by Lexi Scott
“What the hell.” Deo comes up behind me, reaches around my body with the warm snake of one arm, grabs two and pops them both open. “Only if you’re joining me, friend.”
We both take a long pull from our bottles and, by the look on his face, he’s just as beat as I am. The unrelenting pounding of the waves and the sunshine have completely drained us. He takes me by the hand and pulls me back while he flops on the tiny loveseat. The way we’re tangled so close—limbs twined, skin rubbing against skin—could be friendly, technically. But I have to remind myself of the friendly nature over and over again as my body keeps sending my brain a whole different message.
“So, now that I’m just your boring, hot-as-hell, sexy surfing friend, I guess I should ask you the basics. Like how school is going.” When I don’t say anything immediately, he grabs my foot, which is lying on his thigh, and starts massaging it with sure, unbelievably amazing fingers. I pull my lower lip between my teeth to keep from moaning and his hands press quicker and harder. “Uh, if you want this to stay friendly, you’d better bore me with some long-ass school story. Now.”
“You could stop rubbing my foot like th—aaah,” I sigh.
He raises one eyebrow. “You really want me to stop?” His thumb slides along my arch, then rubs a heart-stopping line along the center of my foot.
“No. No, don’t stop.” I try to focus. “Okay. School. Right. I have this project right now for my anthropology class.” He presses on the place right under my toes, and I swear I feel the stirrings of an orgasm. This is so not friend territory, and I’d be smart to stop it right this minute.
No one ever said I was smart.
“So what are you doing? Digging up bones of ancient Californians? Robbing graves? Searching for the Holy Grail?” The mix of his joking voice and his tantalizing hands makes my head spin.
I look at him through half-closed eyes, and he’s even more gorgeous slightly blurry. He needs to leave.
I never want him to leave.
“That’s archeology,” I explain. “I’m in anthropology. We’re studying different cultures. So, my assignment was to watch people in a social situation and make note of any cultural details, like manners or gender roles.”
“Ah. I get it. Not as interesting as fighting Nazis and almost getting your heart ripped out by crazy Hindus, but we can’t all be Indiana Jones, right?” He drops my left foot and picks up the right one, subjecting it to the same mind-numbingly awesome treatment as its mate.
“Did you learn everything you know about history from Indiana Jones?” I ask, arching my back as he hits the perfect spot that I didn’t even know existed on my body.
“All the important stuff.” His hands move more quickly, but his voice slows to an almost slur. “So, ’bout this assignment?”
“I used your mom’s dinner party,” I confess, my voice bleary with the warring needs for him to stop immediately and never take his hands off of me. “And I got back the rough today. My professor wants to read it to the class next lecture.”
Deo’s brows press over his eyes, and his smile is wry. “I could have told you that writing about me would get you an A.” His cockiness melts away at my smirk. “What did you write about, exactly?”
I bat my lashes at him. “Oh, you know. The sad, desperate flirting attempts of young unemployed men.”
He shakes his head, a smile curved on his lips. “You can’t resist me. Admit it.”
“I would say something smart, but this foot rub is amazing, Deo. I can’t lie. I feel like I have no bones in my body. Where did you learn to do this?” I roll my neck back as he purposefully hits that certain spot that melts every tense muscle in my body.
“It’s in my sad, desperate flirting bag,” he teases, then his voice goes low. “Seriously, I’m proud of you. Maybe I can see the paper sometime?”
“About that.” I sit up on one elbow and catch his eye. “I want you to come to the lecture with me. I think…I think you might like it at college. If you wanted, you could come and see what I’m doing.” I try not to sigh when he puts my feet aside.
“That would be cool, Whit. But, you know, I tried college. It just wasn’t my thing. And don’t you worry your gorgeous head about me. I’m a survivalist. I know right now I don’t seem like I have decent prospects, but wait for the zombie apocalypse. I’ll be leading civilization back from the brink and slaying those brain suckers left and right.” He regards me from under his heavy eyelids and his easy smile is as sad as it is charming.
