Summer Solstice (4 page)

Slowly, he opened his eyes and looked at me. "Lexi," he said finally, taking my face in his warm, but rough hands. "I tried to talk myself out of this, but I couldn't. I had to see you." His lips landed upon my forehead and lingered there, before he bent over to whisper, "I can't keep pretending."

I pulled away a bit, his whisper sending a chill down my spine. Pulling his hands from my face, I held them in my own. "What in God's name are you talking about?" I asked. I knew I needed an explanation. How he could run so cold for so long and then, in a few brief encounters, manage to make me so hot that I forgot everything else?

Seth took a deep breath and looked me in the eyes. "Do you know how hard it's been for me to treat you like you're my sister when inside I've been having some very non-sisterly thoughts about you?" Shock coursed through my veins. All these years I'd been lusting after him, not knowing he'd been doing the same thing?

"You're lying," I said. It was impossible. There was no way in hell that was true. I would have caught on somehow. Guys weren't that good at hiding their emotions. "I'm suddenly just some passing fancy. You're lonely, so you're making these things up."

I began to pull away, but Seth reached out and pulled me towards him so that I left the comfort of my blankets entirely and somehow straddling his lap. Once again, his hands found their way to my face as he held my face close to his.

"I'm not lying," he said simply. "I was lying to myself for years that those feelings existed, but I'm not lying now." As his thumbs brushed against my cheeks softly, I stared into the green depths of his eyes. "And anyway," he continued, his lips getting closer to mine, "how can I be lonely when I'm here with you?"

This time, when he kissed me, I was expecting it. The sensation made me warm and my stomach knot up in anticipation. Throwing all caution to the wind, I kissed him back with everything in me. I could feel my lips bruising, but I honestly didn't care. When his tongue pressed boldly against my teeth, I opened my mouth and accepted his kiss further.

Seth moved so that he was lying on my mattress with me pretty much draped and straddled over him. My hands snaked their way up into his hair, bringing his face closer to mine if it were possible, while his traced their way from my back to my sides to my bare thighs.

The skin on skin contact made us break apart like it had earlier that night. "Shit," he whispered, moving his hands along my skin slowly. "Is this what you wear to bed every night?"

I grinned at him coyly. "What?" I asked, looking down at a tank top similar to the one he'd seen me in only days before and a pair of underwear that I'd decided to wear to bed. "It's hot in here," I explained. "Shorts or pants would only get me tangled in the sheets and make me even hotter."

Seth's fingers encircled my wrists and then he flipped us over so that he was lying on top of me. "Lexi," he whispered again, before dipping his head and kissing me once more.

The girl who kissed him back was entirely unlike me. Before, any contact with boys like this made me nervous and awkward, but with Seth, it just seemed to fit and make sense. I didn't feel nervous or awkward. I only felt electrified where we touched and a sense of rightness to the whole situation. This was what I'd craved for all those years. This was what I'd been missing.

Feeling bold, I wrapped my legs around his body and pulled him closer to me as his hands landed everywhere on my body. Our kisses grew more feverish and when my hands found the bare skin of his back, he finally pulled away slightly. His roaming hands stilled as he let his forehead rest against mine.

"We're only making out," he whispered, dropping a kiss on my cheek. "Only making out." When I moaned in protest, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "I am not rushing this," he said simply. "I'm not rushing you though God knows I want to."

Pressing his body into mine once more, I could feel how much he wanted me, but then he pull away entirely, suddenly leaving me cold at the loss of contact. But I shouldn't have worried. Wrapping me up in his arms protectively, Seth settled in behind me, spooning his body into mine. "You have to work tomorrow morning. Go to sleep," he whispered, dropping a kiss onto my bare shoulder.

And so I did.

four.

When my alarm went off the next morning, the last thing that I wanted to do was obey it. I hit the snooze about five times before rolling over. I was just about to go to sleep when my phone buzzed loudly, signaling a text message.

Groaning, I sat up and picked up my phone, hitting all the right buttons to get into my inbox.

'HAD A GREAT TIME LAST NITE. WILL STOP BY FOR LUNCH TODAY. –S'

I smiled at Seth's message and finally got out of bed, my mind reeling from the previous night's activities.

I wasn't sure when Seth had left, as I had practically fallen into a coma when he'd told me to go to sleep, but thinking about those kisses made my face grow warm.

For years I had craved that kind of attention from him and now here he was, returning my affections. I wanted to call Sarah and tell her what was going on, but I didn't want to be premature. Maybe it was best to just stay quiet and see where things would lead to next.

Starting with lunch that very day.

For the past two summers, I'd been working for a summer program as the Arts and Crafts supervisor. It was an easy job where I was pretty much paid to sit in the sun and do tie-dye five days a week. Not only did I get a paycheck, I got an awesome tan. The kids were, for the most part, well behaved and fun to be around. It also helped that my bosses were super lax about policies like guests arriving for lunch.

At eleven fifty five, I saw Seth's car pull into the parking lot and fought extremely hard to keep a ridiculous grin off my face. The kids were on break, eating their own lunches. I sat in the middle of the pavilion at a picnic table, kids surrounding me. It was noisy, but tolerable, and now that Seth was here, that noise wouldn't matter anyway.

