Chapter 21
chapter twenty-one
LEO
“Don’t expect me to slow down for you,” Marisol says as she ties the laces of her running shoes.
A laugh spills from my lips. “Didn’t know I was considered the weakest link here.” She just smiles at the pavement.
Marisol and I ate our pancakes mostly in silence. I was afraid any kind of attempt at conversation would feel forced after our moment in the kitchen. The moment I got too close. Too close to telling someone about that night.
The only person who knows is the therapist I visited for a few months after.
That was before I moved back home, which was an idea that came up organically in one of our sessions after I mentioned the way that my environment felt like a constant trigger.
I couldn’t move on from what happened to me, not while I was living here.
But then Marisol said she was going for a run, and there was no chance in hell I was letting her go alone. I hated that I’d made her doubt herself, made her think she did something to upset me, so no matter how uncomfortable I am being here, I need to shove that down for now.
Don’t tell my therapist.
“I could outrun you any day of the week,” she says as she stands, warming up her muscles. “I think I proved that at Hotel Dolce.”
I scoff. “That wasn’t exactly a fair race.”
“It’s not my fault you couldn’t catch up to me.” She shrugs.
“Who says I didn’t let you go?”
“It’s okay to admit it,” she says. “I’m just faster than you.”
My eyebrows fly to my forehead, and I can’t help but say, “Prove it.”
She grins, her face lighting up before she pushes me and takes off down the pavement. A laugh falls from my mouth as I watch her sprint ahead of me, and when she looks over her shoulder, laughing, her hair flying in the wind, I take off.
I take big strides, but not big enough that I catch up to her too quickly.
I let her run a little longer, following her as she turns into the park, her feet flying over the grass.
She squeals as she runs down a slope she didn’t see coming, her arms flying like little windmills.
I use the downhill momentum to gain on her, wrapping my arms around her waist and lifting her off the ground.
“Leo!” she squeals as she wraps her arms over mine, holding onto me for dear life. She laughs as I spin her around, and it’s like every other thought melts away. I want to hear that sound for eternity.
She stumbles as I put her down, puffing as she turns to face me. The light ring of a bell chimes, and I look to see a child on a bicycle headed straight for us.
“Shit.” I reach for Marisol, pulling her toward me as the bike goes whizzing past us. Her hands land on my chest, and she looks up at me through her dark lashes, both of us still breathing quickly as she lightly slides her hands down my chest.
“Thanks,” she breathes.
“Yeah,” I reply. But she doesn’t move away. Her eyes roam over my face, rebounding back to my lips over and over again.
My hands itch to break away from her back.
I want to push her stray hairs back from her face, want to run my thumb over her bottom lip, to pull her head toward mine and crush those lips against my own.
I can’t help but wonder if she might want the same thing.
I never thought she did. I thought she always left these moments between us in the faking-it box, but I’m not so sure anymore.
Too many of these moments between us have happened when no one is around to see them.
“You proved your point,” she says, her lashes fluttering, and it takes me a moment to understand what she is talking about.
“I’ll match whatever pace you set,” I say, hoping she knows I’m not only talking about running.
I watch her swallow a gulp before she pulls her hands from my chest. “Should we loop around the park?”
“You set the rules.” I step back. “I’ll follow wherever you go.”
Still not talking about running.
This moment feels charged, like an invisible lightning rod struck the very patch of grass we stand on.
She nods, nostrils flaring. “Andiamo.” She turns away. “Don’t fall behind.”
I shake my head as she jogs down the path that snakes through the park, and then I follow her.