Extreme

by Lark O'Neal

  Our hands brush as I take it, and he pauses for a second, lifting his hand to my jaw, the barest fingertips. “I feel so comfortable with you. That’s rare.”

  “Me, too,” I say softly. “Sort of.”

  He grins. “Sort of comfortable, or sort of rare?”

  “Comfortable. And rare.”

  “You don’t strike me as the shy type, but that’s the vibe I pick up now and then.”

  “I guess I haven’t really dated many people.”

  “How many is not many?”

  “Uh.” I stick my hands in my back pockets, stepping away. “A couple. Not a lot of time when you’re training like I do.”

  He shrugs out of his coat, too, and shoves his hair out of his face with those big hands. “Like a couple of guys ever?”

  That constant of my life, humiliation, creeps down from the top of my scalp, but I lift my shoulders. “Yeah.”

  His smile lifts on one side, his hands tucked under his armpits the way guys do sometimes. “You must have known some pretty clueless dudes.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Listen, would you think it was too weird if I jumped in the shower? I’ve only been here for an hour since I got back to Iceland.”

  “No, please. I’ll make some tea and see what you have that I can possibly turn into some kind of meal.”

  He nods and heads for the shower, pausing to take clean clothes out of a bureau drawer. “There’s a stereo, you can put on some music if you want.”

  “Thanks.”

  At the door, he pauses. “I’m really glad you’re here, Kaitlin.”

  “Me, too.”

  He disappears and I shuffle through the fridge to find the small stores of eggs, cheese, and butter. In the cupboard is a loaf of bread, maybe beyond its top freshness. I wonder where the food comes from—thinking about all the rocky landscapes I’ve seen, it seems impossible there is any arable land. But if they couldn’t grow things, how did the settlers survive?

  Anyway. I don’t want to start the food until he’s out, so I wander over to the stereo and push the power button. Mellow alternative rock emerges, and it surprises me. You’d think a guy into something as extreme as volcanoes would be into something more violent.

  Stretching along the wall between the windows are bookshelves, stacked with books of many different kinds. There are the science and volcanology texts I would expect, along with a big stack of papers with long, dry names about geologic ages and magma and other things I don’t even recognize.

  There are also paperbacks of many kinds, non-fiction and fiction carefully divided into sections—because a scientist would need to do that, right?—and alphabetized, which goes along with the sense of minimalist order in the room. The walls are bare, except for a poster of a beach in a storm. Looking around, I imagine that he doesn’t really spend much time here.

  When he emerges, the smell of man and steam and soap waft out with him. His hair is wet and combed away from his face, which he has shaved, revealing the strength in his chin, the elegant angle of his jaw, and his long throat, which I suddenly want to kiss. I want to bury my nose into the damp angle of neck to shoulder and inhale the essence of him.

  “You’re not my imagination,” he says, and that rasp is back.

  It makes me laugh. “I don’t think so.”

  He settles on the couch and takes a long swallow of his beer. “Is your tea ready? Why don’t you come sit with me for a minute?”

  “I was going to make some eggs.”

  “They’ll wait.”

  Shyly, I perch on the edge of the couch, holding my tea between my palms. “You’re very tidy,” I say.

  “Don’t forget that I spent a month in Hawaii. I cleaned it up before I left. It doesn’t always look like this.”

  “Whew. I was worried.”

  “Are you a slob?”

  I nod apologetically. “Kind of. My hotel rooms always look like a hurricane hit.”

  “Spend a lot of time in hotel rooms?”

  “Hotel rooms, dorms rooms, places like that.”

  “Are you nervous with me?”

  I’m perched prissily on the edge of the couch, a full two feet away from him. “Maybe.”

  “But you came to my apartment with me. Why is that?”

  It’s a good question. I meet his eyes. “Because I can tell you’re a good person.”

  “Yeah, how can you tell that?” He sets his beer on the coffee table and moves toward me. “You don’t know me at all. What if I’m a serial rapist or something, and now I’m going to overpower you?”

