Hawk (A Stepbrother Romance #3)(15)

My heart was pounding when I came out of the bath house. I was so nervous I had to run right into the water. Only then did I see his reaction.

He looked at me like he'd never seen me before.

When he followed me into the water, the waves threw us together and I ended up all tangled with him. I can still smell the chlorine in his hair, and the strange way his skin felt under the water. We'd been swimming together dozens of times, but it was never like this. A lifeguard was watching us, so it made me nervous, but I put my arms around him and one time even my legs, and he grabbed me back, his hands placed awkwardly on my back like he didn't know where to put them, this look of constant surprise on his face.

I don't think we said anything the whole time we were in the pool, never more than a few feet apart. Sitting in the cafeteria that day, it was all I could think about. I looked at him and he was the same, but different. Same goofy grin, same compact, lithe body, but he went from a constant fixture in my life to the center of my attention. We spent half a minute just staring at each other while he ate that ice cream bar before he finally finished it and shifted on the bench.

"Uh, hi," he said.

I can't remember a time when Hawk was ever awkward around me. This was new.

"Hi," I said, slyly. Without quite knowing why, I flipped my hair over my shoulder. I had it down that day for some reason.

"So listen, after school…"

"Yeah?"

"I can't walk you home."

"Oh," I sighed.

"I was hoping we could go out later."

I perked up. A little voice in my head asked what, on a date? I didn't ask, I just thought it.

"Yeah. If you could dress up a little bit…"

"I can do that," I blurted out, excited. "I have a dress."

I had exactly one dress.

Hawk blinked. "Yeah, that's perfect."

He was staring at me and I was staring at him. I shifted a little and changed the subject.

"So this is it. School's over."

"Yeah," he sighed, sadly. "It is. You're all set for UD?"

"Yeah," I nodded, and brushed my hair back. "Hawk, I'm worried we're not going to see each other anymore."

He flinched and put down his burger and rested his hand on mine. His fingers curled around my palm. I squeezed his hand and he smiled softly.

"Why wouldn't we?"

I licked my lips. The freaking bell was about to ring. The lunch period was only twenty-two minutes. I didn't feel hungry anymore. My stomach was doing backflips and setting up tables and chairs for a butterfly convention. I pushed my tray away and sat back. Hawk's eyes flicked to my chest. I was just wearing a tank top, nothing special.

Oh my God, I thought. He looked at my boobs. He likes me!

Hawk turned away and I could see red in his cheeks. He started powering down his food and I laughed.

It reminded me of the way he stared at me at the water park. If he thought I wasn't paying close attention, he stared right at my chest. He wasn't fooling me, I knew the whole time and I used my arms to push them together while I was splashing around in the water. I was tempted to flash him but the lifeguards were watching me, too. I don't know if they were reading my mind, or just pervs. I guess it had to be one or the other. Maybe both. I know I can look mischievous.

Or I could then. Not so much anymore.

The bell rang and Hawk ate the rest of his lunch on the way to the trash, then came back and took my tray without asking. As I stood up, he leaned really close to me, like he was going to do something, then pulled back, like he second guessed himself.

It was almost like he was going to kiss me on the cheek.

It was loud as everyone threw their trash away and left.

"Around six?" he said.

"Yeah, can't wait!"

The rest of the day was torture. Classes that weren't classes. I sat there and played on my phone and waited for the economics teacher to yell at me to take my feet off my desk, but she never bothered. She was doing something on her computer the whole time and didn't care what we did. Not that it mattered, we all knew if we were graduating or not. Something about that bothered me. I always took school very seriously, even if the squishy subjects didn't interest me at all, but the way that last day went felt like we'd been marking time to whole time, like life up to that point was just marking off checkboxes on an invisible card.

When the ending bell finally rang, I bolted from my desk, hoping to pass Hawk in the hallway and maybe get him to walk me anyway, but I ended up trudging home alone, so sick with anticipation I thought I was going to barf out my own liver. By the time I got home, I was sweating like a pig and huffing as I walked up the steps behind the shoe store to our little apartment. Mom left me a note on the table, explaining there was cheesy beef in the freezer if I wanted to reheat it for myself and May.

May was going to eat double that night. She was finishing sixth grade, and wouldn't be home for an hour after I was. I was out of the shower by the time she got back, and plopped down in the living room. She had another two weeks of school.

"How was your day?"

"Fine," she sighed, and turned on the TV.

She missed Mom, and she still missed Dad. Sometimes, living in the same little apartment felt like dragging a big hook around in my chest. The same couch where Dad taught me to read, the same TV we used to watch while Mom worked at the restaurant on Saturdays, the same table where we used to all eat together. I was escaping soon, but I felt terrible about leaving May behind. It would be another four years, almost until I was out of college, until she could leave this place herself.