After my once-over with the scissors, I dragged my nails over his scalp and Keane moaned.
That sound. Whoa. It brought me right back to a dark bedroom, to the image of Keane over me, slamming himself into me over and over.
“Feels good,” he said, his eyes closed, and his head tipped back as I stood behind him. From this angle, I could take in his long, thick lashes—lashes most women would envy, his slightly crooked nose—from the time I accidentally hit him in the face with the tetherball in elementary school, and his wide mouth which was curled at the edges in a satisfied smile. He was beautiful to look at. I could say that not only as someone who had crushed on him for the majority of her adult life so far, but also as someone who recognized good looks when she saw them.
His eyes slid lazily open, looking directly into mine—stilling me. “Hi.”
I swallowed and stared into the reflection, not able to keep direct eye contact with him. My emotions were too easily read, and I didn’t need him to figure out what I was feeling before I did myself. “How’s the length there?”
Keane raised his head and dragged his hand through his hair, sending little flicks of water from where I’d sprayed across my chest. “That’s good.”
“I’ll just take a bit off the sides then, even it up.”
Keane just nodded and I turned so I faced his profile as I continued my cutting, trying my best to avoid looking at the angry red lines that started at his shoulders and continued to his back. They weren’t bleeding, but they definitely looked like scratches. And I knew they were from me.
When I finished one side, I moved to the other, getting closer to his face since the other side faced the dark bedroom and made it harder to see what I was doing. Being this close to him, I could see all the details of his face so much more clearly. The light freckles that dotted his cheeks and the line of his throat, interrupted only by the bump of his Adam’s apple. Even though I’d accidentally broken his nose when we were in elementary school, his profile didn’t reflect the damage. My eyes tracked over the scar he’d told me about at the bar and I shuddered in response to the story.
“Cold? I’m the one with my shirt off.”
“No.” I traced the scar with my finger. “I just remembered the story you told me about this.”
“Oh,” he said on a laugh. “Yeah, it’s not the most pleasant story to tell. My mom threw those hooks away when it happened and never hung up hooks again. We had to actually put our jackets on hangers in the closet like a bunch of freaks.”
“Imagine that,” I murmured.
“Hey, what’s up with the air mattress?”
I watched one perfect curl fall to the ground. “What?” I asked, playing dumb in order to buy myself time to think. I hadn’t thought about him seeing the air mattress. “Oh, that. It’s the one I brought along our Moab trip last year. It’s for me.”
“For you?” He raised one brow. “Sure, makes sense. Screw the big, comfy bed—a cold, plastic air mattress sounds like heaven.”
“Exactly.” I sliced off another curl, mourning it as it fell to the floor. He really had the best hair. “No, sometimes I have a hard time sleeping in beds that aren’t mine.”
When Keane didn’t say anything to that, I realized too late what I’d said. Should I address the elephant in the room, or pretend it was camouflage? I debated.
In the end, Keane decided for me. “We can talk about it, you know.” I felt his eyes on me in the mirror’s reflection but acted like I was super concentrating on my task.
“It’s fine,” I assured him, clipping another lock. “Really. We don’t have to talk about it.”
“Is that why you’re being so weird with me?”
“I’m not being weird.” I moved to clip off another lock, but his hand closed gently around my wrist.
“You’re being weird. I don’t know if it’s because of what happened, or if something else is going on and you don’t want to talk about it with me.”
A bit of both, buddy. But I couldn’t say that because he might press me on both. “I’m just really tired, honestly.” And it was honest. I was wiped out, running on empty. And it was also not the full truth, because, yes, there was more to it. But I wasn’t ready to talk about it. “But we don’t need to talk about that night. I really don’t want things to be awkward.”
“It doesn’t have to be.”
“But it will be.”
Keane turned on the stool so that we faced one another. “What’s going on, Navy?”
“Nothing,” I said, knowing he’d see the lie on my face. I closed my eyes, wished for the words that I needed. “Okay, it’s not nothing. But I don’t want to talk about what happened. I want us to be normal again. I want my best friend without the complications that we made.”
He let go of my wrist. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“We don’t have to talk about it right now. But I’ll want to, at some point.”
“At some point,” I agreed, as my brain added or never. “Let me finish this so you can shower. I might not make it through a whole movie.”
“Okay.” He turned so he faced the mirror again and I breathed a short sigh of relief and resumed the haircut.
After a few minutes, I was finished. “Done. Check it out. Let me know if I missed something.”
As he raked his hands through his hair, I began the clean-up of all the hair that accumulated on the floor and ran a lint roller over his pants to remove whatever was stuck there.
“You’ll want to shower off all those baby hairs on your back,” I told him as I handed him the towel.
“I’ll be quick,” he promised, and I let the door close between us.
11
KEANE
We settled on the couch and I pulled out the three DVDs I’d brought with me. “Are we feeling horror, mystery, or comedy?”
Navy studied the DVDs, but she didn’t seem all there—like she was looking through them. I wasn’t sure if it was because she was truly exhausted or if it was due to whatever was going on in her head. But I didn’t push, because I knew pushing meant she’d shut down on me. We were alike in that way.
“Comedy?” I asked when her thousand-yard stare seemed fixated somewhat in that direction.
“Yeah, sounds good.”
I snapped it up and approached the DVD player, sliding it in and turning on the tv as I was standing. “Want something to drink? Wine, or…?”
“You brought Chinese food and wine?”
I gave her a sheepish grin. “Uh… no. I brought Chinese food, but I know your aunt has wine.”
She looked tempted for a moment but waved it off. “No, you know wine makes me sleepy and I’ve got to stay up late tonight anyway.” As soon as she said the words, she clammed back up like she hadn’t meant to vocalize them.
“Oh?” I asked. “Hot date or something?”
“Or something,” she said, swiping the throw blanket off of the back of the couch. “I think she’s got some beer in the garage fridge, if you want a beverage.”