9
I FIGHT NOT to sound winded when I ask the question, though I feel a bit like I’ve been sucker punched. Of course. Of course that’s what it was. The touches, the glances, the easy smiles. It was all an opportunity to practice in front of an unknowing audience. Just like our walk through town. I shake my head. I need to remember. I can’t keep getting confused with Luka.
Embarrassment settles in my stomach like a lead rock the longer the silence lingers between us. This is why I should have gone with the escort service. I bet I wouldn’t be getting this flustered with a rent-a-date.
I try to change the subject.
“I think I’ll start with the holiday prep tomorrow,” I mutter, hunching down in my seat. I bring my knees to my chest, mindful of the way my skirt flares out around my thighs. The bows. I’ll put the bows up tomorrow and pretend this conversation never happened. It was a stupid thing to suggest anyway. What are we going to do—practice kissing? We aren’t in high school. We are capable of kissing each other without working on it. “I’d like to get everything settled before Evelyn arrives.”
Like my sanity.
“All right,” Luka drawls out the words, the car beginning to rumble beneath us as dirt changes to gravel. “But let’s go back a step. You think I came with you tonight to—what—squeeze in some more practice? Figure out how to hold your hand?” I watch as he shifts in his seat, elbow landing on the ledge by his window. He rubs above his eyebrow, frustrated. “I don’t need to practice holding your hand,” he mutters.
I sink farther, my knees knocking into the dash, and bundle my arms around myself. “It was just a thought.”
“Well, it was a dumb one.”
A laugh sputters out of me. “Thank you.”
My laughter must soothe whatever’s agitated him, because his shoulders creep down from his ears. He glances at me once from the driver’s side, starlight haloed around his head. “But I do think you have a point with the
rest of it.”
“Rest of what?”
“The practice thing.”
I blink at him. “You just told me that you don’t need to practice.”
“I said I didn’t come tonight to practice. There’s a difference.” His thumb traces the bottom curve of the steering wheel. “I think it would be good.”
That surprises me. “You do?”
“Yeah, I think—” It’s his turn to shift in his seat. “Well, with us being a couple. Addison—”
“Evelyn,” I correct. I don’t understand why he can’t remember her name.
“She’ll probably be confused if we’re a couple that doesn’t touch each other at all.”
I know it was my suggestion, but my mind goes instantly to the gutter. I think of his hand on the inside of my knee. How warm it felt, how much space he could cover with his palm, his fingers wrapped slightly along the inside of my thigh. I think of him sliding that hand higher, under the skirt of my dress. Higher still, his nose against my throat, my legs spread wide over his hips.
He’s still talking on his side of the car, explaining about something or
another, but I’ve heard none of it.
I clear my throat. “What was that?”
He swallows hard, a dip in the road making the car rock beneath us. “I’m just saying. Wouldn’t it be weird if we didn’t kiss?”
“It would be weird if we didn’t kiss,” I agree. I sound winded, like I’ve just been shot in the foot.
“No need to sound so thrilled about it, La La.”
When I don’t say anything in response, still stuck thinking about his hands on my legs, he sighs, knuckles straining on the steering wheel with the
flex of his hands. “I’m sure we can work around it.”
“Wait,” I turn in my seat, the strap getting caught at my shoulder. “Why are you upset right now?
“Because you’re acting like I just handed you a death sentence,” he
grumbles.
“What are you talking about?”
I can only make out the corner of his jaw in the dim light from the console, the bridge of his nose. But it’s enough to see that he’s deliberately holding himself in check. There’s a rigidness to his body that means he’s upset. I reach for his forearm and squeeze. We’re almost back to the cottage now, darkness curling around us like a blanket. The stars are hidden by a thick layer of clouds, and everything feels closer, quiet, and still. He pulls us to a stop in my driveway but leaves the car on, a heavy sigh gusting out from somewhere deep in his chest.
“I don’t know. This conversation got out of control.” He runs his hand down his face. “I think you have a point about practicing,” he says, an attempt to start over. The tension that twisted him tight starts to slip from the stiff line of his body. “So that the first time we try in front of an audience you don’t suck at it.”
“Suck at it?” I’m offended. “I don’t suck at it. You probably suck at it.”
“I can assure you I do not suck at it.”
“What, do you have a survey you send out? Rate your level of satisfaction from one to ten?”
He barks a laugh. “That’s not a bad idea actually. I’ll add it in with my postcoital gift basket. A little QR code they can scan.”
I roll my eyes and climb out of the car. Good to know we can quickly bounce back to our normal selves. “I never want to hear the term postcoital come out of your mouth again.”
