While You're Away

by Jessa Holbrook

  Stunned, Will softened beneath me. The angry fists of his hands unfurled. They touched my shoulders, but tentatively. Like he was afraid if he searched further he might discover I was nothing but smoke. That I would disintegrate and he would be left there holding nothing.

  “I have to leave in the fall,” Will said, broken and barely voiced.

  The enormity of the moment overwhelmed me. Sitting up a little, I framed his face in my hands. We really did know each other innately, on another level. We didn’t look at each other, we looked in. If he could see my eyes, he’d know I meant every word. And a million more that I couldn’t even speak. Without Will, I didn’t think I could take another breath.

  “So?” I said.

  I brushed my thumb against his lips, my gaze inexorably drawn there. But I made myself look up. We were more than our bodies. More than the unmistakable want that danced between us when we touched. I made myself bare in front of him in another way, my eyes wide open and every part of my heart on display.

  Quietly, desperately, he pressed into my touch. “Sarah . . .”

  “You belong to me. I knew that the first time we kissed. I’m yours, Will. And you’re mine. And that’s all that matters.”

  Will kissed my thumb. Then my hand. Drawing me closer, his gaze didn’t waver. He voiced one last dissent. “It’s over with him?”

  I swore it again. “Will, I’m yours.”

  ~

  Now that we could be with each other, I wanted to be with him every hour of the day. But it wasn’t enough to just sit in each other’s company. Because Will had once surprised me with the meeting beneath the pool, I was determined to find someplace just as special to show him.

  Everything in the school’s theater was out. He already knew where the catwalk was. My house wasn’t an option, because meh, it was my house. It was full of parents and sisters, and that weird outdoor cat that people kept feeding even though it wasn’t ours.

  When inspiration struck, I stopped dead. The date muse had finally reached down to grace me with her gifts. It took a few days and two favors from Jane to get everything in order. But I knew it would be worth it.

  I texted Will to meet me at the old botanical garden after dark. In the shadow of chestnut trees, I watched for his car in the gravel parking lot. The familiar grinding of tires on stone excited me much more than it should have. The sleek lines of his Miata reflected moonlight and the hazy green streetlights above.

  When he parked, I bounded toward him. He was barely out of the car before he had me pressed against the door. Looping my arms around his neck, I rose up to meet his kiss eagerly. The current between us switched on. It hummed and pulsed, our heat pushing away the warmth of a near-summer night.

  Reluctantly, I broke away. I had to press my fingers between our lips to ward him off. Laughing, I brushed my nose against his. I felt full of starlight, spilling over with it as I gazed up into his silvery blue eyes.

  “You have to wait,” I said.

  “Haven’t we waited long enough?” he asked teasingly.

  Since I’d blocked my lips, Will dipped to my throat instead. He strung a chain of searing kisses there, following the maddening race of my pulse. His hands skimmed beneath my shirt. Smooth fingertips swirled ornate patterns against the small of my back. Somehow, he made even a lazy brush of thumbs against my waist feel wickedly delicious.

  Catching his hands, I wriggled from beneath him.

  Using my best, most flirtatious smile, I said, “I’ll make it worth your while.”

  That perked him up. One black eyebrow arched high, he tugged me closer. Nimble and sure on his feet, he spun us around. It was a split second, but a split second when I felt every inch of him pressed against me.

  “Follow me,” I said. I knotted our fingers together and led him into the old abandoned botanical garden. We passed a No Trespassing sign that was weathered gray and black. The arch of ornate iron at the entrance felt like we were stepping into another world entirely.

  A lush, tangled jungle spilled out in front of us. Ivy scaled the fences and most of the trees. A glossy green carpet, it spilled over the neglected walkways, which had never been paved.

  “Let me guess,” Will said. “We’re going to meet the apothecary that lives in the woods. She’s going to make a potion to stop time for us.”

  With an incredulous laugh, I looked back at him. “Where do you get this stuff?”

