“Kins, you’re always forgettingthat I know when you’re telling the truth, and right now, you’relyin’.”
Yeah, I was, but to prove a point, I pulled my head back,putting distance between us. Patrick didn’t react; he was too cool for that. Hejust smiled, and his dimples peeked through the stubble.
“Hey, do you know what my favorite memory is?” he asked ina whisper, reaching a hand out to brush against my cheek.
CHAPTER 6 |
Swings & Lame Irishmen
We said, “Ilove you” when we weresixteen.
It wasn’t until we were fifteen that we decidedto be boyfriend-and-girlfriend. Never mind that we were already making out any chancewe were alone, which wasn’t often after his mother had caught us that day onhis couch. Giving ourselves that official title of exclusivity though, broughtits perks: bragging rights among friends who mattered at the time and neveragain, and the freedom to flaunt moral displays of affection in public withoutour parents scolding us to “behave ourselves.”
We went through the first year of our“relationship,” simply liking each other, and only teasing one another with themore serious L Word to make the other blush the way our annoying siblings did.I wasn’t sure throughout those 365 days that I would ever confess how I trulyfelt. I didn’t know if he would ever learn that I laid awake in bed mostnights, thinking about how hot he had become and how much I loved hearing himlaugh.
And God, those eyes. I could circle the globeand never find another pair of eyes quite as full of everything as his.
I never would.
But anyway, every night, I agonized over myconfession. Wringing my cat-printed comforter in my hands, playing myBackstreet Boys love songs, while practicing my lines. Imagining thedayI would have the courage to tell him.
Until I finally did.
We were kicking at the grass below our feet,dangling from the swing set in my backyard. Our eyes stared, as they did.Sometimes, we didn’t talk for twenty minutes at a time. We just … stared,figuring things out without the hindrance of words. I found my heart notpounding, but singing—full, warm. My chest felt as though it had grown threetimes its size with every gentle sway of my swing past his, and I couldn’t stopthe words as they pushed upward from my chest.
“I love your eyes.”
Wow, how stupid.
I turned away, breaking the spell, and lookedtoward the backdoor of my house. What was I looking for? Maybe I was worried myparents or sister had heard. Stupid Kinsey, opening her stupid mouth and sayingstupid things to the neighbor boy. Ruining good friendships with silly words.
The worst thing? It wasn’t what I wanted to say.It was close, but it wasn’t quite there. If I had said it minus the “eyes” andthe extra “r,” then … Yep, that would have been it, but God, what a scarything. The things it could create, the things it could destroy ...
We’re taught that love is a serious thing, butthat’s where the teaching seems to stop. When we find it, we’re left to handleit on our own. We’re left to question if we have, in fact, found it, becausenobody can definitively describe what lovereallyis anyway.We’re left to wonder if it’s real, if it’s fake, if you’re only simply in lovewith theideaof someone …
But no. Fuck that. At sixteen, I knew, that Iwas in love with Patrick Kinney. Maybe I had fallen before then—maybe even onthat Magical Couch in the living room. But I didn’t know it, didn’treallyknow it, until I was dangling from thoseswings in my backyard, because he had those eyes and he made everything allright.
But, he was also a stupid boy, and he didn’tsay a damn thing in response. So, I defended myself by getting annoyed.
“Forget I said anything,” I snapped, grippingthe chains of my swing.
“Why would I do that?”
“Because it was stupid.”
I nudged a tuft of grass from the ground withthe toe of my sneaker. The soil beneath it was black, still moist from when itrained the day before. I stared at the clump beneath me, wondering if I’d getin trouble, when Patrick gripped the chain of my swing and pulled me towardhim. I turned my head to look in the eyes I had confessed my love for, and hepressed his forehead into mine.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hi.”
“So, if you think that’s stupid, then you’llthink I’m afeckin’ idiot.”
“Why?”
Without checking to see if anybody waswatching, or if we would get caught and scolded for being inappropriate,Patrick kissed me.
He had kissed me hundreds of times over theyears since that first time on the Magical Couch, each time seemingly betterthan the last. Less clumsy, less sloppy. More sensual, more practiced, and thistime, on the swing set in my backyard, we had taken a turn toward a ratingteetering between PG-13 and R.
