Chapter 27
27
NOW
I DIDN’T BOTHER TURNING ON the lights in my parents’ cabin. I didn’t want my family peering out the windows of Sunny Sunday and wondering what someone was doing down here. I just wanted a moment of peace and quiet. A moment to recalibrate.
The Wi-Fi in Chelsea Morning was, of course, unbearably slow. I was fairly certain my parents hadn’t upgraded the router since they bought it six years ago, caving at last to my siblings’ insistence that we needed internet on the island. I clicked on Outlook, and the application bounced slowly up and down for far too long before finally opening my inbox. After another long minute, the inbox refreshed, showing me all the emails I’d missed in the last few days.
There were hundreds. As soon as I saw them, my heart jolted, and I felt a tingle on the back of my neck, as if sweat would soon start to gather there. So much to do. So much that I needed to catch up on. I knew that there would be no urgent tasks; my boss promised to handle everything while I was away. Still, now that I could see all the emails piling up atop themselves, unread, I knew that I couldn’t just leave them.
I clicked the most recent one, which came from one of our vendors. I read it through twice, then started to type. As soon as I was done, I hit send .
Then I did it again.
And again.
I knew how my boss, Cheryl, would respond when she saw me answering. Why are you on your email? I told you to enjoy your time with your family! Still, I didn’t care. This moment, the simple act of sitting behind my computer and typing up responses, firing them off in quick succession…it felt unbelievably good. As if I were lifting a weight from my shoulders that I had tried to ignore all week long.
This was what I loved about work so much. It absorbed all of my attention. Took my mind off Manuel and the Worries and everything else I didn’t want to think about. I let the minutes fly past, not keeping track of how much time had passed since I left Sunny Sunday.
Not until the screen door swung open.
I jumped, looking up from my computer. The lights in the cabin were still off, which meant my shocked expression would have been lit up by my screen, like a spotlight.
In the doorway was an outline I instantly recognized. His broad shoulders and runner’s legs. His curly brown hair.
“Making a phone call, huh?” Manuel asked, voice flat.
“Um.” I drummed my fingers on the computer. “I just thought…well, since I was already down here, and my parents have Wi-Fi…”
Manuel didn’t respond. He stared at me through the darkness. I couldn’t see his expression, but I could imagine it: the disappointment, the resignation, perhaps even anger. Slowly, he started toward me. His footsteps creaked on the wooden floor. I shrunk back, waiting for him to lash out with his words.
But when he reached me, all he did was reach down and shut the lid of my laptop. Gently, he picked it up and placed it on the coffee table. Then he held out a hand.
“What are you—”
“Come on,” he said, “I’ll walk you back to your cabin.”
On the walk, Manuel didn’t say much, which meant I reverted to Nervous Eliot. The one who can’t handle silence. The one who chatters incessantly to fill the empty space. I did an entirely unnecessary summary of the day, of the things that happened, the fights my siblings got into—all of which he witnessed and didn’t need to hear again. But I couldn’t help it.
When we reached Little Lies, we came to a stop.
“And the moon tonight,” I said, gesturing dramatically to the brilliant white orb hanging over the lake, casting a glow on the quiet lake. “Wow. Just wow. This reminds me of when we were kids and would sneak out to Sunny Sunday and—”
“Eliot.”
I hesitated. “Yes?”
Manuel stepped around to stand in front of me, blocking my view of the lake. “Ask me why I came to New York.”
“What?”
“Ask. Me. Why I came to New York.”
This was it. The conversation we’d been dancing around since we got here.
The moment I had both dreaded and desired above all others.
It had finally arrived.
I fisted my hand in the hem of my shorts. My heart picked up speed, pulse thudding erratically in my throat. I shouldn’t do this , I thought. I shouldn’t give in to the temptation, the desire to know what’s happening inside his head. I should stay strong—for his sake, if not mine.
But I couldn’t. I needed to know.
The question came out a whisper: “Why did you come to New York?”
He stepped forward, closing the gap until there were bare inches between us. He raised one hand. Grazed my temple with the backs of his fingers. He whispered, “Why do you think?”
I couldn’t breathe. I lost the ability to do so around the same time that Manuel’s lips came within six inches of my face. “For one-dollar pizza?” I whispered.
He laughed softly, brushing his fingers down my cheek. “No, Eliot. Not for one-dollar pizza.”
My heart was seconds from collapsing. “Then what?”
His hand came down to cup my jawline. His thumb strayed upward, gently stroking my cheek. “To win back the love of my life.”
I inhaled sharply. No , whispered the cruel, familiar voice in my head. Turn around, Eliot. Run away. You don’t deserve him. I jerked my chin to the side, tore it away from his gentle touch, and stumbled backward. What I didn’t realize was that I was standing right at the edge of the boardwalk. My foot missed the wooden planks entirely, flying through open air. I yelped as my body tipped backward, arms swinging wildly as I fell, fell, fell…
Two strong arms wrapped around my torso. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” said Manuel, holding me fast as I dangled out over the bramble. He laughed softly, though there was a hard edge to the laugh, an edge of hurt. “There’s no need to jump ship, Eliot. You can just tell me that you don’t feel the same.”
