6 #4
My pulse climbed. “You’re supposed to ask what I think.”
“I know what you think.”
“That is academic malpractice.”
“Fine.” He leaned back. “What did you feel?”
I looked down again. “Like he believes death has no authority over his love for her.”
“Why?”
“He still calls her his life and his bride. He doesn’t treat those things like they ended when she died.” I ran one finger beneath the line. “Everyone else sees a grave. He still sees her.”
“Romantic?”
“Devastating.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You enjoy this entirely too much.”
“I enjoy watching you stop looking for permission.”
That stole the fight out of me.
I stared at the poem before answering. “It’s romantic because he refuses to let anyone reduce what they had after she’s gone. It’s obsessive and probably unhealthy, but love doesn’t have to be tidy to be real.”
Ryan’s eyes sharpened. “That’s your argument.”
“It can be both?”
“Most worthwhile things are.”
He pushed my notebook closer. “Write it down before you ruin it trying to sound smarter.”
“I hate your teaching style.”
“You keep getting As.”
“That is unfortunately compelling evidence.”
We moved through two more poems before Ryan placed Amy Lowell’s “The Taxi” in front of me. I read it once and frowned.
“I don’t like it.”
“You’ve been saying that before every poem you end up liking.”
“I liked Poe immediately.”
“You’re dramatic.”
“So was Poe.”
“Fair argument.”
I read the poem again. “She barely gives us anything.”
“She gives you enough.”
“That sounds like something professors say when they want students to do their jobs.”
Ryan rested his arms on the table. “What happens?”
“She leaves somebody she loves and gets into a taxi.”
“What happens around her?”
I looked again at the lamps, the people, and the movement of the city. Life continued while she was carried farther away from the person she wanted.
“It keeps going.”
Ryan waited.
I hated when he did that because the silence made me keep digging.
“She’s leaving, and everything around her continues like it doesn’t matter.”
“And?”
I stared at the page. “The world becomes cruel because it won’t stop with her. She’s being carried away from someone she wants while everyone else keeps moving. The city doesn’t care that every block makes the distance bigger.”
Ryan’s eyes stayed on me as I continued before I realized why the poem had started hurting.
“It’s worse because he’s still there. She knows exactly where he is.
She can imagine him standing behind while she keeps getting farther away.
” I swallowed and looked at the earlier poem.
“It’s a different kind of grief than ‘Annabel Lee.’ Poe refuses to accept separation even after death.
Lowell has to live inside separation while both people are still alive. ”
Ryan’s expression shifted. “Now you’re reading.”
“I was reading before.”
“You were translating words. Now you’re letting them hurt you.”
“That is a terrible advertisement for literature.”
“It’s an honest one.”
I looked at him. “Which kind is worse?”
His gaze moved briefly toward the poem. “The kind that ends while both people are still alive.”
The answer came without hesitation.
“Why?”
“Death doesn’t give you a choice.” Ryan looked at me again. “Walking away does. Knowing somebody’s still out there living without you can fuck with a person differently.”
I thought about his mother, the foster homes, and every person Ryan had lost without choosing to. My own selfish fear pushed underneath all of it, carrying Flint, distance, games, travel, women, and change back into the room.
Ryan’s eyes narrowed. “You left the poem.”
“What?”
“You’re somewhere else.”
“I’m right here.”
“Physically.”
I closed the book. “You’re leaving soon.”
His expression softened. “We already talked about that.”
“I know.”
“Still bothering you?”
“Yes.”
The truth surprised both of us.
Ryan leaned back. “How much?”
I looked around my apartment at his cap, his books, the half-open Spanish notebook, and the crackers he had apparently decided belonged beside my literature notes.
“I don’t know.”
“That’s allowed.”
“I hate not knowing.”
“I know you do.”
“I hate when things change after I finally figure out how they work.”
Ryan’s face went quiet, and I tightened my fingers around the edge of the book.
“If my schedule changes, I forget things. If plans move around, I spend the whole day feeling like I missed something. When something becomes part of my routine and disappears, my brain keeps expecting it to be where it was.” I held his gaze because I had already said too much to retreat cleanly. “You’ve become part of my routine.”
Ryan didn’t smile or tease. He reached across the table and took my hand.
“I like being part of your routine.”
My throat tightened. “Flint changes it.”
“Some of it.”
“What if everything changes?”
“It might.”
I flinched, and Ryan squeezed my fingers.
“You want me to lie?”
“No.”
“Then I’m not going to promise you this exact summer keeps happening forever. I have hockey. You have school. Schedules change.”
