Page 13 of Speak

“Fucking nothing.” I grumble.

“I guess the rumors are true.”

“Won’t know until Monday, will we?” I push my tray still loaded with food away. This is madness. How am I not going to eat just because she didn’t speak to me? Don’t I wish more girls wouldn’t speak to me? Why do I want her to? Because she’s not a girl. She’s a little goddess.

Careful, Jonas. Don’t obsess. Remember what happened last time.

She’s nother, brain.

______

It rains so hard on Sunday; it’s coming down in sheets and we can barely see. Our practice scrimmage gets canceled during the middle of it. We head inside from the practice fields and into the athletic building where the locker rooms are. I take my time to shower and change and take so long that I’m the last one out. The rain has ceased but not by much. I pull the hood from my raincoat up when I see a certain sexy little brunette headed into the woods where the trails to reach the library are.

The library that has her family’s surname. I tell myself I’m following her to make sure she gets there safely. With no Axel around, I’ll protect her. Except in the middle of her journey she takes a right off the trail.

Taking the path less traveled little ghost?I want to ask but stay quiet.

I stay a good twenty paces behind her, the path in the woods completely covered in trees is practically dry. Moist in some areas where the branches overhead don’t connect but it’s mostly dry.Bright green moss and mushrooms cover the bases of the tree trunks, vines also crawl along them and I’m fully aware of every twig on the ground. I don’t step over them, so I don’t snap them. I’m six-foot-four and weigh two hundred and forty-seven pounds.

I should probably make myself known, announce myself, but it’s too late now. Now I’ll just look like a fucking creep. Which I’m not. I’m just protecting her.

She moves like a phantom in her little black and white high-tops. She’s wearing jeans this time, and I suddenly miss her skirt. She reaches a gravel shore I didn’t know about and keeps moving forward. I stay on the tree line and catch my breath when my specter, in this pouring late-August rain, removes her raincoat, her shoes, her shirt, and finally those skintight jeans and walks on to what looks to be a dock in nothing but lace black boy short panties and a matching bra.

I was right I was right I wasright.

Her ass is perfection. She doesn’t have a super athletic build but the defined muscles in her thighs don’t give away from how strong they are. She has a narrow waist that isn’t very narrow, and she definitely has meat on her bones. There is strength in her arms probably from playing the cello. Yes, I did go to my dorm and watch her old performances RMU had posted on their YouTube channel. She is incredible.

She dives in.

I was wrong. She’s not a specter or a ghost. She’s a swan. The most beautiful swan I ever did see. I decide I can be a swan.

Once in the water, she throws something on the dock, and I gulp. It’s her bra. Another plop and I can’t breathe. She’s fully nakedin the pond.

After fifteen minutes or so, my legs push forward on their own and now, I’m just in my boxers, standing on the dock, watching her float on her back, pink nipples down to her navel rising out of the water, droplets of rain landing and bouncing off, little ripples of water with each drop, with the top of her head to me, completely unaware of me.

“Mind if I join you?” I ask.

Tensing, she slowly stops floating and lets her lower body sink, looking anywhere but at me. I bend forward and pick up herundergarments, hold them up and put a cool smirk on my face. I am anything but cool right now. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep mine on, I’ll stick to my end of the pond and we don’t have to talk.” I reassure her.

She visibly relaxes and swims a little farther out.

The water is ice-cold when I jump in but warms up when I get used to it. I decide to float, and she does, too. And that’s how we spend Sunday morning together. Floating. In the rain. Not talking. It’s the best Sunday I’ve ever had.

______

“It’s too late to switch your classes, Mr. Anderson.”

Words Idon’twant to hear.

“Miss Overly, I’m sure you know these are special circumstances and I wouldn’t bother you if it wasn’t important. Axel asked me to keep an eye out for her and if our schedules align, even just a little, it will mean a lot to both the Monroe'sandthe Andersons.”

Oh yeah, I pulled out the big guns. I’ve never used my last name to pull rank over something or someone. I don’t even care for my last name, either. But this afternoon, after floating until I was pruned and shivering with my ghost, I was never happier to have my last name.

Rita shoves her glasses up the bridge of her nose and lets out a soft exhale. “The most I can do is switch you over to Professor Harrington's for Criminal Psychology II, which you’ll need either way for your bachelor’s in political science, on Monday, Wednesday, Friday.”

I get to see her three days out of the week, then. “Thank you, Miss Overly. You’re the best.”

“Oh, and Mr. Anderson?” She says before I have a chance to escape the admin office.

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