Chapter 5 #2
Nolan hums and keeps his eyes closed, seemingly enjoying the rare affection Harper is so willing to show.
Jackson and Trevor share a knowing look that I can’t decipher.
Harper has always needed friends but had issues making them, unless you count his built-in best friend Andy, who’s also his cousin.
It’s sort of nice to see him finding a new friend who seems to get him on a level the rest of us don’t.
It’s interesting to see Jackson, who seems so territorial of Harper, so willing to allow him to show an open display of love to such a famous rockstar.
I’m so distracted with watching Harper basically pet the hot rockstar that I don’t realize Joey is making his way over.
Not until Harper goes very still and his eyes widen. “Lee,” Harper murmurs while cutting his eyes to the side toward a very intense-looking Joey.
I lift my head when Joey stops beside me, feet carefully not touching the picnic blanket. “Hello, Joseph.”
“I need you to come with me.”
I blink slowly. “I am here with my friends to enjoy the feature film.”
Beau snorts so hard I think he might snort his stomach out through his nose.
Joey reaches down, gently grabs my bicep, and deftly pulls me up.
I can feel my eyes going big and wide at the display of strength.
I forget, sometimes, how strong Joey is, mostly because he’s always so exceedingly gentle with me.
That’s almost always what I need, but the display of strength has my mind wondering what it would be like if he tossed me around, if I gave him permission to get a little rough.
I clamp that down so tight that I bite my tongue hard enough to make it bleed.
Joey all but frog-marches me away from the noise of the moviegoers and toward the citrus groves.
I want to dig my feet in and stop what I know is coming.
But it’s inevitable, so I let him drag me along, all while watching the perfect cut of his steeled jaw and the black curls that bounce on top of his head with every heavy fall of his feet.
Joey is always gentle with me, but something about him forcing my hand is making me fall a little more in love than I was only moments ago.
He finally ducks into a row of orange trees, successfully hiding us away from any prying eyes. I bite my lip to stop the aggrieved moan from escaping my lips when he pulls his hand away. His balled-up fists land on his hips as he looks at me like I’m a scorned child.
“Talk,” Joey demands.
“Hello.”
“Andrew Bradley.”
I sigh and cover my face with my hands. “That’s not fair, pulling out the full name. Joey, I’m doing my best here.”
“Why did I find out your dad is in a memory care facility from fucking Benji White.”
Oh fuck. I peek at him from between my fingers. “I didn’t want you to do what you always do.”
Joey’s face hardens. “What do I always do?”
“Swoop in and fix everything!”
A stricken look falls over Joey’s face at my words.
I want to reach out, tell him I don’t mean it, that I love him so much.
That I wish I could let him swoop in and fix my whole fucking life, but every time he does it, I fall more in love, and that is slowly destroying me more than keeping a secret from him ever could.
“I want to be your best friend,” Joey admits with a terrible tremble in his voice.
“You are my best friend.”
“Then let me be one! I like taking care of you and helping… I always have. Since—” Joey pauses and seems to collect his thoughts before continuing. “Since that day in the locker room in fucking tenth grade, okay? I don’t want you to ever be in pain and not tell me.”
“That’s nasty work,” I say, shocked he’d stoop so low.
He’d found me in the locker room in tenth grade nursing a broken rib after a particularly rough fight with my father.
That had led to Cindy and David putting their foot down with my father.
I never knew if that made him hate me more or less.
At least he’d stopped hitting me, but he’d been worse in other ways afterward.
“What happened?”
I sigh and cover my face with my hands for the second time this evening.
“He ended up in the hospital again because they thought he was drunk and disorderly. But he was just sober and has dementia. So, we found him room at a facility in the city. I haven’t seen him since he was admitted. He isn’t ready to see me.”
“You’ve gone to see him?” Joey asks, obviously confused.
“He’s my dad.”
Joey grunts and spins around, walking a few paces down the orange grove before spinning around to pin me with a very severe look. “You don’t have to see your abusive father. You did more than most children would. You can stop now.”
I don’t know what to do with that. Yeah, I probably should just dump my father and leave him.
Move on and forget about him. I don’t know how to explain why I keep seeing him, or why I keep wanting to see him.
I also don’t want Joey and Beau mad at me; they’re all I’ve got at the end of the day.