  He answered with a playful shrug. His eyes were so keen in the dark. I could tell he was trying to figure out why I chose this place. What my plan was. He failed, completely. There was no way for him to guess what waited for us when we ducked through the alley of overgrown willows.

  Surfacing through the delicate green veil of leaves, I stopped. Watching his face, I waited for him to take it in. For surprise to register. I wanted this to be just like that moment I’d had down in the boiler room, when I realized what he was showing me.

  A gazebo trailed gracefully toward the sky, confident in its place in the middle of the sitting garden. With Jane’s help, I had hung a white sheet on the side of it. Battery-powered white lights sparkled on the ground, illuminating a path on the lawn. I’d laid out a quilt and some pillows. Bags of microwaved popcorn waited to be torn open and poured into the outsized bowl I’d liberated from home.

  “What—” Will started, but I pressed a finger to his lips.

  “Shh. Sit down, get comfortable.”

  Because once he did, I could switch on the laptop and projector I’d hidden in a fall of clematis. I had three hours of battery power for both, so I hit play and hurried to sit on the quilt with Will. Light poured from the projector, and the sheet became a movie screen. Tingling in excitement, I turned to study his profile.

  His lips were parted in surprise. Wonder played over his features, smoothing some of his sharp angles. There in the dark of the botanical gardens, heavy roses hanging their heads around us, he was beautiful.

  Without words, so much passed between us. I still felt urgent beside him. Like my flesh needed his, all dewy and ripe. My head was dizzy with the realization that I was the architect of this moment. I didn’t have to wait for him to give me what I wanted. This was my fantasy, and if I wanted to touch him, I could. And I would. But first, I wanted to savor him. Affection tempered all that need and want now, a fledgling bud of something sweet to complement the spice.

  It had been easy to fall into his arms. It grew harder to stay out of them. I wanted to brush his hair back from his face. My fingers longed to trace the dark slashes of his eyebrows, the thin and knowing tilt of his lips. But now, I wanted to put my ear to his lips; if he’d whisper his universe to me, I’d listen to it all.

  Rubbing a hand down my back, Will let the previews play for a few minutes before he faced me. Light reflected off his clear skin, colors from the screen dancing like a kaleidoscope across his face.

  Finally the movie started, and Will dissolved into laughter when he realized what I had picked. Clash of the Titans splashed across the sheet, the fabric adding wavering curves to Liam Neeson’s already questionable costuming.

  “It was this or Disney’s Hercules,” I said, snuggling closer.

  Pressing a kiss to my temple, Will pointed out, “Percy Jackson.”

  With a smile, I glanced up at him. “Oh, good one. Maybe next time.”

  I slid closer to him, hip to hip. My shoulder curving into his. A quiver ran the length of my spine when he gently twisted my hair out of the way. I wanted to be shameless. Suddenly, heat coursed through my veins, and I wanted. I wanted him to mark me, to leave some evidence of him that I could touch in the morning. The thought came from nowhere, or from some darker part of myself I had never met. I was still mostly untouched, but my body didn’t care. Tingling and sensitive, every inch of me was awake and aching for Will.

  I knew he felt it, too. His fingers curved, press
ing into my back. They traced it restlessly, each stroke broader, more insistent. I wasn’t going to strip in the middle of the botanical garden. I wanted to, though, each time his touch slipped the hem of my shirt to graze across bare skin.

  Will put his brow to my temple, shuddering with a long, exhaled breath. Beneath the tinny, raucous sound of CGI battle, I heard Will whispering. I couldn’t make out his words at first. It sounded like a prayer, a rosary whispered against my curls.

  Then aloud, so loud it seemed to echo off the broken-down statuary around us, Will said, “Are you really mine, now?”

  My throat ached to tell him the truth. That I’d been his since the moment I kissed him in the boathouse. We were indelible, written on each other’s skin. It was true—there were so many things we had to face.

