Page 38 of The Pairing

“Why, because I can’t be spontaneous?” I say. “I’ll have you know I’ve becomeveryspontaneous. You know how they say to do one thing every day that scares you?”

“You do that?”

“Well, I’m working my way up. Right now I’m at one a week.”

“I see,” he says. “What scares you this week?”

This,something in me answers automatically.You.

“Bull testicles,” I say. “I’m gonna eat some in Spain.”

I dive under and swim a quick lap, five meters out and back, just to pop up behind Kit and startle him.

“Ah, okay!” He spins around, paddling backward. “You win, you’re spontaneous. I’m sorry I doubted you.”

I laugh, swallowing the words down with a blazing gulp of air.

“It’s good to see you swimming,” he says.

Kit was at the swim meet where I messed up my shoulder, and he was there for the years after, when I hated the thought of learning to swim again. He was there before too, so many chlorine-scented summers. He’s missed the past few years of chin-ups every morning to shore up my muscles and exploratory dips at Corona del Mar, but he knows what it means for me to be back in the water.

“Yeah. It feels good.”

We tread water for what feels like ages, our bare shoulders rising and falling with each swell, just talking. I feel sun-roasted and salt-brined, like a tomato in a jar. Life is silly and random and magnificent, and I’m experiencing it all the way. I’m in it up to my nips. I’m in Saint-Jean-de-Luz, a delirious pink tide pool of happy accidents, and despite it all, I’m glad that it’s Kit here with me. I can’t think of anything happier or more accidental than that.

When an especially big wave rolls in, Kit twists around to catch it head-on, and I see the thin, straight line of black text on the top of his left shoulder, running horizontally between the base of his neck and the shoulder joint.

“Oh, hey,” I say, “there’s your third tattoo.”

Kit tucks his chin back to look at it. “Oh, yeah, I forgot about it back there.”

“What does it say?

“Just a line from a book.”

“What book?”

“The Silmarillion.”

“Ah, of course,” I say. Kit’s family introduced me to genre fiction and Renaissance festivals after a childhood of Serious Art. His parents used to say they stole Kit from Rivendell, on account of how he had the air of like an ethereal elf child. Tolkien was always his favorite. “Nerd. Can I read it?”

He turns, and I push myself closer, glad I’m a strong enough swimmer to keep our naked skin from accidentally touching.

The words read,surpasse tous les joyaux.

“It’s in French,” I say, a little disappointed.

He’s quiet while the ocean laps against his chest.

“I read the book in French first,” he says finally. “It means, ‘surpasses all jewels.’”

“Huh. Cool.” It’s been ages since I readThe Silmarillionfor Kit, but the phrase sounds familiar. I’m more fascinated by the linework, the delicate, featherlight script. Whoever did this must have barely dug into his skin at all, but the black is stark and clean. “I love the lettering.”

Without thinking, I run my fingertip over the ink. Wet skin meets wet skin. Kit shivers.

The sense memory crashes in like a rogue wave. I see our skinny legs, grown too fast and not filled out yet, kicking together against the tide. I see a teenaged Kit levering himself out of my parents’ pool. I remember a flat tire in the pouring rain on the side of the Pacific Coast Highway, peeling his wet shirt off in the back seat. I feel my back pressed to his chest in a too-small bathtub, and I see his face, slick with me from nose to chin.

Oh, fuck.

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