On Rotation(12)

Just the image was giving me palpitations. No way was I letting it become a reality.

Giving him an apologetic smile, I took the chain from him and quickly fastened the pendant around my neck myself. When I looked up, Ricky was giving me that look again, the one he’d given me back at the garden that made me feel like I was under a microscope. Not heavy or sexual, like he was undressing me with his eyes, but somehow more intimate, like he was taking me apart and putting me back together again in his head.

“When did you get this?” I said, breaking the silence.

“When I got our water,” Ricky said. He cocked his head, regarding me with a smile. “It looks nice.”

Thank goodness for the gift of melanin. If I had Michelle’s complexion, I would have been beet red. Just in case my embarrassment was still apparent, I walked purposefully in front of him, heading toward the end of the street, where a large stage was set up. This close, the music, before just a distant thumping, was deafening. A small group of people sat on the curb by the stage, eating their festival food and slurping from pineapples filled with pi?a coladas, chatting with one another as the DJ tried his best to gain their attention. A troupe of girls danced drunkenly to the music, spinning in lazy, uncoordinated circles. The dance floor would fill up in a couple of hours, when the festivalgoers had a bit more to drink, but for now, it was sparse.

“I think we’ve seen everything,” I said. The Water Tribe pendant, though cool to the touch, felt hot against my clavicle.

“Yeah?” Ricky said. He sounded almost mournful.

I nodded, looking to the stage. To my amazement, the sun was straddling the horizon. Nia had sent me a text an hour and a half ago announcing that she was coming home, and my response (Me too, boo!) had turned out to be a lie.

The song changed to a bluesy cover of “In the Pines” that I recognized from my playlist of TV show soundtracks. I closed my eyes, letting the speakers blast the words into my body. We listened to the first chorus in comfortable silence, swaying and holding on to what we both had to know were our final moments together. Our knuckles bumped against each other, but neither of us shifted to make space, relishing in those small, innocuous touches. I realized, chagrined, that I wanted him to hold my hand.

“My girl, my girl, don’t lie to me . . . Tell me where did you sleep last night,” Ricky sang softly next to me. I turned to him, surprised that he knew the song, and he smiled down at me, his dimples popping into view. For a brief moment, I felt like a girl in a movie, like all the previous day’s misfortune had occurred just to lead me to this place, to this boy. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to like Ricky. He liked me, right? That was what all this was about—his drawing, our day at this festival, the gift he had practically slung over my neck. And why wouldn’t he? Already, we seemed to slot together like adjacent puzzle pieces, our tastes in music and media, interests, and values aligning almost exactly. It was as though the heavens had seen me crying and dropped the perfect guy to wipe away my tears right at my feet. I didn’t believe much in fate, but maybe Ricky hadn’t been so far off when he said that our meeting was a part of a cosmic plan.

“My girl, my girl, where will you go? I’m going where the cold wind blows,” I sang back, just a little louder. Ricky’s eyes brightened with delight, so genuine that it made my chest hurt. We sang the last bit together, bellowing at the top of our lungs without a care for pitch or tone or decorum.

“In the pines, in the pines, where the sun never shines, I WOULD SHIVERRRRR . . . the whole night through!”

When the song ended, we buckled over in unison, erupting into peals of laughter.

“Oh man, you are super talented,” I said, “but so tone deaf.”

Ricky waved me off, still braced on his knees.

“Yeah, well, I wouldn’t quit med school for a music career if I were you,” he said, wiping away tears. We grinned at each other stupidly for a moment, and then he straightened.

“I guess you have to go,” he said.

“Yeah,” I said, suddenly subdued. Goodbyes were always strange, but this one felt especially hard. “Well,” I added, “you have my number.”

I didn’t need to look at Ricky to know that he was doing that overly intense staring thing again.

“Yeah,” he said. He stepped closer, like some part of him resented the space between us. His gaze dropped rapidly to my mouth and then traveled back up to my eyes, and I tracked it, sucking in my bottom lip instinctively. He was going to kiss me. It would be a perfect kiss to close an almost perfect day, just awkward enough with my hands full of funnel cake that we would probably share a laugh afterward, and I would definitely fall for him then.

I couldn’t let that happen. I stepped away abruptly.

“Can I see you again?” Ricky said, undeterred.

I tilted my head, considering.

“Are you asking me out on a date, Ricardo?” I said teasingly, tracing the raised swirls of the Waterbender symbol on my pendant.

Suddenly, the air between us grew cold. I watched Ricky’s expression cycle between panic and chagrin before evening out to a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.

I knew that look. Fucking hell. I thought about what I’d thought of him, when he’d first bent over to ask me if I was okay: No way is a guy who looks like that gonna be single—

“Um,” he said. “Sorry. No, I didn’t mean to give you the wrong idea . . .”