He gives me a flat look, running a hand through his damp hair, sending the waves every which way. “Is it?”
“No.” I laugh, sinking back against the edge of the tub and kicking my foot up, sending a small splash of water and bubbles towards him.
Beckett smiles when he leans back, too, arms stretching along the porcelain rim. He’s always an otherworldly sort of attractive—the kind that you’d only find in the pages of a magazine—with all that perfectly tousled chocolate hair, the eyes, the jawline, and the dimple.
But when it’s just us, he’s an entirely different kind of wonderful.
His eyes track across my shoulders, just exposed above the mountains of bubbles sitting on the surface of the water. They follow the curve of my neck to my jaw, and I think I can feelthe reverence from here—the way his eyes skate across my lips, sweep up my cheekbones, and land on my own.
He swallows, the muscles in his neck and shoulders somehow more beautiful because of the thin sheen of water. “This is what I mean. This is—I like this. When it’s just me and you. We’re good together.”
Whatever symphony my heart was conducting earlier starts to swell again—and I imagine, as all those chambers fill with the oxygenated blood it needs to survive, it’s stretching beyond the bars of its cage, holding itself open like a conductor might their hands.
My foot finds his thigh under the water, and the corners of his lips twitch. His next words are low, rough, gravelly. Just the way I like his voice. “We could be good together.”
I press my eyes closed, exhaling, before offering him a sad smile. “You might be right, but that doesn’t change anything, Beckett.”
“Can you just”—he jerks his head and grips his chin for a minute—“explain it to me like you might explain something to one of your patients. Dumb it down for me.”
“You’re not dumb.”
“I know.” He flashes me a wry grin. “I know much more about most major historical events than you do. But just ... explain to me why. Why you don’t think we can work through all of these big, hard things together? Why we can’t be together while we learn?”
My lips part with a tiny breath, and any words I might throw up in defense of my boundaries and my barriers stall in my throat.
I hear Rav.
You don’t have to be alone to be enough.
I hear Stella.
Somewhere along the way you’ve confused setting a boundary with closing yourself off.
I give a tiny shake of my head.
My heart inhales, ready for the first note of this symphony that could be my life if I’d just let go—and my brain screams.
“I don’t—” I try, but my voice catches. “What does that make me if I tear it all down and try to run off into the sunset with the first person who made me feel something? I can’t do it again, Beckett. I can’t give away a piece of me when I have these diametrically opposing views again. I can’t even get through a day without thinking I’m a fucking hypocrite, and most days I think I hate myself more than I sometimes hate my dad for putting me in that impossible position. My brain is just so, so loud. All the time.”
The lines of his jaw sharpen, but not in anger, a bit like the idea that I’m in pain hurts him, too. “That must be exhausting.”
“Yes.” I close my eyes.Iamexhausted, I think. Of my brain in general, but also of this war inside me being waged by two organs I desperately need who just can’t seem to agree. “I’m just ... not sure of anything.”
“I’m sure.” He sits forward, sending another tsunami of water and bubbles over the edge of the bathtub. One wave curls across his forehead. His eyes are on me, and he shakes his head ever so slightly, all the lines of his jaw firm now. “About you. About this. About us. About carrying things when you’re tired. About trying to help your brain quiet down. Does that count for anything?”
I shake my head again. “You said I made you real and that’s a scary thing. You need to be real enough for yourself. You want to carry everything, Beckett. It’s in your nature, and I don’t want to be another heavy thing you strap to your back because you don’t know who else to be.”
Beckett points towards my hands, gripping the edges of the tub and hanging on for dear life. “May I?”
I nod.
His hands find my wrists, and one by one, he takes each of my fingers, interlacing them with his, and he pulls me towards his edge of the tub.
My body has always seemed to know what to do with his; so my legs lift, wrapping around him, and he holds our joined hands up when our chests are flush. He presses his mouth to the back of my hands before letting go. Bringing his arms to wrap around my back, he traces my scar softly and tucks my chin to his shoulder.
I can’t see his face anymore. I wish I could—all those beautiful lines and those beautiful eyes that make up a beautiful boy. So, I press my eyes closed and picture Beckett the way I see him. The way I think he deserves to be. Unburdened, light, and free. Head tipped back in laughter, lines around his eyes digging in and making a home because he has so much to smile about.
“You misunderstood me. When I say you made me real...” He pauses, nose brushing along my jaw before he buries his face in my neck and inhales. “I mean that you breathed life back into a body that was just sort of there. I don’t think I thought much about myself at all before I met you. Thought I was reliable, likeable. Someone who served a purpose for other people but never really for himself. That’s what I mean when I say I didn’t think I was real. I just thought that was it. That was life. But then you came along. You were kind of mean”—I feel him grin against my neck—“but eventually you smiled. Eventually you laughed. I don’t think either of those things come for free with you. And they shouldn’t. Probably two of the best fucking things in the world. Turned out the cost was your voice sort of burrowing into my skin and kick-starting my heart.”