  He was going to college; I was staying here. Our future paths seemed completely unlikely to collide unless we forced them to. But I wanted to force them to. I wanted to surrender to this. I didn’t answer his question, not out loud. Instead, I pulled his mouth to mine and answered with a kiss.

  That was better. That was the truth.

  SEVENTEEN

  The last week of school arrived, and the halls were controlled madness. Only two teachers bothered to assign homework. The rest surrendered, understanding that nobody was there to work anymore. The seniors were already done with their classes.

  That meant no Will in the hallways.

  I hadn’t seen him since our date in the botanical gardens, almost a week ago. His family had surprised him with a celebratory graduation trip to Florida. That meant we had to make do with rushed cams and texts. I hated every second without him. I told Jane that we were together—it was official, the end—and dared her to make something of it.

  Trying to cull the last of my personal stuff from my locker, I turned to see Jane winging her way toward me with an expectant smile. She’d done something new to her hair, razoring the blunt edges of her bob to make it seem even more geometric. It didn’t bounce when she walked—it sliced, gleaming and dark and incredibly cool.

  When Jane saw my face, worry tempered her smile.

  “How’s grand romance, your majesty?” she asked.

  “Swoon-worthy,” I replied. Then, with a frown, I tossed more random stuff into my paper bag. “Did you have this much crap in your locker?”

  Jane watched me haul out yet another thick stack of loose notebook paper. I tried to sort it, but after I flipped through, I realized it had to come home with me. Scraps of music mingled with class notes I never needed again.

  Reaching past me, Jane pulled out a Styrofoam cup full of bent staples. “Um, no. I didn’t have this much crap in my locker. Dude, what is this?”

  “Trash.” I took the cup and dumped it in the brown grocery bag at my feet. “They’re from helping Mrs. Adler grade her homework. Don’t even ask—it’s not worth the breath.”

  With a shrug, Jane moved on. She peeled a photo-booth strip with pictures of the two of us off of my locker door and tucked it into her shirt. She thought she was funny, but she was giving that back. She wasn’t all that keen on taking pictures. Hauling her into the photo booth at homecoming was my victory, and those pictures were my spoils.

  “All right, I’ve been thinking,” she said.

  “Uh-oh.”

  “This is our last summer in high school. Our last year together before we go off to college and get questionable tattoos and have even more questionable hook-ups—”

  “Because what is college for?” I asked.

  “Getting the nasty out of your system,” Jane filled in. “Anyway, I want us to do something together. You know, something that will last. Something we can be proud of, and look back on and . . .”

  Amused, I closed my gutted locker’s door. “Oh em gee, is hardcore Jane Dubinsky getting all sentimental on me? Isn’t that my job?”

  Jane picked up my trash bag, rolling her eyes. “I’m going to make a short film, and I want you to write the music for it.”

  My teasing stopped instantly. Jane did a lot of short films, but usually, they were “experimental.” Like, twenty-second clips of the same plastic bag swirling in the wind. She stole the idea from an old Kevin Spacey movie, and I never really got the point.

  Slinging an arm around her, I bumped against her and smiled when she bumped back. “So what’s it about? A lonely salt shaker that gets emptier every time somebody uses it?”

  “Oh bite me,” she said. “As a matter of fact, Snarkaholic Rex, we’re making a movie about East River. Our version of it. The story of our home. That way, when I’m giving TED talks and you’re the musical guest on SNL, we can point at it and say, This is where we came from.”

  Tears sprang up, an unexpected well of emotion. I stopped us dead in the middle of the hall and threw my arms around her.

  Jane nudged me off fondly.

  “You never did tell me how movie night went, by the way.”

  “It was perfect.”

  “So that’s that, right? Summer fling time?

  Closing up a little, I shook my head. “No, it’s more than that.”

  Jane made a little noise that sounded like judgment. But she was nice enough to keep it to herself, just this one time.

  “Why would you think it’s just a fling?”

