Puddle Jumping (16 page)

“You didn’t see me there.” It was hard for me to believe what she was saying.

She laughed then. “I’m a mom. I see everything.”

That was disturbing.

“I told you that I thought he had forgotten about you, even though I knew it would be virtually impossible for him to. From then on, he talked about you. Drew you. Painted you. I have an attic full of renderings of your face . . .” Her eyes went wide with panic. “I didn’t want to upset you, so I never brought them down. But you were like the one point of light in a tunnel he could see so clearly. I guess, what I meant to say is, you’ve always been in his life. I’m shallow enough to have thought you always would be. Even after a year’s worth of separation.” There was a little smile of defeat. “You’ve been apart longer than that before. You’re going away to college. It never occurred to me the distance would be an issue.”

I saw her then. The real her. She was just human. Flawed. Sheila Neely was not a Super Parent. She was trying her hardest just like everyone else in the world. I’d put her up on such a pedestal that it was difficult to wrap my brain around the truth.

Searching for words wasn’t easy. It took me a few minutes to get a steady train of thought before I could speak. “Has he been freaking out?” She nodded. “Breaking stuff. All of that?” Again with the nod. “I love him, you know. And not in a puppy love or teenage love sort of way. I know what it’s like to be with someone because it’s easy.” I let that sentence sit for a moment. “Being with Colton is
not easy
. It’s hard. It’s work. But if I think about my life before him, and my life with him . . . the struggle and work is worth all of it.”

She started to cry then. Like, really, really cry. But I couldn’t comfort her.

 “I promise that love isn’t easy for anyone. Anywhere.”

“You’re right. But if I had to choose between having what dumb people would refer to as a normal life and having a life with Colton, I would choose your son every single time.” Without another word, I stood up and pulled the painting over to my feet, unwrapped it carefully, and let the paper fall away. “I would have boarded that plane with him, if given the chance. Spent my first year of college traveling and being there. I would have done all of it. If I had been given the chance.”

Her silence was only punctuated by small sobs.

But I barely heard them.

Because I was staring at a painting
of
Colton. And he was staring back at me. His body situated in a way to convey sadness. His face solemn.

There, rounded in each corner, the colors overlapped his brush strokes that bore the words
I Love You
over and over and over . . . creating the backdrop of his heartbreak. And mine.

 “Is he home?” I asked as I moved my feet, tripping over my shoelaces in my own haste.

“Yes.”

She owed me time with him before he left. And she knew it. I watched her search for her keys in her pocket, but by the time she had them out for me, I was already at the door.

I didn’t need them.

I had my own way in.

I
was worried about how he would react to me climbing through his window again after the weeks we’d had apart. One piece of me wondered if I would walk in on one of his meltdowns. Another piece wondered if he would be fine and Sheila had simply exaggerated to get me there.

On the way to his house, I called Harper and the conversation pretty much went like this.

“His mom came over . . .”

“I hate her.”

“She didn’t mean for it to happen. She asked him to tell me first.”

“Hmm. Fine. I reserve the right to revisit my hatred at a later time.”

“He painted me a picture of himself. It has
I Love You
written all over it.”

“For real?”

“Yeah. I’m headed there now.”

“Call me later.”

I didn’t even bother to park my car around the other side of the neighborhood. The sky was getting a little darker and I knew Mr. Neely worked mad, crazy hours. And even though I could have knocked on the door, I felt like I needed to climb up that lattice one last time.

I did, with my heart thundering in my ears and my hands shaking from the anxiety I was drowning in. But once I checked the latch and realized the window was still unlocked, tears filled my eyes and I had to take a breath before actually climbing through.

I wondered if he left it unlocked the entire time without thinking about it . . . or if he checked it every night to see if it was still unlocked, just in case I came over.

Either way . . . it made me feel awful.

I stumbled into the room blindly, hoping to God once more that I wouldn’t break anything as I attempted to untangle my feet from the windowsill. When I righted myself, I realized the art room was pretty much vacant. Everything was put away. It felt wrong. Weird. I’d never seen it like that before.

Of course, Colton hadn’t left me before, either.

After bracing myself for a moment, I walked slowly to the door and looked down the hallway toward his room, noting the soft tinkling of music filtering into the open space. I watched the lighting in his room shift, his shadow appearing and disappearing with his footsteps.

Back and forth.

Preparing to leave.

Or was he pacing?

No longer worried about my timing, I crept to his open door and stood there, watching him as he moved a foot and then back, his eyes downcast as his hands started to reach for something and then would stop and he would repeat the movement over and over again. He appeared to be so
very
frustrated.

I knocked gently on his wall, holding my breath as he turned abruptly and stared at my face. Just stared. No words.

“Hi,” I called to him quietly.

His reaction surprised me. In the blink of an eye he rushed forward and wrapped his arms around my waist, pressing me to the wall and burying his face in my neck as he breathed in deeply and squeezed all the air from my lungs.

“Nothing works,” he started, his hands kneading my sides as he tried again. “I try. And try. But nothing works. I can’t focus. I can’t . . . I can’t.”

 “I’m sorry.” I had to stop myself. “I apologize for not coming to see you sooner.”

“You were upset. I hurt you. Something must have happened to make you stay away from me. Is that right?” His nose was pressed under my ear and I fought back another round of tears because he just didn’t fully grasp it. He could have been repeating Sheila’s words for all I knew.

“You’re leaving.”

His body went rigid, and slowly he pulled back from me to look down at his shoes. “You’d like it better if I stayed?”

