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“Every day I spend not touching you is torture, baby. Every day, you hear me?” My words are heated, spilling over her skin as I kiss her, stroke her,squeezeher. Strands of her flyaway hair keep snagging in my beard, and one of her dress straps has fallen down, and if anyone glances over, they’ll think I really am an ogre, fixing to eat her alive. I don’t care.
“You’re my punishment, Clementine. I’ve done wrong at some point in my life, and not having you is my fire and brimstone punishment.”
She kisses me back hard, and her cheeks are damp. Is she crying?
“I hate it too,” Clem mumbles against my lips. Her breath hitches, and she’s definitely crying. “So what was my sin?”
“Baby,” I say again, so broken.
And just like that, the heat drains from my body. I stop rutting; stop panting all over her. She’s hurting from this, clearly as heartbroken as I feel, and there’s nothing left to do except stand in silence together, holding one another.
Her head tucks so neatly beneath my chin. Clem’s so soft and small, wrapped in my arms.
After a while, her body stops shaking with sobs. She quietens down, and there’s a damp patch on the front of my shirt, but that’s fine.
Won’t let her go. Won’t waste a single second of this evening.
“M-Meg can’t ever find out about this,” Clem finally says against my chest, her voice muffled. I grimace at the riverbank, but I won’t argue.
“I know.”
“She’s m-my only real family. I can’t lose her.”
Clem’s hair is soft beneath my palm, and I stroke it from roots to ends. “I know, baby. I know.”
And I hate lying to my daughter; hate feeling Clementine fall apart in my arms. Hate feeling this smoking crater where my chest used to be.
But Clem’s right. She’s my best friend’s daughter—a goddamn college student, and half my age. She hasn’t even graduated yet. This can’t happen, for so many reasons.
So. We’ll get back on track.
We’ve had our one moment of weakness, and now it’s done.
Seven
Clementine
Dear diary,
I finally got what I’ve been dreaming of—and it was just as perfect as I imagined.
God, this hurts.
* * *
Meg and I have shared a room at college for three years now. By rights, by her final year, she should have a cool apartment somewhere off campus, with her own room and a double bed and a kitchen and all that. With all her lifeguard shifts at the pool, she can definitely afford it.
ButIcan’t pay that rent, and my scholarship only covers a shared room in the shitty campus dorms. I’ve told her a million times to go ahead and find something better, but Meg refuses to leave me. Refuses to find another roommate.
She’s loyal. The best friend I’ve ever had.
But the point is: we’re used to creeping around each other in the dead of night.
So many times, she’s stumbled into our bedroom way after midnight, her spiky hair sticking up in the darkness. Meg has blundered into her desk so often while drunk, I baby-proofed the corners in second year as a joke.
It never bothered me.Imay be a bookish little homebody, but Meg’s a wild child. She’s always heading out to one party or another, covered in neon paint or glitter or a cowboy hat, and I love that about her.
So long as she doesn’t drag me with her, it’s all good.
