AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I, uh…” I clear my throat, awkwardly peeling the palette from his skin. “I was expecting that stunt to go in a different direction.”
I can’t meet his gaze, which I feel searching my face.
“I know,” he says softly. “But I’m not retracting the question. I want to spend time with Damien, and I want him to know how much I care about you.”
My stomach, already near my knees, bottoms out around my ankles. Panic scraps like sandpaper against the back of my neck. In my armpits. Inside my throat.
Turning, I find our designated mess bag and put the palette inside, then grab a rag for my hands. Not that it does much. Thoughts ping inside the vacuum of my head.
I’ll need acetone to get the paint off my hands. Do I have any nail polish remover at home? It’s probably expired. Does acetone expire? When was the last time I even painted my nails?
“Celeste.”
“I need a minute,” I say in a harsh whisper. The trees off the side of the road blur, then snap back into focus.
“That’s just the thing,” he says, his voice coming closer. “With everything going on with my mom, your parents, the camp… I realized that I’ve been so terrified of you rejecting me, I’ve lost sight of the fact that a minute isn’t guaranteed.”
“Lucas,” I say piteously. “Stop.”
He doesn’t.
“I love you, Celeste, and I already love Damien. I know I can never replace Jeremy. I don’t think either of us wants me to try. But I can be yours—and Damien’s. I want to be yours.” His voice is now right behind me. “Do you want me to be?”
YES!
Maybe?
I don’t know.
Because my brain hates me, it chooses that moment to show me a visual of Jeremy when he proposed. His dark eyes bright with hope, his hand shaking on the little ring box.
His face forever young.
“It’s not that simple,” I say, spinning to face Lucas, forcing myself to stare into his eyes. “What happened to taking things one day at a time? We’ve been having sex for a week. Now you want to jump into a full-blown relationship?”
His jaw tenses and releases. “We’ve basically been in a relationship for twenty-five years.”
My laugh is maniacal. “Come on! We were kids, and we were best friends. That’s it. We’ve been strangers for the last twelve years.”
“Not buying it. We know each other better than anyone. We always have and always will.”
I throw my hands up. “For fuck’s sake, Lucas! Why now? We had a rocky reunion, but things have been getting better, right? We’re working together. We’re friends again, with benefits we both enjoy. Aren’t things complicated enough? The last thing I need right now is more chaos.”
Hurt flares in his eyes. “That’s what you think we are? Chaos?”
“You’re my Peapod. The place I feel safe.”
The memory—and all the others like it—vibrates between us. To my everlasting horror, my eyes begin to sting.
“I care about you, Lucas. Of course I do. But my priorities are Damien and getting this camp up and running, not starting a new relationship. If what we have going isn’t enough for you, then let’s stop this. I don’t want this drama. I don’t need it on top of everything else.”
The words, I quit, are on the tip of my tongue, but I can’t make them pass my lips. I need Camp Wild Lake. I need it in a way I don’t truly understand, with a soul-scorching conviction I’ve never felt before. And somewhere deep inside me, past all the layers of hurt and memories and grief and longing, is another facet of the truth.
I need Lucas, too.
But I’m not brave enough to admit it. And right now, I’m too overwhelmed to acknowledge how scared I am that he will, in fact, want to stop.
Lucas scrubs fingers through his hair, sending the strands into orbit. His eyes are frantic in a way I recognize—the same helplessness and panic that I saw so often when we were kids. That he only showed me in my backyard at night.
