I add, “And I’m pretty sure my parents and I went to Massachusetts when I was really small. A town called Winterhaven, but I don’t remember much about it.”
“Winterhaven’s near Boston,” Ty says. He tosses another pebble into the water, creating ripples around our feet. “Do you have family there?”
“No, my grandparents died before I was born, and Mom and Dad are both only children. Do you have a big family?”
“Big enough. Four grandparents and a slew of aunts, uncles, and cousins.”
“And your parents and a brother, right?”
“Yeah. Kyle.” Ty tugs a weed from between the rocks, watching his fingers as he twists the stem into a knot. “Kyle would love it here. He’s crazy about mountains. His goal is to climb all the fourteeners in the United States before he’s thirty.”
“How old is he?”
“Thirteen.”
I laugh. “So he has plenty of time.”
His fingers still, and it’s almost as if he stops breathing. Certain I said something to upset him, I open my mouth to ask what’s wrong. But before I can, Ty looks up at me, smiles, and says, “We climbed our first one last year. Mount Muir in the Sierra Nevada Range in California. My parents took us. Kyle kicked my butt. He’s a natural.”
I notice the tattoo on his arm and realize it’s the outline of a mountain range with three spiked pinnacles. The date stenciled beneath it is August of last year. I stroke my fingertips across it, the contact spreading a tingle up my arm. “Is this Mount Muir?”
“Yeah.” He gives a short laugh. “I thought about getting a tattoo of each mountain I climb, but I’d be covered from head to toe if Kyle has his way, so maybe I’ll just stick to this one.”
Relieved that whatever happened to upset him a moment ago has passed, I say, “You should bring your brother here to climb the west peak. It’s almost a fourteener.”
“I’d like to,” says Ty. “Maybe I’ll climb it first, though. While I’m here. I’ve been planning to.”
“I can take you up if you want.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“I’ve climbed it at least a dozen times.” Reaching for my boots, I say, “You want to go for a walk? I should start home soon, but I could show you around a little first.”
“Sure.” Ty stands up in the water, but then he grabs my boots from my hand and tosses them back onto the bank. Before I can figure out what he’s up to, he takes hold of my arm and pulls me up so that I’m standing in the creek, too close to him. I tilt my head back, look up into his face.
“I owe you something,” he says, pointing to his hair, which is still damp from when I splashed him earlier.
I pull back, but he snags my hand. I squint at him. “You wouldn’t.”
“Wouldn’t I?” Ty grins.
“Don’t even think about it!” I shout, giggling and trying to squirm free. “You’ll be sorry. I mean it!”
“Ooh, I’m afraid!” he says in a shrill, teasing voice, mocking mine. “Make me an offer I can’t refuse and maybe I’ll reconsider.”
“I’ll make your lunch again tomorrow,” I say, backing away from him. But he holds tight to my hand until our arms are stretched out as far as they’ll go between us, and I can’t move another inch.
“My lunch?” He gives an exaggerated frown and slumps his shoulders. “That’s not the offer I was hoping for, but your sandwiches aren’t bad, so I guess I’ll let you off the hook.” He drops my hand.
I back toward the bank—one step, then another—keeping him in my sight and grinning so wide my face aches. “I don’t trust you.”
“Smart girl,” he says, advancing toward me slowly. One side of his mouth turns up into a lopsided smile that gives me more of a rush than the cold water trickling over my feet. When I connect with the bank, I crouch and reach back, refusing to take my eyes off him. But instead of grabbing the boots, I quickly swing my arms forward through the creek and send another scoop of water flying up toward Ty’s face.
He yells, then lunges.
I fall back onto the bank and he lands beside me. We laugh until my stomach hurts. In the silence that follows, Ty turns toward me, and I feel that same magnetic force drawing us together that I’ve felt before when I’m with him. When our faces are so close that his breath sweeps my cheek, nerves rush up and I pull