15. Nick
NICK
Omigod You Guys - Legally Blonde
“We should talk.”
What every guy wants to hear, especially after making out with the woman I’ve fantasized about since I was a teenager. I clear my throat. “Good idea.”
I straddle the piano bench and June mirrors my pose. We stare at each other, waiting for the other to go first. It can’t be me. I’ve wanted to kiss her for so long, and it was better than anything I imagined.
And I imagined it a lot.
God, the way she felt, molding her body to mine. The little sounds she made when I touched her, or kissed her, the way she dragged me closer, like she couldn’t get enough.
But this is new for her. She hasn’t been lusting after me for over a decade.
I’m so lost in thought, I almost miss her breaking the silence. “I just got off the phone with my agent.”
My breath huffs out, and I blink several times. “That’s … not what I thought you’d say.”
“What did you think I’d say?”
“I don’t know.” I rub a hand over my jaw, stubble scratching my palm. I only know how scared I am to lose her, when I’m not sure I really have her.
She kissed me once, her soft lips brushing mine, and I attacked her mouth, stopping short of biting and sucking her hard enough to give her a hickey.
I shift on the bench, hoping to relieve some of the pressure behind the placket of my jeans. The idea of marking her makes me even harder. I want to claim her.
Mine .
“I’ve got an interest and availability check,” June says, and I shake my head, forcing myself to stay present.
“What does that mean?”
She runs a hand through her hair. “It means there’s a director who’s interested in working with me, so they want to know if I’m also interested and available to audition on a certain date.”
“Which is?”
“The gala,” she murmurs. “The last day of Conservatory.”
“And your birthday,” I add, pretending not to notice her shocked expression. First her allergy, and now this. I won’t have to tell her about my teenage crush because she’ll figure it out.
Her brows thread together. “It’s possible nothing will come of it.
The director might’ve reached out to a bunch of actors.
It doesn’t make sense to turn it down now.
But the call—” She breaks off, biting her bottom lip.
The lip I now know is pillow soft, and lush, and sweet.
“It made me think. About us. About this summer ending,” her voice cracks, and a selfish part of me hopes it’s from regret.
“I know.”
“There’s no?—”
“I know.” My voice is firm. “And I don’t care, June. Whatever time we have together, I’ll take it.”
A frustrated whimper sounds in the back of her throat. “It’s not fair to you. You deserve someone who will be here for you all the time.”
“But I want you,” I admit.
Her eyes meet mine, a small smile dancing at the corners of her lips. The force of her beauty slams into me until I can’t breathe. Her face is flushed, hair tousled from my hands, and that smile is for me. All mine. Golden, like my song. I can’t bring myself to ask if she knows it’s about her.
“It’s not just me living in the city, though. I’d be on tour, a new place every week. With time zone changes, it’s harder to call, and visit, and … I can’t be what you need, Nick. I wish I could, but that’s not who I am.”
“I don’t want you to change. You are what I need, Juniper.
You, just the way you are. And if I get you until the end of camp, then that’s enough for me.
” It’s not a lie. Three weeks have to be enough, because I’ll never get what I want.
Forever. With her. This is the real world, and women like her don’t want forever with guys like me.
“Like you said, it’s an interest and availability check.
Let’s spend this month together, and think about the rest later. ”
“Fine.” She shoots me that adorable glare, but doesn’t push the subject. “I guess that’s settled. For now.”
I grab her legs behind her knees and bring her closer, right into my lap. “We’re settled?”
“Yes.” She nods, winding her arms around my neck.
“Say it.” I nudge her nose with mine.
Her eyelashes flutter against my skin when she rolls her eyes. “I”—she kisses my cheek—“am settled with”—She kisses my other cheek—“my insanely hot boyfriend.”
All the muscles in my chest, my stomach, tighten. “You think I’m hot?”
She pulls back, taking in my whole face. “Seriously? Nick, you had the glow up of like, the century. I mean, look at you!”
“A glow up.” I huff, my neck flushing with a strange mix of pleasure and yet, embarrassment.
“Ugh, men have an unfair advantage. You turn thirty and boom, sexy as hell. Women hit thirty and suddenly we’re old hags.”
“Guess you’re lucky I’m into old hags.”
“Fuck. You. So. Much.” Her hands go to my ribs, nails digging until I laugh.
“Your words,” I wheeze. I capture her hands and slide them behind her back, pinning her to me. “Don’t worry, you’re a sexy old hag, sugar.”
“Sugar?” June laughs.
I give an exaggerated sigh. “What’s wrong with that one?”
“You sound like my meemaw from down South.”
“Do you have a Southern meemaw?”
“Like, metaphorically.”
“Ah, yes, your metaphorical meemaw.” I push her hair over her shoulder, fingers grazing her skin, just because I can. I savor the way her pupils widen.
“You better figure it out soon.”
“Or?” I nip at her bottom lip.
“Or”—her breaths turn short, shallow—“else.”
“Good one,” I laugh.
“You can’t expect a pithy comeback when you do that !”
I nip her bottom lip again. “Do what?”
Her chest presses against mine, and I don’t just hear her laugh, I feel it.
Something swells in my chest, and I release my hold to run my hands over her body.
She’s so soft. This is real, it’s really happening to me.
Junie Danielowicz looks at me with a hunger that deepens her blue eyes to the color of a rolling sea.
She chases my kiss, craves my touch. I shudder, my brimming feelings close to overflowing, but I hold myself in check.
I’ll scare her with the depth of my need.
Her hands slide to mine, holding them between us. “How long have you been writing music?”