“Deo…it’s fine if you don’t want to go to college, but you may want to secure something. Just on the off chance that I pursue biology and come up with a vaccine that will curb the zombie apocalypse before you get a chance to show off your skills. Which I have no doubt are amazing.”
I’m not a moron, I know it’s a double standard. I want Deo to have a more secure future—for himself. But I’m not willing to secure a future with him. I want a degree, a job, all of those secure things. But things with Deo are different. Deo bettering himself doesn’t hold the risk of hurting himself. Deo, or anyone for that matter, committing to a future with me—that’s full of risk. For us both.
“C’mon. Don’t be sad. Many beautiful women have tried to reform me before. It’s a lost cause. I’ll just be your hilarious, uber-sexy sidekick. Good for a little surfing and a couple of beers, maybe with a semi-sexual foot rub thrown in once in a while. I’m like the perfect no-strings-attached friend. Just like you wanted, right?” Though his tone stays light, there’s a sharp edge underneath, and I decide to back off. He looks at me for a second, like he’s debating saying something else, then changes gears. “Enough of this serious, depressing crap. You wanna see if we can rot our brains with a good zombie flick? Or maybe some shark attack show. Just kidding! I want you to surf with me again. I wish you could see your face right now. Priceless.” He glances at the wall where most people would have a TV. I have seven small plants that are in various stages of death. “No TV?” he asks, looking around the small room.
“I have one in my room. I don’t watch a whole lot of TV, I just keep it on at night, for you know…the company.” I sigh. He just finished laughing about my irrational shark fears.
But he drops the teasing and gets that sympathetic look that makes my throat scratchy. His voice is real and a little sad when he asks the next question, and I have to resist the strong urge to curl into his arms and let him peel back all the fears that leave me shaky every day. “What? Are you scared being here alone?”
Yes.
“No. It’s just too quiet. I can’t sleep like that. Total silence is just…weird.”
Deo nods like he’s not buying it.
“Do you wanna watch something…in my room?” For all my “just friends” talk, I sure seem to cross the line in a million different ways. Between the tiny bikini, the foot rub, and, now, the beer-fuzzy invitation to come to my room, my line in the sand is as indistinct as if it had been drawn too close to the waves at high tide.
“Sure. Mind if I grab another beer?” He swallows so hard I can see the tendons in his neck go tight.
I back away from him, needing a second alone to prepare myself for Deo. In my room. With me. Alone. “Grab two, I’m gonna go change. And find something on TV.”
I hurry into the bathroom and change into a pair of soft cotton shorts and a tank top. I don’t even have the energy to shower, I’m that tired.
Back in my room, Deo is already leaning up against the headboard. His head is tipped back and his eyes are closed. I flip on the ceiling fan and start toward the bed, but Deo’s eyes pop open.
“What are you trying to do, kill me, woman?”
“What are you talking about?”
“The fan, turn it off!” He’s frantic. I haven’t seen him like this before.
“Deo, it’s a fan. Get a grip.”
He crosses the room and flips the switch to off.
“Don’t you know that ceiling fans cause Bell’s palsy?”
I want to laugh, but it is so apparent from the look on his face that he is dead serious.
“They do not. That’s an old wives’ tale. I’ve been sleeping under one forever,” I say.
“Ask Marigold!” he challenges, knowing I more than believe in his mom’s supernatural abilities when it comes to healing and health. He plops back onto the bed next to me.
The twitch in my lip can’t be stopped and I burst into a full, rolling laugh. “I’m sorry, but that’s absurd, Deo!”
He stares at me straight-faced, so I make an effort to pull my mouth back into a thoughtful, serious line.
“Fine. I can see this is a very sore subject with you, and as your friend, I’m going to drop it. And leave the fan off. On one condition.” My voice shakes a tiny bit, but I get a handle on it.
“What’s that?” Deo runs his hand through his hair and sighs. He looks tired.
I take a deep breath and just take the plunge, just ask him for what I want, even if I know this is making that damn fading line in the sand even sketchier. “Would you maybe stay here tonight? With me? Just as friends, of course.”
