Chapter Three #3
“Because it’s empty.” I give him the grand tour as we sail past a shelf full of souvenirs from around the globe, rattling off features like a Realtor.
The old-world French vibe my mom’s going for in the den (he’s careful not to step on the cream-colored rug).
The lacquered rosewood cabinet in the hallway, filled with fine china we never use.
A small ink-wash painting, mounted in a gilded frame like a museum piece, positioned with careful negative space around it. Then we stop in front of my room.
“Give me one minute.” I crack the door open an inch. My god. It’s in its usual state of disarray: an erupted volcano of clothes, shoes, and beauty products. A black bra is strewn across my full-length mirror.
I shake my head. “Meet me back here in an hour.”
“Is there a body behind the shower curtain?”
“Don’t check the closet either.”
He laughs. “Oh, come on. Let’s see it.”
Sighing, I step aside to let him in.
“Wow.” His eyes crinkle at the edges when he smiles. “What interior design style is this?”
I eye him with my chin up. “Minimalist. Can’t you tell?”
He laughs again. Tapping on my phone, I select a song from Josie’s band, Fishnets, and her voice comes through the wireless home speaker.
Josie’s lyrics are dark, but she sounds like a Disney princess.
As she sings “. . . leave before your cat learns the horrible truth . . .” with all the teenage angst she can muster, Sean manages to clear a space on the floor.
He sits down and leans his head back against my bed.
“Want anything to drink?” I ask.
“I’m good.”
“How’s the temperature? Too hot, too cold?”
He stretches out his legs. “Nope, this is perfect.”
Now what? I haven’t thought this through. Now that Sean is in my room, his presence impossible to ignore, I’m suddenly at a loss for what to do next.
“What’s that?” He points to the tapa cloth hanging on my wall as art. The fabric is deep brown and off-white, woven with geometric patterns of diamonds framed by intricate borders of crosshatches.
“It’s a masi,” I say, grateful for something to talk about. “I got it during our family trip to Fiji. It’s made from tree bark, isn’t that cool? They soak the bark, then pound it until it’s soft enough to turn into cloth.”
“That’s fascinating. I’ve never even been out of the country. Was it a good vacation?”
“Oh yeah.” I pull a photo album from my bookshelf. “I actually have some photos here. Want to see?”
“Sure. You have them in print?”
“I like physical copies.”
I sit down and he scoots over, his shoulder rubbing against mine.
He doesn’t pull back, so I don’t, either, and I take the chance to breath in the warm, clean scent of his cotton shirt.
He makes all the appropriate noises of interest when I show him our luxury resort, over-the-top breakfasts, and translucent water, until I flip to a new page.
There’s me lying in the sand, and my thighs are smooth, which is great, but a random guy (Alex?
Adam?) is lying next to me, which is not that great.
Out of reflex, I flip to the next page. More Alexes grin at me. Blood rushes to my face and I snap the album shut.
“It’s okay. I didn’t see that,” Sean says calmly beside me.
I stand up. “This isn’t interesting to see. I mean, Fiji is just an island . . . with lots of water surrounding it.”
He nods. “Yeah, I believe that’s the definition of an island.” I don’t miss the teasing glint in his eyes, which reminds me of the lagoons in Fiji under an overcast sky. “We could look at something else?”
“I could show you the one where I went to cheerleading camp?”
“That’s something I’ve got to see.”
My fingers pause over the album. For sure there were no guys there.
Wait. Madison’s then-boyfriend visited and brought a friend, who hit it right off with me. It was strictly platonic, of course, but it might not look innocent on film. Maybe the photos I took back in the days of St. Margaret’s would be fine. It’s a private girls’ school after all.
No. We had dances with St. John’s.
I sigh.
“Not safe either?” Sean asks from the floor. It’s impossible to tell if he’s more turned off or amused.
I drop down beside him, folding my legs underneath me. “Look. I need to be honest with you.” I knit my fingers together. “I have a lot of friends, and at least half of them are guys. They’re just friends.”
“Hey, it’s okay. You don’t need to explain.”
“All that is BS to me,” I say, scanning his face. “Before Sean.”
He gazes at me, then his face breaks into a grin. Relief blooms in my chest. “You have a cool life, I’m not judging you.”
He stands up and wanders around my room, stopping to glance at a few snapshots lining my shelves.
Seven-year-old me in a tutu. Eight years old, clutching the reins of my favorite horse, Sammy.
Ten, in baggy black sweatpants from my hip-hop phase (a style choice I’ve never revisited).
Middle school violin and fencing, where I lasted all of six months before giving them both up.
None of it stuck. I have tried everything under the sun yet somehow ended up feeling no closer to figuring out what I’m good at.
“You have so many talents,” Sean says. “And no surprise there, you were a cute kid. Seems like you’ve been beautiful all your life.”
“That’s actually my one and only talent,” I say without thinking.
It’s a joke, but also true. Aside from applying nail polish with my left hand, there isn’t much else I’ve mastered.
My brother, Jeremy, once told me that with me what you see is what you get, since my face is the only thing worth mentioning about me.
Wanting to direct the attention from myself, I swallow.
“I bet you’ve been beautiful all your life too. ”
“Not really. I was a scrawny kid in middle school and wore braces.”
I refrain from telling him that even if he had them now, I’d still totally kiss him.
My bookshelf is crammed with magazines I started collecting when I was younger.
Even with influencers dominating the scene now, there’s something about glossy pages that I can’t let go of.
When I try to stick my photo album of Fiji back into place, a leather-bound scrapbook tumbles to the floor. A couple of buttons roll out.
