Page 28 of Fever Dream
“So, when you said earlier you were watching a show …” Harrison mulls thoughtfully. “And you said you thought of me?”
“Mmm?”
“Was it this scene that made you think of me?”
I burst out in a laugh, reading back on my earlier thoughts and where they had taken me. Cos in a way he’s kind of right. I was watching this very scene and thinking of Harrison. But that right there pretty much sums up my weird brain. Who knows what it’s thinking. I take no responsibility for it.
“Kinda, yeah,” I eventually admit. Harrison’s quiet on the other end of the line and I hope I haven’t offended him. “Not, like, in a bad way,” I hurry to add.
“Yeah. Course,” he replies but something sounds slightly off, and I grapple with what to say next.
“Sorry. I’m shit at boundaries,” is what I say.
He chuckles, soft and low. “I know, Casey. You don’t seem to know the word. But you don’t need to apologise for it. I think I like it about you.”
“You do?” I sigh, relief making me smile. “I never know. Some people just take me as I am, like Sonny for instance. Other people don’t know what to do with me.”
“And me? Where do I sit in that mix of people?”
“Ah, see that’s my dilemma. In my head you’re one of my people. Boundaryless. But I’m not sure if that’s just in my head and in truth I’m actually offending you constantly.”
Harrison is silent for a beat. Or two. “No, not in your head. I like being one of your people.”
I smile wide, the sounds of the rampant sex scene finally abating on the television screen. “See I knew that about you, Harry. I could tell from the moment we met. I can pick out my people in a crowd of a thousand.”
“That’s kind of sweet,” he mulls in return.
“I can be sweet.”
“Oh I know, darling, that’s not up for debate. You’re extremely sweet. I bet if I licked you you’d taste like candy.”
“Well,” I shrug. “Only one way to find out.”
Harrison splutters on the other end of the line. “Careful, Case. That sounds like flirting.”
“I can flirt with my best friends,” I reply. “That’s kind of the thing about having no boundaries.”
“So you think it’s within the best friend limits to lick each other, huh?”
“Definitely. Like poking your dimple.”
“I have never given you permission to touch my dimple,” he retorts, voice all gruff and cute.
“You’re funny, H,” I grin back. I can feel his answering smile down the line, and I tip my head back against the cushions. And because I’m feeling extra relaxed and cosy, I shove my hand down my pants for good measure because that sex scene has gotten me a little hot.
Besides, best friends shouldn’t mind if their best friend happens to touch themselves during phone calls. At least, I think that’s within the realms of best friendship. Either way, I don’t think I’m going to mention this to Harrison. Something tells me there might be a boundary there.
***
I wake up early the next morning to get dressed for dawn Pilates. I hope Harrison is still okay to make it because we ended up talking for hours on the phone last night. I gave him ample opportunities to hang up because I think we both knew I wasn’t going to be the one ending the conversation.
But he never did and so now I know stuff about Harrison that I’m pretty sure nobody else knows. Like how he tried out for the local soccer club when he was nine and made it onto the list only to discover he was really quite terrible at it but the club were desperate for numbers.
Of course, Harrison had called itfootballbut everybody knows what is really meant by the word football. And then Harrison told me about how a bunch of boys had been so mean to him that he ended up quitting the game after two seasons. And how that had led him to sports physiotherapy because he really did still love the game but he had come to realise his skills were better directed off the field than on.
I learnt all about Henrietta and Harrison’s parents and the country manor they had grown up in in the Cotswolds that sounded so idyllic and even fancier than I had pictured in my head.
He told me about his first kiss and the first time he’d gone all the way even though he’d been very coy about giving me names. Or details. He doesn’tkiss and tell, apparently which is something I found classically Harrison.
