“Yeah. Until you leave,” I promise, tugging at the waistband of his boxer shorts. “Like you said, this doesn’t need to mean anything.”
“Wait.” He grabs my wrist with a gentle hand. “Charley, stop. We’re not having sex for the first time in the woods.”
“Well, I’m not getting back into that canoe. I just paddled and portaged for an hour, and I’m planning to die out here.”
His eyebrows curl inward in the most adorably frustrated way. He’s a puppy who can’t get his treat out of a Kong toy. “This isn’t how I pictured it going.”
I pull a face. He pictured it?
“We can have more time. We don’t need to rush,” he assures me, but his blown-out pupils mirror my fear-backed frenzy. The momentum between us is fragile. If we stop now, we may never start again.
I shake my head. “I’ll lose my nerve.”
“I won’t let you. What if we—”
A twig snaps within earshot—the unmistakable sound of a hiking boot in the woods. Ethan pulls me close.
“Sorry to startle you guys,” a man’s voice says. “Are you Ethan and Charley?”
My legs nearly give out. Ethan at least has the wherewithal to adjust his shorts. “Yep. You with—”
“The lovebirds,” he says, cutting Ethan off. The man who emerges is thin, pale, and mostly mustache. He’s undeniably the type of stray Petey and Laurel would pick up in a campground. His clothes are tattered and threadbare in that style that toes the line between “obscenely trendy” and “lost in the woods—send help!” But, then again, I’m in a soaked-through shirt and underwear and Ethan is still at half-mast, so our house is made of the thinnest glass.
“Our site’s not that far from here,” he continues, gesturing west. “I can take you, but I’ll…um…give you a second to dry off.”
I salute weakly and scramble for my clothes, refusing to fixate on the possibility that either I’ve destroyed a fifteen-year friendship or my perfect, no-strings sexual encounter was just ruined by this man in a bucket hat.
Chapter 15
Are Zambonis Significant to Your Relationship?
Sunday, Now
“Are you freakingout?”
“No,” I whisper to the back of Ethan’s head. The word echoes judgmentally through the canoe we’re schlepping on our shoulders. I’m not freaking out. I’m not.
“Don’t freak out,” Ethan suggests.
“Stop telling me not to freak out. Now Imightfreak out.” I’ve been legally single thirty-six hours, and I’ve already jumped my male best friend twice. Perhaps a small panic is warranted. Prudent, even.
“It’s only weird if you make it weird.”
“How am I making it weird? Back there, I was the one saying it didn’t mean anything while you were all like, ‘Not in the woods, Beekman.’ I’m not weird. You’re the weird one.” And now I’m whisper-yelling the word “weird” into a canoe like a lunatic.
“I’m sorry that I wasn’t prepared to havepublicsex with you,” Ethan argues under his breath.
“You live in a van,” I hiss. “All of your sex is at least semi-public.”
“Everything okay?” Jonah inquires over his shoulder. Hesounds about fifteen feet ahead, most definitely within earshot but honorably pretending not to be. I’ll have to rethink my harsh take on men who wear bucket hats. “You can set your boat down with the rest of ours,” he directs, and we follow his instructions. “They’re just over there.”
Voices carry through the brush, and for a split second, I wonder whether Jonah is luring us into a cannibal den, but then I hear the unmistakable sound of my sister woo-hooing over whatever feat of strength Petey is performing on the other side of the greenery.
Jonah pushes up a branch for us to climb under.
“You first,” I tell Ethan, but he’s doing one of those gentlemanlyafter yougestures, and our heads clunk together when we attempt to enter the clearing simultaneously with a mutual “Ope!”
It’s possible I overestimated my ability to remaincasualin a casual arrangement with my oldest friend.
