Playing Hurt

Clint

hooking





I swear, the couple of days I agree to take off from work after the accident torture me far worse than the actual dislocation. Because I spend the whole time thinking about Chelsea—and how wrong I’ve been. I never should have pushed her away, never should have ignored the way every single fiber in my entire body told me she was what I wanted. I have to talk to her, but not on the phone. I know I have to look in her face to tell her what’s swirling through my head.

The day I finally do go back to work, I’m armed with Ibuprofen, the promises I made to Mom about taking it easy, and the promises I made to Pop about doing the gentle range-of-motion exercises the ER doc gave me so my arm won’t freeze. I’d promise anything at this point; I have to get out of the house.

I can’t wait to find her.

I’m sore and tender, but I still rush to cabin number four. When I realize it’s empty, I start breaking my promise to Mom by racing around the resort searching for Chelsea. Because yes, maybe there’s another guy waiting at home for her. Maybe she does have feelings for him. But isn’t there still love inside me, too, for Rosie? Won’t there always be?

Screw Gabe. Screw all this stupid fear. And screw the clock that counts down the time Chelsea and I have left. I’m already in deep enough that it’ll hurt when she leaves. I’ll miss her. But right now? All I know is that I want her. That I’m giving this a shot.

By the time I rush into the lodge, I’m covered in a thick, sticky sweat. I feel a little beat up, but it’s worth it when I finally find her in the lobby, staring at the bulletin board that still has her photo tacked to it—the one I took of her and her walleye.

When she turns and sees me, her face smooths out, like maybe my showing up means she’s just found what she’s been looking for, too.

“You could go out on the boat again,” I say, pointing at the photo of her walleye. Not at all what I’d wanted to say, but I don’t really know where to start.

“It wouldn’t be the same without you.” She smiles at me. “And you’re out of commission for the next few weeks. At least you don’t have to wear a sling. Does it still hurt?”

“The thing is,” I say, charging ahead, not able to hold it back any longer, “you get hurt regardless, you know? No matter how safe you try to stay. Things … you … ” You had two days to think of what you’d say to her, Morgan, and here you are acting like an idiot.

Chelsea grins slyly. “You decide to change your mind about the trainer thing?” she whispers.

God, did I.

“Listen,” she says. “I have an idea. About what we could do tomorrow. If you think you can get away, that is.”

“I can get away,” I tell her. I glance up to make sure the front desk is still empty, that no one from the dining room is heading into the lobby. When I’m sure we’re good and alone, I search her eyes. They curl into a smile as I lean forward to let my lips graze her cheek.

“How about,” she says, playing back, her lip running along my jaw, “bowling?”

“Bowling?”

“Yeah, a rematch.”

“I don’t think so,” I tell her, running my fingers along the V-neck of her blouse.

“Drive-in got another classic movie playing?”

“Chelse—”

“Okay—how ’bout that rain check?”

I squint at her, shake my head. “Rain check,” I repeat, not quite understanding.

“Remember? When Mom showed up at the cabin? And you told me ‘rain check’?”

“You want to go night fishing,” I mumble, but I can’t laugh, not with my entire body threatening to explode.

“Meet me at my cabin. Seven o’clock,” she says. “Brandon’ll be at Pike’s by then. So will Mom and Dad.” Her voice trails off and her eyes spark as she flashes me a crooked grin.

“Just make sure,” I tell her, “to duct tape Brandon’s strap to his Marshall this time.”





Chelsea

score





Sure you don’t want to come?” Dad asks for what must be the eighty billionth time.

I shake my head.

“You and I could go out to the patio at Pike’s. Horse rematch. Come on,” he pleads. “That band of Brandon’s gets a little—”

“—bit better every single time we go,” Mom interrupts. “And it’s our last chance to hear the Dwellers play. You sure you want to miss out on that?”

You really have no idea how much I want to miss out on that, I think as I try to play it cool, nonchalantly waving them all goodbye.

And then I’m alone, in a quiet cabin, waiting for Clint. And waiting. Fidgeting.

I sit on the couch, stare for a moment at the spiral notebooks Mom’s stacked on the coffee table—I open one and start thumbing through, flipping past all the recipes she’s been tweaking. When I get to the blank pages at the end, I drum my fingers awhile. Hate the empty sound they make against the paper. Just for something to do, I pick up the red marker Mom’s been using to edit her recipes and draw a giant heart on the page.

As I run the marker over the heart, quickly coloring it in, I can hear the now familiar sound of the waterfall in the distance. It pulses like the blood in my ears.

My mind races as I begin to cook up a plan, a way to make sure Clint and I won’t be interrupted this time. A plan to make sure the wild, excited rhythm of my body—the rhythm that drums every time I see Clint—will get a chance to beat within the world’s most perfect setting.

I flip through the rest of the notebook, drawing a giant red heart on each page and quickly coloring it until I hit the last blank sheet. On this page, I write a quick note.

Mind churning, I rip all my pages from the notebook. I grab the comforter off the twin bed in my room, fold it up, and tuck it under one arm.

I hurry out the door, shutting the screen on the note I’ve just written, and hurry down the front steps. My entire body is throbbing as I tuck myself into a thick patch of leaf-covered branches and wait for Clint to make his appearance.

When he shows, he’s rushing. Probably faster than he’s supposed to. He hurries up the porch steps, knocks on the door. Takes off his cap and smooths his hair. Raises a fist to knock again when he sees my note. He snags it and reads the message I scrawled for him:

Follow the hearts …

He darts for the porch railing as if to jump it, then pauses, obviously thinking better of it (probably remembering the doctor’s warnings about reinjuring his shoulder—don’t I know what that’s like). He hurries down the steps.