  “Well, you can try.”

  He laughs. “You do walk like you’re strong.” His hand comes around the back of my neck. “But right this minute, I’m more interested in the soft bits.”

  “Like what?” I ask, looking at his mouth. I can’t remember ever wanting to kiss someone as badly as I want to kiss him right now, and I raise my face toward him, feeling his lips barely brush mine, a hint of heat, give.

  “This is good,” he says, and I feel the words move his mouth against mine, electrifying my skin, my bones, before he tilts his head and kisses me.

  It’s only his hand on the back of my neck, his palm hot and strong, his thumb touching my earlobe, and my hand on his thigh just above the knee, and his mouth engulfing mine, velvety and deep. Our tongues slide, tip to tip, side to side, circle. He draws back slightly and sups at my lower lip, then my upper, and I return the gesture, sucking lightly on his succulent lips, then letting go, opening to dark velvet again.

  Sensations move through my body, over my throat, my breasts, my spine, moving in time with his kiss, ebbing and rising, surging and receding like waves, as if the energy in my body is the sea and he is the moon, moving it at will. It makes me so dizzy I pull away slightly, curling my free hand around his jaw, sliding it down his neck. I swallow.

  “Wow,” I say, and it sounds stupid, but it’s really the only word I can find.

  He bends his head into mine, pressing our foreheads together. “Ditto,” he says, and we just sit there for a long time, as if we can communicate through our foreheads. Our fingertips touch, index to index pad and thumb to thumb, and palm to palm. A wet curl touches my cheekbone, and my entire head is filled with the scent of his shower, the steam and the herbal green notes, and his skin below it all.

  “We should eat,” I say, aware that this is bigger than I expected, that I feel like an imposter, a stand-in for the woman he thinks I might be.

  “That’s a good idea,” he rasps.

  The music takes a romantic turn and I realize why he probably has this kind of music on his stereo—it’s good make-out music. I suspect he’s had a lot more experience than I have.

  Feeling like my skin shrunk while we were sitting there, just touching so lightly, I start making a simple supper. My specialty is scrambled eggs with cheese and sugar bread with cinnamon, but I’m not sure I’ll find spices in this bachelor pad.

  “Doubtful,” he says, and he sounds sleepy. “You can look around. It’s a sublet.”

  A quick search reveals there is only pepper and salt, but that’s okay. My back-up plan is toad in the hole, eggs fried in the hole I cut into slices of bread. Because I’m very hungry myself, I flip them over and add shredded cheese on top.

  It only takes about five minutes, but by the time I turn around, Gabe has stretched out on the couch, his head on a pillow, and fallen completely, dead asleep. It’s a collapse kind of sleep, his arm flung sideways, and I recognize it. I’ve been there many times after a big competition or a hard training day.

  Instead of waking him, I slide my supper onto a plate and eat like a hungry wolf. When he still isn’t awake, I eat his, too, and check my phone for messages.

  Nothing.

  For about ten minutes, I tap my fingers along to the music, trying to decide what I should do. It’s only seven. I wonder if I should call a taxi to take me back to the hotel.

  But there will only be the same things there that are
here. I have my backpack with me, and my phone. He has a ton of books and a lamp by the bed.

  The music is relaxing. My belly is full. Nobody needs me. I don’t have to be anywhere—and even if I had to be, I can’t leave Iceland.

  I might as well just make another cup of tea and find a book to read and relax. It’s the best thing my bruised body could ask for.

  Or at least that’s what I tell myself. The truth is, there’s no way I want to leave Gabe sleeping on the couch. I can hear him breathing. I can feel the imprint of his lips. I want to be here when he wakes up.

  Chapter TEN

  Kaitlin

  The book I choose has a dog on the cover that looks like my old dog Candy, a pretty golden retriever. From the first page, I’m totally lost in the story of Enzo, the dog of a race car driver. At some point, I get up to go to the bathroom and when I come out, I realize that Gabe’s long legs are scrunched up on the couch, his head at an angle that will be painful when he wakes up.

