In This Moment (31 page)

    “Burglars r
inging the doorbell?”

    “You never know
…”

    Dad ignores her and strides
to the foyer with me on his heels. The doorbell sounds again.

    “Coming!” He bellows, flipping the lock
with his left hand.

    “Shhhh!” Mara is pushing herself into my back.

    “Shhh,
what
? I don’t understand why we’re all so jumpy.” I glance over my shoulder and see Mara and Mom both creeping up behind me, back-to-back, shoulders curved forward like quotation marks.

    “Oh.” Mom’s changing expression is my first warning. Mara’s gasp is my second.

    Nerves escalating, pit in my stomach gaping open, chills prickling over my skin, I swivel my neck around and look.

    One. Two.
Three. Breathe.

    It’s Cole.

    I can’t quite believe it, but of course it’s Cole.

    He really is s
tanding here—just this side of my front door with his blond hair looking blonder and his green eyes looking greener and his muscly body looking more muscular than ever.

    I’m hyperaware of every single breath, every flutter of air
that passes in the space between us. Cole moves his mouth slightly and I feel an answering tingle nip below my navel.

    My mom is the first to break the magic
al spell and speak. “Cole, how nice to see you.” She comes forward, tugging on my hand as she passes by.

   Her words seem to spur the rest of the Spencer clan into motion. Dad starts in about his new kayak (what is with him and the kayak?), Mara blathers something about midterms. Mom nods appropriately and does a lot of smoothing of her clothes.

   
This is surreal. I’m almost afraid to blink my eyes, but I do, and my faith is rewarded by the fact that he doesn’t just… evaporate. He’s still standing here in my house, with his weight on one leg, hands tucked deep into his pockets, talking to my family like a normal human, all while keeping his eyes on me.

    A
n awful thought hits me and my hand snaps to the rat’s nest that is my unwashed hair and my eyes dart down to the old camp shirt that I found and slipped over my head after I got home from the pool.

   
Nice.

   
“Um.”

    Everyone
turns and looks at me expectantly. I try again. “D-do you guys, um, mind if Cole and I go outside for a second?”

Cole

The longer we just stand here staring on her front porch with a frail wind kicking up around our feet and the stars flickering above, the more the pressure builds.

    “
How’d you…” Her voice trickles away.

   
“Daniel. He gave me your address.” I can tell that she’s about to ask another question but I don’t give her the chance. I drove down here because I have something to say and I’m going to say it. “I want to ask you a question, but first, can I just talk for a minute?”

    Aimee nods
her head like she’s on autopilot. She’s got her eyebrows pulled together and her mouth pursed into a pucker and I can see that her whole body is practically shaking. I’m not sure if that’s a good sign or a bad sign.

   
I draw in a breath and let it out. “I called my mother earlier.”

    “Oh.
” She pulls her arms around her body. “What happened?”

    “
I don’t know,” I tell her honestly. “We’re not alright but… we’ll see. It was actually her that told me to come here to see you. She pointed out that girls are big into the romantic gesture thing. I told her that you weren’t like most girls, which is true. But then I started to think that maybe she had a point.” I remember our first official date. Aimee said that she liked flowers and I realize that I probably should have brought her flowers or chocolates or bacon covered donuts or something. Ah, fuck it. All I’ve got is me and I’m going to keep talking even if it kills me. “But before I get into the whole romantic gesture, I need to tell you that you were being an idiot when you ended things.”

   
She makes a sound and her eyes change.

    “Don’t look like that. It’s the truth. Pulling away
from me was a bad call. I don’t need space to figure things out or get my shit together. I don’t need time or a shrink or a priest. I need you. I need you like I need air. And don’t think that I’m a codependent bastard who wants to smother you because it’s not like that. It’s not. The truth is that we make each other better.
You
make me better. Aimee, you make me
want
to be a better man.”

   
She looks down, pulls on the bottom of her t-shirt. “Cole, I—”

    “I’m not done yet.” I
blurt, pushing my hand back into my hair. “I actually stole that line from a movie but you didn’t know that, did you?”

    She shakes her head and bites her
bottom lip. Fuck. That lip.

    “See? I know you
, Aimee Spencer. I know you inside and out, and you know me. Shit. You’re crammed so far under my skin that it’s like my feelings can’t even take one step without tripping over a part of you.” I shuffle toward her.
As long as I’m still breathing, I’m trying.
“I want to be with you. And that might be selfish of me, but I never claimed to be selfless or a good guy. Maybe the circumstances aren’t perfect and maybe we don’t make sense all of the time, but as long as my heart is going and I’m still breathing, I’m going to try for you. I’ve got to fucking try because that first day… Aimee, you weren’t the only one that fell.” I take a long breath, attempting to control the maelstrom of words moving through me. I focus my gaze on her—on that one freckle on her cheek. “Now I have to ask you a question.”

    Her voice is soft and uneven. “Okay.”

   This is it.

    One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Breathe.

    No thoughts.

    No
worries.

   
“After all of it… the good, the bad, the in-between… If I told you that I love you, what would you say?”

Aimee

Love is a choice.

