Page 6 of Depths of Desire
“Love you,” she said.
I hesitated for half a second. “Love you, too, Snip.”
She hung up, still smiling, and I stared at the blank screen for a long moment after.
Lennox Ellery. That name hadn’t crossed my mind in years. I didn’t even know he remembered who I was.
But I remembered him.
Not in vivid detail. Not like a crush, not quite. Just…moments and glimmering flashes. A summer memory left out in the sun too long, faded around the edges but still mostly intact.
He’d always been surrounded by people. Girls, especially, were clinging to his arms or flopping on poolside towels and tossing their heads back whenever he so much as smiled. It wasn’t obnoxious. That was the thing. He wasn’t trying to impress anyone. They’d just gravitated toward him, like the sun finally showed up and everyone wanted a piece of the warmth.
I watched from a distance. Not because I was scared, exactly. Just because I didn’t see the point.
Lennox was the kind of boy who laughed easily, who belonged in groups, who glowed in public. His hands were always moving, offering, nudging, passing someone a bottle of water, slapping a teammate’s back. I couldn’t imagine him still, couldn’t imagine him quiet.
So I stayed where I was. Focused on my laps, on my breathing, on keeping my pulse down whenever he walked by, wet hair slicked back, skin flushed from the heat, eyes bright.
He might’ve looked at me once. Maybe twice. I never gave him a reason to look again.
And later, when I started figuring myself out, slowly, painfully, in the solitude of hotel rooms and locker rooms and questions in the back of my head, I realized I wasn’t built forthat kind of life—the loud, easy, lovable one. I wasn’t meant for passing kisses and arm touches and Saturday night hookups that turned into Sunday breakfasts.
I didn’t do complicated.
I didn’t do dating.
The people I fucked—and that’s what it was, nothing softer than that—came from apps. Or bars I didn’t frequent more than once. It was cleaner that way. Controlled. No names, no promises, no risk.
Because anything with stakes could be used against me. Anything real required space.
And I didn’t have any.
Not after this summer. Not after the medal.
God, the medal.
I didn’t hang it up. Didn’t even open the box after the airport ceremony. It sat in my bedroom closet behind my spare towels and backup resistance bands. I didn’t need to see it to feel it. It was always there. A silver sun pressed to my spine. A reminder.
Not good enough.
Not first.
Too slow.
People called it an achievement. They wanted to celebrate and to ask questions. To post my name and stats on screens and lockers and banners across Westmont’s athletic page. But for me, it was just…weight.
No wonder I didn’t decorate the apartment. No wonder I couldn’t deal with family visits or check-ins about my love life or conversations about who I was or who I might be someday.
There wasn’t space for it. Not with that thing burning a hole through my chest.
If I wasn’t training, I was recovering. If I wasn’t recovering, I was planning the next round. If I wasn’t doing any of it, I felt like I was drowning.
So no. I hadn’t thought about Lennox Ellery.
Not until tonight.
And even now, I wasn’t sure why the idea of sharing a car ride with him had struck me so hard. It wasn’t nerves. It wasn’t excitement.