  “How could you not?” Jane asked. She seemed genuinely baffled. “He’s leaving for college in the fall.”

  She was absolutely right, of course. He was headed to St. Philip-Windsor College, an elite private school, about four hours away. As he described the campus, I had imagined him on the quad, shirtless and playing ultimate Frisbee.

  I’d been failing to mention that immutable fact. We both had. After all, Will’s epiphany came packaged with the realization that we had lost years, and we only had months before we’d be separated again. I’m not sure how I’d so thoroughly convinced myself not to talk about it, though. Because once Jane said it, it felt frighteningly, loomingly clear. Will would be leaving—sooner rather than later.

  “Sare?” Jane said. “You okay?”

  I nodded, though I knew it was a lie. Will and I couldn’t keep pretending that we had all the time in the world.

  Two months. Eight weeks. That wasn’t enough.

  ~

  Propping my cell phone on my guitar case, I sat down in front of it. Carefully framing myself against the background, I settled in. Behind me, a massive bronze sculpture swirled toward the sky. It was a piece called Two Lovers, At Play and anybody who grew up in East River would recognize it.

  It was the centerpiece of the Arts Garden near the museum. In elementary school, it was an annual field trip. We’d look at the latest exhibition inside, then eat our sack lunches in the garden.

  Many a game of tag had been won in the shadow of Two Lovers, At Play. And in sixth grade, we all suddenly understood that lovers had a slightly naughty definition. After that, our game morphed into kiss tag, much to the teachers’ frustration.

  So when I sent a cam request to Will, I wanted to make sure that he could see the statue clearly. Excitement raced through me. Clutching my guitar, I almost laughed in delighted relief when Will’s face suddenly appeared on the small screen.

  “Tag,” I said. “You’re it.”

  For a moment, he looked confused. Then, his pale gaze narrowed, and I could tell he was studying the scene behind me. He lit with realization. A wicked smile curved his lips, and suddenly he was moving.

  “I see you there,” he said. Scenery wavered behind him as he walked through his house—his family room with built-in bookshelves, ceiling to floor, then his kitchen, all gleaming granite and stainless steel. “Thinking you won’t get caught.”

  Strumming a teasing chord on my guitar, I leaned toward my phone. “I’m not going to get caught. I’m more clever than that.”

  “We’ll see,” he said.
>
  The lights went out on Will’s phone. For a second, I thought I had lost him. Then the sound of the garage door ground to life. Light blanked the screen, and then suddenly, the picture moved again. It wobbled, too blurred to make sense. I heard him open a door, and then the rev of an engine.

  A sting of hot sweat touched the back of my neck. My plan had been easier to enact than I thought. He really was coming to find me.

  The video flipped, and I found myself staring at the ceiling in his car. I could only see Will’s elbow from time to time. Sitting back, I started to play. Not my own songs, but music that he would recognize. First, the James Bond theme, in a Cali-surf style that made it sound urgent.

  “Better hurry,” I teased. I wasn’t going anywhere, but he didn’t know that. “Your time is running out.”

  “I’m halfway there, girlie girl.”

  Laughing again, I replied with a few folksy bars of Macklemore’s “Thrift Shop.” The arrangement was all Ed Sheeran, and it made Will laugh like a loon.

  “Uh-oh,” I said. “There’s a crowd gathering. I might have to run.”

  Will’s distant voice replied. “Run as fast as you want. I’ll always catch you.”

  Segueing into a standard blues riff, I played it through a couple of times. Then I started making up lyrics just to mock him. My heart pounded faster by the moment.

  Will didn’t live that far from the museum. He was getting closer, but because all I could see was the ceiling in his car, I had no idea how close he actually was. It was like the thrill and adrenaline of being chased without running a single step.

  My fingers skipped down the strings, a faster blues progression than I intended. “There’s a pretty boy on the road,” I sang, trying not to dissolve into laughter. “And he’s coming for me. Got his engine running, ’cause that boy is built for speed.”