6. Junior Year
Junior Year
LONDON
AGE EIGHTEEN
" Y ou're upset," I say, tossing my gym bag into the truck bed behind her, the thud punctuating the tension between us.
"I'm not upset," she says, uncrossing her arms and flexing her fingers before dropping them on the edge of the tailgate. "Stunned, confused, and nervous are a little more fitting."
I move to stand in front of where she sits on my tailgate so she can't avoid my eyes and give me half-truths. "What part are you confused about?"
"The part where you called me your girlfriend. Why did you say it?" Her brown eyes pierce mine. "Why that moment?"
My eyes widen. I know what she's asking, but the topic I expected to make the top of her list when I came out of the locker room was the bet.
"Do you want a list? Because there's more than one reason."
She leans back, bracing herself on her palms, the shift putting space between us. "No, I just want the one at the very top."
"Because I want you to be," I say without hesitation. There's the semblance of a small smile, and I step between her legs hanging over the tailgate. "Does that smile mean you're not mad anymore?"
"I told you I wasn't mad."
She tries to keep the smile from curling her mouth, but we both know she'll fail.
It's one of the reasons I'm hooked. Her smile is contagious, but her eyes intrigue me the most. She looks at me like I'm a puzzle she's dying to solve.
It's the intense desire I see in them that keeps me holding on.
No one has ever looked at me the way she does, she wants everything I have to give.
I only wonder if she knows I see everything I want in this world when I'm staring back at her.
My hands find the frayed edges of the jean shorts she must have slipped on after the game. "Semantics." I smile as my hands find a stray string on the shorts. "Want to go somewhere?"
I watch as she pulls her bottom lip between her teeth, a lip I'm eager to have pressed against mine again as I wait with bated breath, hoping she'll give me the answer I want.
We spent a summer apart, of which I spent every day counting the hours until I knew I'd see her again.
I knew coming home after the way I left things wouldn't be easy.
I was well aware I'd have things to answer for, but I wasn't prepared for the space she'd put between us.
She nods just once, and I fight to contain my relief. I've languished in friendship purgatory for two weeks, carefully trying to rebuild what I broke, desperately seeking the trust I'd squandered. Tonight feels like the first real step back toward us.
"What's the deal with Noah?" I ask as I pull out the bag of snacks we stopped at the gas station to get before coming to the lake.
"Deal?" She asks, rummaging through the bag for her candy.
"Yeah, first I come home, and he's sitting comfortably at your mother's dinner table. Now I'm winning my first home game of the season and looking over to find my girl wrapped around him. "
She smiles as she tears open the bag of chewy Nerds, and I can't help but mirror it. Calling her my girl is new, but I like it. It feels like a title that should have been there all along.
"We're just friends." She pops a piece of candy in her mouth.
"We were lab partners in Biology last semester, and we were assigned a summer project for AP Biology this year.
" She shrugs and pours a few pieces of candy into her hand, sorting the colors before adding, "He's nice, and he's helping me. It’s nothing more than that. "
"Yeah, well, we were once just friends too," I say, pulling my bottom lip into my mouth and biting down so I stop talking. I told her on the field, I trust her, and I do, but I'm a guy. I know when another guy is making a play.
"You sound jealous," she teases.
"So, what if I am?" I release an anxious breath. "I'm not afraid to admit that. Jealousy means I know what I stand to lose."
"You don't need to be." Her eyes hold mine.
"Yeah, well, you're all I think about, heartbreaker. I've had a crush on you for years."
"How long is that exactly?" she questions, trying her best to hold back the smile that's tugging at her mouth.
I've always seen Laney. She has meant something to me since the second I laid eyes on her, but once eighth grade hit, I couldn't keep her in the friend box anymore.
Not when the desire to be more than her friend was greater, so I started putting space between us and waited.
I waited for her to give me a sign that she felt the same way.
"Long..." my eyes search hers, scanning their depths.
I know I hurt her this past summer. If I could do it over, I would, but I can't. All I can do is move forward and make sure I give her no more reasons to doubt what I know she feels between us.
"I realized I had a crush on you when our friendship was no longer enough. "
Her eyes widen with her smile before she ducks her head, dropping her gaze to her lap as she sets aside her bag of candy, and I want to reach out and tilt her chin back up. I hate that I can't catalog every reaction and feel it with her.
"Well, now I don't know what to do with my face," she says before her brown eyes pierce mine. "Friendship was never going to be enough for us."
Our eyes stay locked as the vulnerable honesty we both shared rewrites everything between us in real-time. I can practically feel the walls of just friends crumbling around us, and I never want to go back to pretending again.
She breaks first, sinking her teeth into her lip and reaching for a soda can, and when she attempts to pop the top, the tab snaps off before the can opens.
"Here, let me have it." I reach for the can and pull out the chief. Flicking open the blade, I press it into the aluminum and open the can.
"The chief saves the day once again," she says, grabbing the can and taking a long, slow drink.
I want to change the topic. I don't want to talk about anyone else when I'm with her, but I need to speak my piece first. "Laney, I'll never tell you who you can and can't be friends with, but you should be careful.
Noah doesn't care about a title. If he wants something, he thinks it is his for the taking.
Guys like him don't take no for an answer, and because you're giving him the time of day, he's not going to let it go. "
Laney sets her soda aside and reaches for the snack bag again. "I know," she says, her tone a bit too cheery, given the warning I just gave her as she digs through the bag. "But you still haven't told me about this bet you made." Her eyes swing to mine. "Maybe I'm just keeping my options open."
I tackle her onto the truck bed. "The hell you are, heartbreaker.
