The Way Back to You (20 page)

Kyle smiles playfully. “Bet you didn’t know that move’s been around for three million years.”

I move into the small cell, my arms crossed. “Just so we’re clear, Wally, I am
not
going to any future school dances with you.”

“Sorry, dude,” Kyle says to him, frowning. “I thought she’d be into the bad boy thing.”

This pulls me up short. “What?”

“Sure. I can see it.” He scoots over, leaving a space for me between him and Wally, and waves his phone at me; it’s our newly invented sign for requesting a photo together, more evidence that this friendship is getting solid. Friends use secret signs.

After we squish together and Kyle takes the picture, I say, “I must put off twisted signals. Boys don’t really get me.”

“We don’t?”

I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. “The boys that I do like think I only want to be friends, and the boys who I only like as friends think I want more than that.”

Kyle fiddles with the strings on his hoodie. He loops one
tightly around his finger. “So what does it mean when boys think you can’t stand them?”

“Depends.” I smile. “If you mean Jacob Tamsin, I’d say my signals are working perfectly.”

He lets the string fall loose. “And if I mean me? For the past year?”

One time at practice, Violet Porter accidentally elbowed me in the diaphragm after I lost my footing doing a Scorpion. That’s what this feels like. When Kyle brought this up our first hour into the trip, I wriggled out of it like I always do. I can’t do that again.

“I never hated you,” I tell him, leaning back against the wall and staring through the cell bars. “You know that, right?”

“I do now,” he says, his voice deep and quiet.

“I was just—”

What?

I was just trying to keep a secret. That I was just a little in love with you when I wasn’t supposed to be. When any good thought I had about you was also a betrayal. So I hated myself and punished you for it, too. But I’m better now, you see? I wished on a paper lantern.

I don’t say that.

I do say, “I’m just . . .”

Kyle’s glance is razor sharp, curious. “You’re just a vampire? And the smell of my blood consumes you with bloodlust, but you made a vow to your coven that you wouldn’t drink from humans anymore?”

My groan is guttural and pathetic.

He keeps going. “You’re just a time traveler sent from the future to assassinate me, but I was such a good lab partner, you haven’t been able to make yourself do it?”

I jiggle my legs up and down before looking at him. “I humiliated myself at WinterFest, and then I made it worse by being a dick when you came over. It was stupid, but avoiding you was simpler.”

“No, I get it.” He moves back so our shoulders touch. “It sucked, though. I missed talking to you.”

“Come on,” I laugh, but his face is serious.

“I know our conversations weren’t, like, deeply philosophical or anything. But they were fun. I liked being with you.”

Everything about the way he says it and the kindness in his eyes makes me believe it.

Then he swivels, knocking his knees into mine. “And I am happy we came here, by the way,” he says. “I was worried it would be too different, or that
I’d
be too different. But it’s like nothing’s changed. In a good way, I mean.”

“Except,” I tell him, channeling Hannah from earlier today, “you’ve gotten so tall. And buff. And
cute
.”

His eyes spark. I’m paying for that.

I sense the movement a half second before he lunges, and I slide away, but I’m too late. My elbow bumps into Wally so hard his decrepit head rolls off his body and into my lap. I yelp and punch it to the ground.

Kyle’s laughter tickles my ear, and he’s shaking from it—I only know that because his fingers are curled into the sides of my coat. His laugh fills up the tiny cell like warm water, the
opposite of the frigid, paralyzing stream at Slide Rock. His laugh is something I want to spend time in.

He’s so close, I can see the spaces between his eyelashes. We’re passing the same breath back and forth between us, and I’m smiling so big, my lips might crack apart. And then, somehow, impossibly, his lips are there against mine, and every other part of me might crack apart instead.

Our mouths press together gently; we’re almost not kissing at all. But we are, and I can tell we are because this isn’t our first. Our first was a mistake—my biggest mistake, muddled with alcohol and resentment. Even in the moment, it wasn’t like
this
. Pure and certain and what real first kisses should be like.