   
Cole is standing statue-still looking at me hard. His question reverberates in my ears.
If I told you that I love you…

    “I’d say
that loving me is a bad idea.” All we’ve got are moments so I don’t make him wait long, maybe just a second or two. “And then I’d tell you that I love you too, and I’d probably throw in a sonnet or something else equally as cheesy.”

    
His eyes shift and he gets this look on his face. God, I love that look. “Yeah?”

   
My shrug is matter-of-fact like I’m not on the verge of unraveling into a boneless puddle. Cole Everly drove to my parent’s house and has placed his heart in his palm and passed it over to me. I’d say that it’s a feat of nature that I’m still able to keep myself upright. “This is hypothetical, right?”

   
Cole keeps his gaze locked on mine as he takes another step forward. Now he’s so close that I can see my reflection shine on the surface of his eyes and feel the warmth coming off of his body.

   
“Definitely hypothetical,” he says, reaching out to touch my hand. One by one, he lays his fingers against mine, telling me with his touch what he feels.

   
“Well, then…” I glance down at my bare arm. It’s covered in raised bumps and I’m pretty sure that my entire body is trembling like a Chihuahua. “Yes, I would. Probably Shakespeare. You know, like, ‘shall I compare thee to a summer’s day’ or something.”

   
“Shakespeare?” His voice is tinged with wonder. He lifts his other hand and cautiously brushes my hair away from my face.

   
“Shakespeare,” I confirm, swallowing hard.

   
We look at each other for a long time, barely touching, feeling the heartbeats move over us and through us. I think about those lines, the ones that tangle in the space between, winding, stringing us together. I think about the rhythm of Cole’s heart and the predictable whoosh of his hot breath moving over my skin. And I think about Jillian knocking against my ribcage to let me know that she approves.
Do you hear that sound?

   
“Come here,” he says as he slides his hand to the back of my neck and pulls me into his body.

    “Fina—” I don’t get to finish bec
ause Cole is kissing me, searing me, handing over the words with his tongue. I fall into him—well, I guess I fall. I’m certainly not holding myself up anymore. I register Cole’s arm wrapped tightly around my waist and his other hand coasting down the side of my body, pulling my left knee up.
Oh God. Oh God
. As he continues to greedily shape his lips to the contours of my mouth, I tip backward until my shoulder blades are pressing into the cool wood of the front door.

    “Holy shit.” I don’t even know which one of us mutters it. 

    Breathing hard and fast, he breaks away from my mouth and presses his face against my hair. “Your parents are right behind that door and if I don’t stop now, I’m not going to stop.”

   
His thumb drifts up the edge of my t-shirt to trace the line of my spine. I inhale the scent of him and it’s like remembering the lyrics to a song that you forgot you knew. 

   
“Mmmm,” he sighs huskily, mirroring my thoughts. “Chlorine. I love the smell of chlorine.”

Cole

I ended up eating Thanksgiving dinner with Aimee’s family. When her mother realized that I didn’t have plans, she insisted that I stay over.
In the guest room,
her dad was quick to point out.

   
And I’m not going to lie. Thanksgiving was a little awkward. Daniel stopped by to thank Aimee for going to talk to his mother. Then he stayed for pie. It was weird. But it was weird and wonderful and all ours.

   
“You know,” I say, glancing over at her. We’re in my truck driving back to her place. “If you keep looking at me like that, you’re going to ruin me.”

    Staying out of her bedroom last night was a testament to my willpower. Every inch of my body was burning. I think I may have actually left a pile of ashes back in the guest room bed.

    “What do you mean?”   

   
“That,” I point with one finger. “Right there. That lip bite. I think you’re aware that it drives me wild and you’re using it against me. We’re not even going to make it to your bed.”

    Aimee blinks innocently. “
What…
this
?” She sucks on her bottom lip. “Does it bother you?”

     I growl. I actually growl.

    Right before we sat down for Thanksgiving dinner, I pulled Aimee into the hall and whispered into her ear all the things that I planned to do to her when I had the chance. I think that I may have even licked her neck. I can’t be sure since things tend to go a little blurry when I’m that close to her.

    The good news is that she didn’t hesitate to announce
to her family that we were heading back to school early to… “um, study.” I swear that her dad looked a little nauseous and I don’t really blame him. The things I plan to do to her tonight…

    “I’m not kidding,” I say
to her.

    And I’m not.

Aimee

Cole’s right. We
don’t even make it to the bed.

    He’s on me before I can kic
k the front door shut. His fingers are at my waist, fighting with my zipper, eagerly peeling my panties down my legs.

    I think I make a sound as we h
it the ground, but I’m distracted by the weight of his body pressing into mine in all the right places. I grab the back of his shirt and pull, digging my fingers into the flesh of his lower back.

    “I need…” I whimper. God, I sound insane
, like I’m being pulled apart at the seams.

    Cole kisses me, captures m
y breaths with his mouth tells me that he needs me too.
Like air,
he reminds me.

    Later
, when we’ve managed to remove all our clothes and make it to my bed, I ask him a question that’s been niggling at my brain. “So what was the movie?”

   
I’m on my stomach and he’s next to me, propped with two pillows behind his back. He’s holding my right hand in front of his body, drawing lazy circles in the valley between each finger. “What?

    “
The one that you quoted to me earlier.”