June, Reimagined (35)
“Tell me something about him,” Lennox said.
“He collected baseball cards,” June offered. “Hundreds of them. He always claimed he was going to sell them one day for millions of dollars.”
“An entrepreneur.”
June chuckled. “He only ate the middle of Oreos. Drove me crazy he wasted a perfectly good cookie.” The tightness in June’s chest eased a bit. “This one time in junior high, our mom was so sick of hearing us slam our doors all the time, she took them away. I was so mad I almost slammed my closet door just to piss her off.” June released her legs from her tight grasp. “I was lying on my bed, pissed, and Josh was in his room directly across the hall, just as mad, and the next thing I know, a tennis ball comes flying into my room. And there’s Josh, sitting on his bed, waiting with open hands, like ‘Come on. Throw the ball back.’ We played catch for hours. And then it kind of became our thing. Every night before bed, we’d play catch, Josh in his room, me in mine.”
“Did you ever get your doors back?”
June nodded. “Our parents gave them to us as Christmas presents. I acted relieved, but . . . I was actually sad. I knew we wouldn’t play catch anymore.”
“And did you?”
“Not once.” June curled back into a ball and rested her cheek on her knee. “Josh had a scar just like yours.” Then in what felt like the riskiest thing June had ever done—more than smoking a stranger’s weed at a Phish concert, more than jumping the railroad tracks in her dad’s new car, more than upending her life and flying to a foreign country to stay in a foreign town—she reached up and touched Lennox’s scar. He didn’t back away. She ran her finger across the crease below his eyebrow, taking her time, savoring the contact. She wanted intimacy with his skin, to experience every pore, every crinkle, every texture.
“How’d it happen?” Lennox asked.
“Pillow fight. I knocked him over, and Josh hit his eyebrow on the corner of the bedpost. He had to get stitches. I thought my mom was going to kill us. I swear every time he was mad at me, he’d rub that scar just to make me feel bad.” June’s hand fell away from Lennox. “How about you?”
Lennox rubbed his scar as if he could scrub it away. “A stupid fight.”
“No way. Mr. Responsibility, fighting? I don’t believe it.”
“Believe it, June.” Lennox spoke as if his words were weighted, and in his eyes was the cavernous, gutting sorrow June had seen before, recognized in herself, because while every living, breathing human carried the weight of grief and guilt in some form, only a few created a permanent harbor for it.
June placed a hand on his shoulder. “Lennox . . .”
He shook her off and stood. “Don’t tell me I’m a good person, Peanut. You don’t know me.”
June flinched at his condescension. Were they really back to this? She got up and walked away, wanting the boat’s length between them, but Lennox followed her.
“I’m sorry.”
June put her hands on the railing, looking out over the edge of the ship as if she were at sea, the salty air in her hair. “I hate those two words.”
I’m sorry about your loss.
I’m sorry you’re going through this.
I’m sorry this happened.
I’m sorry . . .
I’m sorry . . .
I’m sorry . . .
“I’m sorry” was never on time. It was always too late.
Those two words haunted June.
She didn’t want to talk about Josh anymore. The barn felt claustrophobic, the heat too much. She missed the cold, the deafening sound of wind in her ears. What she wouldn’t give for a snowball right now. A distraction. She saw a plastic sword leaning against the mast and grabbed it, pointing it at Lennox’s chest.
He threw his hands up in surrender. “What are you doing, Peanut?”
She pushed the pointed end into his chest. “It’s time you walk the plank.”
Lennox cocked an eyebrow and stepped back. “Now, just take it easy. No need to get pushy.”
June lifted the point of the sword to his throat. “How many times have I told you not to boss me around?”
Lennox backed up further. “How many times have I saved your arse when you haven’t listened?” He grabbed a play spear from the ground so quickly that June barely registered what he was doing.
She crouched with the sword, ready for a fight.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Lennox asked.
June whacked at his spear. “Why? Are you scared?”
“Of a bonnie wee lass the size of a Smurf?” She struck the shoulder she had bruised earlier with a snowball. Lennox flinched and grabbed at it. “Playing dirty, are we?”
“Is there any other way to play?”
A wicked grin grew on Lennox’s face. “I hope not.” He dropped the spear and lunged at June, who shrieked and threw up the sword, her only defense. She pivoted in an attempt to get away, but Lennox had her around the waist. He pulled her to his chest, licked his finger, and brought it to her ear.
June squirmed. “Don’t you dare, Lennox.”
“You’re the one who started this. Now just hold still. This will only take a moment.”
June hadn’t had a wet willy since elementary school. She thrashed against Lennox’s grip and laughed uncontrollably, begging him to stop, and before she knew it, they were face to face, not even a whisper between their bodies.