Second First Impressions(48)

“When I get out of this pool, I want you to close your eyes.”

He covers his face. A sparkling hazel eye peeps through a big gap in his fingers. My laugh turns up his wattage. His hand drops away, revealing saucy eyebrows. “What’s the big deal?”

“Gravity’s the big deal.” We’re very close, but there’s something about floating that makes it feel okay. “Not everyone looks like you in their swimwear.”

“You flatter me.” We’re now floating closer, our hands making circles in the water, knees sometimes touching. “Do you think I’m a bit pretty, Ruthie Maree?”

I’m starting to get out of breath. “What’s it like being so self-confident?” I sink lower in the water.

“It’s just how I feel when I’m with you. But then I can’t seem to get the reaction I want from you, and I start doubting myself. Then I look at my reflection in a spoon and I’m an abomination. By dinnertime I’m a wreck and the ugliest man in existence.” He seems to bite off this torrent midstream and closes his eyes for a second like he’s exasperated. “I say the stupidest stuff to you. Why does this keep happening? I’m actually really normal and cool.”

I nod sagely. “I want to believe you.”

He goes completely still, because he’s tall enough to stand on the bottom. He puts my hand on his shoulder like I need assistance and a rest. Accurate. His eyelashes are crisscrossed spikes. Under my palm there’s a lit match inked onto him, and I feel that tiny spark.

His lip lifts in amusement. “Now you’re making me feel pretty.”

“As if you need little old me to pump up your ego.”

“Oh, but I do.”

Keeping the smile off my face around him is turning me into a medically certified killjoy. But if I relax, what will happen? He’ll be unstoppable. He’ll annihilate me.

“Hands where we can see them,” one of the residents shouts at us, and the shrieks of laughter echo off every reflective surface.

“Okay,” I hold my other hand up, and the laugh gets louder. “They honestly suspect me of feeling you up on a workday? Dirty old women.” The cogs turn in my brain. “Oh. They were talking to you.”

“You have a guilty conscience, don’t you? Where were we. Oh yeah, self-confidence. You gotta start walking around like you’re the shit, because you are,” he tells me, gathering up my hand and walking me in an improvised backward water waltz. “Want to hear a secret?” Even before he opens his mouth, I see the compliment coming straight for me like a shark fin. “Neat and tidy is my absolute favorite kind of girl.”

I don’t know how he can switch modes so easily. He was just horsing around poolside. Now, he’s got darkening eyes and that seductive husk in his voice.

I decide to try swimming for shore. “Okay.” I’m twirled out to the length of his arm, the water churning around us.

“But you don’t believe me.” He pulls me back, closer this time. “Your eyes are …” He blinks away from me now. Why would he feel self-conscious? He does, and it flips my heart. “Magnetic,” is what he goes with. Then he groans at himself. “I’m corny as fuck.” He dips down under the water for a bit.

When he resurfaces, I say sternly, “You’ve found the only female under the age of fifty in the building to mess around with. That’s what this is.”

But it’s too late. A flattered sizzle goes down my spine at the exact moment that he puts his hand low down on my back, only a wafer of wet fabric between us.

“Learn to take a compliment. Appreciate yourself. You’re sublime.” That’s the last word I ever thought would be applied to me.

“That’s kind of you to say.”

“Oh, I’m not kind. I nearly reverted to my old ways the other night, at your place. You should know my secret. I have a major Heaven-Sent-Francine-Percival kink.”

“Okay, well, she is gorgeous.”

“I love neat-and-tidy types who have label makers and smell like a bubble bath. All the soup cans in the cupboard with the labels facing the same way. The bath filling up at the same time every night. God, you walk around in this haze of bubbles. I just want to eat all your cheese and snuggle up in your bed. I can admit it.”

“I’m pretty aware of that.” My throat is making my voice weird. That was too many lush words for me to process. Bubbles, kink, snuggle, bed.

“You feel it, right?” His mask slips for a second as he looks down at my floating legs. Maybe he’s considering the possibility that he’s alone in this. “I think we’ve got an interesting sizzle.”

I look at the word GIVE, written on his skin forever. He’s always so brave. I’m going to try to be more like him.

I put my hand under his chin to tip his face up for my inspection, and his mouth opens in surprise. I look at his lips and the porcelain sharpness of his teeth. His stubble feels like wet sand on my palm. Men: so animal, growing bristles and beards. It must be a lot of effort to disguise it.

I decide to give him what he craves so badly. It’s not exactly my well-kept secret. “Teddy, you’re so pretty it’s crazy.”

Instantly he replies, “You’re so pretty I need to buy a pencil sharpener.”

He looks at my mouth and his pupils dial out, ink black, and everything on the edges of this moment washes away. I think he’s going to kiss me. I’ve only just come out of romance retirement and I’m very inexperienced, but even I know that this is it.