“What?”
I genuinely don’t know what he’s talking about until I see the look on his face. He tosses my exam papers on the coffee table and grabs me, pushing me down onto the sofa. His lips descend on mine, and he kisses me roughly.
“Whoa!” I struggle to get out from under him. “Nate, I’m in the middle of something!”
“So what?” He silences my protest with another kiss. “You can do that later.”
This is so wild. Usually, we have sex, like, a dozen times the entire year, and now suddenly he wants me two days in a row. And his behavior seems strange. It almost feels like he’s hungry for me, like he’s ready to rip my clothing off, which is unusual for him. I haven’t seen this kind of passion from him in so many years.
I don’t know what’s going on. Does he have a brain tumor? Because that’s the only thing I can think of to explain this.
I would probably go to the bedroom with him if I didn’t have plans for tonight. But the truth is, I’m looking forward to seeing Jay. I don’t want to cancel, although I’ve never had a dilemma like this before.
“Nate.” I forcibly push him off me. “Maybe…could we do this another time? I want to get through these papers before I go out…”
“Seriously?”
“Yes!”
Nate looks at me in disbelief as he allows me to disentangle myself from his embrace. “I don’t get you, Eve. You are always whining that we don’t have sex enough, and now I want to do it, and you’re pushing me off you.”
“Nate…”
“No, forget it.” He climbs off me, a scowl on his lips. “I’ll take care of it myself then.”
I jump off the couch, calling his name as he storms off. The bedroom door slams upstairs, and now I’m the one staring in disbelief.
What on earth was that all about?
OceanofPDF.com
Chapter Forty
ADDIE
THE MEETINGS of Reflections used to be the best part of my day, but now all I want is for it to be over so that I can sneak off with Nathaniel to the darkroom.
“This whole poem,” Lotus says to me, “it’s too…sappy.”
“Sappy?” I repeat. The poem she’s looking at is one that I wrote while thinking about Nathaniel. It’s a love poem, but I didn’t think it was sappy.
Your eyes are brown
like freshly fallen
autumn leaves
I crave your embrace
in the misty night
I see you every day
But when I can’t be with you
I long to be in your arms
My love for you is like
a black hole
It is so deep
and I can’t stop falling
“Yeah.” She crinkles her nose. “I mean, look at this. ‘My love for you is like a black hole.’ Seriously, Addie? It sounds like some lovesick teenage girl wrote it. You don’t usually write shit like this.”
I snatch the poem away from her, my face on fire. I had been considering showing Nathaniel the poem today, but now I’m not so sure. I didn’t think it was sappy. I didn’t think it made me sound like a lovesick teenage girl. But then again, Lotus knows her stuff.
“I’m just trying to help,” Lotus says. “You need to have thick skin if you want to be a writer. People are going to tell you way worse stuff than that.”
“Yeah…” I look across the room, where Nathaniel is talking to another student. He notices me watching him, and he flashes a ghost of a smile. “I guess you’re right.”
She looks down at her watch, noting that it’s 4:30 now. The meeting is just about over. Thank God. “Hey,” she says. “You want to go grab some pizza?”
It’s the first olive branch Lotus has extended to me in a long time. Except I don’t want it. Becoming friends with Lotus would make it harder for me to meet up with Nathaniel. And no friendship is worth jeopardizing that.
“I have to be home for dinner,” I tell her.
“Oh. Okay.” Lotus looks disappointed, which surprises me. I thought she hated me. “Well, let’s go then.”
She grabs her bag, swings it over her shoulder, and waits for me. Except I can’t leave with Lotus. I’m not missing my opportunity to be with Nathaniel.
“Actually,” I say, “I need to talk to Mr. Bennett about something real quick. Maybe I’ll catch up with you later.”
Lotus gives me a funny look, but she doesn’t push me further. She doesn’t really have interest in being friends with me.
I let her leave first, but I don’t wait for Nathaniel. I leave the classroom and go directly to the darkroom. After all, it would look suspicious if we keep sneaking in there together.
While I wait for him, I smooth out the creases on my shirt and run my fingers through my hair. The last time we were in here, which was our third time, I took off my shirt, but I was kind of embarrassed about my bra. It was this tan-colored utilitarian bra that was basically the opposite of sexy. I wish I could take off my shirt and be wearing something cute and lacy, but I don’t own anything like that. And it’s not like I can get my mom to buy me a sexy bra. If I even asked for it, she would probably ground me on the spot.
Mostly, we have just kissed and he put his hands on my breasts. Other times, we will just talk, and sometimes he recites poetry for me. He knows so many poems by heart, including his personal favorite, “The Raven.” He is super patient with me, and he keeps telling me that we don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do. He just wants to be with me. He told me it was okay if we never had sex. I think we probably will someday, but I love that he is so patient.
While I’m waiting, my phone buzzes inside my jeans pocket. I pull it out and notice a message waiting for me in Snapflash. A lot of kids use Snapflash so their parents won’t invade their privacy and read all their text messages, but I only use it to communicate with one other person: Nathaniel. It was his idea, because the text messages disappear after sixty seconds. It’s the safest way to communicate.
I read the message that he sent to me:
Just finishing up. Will be there in two minutes.
I stare at the message until it disappears from the screen. I love the messages he sends me. Every time I get one, I read it and reread it for the entire sixty seconds.
After the message vanishes, I take out the poem I wrote for Nathaniel and read it one more time. Lotus said it was sappy, but I don’t think it is. It really does feel like my love for Nathaniel is this endless black hole. Lotus just doesn’t understand because she has never been in love. Really, I feel sorry for her.
The door to the darkroom cracks open, and I get that jolt of excitement like I always do practically anytime I see Nathaniel. But especially in here because I know he’s going to touch me. And I love the way his face lights up when he sees me.
“Addie,” he breathes. “My sweet Adeline.”
“Hi.” I always feel weirdly shy when he comes in here. It takes me a few minutes to warm up. “How are you?”
“Really good now that I’m here.” He crosses the small space and wastes no time in kissing me. Good thing he doesn’t get shy. “And there’s something I want to show you.”
“What is it?”
In the dim light, his cheeks color. “I wrote a poem—for you.”
This absolutely takes my breath away. He wrote a poem for me? How could that be? I’m not the kind of person who men write poems for. And yet he means it. Nathaniel Bennett wrote me a poem.
I’m going to faint from happiness.
“Do you want to hear it?” he asks, now shy himself.
I nod. “Very much.”
He pulls a scrap of notebook paper from his pocket. I recognize his handwriting now, and I can see the scribbles on the page. Words he wrote just for me. I listen in rapt attention as he recites the verses:
Life nearly passed me by
Then she
Young and alive
With smooth hands
And pink cheeks
Showed me myself
Took away my breath
With cherry-red lips
Gave me life once again