I don’t know if Deo is confused or horrified or what, but he doesn’t answer at first.
He finally reaches over and cuts an invisible line down the quilt, dividing the bed into two sides, his and mine, and his voice grinds out, hard and rough.
“Sure. As long as you can stay over there, friend.”
Chapter Eleven
DEO
Whit looks like an angel when she sleeps. She’s all sweet, full lips, long, curly lashes, and a tumble of sleek, dark hair against the pillow.
She also kicks like a mule, snores like a bear, sweats like a hog, and steals the covers like a fat, menacing caterpillar about to cocoon herself before her metamorphosis. Which I keep hoping may actually happen and turn her into a relaxed, soft-breathing, cool-skinned, cover-sharing butterfly. Instead, she wakes up most mornings looking like a burrito with a small, sweaty, scowling girl’s head, ready with crazy accusations.
“Deo, you were totally on my side of the bed all night. You were the one who made the divide,” she snarls, while I sprint to the kitchen to get her a cup of coffee. I never pictured myself the kind of guy who’d be all whipped into getting a girl her morning joe, but I never encountered a person who was such a raging psychopath before her first cup of coffee either.
I shove the coffee, two sugars and a drop of cream, into her hands and she growls and laps up the dark liquid like the alpha wolf she is. When the caffeine has settled her frayed nerves a little, I venture to suggest she’s not being entirely fair about our little arrangement. “Seriously, Whit? I’m considering growing out my toenails so I can get a better grip on the edge of the mattress. I have, like, six inches tops. You sleep like a bus wreck.”
“So don’t sleep here.” She slurps another sip of coffee, and, when the caffeine takes a better hold over her ravaged brain, she gives me the sorry eyes over the rim. “Sorry. I’m such an awful human in the mornings. It’s no excuse, but I am sorry. And thank you for the coffee. Did I mention you make the most amazing coffee?” She smiles hopefully.
I tweak her cute little nose. “Stop with the flattery. We both know you’re just charming me so I keep doing your bidding.”
She finishes the coffee and heads to the shower. She’ll gather her stuff for school, drop a kiss on my forehead, and head out the door. I have my own key to her place. I examine it right now, running a finger over its bumpy teeth. She handed it to me like it was no big thing.
“Just in case I leave before you, you need to lock up. Get that look off your face, Deo. It isn’t a promise ring. It’s safety. You’re afraid of ceiling fans, I’m afraid of psycho killers coming in and slitting my throat.” Her words were all tough, but her palms were clammy when she slid the key my way.
And I stay here. Most nights. Sometimes I take some time to hang with Gramps, but he’s like a damn pioneer. He’s the kind of guy who’d prefer if he could pump his own water and keep his own cows and live by candlelight. Except then he wouldn’t get the UFC fights on his 72” LED. It’s his one modern obsession, that TV, and he treasures his time with it and his beer and pistachios.
I stay here with Whit, but we’re definitely not together. Not in any way, shape, or form. The foot rub a few weeks before was the most intimate thing that’s happened between us.
Other than the snuggling.
I told her I was a hardcore snuggler, but she didn’t believe me. But I know it was the snuggling that clinched her decision to basically move me in. Whit is scared shitless to be alone in the dark. She’s never given me a shred of a clue about why. That’s off-limits, and we just don’t go there, but I’m sure it’s somehow related to the freak-out at the café.
When the lights are on, we’re jesting, sarcastic, friendly assholes guzzling beer, playing poker, and hitting the beach and various cheap area restaurants to satisfy her desire for pizza or fish tacos or whatever other weird craving she might have. We stay that way right up until we walk into her bedroom. She changes in a little huddled mass with her back to me or stays in the bathroom, and we both sternly establish that there’s a line we don’t cross in the middle of her too-small full bed.
