No longer boyish, clumsy, and eager. Confident, adult—the disarming patience of a deliberate man.
His hand came to the side of her face, cupping her cheek, deepening the kiss, his tongue seeking hers, and she felt like her blood might actually be on fire. She wrapped her legs around his waist, and he carried her through the house to another darkened room, and she was overcome by déjà vu: this man, his bedroom, his smell, and his touch. It all came together in a paint swirl of memory, bursting with color like the sunset behind the mountains, too bright to look at directly, so instead she closed her eyes, felt his fingertips skimming her hips, his lips on her stomach, her breasts, a gentle kiss in the hollow of her throat that sent shock waves down her spine and her legs, turning her liquid. His hands slowly patching her back together. Making her feel whole, not for the first time.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
Then
August 1, 2002
It was a terrible cliché that the worst fight of Hannah and Julia’s relationship would be their last one.
“There’s a picnic in town.” Julia stood in the doorway between their rooms, wearing a white, gauzy off-the-shoulder dress and red wide-brimmed hat, looking like a model. Her hair was shining, ringlets cascading down her back. So different from Hannah’s floaty wave. “For the Rockwell Fish Fry.”
Rockwell was a fishermen’s town. The Beaverkill was the most popular trout stream in the country, and Rockwell’s entire identity came from fly-fishing. The downtown contained fly shops and bed-and-breakfasts that catered to out-of-town fishermen. At the end of every summer, the town held a fish fry.
Hannah had been lying on her bed, reading, and she looked up, startled at her sister’s sudden appearance. It used to be their normal, but lately, an unspoken wall had been erected. The doors between their rooms remained firmly shut. She didn’t know when the divide had happened. The first week of June had been joyful, pancake breakfasts with whipped cream and strawberries from the garden and quiet games of checkers in the evening, and then slowly, Julia had changed. By the third week in July, they’d barely been speaking. Hannah could never figure it out (and she tried plenty). Julia had turned sullen, quiet, moody. She was either gone, destination undeclared; hunched over a little brown journal; or secluded up in her room.
Julia hadn’t asked Hannah to come to town with her in weeks. She ducked out after breakfast, leaving Hannah behind. Slipping back in right before dinner. Shrugging off any questions. Rolling her eyes. Acting in general like Hannah was a pest, which she’d never done before.
“Okay,” Hannah replied cautiously, licking her lips.
“Are you going?” Julia inspected her nails, painted bright red and gleaming. Manicures were things that they used to do together but that now Julia did alone and Hannah had no knowledge of. She’d always worn pale pinks, sometimes purples or blues, making her hands look like a corpse’s, and Hannah would make fun of her. Now, red. So many differences in such a short time.
“Do you want me to go?” Hannah’s voice was small, wheedling, and she felt sick of herself. No wonder Julia preferred her friend Ellie, with the wild red hair and skimpy bikinis, or even Dana Renwick, another girl in their group, with a short blonde asymmetrical bob and fuchsia lipstick: bold and confident, with a loud mouth and brash laugh.
“Of course,” Julia said, like nothing had changed. Hannah thought of Wyatt. He’d kissed her, fingertips grazing the skin under her T-shirt, soft moans into her mouth, her back against the concrete of the pool snack stand in the early evening after closing. She’d been riding there for weeks, helping him clean the fryers, keeping up a steady stream of chatter. When they kissed, they both smelled like old grease.
He found everything she said interesting, sometimes even asking her days later to retell a story, something about Trina or Julia, or that Tracy or Beth had said, or about boys at school (they all seemed so childish now). She told him about going out on Beth’s dad’s boat and catching a trout once. Beth’s dad showed Hannah how to hit it on the head with a pipe, and she was so horrified she cried, and Beth’s brother laughed so hard he fell off the boat. They ate the fish later, and Hannah couldn’t even take a bite, and Beth’s gross, acne-riddled brother chased her around their backyard campfire with a square