Two doors slam, boots echoing up the stone walkway.
“Why?” Luka’s trailing me, his stroll leisurely, his hands in his pockets.
Because I don’t want to think about Luka with anyone. Because his hand on my thigh at dinner is going to haunt me for decades. I clear my throat as I try to find my keys in my bag, Luka crowding my space.
“I think coitus is a weird word,” I tell the inside of my bag. One day, maybe I’ll be a more organized person and won’t have to hunt for my house keys every time I need to get inside. But it won’t be this day.
His laugh whispers across the nape of my neck. I shiver and hope he
doesn’t notice.
“What word do you prefer, then?”
“Hm?” I finally manage to get my key in the lock and practically fall through the door. My cheeks feel hot despite the chill in the air, my breathing too fast. I unwind my scarf and drop it on the table.
“If you don’t like coitus”—Luka does his best to bite back his grin, but it fights its way through—“what do you prefer?”
I prefer to not have this conversation.
“I don’t know if I’ve thought about it,” I manage. I kick off my shoes and wander to the kitchen, Luka following after his requisite reorganization of my space. I’m glad I had the forethought to set out the good whiskey this morning, knowing I’d want a hot toddy immediately upon my return.
Whiskey, lemon, tea, honey—it’s all set out neatly on the countertop. Also the remnants of a pumpkin loaf, courtesy of Layla.
I hold up the whiskey bottle in silent question and Luka nods. He finds a seat at the old rocking chair that sits at the head of the table, mismatched and hideous but surprisingly comfortable. I snag the lemon and the cutting board.
“Pound Town? Bumping uglies?” I narrowly miss slicing my finger off as Luka lists options. “The no-pants dance?”
“I can’t say anyone has ever asked me to Pound Town.”
“Something more direct, then.” He rests his chin in his hand and levels a stare at me that I feel low in my belly, in the backs of my knees. “Fucking, yeah?”
I swallow at that, a whole slew of imaginings falling through my mind like dirty dominoes. I can honestly say I have no idea what we’re discussing anymore. I hear that word, out of his mouth, and lose the thread of conversation. All I know is the pulse of heat that pulls sharp between us, his brown eyes dark in the stillness of my kitchen. This is new territory and . . .
not unwelcome. Mouth suddenly dry, I wet my bottom lip with my tongue.
“I, um—” I shake my head and reach for the whiskey. “What?”
“Fucking.”
Luka and I have discussed sex exactly two times, and only in vague terms and suggestive hand gestures. Once, when I alluded to the complete lack of commitment to foreplay by the entire male population, and another time after watching a period piece with a very confusing love scene, when we argued about blow jobs for seven minutes.
So I am . . . confused. Confused and flushed from my head to my toes. “I don’t—” I shake my head and slice the lemons, turn on the burner for the teakettle. The fact that I can even manage these basic tasks when it feels like I’m having an out-of-body experience is astounding to me. I’m going to hear Luka saying fucking for the rest of eternity. “What is happening here?”
Luka balances his ankle on his knee and rocks back once. “I don’t know. I got carried away, I guess.” A faint blush brushes at his cheeks, his gaze lingering on my shoulders, skimming down the curve of my back. I’ve never seen him look at me like this before. I feel it like a caress. “It’s easy to get carried away,” he adds as an afterthought, voice a whisper in the stillness of the kitchen.
I study him, unsure if he’s messing with me or serious. I can’t tell. It almost feels like he’s—like he’s flirting with me. I don’t know what to do with it. I shake my head slightly and fight to get this conversation back on track. “This is not what I had in mind.”
“No?”
“I don’t think anyone is going to ask how I refer to sex.”
“That’s a fair point.”
“Thank you.”
We stare at each other in silence, the air heavy. My eyes don’t know where to land. His fingertips, tracing back and forth along the arm of the chair. His long legs spread just slightly. The flush of pink on the tips of his ears. My perusal is interrupted when the kettle begins to whistle on the stove.
I turn my back to him and fish for two mugs in the upper cabinet, pressing up on my toes.
Usually, I have mugs scattered throughout the kitchen. It’s not that I’m messy; I just prefer convenience. I drink a lot of coffee. And tea. And whiskey. And tea with whiskey. Sometimes mulled wine. And the occasional cake in a cup. Mugs are my cup of choice and, as such, are typically left at various places around my home.
