Page 41 of Always You

My tongue darts out as I lick my lips, stunned, then push out a breath. I have no clue how to respond to that while my handreaches up to rub the back of my neck.Love.I don’t want to fall in love. Love is messy, and it hurts like hell when people leave.

And everyone leaves.

“We’re friends, ma’am. She’s become my best friend. I have no intentions of messing that up.” I lean forward, resting my elbows on my knees, holding my tumbler in a tight grip. It’s all I got right now. All I can admit without falling apart, and I can’t afford to fall apart. I have to survive long enough to graduate and get out of this one-horse town, chasing dollars in the big cities.

“I know, and you don’t have to admit it, boy. You love my daughter. It’s written all over your face, and you know it even though you’re pushing it away something fierce. One day, you’ll wake up and realize your life is worth living. Until then and after, our door is always open for you.” She gulps the entire drink down her throat before putting it back on the table, eyes colliding with mine again.

“How do you know, ma’am?” I don’t even know why I ask, because I’m pretty sure I don’t want to know the answer.

Her hands rest on her robe, her lips rolling as if she’s trying to pick her answer with care.

“Your eyes. You can fool the world, but your eyes radiate the truth.”

My head snaps to the side at the screeching of the porch door.

“What did I miss?” Charlotte beams.

“Nothing, just telling Hunter here the importance of birthdays,” Elizabeth says.

“See! Even my mom agrees.”

“I guess I can’t argue with the both of you.” I muster a smile, but an unsettling feeling makes my hands tingle.

Elizabeth's words frantically fly through my mind, like a bird trapped inside a house, desperate to find the way out. Panicking. But when I glance up at Charlotte, it all disappears.Fear is replaced by comfort, and I roll back my shoulders to relieve the tension in my spine.

“That would be wise, boy.” Mrs. Roux gives me a wink, then slowly gets back up. “I’m going back to bed. Two drinks, Charlotte. No more. And no driving, Hunter. You can take the guest room.” She lifts her finger in a reprimanding way, something that would be rewarded with an eye roll by any other giving teenager, but for me, it feels like a victory that she cares.

“Yes, ma'am. Goodnight.”

“Alright, Mama. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight, kids,” she muses as she disappears into the house, and Charlotte flops back on the lounger next to me. She casually rests her head on my shoulder, and I bring my arm up to wrap it around her neck, settling her into my side like we did before.

The ginger beer lingers, combined with her sweet scent, a potent mix I’d love to nuzzle my head in. The temptation of giving in to my urges grows when her fingers fall to my stomach and the heat of her palm burns through my t-shirt.

“Sorry for my mom bursting through the door. I thought she was sound asleep.”

“Don’t worry about it, babe.” I move my hand up and down her arm, stroking the soft skin that isn’t covered up by her t-shirt.

“She likes you. I can see it in her eyes.” She looks up with her sparkling eyes, stopping my heart for a second before I put my focus back in front of me, with a sigh that’s both content as a little frightened. If these women are as good at reading eyes as they say they are, I’m in deep trouble.

“I like her too, Charls.”

14

I’m setting myself up for heartbreak, but I can’t stop.

After his birthday, Hunter and I fall into a routine that has me spending more time with him than I ever have with Julie. He picks me up every morning so we can go to school together. We have lunch at the school cafeteria, sometimes with Julie and Jason.

But I mostly look forward to the moments he will just stroll into my house like he lives there. The moments where it’s just me and him. The moments we hang out and play rock-paper-scissors to decide who will pick out the movie we're watching. The moments he brings over my favorite ice cream or the moments we just drive around town with no destination at all. Our lives are completely synced, and at this point, I can barely remember what life looked like without him.

I know we’re supposed to be just friends, and I have no illusions that he goes straight home at night after he leaves my house, but it sure makes it easy to pretend he’s mine. But over the last week, I haven’t been able to sleep at night, wishing he was there with me.

It has to stop. We said friends. We agreed on friends, and I don’t want to ruin whatever we have by doing stupid things like giving in to the desire to find out if we could be more.

“Everything with you is easy,”he told me the other day. And that’s the exact reason I can’t make life more complicated forhim than it already is. It’s why I need a plan. A perfect plan to get whatever weird idea my heart has out of my head as quickly as possible.

I close my eyes as a shiver lifts the hairs on my neck. I don’t have to turn around to know Hunter is standing behind me. I can sense his energy hitting my back, just like it does when I’m cooking and he passes behind me to grab a drink from the fridge. It’s a pull too heavy to ignore, but not from my lack of trying.

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