Page 37 of Your Echo
My fingers curl around the edge of the book. I hear the shake in my own voice. I can’t look up at Stéphanie. Instead, I turn around and leave the store.
“Hey.” She’s only a few seconds behind me, reaching for the top of my arm to stop me in my tracks. “Wait.”
The feel of her slender fingers, warm against my bicep even in the summer heat, and the sight of her white skin against the dark ink on mine are too much to handle. I go rigid, drawing in a sharp breath, and she lets go.
“Sorry,” she breathes, like she’s made a mistake.
Touching me was definitely a mistake, but I don’t know who’s going to suffer more from the consequences—me, or her.
“It’s okay,” I grunt.
It’s like I’m in two places right now: standing on a street corner with a gorgeous girl who makes my blood boil with the mere ghost of her fingertips on my arm, and crouched down in a dim corner of the Westmount Elementary School library. I used to sneak in there at recess. At first, I had no interest in reading; I only went so I wouldn’t have to go outside with the other kids. Spending an hour in the quiet, gloomy library was a million times better than all the screaming in the schoolyard.
I only opened that copy of Poe because of the cover. The school’s edition had a raven on it too, perched on the branch of a dead tree. I had to read it in quick snatches, always on the lookout so I could duck into a different aisle every time the librarian passed by.
“Ace? Ace, hello?”
“Hmm, what? Sorry?”
“I just said I should probably go,” Stéphanie tells me.
I reach up to scratch my neck, trying to seem casual instead of completely vacant. “Yeah, me too.”
“Thanks for the ice cream.”
“Thanks for the catharsis.”
She gives me the hint of a smile. “Anytime.”
When she heads off in the direction of the metro station, I stand outside the bookstore and watch her go. That perfect ass and those long, toned-as-fuck legs are even harder not to stare at when she’s wearing leggings. I can still feel her hand on my arm. I look down at my bicep, half-expecting to see that her fingerprints have melted into the ink.
