Dizzying Seventeen Years Old, Virginia
Dizzying
Seventeen Years Old, Virginia
Late Saturday night, after poke bowls with Macy and Wyatt and a hot shower that does little to loosen the kinks I earned after ten hours on the road, I push the door to the guest room open to find Isaiah. He snagged a shower right before me, and now he’s sitting at the end of the futon in basketball shorts and a wrinkled T-shirt.
He looks me over, and his mouth turns up in a smile.
“I wasn’t expecting company when I packed,” I say, suddenly self-conscious of my ribbed tank and baggy sweats.
“What would you have brought if you’d known I was gonna tag along?”
I glance down at my pajamas. I shrug. “Probably this.”
His smile stretches wide. “Good.”
I turn to set my toiletry bag in my suitcase, then root in it aimlessly, too nervous to turn back around. I’ve spent the night with only one boy, and I analyzed and planned for and envisioned sleeping with Beck for literal years before I actually climbed into his bed. Tonight, Isaiah and me and a futon dressed in paisley sheets, is far less considered.
Behind me, the floor creaks.
Footsteps pad across the carpet.
Barely touching his chest to my back, he reaches for my hands, guiding them away from my suitcase. He runs his palms lightly up my arms. I begin to relax as he kneads the stiffness from my neck, my shoulders, my wrists, my fingers. I close my eyes and settle against his sternum, apprehensive to blissed in a matter of minutes. When his arms encircle me in a hug, I let go of a sigh. I could melt into the floor and, simultaneously, float skyward. Instead, I find myself thinking about how wretched this day must have been for him. Fresh off losing Naya, he’s stepped into the pain of my past—and the life I used to share with someone else.
With a tug on my hand, he urges me to face him, and then, sleepy-soft, says, “I don’t mind crashing on the floor. Or out on the couch.”
“No. I’ll be okay.”
“You sure?”
I try hard to filter my needs and my hopes from the storm of emotions in my head. Unconvincingly I say, “I think so.”
“I’ll keep to my side of the bed if that’s what you want.”
I peer up at him, sweeping the contours of his face, the crooked line of his nose, the uncertainty of his smile. Our eye contact lingers.
His soul will offer yours a second match.
And then my needs and hopes coalesce, fusing into a clear vision. Isaiah and I, starting a fresh page. Isaiah and I, penning a romance all our own.
His hands glide up my back, and our breaths synchronize.
I walk to the futon and pull back the covers, then sit down.
“I want you to stay, Isaiah, and I don’t want you to keep to your side of the bed.”
***
We whisper late into the night.
He tells me about the cities he’ll explore next year. The landmarks he’ll visit. The streets he’ll travel: Highway 1, Route 66, the Great River Road.
“You could come,” he says, drawing me close.
I think about the au pair agency I read about online last night while he was driving. I recall the exhilaration I felt, considering the different locations I might choose. Germany, or South Africa, or Australia—Australia! I could go for a whole year. I could hang out with kids while making money and exploring the country of my dreams.
It sounds perfect.
But so does a year on the road with Isaiah.
“Think about it,” he murmurs. “It’d be an adventure. An adventure all our own.”