget about it. Everybody else in the house seemed to have no trouble sleeping….”
“She’s going to be okay.”
“And if she isn’t?” He sniffled, and something wet landed on my calf, quickly soaking through my thin pajama pants. “What then?”
My voice was thin. Wavering. “She will be.”
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“I came here because you were the only person who I thought could make me feel better.”
“Oh,” I murmured. Crap. Think of something to lighten the mood. “Well…uh…I’m struggling to think of a joke or something under this kind of pressure.”
He chuckled under his breath, the mattress dipping as he moved even closer. Prickling heat flooded my capillaries, no doubt turning my skin red, and I focused on the tenderness of his fingertips as they grazed my knees.
When his hands settled on my outer thighs, my stomach warmed and churned as if I’d just chugged a large mug of hot cocoa. I licked my lips, staring at the silhouette in front of me, wishing I could see his face well enough to gauge his emotions.
Was he going to kiss me?
No, I told myself. Having him in my bedroom in the middle of the night was messing with my head. Simple as that. He was upset over his mom’s cancer diagnosis, and thinking he had anything else on his mind was disgustingly selfish.
“Bear,” he whispered.
Normally, Blair Bear was a nickname he reserved for when he wanted under my skin. But this time, it felt special and filled with love. It was us.
“Sorry, I want to help cheer you up, but I don’t know—”
His closed lips pressed to mine. Soft, yet firm, and salty from his tears. I held still, embarrassingly unsure of what to do. Sure, I’d fantasized about kissing him a million times, but the real thing was different. Of course it was. Denny’s lips were perfect. He was perfect.
As quickly as it happened, it stopped.
When he pulled away, I was frozen in place, everything inside me aching to kiss him again. Only I didn’t know how. I’d practiced kissing my hand a lot, learning the techniques descriptively outlined in CosmoGirl magazine. But in the moment, nothing was happening in my brain, and my entire body was hot, and— oh god —I screwed it up. My eyes shot open, desperate to find his face in the blackness, naively hopeful I’d get some indication about how he was feeling.
Before I had the chance, he flopped backward, head landing on the pillows with a huff. “Can I stay here tonight? I want to be with you.”
With me.
We kissed.
He wants to spend the night.
With me.
Unable to form words, I simply lay down next to him, our shoulders and upper arms touching. I was painfully, zealously consumed by him. And when he rolled to his side—slinging an arm across my stomach and shuffling close enough I could feel his steady, sleepy breath throughout my hair—I stroked a finger across my bottom lip and prayed it wasn’t the last time I’d get to kiss Denver Wells.