Leaning back, I gave him a once-over. Okay, it was a twice-over, but the newly discovered muscles were distracting. “I’ll bet you were the type to climb to the top of all the trees and scare your mom to death. And you were probably doing stunts on motorcycles by the time you were eight.”
He laughed. His feet brushed against mine in the water for a moment before I pulled them away. “I wish I were that cool back then. I was more like you, actually. Spent most of my free time reading in the hammock. The bigger stuff came later. Though, I did love a good slip ‘n’ slide. And not sure I’d consider climbing trees too dangerous.”
“What books did you love as a kid?”
“Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Percy Jackson—"
“Such a cliché.”
“Not clichés. Classics, Miss Secret Romance Books Hidden on Her Kindle.”
I blushed at the memory. “It was for research,” I insisted.
“Let’s do a quick recap. I walked into your classroom to ask you a question, and you didn’t even hear me because you were so engrossed in your billionaire-baby-vampire romance.”
“I was fact-checking.”
His smile widened. “For what?”
“One of my students wrote a paper on it, and I had to make sure she had actually read it.”
He laughed again, pinching the bridge of his nose as he did so. “I think all your classic books are just a disguise. Are you ever gonna tell me what else you have on your Kindle?”
I kept my face passive, but my heart rate spiked. I would slice my right arm off before anybody saw what was on there—especially Miles Taylor.
“Nothing that would interest you.”
“Probably right. And I get in trouble for The Terminator?”
“Yes. There couldn’t possibly be a single redeemable thing in that movie that should instigate a discussion in a school setting.”
“Clearly you’ve never watched it.”
I shook my head and looked back toward the pond, ready to change the subject, but Miles beat me to it.
“What happened with Glenn?”
I groaned, tilting my head at him. “Really? Why? We just got rid of him.”
“Can’t blame your fake boyfriend for being a little curious about your exes. Why’d you break up?”
I scoffed. “Can’t you see why?”
“I can see. But I want to know what you saw.”
Tucking my hair behind my ear, I thought about what to say to Miles. I was completely over Glenn. Had been, in fact, for nearly three months before I had the guts to end it. The only thing that made me agree to this fake dating was that Glenn’s ego wouldn’t let me go. Glenn had clearly been glad he showed up at the hot tub tonight. He had wanted to watch me fail. To prove himself right. If Miles hadn’t been here, he would have been much more of a nuisance toward me this week. I would have been living next door to him in Chloe’s cabin. I didn’t want to feel grateful that Miles was here in the hot tub with me instead of Glenn, but the thoughts came anyway.
He adjusted his position in the water, his foot brushing against mine again for a second and causing me to snap out of my thoughts. He was watching me, patiently waiting for me to gather my thoughts.
“He was just…kind of a jerk.”
When Miles didn’t react, I added, “He always...had a way of making me feel small.” My words came out shy and unsure, as if I had just accidentally given him more of myself than I should have. But when I looked at him nervously, he was nodding.
“I can see that. He looks like the type who has a habit of doing that to everybody he’s around.”
I nodded. “Sorry about him.”
He smiled. “I can handle him. How’d he take the breakup?”
I cupped a scoop of water in my hands and watched the water escape. I had given him a crumb, and now I was tempted to offer a bite as I felt myself relax a tiny fraction in his company. “In true Olive fashion, I couldn’t find a decent excuse to break up with him, so instead of facing the problem straight on and just doing it, after college, I made sure to pick a job two states away. Long distance really wasn’t his style. So, while I technically broke up with him, it was all done very…strategically.”
“How did you end up dating him?”
“He was my neighbor growing up. He’s a few years older so never had much to do with me, but when we connected during my final year at UNH, he asked me out. I was pretty flattered at the time. We dated about six months total, but I’d say the last three, I wanted out.”
“So why’d you stay with him?”
“He was nice.” I shrugged. “At least, at face value. He could put on a good show. My parents loved him, so I kept brushing off all the little comments, thinking I was overreacting. He was always flipping things around in conversation to make something my fault. But it was all done in such a friendly way, with a smile, like he was just teasing. I didn’t have a concrete thing to hold onto that would be a good enough reason to break up. So, I just avoided the problem and secretly sent out applications out of state.”
“Sometimes that’s the only way to get rid of guys like that.”
We sat in contemplative silence for a long moment, me reliving brief moments in my history with Glenn and cringing. I hadn’t known what it felt like to be around Glenn until I got away from him. Only then could I put into words just how he had made me feel. One thing it did teach me, though, was that I never wanted to feel that way again.
“You know that you’re not…small, right?”
I startled and raised my eyebrows at Miles. His eyes widened, and an embarrassed smile flashed across his face. “No, I meant…you’re not—" He put his hands over his face while we both began to laugh.
“I meant that…even though you’re kind of annoying, personality wise…you’re big time. Top-notch.”
I was still trying to hold back my laughter when I took in his gaze, piercing and direct on mine. Though he was across the hot tub from me, tingles began at the base of my stomach and worked their way outward toward every limb and nerve ending on my body.
“Thanks,” I said, turning my attention back to the water. Things suddenly felt a little too intense for a fake-date situation. “You could have fooled me with how you treat me at school.”
Another smile touched his lips. “Well, the joke’s on you because I only tease people I like.”
It didn’t mean anything. I didn’t want it to mean anything. He liked a lot of people. But for some reason, his words kept me warm the whole frigid walk back to my cabin.
FIFTEEN
“Merry Christmas little fella. We know that you're in there, and that you're all alone."
Home Alone
A loud banging noise woke me with a gasp and a start. I looked around the small log bedroom in a state of confusion before I heard Miles’s cheerful voice from outside.
“Rise and shine, Celery Stick! We’ve got a lot to do today.”
Not for the first time, I found myself wishing that my bedroom wasn’t right next to the front door on the porch. My first choice had been the other bedroom down the small hallway, but it was locked for some reason, which disturbed me greatly, but when I asked Miles about it, he only shrugged.