25. Casey
twenty-five
Casey
T he weeks of camp were flying by, much faster than they had any right to, and the raucous sounds of the bonfire's singalong—an end of session tradition—still rang in my ears, reminding me of the passage of time as I slouched on the worn wooden bench, watching the bonfire spit and crackle.
Matt's shoulder pressed against mine. The touch was casual and familiar, making my skin buzz beneath my sweater. Not that I'd let him know. Around us, the last stragglers of campers and counselors filtered away, their excited chatter fading into the woods like smoke. The night had gone better than I'd expected—my music students hadn't completely butchered their performances—but the satisfaction curling through my chest felt dangerous, like something that would hurt when it eventually disappeared.
"What's that face for?" Matt asked, his voice low enough that only I could hear.
"I don't make faces," I muttered, kicking at a pinecone near my boot. The fire popped, sending a shower of sparks into the night air. They danced upward, little orange comets against the darkness, before winking out.
Matt chuckled, the sound rumbling through the small space between us. "Sure you don't."
I watched the last group of junior counselors herd their chattering campers toward the dormitories, their flashlight beams bobbing like fireflies among the trees. The talent show had run later than planned—my fault, partly. I'd let my guitar students add one more song to their set, and then the dance group wanted to perform their encore, and somehow we'd stretched past curfew.
Matt didn't seem to mind. He'd stayed planted on that bench through every performance, clapping louder than necessary whenever one of my students took the stage. Now he was extending that same patience, waiting for the area to clear before dousing the bonfire.
"We'll be here a while," he said, glancing at the thinning crowd. "Fire this size needs to burn down before I can safely put it out."
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak when he shifted closer and draped his arm across my shoulders. His palm curved around my upper arm, thumb absently stroking the worn fabric of my cargo sweater. The heat from his body rivaled the fire's warmth.
"Cold?" he asked.
"I'm fine," I said automatically, though I leaned into him. The dancing flames cast shifting shadows across his face, highlighting the sharp angle of his jaw, softening the creases around his eyes. Those blue eyes that somehow managed to look right through my carefully constructed armor.
"I was blown away by the progress your music students made just over the course of this session," he said, his eyes reflecting the fire as he turned to look at me.
I shrugged, the motion bumping his arm higher around my shoulders. "I just showed them some chords."
"Bullshit." His grin took any sting from the word. "I saw how you worked with them. Even that kid—what's his name? The one who kept saying he was going to quit?"
"Tyler," I supplied, remembering the lanky fourteen-year-old who'd stormed out of three consecutive lessons before something clicked. "He's got talent. Just needed to get out of his own way."
"And who helped him do that?" Matt squeezed my shoulder. "You did. You don't give yourself enough credit."
I tucked a stray lock of my hair behind my ear, hoping the firelight would hide the heat I felt rising to my cheeks. My most recent dye job was a soft, cotton candy shade of pink, and I think I liked that best.
I hadn't expected to care this much—about the camp, about the kids. About Matt. I'd taken the summer job for the paycheck and the experience on my resume. But somewhere between arrival day and now, things had shifted. Tyler's face when he nailed that difficult chord progression. The shy girl who'd found her voice through songwriting. The impromptu jam sessions that broke out on rainy afternoons.
Matt, waiting up for me on nights when I stayed late in the arts center, helping students practice.
"You're doing it again," Matt said.
"What?"
"Thinking too loud." His thumb resumed its gentle stroke against my sweater. "I can practically hear the gears grinding."
A distant peal of laughter floated across the grounds from the direction of the dormitories. The counselors would be settling the campers in for the night, checking bunks, collecting contraband candy, shushing the inevitable whispers. Camp routine—predictable, structured. Unlike whatever this was between Matt and me.
"Just thinking about my students," I admitted. "They surprised me."
"And you surprised yourself?"
I shot him a look. "Don't push it, Blackstone."
He laughed, the sound mingling with the crackle of burning logs. His arm tightened around me, and I found myself relaxing into his side, my defenses lowering inch by cautious inch. I didn't know why I was so afraid to admit that this was good, that it felt right. And I really didn't understand why he was so patient with me, but I had a feeling it was just in his nature. Matt saw people–—really saw them, flaws and secrets and all.
