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“Alright,” he says, releasing a deep breath, his hands trapped in the front pocket of his black hoodie. “Fuck it. Let’s go right now, when your shift is up.”
I squeal in excitement, and I catch his soft smirk as he turns and walks toward the door.
Finishing up my shift, I hang up my apron, meet Jude by the exit, and he leads me outside with his hand wrapped around mine. As soon as we’re out of the coffee shop, he turns on me, wrapping his arms around me and lifting me up into a hug, crushing me against his chest.
Tension lines his every muscle, every marked curve and angle I can see. “You sure about this, Little D?” he asks, that tension trickling into his tone. “I could think of a thousand other things we could do instead.”
I smile, running a finger along the space between his brows to smooth away the line of tension there. “I’m sure. It’s something I really want to do, and I feel safe doing it with you.”
The tightness bleeds from his muscles as he relaxes beneath me. “Alright,” he relents. “You’re fucking killing me right now, but alright. Let’s go get you pierced.”
He grasps my hand after lowering me back to the ground and leads me down the sidewalk, his thumb lightly brushing along the expanse of mine. Back and forth, methodically, thoughtfully.
There’s been a level of intimacy between us these last two weeks that didn’t exist last summer.
The way he sweeps me up against him in these amazing, intimate hugs, burying me in the warmth of his body.
The way his small touches have grown more frequent, and more familiar—his hand wrapped around mine as we walk through the city, or placed at the small of my back through a busy crowd; tucking stray pieces of hair behind my ears; lifting my chin and forcing my gaze to his when he has something significant to say; and the way he’s kissed me, too, on every small inch of my face except for the one place I really want him to—outside of the day I picked him up from the airport.
The way we’ve opened up to each other so easily this summer, diving deeper than the summer before, or even in all the months that followed.
Our words still haven’t conveyed anything beyond that, though, and I’m realizing I’m the kind of girl who needs the words, too. Even if I can admit I’m afraid to hear them, to say them, when they have the potential to change everything.
______
We head another few blocks down the street, and then we duck underground and wait for the subway. Jude’s arm stays wrapped around me the entire time, and we make small talkabout his brother’s shop.When it first opened, how he knew tattooing is what he wanted to do, how he got funding from a well-known and established artist in the industry who could see Elijah’s talent from a mile away.
I’m lucky enough to see his talent from right here, painted beautifully on the canvas that is Jude.
“My dad was pretty pissed at first. Especially when every time we came home, I was covered in more and more ink before I’d even hit eighteen.” He grimaces playfully, but a hint of guilt blooms beneath the expression, too. “But even he couldn’t deny my brother’s talent, and now the old man has even got a few pieces of his own.”
“That’s really cool.” I smile through a breath of laughter. Imagine that—parents supporting their kids. I still haven’t talked to mine since I left home last year, but they did call me. Once. I let it go to voicemail, and though I haven’t deleted it, I haven’t been able to bring myself to listen to it, either.
Maybe someday I will. Or maybe I won’t. I don’t know.
We step off the platform and onto a waiting subway, and the doors of it close almost as quickly as they opened—something I still haven’t quite gotten used to.
The panic of movement in this city.
Everything, everyone, always rushing so fast.
We ride the subway for no more than fifteen minutes, and then we’re getting off again. Climbing the stairs, we break back out into the city, the sounds of honking and fast-moving cars filling my ears. Jude still holds my hand firmly within his, leading the way, holding it with an air of possessiveness and a hint of surety I don’t feel because I’m still not sure howhefeels.
And it’s at this very moment that I start to overthink everything.
What if all this is to himisfriendship?
It’s a stupid thought to have, after everything, but it feels like he’s been holding himself back, too, and I’m not sure why.
Maybe for the same reasons I am. Maybe he’s just as unsure, just as afraid that one step over the line will change everything.Because I already know—with us—it won’t be something that can be taken back once it’s been given.
Or maybe he is dating someone back at school, andthat’swhy,the thought whips through me, lashing at my insides.
Shit.What if he is?
“Are you dating anyone?” I blurt the question out before my mind can catch up to my mouth.
He pulls me into his side and drapes his arm over my shoulders. “Tell me you don’t want me to be, and it’s done,” he says with a smirk, but his answer stuns me still. Thoughts screech like tires against asphalt as they skid to a halt in my brain. My feet do the same, grinding into the concrete of the sidewalk.