Page 34 of Fighting With Light

The ocean is bright and blue, thrashing against the cliffs, kind of like my heart. “This feels impossible, Liam. Is this a fool’s errand?”

“It’s only a fool’s errand if we gain nothing from it,” he mutters, still looking at the screen.

“Well, then, we better damn well find something.”

14

Liam

The next day Iwoke up to find Aelia making eggs in shorts and a t-shirt with her hair in a messy bun. I stare at her for a moment because I’m amazed she cooks for herself.

“What?” she asks.

I smile and shake my head. “Oh nothing, princess, good morning,” I murmur.

Her face brightens and she looks for a fork in the cabinets. I come around her, open the drawer with the cutlery, and hand her one.

“Thanks,” she says quietly.

The day after tomorrow is day one of the competition. If all goes well, I’ll have my heat and then we’ll have another two or so weeks before we have to go to El Salvador, but when it comes to the ocean, you take what she gives you. You’re not in control, and I’ve been fighting with her from the moment I started surfing.

I don’t know why I decided to go pro for surfing. It was something I was good at and I left it at that. But rock climbing is my favorite thing to do. It’s the one thing I feel like I can control in my life. I think surfing is the challenge for me to let go and accept that I don’t have control and that’s difficult when you’ve barely had it your entire life.

“Do you have something against shirts?” Aelia asks me, drawing my attention away from the ocean.

“Uh, no?” I say, unsure.

She stares at me and takes a bite of eggs. “Aren’t you afraid you’re going to burn something just hanging out, out there?” she asks, smiling around her fork.

“Are you trying to tell me you don’t like this?” I gesture to my naked chest.

“I never said that. I was just curious if you had a thing against shirts.” I give her a dirty look and grab the eggs she left out. I crack four into a bowl, pull out the cooked bacon, and batter the chef made last night to make pancakes.

“I don’t, for the record. Do you want pancakes and bacon?” I ask her.

“Sure.” She sits down at the island on one of the bar stools. I get out the griddle and heat my bacon. Once the pancakes are going, I get them stacked up before I start my eggs.

“How did you sleep?” I glance at her over my shoulder and flip the pancakes.

“I never sleep well the first time in a new place.”

I get that, but she’s safe here. “You could have come in if you wanted,” I tell her, surprised at my own words. I know we agreed on an arrangement, but I figured she wouldn’t want to share a bed and do nothing in it. Maybe I was wrong, or maybe I need to get my head out of the gutter and try to be better than my past, different than what my brothers expect of me. So this might be a good thing overall. I’ve never had a casual girlfriend for more than a month or two, especially if I was staying somewhere for more than a few weeks. Not that Aelia is my girlfriend. Regardless, I’ve always made sure they knew it was temporary. That didn’t always go over well, and I don’t like to admit it to myself, but I felt bad when it was all said and done. Yet, I continued to do it. Maybe I’m my own worst enemy.

“Liam!” Aelia yells. I look down, realizing I’m burning the pancake, pull it off the griddle, and pour more batter. I’ll eat the burnt one. “Are you okay over there?” she asks.

“What? Oh, yeah, I was just thinking.”

“Oh well, um, thanks for the invitation. I might take you up on that.”

I wink and watch the pancakes carefully.

“Did you…” Aelia trails off and I flip the pancake before looking at her again. “Did you want me to come to your bed last night, or maybe you come to mine?”

The corner of my mouth tips up. I study her a little more. I like her relaxed like this, zero makeup and a little messy. She’s never once appeared messy, not a single hair out of place, so seeing her like this makes me think she’s trulycomfortable around me, and I like that. “I wouldn’t have said no,” I tell her, watching her reaction.

“I’ve, uh, never done this before, so I guess I don’t know the…etiquette on the subject,” she says, avoiding eye contact.

I grab the pancake and pour the last few, then flip on the skillet for my eggs. “It can be whatever you want it to, Aelia. I’ve never done this before either and it feels…I don’t know, weird or awkward. Right?”