The fire had burned down considerably, the massive logs now glowing red beneath a coat of silvery ash. Only a few small flames still danced along the edges. The heat reached out to us in waves, keeping the mountain night's chill at bay. My hand somehow found its way to rest against Matt's on the bench between us, our fingers not quite intertwined but definitely touching. My pinky overlapped his index finger; his thumb settled against my wrist.
"The night sky here still gets to me," Matt said, tilting his head back to look up at the stars. "Even after all these years."
I followed his gaze. Without the light pollution of the city, the stars spread above us in impossible profusion, a spray of distant suns against velvet blackness. The Milky Way stretched across the heavens, a river of light.
"It makes me feel small," I admitted, the words slipping out before I could censor them.
"In a good way or bad way?"
I considered this, feeling the gentle pressure of his thumb now stroking the sensitive skin of my inner wrist. "Both, I guess. Reminds me that my problems don't matter much in the grand scheme."
"They matter to me," Matt said, so quietly I almost missed it beneath the fire's dying crackle.
Something caught in my throat—emotion or maybe just smoke. I swallowed it down.
"You're getting dangerously close to sentimental," I warned, but my voice lacked its usual edge.
"Can't have that," he agreed, eyes crinkling at the corners.
We sat in silence for a while, listening to the fire consume the last of its fuel. The bench beneath us seemed to have shrunk, bringing Matt's body closer to mine—or maybe I'd just stopped fighting the pull between us. His warmth, his steady presence beside me, felt like an anchor in waters I was still learning to navigate.
Matt's fingers traced idle patterns on my shoulder, and I felt myself relaxing further, my perpetual defensiveness softening under his touch. I didn't need my armor here, not with him. The realization was terrifying and comforting all at once.
"Fire's almost out," Matt observed, his voice a low rumble against my side.
"Mmm," I agreed, making no move to pull away. "Guess we'll have to go soon."
Neither of us moved, even as the fire dwindled to nothing but embers now, their orange glow barely pushing back the darkness that pressed in from the surrounding woods. I shifted against Matt, uncomfortable in my own skin. The night air had cooled, but that wasn't what made me draw my knees up to my chest and pick nervously at a loose thread on my sweater. Time was slipping away—session two ended in just days—and whatever this thing was between us hung in limbo, undefined and terrifying. And Matt just waited.
"I'm really stressed," I admitted, my voice sounding foreign to my own ears—low, uncertain, stripped of its usual defensive edge. I swallowed hard before adding, "We don't have much time left."
Matt's arm tightened around me, and he shifted to face me more directly. I kept my eyes fixed on the dying fire, afraid of what he might see if I met his gaze. His hand slid from my shoulder to the small of my back, the heat of his palm seeping through my sweater.
"Look at me," he said softly.
I reluctantly dragged my eyes from the embers to his face. The faint orange glow caught the angles of his features—the straight line of his nose, the curve of his cheekbones, the fullness of his lower lip. His blue eyes looked almost black in the low light, but I could still see the softness in them.
"We have tonight," he said, his hand giving a gentle squeeze at the small of my back. "And there's no point in losing what tonight could be while worrying about tomorrow. Live in the moment, and trust that it'll work out."
Something in his words—their simplicity, their certainty—cracked something open inside me. I felt raw, exposed, my carefully constructed walls crumbling like sand castles at high tide. My vision blurred, and I realized with horror that my eyes were glistening with unshed tears.
Fuck that. I would not cry. Not over this. Not over him. "What if I can't trust?"
"It's enough for now."
"That's some grade-A bullshit, Blackstone," I managed, but my voice cracked traitorously. "Enough for now? What about next week? September? When I'm back in Oregon and you're—"
"Hey," he interrupted, both hands now framing my face, forcing me to maintain eye contact. "One day at a time. If we're meant to be, we'll find our way to each other, no matter the obstacles."
