Tomorrow was going to be a fun chat.
Dylan yawned wide, her arms stretching above her head. “Okay, I’m ready for bed. I cannot do nights out any more, especially after a weekend of partying.”
A weekend of partying… I declined to bring up the fact I’d seen her napping half-way through the birthday party, and I knew she’d slept until ten the next morning, but I was also feeling weary from the time difference. Plus, I legitimately partied all weekend.
“Come on, let’s go home.”
Dylan, Decker, and Lowe all marched straight up the stairs the second we’d arrived at the house. I followed, mostly for something to do, though my mind was too busy to sleep. I tried, but couldn’t. Thoughts of my dad, Jupiter, and The Lions were rolling round my head on a loop, boomeranging between panicking I was going to fuck everything up, and having the confidence to know I wouldn’t. It didn’t help that Lowe was sleeping under the same roof as me for the first time since I’d left for college.
She was right down the end of the hallway.
I threw off the comforter and pulled on some swim shorts. I needed to burn off this restless energy. Even at midnight the air was still balmy, the cicadas twittering in the darkness as Ipadded my way down the path to the pool, diving right in to the warm, onyx-dark water before I could think twice about it.
It was as I completed my twentieth lap that I hit something other than the pool wall on my turn. I pulled myself up to find Lowe sitting there with her legs dangling, slowly kicking through the water.
She was wearing sleep shorts and a soft sweater which hugged her curves in a way that clogged my blood, turning it green with jealousy. Jealous of a sweater. I really needed some sleep.
“Hey,” I shook the water from my hair.
The goosebumps running along my spine had nothing to do with the air hitting my wet body.
“Hey,” she smiled down at me.
Her hair, which had been loose earlier, was now scraped back from her forehead, tied up in yet another messy knot on her head. I briefly wondered about her bedtime habits, what her routine was like as she got ready to sleep. The moon had also decided it wanted a closer look, peeking through clouds to shine a beam directly onto her where it bounced off her golden locks; she looked like she had a halo.
My heartrate was having a hard time returning to normal, especially as she was still holding my gaze.
“Can’t sleep?”
“No.” She shook her head. “You?”
“I can. I’m sleep swimming right now.”
“Funny.” The power of her beautiful smile outshone the moon’s celestial spotlight. “Does your midnight swim have something to do with Jupiter Reeves and why he couldn’t hit anything tonight?”
“He hit two home runs!” I protested. She pursed her lips until I answered properly. “Yeah. I’m going to see him in the morning, and he said he’d give me a decision.”
“That’s amazing! How are you feeling?”
I sunk my shoulders beneath the water and leaned my head back while I thought. I normally found it hard to think around her; though maybe it was the time of night, or the warmth of the night air, or the full moon, or the couple of beers I’d had, but my heart wasn’t pounding with the same combination of longing and anxiety it normally did when I was close to her.
In fact, if I really tuned in, there wasn’t any anxiety at all. The longing though? That was flowing thick and fast.
“Good. I think.” My feet hit the pool floor again so I could stand. “If he says no, I’ll have to come up with another plan.”
“I don’t think he’ll say no.”
Consider me curious. “Oh, yeah? Why?”
“Because it’s an amazing opportunity, and I think anyone who’s got to the position he has would want a new challenge. Plus…” She looked down at her feet still kicking softly in the water, sending ripples across the surface. “Who wouldn’t want to work for you?”
Her eyes travelled up to mine again, slowly, so slowly that I could almost see her blushing, even in the shadow of the night, and it jogged a memory of what Murray had said. Maybe he’d been right and she had been looking at me, because she was currently looking at me like I’d always fantasized about her looking at me.
Whatever it was, she’d definitely never looked at me like this before. I was more certain about that than about anything else in my life.
My heart thumped hard, just as another avocado plopped loudly in the other end of the pool, breaking the moment.
“I’m sure I could think of a few people.”