Seth, for the first time ever, was coming to eat lunch with me and I hadn't forced him into it. I watched him pull a bag out of the back seat and then walk across the parking lot towards the pavilion.

"Hey," he said, giving me a grin as he sat down on the bench next to me.

"Hi," I said shyly, returning his grin. "You showed up."

"I told you that I would," Seth told me simply. "I tend to keep my promises to you."

My cheeks heated up as I thought about the promise he'd made to me in my bed last night. We were only going to make out and even if I thought at the time that I could handle more, I knew deep down inside that he'd been right. That had been enough. Much more would have been a disaster.

"So what'd you bring me for lunch?" I asked Seth, grabbing the bag from him.

"Hey!" he exclaimed, snatching the bag back from me. "Who says I brought you anything, Miss Grabby-Fingers?"

Up until this point, the kids had been relatively quiet, but watching this scene unfold around them, they all called out with a taunting, "OHHH." This only made me even more embarrassed, but even less willing to let it show.

"Seth," I whispered, leaning towards him. I put my hand on his knees and squeezed it gently. "I'm really hungry. No one feeds me at home."

Seth shook his head and laughed. "Yeah right." He took hold of the hand that he'd placed on my knee and squeezed it, before dropping it. That disappointed me, but at the moment, my stomach chose to revolt and growl loudly.

"I guess I could feed you," he mumbled as he set my lunch in front of me. "I can't stay and eat with you today. My mom and I have a lunch date, but I wanted to see you." His hand landed firmly on my lower back from behind and his fingers massaged the area there. "I can stop by to walk you home?"

I nodded quickly, almost like an eager child. "I'd like that."

"I'll be by around four."

With that, he stood up and walked back towards his car in the parking lot. I couldn't fight it any longer. The stupid grin I'd been holding in burst out across my face.

I was pulled out of my reverie by one of the kids. "Oooh! Lexi has a boyfriend!" The chatter only seemed to grow more and I felt myself getting embarrassed all over again and this time the instigators were children.

Shooting them what I hoped were glares, I opened my lunch bag. Seth had packed me the most fourth grade looking lunch ever. A juice box. Peanut butter and jelly cut into four squares. Apple slices. A pack of fruit snacks. A homemade brownie. My heart pretty much melted on the floor over the stupidest things this time being the lunch.

At the very bottom was a napkin with a message scrawled on it. I remembered how my mom used to do that whenever she'd pack a lunch. My napkin everyday had a note from her. When I'd been in elementary school, I'd been excited to read it every day. When I got to middle school, it made me embarrassed if the other kids would see them but deep down, I treasured those napkins.

Pulling the napkin out, I saw Seth's crisp script written in black Sharpee. The message was simple, but made my stomach churn so hard that I felt dizzy. How he'd gotten the lunch and the note by my brother, I didn't know, but it was something that I really didn't want to question either. Glancing over the words again, all the emotions from the past few days flooded me.

I really, honestly, simply cannot stop thinking about you.

At exactly four o'clock that afternoon, Seth arrived, as promised, to walk me home. The playground where I worked was about four blocks away from my house, so I usually walked, unless it was raining. Most of my kids were still loitering around the park, but I was off the hook.

Walking towards Seth, I met him halfway. Before I could even comprehend what he was doing, he pulled me into his arms and hugged me solidly. Stealthily, he laid a kiss just beneath my ear before letting me go.

"How was work?" he asked, grabbing my hand and lacing my fingers through his as we started the walk.

"Work," I shrugged, non-chalantly. "Same shit, different day."

We made small talk for the first block or so, when I couldn't hold it in any longer. "What if someone sees us holding hands?" I asked, worried. "What if someone sees us together and then tells Rich?"

I'd been thinking about what Seth and I had done and would probably do all afternoon. The one person who was never far from my mind was my brother. I had no doubt that my parents would be thrilled if Seth and I decided to make a go of it and give our relationship a chance. My brother on the other hand...

Seth stopped walking suddenly, but still held onto my hand. I turned to look at him, afraid and nervous about what he was going to say. He was quiet for a long moment, before he said, "Do you want me to let go of your hand?" I shook my head almost violently. Seth sighed. "I've been thinking about the situation with your brother a lot, Lex." He fell silent again as he tried to piece his thoughts together. "I'm not backing down," he said, finally, his voice strong. "I have wanted this
…
wanted you for so long. I'm not giving you up now that I may have you."

I couldn't help it, I practically flew forward and into his arms. Hugging him close to me, I felt his lips land softly on my forehead. "So what do we do?" I asked.

"We try this for awhile before we tell him. There's no use in getting him upset if nothing ends up happening."

The thought of nothing happening broke my heart, but I could see where he was coming from. If this was just some kind of lust, then that was something that Rich simply never needed to know about. The thought of it would probably make him sick.

So I agreed. Pulling away from him, we continued our walk again. I loved my brother, don't get me wrong, but I owed it to myself to see where this could go.

Around one that night, I heard the familiar scraping outside my bedroom window and smiled softly to myself. Two nights in a row I would be receiving a visit. Who knew?

After Seth had dropped me off at my house that afternoon, he'd given me a kiss on the cheek before he'd left. The rest of our conversation on the way home had been about work and lunch with his mother. Typical conversation, stunted by the tension flowing between us. I wanted nothing more than to kiss him senseless, and from the look in his eyes, I knew he felt the same way.