34. Love Letters
Chapter 34
Love Letters
Bonnie
We don’t lock our doors—not in Never Harbor—which is good because Lulu stumbles through the front door, drunk at noon on a Sunday, and bolts to the bathroom to vomit.
I rush after her with Rafe behind me. He closes doors and turns on lights that I bypassed on my way across the house.
Over the toilet, mid-purge, with my hand stroking her back, Lulu mumbles, “Bon, can you go look at my study schedule?”
It’s actually a giant slur of kanewgolookatmystudskedool , but I get the gist.
“Lu, is now the time?—”
“Please.”
“Go. I’ve got her,” Rafe says, gathering her long black hair into his fist and curling it into a ponytail as Lulu dunks her head into the toilet and orange punch empties in the bowl.
I go to her room, stepping past the stack of books, papers, and slew of tabs littering the floor, finally spotting the color- coded whiteboard with a lot of chapters scribbled under today’s date.
“Light load,” I lie once I’m back in the bathroom. “Don’t worry about it today.”
“Oh good,” she says. More like ohmgud.
She hunches her back, as if to let out more, but nothing comes. She groans.
I crawl to the floor and sit next to the toilet, stroking her damp cheek.
“What happened?” I ask.
“Punch.”
“Peter?”
“The drink.”
I laugh. “Sure, but why?”
“Your brother.”
My brow furrows. “Peter?”
“No,” she says, her voice so tired. “Milo. And his girlfriend.”
“Harriett?”
“Yeah,” she moans. “Y’know, she’s a real bitch.”
This time, Rafe snorts out a laugh.
I rub her back and sigh. “I know …”
“I overheard her say I was pathetic.”
My palm tenses against her sweaty shirt. “Pathetic? For what?”
“For liking Milo.”
Lulu gags, and I can’t tell if it’s because the thought of liking my stupid brother is insulting—totally is—or if the alcohol hit her again. She never admitted it, but I knew my best friend had a crush on Milo when we were younger. But that was it—just a childhood crush.
“Well, that’s not pathetic, but it is ridiculous,” I say, hoping to make her feel better.
Rafe clears his throat and shoots me a look.
“What?” I ask. “It is.”
But Lulu can’t see him shaking his head in disagreement.
My lips part in realization.
Wait— does she still like Milo?
I know Lulu better than anyone. She would have told me, wouldn’t she? Besides, she’s the coolest person I know, and her falling for my brother , of all people, seems so … un cool. He may be almost ten years older than her, but she’s totally out of his league. She’s out of most people’s leagues.
Unless … I haven’t been paying close enough attention.
Lulu groans. I roll layers of toilet paper over my palm and hand it to her. She wipes her mouth, then leans her cheek on the side of the toilet.
“I think I’m done.”
“You sure?” Rafe asks.
“Mmhmm.”
Rafe gently picks her up into his arms once more, carrying her to her bedroom, while I grab a spare bowl from our kitchen and set it beside her bed. I place her phone on the pillow next to her.
“Call me if you need something, okay?”
She nods into her pillow with another muffled, “Mmhmm,” and by the time we leave the room, she’s out like a light.
I blink to myself.
Lulu … and Milo?
“Let’s give her some space,” Rafe says.
“Yeah,” I murmur. “Sure. I have my art shed out back. Let’s go there.”
Rafe follows me out to the garden and across the yard. I’m moving in slow motion. Everything about today is confusing.
Stupid Peter. Of course he got punched—not that he didn’t deserve it, but still.
Poor Izzy. What did Rafe mean that Peter had made her cry?
Poor Lulu.
Stupid Milo and Harriett.
And Rafe. With his bruised knuckles due to Peter’s thick-ass head.
I creak open the shed door and stumble into the room, landing with a pmoof onto my pallet of comforters, blankets, and pillows. Rafe closes the door behind us.
I peek up from my pillow to watch him roam. My face heats as Rafe peers up at my art. It’s surreal, having him in my personal space, but only because I never imagined he’d be here. Seeing him in my quaint studio, higher than eye level to my hung drawings—accentuating just how much shorter I am—and clunking around the wooden floor in boots much larger than my own is … something.
He looks so unnatural yet perfectly in tune, all at once. Curious yet comfortable.
He walks to the corner with my corkboard full of practice illustrations for the competition, stickies of logo design, and the skeleton holding the violin—the oldest in the bunch—wrinkled at the edges and curling up.
“Is this the original?” he asks.
“Yeah. I drew it in high school. I swear it haunts my dreams.”
He smirks. “Is this your soul?”
I give a weak smile. “Yeah. Could be. It’s my favorite.”
“It’s my favorite,” he says.
He turns on his boot. My heart sinks when he finally sees the opposite wall. His wall.
My ears, cheeks, and neck get red hot. I don’t even want to see his reaction. I bury my face in my pillows.
It’s the wall with drawings of him. His lingering gaze. His lips. His hair. His tattoos. Paintings of indigos, midnight blues, and shimmering whiskey browns for his eyes. They’re my little love letters in the form of charcoal, acrylic, and oil.
I steal a peek as he traces a finger over the dried ink.
“Do you always touch other artists’ work?” I ask, attempting casual teasing even though my body is practically seizing with tension.
He grins back. “Only when it gets them to talk.”
“That’s my excuse, not yours.”
“I can make it mine too,” he says, turning back to glance at it.
He roams the rest with his eyebrows up, lips parted in awe. I’m accustomed to it being the other way around, and I understand now why he appeared so self-conscious when I perused the gallery in his shop. He’s right; seeing someone’s art is like seeing into someone’s soul, and here he is, peering so intimately into mine.
“These are all of me?” he asks.
“Yes,” I admit.
“Why?”
I shrug. “Because it’s always been you.”
“How long?”
“Since the day you moved here.”
But it’s different now. He’s not that same guy I romanticized. He’s so much more.
Rafe’s jaw tenses, ticcing back and forth, like he’s thinking hard. My body is so tense that it hurts, and I don’t realize I’m holding my breath until he finally speaks.
“I’m sorry for punching your brother.”
I nod more to myself than him. I was there to watch it all play out. Peter swung first. He deserved it; he almost always does. But … it’s also Peter.
“He’s my brother,” I say. “It wasn’t okay.”
He runs a palm through his hair and sighs. “I know,” he agrees. “It wasn’t okay.”
Rafe lowers down to the ground next to me. My nest of blankets has grown larger over the years, but only if you’re curled with your knees to your chest. Rafe stretches out beside me. Everything below his knees extends onto the hardwood. I truly believe it’s impossible for him to look uncomfortable in any environment.
He cups the back of my head in his palm and pulls me closer to kiss my forehead. He smells like his usual cedar, but now with a hint of mint gum, which is new. I like it.
He strokes a thumb over my cheek and leans his forehead against mine. It feels just like that first night we were together. No, it’s better because it’s us now—not the virgin and the god. Just Bonnie and Rafe.
I take his hand, pulling it up to my lips and kissing the knuckles, lingering on his middle finger still wearing that silver ring.
He buries his nose into my neck.
I expect us to mess around, but neither of us moves.
It’s good; I like that we fall asleep together on the floor of my studio, in my safe place, where he belongs.