A Whole New Crowd(44)

A helpless laugh came from me. “You mean beside this? What we just did?”
His hand curled around the back of my neck, and he moved me so I was looking up at him. Our eyes caught and held. He was somber. “This scares you?”
“What you can do to me scares me.” I was being honest. It was freeing. Then I frowned. I had never been this open with Brian.
“You mean this?” His hand dipped down and went between my legs again. He paused, his fingers right where I wanted them and he smiled. “Or this?” His other hand rested between my breasts. My pulse was racing, and my heart seemed to leap to meet his touch.
He felt it and his smile grew tender.
I swallowed. “Both. You’re real.” Real relationships. That’s what we had talked about. “That makes me want to shit my pants.”
His fingers teased me and slid back inside. Then he grew serious again. “This shouldn’t scare you.”
“Spoken from someone who knows his family, who’s had the same friends probably most his life, who never had to move from home to home.”
He frowned, but said, “Spoken like someone whose father is a disgrace to me.”
I sat upright. “You’ve never said much about your family.”
“Neither have you.”
“My family was Jace and Brian. I’m trying to move on from them.”
He touched my bottom lip, drawing my attention back to him. “What are you thinking?”
I hesitated, then said, “About letting you in.”
His eyes were so serious, but the corner of his mouth lifted in a slight grin. “I thought we were *s, and we were going to remain *s together?”
“Sometimes *s lie.” I felt like I couldn’t breathe. “And they aren’t *s to the ones they let in.”
His chest moved up and down beneath me. His hands rested on my hips, and I remained there. What the hell were we going to do? No. What the hell was I going to do?
“Yo!” A hard knock came to my door.
Tray cursed and ran a hand through his hair. “Great timing.” I grinned at the sarcasm, but couldn’t deny the relief that went through me. He tucked me against his chest and raised his voice, “What do you want, Dylan?”
“We’re going out to eat. You two want to come?”
Tray glanced at me. “You want to?”
I shook my head. “I’ve never been one for crowds.”
He laughed. “Who couldn’t like this new crowd?” Then he lifted me off him and placed me on the bed. The entire movement was gentle, so gentle that an unnerving emotion began to spread in me. I didn’t want to name it. It was too uncomfortable for me. He rose from the bed and pressed a kiss to my forehead, tucking some of my hair back at the same time. He whispered against them, “For what’s it worth, you affect me the same way, Matthews.”
My throat was thick as he left. Then I heard them go downstairs and drive away. “Fuck.”
*

Austin left to ear with them, and I didn’t want to sit alone with my emotions so I went swimming; fortunately our school’s pool had late hours. As I dove into the depths, I ducked my head down and swam.
I hadn’t thought about swimming in a long time, but when everyone left I needed to do something. I couldn’t steal anymore. I was good at swimming. The water absorbed me, taking me away from the world, until it was only me. It was me, the water, and my thoughts.
Lining my feet against the wall, I held myself there and stared at the end. The water rippled, as if daring me to go faster and plunge through it, and I was itching to answer its challenge. I felt the excitement building inside, and shoved off from the end. My arms were already circling when I ducked my head down and kicked out.
I started out limber, going slow to get into a good pace, but I knew what would happen. I would use every muscle in my body. My lungs would strain, stretching to their fullest capacity, before I turned and took a relieving breath. I would suck air in, and my head would go back down. Each kick would match each stroke and I would take myself to the end only to duck down and repeat the process.
This was the warmup when it was fun and freeing, but soon, I would hit a wall of fatigue. That’s when those muscles would protest. My lungs would scream for relief. Every cell in my body would want me to quit, but I wouldn’t. I never did. An hour later, then another thirty minutes after that, I kept going. I didn’t stop. I pushed through the pain until my mind screamed, ‘enough.’ It was then I went to the end of the lane and stopped. My fingers clutched the edge and I panted. I had reached the point where my brain stopped working. All thoughts had fled and the emotions had been cleared from me.