Page 75 of Lovesick
He smiled and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “Grief waits, you know. You can ignore it until you gather your strength. Instead of buying books, let’s look at delicious pictures of food that we can make together.”
“Really?”
He nodded. His hair swayed gently around his cheeks. “If you’re not ready, then you’re not ready. You don’t have to go back yet, anyway. I still get you.”
His face was a breath away from mine. My gaze dropped to his lips, half-parted, for a mere second.
“What if I’m never ready to face it?” I whispered.
“You will be, because that’s the kind of person you are. But it doesn’t matter if you’re ready now. The books will be here when that time comes. While you’re figuring that out, let’s find something to make for dinner tonight. Together.”
His hand dropped to my neck. The other one found mine and braided our fingers together. I wanted to pull myself into him and stay there.
“Sound okay?” he asked.
Relief flooded me at the thought of more time with him. Less time with ghosts. I nodded and stuffed the image of Mama away. If I was with him, I could do anything. Even forget all I’d lost.
Because if I hadn’t lost it, would I have ever found him?
“Okay,” I managed.
He smiled, pulled me close, and turned us back to the cookbooks. “Okay. Let’s check out what they’ve got. I, for one, am always craving Indian food.”
24
JJ
My ice cleats dug into the snow.
Breath puffed out in front of me in a fog as I ascended a particularly steep section of trail. I’d broken through thigh-high snow for an hour, and my heart was pounding so hard it shook my torso. Adventura lay at nine thousand feet elevation, but I pressed higher. Close to ten thousand. Shifting through sand-like snow for this long meant my heart would be bruised.
Felt so good.
For a moment, I stopped to scan the mountains. This high, I had a new view. A different perspective. The canyon lay to the south. Ahead of me rose a mountain so high I couldn’t see the top. Last summer, I’d climbed it with Mark while Justin spotted.
Being with the rocks again felt like a cool kiss on frazzled nerves. Mark was feuding with the city council, so he’d slipped into full brooding mode, sitting in his pajamas and staring at the ceiling. It’s where his magic always happened, so I left him to it, but Lizbeth was checking on him every five seconds.
My mind drifted back to our perfect evening last night. We’d found a recipe for spinach lentil dahl in an Indian cookbook, shopped at the grocery store, and fixed it together. She brightened when we discussed her favorite romance plots, then listened intently while I talked about climbing.
The whole night could have been ripped right from a book. Particularly the part where I desperately wanted to kiss her.
But I didn’t, because ... I didn’t know. Maybe the expectation of the first kiss? Did she have massive dreams for this?
This morning, she’d started into the website project with her usual organized gusto. She’d rattled off a whole bunch of information about landing pages, CSS coding, and professional photographs of the campground. The checklists and spreadsheets she could muster at a moment’s notice were impressive, to say the least.
But now things had changed between us. Nothing was the same. We’d shown a level of interest beyond friendship. I had no idea what to do next. Let this ride? Enjoy the time with her while I had it?
Kiss her already?
Definitely.
Why does it matter?The answer came easily enough. It mattered because Lizbeth mattered.
And Lizbeth mattered a lot.
Maybe too much.
On the back of a long receipt, I’d scribbled several romantic ideas pulled from the audiobook I’d been listening to. Dancing in the rain ranked at the top, apparently. Another one suggested surprising a girl with coffee and letting your fingers linger. Didn’t get that, but all of this was foreign. The ones that had me most worried wereknow just what to say at the right momentandsave her from inevitable danger by being a badass at fighting.
