Love and Other Words
Page 36

“Ashley?”
“Yeah. Ashley.” He uses the tip of his index finger to push his glasses up, and stares out at the thick trees in front of us. “You act like you’re with him only because it’s easy. But in some ways, he’s your dad in this scenario, and you’re the woman who came after your mom. Sean doesn’t have as much to give, but you understand why. After all, you wouldn’t want to try to replace anyone.”
I stare up at him in shock. In only a few sentences, Elliot has just explained why it makes sense for me to be with Sean, while simultaneously proving that he – Elliot – is the only person who truly understands a thing about me. I didn’t even see this truth until now.
“Why are you so good to me? After everything?”
Elliot tilts his head as he looks back at me. Of course he doesn’t see it skewed this way. He only knows his betrayal, not mine. “Because I love you?”
Emotion clogs my throat, and I have to swallow a few times to get the words out. “I don’t think I really noticed before how numb I’ve been. Or cared, maybe.”
I see the way this hits him, physically. “Mace…”
I laugh darkly at this, at how fucking horrible it sounds. “That’s awful, isn’t it?”
He steps forward abruptly, pulling me into his chest. One hand cups the back of my head, the other wraps around my shoulders, and it feels like I haven’t really cried in ten years.
then
saturday, june 3
eleven years ago
D
ad and I packed up our lives for a summer to be spent in Healdsburg. Nervous clawing took up residence in my stomach. Everything felt different this summer: We’d finished junior year and were on the cusp of being seniors. School seemed more interesting, friends seemed less dramatic. And although Elliot and I hadn’t gone to my spring formal together – I hadn’t gone at all, actually – summer always felt like when things between the two of us shifted monumentally.
I was seventeen. Elliot was nearly eighteen. Last summer, we had kissed. We’d admitted to feelings. And ever since, he’d looked at me differently, more like something to be devoured than something to be protected. As much as I tried to think we could stay the kind of friends we’d always been, I knew I also wanted more. He was already one of the two most important people in my life. Instead of worrying about losing him, I had to focus on how to keep him.
I was draped on the pillows in the corner when he stepped into the room the Saturday after our arrival.
“Hey, you,” he said.
At the sound of his voice, I jumped up and ran to him, flinging my arms around his neck. It was a different sort of hug; instead of creating the careful triangle-embrace we’d always managed – shoulders touching, nothing else – I pressed my front all along his, from my chest to my stomach to my hips. Of course I knew he was the same Elliot from only a few weeks ago, the last time we’d been to the house, but after all my nervous obsessing over what the summer might be like, I suddenly didn’t feel like the same Macy.
He froze for a moment and then reacted with this tiny, perfect grunt of relief. Bending, he wrapped his arms around me and exhaled a quiet “Hey” against the top of my head.
For a few breaths, everything went still, and my entire world was the feeling of Elliot’s heart beating against mine, and the way his hand spread across my lower back.
“I’m so excited it’s summer,” I said into his neck.
He stepped back, still smiling. “Me too.” There it was again – the breathless silence between us. And then he broke it, brandishing two books in his hand. “I brought you something to read.”
“Something for our library?”
He laughed dryly. “Not really. You may not want to leave these out.”
His words confused me until I looked at the covers: Delta of Venus by Anaïs Nin and Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller.
I was enough of a book nerd to know these were not books I would already find in my high school’s library.
“What are these?” I asked, seeking confirmation.
He shrugged. “Erotic literature.”
“When did you get them?”
“A couple of years ago. I read them in January.”
I swallowed thickly. After my revelation that things were definitely changing between me and Elliot, these books felt like blistering rocks in my hands.
Elliot flopped down on the futon. “You’re all curious about boys and sex, I thought you might want to read them.”
I felt my entire face heat and handed the books back, avoiding his eyes. “Oh, that’s okay.”
I was ready for a step forward. But the idea of sex, and Elliot, sent me into light-headed territory.
“‘That’s okay’?” he asked, incredulous.
“I’m not sure I’d like them.” My voice was thick; the lie didn’t want to roll off my tongue.
He smirked. “Cool. Well, I’m done with them anyway. If it’s okay, I’ll leave them here.”
A week into vacation and I caved. The nondescript book spines had been staring at me, daring. I’d put them on the shelf between The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance – in other words, squarely in Elliot territory, as a hint that he was welcome to take them home if he chose.
It’s not like I wasn’t curious. It’s not like I didn’t itch to pick them up. But with Elliot stretched out in front of me every day, absently reaching to scratch his stomach or crossing his legs at the ankle – the movement somehow redefining and emphasizing what existed beneath the buttons of his jeans… I wasn’t sure what I really needed was more erotica.
Alas, Delta of Venus was first. I started it at daybreak, hours – I reasoned – before Elliot would show up.
But as usual, it was like he knew.
“Oooh. What are you reading?” he asked from the doorway. The barest daylight weakly lit my bedroom behind him; he blocked most of it with the width of his shoulders.
I ignored the rising heat in my cheeks and turned back to the cover as if I needed to remind myself. “Oh. Just one of the books you got me.”
“Ah,” he said, and I heard the satisfied grin in his voice. “You’re up early, too. Which one?”
Unwilling to say the name, I simply held up the book and waved it at him, struggling to look casual even though I knew my face was a ripe, heated red.
“Mind if I join you in the closet?”
“Suit yourself.” I rolled onto my stomach and continued reading.
Whoa.
The words were almost too much even for the privacy of my thoughts. I’d always thought of sexual things in such abstract ways, not with language but with visuals. And even more intense? I realized while reading this… I always imagined Elliot. I would imagine him coming closer and touching me, what he might say or how he might look. But never had I thought words like quivering, and tormented with desire, and absorbed him until he came.
I could feel him watching me but worked to keep my expression neutral. “Hm,” I said thoughtfully. “Interesting.”
Elliot exhaled a laugh.
“What did you just read?” he asked a while later, voice teasing. “Your eyes are going to fall out of your head.”
“It’s erotic literature,” I said, shrugging. “Safe money says I read something erotic.”
“Share.”