There is honesty within his eyes, somewhere within the fire that’s still burning, and I know that I can trust him enough to share my secrets, to tell him about Portland and the people there. It takes me a minute or so to make up my mind. Only Amelia knows my secret and I’m undecided whether or not I want to make that two people instead of one, but Tyler gives me an encouraging nod, like he’s trying to convince me to jump off a cliff with him, and I give in.
I take a few deep breaths, building up the courage to speak. The truth is, I don’t want to admit what’s going on. “I love Portland. It was an amazing city to grow up in,” I say with a sort of sad smile, as though I’m reminiscing about the good old days, as my grandparents would call them. “I had three really close friends. Amelia, Alyssa, and Holly.”
“Had?”
“Had,” I confirm. Tyler is staring at me with keen interest, taking in my every move, every word. “When my parents got divorced I was thirteen, and it hit me really hard. I used to cry myself to sleep, because my mom would be crying and my dad wouldn’t be there and I didn’t know how to make her feel better and it just sucked. It really, really sucked.” I pause for a moment, my next few words proving difficult to force out of my mouth, but somehow I manage, somehow I can handle it. “I started to eat a lot because I was so upset, and I put on some weight during freshman year. Alyssa and Holly had a lot to say about it.”
I can see Tyler glance down at my body, and it only makes me feel even more insecure than I did before. I try to breathe in. “You’re not fat,” he states bluntly, like he’s mad at me for even suggesting it.
“That’s because I run, Tyler.”
He continues to study me, as though he’s trying to figure out what I’m thinking, just like I always try to figure him out. He slowly shifts his body across the floor, almost cautiously, and then positions himself directly in front of me. My body is trapped between his legs, and he places his hands on my knees, his touch making me flinch. “Keep talking.”
My train of thought has been interrupted by the desire to reach over and kiss him, so I place a hand to my cheek and force myself to continue. “They made me feel like shit,” I admit, because it’s true. Alyssa and Holly did treat me awfully for over a year, they did throw snide remarks about my weight into every conversation, and they did cause the downward spiral of my mental health. “I had two of my supposed best friends calling me fat every day, so I started running. We don’t talk anymore, but they still bitch about me behind my back. It’s just hard, because Amelia…Amelia’s still friends with them. She stuck by my side the whole time though.”
“Eden,” Tyler says, firmly again, like the only way to get my full attention is to use the quiet force of my name. “That’s why you always say you’re never hungry, isn’t it?”
My lips part as I stare back at him, almost embarrassed that he’s paid so much attention to me. Not even Dad has picked up on this. But then again, he’s always been selfish. “You noticed that?”
“Only just now.” He glances down to stare at my legs as he runs his fingers from my knees to my thighs, lightly skimming my skin. “Just so you know, I completely disagree with those girls. I’m sorry for what they did.” With his head still tilted down toward my thighs as he continues tracing patterns, he glances up at me through his eyelashes, his eyes unbelievably powerful, and I succumb to their strength and the sensation of his skin against mine.
And he must feel the way my shoulders relax and sink back down with a breath of relief, and he must sense the way my entire body grows almost limp beneath his touch, and he must be sharing the same thoughts as I am, because his fingertips stop circling my skin and he grabs my thighs, leaning forward and crashing his lips against mine.
I don’t know why, but I love it each time he completely dominates the situation. It’s like he’s doing all the hard work while I bask in the exhilaration and the adrenaline. I’m starting to get used to the way his lips fit against mine. My arms seem to move on their own accord, loosely throwing themselves around his neck as I smile against him somewhere amid the kiss. I like that this is beginning to feel familiar.