But I’ve been trying to be neater, more organized, and Luka’s arrival has heralded the usual two-week trend of cleanliness. Which unfortunately means I’m putting my mugs back in the most unreachable place in the kitchen. I hear the creak of the rocking chair, easy footsteps across the hardwood, and then I feel Luka behind me, close enough for his knees to brush the backs of my thighs. My breath rushes out of me when one of his hands finds my hip, the other reaching above our heads for the mugs.
“Here we are again,” I mutter. I never did get out the step stool to check what he’s got stashed up there. Feeling a little indulgent, I press my head back slightly so I can feel the catch of his stubble in my hair. His laugh rumbles against my back, one mug and then two set neatly in front of me.
“What does Charlie call you? Short stack?” Luka doesn’t step back as I reach for the kettle and pour, handing me the whiskey over my shoulder with one hand, his other still on my hip. He squeezes once.
“Yeah, he’s been trying out nicknames. Trying to find one that sticks.”
“Maybe he should try Cinnamon Stick. Isn’t that what Sheriff Jones calls you?”
I hum, my entire existence focused on where his thumb drags against my hip bone. He presses into me farther, just for a second, his body weight a delicious, heavy pressure against me. His nose drags through my hair, nuzzles once beneath my ear.
“You do smell like cinnamon,” he says, voice quiet, serious, unbearably sweet. I turn my head slightly, my temple against his jaw.
“A hazard of the job.”
“Do all tree farm owners smell like cinnamon, then?”
“And sugarplum fairies.”
Luka laughs at that, the strange tension between us splintering. He steps back, but his hand holds against my hip, fingers slipping away with
reluctance. I look up at him in the dim light of my kitchen, and for a single breath, I see a wild, ferocious hunger. But he blinks and it’s gone. He’s my Luka again, the change so quick I think I’ve imagined it. Brown eyes soft, smile crooked, hair a wild mess.
He drops a slice of lemon in my drink. “Saluti.”
“Thanks.” I hand him his mug, an old chipped thing that has a fox on it and says, OH, FOR FOX SAKE. He takes a sip and I tilt my head at him. “And thanks for coming with me earlier. It means a lot.”
“You don’t have to keep thanking me,” he mumbles, the thinnest edge of frustration in his voice. He looks like he wants to say more but swallows it, eyes searching my face. I feel it like a fingertip at my jaw, the hollow of my throat, the corner of my lips. “I’m not doing this for your thanks, okay?”
He reaches over my shoulder and plucks a piece of pumpkin bread off the counter, holding it between his teeth as he tugs me once toward the couch.
“We’re going to watch Die Hard, and you’re going to do your Hans Gruber impersonation.”
As we settle onto the couch, a flannel blanket thrown over our laps, I don’t even think to ask. If he’s not doing this for my gratitude, then why is he doing it?
I START MY morning in the big red barn by the road, armed with a giant plastic candy cane and a wooden cutout of a nutcracker soldier. I look like some vengeful holiday knight. The only thing missing is a bow and arrow made out of gingerbread. But I heard rustling in the corner by the door when I came in, and I have no intention of getting rabies before Evelyn arrives.
Foaming at the mouth doesn’t really fit in with the aesthetic I’m trying to achieve.
I hear it again, a little louder this time, one of the giant metal arches that we use over the road for the lights swaying back and forth.
“Shit,” I curse, and search the ground. Maybe I should have one of the firehouse guys down here to take a look. They’d know what to do with a
family of raccoons, right? The arch gives another shake, and I abandon my candy cane and head for the door.
I’m not willing to tempt fate today. Tomorrow is a new day.
The barn door is heavy beneath my hands when I try to slide it open. It doesn’t budge the first two pulls, and I huff a laugh under my breath. Of course I’d get stuck in here with endless piles of decorations and whatever critter has decided to move in. It feels like a sign from the universe to not lie on contest applications.
I pull again and press the toe of my boot into the bottom edge to help the weathered wood stay on its tracks, all of my concentration focused on sliding it open without breaking the damn thing. It finally gives, a foreboding shriek accompanying its incremental movement, enough space for me to slide my way through. Only as soon as I start to step out of the barn, someone else decides to step in.
I knock my knees against Luka, my hand losing its grip on the door. It begins to slide closed, and Luka mutters a string of obscenities under his breath, curling my body close to his and moving us both out of the way. I’m still pressed up against him when the door falls shut.
“Hey,” I manage, staring wistfully at the door. I have no idea how I’m going to open that thing again. Luka might have to give me a boost to the narrow windows on the south-facing side. I’ll have to wiggle my way out.
Hopefully, Beckett and Layla are somewhere else on the farm, and no one has a camera. I’ve been that dumb before, and I have a Christmas card courtesy of Layla’s camera phone to prove it. I blink back to Luka. “I wasn’t expecting you.”
