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17
CELINE
IftherewasanyoneI wanted to be stranded in the forest with, it was Lorenzo. A while ago, I would have said fuck everyone around us—I’d rather be stranded alone. Weird how things could change.
Lorenzo was a pillar of strength. When we’d started hanging out again, I’d been so irritated with him pushing into my space, pushing into mylifethe way he had. Not that I’d wanted him to stop—I was a complicated person that way, I guess.
Despite being complicated and difficult, and, quite frankly, a bitch from hell sometimes, Lorenzo put up with me, and now, I couldn’t imagine doing something like this with anyone else.
Camping had been a bad idea. I felt that now more than ever. Being stranded with nothing but the clothes on our back and two bottles of water wasnotmy idea of fun. Having Lorenzo with me stopped me from losing my mind.
“Tell me about your uncle and aunt,” I said when we’d walked for what felt like forever and finally stopped to rest.
Lorenzo, who’d been carrying the pack all this time, shrugged out of it, rolled his shoulders and tilted his neck both ways until it popped. I’d been checking my phone for signal at regular intervals, but there was nothing. Lorenzo didn’t seem worried about it, but that wasn’t right. This was serious.
“What about them?” he asked. He unzipped the pack and handed me a bottle of water.
When I sipped the water, I pulled a face. It tasted like mud.
“I’d rather not drink this,” I said, screwing the top back on.
“You have to stay hydrated,” Lorenzo said. “God knows how long we’ll be out here, and if you don’t drink water, things start going wrong.”
“More wrong than they already are?” I asked.
“You have no idea how bad it can get. Trust me, drink it.”
I pulled a face. “I prefer sparkling water.”
“I prefer not being lost in the forest, but here we are.”
I sighed and did as Lorenzo said. I forced myself to take a few more sips of the swill in my bottle.
Lorenzo watched me, a grin on his face.
“What?” I asked. “Is my misery amusing?”
Lorenzo laughed. “No, I’m just looking at you. You’re adorable.”
I pulled a face at him. “With all this mud on me, dressed in filthy clothes? I haven’t had a blowout indays.”
“Especially with mud on you and filthy clothes,” Lorenzo said with a wink. “All the stuff you keep doing like your hair and nails and designer clothes… it’s not what makes you beautiful.”
I frowned at him. “Is it my sunny personality?”
Lorenzo laughed out loud at that.
“I wish you could see yourself the way I see you.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. His words made me feel warm. What was it about Lorenzo that made me feel so… different? I had all these walls to keep people out, all these systems in place to make sure no one tried to change me, and Lorenzo somehow managed to get past it all and into my center. Now that he’d managed to break through, he didn’t want to change me and see what he could gain from me, either. He just wanted… me.
It was a strange sensation. Everything with him made me feel out of my depth. Lorenzo made me feel like I was way outside my comfort zone. I had no idea what to think when I was with him, and I was starting to question how I acted.
Despite feeling out of my comfort zone with Lorenzo, I also felt like I washome.
The combination was unnerving. I didn’t get emotionally involved with people. It was safer not to—they could hate me all they wanted and it wouldn’t matter. I was getting emotionally involved with Lorenzo. Hell, I was falling for him. It mattered to me what he thought of me. It mattered how he saw me.
Somehow, he still thought the best of me and saw me in a good light. I had no idea how that happened, but he didn’t judge me, and the feeling was foreign.
