Page 69 of Pictures in Blue
“What is going on between us?” It comes out more bold than I planned, but I also am tired of being confused. My mind is in a million places at once and I can’t begin to sort through my feelings. I want him. But I don’t want to want him. “What is,” I motion between us, “this?”
I had planned to leave with a clear head, a sure path. But my head is muddied and cloudy. I don’t need a mountain man wrapped in flannel with hair thicker than mine fogging it up. My path now has endless forks in the road created by the man standing in front of me.
“This,” he repeats my hand motion, “is physical attraction.”
As much as I want to deny it, he is right. I am attracted to him and with all his subtle, small, occasional touches, there’s no doubt that he feels the same way.
“So what do we do about it over the next two week? Because, to be completely honest with you, it’s already torture.”
“Don’t think you can resist me, Sunshine?”
I roll my eyes and punch his bicep, resisting the urge to grab it and pull him closer to me, making him shut up in a completely different way…
“You feel it. I feel it,” he confirms. “Two weeks. There’s an end date. So let’s take the two weeks and get it out of our systems.”
Get it out of our systems.I can’t count how many times that line has been written into romance novels only for it to end up being the biggest lie. And here we are. Telling lies like we both expect this to remain surface level.
“No strings attached.”
I let out a frustrated sigh. “Have you seen the number of movies about friends with benefits? There’s literally a movie calledFriends With BenefitsandNo Strings Attachedwhere the main characters can’t stick to the rules they made up in the beginning.”
“The difference is we aren’t characters in some romantic comedy. We are actual people and staying away from each other isn’t working.” He’s right. It’s not. The amount of tension we have built up in the last week has become stifling. As thick as the fog covering the grass outside. “You leave at the end of it. I stay. We go back to our lives.”
No strings attached.The words bounce around in my head, a ping pong ball being volleyed back and forth. They hit the net and settle, softly bouncing on the table. Can I do no strings? I don’t want to admit it, but the crush I felt when I saw him in the coffee shop has only grown.
Just have fun.Charlotte’s words come back to me, convincing me to let loose and trust myself. A few short days and only one day at his place and my heart is retreating into enemy territory, betraying my determination to believe that I don’t deserve something like this.
No strings attached almost never works in movies or books, and a little bit of me knows when I leave this town, a piece of me will stay behind. Not just because of Hudson, but these people. This town. It has taken me by the best kind of surprise.
It is breakfast in bed, friends jumping out of their hiding places to yell “surprise!”, a gift out of nowhere just because, wrapped in paper hugged by a shiny, gold ribbon. A piece of me will always be here. And I can feel a small piece starting to break off and attach itself to Hudson.
“Two weeks,” I hear myself say before I can think about it anymore. The ping pong ball rolling off the table, gaining momentum until it becomes hidden in an overcrowded garage, lost among the piled up junk.
Overanalyze. Overthink. It’s what I always do. I’m done with that. At least, for two weeks I am. No overanalyzing. No overthinking. Just doing. Just action. Just him.
I’ll let myself freak out and panic about it on my 13-hour drive back to Malibu. But right now, all I want is his hands on me.
“Two weeks,” he repeats before he reaches for my waist, pulling me closer, the grill behind him forgotten. There is no space between our bodies and the heat under my skin is almost unbearable. With no warning, he lifts me up and wraps my legs around his waist, carrying me through the door and into the living room. I’m getting too used to him carrying me around. After he sets me down on my feet, he starts lowering his head, his lips hovering above mine before he stops abruptly.
“Wait,” he says. “Hold that thought. Don’t move.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
HUDSON
Irush through the back door, leaving Avery standing in the living room, confused. A look of hurt flashes across her face. “I’m coming right back, I promise. Just wait here,” I reassure her before running into the backyard.
I scrape my way across the yard, through the wildflowers and to the tree line where the saplings are planted. I find one that doesn’t look like it’s going to survive because of its smaller size and withering branches. I pull out a pocket knife from my back pocket & cut it near the bottom beforeI run back inside and stretch my arm out to Avery, sapling in hand.
“Here.”
I don’t think I have ever seen a more bewildered expression on a person’s face than the one on hers right now. I guess I would be confused too considering I just sprinted into my yard and cut out a tree like a crazy person.
“Before,” I continue. “You said that whatever this was between us stays in the woods. Well, now, so we follow what you said, here’s some of the woods,” I say, sheepishly realizing how ridiculous it sounds when I say the words out loud.
Avery grabs the sapling from me. “Hudson, you did not just go out into the woods and cut down a fucking tree to bring in here.”
I shrug. “Yeah, I did. It sounded a lot better in my head.”