“Yeah, I wasn’t expecting me either.” He rubs one gloved hand over his face, brown eyes peering at me through the fan of his fingers. He lets his hand drop with a heavy sigh, frustration tightening his features.
“Everything okay?”
“Stella, I have to head back to the city.” He says it with the same gravitas as one would announce, I have cancer, or I’ve discovered a Civil War ghost in the attic.
“Okay.” I try to move past him, but he shakes his head and walks us farther into the barn, his hands curled around my upper arms. It’s disorienting walking backward, and I shoot a glance over to the arches. No movement now. Hopefully whatever critter was over there is long gone.
“I didn’t think I’d have to go back before Evelyn gets here.”
I give his chest a little pat through the down of his jacket. I definitely didn’t expect him to spend the entire month of November in Inglewild. He works remotely from time to time, but even so, I had assumed he would be back and forth between here and his office. I know they rely on him for presentations to clients, and he can’t do that from behind his computer.
“That’s all right. You won’t be missing anything here. We’ll just be setting up for Christmas. And potentially getting a new barn door.” I nod over his shoulder and take another look at the door. It seems to still be on its track, at least. “When will you be back?”
“A week, I think. And then I’ll be here through—” He swallows, not finishing his thought. “I’ll be here.”
“Okay?” I still don’t understand why he’s so worked up. He’s holding himself still despite his hands curled around my arms, a perfect two inches of space between our bodies. He flexes his fingers once, twice, and then levels me with a determined look, his tongue poking the inside of his cheek.
“I think we should practice now, before I go.”
“Um, okay?” I swear I know another word, but my mind is like a record skipping on the memory of him in my kitchen. Holding that stupid mug, smelling like lemon and whiskey. The way his voice rasped and the things he said. How his body pressed to mine against the kitchen counter, his chest against my back, the countertop digging into my hips.
After he left last night, I tossed and turned in bed, the sheets twisted around my bare legs, my hand low on my stomach beneath the soft cotton of my T-shirt. I lingered there, fingertips dragging back and forth just below my belly button, an ache I hadn’t felt in ages.
“Because here’s the thing, Stella,” he says. I breathe in deep through my nose and hope what I was just thinking about isn’t written all over my face.
“If we don’t practice today, you’re going to think about it all week.”
He’s right. I will absolutely think about it all week. I will fixate, freak myself out, and probably start stress eating Layla’s peppermint mocha brownies until there are none left for customers. She just started making those too.
“Okay?” I clear my throat and look for other words. “Okay.”
Great.
Luka is not bothered. “I’m going to kiss you, and we’re going to deal with it like two mature, consenting adults. And when I come back, and when Evelyn is here, you won’t be worked up about it. And it will be fine.”
Except I am not a mature adult, and I decide I’m going to kiss him first.
Like ripping off a Band-Aid. I grip the collar of his coat with both hands and use the momentum to press myself up and into him. The force of it has our mouths meeting awkwardly, my bottom lip slightly on his chin, our noses pressed at an awkward angle. I don’t try to correct it, don’t linger, and drop back to the flats of my feet, hands still curled around him.
“There,” I say, pleased with myself. I feel like I’ve finally gained the upper hand. I kissed him first. I kissed him and it was fine. “Done.”
He blinks at me, his hand coming up to press against his mouth. “What was that?” he whispers.
I shrug. “You wanted a kiss. I gave you a kiss.”
“What you gave me is a concussion. Is that how you kiss?” He looks
genuinely concerned.
I roll my eyes. “Stop.”
“I’ll probably need some dental work.” He pulls his hand away like he’s checking for blood.
“What happened to dealing with this like mature, consenting adults?”
He hides his smile behind the palm of his hand. “Okay, you’re right. Let’s
try that again.”
“Again? I think that was fine.”
“It was not fine,” he fires back, gaze lingering on my mouth. He’s a healthy dose of stubborn, the amber that usually lights up his eyes dimmed to a warm chocolate brown. “If anyone sees us kiss like that, they’ll know in half a second we are full of shit.”
It’s a fair point.
“Okay, then you try.”
“I am trying to try,” he mutters, exasperated. He heaves a deep breath through his nose and considers me, eyes dark. There’s a single beam of light that filters in from the windows at the top of the barn, early morning sunshine beginning to wander its way across the floor. The light just barely catches an old box of garland, a shower of gold exploding like a kaleidoscope as the sun shimmers through the strands.