My heart hammered against the arms holding me so tightly. I stared up at his eyes. Did he really think I didn’t feel the same way? How could I possibly? How could I, when just inches away from his warm chestnut eyes, like honey, like caramel, like every sweet flavor I’d denied myself for so long…
I threw my arms around his shoulders.
I pressed my lips to his.
Manuel stumbled backward, shocked by the sudden embrace. His shock dissolved quickly, however, replaced by a low growl as he scooped up my small frame and nestled me close to his chest. Our bodies started to sway as he carried me up the boardwalk toward Little Lies, all without breaking the kiss. I didn’t open my eyes. I trusted him to get me where I needed to go.
The screen door banged open as Manuel carried me into the cabin. Still I kept my eyes shut, determined not to wake up from this wonderful, intoxicating dream into which I’d fallen. One where I never hurt my best friend. Where I wasn’t a bad person, where I actually deserved love. I knew it wasn’t real, that I would have to face the truth eventually, but for now…
For now, I let myself sink into the bed as Manuel laid me down. Let my eyelids flutter open to take in the moonlight glinting off his eyelashes, his jaw, the desire burning in his eyes. It was almost too much, like I could die from how badly I ached for him. A part of me was okay with that. A part of me wouldn’t mind if he was the last thing I saw.
Then again, that would mean that I wouldn’t get to feel the soft brush of his lips as they kissed down my neck, my collar, the soft skin of my stomach. I wouldn’t feel the heat of his palms as they slid down my sides, slipped under the cotton of my T-shirt, grazed the bare skin just above the hem of my shorts.
For the past year, I’d done everything I could to douse my body’s ability to become aroused. I ate almost nothing. Exercised religiously. Spent my days staring into the abyss of my work laptop, drowning the little focus I had left in an ocean of words. I didn’t want to think about kissing. I didn’t want to think about sex. I didn’t want to think about anything that could awaken that part of my body, the one that terrified me so badly.
But here I was, moaning softly at the feel of my best friend’s hands on my body, every touch a flame on the fire building within me. It didn’t feel wrong, the way I expected. It didn’t feel dirty or evil. I couldn’t dwell on my fears; I was too wrapped up in him. I felt safe. I felt alive .
“Eliot,” he whispered. His fingers toyed with the hem of my shirt.
“Take it off,” I said. “Please.”
He pulled up the fabric, and I raised my arms to help him get the shirt off my body. He tossed it onto the wooden floor. A light breeze blew in through the open door, raising little goose bumps on my bare skin. Manuel skated his fingers along them, leaving trails of warmth in his wake.
His gaze roved up my torso, my neck, my chin, settling at last on my eyes. Slowly, his fingers danced low, brushing the insides of my thighs. I inhaled sharply. His eyes darkened, and his fingers crawled higher. Up into my shorts. I wasn’t wearing underwear, which Manuel quickly discovered. When his fingertips brushed the wet skin around my soft opening, a low groan escaped his lips.
“Eliot.”
“Yes?” I asked breathily, trying not to push my pelvis too eagerly against him.
His fingertips brushed over my opening once more. “Try to stay quiet, okay?”
I whimpered.
Then he plunged one finger inside me.
I twisted my neck to the side, moaned into my pillowcase. I knew my family was all over this island. That they could be standing on the boardwalk just outside this cabin, could hear if I let loose. I needed to muffle the pleasure rolling out of me, but it was almost impossible.
“Tell me if it’s too much,” he whispered.
“Not too much,” I practically hiccupped. “N-not enough.”
Manuel’s teeth glinted in the moonlight as he smiled. His finger moved in small circles inside me, each one eliciting a little thrust of my hips upward. Something was beginning to build within me. Something foreign and warm and wonderful, like a bundle of rope baking in the sun. The rope stretched and stretched, the knot at its center growing tighter and tighter. It was not just in my pelvis. It was every muscle in my body, every vein and artery. They seized up, forming one big, protective knot around the pleasure crackling at my center.
“Condom,” I choked. “Tell me you brought a condom.”
Manuel’s shoulders shook with silent laughter. “Eliot,” he said, and my name sounded so beautiful on his tongue I wanted to make him say it over and over again. “When would I have had time to go back to my cabin and get a condom?”
“So, you do have one in your suitcase.”
“A boy can dare to dream.”
I grinned. “What do we do now?”
His fingers were still inside me. They slid slowly out, teasing the bundle of nerves at the very top of my opening. “I have a few ideas.”
“Which are?”
He didn’t elaborate further. Instead, his head moved down, down, down, and before I knew what was happening, something soft and lush pressed into me, and I gasped, and stars prickled the edges of my vision, and I could say nothing more.