  I bend over him. “Hey, Gabe,” I say quietly.

  Nothing.

  “Gabe,” I say a little louder.

  It strikes me suddenly that it’s weird that I’m in this stranger’s apartment in a city so far away from everything I know.

  And yet.

  Here I am, bending over a man so beautiful he makes me think of the story of Lucifer, the beloved angel of God who was banished from heaven. In our Sunday school books—good Episcopalians, nothing too messy or loud or passionate—that was the one painting that stuck with me. In sleep, he looks younger, his lashes a sweep of black, those curls falling around his forehead and temples. In this light, the long, thin scar is barely visible. The look of him makes my heart ache.

  But if he were stupid or mean-spirited, I wouldn’t care. Believe me, there are a lot of thick-headed, small-hearted athletes. Among the children I grew up with, there are a lot who only want money or position, who feel they would disappear without their connection to the rarefied world we were born to. Tyler stood out for trying to break free, and I guess one of the reasons I idolized him so much was because he showed me the world would not end if I tried to follow a vision for my life that wasn’t exactly what my family wanted for me.

  Gabe is real. There is something good in him, something big-good. You can just feel that about a person. It must be part of their aura.

  I reach out a hand and touch his shoulder. “Hey, Gabe. You need to move to the bed.”

  His eyes sweep open, and for a long moment, it’s plain that he’s disoriented. He stares at me intently, and I find myself falling into those dark, dark pools, falling far and deep, my hand hot on his shoulder.

  He reaches out one finger and touches my jaw, and his voice is raspy when he says, “I thought I dreamed you.”

  “I’m real.” I smile gently. “You need to move to the bed or you’ll have a stiff neck.”

  He nods, holds his hair out of his face as he swings his body to a sitting position. “Sorry about this. I didn’t sleep for nearly 70 hours.” He bends and rests his face in his hands. “If you give me a few minutes, I’ll wake up a little.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. You need sleep.” I slide a hand beneath his arm. “Up you go.”

  He stands, wobbly, and makes his way to the bed, where he starts to shed his jeans, and then stops. “Uh, sorry. I forgot.”

  “I’ll cover my eyes. Just get under the covers.”

  I hear the jeans hit the floor, the sound of rustling bedding, and he says, “Okay.”

  “Can I get you anything?” I ask. “A glass of water?”

  He shakes his head, his eyes already closing. Smiling, I pick up the book from where I left it on the bed and turn off the bedside light. “Sweet dreams,” I say.

  “Don’t go,” he says, eyes closed. “Sit with me.”

  “The light—”

  He pats the bed, the move slowing. “Here.” He takes a long breath in. “Couch, eh. Not comfortable.”

  I ease down on the bed next to him. Pick up my book, and when Gabe’s breathing tells me he’s fallen completely back asleep, I take off my outer clothing and climb under the covers in my leggings and undershirt, taking pleasure in the warmth of his body.

  Before long, I’m lost again in Enzo’s world. I read and read and read, riveted, and when I finally get to the end, I’m so overcome with emotion that I have to get out of bed and find some tissues. It’s not sad, exactly—it is sad, and then it isn’t sad, and it’s one of the most moving stories I’ve ever read, and for ten minutes, I sit on the couch and let myself feel it moving through me, crying and laughing, trying to be quiet.

  Not quiet enough. Gabe gets out of bed, wearing a t-shirt and boxer briefs that show off his legs, and even that can’t capture my attention. He kneels in front of me, and says, “It’s the best book ever, right?”

  “Yeah,” I manage, then choke up again, and he laughs gently, tugs me into his arms and cradles me, rocks me softly as I cry, and say, in that halting crying way, “I…love him…he was so good…and dogs…are…” but I can’t finish because the whole thing is just so incredibly beautiful.

  His hands are on my back. “It is my favorite book of all time.”

