He pauses. “Do I smell?” He breathes into me, sending goose bumps down my arms and up my legs.
He smells like sunscreen and grass and bug spray and some tangy boy deodorant and, yes, sweat. Eyes closed, I bury my nose in his soft curls and inhale loudly. “No.”
Andrew returns to my neck, softly grazing the spot on my jaw where his bludger hit weeks ago.
“I’m pretty sure . . .” I lose focus halfway through my sentence because I require more mouth kisses, but after a minute I try again. “I’m pretty sure I have grass in my . . . everywhere.”
A pause.
“Do you want me to check?” Andrew’s fingers find the line of skin between my shirt and my shorts, and linger.
I wrap my arms around his back (how does he have so much back?). I spread my fingers and squeeze to hold him very, very still as I consider the question. Not with all my quivering melty body parts, but with my brain. Assuming I still have one in here somewhere.
“No sex,” I say, and then because I am ridiculous I add, “No sex for me today, thanks.”
Andrew laughs and starts to pull away, but I lock my fingers to keep him in place until he relaxes against me, breathing into my chest. For a few seconds I can feel his heart beating.
“Maybe just . . . more of this?” I ask.
Andrew’s kiss has more weight behind it this time, and I use it as an excuse to sink back toward the armrest, drawing my bare feet up onto the cushions and pulling Andrew down with me until we’re slotted together sideways across the cushions.
“As much as you want,” he says, slipping a hand into my hair to scratch my scalp. I shiver, my grin as wide as his.
It turns out I want a lot, exploring the vast wilderness between kiss and sex. I’m deep in that wilderness, striking out in the inhabited but uncharted frontier, panning for gold with small shaking motions until all the bits of sand and silt and fractured frivolous pieces fall away.
I sparkle in the light, and the flash is blinding.
* * *
• • •
Andrew sits up and I stay flat, catching my breath with my limbs still buzzing and my lips aching like muscles after conditioning practice. He maneuvers my feet into his lap and runs his fingers across the soles, which normally would be tempting fate, but I guess I’ve moved beyond ticklish.
Eventually I extract myself from our couch heap and head toward the restroom, leaving Andrew with a smile on his face and his head leaned into the cushions. I stumble on my overturned bag and my phone, which lies on the floor where it must’ve landed after falling out of my pocket.
The second I close my hand around it, the world reappears, intruding into my sleepy bubble of ignorant bliss to remind me that there are words for what I just did.
One-night stand. Random hookup.
Other, less kind descriptors pop into my head, words for the people who do this. Words that I would never use because they’re totally antifeminist. Words that shouldn’t echo in my sex-positive brain but still somehow do. My stomach lurches, and I shove my phone into my pocket without glancing at the screen. I trudge to the bathroom.
After I pee and wash my hands, I stare into the bathroom mirror for a few extra seconds, trying to examine my face like an objective outside observer. Is that a sunburn or a blush on that person’s cheeks? Is her hair hanging stringy around her face because of a long healthy day of physical activity or because of her nocturnal physical activities? Does she look different now than she did an hour ago? And is that a smile sneaking in at the corner of her lips?
I suspect that if I really were looking at a stranger, I would be glad that she was enjoying her life. If it were Melissa (prefight), I’d give her a high five. But when she’s me . . . it feels weird. I don’t know how I feel.
Andrew’s curled into the couch, eyes closed, the fingers of one hand twitching in what I imagine is a dream about face-beats. But it’s all imaginary. I have no idea what he might dream.
I need to talk to Melissa.
I find a pad of Post-its next to the laptop on the desk in Andrew’s room. After a minute of hesitation, I leave my note:
Ellen Lopez-Rourke. I was going to leave a number, but honestly just find me on the interwebs.
(Also thanks.)
(Also sorry.)
(Also your room is kind of a mess.)
(Also fuck the patriarchy.)
(Okay, I’m done now.)
I leave the note on the keyboard of the silver laptop. I can’t think of a safer place to guarantee he will find it, fast.
I slip my feet into my wet Converse and grab my bag off the floor, shoving a spilled sock back into its open mouth, and then I sneak out the door. I follow the noise back down to the party, toward the only person I want to tell about this night. Toward a conversation I need to have, gossip too exciting and confusing not to dissect. Toward the high fives I can’t give myself. Toward an end to this pointless fight. Toward Melissa.
26
Music still blares, but the party is winding down. 12:06 a.m. isn’t exactly the end of the night, but most people have early games to play. I scan the kiddie pool of melting ice water, the dance floor area, and the quidditch beer pong table. I spot a sleepy-looking Alex swaying to the music on one of the couches, a few familiar faces chatting in small groups, but none of my teammates. I check down the hall. The door to our temporary team housing is closed, and no light peeks into the dark hallway from under the crack. Is everyone asleep already?
Actually, Melissa is almost definitely asleep. Crap.
I reach for the doorknob to ease the door open, but before I can get my hand on it, the bathroom door swings open. A familiar startled squeak, and I glimpse a shoulder and a ponytail before the door slams shut.
“Melissa?” I move toward the bathroom, excited to catch her out of bed. “Are you in there?”
“What?” Melissa calls from the other side of the door. “You—you surprised me.”
“Look, I know earlier I . . . Can you come out, please? I have a thing to tell you.”
In the long pause, I relive Melissa’s angry texts, the week of cold shoulders, how angry she was at the end of the tournament. Maybe it’s not realistic to think that we can just drop all of that, but I do. I know she recognizes the urgency in the word “thing,” so I know she’ll open the door.
And a second later, she does.
“I was going to bed,” she mumbles, slipping into the hall and standing, arms crossed, with her back against the door.
“I know, but . . .” I’m too excited to start properly. “But gossip.”