I stare at our hands, mine so large they engulf both of hers. “It’s one of those things I’ve kind of been doing my whole life? Even when I’d just started lessons, I’d mess around with the piano, making up my own melodies. But I started actually notating it a few years ago.”
“You’re really good.”
“Thanks.” I grind my molars together to stop the self-deprecating comment from slipping out. Simply taking a compliment is like swallowing something sharp and bitter.
“Really, really good.”
“Thanks?”
She tugs on my hands, ducking her chin until I meet her gaze. “Screw our duet, you should perform that at the cabaret.”
“Oh, no.” Cold sweat breaks out at my temples. “I don’t perform my own music. It’s something I do in my spare time. A hobby.” The wrongness of that word is a nail hammering into my chest.
She tilts her head, assessing. “You’re kind of a tough nut to crack, Mr. Harper.”
I can’t stop the grunt of pleasure when she calls me Mr. Harper.
I pull my hands away, running them over the grooves between the piano keys.
If there's anyone I could tell about my dreams, it’s June.
So I force the words out, completely unused to talking about this quiet hope.
“In a perfect world, yes, I’d quit my job and go be a happily broke musician. ”
“Wow.” Her eyebrows shoot up. “I thought your goal would be, I don’t know, performing your music at the jazz cafe on weekends. I didn’t realize you wanted all that.”
I’ve told her too much, but it’s too late to retreat or make a joke. “I do. I want it so much it’s hard to breathe sometimes.”
“I get that.”
I knew she’d get it, but saying it out loud makes me … itchy. Restless.
“Why don’t you then?”
“Because we don’t live in a perfect world.”
“There will never be perfect conditions, or a set of perfect circumstances, for you to take that risk.”
“And that’s why it’ll never happen.”
“Nick.” She runs her fingers through the hair at the nape of my neck. “That’s not what I meant and you know it.”
“I can’t quit my job, leave my dad, and move to the city.” Even if I fantasize about it weekly. I can’t walk away from my whole life.
“You could , but you won’t.” Of course she’d say that. She has two parents who are musicians themselves. A support system.
I’d have to completely abandon my dad and strike out all alone. “I have responsibilities. Not everyone’s cut out for that life, June.”
“True,” she agrees. “They’re not. But you won’t know for sure unless you try.”
“Can you—can you drop it?” I splutter, desperation squeezing my throat.
Her eyes rove over my face, seeing me, really seeing me. My muscles bunch, fingers curling into fists. Maybe she’s frustrated with me, disappointed. Realizing what kind of man I am. And maybe it’s not enough for her. I’m not enough for her.
Whatever she sees in my face, she nods, more to herself. “If that’s what you want. Should we run the song?”
I grab the music from my bag, swallowing to loosen the lump in my throat. We sing it twice through to get the lyrics and timing down. “Should we do Emmett’s costume change?”
“It would be so fun if we could!” June claps her hands. “But how would that work if you leave and come back?”
“Do you play?”
“A little, but I’m not very good.”
“Even if you vamped, it would work. Wanna try?” I hook a finger into the belt loop of her shorts, pulling her closer to the middle of the bench.
“No, no, no. I need to practice before you hear me.” She slides back to the end of the bench.
“Seriously?”
“Please, let me practice on my own before I embarrass myself in front of my super hot, super talented boyfriend.”
“But you’re … you.”
“Uh huh.”
“And I’m … me.”
She bumps her knee into mine. “Can’t get anything past you.”
I’m not feeling particularly articulate right this second, but explaining June’s breathtaking talent to her is like explaining to the sun that it’s very bright. “You’re amazing, June. Y-you’re everything . I don’t know why you’d be with me.”
“You mean a smart, funny, hot as fuck man who’s so brilliant he writes his own music? Yeah, totally gross. Ick. Get away from me,” she deadpans.
I can’t breathe. My chest is too full of—something. My mind turns to static. How do I respond to that over-the-top praise?
Her lips ghost over my cheek, cool in comparison to the heat of my skin. “That wasn’t a good enough compliment to make you blush, but it’s freaking cute.”
“What every man wants to be. Cute.”
“Well, you are. Deal with it.” She straightens in her seat. “Let’s run it again. I’ll practice my part later. You’re amazing too, Nick. Own it.”
I flip back to the first page, hands shaking. But when I start playing, my fingers are sure. The music carries me to that place, where I’m nothing but notes on the page and fingers on the keys.
And sharing it with June feels right. Something this good should scare me, because I don’t get to keep it. But I’m too deep in the music, too deep in my feelings for June, to care.
The song finishes and her eyes sparkle when they land on me, her cheeks flushed from singing. When she sits this close, and looks at me like that, all at once, I understand the song we’re singing.
“The guy I want to be,” I murmur.
“Hmm?” She shifts closer.
“‘Take It Like a Man.’” The need to explain steals over me and the words tumble out, “I want to be that guy who takes chances,” for you , I want to add.
“What’s stopping you?”
“I don’t know how to—I can’t see a way to follow through.”
“It’s not one big change, though, you know? It’s lots of little ones. One step at a time.” She cups my jaw, then her hand slides to my throat, my chest, resting over my heart. “What would the man you want to be do right now?”
But all those little choices start with one big decision—it’s time to make a change. I drag June to me until she’s pressed tight against my chest. Maybe, with her, that one big decision isn’t so big.
“This,” I whisper, and kiss her.
She opens for me and I can’t stop at one kiss, one touch. Because the man I want to be wouldn’t stop. He’d hold on with both hands, savoring every second, until he has to say goodbye.