Kyle pulls back slightly, and my stomach roils as I wait for him to politely shrug me off. Instead he watches me, his eyes dark, his hands still making fists in my coat. My wish lantern is floating somewhere above us now, and didn’t I pack my feelings with it, sending them far from here? Some must have jumped overboard before the universe got to them. Or maybe the truth is I was kidding myself. You can’t wish away what you want to keep. I reach up and put my fingertips to Kyle’s brow like I’ve always wanted to, smoothing out the questions.

Our next kiss is not gentle. My lips part as he angles his mouth over mine. I hook my arms around him because it’s all I can think to do:
bring him nearer.
My brain sizzles with the need to have more of him against more of me. Without breaking the kiss, Kyle pulls me up so his chest is against mine, and I crawl into his lap, facing him.

My coat makes swishy noises as Kyle runs his palms flat
down my back. When I tilt away to shrug the thing off, he moves with me and I grin against his mouth. With my hands free, we both pull at his hoodie. He helps me lift it up, but I’m too impatient; without waiting for it to clear his nose, I go straight for his lips. His arms are wrapped in the sleeves, and he’s grinning as I help him break loose.

“Sorry,” I say. My voice is thick and very not-sorry, especially when his fingertips dip under the hem of my shirt.

He smiles a swollen-lipped, dopey smile. My heart lurches, expands, makes even more room in it for Kyle Ocie.

I arch back as he presses his mouth to my neck, making our hips meet. His fingers flex on my waist, and we’re kissing and breathing and moving together, holding each other tighter. The ends of my hair could singe from how strong his hands are, or the chocolate-minty taste on his tongue, or what his skin feels like through thin cotton.

I want Kyle to know. I want to rewind to earlier—how long has it been?—when I should have been honest about how I’ve always felt about him, because I can’t lie to him anymore. For the first time, I can tell him.

For the first time, it might mean something to him, too.

O
f everything that’s happened during the past week, Cloudy Marlowe and me making out in the dark next to a decapitated mannequin is, by far, the most unexpected.

I mean,
I
did this. I kissed her first. But I couldn’t have predicted that she’d kiss me back so intently, she’d sit straddling me on this bench, or that, just like that, I’d become addicted to inhaling her coconut scent and feeling her body pressing against mine.

My hands are on her hips, holding her steady, pulling her closer, always closer. I have no idea how many minutes have passed since we started this (five? ten?), but our lips haven’t taken a break for more than a second.

I’ve constantly been sneaking glances at her. I want to see her. I need to. And I’m hoping, just once, she’ll open her eyes again and see me, too.

The Bedrock City Jail has holes cut out for windows and doors, so some of the talking and laughter outside is coming through, but as Cloudy rakes her fingers through my hair, the sudden
CRUNCH! CRUNCH! CRUNCH!
of shoes on gravel directly outside startles us both. We detach our mouths and sit
frozen in place, listening. I keep my eyes on the doorway, but when no one comes inside after several seconds, I exhale and refocus on Cloudy.

She’s finally looking at me, and I don’t have to guess whether she’s as glad as I am about what’s happening here with us: her dreamy expression says it all.

As our lips touch this time, I don’t close my eyes and neither does she. She cups her palms around my face while I slide my hands underneath her shirt and all the way up her back. We’re looking into each other’s eyes and touching each other’s skin and kissing and shivering, and it’s so intense that a tiny part of me is relieved when crunching gravel interrupts again.

Unfortunately, it’s then followed by Devynne’s voice getting closer. “Well, it’s
ridiculous
, is what it is. We’re all here to celebrate
her
birthday, and of course, she has to go and— Oh!”

One phone flashlight shines directly at my eyes, and is joined by two more. It’s so bright I can’t see the faces of the people holding them. Instead, it’s three gleaming white circles cutting into blackness over three headless torsos.

As I’m blinking and squinting, Cloudy covers her eyes and hops off my lap, landing awkwardly on the bench between me and the other headless body in this jail. “That’s kind of blinding,” she says.

Devynne again. “Sorry!”

The lights jump to new spots in the jail cell: one shines on the fake bones and net hanging above us, another lights up Wally’s body, and the last illuminates Wally’s head lying beside the heap, which happens to be Cloudy’s coat and my sweatshirt.
My vision adjusts in time for Devynne and Sergio to exchange amused glances. Charlie is taking in the whole scene with his mouth hanging open.

