Page 52 of My Revenant
Rabbit
Isn’t it cold?
I know a way to keep warm.
Rabbit
I’m not coming.
You will be ;)
Rabbit
Gross.
See you in an hour, Rabbit.
twenty-one
Jonah - Past
THE TASTE OF CIGARETTES AND HOPE.
We were at the Meadow Park field again. We had been every other day for the past two weeks. Dex would text me to meet him here, I’d tell him no, and then I’d show up anyway.
The field was bathed in the warm light of the afternoon sun. It was a rare day compared to the weather we’d been getting lately, without a single cloud in the sky. It was still cold. The gentle breeze carried an unfriendly chill, but lying here in the grass, we were shielded from most of it.
I’d lost track of how long we’d been here, and I couldn’t find it in me to care anymore.
I hadn’t wanted to tell Becca about this, but when I was suddenly hanging out with her less and I wasn’t at home, the beach, or the diner, she’d all but guessed what I’d been up to. To say she disapproved was an understatement, and I understood her concern. I did, and yet here I was again anyway, because he’d asked me to be.
That first night he’d texted me to meet him here, I’d fully intended to stay away. But then an hour had passed, and it was the time we were supposed to meet, and Dex was silent. He hadn’t texted me again like I’d expected him to, hadn’t followed up to see if I was still going to come.
It was the silence that had propelled me into pulling off the covers, getting dressed, and facing the ache in my leg as I made my way here. I couldn’t shake the feeling that maybe something waswrong. By the time I got here, I’d half expected him to be gone, but there he was, lying in the grass, looking at the stars. In silence, I’d taken my place next to him, and we’d stargazed for an hour before he was on me.
That became our pattern. Dex would message me, and I would come, summoned like a loyal dog and hating myself for it. We’d lie in the grass. He’d watch the sky, and I would pretend I was as well until he decided that enough time had passed and he’d give his attention to me instead, his hands or mouth on my body in a way I was growing dangerously familiar with.
Whatever hopes I had of getting him out of my system were shattered a little more each time he broke me open beneath him. Each time I unraveled from his touch only left me wanting more.
It was a dangerous thing. His touch felt like a drug. Something powerful. Something deadly. Each time I’d swear it would be the last, and then I’d be back again at the very next opportunity. I guess that was the thing with drugs; no one planned to become an addict. “Just one more and then I’ll stop” becomes a constant mantra, and suddenly there’s a dependency that’s increasingly difficult to overcome. I was at risk of becoming an addict for him. I still couldn’t bring myself to stop.
I turned my head to look at Dex, still gazing at the cloudless sky.
His eyelashes were ridiculously long, and I wondered if they obscured his vision. Surely he could see them when he blinked. It wasn’t normal, and it wasn’t fair, how they framed his icy blue eyes and made them even more striking. His lips weren’t fair either, full and pink and perfect. Fuck, he was beautiful.
“Something on my face?” Dex asked, those perfect lips pulling up into a smirk.
“No.” My fingers reached for his as I stole the smoke from him, bringing it to my lips.
His eyes stayed on me, so I turned away, watching the smoke I exhaled dance in the breeze until it disappeared completely.
“What’s your dad like?” he asked. The question startled me. We talked sometimes, but never about anything serious, and certainly not about our parents.
I took my time answering, wondering if he’d drop the subject if I was quiet for long enough. He continued to stare at me, the weight of his attention increasingly heavy, like an anvil slowly cracking open the shield I kept around me.
“He’s…” I tried to think of a way to describe the man I shared a house with. When no good words came to me, I simply sighed and let out the truth that constantly bubbled under my surface like a poison. “He’s a piece of shit, is what he is.”
“Does he hurt you?”