“What’s that?”
Picking up the buttons, I hide my face behind my hair. “It’s silly. It’s kind of a fake magazine I put together when I was little.”
“Can I see?”
Why Sean’s interested is beyond me, but I hand over my scrapbook. Let’s just get it over with. He’ll make polite comments and I’ll joke and deflect. He unbinds the leather wrap, and my face heats like he’s undressing me.
The pages are brittle with age, yellowed around the edges.
Swatches of fabric are taped in crooked rows, alongside magazine cutouts of haute couture dresses.
Three whole pages are dedicated to buttons, glued on in messy clusters.
My childish handwriting fills the blank spaces with commentary—Fabulous!
or Efferevansce! (an enthusiastic attempt at effervescence, apparently) or Don’t know what to think about this yet!
There’s even an entire section devoted to Met Gala events. Next to each outfit, I’d scribbled critiques on how it could improve—Lose the necklace or Different hairdo, please—followed by snide remarks and analogies only a younger me would think were clever.
Next to one particularly unfortunate white dress with embroidered green patches, I wrote Toast with mold???
Sean laughs at that one. He flips through the pages gingerly and smooths a crease.
“I like fashion,” I offer as an explanation.
“Yeah, I wanted to ask you at the coffee shop. Is that what you want to be, a designer?”
“Oh, no, I’m not that talented. I can’t even draw.
I’m more interested in, you know, fashion trends and cultural influences.
Things like what works and why. Why are some things classic while others go out of style?
What do people’s outfits say about them?
” Also, why does Sean only wear neutrals and still look incredible? “That sort of thing.”
He rubs his chin with his thumb. “I’ve never thought of any those questions before.”
“The spare buttons come with the clothes I buy, so I collect them.” I open my palm to let him see.
“These are flat buttons. You usually find them on dress shirts. They seem insignificant, totally interchangeable, but they’re not.
A plastic one with the wrong depth can cheapen a look instantly, but switch it to a high-shine mother-of-pearl one?
Timeless. It’s a detail that people don’t think about, but they feel it.
And that’s not even getting into jeans studs or toggles. ”
I catch myself. This is a guy who’ll go on to build a rocket for NASA, while I’m here obsessing about buttons? How much more frivolous can I get?
“Anyway.” I force a laugh, then slip the buttons back into the scrapbook, close it, and set it aside. Then I settle back down on the bed next to him, but look at the crystal knobs on my closet doors.
“Very cool,” Sean says. I check to see if he’s being sincere. “No, really. I’m not that interested in buttons, but I like hearing you talk about them.”
No teasing glint, no smirk. His eyes are kind.
I turn the music down and we keep talking. When the playlist reaches its end, he stretches his arms over his head and says, “I’m getting déjà vu.”
“How so?”
“This is the second night we’ve ended up sitting together in a bedroom.”
Without knowing why, my lips curl into a smile. My cheeks tingle as I try to control it.
“What’s so funny?” Sean asks.
“I’m just . . .” I peer at him through my lashes. “I’m happy. I’ve wanted this since forever, to talk to you, and tonight is one of the best nights of my life.”
His eyes soften. “Flora—”
“You know how you can have a crush on someone, but when you get a chance to know them better, it feels wrong? Like, what did I ever see in them? But sometimes, they turn out even better than you imagined, and you want to freeze that moment and relive it over and over again? I’m really happy now. Thanks for keeping me company.”
In movies there’s always a climax leading up to a kiss. Maybe it’s a heated argument, or a reunion after a long time apart, or that perfect ending moment when the saxophone swells, snow starts to fall, birds sing, and you know everything is going to be okay.
In my case, it just happens.
He moves in closer, I shut my eyes, and the kiss falls into place.
It feels right. Destined. I’ve imagined kissing Sean Foster many times in my head, but every version was wrong.
It’s so much better in reality. Intoxicating and warm and devastating and firm and soft and tasty and all the good stuff thrown together.
His kiss reminds me of cotton candy and mint and starlight and the first ray of sunshine, like spring and summer rolled into one.
Before I know it, we’re on the bed and I’m on top, his chest muscles taut beneath me. Despite the part of me that is getting carried away, part of my stunned brain is running a news report about the fact that it happened. Sean Foster kissed me. Sean Foster is still kissing me.
I’ve kissed boys before, but this is on an entirely different level. He knows how to do this.
“Wait,” he says, pushing me away.
“What? What’s wrong?”
He reaches behind him, fumbles around, and pulls out a high heel. The velvet shoe I tried on before going to the party. He holds it up, scrunching up his nose. “I can’t concentrate with this digging into my back.”
I snatch it from him and toss it to the floor. With a playful shove, I push him back on the bed, and that’s when we both break into laughter. His body trembles as he wraps me in a hug. I bury my face against his chest, drowning in mortification but also giddy excitement.
When the laughter dies down, he brushes my hair away from my forehead and lifts his face to find my mouth again.
This time, without the distraction of my shoe, it’s heaven.
Sean might be reserved on the outside, but his kisses aren’t.
We continue, stretching it out for as long as possible, and he keeps his hands above my waist.
When we finally stop, both of us breathless, I gasp, “You’re the best kisser ever.”
“Hmm. Was it a tough competition?” He squints at me then smiles, and my heart kicks into a gallop. He seemed so serious at first glance, and now the contrast is amazing. I’ve cracked open an ice door to find a garden blooming.
Sean is my Wonderland, and I’ve tumbled down the rabbit hole. It’s a long, hard fall, and there’s no way I can climb back up again.