Page 55 of Four Weekends and a Funeral

My heart squeezes, and I beam, unable to remain cool and impassive. It’s the reaction he wants. His face hardly moves, but his eyes soften into an open, boyish expression. It curls my insides like scissors pulling against a ribbon. “It’s a very weird thing to say.” The air in the truck has thinned out, leaving nothing but our hot breath. “You’re my favorite new person too.”

His knee taps mine. I press his knee back, electricity zinging through my nervous system like it’s a conductor rail. His deep brown eyes sweep my face before locking on to mine. A blush crawls up my neck as warmth covers my skin like a wool blanket.

“You’re also one of the only new people I’ve met in months,” I say to poke him, because I’m not sure what happens next. I sigh out a nervous breath, waiting.

Without removing his eyes from mine, Adam tosses a glove at my face.

“Where did that even come from?” I shriek. His low laugh rumbles, and now I’m laughing too. Our legs tangle together, my free hand drifting up his broad chest with our faces inches apart. Before my brain can register what’s happening, he’s slipping his hand behind my neck, and I’m clutching his denim jacket to angle my mouth up to his.

It’s a soft, sweet breath of a kiss. Until it isn’t.

We crash into each other against the cloth upholstery of the bench seat. Adam’s mouth catches me, kissing me like we’re building something, like we’re creating something new and beautiful. His lips glide against mine, and a sigh escapes my throat. Phantom sparks explode over my breasts as my hand fists his hair like it’s the edge of a cliff and I’m in free fall. The way his stubble scratches against my face sets me on fire. It’s nothing like I imagined. It’s more. Almost too much. Everything about his touch, his kiss, the press of his body against me, is too much and not enough all at once.

“This is so…” His hungry words fall away as his mouth finds my jaw. His tongue burns into my skin. I can’t think. I can’t see. The buzzing energy of the universe collapses in on his soft lips and sweeping tongue.

He grapples for my hips desperately as rivulets of need flow through me. I can’t form any complete thoughts except I need to feel every part of him against me. I scramble up onto my knees as his arms guide me onto his lap, and he gasps into my mouth. His hands tighten on my hips, pulling me impossibly close, eating into space that never existed. My senses are filled with nothing but Adam Berg.

His hands wrestle with the bottom of my coat, and I pry my hands out of his hair to help as we furiously yank at the buttons. He pulls it down my shoulders, my arm knocking my open salad off the dash in the process. Oil-soaked lettuce slides down the console until it all lands on the floor with a wet plop.

“Shit.” I shift in his lap, but his hands cup my face and pull me back to him. His eyes drill into me, his pupils so large I hardly recognize him.

“I don’t care about my truck right now.” He presses our foreheads together as we both catch our breath. “I can’t care about anything but this.”

His hand strokes my hairline tenderly, tracing down my face over the soft line of my jaw.

“Neither can I,” I practically pant before pressing my mouth to his again.

Heat ripples through me as he sinks into me desperately and all trace of tenderness melts away. His mouth is heavy and hot. It’s a deep, mind-numbing, stomach-flipping kiss, and I don’t know the day, the time, or what postal code we’re in when I whimper into his throat at the feel of his fingers toying with the hem of my sweater. His hand travels up my bare back, thumbs grazing my spine, while his other grabs hold of my hair. He grasps at more of me, anchoring me to him as I nearly unravel in his lap.

Whatever is left of my rational brain goes fully offline. I’m all nerve endings and need when the horn from Uncle Ricky’s tow truck sends my head into the ceiling of the truck cab.

—

Uncle Ricky pulls my car out of the snow with an awful crunch as the metal lurches over the curb and my front bumper falls to the ground with a thud. I sign paperwork and hop back into Adam’s truck so he can drive me home, watching my car disappear in the direction of the autobody shop.

Adam squints out at the snow-covered streets. His face is stony. He doesn’t say anything right away, and panic swims in my stomach as we sit in heavy silence. I move to turn the radio on for a buffer, but he puts a hand up to stop me.

“I’m sorry about that,” he starts, his eyes flitting between mine and the road. “I got, uh—”

“It’s my fault,” I blurt, falling on the proverbial make-out sword for the both of us. “I shouldn’t have. I was—”

His laugh is forced. “We both know it wasn’t just you.”

He works the back of his neck with his one hand. I rub circles over my right temple like it will erase the last twenty minutes—a sexual expungement.

“It was a, uh…” He’s about to say the word mistake. I know it in the way he’s gripping and releasing the steering wheel. If the word falls from his lips, I’ll be sick.

“It wasn’t a mistake,” I announce. “It was just a thing that happened. A lapse.”

“A lapse?” His eyebrows lift with curiosity.

“I read an article about a study on grief…” I’ve read no such article. “It said a, uh, physical connection can be necessary to move into the next stage.”

“Which stage?” His eyes dart back to me.

“The fourth one?”

“Depression?”

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