  “Mine, too, now.” I cling to him, aware that I’m well past any hope of cute-crying. I’m slobbery and snotty and awash with tears. “I’m so glad I read it. I’m so glad I was here to read it.” And then I am laughing as I cry. “I’m sorry. This is weird, but I can’t help it.”

  “I reacted exactly the same way. Exactly.”

  Still, I’m getting kind of embarrassed. I pull back a little and duck my head. “I have to go wash my face.”

  In the bathroom, I avoid looking at myself in the mirror, and run cold water, splashing away the tears and snot and slobber until my eyes feel cooler. For one second, my heart wanders back to the book, and I feel the emotion welling up again and make myself think of my face only.

  When I raise my eyes to the mirror, it is not pretty. My face is red and splotchy, but there’s not a single thing I can do about that. I come out, take in an exaggerated sigh, blow it out. “Sorry about that.”

  He has crawled back into bed. “I turned up the heat, but come under the covers with me for a minute.”

  It feels like the most natural thing in the world to slide under the covers and across the small space of the bed to curl up against his chest, my head resting in the hollow of his shoulder. His arms come around me, and he makes a low noise of approval that rumbles through his chest. His hand moves on my arm, and I move mine on his waist.

  “You have no idea how much that made me like you,” he says. “I’ve read that book about twelve times.”

  “That you love it makes me think all the things I imagine about you are actually true.”

  “Are you imagining things about me?”

  I smile. “More than I’m going to tell you.”

  “Good.” His hand moves on my arm, up and down, easy. “You like dogs, then?”

  “I don’t get to be around them right now that much, but yeah. My family always has dogs, multiple. Enzo reminds me of my favorite when I was growing up, Candy. She was some kind of retriever mutt we picked out at the pound and she was my very best friend from the time I was six until I was fourteen and we had to put her down.”

  “Not very old.”

  “Oh, no, she was. She was sixteen. Her family had just moved way and couldn’t take her.”

  “I hate that,” he says fiercely. “Like how do you do that? Just leave a dog behind?”

  “Me, too. That’s why we always have rescue dogs, from the pound.”

  “Huh. I wouldn’t have figured the kind of family you described to choose rescues.”

  “My parents really, really believe in doing everything you can to save the world. Including animals.”

  “That’s amazing, Kaitlin. It makes me want to meet them.”

  “It’s a little bit exhausting,” I say. “Like my sister is a doctor, and she runs this clinic for inne
r city kids, and she’s having kids of her own like they’re on special this week.”

  He laughs.

  “Actually,” I continue, “it’s her partner carrying the babies, but Sarah is quite happy to have more and more and more.”

  “How many do they have?”

  “Well, only three, but one more is on the way, and they’re talking about a couple more.”

  “And your parents were okay with her being a lesbian?”

  “They didn’t care.”

  “They sound a little too good to be true.”

  “They kind of are.” I curve my hand to the shape of his ribs. “It was hard to be their child, you know? It was a big love match and they’re still crazy about each other and take these secret weekend getaways up to the Hudson Valley or to ‘this little village in France’ that they love.”

  “You’re not making me like them less.”

  “I know.”

  “It must be hard to want something other than they want.”

  I sit up on one elbow. “Yes! It’s really hard. And I know that snowboarding isn’t going to save anybody’s life, but it feels like what I am supposed to do.”

  He nods. “That’s tough.”

  “Ow.” My shoulder aches from leaning on it, and I slide back down into the nest of Gabe’s chest and the covers and the heady smell of our chemistry combining. “What about your parents?”

  “Not much to tell apart from what I said already. My dad is a science teacher, he’s a total geek and my mom—” He pauses and it’s significant, so I listen carefully to what he says next. “She was in a car accident when I was twelve, and she’s had issues ever since.”

  I tilt my head back to look at him, a question.

  His mouth twists. “Okay, here’s the part where I have to admit I lied a little bit.”

  “Lied?”

  He touches the scar on his face. “I didn’t actually get this falling out of a tree. I tell people that because otherwise, it gets all weird.”

  “Okay. I’m listening.”