I nodded even though I hated every word.
“But I’m not disappearing.”
I looked at him.
Ryan held my gaze. “I know what disappearing does to people. If I stop wanting this, I tell you. If something changes for me, I tell you. I’m not going to make you sit around trying to figure out whether I vanished because you did something wrong.”
My eyes burned. “That’s a very specific promise.”
“It’s one I can keep.”
I looked down at our hands. “What if I get annoying?”
“You’re already annoying.”
I laughed before the emotion could embarrass me, and Ryan smiled.
“What if I text too much?”
“You already do.”
“I do not.”
“You sent me fourteen messages about Tennyson before lunch.”
“That was academic distress.”
“You sent a picture of your coffee.”
“It had a heart in the foam.”
“Exactly.”
I smiled while his thumb moved over my knuckles.
“What if I miss you?”
Ryan’s expression changed as he glanced at the Spanish notebook, then returned his attention to me.
“Te extrano.”
My chest ached. “What if I want you to come back?”
“Vuelve.”
“And if you can’t?”
“Then I tell you when I can.”
The simplicity of the answer made me want to cry.
Ryan stood before I could. He moved around the table, stopped in front of me, and turned my chair until my knees rested between his legs. His hands settled along my jaw.
“Mírame.”
I did.
“I want you.”
My breath caught while Ryan’s thumbs moved slowly over my cheeks.
“I’ve been clear about that, but I’m going to say it again because apparently you need repetition.”
“I’m a student.”
“Terrible excuse.”
His mouth curved faintly.
“I want you when you’re dressed like you’re about to meet somebody’s board of directors.
I want you in leggings with your hair falling out of whatever the fuck you tried to do with it.
I want you when you’re arguing with me, when you’re nervous, when you’re laughing too loud, and when you’re pissed because I made you defend something. ”
My heart pounded.
“I don’t care who knows I want you.”
That landed differently because I cared who saw almost everything. Ryan didn’t seem embarrassed by any part of me except the parts he didn’t know existed.
His gaze dropped to my mouth. “I’m going to Flint, and I’m still going to want you when I get there.”
“You don’t know that.”
His eyes came back to mine. “Don’t tell me what I know.”
The quiet command sent heat through me. “I’m—”
Ryan’s expression tightened before the apology escaped.
I stopped myself and tried again. “I’m working on believing you.”
His thumb brushed my lower lip. “That’s better.”
“I don’t need you to promise me anything beyond what we already said,” he continued. “I’m seeing where this goes. You’re seeing where it goes. Nobody else gets a place inside it.”
“Nobody else,” I repeated.
“Yeah.”
My fingers curled into the hem of his shirt, and Ryan’s eyes darkened so quickly that heat moved straight through me.
I had started recognizing that look over the last few weeks, the moment our conversation stopped feeling innocent and every inch between us suddenly mattered.
He stood between my knees with his hands against my face, broad enough to block most of the kitchen from view, and all I could think about was sliding my hands beneath his shirt to feel the warm skin I already knew was there.
Ryan’s gaze dropped to my fingers gripping the fabric, then returned to my face with an expression that told me he knew exactly where my thoughts had gone.
“Careful, mi hada.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because you keep doing shit like this.”
My smile came before I could stop it. “Holding your shirt?”
“You know damn well that isn’t what you’re thinking about.”
He leaned down until his mouth hovered over mine. “What do you want?”
The question had stopped terrifying me as much. Maybe Professor Brown deserved some credit. Maybe Ryan did. Maybe I was simply tired of wanting things silently.
“You.”
His breath changed. “That answer’s going to get us in trouble.”
“You asked.”
“Yeah, I did.”
I slid my hands beneath his shirt, and Ryan’s stomach tightened beneath my palms.
His mouth brushed mine once, soft enough to tease. I chased the kiss before he could pull back, ending whatever game he had planned.
Ryan kissed me hard enough that my fingers clenched against his skin. One hand moved into my hair while the other wrapped around my waist and pulled me forward until the edge of the chair pressed beneath my thighs and his body filled every remaining inch between us.
I made a sound against his mouth, and Ryan answered with a low groan that shot straight through me.
His tongue moved against mine slowly at first, then deeper when I pulled him closer.
The kiss carried none of the uncertainty of our first one.
We knew each other now. I knew how his breathing changed when I tugged his hair, and he knew the place beneath my ear that made my entire body tighten before his mouth reached it.
Ryan kissed down my jaw, tipping my head back as he laughed against my skin. “You’re learning.”
“Shut up.”
“Make me.”