Luka doesn’t say anything. I watch as he searches my face in the dancing light, the gold reflected in his gaze. He’s looking for something in my expression, and when he finds it, the right side of his mouth hitches up in a smile, a smooth pull of his lips. It’s my smile—this one. I hoard it like all the others, bundle them up and put them in the same drawer as my cardboard pine trees.
In an achingly slow movement, he leans forward and brushes his nose against mine. I keep my eyes open even though it makes everything a little bit blurry, gold sparkles twinkling at the edges. Close like this, with his bottom lip just barely brushing mine, I can count every individual freckle on his nose. A burst of them on the bridge, less as they fan out below his eyes. Once when we were younger, we got drunk off tequila and I drew constellations on his skin, hovering over him with my hair curtained around us. I remember the weight of his eyes on me, sprawled across my living room floor, how he curled his fingers around my ankle like he had to hold himself steady.
He catches my mouth in a kiss the same moment his gloved hands find mine, fingers gently skimming until our palms press together. I’m frustrated by the thick material covering his skin, unable to feel the heat of him, the calluses on his palms. He squeezes once as I shuffle farther into him, a reward for good behavior. When I sigh, his lips smile into mine, a curve of his mouth that I want him to imprint everywhere. Into my cheek, my neck, the soft skin of my thighs. It feels like the beginning of every argument we’ve ever had. Me impatient. Luka teasing. It’s a reassurance that despite tipping the scale of our relationship, we’re still us.
Luka holds me there, our hands twined together, his lips soft and searching. Like this, he says with his mouth against mine. Slowly. It’s the deliciousness of a kiss that isn’t intended for more. Patient. Chaste.
It drives me insane.
He hums under his breath when I slip my hand from his to find the nape of his neck, a tiny sound of surprise that has me catching his bottom lip between mine. I want to pull at it with my teeth, see if that sound deepens, sharpens. I want to shift my hand up and tangle my fingers in his hair, use it to angle his mouth against mine. I want to untangle all his gentle calm until he’s as impatient as I am.
He pulls back instead. Eyes closed, he hovers with his nose against my cheek, forehead tucked to my temple. I can’t tell if my hands are shaking or his.
“Um,” I clear my throat. I wet my bottom lip with my tongue and taste hazelnut coffee. It is, quite frankly, a lot to handle. I clear my throat for a second time. “I think that will work.”
He pulls away completely, and I keep my eyes on the box of garland in the corner. The sun has moved past it now, cast it half in shadow. He lets go of my hand and I curl my fingers into fists.
“Yeah, that was good.” I gather my courage and look up at him, watching as he runs his hands over his hair, front to back and back again. He looks like he just got home from the grocery store. Like he had to stop on the way to fill
up the gas tank. Calm. Unaffected.
Business as usual.
I tell myself to get it together.
“I’ll see you in a week?” I say.
Luka nods and wanders over to the door, bending at the waist and tinkering with something near the ground. “I’ll call you when I’m leaving the
city.”
“Great.”
He unfolds his body from his crouch and pulls on the handle. The door slides back smoothly. A burst of sunshine floods the room, and I curl my arms around myself.
“Want me to walk you back?”
“Nah.” I gesture toward the pile of decorations, the fifty thousand lights that are tangled together. “I’m going to work in here for a little bit.”
I don’t care if there is an entire family of raptors hidden in this barn. I need some time to myself to unpack that kiss and then pack it right back up again.
He hesitates in the doorway. “I’ll see you soon.”
I wave him off and busy myself with unpacking. It’s the exact type of mindless movement I need, too focused on lights and candy canes and signposts to think through that kiss in any sort of detail. It was a good kiss, yes, but only because we were both determined to make this work. Because we’re both committed to making this fake relationship seem as real as possible. Just because I felt it all the way to my toes, it doesn’t have to mean anything.
By the time all the boxes are stacked and sorted, I have successfully convinced myself that I am as unaffected as Luka.
I call it a morning when my stomach begins to rumble. On my walk back to the office, I tuck my hands into my coat pockets. It’s starting to get colder, the winds coming down off the foothills and whipping across the fields. If we’re lucky, we’ll get some snow when Evelyn is here. I picture what it’s like out on the fields when that first layer of white kisses the branches of the trees. The cold stillness, the heavy expectation in the sky. The soft flutter of snowflakes as they land on my cheeks, my lashes, the tips of my ears. If I could live out in the fields during the snowfall, I would.
I flex my fingers in my pockets and feel the sharp edge of firm paper, a piece of string catching on my pinky. I pull it out and smile.
A pine-scented air freshener in the shape of a tree from the gas station just down the road.
