Chapter 14
Kit
“Just saying, maybe today isn’t the best day,” Brett murmurs. “You know, man, with what happened yesterday…”
“She’s just coming for the day,” Bowen sighs. “Mom said it was fine. Kit’s parents said it was fine. You’re the only one being weird about it.”
I don’t move. I lie perfectly still under my covers, blinking the sleep from my eyes at the wall. Even though they’re using low, careful voices, I still woke up. I don’t even know what they’re talking about, but I already know I agree with whatever Brett is saying.
Because what do they mean she?
The bunk above me creaks as Brett shifts to climb down the ladder.
“I’m not being weird. I just thought maybe we should, you know, talk to Kit about yesterday?”
“Right,” Bowen says, audibly annoyed now. I frown, ears straining. Is he annoyed with Brett or with me? “If Kit wanted to talk to me, he wouldn’t have run away when I tried talking to him yesterday.”
Brett makes a noise of frustration before the door outside opens, and I don’t have to turn to know it was Bowen walking out first. He sounded closed off, like he gets when he’s decided on something, and that’s that.
I let my shaky breath go.
I already know that I don’t want to do today.
The lake sparkles under the summer sun, and my stomach is twisted in knots I can’t seem to untangle all morning.
I’ve been dragging my feet in the main cabin, helping Sheila cut up fruit, dodging Tucker’s half-hearted attempt at tossing ice cubes down the back of my shirt, and ignoring his pestering jokes.
He’s older brother-ing extra hard today.
Probably trying to show me that he doesn’t care that I’m gay, which is honestly kind of sweet.
I would appreciate it a lot more if my stomach wasn’t cramped with nerves.
Brett has been glowering on the porch for a while now, and Bowen won’t sit still. It’s like they’ve switched places. Body swapped in the night.
Normally, it’s Brett who is aimlessly moving and picking at things and biting his nails, and Bowen who is sitting and observing with a semi-frown.
Not today.
They both seem to have eyes for the driveway, though.
She.
A she is coming.
I’m not prepared for the way my stomach drops down to my toes when I hear the crunching of gravel a little while later and see a car I don’t recognize pull up.
A tall, curvy girl with honey-blonde hair steps out.
I’ve seen her before, at school. I’ve seen her hovering around Bowen.
Laughing at his every word, tossing her hair too much, leaning too close.
Delaney.
I didn’t need anyone to tell me who she was to him. Not after seeing the way his face lights up when he sees her walking towards him. She gives him a little finger wave, smiling back.
“This is gonna suck,” I hear Brett mutter. I don’t remember moving so close to the screen door.
I don’t respond, even though I wholeheartedly agree.
The door slams shut behind me like it always does as I step out on the porch with a platter in hand and what I hope is a smooth expression on my face.
Sheila piled it high with watermelon, cookies, and chips and shooed me out the door.
I was just about to pull out all the canned goods and reorganize the cupboard alphabetically, too.
Then, maybe, I was going to mop the floors with a dishcloth on my hands and knees or dust the walls or something. Literally anything but do this.
But here I am. Joy.
I pause just outside the door and hate that my treacherous eyes immediately find him. Them.
She’s prettier than I remember; sunglasses perched on her head like a headband. She’s got that cool-girl confidence, the kind that makes other people want to lean in to hear her every word.
Bowen is leaned in, alright. He’s sitting next to her on the bench of the picnic table, their shoulders touching, and something just between them written all over their smiles.
Gag. Kill me now.
He looks up and catches me watching before I can get my body to turn around to step right back inside. Bowen stands up, smile dimming and changing before my eyes. The smirk I know well is fully in place when he walks over and takes the food from my hands. He balances it on one palm, then…
Then he reaches up and brushes my bangs out of my face with two fingers, slow and familiar like he’s done it a million times before. Because he has.
“Hey,” he says, so warm, not knowing he’s setting fire to my entire existence with the way he looks at me. “I thought you were going to hide from me all day. You okay?”
I nod. Or maybe I shake my head. I don’t know. It must be a nod, though, because then he tilts his chin in the direction of his guest.
“This is Delaney.”
“Kit, right? I’ve seen you around school. Bowen’s told me about you,” she says, voice pretty, like her. “I think my friend had a crush on you last semester.”
My head tilts to the side. “Your friend?”
She nods with a laugh. “Yeah, thought you were cute. You never really came around though.”
I stare at her for a beat too long. Then shrug, trying to come off as cool as she effortlessly does. “Is your friend a guy?”
Brett chokes on a chip.
Delaney blinks.
Bowen huffs a laugh, tickling my cheek with it and sending a shiver down my spine. He gives my shoulder a squeeze before he moves back to the table and snags the sunscreen after setting down the food.
That’s it. As if it doesn’t actually matter, and that’s the way it should be. But after years of internal preparation, my psyche is prepped for the worst and on the brink of fight or flight again.
“No,” Delaney says, a little too quickly, cutting into my mental freak out. Then adds, “it's cool.”
It doesn’t feel cool. It feels awful, actually.
Yesterday's shit show in the lake is far too fresh. My feelings are too close to the surface. I feel silly for my reaction and raw from the truth that’s out there now, whether I wanted it to be or not.
Not to mention, now I’m sure every interaction with me and her boyfriend will be under a microscope.
The way I stare too long. Blush too often. The way he—
“Kitten.” Bowen’s voice is low beside me. I squint one eye from the sun to look up at him.
“Boe.”
He holds up the sunscreen bottle. “You’re already burning. Turn your head.”
“It’s fine.”
“It’s not.”
I sigh, too tired to argue, and look away. A cold burst of spray hits my neck and makes me shiver. His hand follows right after, fingers smoothing the sunscreen down over my skin. His touch is familiar. Like he’s touched me a million times.
Because. He. Has.
But today it feels different. Because she’s watching. And I feel seen.
I suck in a sharp breath, but Bowen doesn’t seem to notice.
“Got it,” he murmurs, stepping back.
Delaney’s smile is unreadable when I look back at her.
I sit down across from them and pretend everything is normal.
That Bowen’s not still close enough to smell the lake water dried in his hair, and the coconut-scented sunscreen rubbed on his own skin.
That Delaney’s not dissecting me with her eyes now, or at least it feels like she is.
Brett’s grinning like he knows something they don’t.
This is the worst.