Page 21 of If the Stars Align
“Just don’t get too attached,” she demands, her eyes burning holes straight through me.
I get up from the table and pour myself more coffee, which is a terrible idea because it will only make me more jittery. “Attached?” I attempt to say as coolly as possible despite myshaking hands.
“Look, sweetheart. We’ve talked about this before. Dex is handsome and charming—no one can blame you for having a crush. But I hope a crush isallit is. Because you’ll never be able to hold onto a man like him. Trust me.”
It’s the cruelest thing anyone’s ever said to me. I wonder if she can see it in my eyes when I sit back down and sip my coffee—how much she just hurt me.
“I don’t only meanyou, sweetie, of course not. You’re smart, and beautiful, andanyman would be lucky to have you. But Dex is not the kind of guy who’s ever going to settle down. I mean, he wants to be an actor, for Chrissake. And withhisgood looks? He’ll have women throwing themselves at him left and right. I’m sure he already does. And is thatreallywhat you want, Sunny? To live in a man’s shadow like that? To abandon your own dreams and follow him around like a lovesick puppy? And hope, against all odds, that he’ll come home to you every night?”
I stand up from the table and take my still-full coffee mug and bowl of soggy flakes to the sink. “You’re being absurd,” I say in my most convincing voice. “Dex and I are just friends.”
I make it out of the kitchen, up the stairs, and into the bathroom just seconds before I throw up.
It’s Labor Day weekend. The unofficial end of summer.
Dex suggested we go on a camping trip, which we haven’t done since junior year of high school. And for the first time ever,it’ll be only the two of us. I’m so excited, despite the looming cloud that’s been over my head ever since the morning my mom roasted Dex during breakfast. I didn’t even consider telling her the actual truth about where I was going this weekend. I lied and said my roommate invited me to her family’s lake house in Michigan again. Not that my mom can stop me from going on an unchaperoned camping trip with Dex—I’m a grown woman—but I don’t want to give her another opportunity to slander him. I’m already having a hard enough time getting her malignant words out of my head.
You’ll never be able to hold onto a man like him.
But whenever I’m with Dex, and he’s kissing me, and touching me, and his arms are wrapped tightly around me, all my worries disappear. And when he looks into my eyes the way he’s looking at me right now, like he truly, deeply knows me…that’s when I know in my heart that everything’s going to be okay.
“You have the biggest smile on your face,” he says to me with a laugh in between kisses. We’re lying on a blanket under a sky full of stars, in a secluded spot at our favorite childhood campsite, and I’m so giddy, I can’t help but giggle. And maybe it’s the two beers I downed with the brats we made for dinner, but I’m feeling a little more bold than usual tonight. So this time, I tell him exactly what I’m thinking.
“It’s just so crazy. I mean, we used to come here all the time as kids. And now, here we are…kissing.” I giggle again, and Dex’s lips land on mine, both of us smiling.
“I used to think about this all the time,” he whispers in my ear before he starts to kiss the skin right beneath it.
If Dex thought I looked happy a minute ago, he should see me now. But he’s busy kissing his way across my collarbone. “Oh, yeah?” I say as my hands travel down to unzip his pants. “Did you used to think about me touching you like this?”
His chuckle quickly turns into a groan. “You have no idea, Sunny.”
“Trustme, I do,” I tell him with an airy laugh. “I used to think about us too.”
Dex raises his eyebrows as he smiles. “Is that right,” he says as he pulls off my shirt.
I bite my lip and nod as his hand moves under my bra. “And it was always good in my dreams, Dex…but this issomuch better than I ever could have imagined.”
Neither of us is laughing anymore. We kiss and touch each other with a new sense of wonder now that this truth has been unveiled. Now that I know he’s wanted me, and he knows I’ve wanted him.
“Sunny,” he says quietly after several minutes of kissing. “When you told me you were dating someone back in February, it really wrecked me. I’m not telling you because I want you to feel bad. I just want you to understand. Why I stopped calling you.”
I search his eyes, confused. “But you sounded…thrilled. You said you were happy for me?—”
“I was acting, Sunny. I’m an actor, remember?”
I frown. “Do you act when we’re together?”
“Not normally,” Dex tells me. “But I wanted you to be happy.”
I smile. “I’m happy now.”
We kiss, and when our eyes meet again, Dex smiles andshakes his head.
“What is it?” I ask him.
“I just can’t believe how lucky I am. To be with you.”
My gaze slinks away from his. “No…I’mthe lucky one,” I tell him.
