“Please,” he adds, and his sweetness—his attention—pushes me over the edge. I stand and brush off the back of my jeans, then stuff my hands in my pockets, swishing side-to-side while I scoot my feet closer to his. He takes the final few steps toward me and gently grabs my wrists, pulling my hands from their hiding spots. His fingers find the spaces between mine until we’re holding hands palm-to-palm like a mirror image of each other.
His bottom lip is heavy with unsaid words, and his eyes dip below my gaze as he struggles to speak.
“I don’t want—” He stops short, knitting his brows. Eventually his eyes close. “I don’t want my family to fuck it up. I want to keep this ours for a little while.”
His eyes reopen on mine and there is a hardness to them, a brewing anger that I want to ask about but somehow know that now is not the time. His father holds him to his own set of expectations yet doesn’t live up to them himself.
I step close, bring our elbows together until we stand like extras doing some ballroom dance in a period drama. I lift myself up on my toes so I’m closer to his face, staring hard into his eyes.
The crickets from the surrounding trees are singing, and if I were rich—I mean really rich—I would buy this lot of land and build a home for me and Lucas right here. It’s a fantasy kind of future, but I haven’t indulged in fantasies in a very long time. What’s the harm in giving in to one right now?
“What’s the favor?” A faint smile paints my lips. We’re standing so close that Lucas can only focus on one of my eyes at a time. I shift my gaze in harmony with his until the curves in our mouths match exactly.
“I’m going to interview for MIT. And Coach and my dad . . . they can’t know.” Uneasiness pulls the corners of his eyes down, and his breathing stills.
“They won’t,” I assure him, knowing that I can’t—and shouldn’t—make that promise. But more than that, I can’t let him not try for this. It’s what’s in his heart. He wouldn’t have told me about it if it didn’t weigh on him so heavily.
“I have a plan. You’ll need to take my truck.”
I grin and he shakes my hands in his, laughing lightly with his head tilted back.
“I’m gonna want it back in one piece,” he says.
I shake my head. “No promises.”
He smiles with puckered lips and looks down at me with narrowed eyes.
“Do you need help getting ready for the interview? Is it at school? Or do you go to an office?” I rattle out a few more questions, but stop, letting my voice trail off with breathy whispered words when I realize he’s more than just amused by me.
“What?” My cheeks are burning and I’m so grateful that it’s dark outside.
Lucas pulls my hands up around his neck, then delicately traces his fingertips down my arms to my waist until we stand like we’re dancing without music. I fall back down on my heels and he removes the last few inches between us so he can tower over me. My eyes flit up to his hair, mussy from his run but now dry. I push the locks dipping over his right eye out of the way, the soft curl that the strands form tempting my fingers to stick around and play.
“June?”
It’s hard to look him in the eyes right now. He’s looking at me with want, which is something I never fully prepared for. I look up briefly but dip my gaze when the pounding in my chest feels unbearable.
I have zero control over my mouth right now. My lips are vibrating, and if he forces me to use words, they will be a scrambled, blubbering mess. Lucas eases my nerves with a soft stroke of his thumb across my bottom lip. Then a tender touch from the back of his fingers along the line of my jaw and my cheek. He lifts my chin until it’s hard to not let my gaze follow, meeting his. Wordlessly, he asks for permission, eyes falling to my mouth briefly, then returning to my stare.
I melt quickly, wanting badly to relive the kiss we had in my bedroom. I’m still so full of questions, though. I feel this pull that comes from somewhere else entirely, and I think it’s my past self. I owe it to the girl I was a year ago—two years ago—to get answers before I give in to the lure of kissing Lucas Fuller. I spent too many nights wondering what I did to cause my best friend to abandon our relationship. He was too cruel for it to be meaningless hormones, and too committed for it to be high school politics or a dare. My feelings war inside my head until it becomes impossible to hide the trepidation that drags down every last bit of happiness finally blooming on my face. My body stiffens in warning and Lucas steps back just enough to study me, and the reciprocal weight of doom that tugs at his light gives us enough space for me to once again ask the hardest question of my life. This time, I can’t give in without getting an answer.
“What happened?” I’m shaking where I stand, terrified of the answer.
Lucas shakes his head, and I think he’s begging me not to ask. The mystery is too much, though. I need to know. I need it for there to ever be an us again.
“Why did you pull away? Lucas . . . I need to know.”
His hands fidget at my sides, his fingers squeezing at my hips with light pressure, as if he’s afraid I might run.
“Please don’t make me tell you, June. Don’t make me say it.”
A wave of nausea makes me dizzy, and a light sweat covers my neck. He has to know I’m too far in to go back now. I can’t kiss him with this cloud threatening us. I could never accept it as real; it would always be a distraction, his way of once again getting out of the hard truth. He is my weakness, but he used to be my strength. I need to know where that part of him went and why.
He shakes his head harder, like a man trying to banish a bad dream, troublesome thoughts or voices in his head. Through it all, his hands stay on my hips, threatening to slip away but never quite fully letting go.
“June,” he pleads, squeezing his eyes shut. He finally breaks his touch on me and grips at his hair, and I am truly scared.
I wait through his labored, heavy breaths and force myself to maintain my hold on his red, tortured eyes. When the fight is finally choked from his body, his hands go limp at his sides. He offers one last breath, one last chance to touch my hand to his mouth and stop the onslaught of words that will change everything.
I don’t.
“This isn’t my father’s first affair.”
We’re both breathless. I ignore all other sounds; no more crickets or faraway hum of traffic. The darkness has eaten any light that’s left, and I hold on as Lucas drags me down a rabbit hole that will change me forever.
“My dad was seeing your mom.”
Those were the nights I made my own dinner.
“My mom caught them together.”
That’s when my dad said she was a hypocrite.
“He begged my mom not to leave.”
My dad took advantage of an easy out.
“My mom wanted him to make you and your mom move, but she settled for us never talking to you again.”
Us. Lucas. Me.
“She said she would tell everyone how your mom and my dad met.”
My mouth waters with anger and all I can muster is a strong shake to my head.
“He hired her, June. She needed money to get away from your dad and still be able to afford . . . things. And my father paid. He paid over and over. And he said he wasn’t the only one.”