I rub my hand over my heart where it pounds away in my chest. I can feel the tightness starting, the very beginning of an anxiety attack.
But it goes away as soon as Joey steps forward and tugs me into the circle of his arms. He’s an inch or so shorter than me, not as broad, definitely not as heavy, but in his arms I always feel smaller, like I was made to be held by him.
“I love you,” Joey whispers into my hair. “I love you so much. I just want you to count on me. Whatever you do, whatever you decide, you’ve got me and Beau until the end of time.”
“That rhymed.” I take a deep breath of Joey’s amber-and-sandalwood scent, wishing I could bury myself into him. “You know how I am.”
“I know.” Joey runs his hands over my back as he presses kisses to the top of my head. “I’m sorry I hate your dad so much. But whatever you wanna do, I’ll be there for you. No matter what that entails.”
“Even if I decide to see him every day until he dies?”
“Even if you decide that,” Joey promises, and I believe him.
He sways us back and forth between the citrus trees.
Their sweet scent, combined with the smell of Joey in my lungs, lulls me into a sense of comfort that I had hoped to gain from the evening.
“Remember that time we gorged ourselves on oranges on our lunch break that one summer because we couldn’t eat one more watermelon after pitching them all summer long? ”
“Yeah, so worth it though. I couldn’t eat another slice of watermelon that summer without yacking.”
“Oranges always make me think of you now.”
I pull away to look into Joey’s eyes. Our faces are an inch apart; I can feel his breath on my cheeks with each of his exhales.
He has a little stubble on his chin, but mostly he’s clean-shaven, and he’s always been that way.
Makes him look younger and softer to my rough and rugged. My perfect counterpart.
“Why do oranges make you think of me?” I whisper, curling my fingers into Joey’s hips.
“They’re sweet, and I always want them.”
“Oh.”
Joey’s eyes flit between mine, warm and unhurried. “You tasted like oranges when I kissed you senior year.”
My heart stills at the memory. My chapped lips.
His wry smile when I’d tearfully admitted I didn’t think I’d ever get kissed.
The way his breath smelled like Coke because he’d just decimated a glass bottle after a hot day in the fields.
The kiss had been here, then gone, nothing more than a memory that I sometimes wonder if I imagined it.
Apparently not though. And Joey remembers it just as vividly.
Joey lifts his hand to cup my cheek again.
My heart is doing this weird flip in my chest, like it wants to break loose and run a victory lap.
But I stay perfectly still as Joey cups my cheeks, rubbing his thumbs under my eyes.
His eyes are so brown and wide, but I can’t read the intention in his words clearly.
I’ve always been a little stupid when it comes to Joey.
As a teen it meant I fumbled around him, so I just made myself quieter, letting him lead more of our conversations instead.
It’s better now after years of friendship, but I still fall back on that fat kid in love with the new kid.
Joey moves forward an inch and my entire body stills.
“Joey! Lee!” Beau’s familiar voice calls out.
I jump away from Joey like I’ve been struck by lightning.
But he’s just staring at me, that same confused, considering look in his gaze as earlier.
I swallow hard against the rock in my throat and wipe my sweaty palms on my jeans.
I step out of the orange grove and into the row that leads back toward the hill. I wave over at a curious-looking Beau.
“We’re coming,” I tell Beau.
Beau does a double take when Joey comes out from behind me. “The movie is starting,” Beau says, voice full of concern.
“Uh-huh,” Joey says, a tremble in his voice.
“Y’all alright?” Beau asks, looking between us both like he caught us stealing.
“Good,” I answer, but my voice breaks on the word.
I walk past Beau back toward the farm, leaving Beau and Joey standing behind me.
The sun has fallen behind the hills by the time I reach the guys that are sitting patiently on the picnic blanket.
Benji has joined the group now, sitting down with Nolan’s head in his lap.
The large inflatable screen shows the opening sequence of the movie, so I plop myself down and get cozy to enjoy the movie.
A few moments later, Beau and Joey join the group, with Beau settling beside a curious-looking Trevor.
Joey sits beside me like always, the heat of him radiating into me.
I might be unable to stop being Joey’s best friend, but I have to maintain the distance so that being in love with him doesn’t destroy me from the inside out.