Page 58 of Striking Range

“I love you, Mom. I gotta go,” I interrupt.

She chuckles. “I love you too, baby.”

Ending the call, I toss my phone next to the Switch. Everett is staring at me, his shoulders slumped as if some great burden he has been carrying the whole drive here has just fallen straight to the hardwood.

After a moment, he flops down onto the bed, sitting on the edge.

“Hey,” I greet him, slowly inching closer.

We’re like two magnets, Evie and I. Always searching for one another.

“Hey.” He sounds so tired, so defeated.

“You okay?”

“Just a… long dinner.”

I make a sound of acknowledgement, settling in to sit next to him. “Want to talk about it?” He shakes his head, so I say, “Okay. Want to order a pizza and watch Family Guy?”

Slowly, his gaze lifts, giving me a soft smile that makes my heart squeeze uncomfortably. “Yeah, that’d be cool.”

I try not to let my mind wander; I pray he doesn’t hear the pounding of my heart as we move around the apartment, placing our pizza order and turning on the TV in the living room.

As we sit on the couch, I try to navigate this tension that wasn’t here this morning—I can’t seem to find the source of it. Is it coming from what we did last night? The dinner he just came back from? School?

But Evie doesn’t want to talk about it, and I won’t force him.

So, we sit in this tension instead.

“Ready for midterm studying?” It’s a very lame question, one we’ve probably asked each other a billion times by now, but I have no idea what else to say to him now that we’ve touched; now that I know how obscene he looks as he’s coming.

And fuck, I want to see it again. Preferably in my mouth, or maybe even in me. Would he be into that? Am I allowed to ask?

What is this new thing between us? I mean, how can we just be Evie and Sky after what has transpired? He admitted to wanting me sexually, and I showed him by returning the favor.

We are in a limbo, stuck in an in-between I am not familiar with.

“Yeah, are you?” Everett finally responds.

And yeah, okay, now probably isn’t the right time to ask him to fuck me.

“Yeah,” I murmur.

Silence. Once again.

The pizza arrives, so I grab it and put it on the coffee table. We eat to the sound of Family Guy reruns, and once we’re done, I try again.

“Everett,” I prompt sternly, watching as he turns his head to look at me. “What’s up?”

I don’t want to push, but this silence is suffocating.

“I just need to get out of my head.”

Oh. Does that mean… surely not. If it did, he would have jumped me by now, right? My palms are getting sweaty; my heart rate is rising once more, despite how casual I’m trying to appear.

“Okay. What do you want to do?” I ask.

He sighs, long and defeated, and says, “I don’t know.”