Total pages in book: 140
Estimated words: 137433 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 687(@200wpm)___ 550(@250wpm)___ 458(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 137433 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 687(@200wpm)___ 550(@250wpm)___ 458(@300wpm)
He swallows audibly and I wonder if the universe forgot we are young and stupid and decided to descend every wrathful punishment God has in store on us.
“I used to lay awake with you in my arms for weeks and months and years, praying that you would break a leg. Tear a ligament. Get injured so you have to stay back here.” Lev chokes on the admission, talking into my hair. “I’m so fucking awful, but I still hoped that. Hoped something would stop you. Because that someone can’t be me. I can’t do that to you.”
A storm brews inside my body. He keeps talking, growing stiff in his briefs between my ass cheeks, which are clad in a pair of boy shorts.
And I can admit it to myself now. How we haven’t been platonic friends for a long time.
Sex has hovered over our relationship for the last few years.
We’ve been skimming the line of dry humping wordlessly every night. Accidentally brushing each other’s abs, and nipples, and everything.
He came close to the edge a few times. So did I. And we never spoke about it.
We’ve been playing with matches for months. Now? We’re drenched in gasoline. Soaked to the bone.
It’s time to set this lie between us on fire.
We lie there for a long time, until I’m sure he’s asleep. For one thing, he stops talking.
Pouring all his secrets, about all the times he not-so-accidentally got off while we were in bed together.
How he scared off all my potential suitors at school, how he once beat a guy from Las Juntas to a pulp for following me home when I didn’t pay attention.
His breaths even out. I mull his words in my head all night.
Bailev.
Best friends.
Thick as thieves.
Always have each other’s backs.
And it’s all bullshit. We’re not friends. We’re two people obsessed with each other, trying to hold one another back.
He doesn’t want me to become a ballerina, and I don’t want him to ever find true love.
If we stick together, we’ll end up resenting each other, then hating each other…
I know what I need to do and how I’m going to do it.
The sun slinks up from between fluffy, marshmallow clouds. The sky is painted pink and blue, and the moon is as thin as a fingernail dent.
I gather my courage like the hem of a ballroom dress, turn around from the wall, and make a move to kiss Lev. To ruin everything.
I’m startled when I see he is already up, wide-awake and staring at me.
By the red spiderwebs on his eyeballs, I can tell he didn’t sleep at all.
“Stay.” His throat bobs with a swallow when he says, “Please, Dove. Just…just stay here. One more year. Then we can go together to New York when I graduate. Please don’t leave me.”
“Lev,” I say. “You don’t… You wanna go to Colorado for school.”
But what I really want to say is how dare you?
What I really want to say is I’d never ask you something like that. How can you do this to me? You know how serious I take my promise to Rosie to always take care of you.
“Yeah. I know. You’re right.” He licks his lips. “Look, I got you something.”
He turns around and rummages in his jeans on the floor. I hear rustling, my eyes focused on his corded, muscular back.
In a few moments, I am going to ruin us—if he hasn’t already. Lev turns back to me, plants something in my fist, then brings the fist to his mouth and kisses it. “Whenever you’re ready, Dove.”
I uncoil my fingers to find…a bracelet? No, two of them. With little wooden dove pendants. They’re identical, with a simple black leather string.
“Carved it myself at the party. That’s why it took me so long,” he admits, blush creeping onto his cheeks. I thought he was hooking up with girls…when this is what he did? I’m speechless. “That way you’ll never forget about us in New York when you become a superstar.” He winks.
The smile on my face feels hollow. I gently rest the bracelets on the pillow between us.
“Where did you get the wood?”
“Is now a good time to make a boner joke?”
“No.”
“In that case, let’s just say Finn’s house has a credenza in need of replacing.”
“Well, thank you,” I say primly. “It’s beautiful.”
“That’s it?” He quirks an eyebrow. He’s used to my constant cooing and praising.
“No, that’s not everything.” We are so close, I can feel every inch of him, and I want to laugh that I told myself we were ever just friends.
“What else?”
I swallow hard. “Kiss me.”
Lev’s mouth falls open. “Kiss you?”
Nodding, I trail the tip of my fingernail along his neck. My fingers are trembling.
I’m ruining us together, to save us individually. To give us a chance to blossom apart, not just together. “Isn’t that what you’ve always wanted?”