“Yeah. Do you still play hockey?”
He shook his head. “Nah, I don’t want to risk an injury. But I still skate sometimes at the community rink. It’s meditative.” As he considered his answer, he traced his thumb across her palm. She shivered, ticklish. “In the summer I bike. Trails and stuff. You have to concentrate or you go ass over handlebars.”
“You mean like mountain biking?” She couldn’t imagine him in the woods, dirt on his knuckles, a helmet covering his face. Reece seemed too gentle, like a golden retriever who romped around the backyard, or at most, the dog park. He wasn’t an off-the-trail breed.
Reece laughed at her obvious disbelief. “What, did you forget I’m a jock?”
“No.” Charlotte gestured with her free hand. “It’s just rugged, that’s all.”
“I’m not rugged?” Reece waggled his eyebrows.
She scoffed. “That’s not what I mean!”
“I played hockey, remember. I could throw punches. And take them.”
Charlotte shoved him in the shoulder. He laughed as he swerved off the path before easily regaining his balance and returning to her side.
“Now you take care of sick cats!” she protested. “You gel your hair!”
“Ah, so now I’m domesticated.” He put his hands up. “I’ve gone soft.”
“You were always soft,” she spluttered. “And hard. A soft jock.”
A very undergrad-Reece smirk stretched across his lips. “Tell me more about how hard I am.”
Charlotte sighed, exasperated. “You are the worst.”
Reece wrapped his arm around her shoulders and kissed the side of her head. She snuck her hand into the back pocket of his jeans.
“Nice job copping a feel,” Reece teased.
She pinched his ass in retribution.
They bickered and teased the rest of the walk back to the dorm, past the grand library with its hulking marble pillars, and the stone academic buildings fronted by manicured lawns. Charlotte noticed little of it. Hein’s campus faded into a muted New England blur of green and gray behind Reece’s profile, and for the first time in a long time, she relaxed.
—
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JACKIE SLAUGHTER TO CHARLOTTE THORNE, 12:26 AM: btw there are condoms in my makeup bag!! in the side pocket with my valtrex.
Charlotte felt a new twist of déjà vu as they walked down the hallway to her room. Everything looked exactly the same as it did last night, only now her hand was tucked neatly in the crook of Reece’s arm. Her phone nestled in her back pocket on silent.
The conversation they batted back and forth during their walk fizzled out as she retrieved her keys. Reece stood just behind her. She could feel his eyes on her neck, on her hair curling and knotting where it poured down her back. He watched in silence as she slid the key into the lock. She pushed the door open, the darkness of the room yawning in front of them.
She ignored the light switch on the wall—the overhead lamp would be too bright. Reece stayed in the doorway as she crossed the room to pull up the blackout curtain and let moonlight fall across the linoleum floor.
The door clicked shut behind him. At last, they were truly alone.
Charlotte hesitated at the window. She pressed her palm to the cool glass and watched the wind move through the trees. Leaves rippled in so many shades of gray, the moon leaching them of color.
Time warp again: It felt like fall, like the possibility of a new school year beginning. Nine new months to learn and reinvent herself. Nine months to storm across campus and demand adventures.
Eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one. Immortal on a September evening, her Doc Martens muddy and her shoulders bare.
She took a deep breath, and then another.
Even with her back to him, Charlotte never lost her awareness of Reece’s presence. She could hear the soft noise of his sneakers on the floor as he shifted his weight from foot to foot. He waited for her to turn around again, waited for her to be ready.
She was ready, she just needed a…a moment. She’d done this before—hell, she’d done this with him before—but tonight was something else. This ran the risk of mattering.
Reece cleared his throat. “We don’t have to…if you don’t want—”
Charlotte whirled around. She didn’t want to make him worry, not for a second. She owed him that much. “No, I want.” She laughed, the words clumsy but true. She wanted. She wanted so much more than she’d bargained for.
Reece stepped toward her once, and then again. She met him in the middle, her arms circling his waist as he took her face in his hands.
“I’m so glad you’re here,” she said, hungry to reassure him. They were in this together, whatever it wound up being. Even if it was temporary.
“Me too,” he said.
Reece eased into a crouch on the floor before her. She placed a hand on his shoulder as he guided off her left shoe, and then her right. He didn’t seem to care that her toenails weren’t painted or that (oh shit) she hadn’t shaved her legs in three days.
Another thing she’d forgotten to pack for the weekend: a razor.
Once her feet were bare, Reece untied his sneakers. He lined them up beside her loafers underneath the bed. Then he stood, his full height making her feel wonderfully small. His eyes never left hers as he took off the flower lei and hung it from the bedpost.
Then, oh sweet mother of God, he took the bottom of his shirt in his hands and pulled it up over his head, revealing the lush expanse of his stomach. Charlotte’s stare caught on the smattering of hair that led down to the fly of his jeans.
Her mouth went dry. She skimmed her fingers down his chest, lingering on his belt buckle. Reece shuddered at her touch.
