Andy takes my hand and we walk to the door. This feeling of safety mixed with excitement bursts inside me. It makes me walk faster, and soon I’m at the door, trying to let us in. I fiddle with my keys, thumbing the mystery bronze key, before finding one to the house.
“We made it.” I exhale as we walk inside. I still can’t believe we’re here or that I’m the one who drove us here after all those months of not driving.
“We did. So tell me the plan,” Andy says, spinning me again toward the living room.
“No plan,” I say, smiling. “My dad keeps wood in the garage. If you know how to make a fire, that would be pretty nice right about now.”
“As a matter of fact, I do,” he says. “Fire and hot chocolate like you and your fam do?”
“You remember that?” I ask. I know I told him about my family vacations on our ride to NYC, but hearing him repeat it now is surprising in a good way.
“I remember everything you tell me,” he says, rubbing my shoulders.
“Everything?” I ask.
“Mm-hmm. Like when you told me there was a hot tub that we can take advantage of.”
“Oooh, hot tub, then fire and hot chocolate?”
He smiles. “Sounds like you’re trying to plan now.”
I frown. He’s right.
“Hey,” he says, kissing my forehead. “You know, I like that about you. And hot tub then fire sounds amazing. Let’s do it.”
“Really?”
He spins me again. “As much as I’m going to hate you changing out of this dress. Yes.”
We kiss again until I can feel we’re both smiling. “Go change,” he whispers. I nod and head to my room. My bathing suit drawer is a mess, and it takes me longer to find a matching top and bottom than I expected. It’s only when I try on my favorite black bikini that I feel self-conscious. I stand in front of the mirror, looking at the scar that runs along my chest from the accident. Normally I’m able to hide it, but there’s no hiding it in this suit.
It’s dark outside; he won’t even be able to see it, I urge myself. But it only helps a little. I find a robe in my closet that I can wear until the last possible second.
As I make my way to the hot tub, I can hear the water rushing. Andy must have started to warm it up.
I move over to the window. Peering out, I can see that Andy’s already inside. The hot tub is lit up, and I suddenly want to turn back around and say I changed my mind. But almost like he knows what I’m thinking he looks up and spots me. There’s suddenly a huge smile on his face, and he waves me over. I take a deep breath. It’s now or never.
I make my way to the sliding glass door. Opening it, I feel a burst of cold air. I run quickly to the hot tub. I’m barefoot, so my toes are cold as they hit the cement pathway my dad put in years ago.
When I reach the hot tub, I know that the faster I take my robe off, the faster I can get into the warm water, but I hesitate, looking at Andy. His hair is wet from going under. There’s a small drop of water on his lips that I have the urge to kiss away, but it slides off when he talks.
“Are you coming in?” he asks, watching me hesitate.
“Yes,” I say, but my body stays frozen where I’m standing. Maybe I can ask him to turn around. Then once I’m in the water, I can stay low so my scar is beneath the bubbles.
“What’re you doing? I can’t kiss you from all the way over here,” he teases.
I sway awkwardly in my robe. It’s not that I don’t want to go in and kiss him. I do. I just wish with everything in me that I could go back to the days where I could put on a bathing suit feeling as confident as I did in the dress I wore tonight. But as I’m thinking this, Andy moves over to the edge of the hot tub to be closer to me.
“Is something wrong?” he asks.
“I…I have a scar,” I confess. “From the accident. The second I go in there you’re…you’re going to see it.”
His eyebrows furrow. “And you think I’ll care? Is that really what you think of me?”
“No, not just you. Everybod—”
“I’m not everybody. I’m telling you that nothing is going to change the way I feel about you.”
He reaches out his hand. His eyes are staring straight into mine—unflinching—and the way he’s looking at me now makes me believe him.
Slowly, I untie the sash around my waist. Andy’s eyes remain on mine. When the robe drops to the ground, he smiles his warm Andy smile. I quickly grab his hand and he pulls me toward him. I walk up the steps and then slide into the hot tub beside him. My body goes from freezing to warm in an instant.
Still holding my hand, Andy pulls me closer to him so that we’re completely facing each other. The moonlight dances on his face.
He pulls our hands out of the water and brings the back of mine to his lips. He kisses it and then slowly starts kissing up my arm and up to my collarbone. My heart starts beating faster with his face so close to my scar, but when he kisses the spot right along my clavicle, I feel like I’m melting right here in this hot tub.
Soon he is at my lips, and when I kiss him back, I do so more passionately than I’ve ever kissed anyone. His hands move to my face and he holds me closer. I never want this kiss to end.
When eventually we pull away, he looks at me and brushes a piece of wet hair out of my face. “I love you, Ella Fitzpatrick.”
At first, I’m not sure I hear him correctly over the bubbles around us but the look on his face tells me everything I need to know. He looks at me like I’ve always wanted to be looked at. He sees all of me.
I wrap my arms around his neck.
“I love you too.”
With those words he finds my chin with his hand and lifts my mouth up to his mouth. He kisses me gently—so gently that it feels like my lips are fully absorbed into his.
Seconds turn to minutes. When we finally break for air, I don’t know how long we’ve been in here, only that our hands have become pruned from being underwater.
We decide to head inside, sprinting as fast as we can to the house, my robe in hand. Still not tired of kissing him, I lead him to the shower. In between kisses we rinse each other off in our bathing suits, my breath speeding up as Andy’s hands touch my skin.
After the shower we change back into our clothes and I make hot chocolate in the kitchen while Andy starts a fire in the living room.
Once we’re both done, we sit together on the couch, sharing a blanket. Little pops come from the crackling fire. I rest my head on Andy’s chest and he strokes my hair with his free hand. It’s so soothing that I completely forget about everything that’s happened in the past couple of weeks. All I can think about is that I meant what I said outside—I love this boy. It happened so quickly but it feels right—like everything that has happened so far was important because it led me to him.