admit. “I was scared because you shut down and I thought—”
“I’m sorry.” The words are quick like a slingshot, like he doesn’t want my thought completed. “I’ve been dealing with some stuff related to my injury, and maybe I haven’t been doing the best job.”
I pause, hoping there’s more, there’s an explanation of the ups and downs, what’s happening in Boston, but as the silence enters a second beat, I can’t take it anymore. I don’t care if there’s stuff he’s keeping from me. There’s time for that.
“Does this mean . . .” I don’t know what it means. And please don’t make me explain what I mean by this. Because I can’t take the withdrawal. I can’t do casual. I can’t—
“I want us to be more than French partners,” he says, smiling, eyes on me. Eyes that are steady, open. I sift through the words, looking for an uncertainty, but it’s hard to concentrate with all those stupid butterflies—papillons—swirling inside. “And I want you to know that I don’t like Chloe the way I like you.”
I bite down on my bottom lip, hard. I want Zeke to say more, to say that nothing ever happened with Chloe or Stephie, but I know he can’t. And I can’t fault him for what came before.
“More than French partners?” I lean forward. “Badminton partners too?”
A slow smile awakens his face again. “You don’t like sports.”
I lean forward another tiny quarter inch. We shouldn’t be talking anymore; there are so many better things to do. But . . .
I love this. “Badminton isn’t a sport.”
“Stop,” he groans, and I can’t help it; I sink into Zeke. I sink and holy everything that is holy, this. Those callused fingertips? Incredible as they slip down my arms, opening every pore, every atom in my body. Zeke leans to the side, pulling me down onto the bed beside him, our lips still discovering, playing, god almighty I don’t even know. He pulls me closer, our legs intertwining, closer.
And even though our mouths are desperate for each other, words still come out. Words like belle and tu m’étonnes toujours. Beautiful and you always surprise me. Words like s’il te plaît, please, and encore, again.
And then we slow. We slow because it’s too much to keep going faster. It’s perfect just being here, not needing to move forward. His lips stroke across my jaw, down my neck, and I’d do anything to keep this going forever. Forever and ever, in this room. Nothing else. Not the knocking on the door, not the “Abby?” Not the “shit” Alice says as she walks in.
I tuck my head into Zeke’s chest, wishing I could hide inside him.
“Hey, Alice.” He smiles. “We were just watching a movie.”
I snort, trying desperately to keep the laughter inside. Because we weren’t so much watching the movie as reenacting it.
“So, you and Zeke?” Alice asks as she flops down on her bed. “I was beginning to think you guys would wait it out until the last day of school.”
I can’t help it; I touch my lips, my cheek, my jaw. All the places his lips were, the places I can still feel him. Is it normal to feel like this?
“I . . .” Apparently words are not my friend. I need to put a verb next but I don’t know which to use because no verb is strong enough for this. No verb aptly describes the feeling that your skin is alive, that your heart won’t stop racing, that you long to roll around in your bed and remember what it felt like. That you feel real and powerful and out of control and maybe like you want to cry a little. Okay, a lot.
Alice slips off her bed and comes to sit beside me, just where Zeke had been.
“You okay?” she whispers.
And I don’t even know how to tell her just how okay I am.
NINETEEN
I JOKE WITH ZEKE THAT we need to make up words to put in our log book because the words we’re speaking in French aren’t appropriate for class.
Words like:
Your mouth. Ta bouche.
Your eyes. Tes yeux.
You’re so beautiful. Tu es si belle.
Can I kiss you here? Puis-je t’embrasser ici?
What about here? Et ici?
And here? Et ici?
Please. S’il te plaît.
And then there are the words I think in my head. His fingers. Ses doigts. His skin. Son peau.
And then the words that are buried so far in my subconscious. The words I feel as he kisses me, over and over again. My jaw.