I spear my first heart page through the lowest branch of a tree just beside the path stretching toward the waterfall. And I start to make my way up the trail, spearing pages of red hearts onto the lower limbs of trees. I look over my shoulder to see what kind of progress Clint’s making. But I keep moving forward, even while glancing back, keeping myself in the cover of low-hanging limbs. I’m not quite ready for him to see me.

He keeps making motions with his hands as if to tell himself, Just calm down and think. He finally zeroes in on the first heart I’ve pinned. When he snags it off the tree, he’s not too far away for me to see the smile break across his face.

He glances about, grabbing the heart off the next limb, the next …

I’m absolutely brimming with excitement. Not fear. Just pure elation, anticipation. Adrenaline breaks inside me, scattering warmth through my chest. I return to spearing hearts onto low limbs. I work my way slowly, almost feeling like I’m play-acting what slo-mo looks like. But this isn’t a challenge, not like the day out there in the marsh on our ATVs. I’m not racing him. I want him to catch me.

Butterflies dance joyfully inside me when his feet snap a few twigs just behind my shoulder. He slips my last heart out of my hand before I can hang it on the tree in front of me.

“Finally ready to see that waterfall?” I hear him ask.

When I turn, he’s folding my hearts, putting them in his back pocket.

“I wanted to see it for the first time with you,” I tell him. I hold out my hand, which Clint fills with his warm, rough skin.

A fine spray pelts me as we hurry to the top of the hill. My breath bursts in harder, faster spurts as we near the peak. Good God—the sight that greets me as we round the top curve is absolutely majestic. Frothy white foam cascades over the top of a rocky cliff and pummels a small pond below. A stream of clear blue water flows back down the hill. Birds trill and flowers bloom everywhere—mist dots my skin and tangles itself up in my eyelashes.

Clint points out a flat rock where we can stand safely—high above the rest of the world, it seems—and watch bees flit from blossom to blossom in search of the sweetest nectar. We watch squirrels and a raccoon bravely come inches from our toes before racing off again. I gaze down into the glassy stream that flows into the Rainy River. The sound of the water is no mere rhythm—it’s a melody. A love song. As I watch a small gray-winged bird (a dove, maybe?) swoop down for a drink, suddenly I have to get a taste of that water myself, have to feel it against my skin.

I scurry down the rocks as carefully as I can, Clint following behind me. At the edge of the wide pool at the base of the waterfall, I put the comforter down and start to kick my sneakers off, ready to ease my body into the water, eager to feel gurgles and bubbles dancing up around me. This is the perfect place to pick up where we left off … this is no mere shower, but a waterfall. I want him to follow suit, to slip out of his shorts, kick off his shoes. But he just shakes his head.

“No,” he tells me, picking the comforter up and motioning for me to follow. “I want to show you something.”

He guides me along the edges of the rocks, closer to the waterfall itself. When we’re close enough to reach out and touch the brutal stream, he shows me a pocket behind the falls where smooth rocks have formed a tiny little room—a sanctuary of cool peace behind the violent, pounding water.

I’m still drinking in the utter sweetness of our seclusion as Clint spreads the comforter across the stone ground. “Perfect,” he says, sitting down on it.

I finally get my feet to move, and I sit on the blanket beside him.

The waterfall’s mist dances across our arms. I reach out to draw a small heart on his forearm, the way little kids draw on rain-soaked windows.

Clint picks up my hand, puts it against his chest. I can feel his heart beating so hard it must hurt. “That’s for you,” he whispers.

We start kissing as though we’d never once been interrupted—not by George on the night we fooled around in the lake, not by my mom, not by nagging guilt. And certainly not by the ancient (or not-so-ancient) histories of our own loves. It’s as though all the should-we-or-shouldn’t-we’s never bloomed and spread like weeds. As though neither one of us has ever worried about breaking someone else’s heart or dishonoring the past. As though neither one of us has ever been hurt. Or afraid.

The outside world evaporates. Desire—that’s the only thing that fills the space between us. Only there isn’t any space, not when we wrap our arms around each other, pull our bodies together. Somehow, though, even with our chests pressed tightly against each other, we aren’t close enough. Clint pulls off my cami and peels his damp T-shirt from his glistening chest. Skin on skin, and still, it isn’t what either of us need.

He tugs at my shorts, pulling them down to my ankles. I kick them away and slip my fingertips into the sides of my panties. I’m completely, gloriously naked. Clint’s breath draws goose bumps as he kisses the back of my neck … my arms.

We tangle around each other like lady slippers twisting to move beyond the shade. Searching out the heat of our passion the way a flower seeks the heat of the sun.

His mouth is everywhere—my breasts, my nipples. My hands follow the hard muscles in his abdomen. We lie intertwined on our bed as the mist continues to paint our bodies with a heavy coating of dew. Our hair shimmers in the fragrant spray.

We rock together like two boats bobbing on a current. He chases running droplets of mist down my skin with his tongue. I race my fingers down his legs, vowing not to let a centimeter of his skin go untouched.

Mist and sweat and desire tumble down my back and breasts and arms.

This is right. The words keep swirling through my mind like a whirlpool.

Clint quickly rolls on a condom he’s pulled from his own cast-aside shorts, his breath heavy with emotion.

Don’t stop, I tell myself as I straddle his gorgeous body. I can feel him against the inside of my leg, every bit as feverish as the heat that pulses inside me.

“Chelsea,” he moans. “Please—”

He doesn’t have to ask again.