Page 22 of Summer Skate

“That wasn’t a normal push. It wasn’t even that big of a deal. It wasn’t even your fight!”

“It was my fight. JT is one of my closest friends. If somebody threatens him, I’ll kill them. He’s lucky. He got off easy.”

“What about the fact that JT slept with his wife ? Do the laws of matrimony mean nothing to you?”

He laughs, loudly. “That’s rich, coming from you.”

“And why would you say that to that girl, Charlotte? You made her cry? Don’t you feel bad? Don’t you feel anything ?”

“I don’t think that’s any of your business,” he says. “But everything is your business, right?”

“What’s that mean?”

“It means we’re all such interesting material to you. You’re using all of us for your own selfish gain. Do you even love your family or do you just need them for the jokes?”

I am stunned. All I can do is repeat his words back to him, slowly. “ Do I even love my family?”

He goes on: “How much material have you gotten out of us? Out of me? How much material are you getting right now? Are you recording this conversation? If not, you’d better write it down! You might forget!”

“You know what? Congratulations on being able to correctly identify everyone else’s vulnerabilities. I hope nobody ever turns the tables on you.” I am shaking, with tears in my eyes, as I take my car keys out of my bag. “I never want to see you again.”

“I’ll drive you,” he says.

“I can drive myself.”

“You’ve been drinking.”

“So have you!”

“Yeah, but I can handle myself. And you can barely drive sober.”

I hit the button that unlocks my car.

“Give me the keys,” he says.

“ No . Why don’t you go find a model or an influencer or a billionaire’s daughter and leave me the fuck alone.”

“Oh my god. You’re exhausting.”

“ Am I? Or are you just not used to expending mental energy for more than twenty minutes at a time?” I put my hands on my hips. “Is your brain okay? Do you need me to take you to the fucking hospital?”

He comes up to me and tries to pry the keys from my hands.

I shove him, then whack his arm with my fist. He holds my wrist so that I don’t whack him again, then shakes it so that the keys fall out of my hand and onto the pavement, and he grabs them.

I grip his arm, try to tear them out of his hands, and we continue to battle over my car keys on the streets of Sag Harbor, outside of Tutto Il Giorno, right next to a lovely gathering of potted plants.

A police officer comes up to us. “Excuse me, Miss? Is this man bothering you?”

“Now that you mention it, he is,” I say to him.

“ Jessica ,” Carter says sternly.

I smile. “I’m just kidding. We’re messing around. He’s fine. He’s famous!” I shrug. “It’s the Hamptons!”

“She has a weird sense of humor,” Carter explains.

We stand there silently as the officer moves along. He looks back at us several times from down the block. I smile. Wave. Smile. Nothing to see here .

I feel drops of rain on my arm, a few falling on my head. I look up.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I say. “Fine. Just drive me home.”

We get in the car and sit in silence. It feels like a furnace, but I can’t open the windows because the rain is coming down hard against them.

I turn on the air conditioning. I catch my breath.

I can feel myself calming down. We drive by the boats in the harbor, rows and rows of sailboats, all rocking in the warm wind.

The lightning is visible in flashes overhead and there are bolts in the distance.

I can feel my anger start to dissipate. Unfortunately, I can also feel my anger slowly turning into something else.

Pleasure. Intense waves of it. So intense that it feels like a problem.

So intense that I feel like I might not be okay.

FUCK. WHY?

I look over at him. He looks increasingly agitated, keeps glancing over at my legs, tightens his grip on the steering wheel. I am fidgeting, touching my face a lot, nervously playing with my hair. I uncross and recross my legs.

The sky continues to flicker, bright white among dark clouds, the clouds turning on and off as if lit up by lamps.

The lightning is mimicking the flashes of heat inside of my body.

He’s making little noises. I’m not even sure what they are.

He sighs, appears to be having a silent argument with himself.

I turn up the air conditioning. It’s okay.

You’re fine. It’ll pass. Just ride it out.

Think of something else. Think of your kids.

Your family. Pull it together for the next twenty minutes, and then you can break down at home, alone .

But nothing works. All roads lead back to this.

My mind will not leave this place. It is stuck like glue to the present moment.

The waves start hitting me harder. They last longer. He starts drumming the steering wheel with his right hand, tapping it with his fingers at a constant pace. He turns the music on. I glance at the dashboard.

“#41” —Live at Luther College, Dave Matthews & Tim Reynolds comes droning out of the car speakers. I sigh. You’ve got to be kidding me .

“I love this song,” he says.

“So do I,” I reply.

How does he even know this song? Isn’t he too young?

I take my sweater off, hold it in a ball in my hands.

My body is hot and tingly. My heart is behaving erratically. I keep looking over at him, for a few seconds at a time, because my only solace is that we’re in this together. He keeps looking over at me, but we never look at the same time, until he stops at a red light, and then we do.

He touches my knee. He knows. I know.

He makes a sharp turn onto North Sea Road. It is a road that winds uphill, with small houses, erratically spaced apart. If you look carefully, between the wild, untamed shrubbery, you can see glimpses of water.

It is quiet. We can hear only the music, our breathing, and the rain.

He drives to the end of the street, which is a dead end.

I can see a small path that leads to the water.

He puts the car in park, gets out, into the rain.

I hear my trunk open, him rummaging around, and then the sound of the trunk slamming shut.

I sit there feeling my heart gallop. He appears at my door and opens it.

He has a manic look in his eyes, peering down at me with a beach towel in his hands, his hair and shirt already soaked.

I stare at his body, the way his wet shirt hangs against his shoulders and stomach muscles.

We are just two bodies now, and they have to get as close together as possible.

I’ve lost. I’ve already lost .

I climb out of the car and take his hand, follow him through a small patch of woods.

Beyond the woods, there is grass, sand, the bay.

I am soaked by the time we reach the sand.

With one hand, he spreads the towel on the sand.

I try to let go of his hand, so that it’s easier for him to spread the towel, but he won’t let me.

“Take off your clothes,” I say, as I take off my top, and drop down to my knees.

I sit in a white skirt and pink bra, facing him. He takes off his shirt, then stands there, frozen.

I laugh a little. “You’re shy, suddenly?” I say, and then unbutton his shorts. I take them off, along with his underwear.

I run my fingers along his dick and then go toward it with my mouth. He’s so ready for me. I look up at him.

“I need to kiss you first,” he says, and then leans down.

We kiss and his mouth feels so good, but I need more. He stands up straight.

I put his dick in my mouth. He looks up at the sky.

“I can’t. You can’t do that. You’re going to make me come. I need to be inside of you.”

“Lie down,” I say, and peel off my skirt and underwear, unhook my bra. My nipples are hard from the rain. I straddle him, moving involuntarily. I lean forward and he puts one nipple into his mouth. I arch my back as he uses one of his hands to play with my clit. I am talking, involuntarily.

Oh, your dick is so big .

It feels so good .

Oh, fuck, that feels amazing .

I’m gonna come .

I rock back and forth. He is squeezing my ass, hard, spreading me wide open.

Suddenly, I am coming, gasping for air. I let out a cry, my mouth wide, and then lurch forward, collapse onto him, face buried in the towel. He holds onto me as I breathe.

I feel him push up into me, hear his breathing get heavier, too, into my neck. He grips me as he sharply exhales. With his chest against mine, I can feel his heart beating fast. Mine is right there too.

We shift so that we are both on our sides, our arms still wrapped around each other.

He is watching me, I can tell, and it makes me self-conscious, so I throw my arm across my face, cover my eyes with the inside of my elbow, and start to laugh.

He laughs at me, and then we are just two bodies, laughing.