“I have no idea.”
“I was thinking that even though my parents were here for only three days, it seemed like an entire month.”
He chuckled before meeting my eyes again. I felt his thumb teasing the back of my hand, featherlight.
“Do you want me to come by tomorrow to tutor? Because if you need a day to unwind, I completely understand.”
Avoiding Bryce, I knew, would make me feel even worse. “I want to keep going on my reading and my assignments,” I said, surprising even myself. “I’ll be okay after I get some sleep.”
His expression was gentle. “You know they love you, right? Your parents, I mean. Even if they aren’t too good at showing it?”
“I know,” I answered, but strangely, I found myself suddenly wondering whether he was talking about them, or about himself.
* * *
As we eased into February, Bryce and I fell back into our regular routine. It wasn’t quite the same as before, though. For starters, something deeper had taken root when I’d sensed he wanted to kiss me and had grown even stronger when he’d taken my hand. Though he didn’t touch me again—and certainly didn’t attempt a kiss—there was a new charge between us, a low-level and insistent hum that was almost impossible to ignore. I’d be doing a geometry problem and I’d catch him staring at me in a way that seemed unfamiliar, or he’d hand me the camera and hold it for an instant too long, making me pull, and I felt like he was trying to keep his emotions in check.
Meanwhile, I was sorting through my own feelings, especially right before drifting off to sleep. I’d get to the point of no return—that brief and hazy period where consciousness blends with the unconscious and things get swimmy—when all of a sudden, I’d picture him on the ladder or remember the way his touch had set my nerves on fire, and I’d immediately wake up.
My aunt, too, seemed to notice that my relationship with Bryce had…evolved. He was still having dinner with us two or three times a week, but instead of leaving immediately afterward, Bryce would sit with us in the living room for a while. Despite the lack of privacy—or maybe because of it—he and I began to develop our own secret nonverbal communication. He’d gently raise an eyebrow and I’d know that he was thinking the same thing that I was, or when I impatiently ran a hand through my hair, Bryce knew I wanted to change the subject. I thought we were pretty subtle about the whole thing, but Aunt Linda wasn’t easily fooled. After he’d finally gone home, she’d say something that would make me reflect on what she was really trying to tell me.
“I’m going to miss having you around here once you leave,” she’d say casually, or “How are you sleeping? Pregnancy can have all kinds of effects on hormones.”
I’m pretty sure it was her way of reminding me that falling for Bryce wasn’t in my best interest, even if she wouldn’t say it directly. The net effect was that I would reflect on her comments after acknowledging their underlying truth: my hormones were running wild and I was going to be leaving soon.
And yet, the heart is a funny thing, because even though I knew there was no future for Bryce and me, I would lie awake at night listening to the gentle lapping of sea against the shoreline, knowing that a big part of me simply didn’t care.
* * *
If I could point to a single notable change in my habits since I’d arrived in Ocracoke, it was my diligence when it came to schoolwork. By the second week of February, I was completing March assignments and I’d done well on all of my quizzes and exams. Simultaneously, I continued to grow more confident with the camera, and my proficiency was steadily improving. Chalk it up to our narrow focus on schoolwork and photography, but Valentine’s Day was just…okay.
I’m not saying that Bryce forgot about it. He showed up that morning with flowers, and though I was momentarily touched, I quickly noticed he’d brought two bouquets, one for me and one for my aunt, which sort of diminished their impact. I later confirmed that he’d gotten his mother flowers as well. All of which left me wondering whether everything that was happening between us was simply a hormone-induced fantasy.
Two nights later, however, he made up for it. It was Friday evening—we’d been together twelve hours by then—and my aunt was in the living room while we were on the porch. It was a warmer-than-usual night compared to what it had been, so we left the slider open slightly. I figured my aunt could hear us, and even though she had a book open in her lap, I suspected she was sneaking the occasional peek at us as well. Meanwhile, Bryce squirmed in his chair and shuffled his feet like the nervous teenager he was.
“I know you have to be up early on Sunday morning, but I was hoping you might be free tomorrow night.”
“What’s happening tomorrow night?”
“I’ve been building something with Robert and my dad,” he said. “I want to show it to you.”
“What is it?”
“A surprise,” he answered. Then, as though he was in danger of promising too much, he went on, the words coming quickly. “It’s not a big deal. And it has nothing to do with photography, but I was checking the weather and I think the conditions will be perfect. I guess I could show you during the day, but it will be a lot better at night.”
I had no idea what he was talking about; the only thing I knew for sure was that he was acting the same way he had before inviting me to the New Bern Christmas flotilla with his family. The sort-of date. He really was unbearably cute when he was nervous.
“I’ll have to check with my aunt.”
“Of course,” he said.
I waited and when he added nothing else, I asked the obvious. “Can you give me a little more information?”
“Oh yeah. Right. I was hoping to take you to dinner at Howard’s Pub, and then after that, the surprise. I can probably have you home by ten.”
Inwardly, I smiled, thinking that if a boy asked my parents whether I could stay out until ten, even they would have agreed. Well…in the past they would have, but maybe not now. But still, this sounded like a date date, not a sort-of date, and even though my heart suddenly boomed in my chest, I rotated in my rocker, trying to look calm and hoping to catch my aunt’s eye.
“Ten o’clock is fine,” she said, still gazing toward her book. “But no later.”
I faced Bryce again. “All good.”
He nodded. Shuffled his feet. Nodded again.
“So…what time?” I asked.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean what time do I have to be ready tomorrow?”
“How about nine?”
Though I knew exactly what he meant, I pretended not to, just to be funny. “You’ll pick me up at nine, we’ll have dinner at Howard’s Pub, see the surprise, and you’ll have me home by ten?”
His eyes widened. “Nine in the morning,” he said. “For photos, I mean, and maybe a little Photoshop practice. There’s also this place on the island I want to show you. Only the locals know about it.”
“What place?”
“You’ll see,” he said. “I know I’m not making much sense, but…” He trailed off and I suppressed a thrill at the thought that he’d actually asked me out on a date date. Which sort of scared me but kind of excited me, too. “See you tomorrow?” he finally added.