Then I flick the light off and settle on the bed. In the shadows of her room, she wordlessly turns to me, and I wrap my arms around her. She flips the other way after a few seconds of rubbing her nose to mine, curves her back against my chest, her ass nestles painfully close to my dick, and her smooth, long legs twine around mine, her toes brushing up and down the length of my calf. I run my hands over her without saying a thing. I trace my fingers from the rounded curve of her shoulder, down the long line of her upper arm, around the pointed curve of her elbow. She always lies on her left side, and her right elbow has a puckered bump. In the light, I can see that it’s from a pretty gnarly scar, but I don’t ask about it. What happens in the night doesn’t get talked about during the day. That’s the way it works with us.
Usually when I’m running my hands over every sweet curve and soft length of a girl’s body, it’s because I want to hear her gasping for breath, sighing my name, begging me for more, and moaning with body-shaking satisfaction.
With Whit, I want the opposite.
I want to be the one who takes all the stiff-limbed panic from her, who eases her out of the tense-muscled pre-sleep ball she curls herself into and lets her have a few minutes of sweet, relaxed sleep. Once she’s asleep, there’s nothing I can do to ease the rest of the night for her, and some of those nights are beyond brutal. She kicks and flails, grits her teeth, whimpers, sobs, opens her eyes and looks at me without seeing a single thing, sometimes wailing indecipherable things, sometimes just choking on her tears.
When her upset thrashing wakes me up, I curve her back into snuggle position and run my hands over her damp hair, put my mouth close to her ear and whisper sweet, quiet things, pull my arm tight around her waist to anchor her to the calm reality I try to provide.
Sometimes it works.
Other times it’s like she’s a DVD that has a deep scratch and we keep watching the same painful scene over and over on repeat. In the morning, we both wake up spent and grouchy, and all the menace of the night swirls between us, unacknowledged and heavy as a ton of cement on our shoulders.
I’m scared as hell to push anything further. I want to help her work through all her shit, but she won’t let me touch it. And, as unsatisfying as it is to be so close to her but closed off, I’m glad for her friendship. I’m glad to be able to cook for her while she tells me how amazing my food is, to watch Netflix on the couch while I rub her feet. I’m glad to hear about lectures she loved or places she wants to travel. We watch the stars together on the beach a couple nights a week and trade random stories about our lives.
When she pauses at the door to say good-bye, I reach over and touch the ends of her hair, remembering that smiling girl in the picture on her license.
“You could grow your hair out
a little,” I say. The words slip out before I can stop them.
“See you later,” is all she says.
I wonder if she knows that I see the clippings in the bathroom trash can.
Every few days she clips the ends of her hair.
It feels like it’s whenever I dare to get too close.
“How was work?” I ask later as Whit shimmies in the door with a bag of groceries in her arms. I jump up from the sofa to take the bag, even though I know she’s not going to let me.
“I got it,” she says. I know. “But thank you,” she adds, looking up from under her thick lashes.
“No prob.”
“Work was fine. Pretty busy tonight.” Whit presses up onto her tiptoes to open up one of the top cabinets, and the dress she’s wearing creeps up in the back, exposing her soft upper thigh.
“So I was thinking.” I clear my throat, wishing to God I could reach out and run a palm over that skin. Instead, I shove my hands deep into my own pockets. “It’s a gorgeous night. You up for a bonfire?”
“You know, that sounds perfect.”
“Wanna grab some marshmallows?”
“I’d love to.” She narrows her eyes playfully at me. The tension from when she left earlier is gone. “Race you to the Jeep!”
We elbow each other like derby queens on the way out the door, and I lag up a little so she can slam into the side first, her arms raised over her head in a victory sign.
“I won!” she screams, head tilted back.
This time my hands aren’t in my pockets anymore. I put them on either side of the door, and she stops laughing and screaming about how she’s the greatest.
“What’s up?” she asks.
“I don’t know.” I tilt my head close to hers, just barely brushing my lips against her skin. I can hear the quick way she breathes. Almost like she’s panting. I have a dozen questions on the tip of my tongue, but I bite them back. For now. “Let’s get those marshmallows.”
She looks disappointed. I feel a rush in my veins.
