Page 52 of Finders Keepers
Anyway, I don’t believe that my bachelorhood ever caused Issy to want for anything. She had all of the love and guidance a girl needs. Lou and I made sure of that.
23
Maybe it’s themoonlight reflecting off the river, or the sticky air settling on my flushed skin, or too many tequila-based cocktails, but tonight feels different. Magical. Full of possibility. Almost like being at Sprangbur. Even though the place is half a mile behind us, it’s as if we’ve stepped inside one of the magical Edlosian bubbles Fountain talked about and now we’re drifting somewhere new and exciting, unable to steer but open to wherever it takes us.
All I know is that, when I look at Quentin strolling beside me along the water with his pale skin glowing and his hair fluttering in the breeze, our history collapses into something folded so small I can tuck it away. I’m able to store it out of sight and fully focus on the man beside me. Up until now, it was like the teenage version of Quentin was a ghostly image projected over the adult version. But now the projection has been shut off, and I don’t have to try to figure out which parts of what I’m seeing are from the past and which are present. Everything tonight is stripped down, simplified intohimandnowandwant.
Instead of feeling lost, I’m starting to feel…free.
“Hanako,” he says out of the blue.
“What about her?” I ask, stomach dropping.
“Do you want to know our secret?”
Yes. But also no. It really depends on what it is, I guess, but I can’t admit that without sounding jealous. “Sure. If it’s yours to tell.”
“She was my first kiss,” he confesses. The streetlights illuminating the trail reveal a deep blush spanning his cheeks and continuing to the tips of his ears.
I’m officially nauseated. “Oh. I assumed something like that.”
“Really?” Quentin raises his eyebrows as he glances over at me. “It wasn’t because we had any sort of connection or anything. I wasn’t particularly, like, interested in her—not that she isn’t attractive, of course.”
“Of course,” I repeat. I’m not sure why he’s telling me this. It doesn’t make my stomach hurt any less. And the magic feels like it’s dissipating by the second, like the bubble might be about to pop and drop us somewhere inconvenient, like into the river.
“It only happened because we got to talking that night, at Tyler McMaster’s pool party.”
“Why were you even there, anyway?” I ask. “No offense, but you weren’t exactly a cool kid.”
A low rumble of laughter rolls through him—thatTaco Bell rumorone. “Offense very much taken! I have always been cool, Nina.” He claps a hand to his chest as if I’ve wounded him, then lets it fall. “I was at Edgar’s playing D&D when Tyler IM’d to invite him—they were on the varsity soccer team together, remember?—and Ed asked if he could bring me along. Anyway, we went over there. I had like half a Bud Light, so I was feelingwild, and I wound up spilling my guts to Hanako about how Ihad a huge crush on someone but was terrified to make a move because I’d never kissed anyone before and didn’t feel like I knew what I was doing. She suggested she give me a quick lesson, just platonically, so that I’d be confident enough to shoot my shot before I left at the end of the summer. It was all very technical and unsexy, to be honest. But helpful. And really kind of her.”
My pulse is going a million miles an hour. Not only did I not know about his kissing Hanako, but there was a whole crush on someone he never mentioned? Even though I actively feel like I might vomit, I can’t help but ask, “So, did it work? Did you work up the nerve to kiss your crush?”
He shakes his head, grinning down at the trail beneath our feet as we walk. “Not yet.”
Not…yet? I try to think of who is still around that he might be in contact with, but the only person that comes to mind is…me? But that doesn’t make sense, because then why wouldn’t he have made his move that night in his backyard? Or one of the zillion other times we were alone together that summer?
The toe of my shoe hits a small divot in the asphalt as I take my next step. I wobble before stumbling slightly in the direction of the riverbank. I regain my balance quickly, but not as quickly as Quentin reaches out and grabs my arm.
“Geez. Didn’t realize you were that drunk,” he says.
“I’m not!”
He playfully narrows his eyes as if he doesn’t believe me. “Well, I’ll feel better holding on to you. Just to be safe.” He lets go of my arm and instead interlaces our fingers.
Oh my god. Quentin Bell and I are holding hands again. We are holding hands as we walk home on a beautiful night, and he and I are two adults who are getting to know each other better,untethered by whatever happened to those kids we used to be. This could be the beginning of a new chapter. One in which this attraction I feel toward him is something that can be acted on. Something that doesn’t have to be a fantasy I resent, or dismissed as a coping mechanism, but a real possibility.
I should be more anxious about that. Why am I not more anxious?
Probably the tequila.
Heat from his palm transfers to mine, and thinking about it makes it spread faster and wider until I feel it in my arm and my chest and my face and between my legs. We walk and chat idly, letting our joined hands swing as if this is a normal thing that we do. Or maybe it’s actually the start of a game of intimacy-based chicken in which we each keep pushing ever so slightly forward until the reality of it becomes too much and one of us backs off. Another competition between us.
More likely, I’m completely overthinking it and Quentin is truly worried I might stumble into the river.
Except when we reach the end of Riverside Park and turn onto East Baltimore in the direction of our houses, no more water in sight, he doesn’t let go. Neither do I.
When we’re standing in front of our duplex on West Dill ten minutes later, I figure this is the moment when he’ll finally release me, laugh it off. But we keep our fingers threaded together as we go up the stairs to our respective porches. The support column at the top of the steps forces us to finally part, and we make a big, goofy, tipsy show of it. I do a little lopsided pirouette on my porch, nearly falling over. Once I regain my balance, Quentin takes my hand again. This time he gently tugs me toward him until we’re standing mere inches apart, the wooden railing the only thing separating our bodies.