Devynne steps back. “Um, maybe we should—”

“Yes,” Sergio says. “We definitely should.”

The three of them scramble to the doorway, leaving Cloudy and me sitting in darkness once again.

“It would be better,” I whisper, putting my arm around her, “if buildings from the Stone Age had doors.”

Cloudy giggles. “Those won’t be invented for at least a million years.”

Outside, Charlie announces, “That
was
utterly
macabre.”

Sergio and Devynne burst out laughing.

“Hey!” From a distance, Will’s voice cuts in. “Have you guys seen Kyle or Cloudy?”

“Both,” Sergio yells back.

Devynne chimes in. “They’re kind of . . . busy in the jail right now.”

“You mean,
getting
busy in jail,” Charlie says. “And now we do know someone who’s made out with Kyle at Bedrock City. Next to a severed head!”

“Next to a
what
?” Will is much closer now.

Cloudy sighs, and then calls out, “Will, what’s up?”

He answers from somewhere near the doorway. “We’re getting ready to leave. In maybe ten minutes? I’ll be driving Hannah’s van back.”

“Thank God,” says Sergio. “For the leaving
and
the you-driving concepts.”

Soon their voices grow faint as they migrate elsewhere.

Leaning in close, I kiss Cloudy’s lips one more time. “To be continued?”

Nodding, she smiles back at me.

AFTER CLOUDY AND I have set Wally’s head onto his neck where it belongs and slipped our discarded clothing items back on, we step out of the jail together, holding hands. I don’t care what Hannah has to say about it; I’m riding back to Sedona in whichever vehicle Cloudy and I can be in together.

I’m about to tell that to Cloudy as we’re making our way past a Stone Age police trike, but the ground shifts, pitching me forward. I catch myself, somehow managing not to fall.

She grips my hand tighter. “Are you okay?”

“Was that an earthquake?”

“If it was, I missed it.”

I can’t keep upright, so I sit on the gravel, bring my knees up, and hold on to my legs with my eyes closed.

“Did you get up too fast and make yourself dizzy?” Cloudy asks.

She doesn’t feel it. How can she
not
feel that we’re dice in a Yahtzee cup? That everything is too hot and too bright and too swirly?

“Kyle?”

I hesitate until the world rights itself. “I’m fine now. Sorry.”

“It’s all right. You kind of freaked me out.” She takes both of my hands to help me up, but I can’t do it yet. I let myself fall backward and she falls with me.
On
me. We both laugh and
it’s loud in my ears. I wrap my arms around her and shift our bodies until I’m flat on my back with her lying on top of me. Better. This is better.

Strands of her hair hang over my face, and I peek through them at the sky. Overhead, it’s a black sheet with thousands of pinpricks of white light bleeding through. Her hair is making fine lines in front of it.

“So,” Cloudy says softly by my ear, “what exactly are we doing on the ground?”

I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m doing. All I can think at this moment is:
I need you so much closer
.

It’s the truth. I don’t know why it became the truth, but it is now. I hold on tighter. “I don’t want to go back.”

She lifts herself up and kisses my cheek. “Now
you
want to stay forever?”

What I meant is, I don’t want us to go back to how we used to be. I don’t correct her, though.

As she settles down again and rests her face against my neck, the sky—it winks at me. It goes entirely black, then flashes bright white.
Too
bright. The stars become . . . superstars. Bigger than the sun. All of them. All at once. Then they contract so they’re sparkling flecks, as small as dust.

They turn big again.

Then medium-sized.

Huge.

Tiny.

Then all the sizes, all at once.

“The stars are weird tonight,” I say.

“How so?”

“I don’t know. They’re . . . shiny.”

She laughs. “Okayyyy.”

“Sorry if I’m not making sense. I’m a little”—I don’t know. There’s a word for it. For what I am right now. I’m pretty sure there is. I can’t remember it, though. I’m trying. The word. The word is—I’m . . .—“tired,” I finish.

“We’ve had a busy week.”

I’ve felt like this before. Silly like this. I was twelve and my dad took me to Las Vegas for the weekend—

“When you were
twelve
?” Cloudy asks.