“No!” It was a lie. But it wasn’t. “This is . . .
such
. . . a great opportunity for you. You should go.” His eyes met mine briefly. “But I’m going to miss you so very much while you’re gone.”

He nodded a little.

“Your mom delivered my birthday present. It’s wonderful. Thank you.”

A sad smile pressed his mouth upward. “I wanted you to have me with you.”

The pain in my heart grew a thousand times over. “I know.” My hand pressed to his cheek. “It was very thoughtful. Just like the words you painted . . .”

It was then his eyes met mine. I’m still not sure what he saw at that moment, but it felt like he was looking beyond my face and into my soul.

“I paint the truth, Lilly.”

My heart stopped.

“I do . . . love you. If you needed me to say it before you should have told me so. I know what it means.” The way he said it was like the words were forcing themselves from his mouth almost painfully, his face contorting as they left his lips and his eyebrows drew together. “This emptiness inside of me here,” he placed my hand on his chest, “means I love you. When you’re not here, I can’t focus. It’s too loud . . . But my heartbeat does this when you’re close.”

Under my palm, the erratic cadence was more apparent than I’d ever noticed before.

“I dream of you. And I don’t like it when I can’t talk to you or see you or touch you.” His eyes found mine again. “That’s love.”

A sob broke through my chest as he pondered it. “Yeah, it is.”

“Does my loving you make you sad?” Concern pulled at the corners of his eyes.

“No, I’m not sad you love me.”

“Then why are you crying?”

I had to laugh a little, then. “Because I’m happy.”

He was more confused. “Well, that doesn’t make sense. Crying is for sadness.”

“Sometimes,” I laughed louder, “it means happiness. But . . . girls are strange.”

His head tilted a little as he thought. “You would be more of an expert on that than I would be.”

I pulled him closer, circling my arms around his waist and listening to his breathing while we stood, pressed against one another. I apologized, he accepted and we were fine, once again. It was the beauty of us. It was what it was. No games. No pretenses. No blame or guilt to deal with unnecessarily.

“Do you need me to help you finish packing?” I’d asked with my face smushed into the front of his gray t-shirt.

“I’d prefer to kiss you for a while before you have to go home.”

My smile started and then faltered. “I forgot to bring a toothbrush.”

He was gone and back in less than five seconds, holding a brand new one in my face. “My mother bought an extra one for my trip.”

Once again, I was thankful to Sheila for something.

He watched, as he always had, causing me to take a mental picture of him leaning against the wall as I spit and rinsed. And just as fast as I could get to him, I was in his arms.

The door was locked. The music was on. I mean, there weren’t any candles or anything like that, but we were together one last time before he was going to leave for a year. Our recent absence from one another did nothing to slow our passion. It only made it more forceful. Our touches were heavy handed. Meaningful. Lingering. I wanted him to remember all of it.

I wasted no time taking off his shirt. There was no hesitance in his hands as we fumbled with my own.

It was hot needy kisses of the here and now.

It was:
take this with you when you leave
.

It was:
keep this in your memory when you lay in bed at night
.

It was:
You have all of me now
.

Our fingers explored one another. I was committing him to memory with my eyes closed and body erupting in goose bumps while becoming overheated at once. He studied my scar and his fingers trailed over the raised flesh again, so softly . . . I knew he remembered how he’d saved me once. But the truth was, he’d saved me again since then.

My touch was rough, just like he wanted. My kisses were insistent, just as they needed to be.

When I realized I was flat on my back on top of his bed, there wasn’t a thought in my mind. I savored every touch. Every kiss. Each graze of my lips to his skin, willing my brain to just
remember
.

And when he pulled back off me, his lids half open and his hips dipping forward like before, I didn’t stop him. I watched, fascinated.

Books and movies make it seem so much easier, like it just happens. But there’s more to it. It just seemed to take a little longer than I had anticipated. I wasn’t going to complain, because in that moment I wanted to be with him in one last way.

If he was leaving, he was taking everything I had to give with him.

His forehead was creased with . . . worry? Pain? I couldn’t tell because I was trying so hard not to cry over the finality of it all. I was too tense. It was too much.

It suddenly occurred to me he must have been experiencing that times a million.

“Colton, look at my face,” I called to him and he did as I said, his eyes watching my lips as I spoke. “Relax . . .” As soon as I said it, I think we both loosened up at the same time, and it finally, finally happened.

It wasn’t painful with Colton. He didn’t rush the experience. It was so overwhelming for him that he was struggling to breathe. I shifted then, only minutely, to pull his face to mine with my hands, gripping the back of his neck tightly. Then I crossed my ankles behind his back. And squeezed my thighs against his torso.

Hard.

I believe we both had our eyes closed for just a moment, but I opened mine at one point to see him staring down at me in wonder, his mouth open as if he were struggling to speak.

But we didn’t need to talk. We were communicating just fine.

A lot of girls probably lose their virginity and it’s fast or painful, careless or upsetting.

Mine was not like that.

It was awkward and it did hurt a little. But I was with Colton. He was my first. My only. And it caused me to shake as his head fell to my shoulder and he pressed his lips to my neck.

“Lilly. Lilly.” He just kept repeating it over and over.

I loosened my grip around his waist and I held onto him as he squeezed my side with one hand, using all the strength he had, pinning me to the mattress, making a breathless sound against my neck before it was over.

My shaky fingers touched his face, waiting for him to relax. I was afraid he would freak out. But as he pulled away from my neck, his eyes appeared serene. His fingertips traced over the side of my head and then lower across my ribcage until I could feel them on my hip.