You're mine. I made it so, and now you're stuck with me.
" I grab her knee and squeeze right above her kneecap, making her laugh and squeal.
Her laughter is like music to my soul. It washes away all the ugly things that are collected from everyday life, taking with it the weight of the things we can't change.
When I'm with her, I'm happy, and the upward curve of her mouth as she laughs and struggles against my weight, trying her best to reach my hips and find her counterattack, tells me I make her happy too.
When it's her and me, the world falls away.
"London, stop, it hurts…" She struggles to get the words out between laughs, and I release her knee, but my hand doesn't fall away.
Her laughter fades as my hand glides up her thigh, my eyes tracing its ascent as I watch her skin pebble beneath my touch.
"When I saw you wearing my shirt at the party, I couldn't take my eyes off you.
A million thoughts had already been running through my head, and then you showed up wearing that.
I knew the second I saw you wearing it, I would find out why.
" My fingers reach the hem of her jean shorts, and my eyes finish the journey, finding hers.
"I assumed you wanted my attention, and you had it. "
Her pouty lips part slightly as her eyes explore the depths of mine. "Cooper Downs was going to try to talk to you, but Fisher stepped in and told him you were off limits because you already belonged to me."
"Why would Fish say that when it wasn't true?"
My hand aimlessly starts playing with the fringe of her shorts again as I find the courage to tell her everything.
"Because he's my best friend, and he knew I'd only ever wanted one girl.
I just didn't have the guts to own it. I was afraid shooting my shot would ruin our friendship, or worse, I'd ruin your happiness if that was what you had found.
But the more I watched and listened to Cooper rattle on in the background, I knew I couldn't go one more day without telling you how I felt, so by the time he dared me to prove it, I had already decided I would pursue you.
I didn't know what would happen when I walked downstairs.
All I knew was I wasn't proving to Cooper that you were mine.
I was proving to myself that I wasn't going to go another day without finding out if it was me that you wanted.
When I came downstairs, you and Noah had already started walking down to the lake.
..and you know what happened after that. "
I make a mental note that I still need to have a talk with Cooper. Noah could have only known about that conversation through him since they play baseball together.
"Maybe you didn't bet on me then, but on the field tonight…I bet on you."
"How so?" I ask as I lean on my arm beside her, making myself at home with her body tucked against mine.
"I've never been able to figure you out.
There have been times when I thought I knew what you were thinking, what you wanted, but then you'd go and do something that said the opposite.
All these years, I wanted you to see me the same way I saw you, and tonight on the field, I had to sift through all the times I thought you did, all the times that made zero sense, like when Riley Heron showed up on your front lawn. "
"Hey, can we not?—"
Her finger presses against my lips. "I get it. I'm not trying to rehash what's done. I'm only saying I had to bet on the man I thought you were, the one who didn't always let me in."
My hand finds her hip. "I did let you in, and it scared the shit out of me every time. I'd be lying if I said it still doesn't."
She smiles softly. "Good, at least we're on a level playing field." Her hand reaches for the one I have on her hip, and she brings it to her chest. Placing it over her heart, she says, "This is what you do to me every time you look at me."
"It's racing," I say, my fingers splaying over her soft skin.
"It always does when you're around."
"I want to kiss you, Laney Hart."
A small smile turns her lips upward. "You're in luck because I want the same thing."
It's not our first kiss, but damn if it doesn't feel like it.
I'm hooked, addicted, and still completely terrified—the same way I was the night in her room.
I don't know if having her will ever shut out the fear.
If anything, in a way, it makes it worse.
Before, I feared her not wanting the same things.
I feared never knowing what it was like to have her, and now I fear losing her. I can't lose her.
As our kiss deepens, her hands wander, and fuck if I don't love every inch they explore.
My hands do the same, memorizing the curve of her hips, the softness of her stomach, and the heat between her legs when she throws her thigh over mine.
Shit. A groan I can't contain rumbles from deep in my chest. She's too perfect, and I want everything.
The soft fingers that were exploring my chest dip to my belt, and I release her mouth.
"Laney…" is all I manage as I close my eyes and try to temper my body's reaction to her.
"Did I do something wrong?"
"God, no, you could never do anything wrong."
"Then why did you stop?" Her hand suggestively slides along my waistband, and I grab it. "Oh." Her face drops.
"Don't do that. You have no idea how hard it is to say no to you."
"Then don't. Don't you want to?"
I roll onto my back, putting space between us, and cover my face with my hands. "It's not that. You mean a lot to me."
"Well, isn't doing stuff a way to show how much you care about someone? You did stuff with Riley. Are you saying you give your body to people you don't care about?"
"What? Who said?" I drop my hands. "Never mind, it doesn't matter.
I didn't bring you here for that. I brought you here so we could be alone and talk and find each other again.
I wanted to close the distance that spending the summer apart put between us.
" I grab her hand and intertwine our fingers.
"I have you, and you're enough just like this. "
"Okay," she says somewhat dejectedly.
I'm about to question her and demand she tell me exactly what she's thinking.
I'm done guessing. I chose her, I want her, and that means everything.
I want every insecurity, every argument, and every bad day, so I can make it better, because that's what existing in her world does for me. She makes it better.
Her eyes flash to mine. "But you do want to…"—she nervously clears her throat—"do those things with me?"
"Yes, Laney. I want everything with you."
Her eyes slowly flick between mine, and then she lays her head on my chest. "Me too."
She makes herself comfortable, listening to the beat of my heart, and it's on the tip of my tongue to tell her it beats for her, but I don't. We have time. I plan on keeping her. I plan on giving her the world.