48. Dylan
FORTY-EIGHT
DYLAN
I drag my feet the whole way back home. It doesn’t take long, because heading barefoot into a jungle with nothing but your underwear on is not a good idea and won’t get you far.
I do spend a good chunk of the afternoon beating myself up for being so fucking stupid.
I don’t know what happened. I just got lost in this daydream, and I couldn’t stop weaving it, and then everything got way out of hand because I saw the exact moment when everything I was saying turned just a bit too real for Adrian.
That fucking hurt. It burned.
And it’s not his fault.
I’m the thief. I’m the one who’s stealing moments with him I never had any right to. I knew from the start there would never be anything between us, so I have no right to be angry or hurt.
All I have to do now is get my act together, head back to the beach, and pretend nothing happened earlier.
And then protect myself a bit better. No more fantasies of a life together. No more ideas about any kind of future.
Should be a piece of cake.
I sigh and square my shoulders. It’s getting dark, and the mosquitoes have figured out there’s fresh meat in the vicinity and alerted their whole population.
Adrian gets to his feet the moment he sees me approach.
“Hey,” he says when I stop in front of him.
“Hey.”
Then we both just look at each other in silence.
“I’m sorr?—”
“I didn’t mean?—”
We both put on equally tight grins.
“You first,” Adrian says. He tries to hide it, but there are still remnants of that earlier freaked-out look in his eyes.
I blow out a breath.
Act. Normal.
I drag my fingers through my hair to buy myself some time, but shockingly, the act of raking a hand through one’s hair doesn’t take that long.
Right.
“I don’t know what happened earlier,” I say.
Good. That’s good. Your honor, I plead insanity. Case closed.
“This place must be getting to me,” I say—lie. What’s getting to me is the prospect of leaving this place and letting Adrian go.
Oh. Fuck.
I force myself to breathe slowly and evenly.
“I didn’t mean to freak out on you. I guess it was just the thought of home that got to me, and then I got pissed because I’ve been mostly trying not to think about home and…” I clear my throat and blow out another breath. “You didn’t deserve any of it, and I’m sorry.”
There. That sounded pretty good, if I do say so myself.
“Yeah,” he says slowly. “Yeah. I mean, it makes sense.”
But he avoids looking at me.
I think… I think he’s pissed at me, which… He’s allowed. He’s definitely allowed when somebody calls him an asshole and storms away like a lunatic. He’s not really someone who holds a grudge though, so I’m not sure what I should do here.
“Dinner?” I offer.
He finally looks at me.
For some reason, it seems to be his turn to look freaked out. Seriously. He looks nervous as fuck, and I’m not sure why.
“Sure?” he finally replies, even though he doesn’t sound sure at all.
We figure out something to eat anyway, both unusually quiet and unfailingly polite and careful with each other.
It’s not great.
Later, we lie in the life raft, him on his side, me on mine. It’s dark outside and dark inside.
We’ve been silent for a long time.
“Dyl?” Adrian whispers softly.
My body tenses.
It only takes me a millisecond to decide what to do.
I’m going to be a coward.
I’m going to take the easy way out.
I pretend I’m asleep.
He doesn’t try to wake me.