I hadn’t realized I was speaking aloud. “We did kid stuff. Riding roller coasters. Buying candy and T-shirts at the M&M store. A magic show. Have you ever been to Vegas?”

“No.”

“Well, on the Vegas Strip, everything seems so close. But once you start walking, you realize it isn’t. It’s like a—like that thing in the desert when people think they see water, but it isn’t water?”

“A mirage?”

“Yes. A mirage.” I pause. It’s so hard to remember words. “Except it’s like, you keep heading toward a place and it stays the same distance away no matter how many steps you take. So my dad and I were walking back to our hotel late. I don’t know why he didn’t get a cab, but he didn’t and I was exhausted. There was this picture I saw later. My dad had taken a picture of me in front of a statue. This winged horse. So I’m in the picture. I’m standing there. But I could swear I’ve never seen this
Pegasus statue in my life. I don’t remember posing. And it was like. It was
crazy
.”

I wait for Cloudy to say something. I wait a long time. Finally, she does. “Is there more?”

“More what?”

“You were saying the Vegas Strip is like a mirage.”

“Yes.”

“And then . . . did something specific happen?”

I blink a few times. I already told her. I told her the whole story. “The winged horse picture!”

“The what?”

Did I not say that part aloud? Did I not say
anything
? What the hell is wrong with me? “I’ll show you when we get there. You’re going to like it.”

“Okay.”

She strokes my cheek. This is so confusing. Why did I tell her she’ll like a statue that I don’t know how to find? I should stop talking. And thinking. Just stop.

S-T-O-P spells
stop
.

Stop. Spot. Tops. Opts. Pots. Post.

Four letters. Six words.

S-T-O-P.

S-P-O-T.

T-O-P-S.

O-P-T-S.

P-O-T-S.

P-O-S-T.

S-P-O-T.

S-T-O-P.

It’s
Sesame Street
in my brain. I’m Elmo. Or Melmo. That’s how I said the puppet’s name as a kid. My parents thought it was hilarious.

Melmo!

I stifle a laugh and keep watching the sky. Every single one of those stars is about to fall. Fall onto my fingers running through Cloudy’s hair. Fall onto my face. It’s going to happen and all I can do is watch and wait for it.

Wait for it.

Wait
.

What am I waiting for?

I’m waiting for . . . something.

My thoughts are slipping, slipping, slipping, slipping thoughts. Thipping sloughts.

Thipping sloughts?

Cloudy whispers, “It’s always been you.”

It has?

What has?

Is this her answer to my question? Did I ask a question?

She’s still saying words, but I catch only the last four: “And I love you.”

That isn’t what I asked. I would never even think to ask her something like that.

“Cloudy—”

“You don’t have to say anything.” She props herself up so her chest, her warmth, is no longer pressed against me. I miss it. I miss her. “I thought you should know the truth.”

“That you . . . love me?”

She nods.

Her face. Is mesmerizing. Her mouth is so. Pretty. And her nose. Her cheekbones. They’re so—

Today she held my hand. I kissed her. I wanted to kiss her, so I kissed her. We kissed each other. We kissed a whole bunch of times.

And now. We love each other?

Maybe.

It makes sense.

I think it does.

Her lips are so perfect. And her eyes. They’re so . . . big. I place my hands on either side of her face. It’s the regular size, I think. I mean, it feels normal in my hands. But it looks—it looks like— “How are you doing that?”

She smiles down at me. With her huge mouth. So.
Huge
. “Doing what?”

“Your face. Your whole face. It’s so— It’s like— Expanding. How? How can you make it that big?”

“What?”

Her screeching voice makes me laugh. And laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh—

“For real, Kyle.” She climbs off me and plops onto the rocks. “Are you drunk?”

—and laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh—

“Kyle!”

“Sprite!” I explain, forcing my laugh to be small. To be tiny.
Tiny giggles piled on top of tinier giggles. Like soda bubbles. I try to sit up like she is. I fall back again. “I only drank Sprite. I ate a burrito. Remember? And a cookie. No. My cookie. Your cookie.
Two
cookies.” My tiny giggles turn into big ones. They clog my throat. I can hardly breathe. “I’m not Melmo. I’m Cookie Monster.”

“Oh. My. God,” Cloudy says. “It’s the
cookies
.”