“I’ll walk you to your car,” he says after a moment, one side of his mouth lifting into a small smile. His thumb strokes my back again, dips into the valley of my spine.
“Thanks,” I say, softly. “You never know what’ll happen between here and the parking lot.”
“No, but you can make an educated guess,” he says.
His thumb strokes my back one more time. It’s not a gentle stroke. It’s firm, like he’s trying to find the notches in my spine. Like he’s testing me.
I don’t budge.
“I’ll see you later,” he says to Silas, turning his head.
“Later,” Silas says, holding up his beer, and we walk into the dark.
Chapter Seven
Seth
Still Two Years and Three Months Ago
The three hundred feet between the bonfire and the parking lot is the longest walk I’ve ever taken. It’s long because the whole way, I can feel my brothers watching from where they’re standing by the bonfires, and I know what they’re thinking. After all, they did their best to keep me away from her earlier.
It’s long because there are still people here, at Fall Fest, waving and saying hello.
But mostly it’s long because she came over to say goodnight. It’s long because she didn’t move away from my hand on her back, because she sank into me. It’s long because when I touched her she gave me a look that made me feel like I could throw lightning bolts and make it rain.
In my less lucid moments, I sometimes wonder if she’s a sorceress. A witch, maybe. Some sort of enchanting demon, because what besides black magic could explain her hold over me?
“You do this every year?” she finally asks.
“By this, you mean Fall Fest? Yes,” I say.
“You guys make good beer.”
“You mean Daniel makes good beer,” I tell her. “I make good business decisions.”
That gets a smile out of her, a quick laugh.
“Of course you do,” she says, teasing. “I’m sure you’ve got a complicated flow chart for every decision.”
“Who says they’re complicated?”
“So there are flow charts,” she says, laughing.
Her laugh makes me feel like silly putty, like she can mold me however she wants. It always has.
“I can’t make staffing and overhead decisions based on a whim and a prayer, can I?”
“You could,” she points out.
She looks at me, her eyes dancing, her smile in the fine creases around them. I’m light as a feather, needy as a black hole. Her car is on the other end of the parking lot, and it feels like miles away.
“Can I show you something?”
“What?”
I reach into her pocket and take her hand. It’s warm as the bonfire we just left, and her fingers wrap around mine just like I remember.
“A surprise,” I say, and steer toward the shadow behind the brewery, a spot where the lights from the parking lot don’t reach.
The surprise is that when we reach the dark I turn, pull her in, push her up against the wall. The surprise is that she’s already pulling me toward her as I do, head back, lips slightly parted.
The surprise is that when I unzip her jacket, her nipples are already hard.
“This the goodnight you were looking for?”
“Something like it.”
I push myself against her, already rock-hard. She makes a noise. I do it again.
“Good, I was afraid I might misinterpret,” I say. “Usually when you summon me you’re a little more direct.”
“Silas was there,” she says, releasing the zipper on my jacket, her hands sliding over my shirt. “Half your family was ten feet away, I couldn’t just walk up and say hey Seth, wanna fuck.”
I grab one leg, hike it over my hip. She gasps, one hand clenching my shirt, cool knuckles against my warm skin.
“You could say it now,” I tell her, stroking my thumb along the gusset of her jeans.
“Hey Seth,” she whispers, her lips so close they’re brushing mine. “Wanna fuck?”
At last, I crush my mouth against hers.
Somehow, we make it to her car with our clothes on. She drives, and I don’t ask where we’re going. I just watch her, face lit by the dashboard lights. Lips dark, skin pale, chest still heaving.
She turns off the main road onto a gravel one that disappears into the forest, turns right. Before she shuts the headlights off I see the NO TRESPASSING sign, and then it’s dark as a tomb and I pull her onto me.
The first time is always rough, haphazard, frantic. We fuck like we’re time bombs. Usually it’s on the floor, sometimes a table. This time we spill into the back seat of her car, half-shedding our clothes as we go like we’re in high school again.
The only thing she says is are you still good? And I answer as long as you are and then I’m inside her, up against the back seat, and she’s bracing herself with one leg against the driver’s seat, the Jesus handle in one hand, her shirt and bra shoved up over her breasts as I wrap a seat belt around my fist and use it for leverage.
It doesn’t take long. The first round never does. When we both finish we’re a tangle of limbs and clothing and car parts, and I rest my forehead against hers and for a few moments, the world stops spinning and we float.
Then I clear my throat and ask if she keeps napkins in her car.
Delilah is staying in her parents’ guest house, so I offer to take her back to my place. There’s no point pretending that we’re done, so I don’t.
Instead, she drives us to the Hillside Motor Hotel, right outside the national forest. She doesn’t say why she doesn’t want to go to my place, and I don’t bother asking. I’d rather fuck again than fight.
We take the second round slower, though not by much. Being with Delilah is otherworldly, elating and terrifying, addictive. I feel like some other version of myself, one unweighted by the outside world, pure and primal and on a plane beyond this one. I feel like the wrong parts of me are gone and whatever’s left is what’s right.
We’re still in bed when the sun comes up, pink rays nudging their way through the closed curtains. She half on top of me, fingers pushed through my chest hair, big toe wiggling slowly against my leg.
I know that like a drug, this is the high and the comedown will be here soon. I know it, but I tell myself that this time will be different. This time, when we’re done with each other, we’ll part on mutually friendly terms and go back to our lives.
I’ve told myself that for years now.
Finally, we fall asleep.
Chapter Eight
Delilah
Still Two Years and Three Months Ago
I toss the phone book onto the bed, then flop myself down in front of it. It’s late afternoon on Saturday, the sun trickling in between the curtains.
“Does anyone deliver out here?” I ask. “I think most places have a five-mile delivery radius, or something like that.”
On the other side of the bed, a very naked Seth shifts slightly, reaching one arm over his head.