His thumbs brushed lightly over my cheekbones, and I could feel the calluses on his hands—rough from years of outdoor work, familiar now against my skin. I'd memorized those hands, their strength, and surprising gentleness. His trust that we'd be okay was as comforting as it was insane, and I didn't know which to react to.
A wave of want crashed through me, fierce and desperate. If time was running out, I'd take what I could get.
Before I could second-guess myself, I moved in one fluid motion, uncurling from my hunched position and climbing onto his lap. My knees settled on either side of his thighs, the wooden bench creaking beneath our shifted weight. The new position put us eye to eye, my hands finding purchase on his broad shoulders for balance.
Matt's surprise lasted only a second before his hands found my hips, steadying me.
"Casey," he breathed, his eyes widening slightly.
"Shut up," I muttered, and leaned in to kiss him.
Our lips met with a familiar spark—static from the dry air, but it jolted me, nonetheless. What started as a forceful press softened almost as Matt responded, his mouth moving against mine with practiced ease. He tasted faintly of the marshmallows from earlier s'mores and something else uniquely him. I inhaled sharply through my nose, unwilling to break the contact even for breath.
Matt's hands slid from my hips to my lower back, drawing me closer until our chests pressed together. The heat between us rivaled the dying fire, each point of contact sending sparks along my nerve endings. My fingers tangled in his hair, pulling it free from its man bun to spill around his shoulders. The soft strands twined around my fingers as I deepened the kiss, my tongue sliding against his in a rhythm we'd perfected over stolen moments throughout the summer.
A small, desperate sound escaped my throat—humiliating in its neediness, but I was beyond caring. I rolled my hips forward, creating delicious friction between us. Matt groaned in response, the sound vibrating against my lips.
He broke the kiss, his breathing ragged against my cheek. "Casey, we're still in the open," he whispered, but his hands belied his concern, sliding down to cup my ass and pull me even tighter against him.
"Everyone's gone," I gasped, glancing quickly around the deserted fire pit. The camp had gone silent, the lights in the dorms dimmed for the night. Even the usual night sounds—counselors making rounds, the occasional giggling camper sneaking to the bathroom—seemed distant and muffled. "No one's coming back here."
"You're killing me," Matt muttered, but he didn't push me away. Instead, his grip on my ass tightened, his fingers digging into the muscle through my jeans with a possessiveness that made my breath catch.
I rocked against him again, feeling him harden beneath me. His head fell back, exposing the column of his throat. I couldn't resist leaning in to press my lips there, tasting salt and feeling his pulse hammer against my tongue.
"God, Casey," he groaned, one hand sliding up under my sweater to splay across my lower back, skin to skin. His palm felt like a brand, marking me. "Keep this up and I'm going to fuck you right here."
His words, rough with desire, sent a shiver up my spine that had nothing to do with the night air. The image they conjured—Matt laying me down on the bench, or maybe on the ground beside the dying fire, our bodies moving together under the stars—made me dizzy with want.
"Maybe that's what I'm after," I challenged, pulling back just enough to see his face.
In the faint glow of the embers, his expression was a complex mix of desire and something deeper, something that made my stomach flip in a way that wasn't entirely comfortable. His eyes searched mine, looking past the bravado to the vulnerability beneath.
"I want you," he said, the words sending a fresh wave of heat through me. "Fuck, Casey, you know I do. Always. But not as a distraction. Not as a way to avoid talking about what's really bothering you."
I slumped against him, burying my face in the crook of his neck. His arms wrapped around me, holding me close in a way that felt more intimate than the grinding of our bodies had been moments before.
"I hate that you know me," I mumbled against his skin.
His chest rumbled with quiet laughter. "No, you don't."
And he was right. I didn't hate it. I was terrified by it.
We sat like that for a long moment, my body cradled against his, his hands making soothing patterns across my back. The embers glowed fainter now, the darkness pressing closer. Eventually, Matt shifted beneath me.
"Come on," he said, his lips brushing my temple. "Let me put out this fire properly, and then we can go back to my place and give you the cuddles you need."
"Cuddles with your dick shoved inside me?"
He laughed, shaking his head. "Perhaps. We'll see when we get home."
Home. Such a simple word, and yet so loaded.